The Duke thereupon made his plans for protecting a line of from seventy-five to ninety-five miles of river with a force of thirty thousand soldiers of all ranks, the sick list having by this time claimed close upon seven thousand men of his army. His right from the Bommeler Waert to Grave was held by about five thousand Hessians, their main body being stationed at Alfen, a little to the east of the island; Grave was held by two Dutch battalions; east of Grave four brigades of infantry and two of cavalry lay about Mook; Abercromby, with two more brigades of infantry and one of cavalry, stood higher up the river at Gennep; and six thousand Hanoverians under Walmoden prolonged the line from Gennep to Venloo, with their main body at Well. Craig, however, did not deceive himself as to the inevitable issue, being firmly convinced that there was an understanding between the Austrians and French; wherein he appears to have been correct.[279] “We shall have to fall back behind the Waal,” he wrote; “depend on it, this will happen in a few days ... and in a fortnight the Austrians will be behind the Rhine.” Jourdan followed up the Austrians, leaving Kléber to invest Maastricht; whereupon Clerfaye, who had sixty thousand men behind the Roer, forthwith called loudly on the Duke of York to relieve that fortress. Grenville at the Foreign Office, anticipating something of the kind, had already despatched urgent representations to Vienna requiring the concurrence of the Austrians in this operation, but of course to no purpose. The Duke, by advice of Abercromby and Walmoden, sent Craig to stir up Clerfaye, and, that the Austrians might have no pretext for complaint, moved sixteen thousand men at great risk towards Venloo. ◆Oct. 2.◆ But all was perfectly useless, for Clerfaye declined to budge. An attack of the French on his position on the 2nd of October gave him the excuse that he wanted; and he immediately retreated across the Rhine.[280] ◆Sept. 22.◆