and, while on the march, the Duke received the satisfactory news that Lottum had captured the lines without difficulty. Next day the whole of Marlborough’s army was camped along the Lys between Menin and Commines, within the actual territory of France. Detached columns were at once sent out to forage and levy contributions. The suburbs of Arras were burnt, and no effort was spared to bring home to the French that war was hammering at their own gates. But the Allies were still doubtful as to the operations that they should next undertake. So long as the French held Bruges and Ghent they held also the navigation of the Scheldt and Lys, so that it was of vital importance to tempt Vendôme, if possible, to evacuate those towns. The British Government was preparing a force[49] under General Erle for a descent upon Normandy by sea, and Marlborough was for co-operating with this expedition, masking the fortress of Lille, and penetrating straight into France—a plan which the reader should, if possible, bear in mind. But the proposal was too adventurous to meet with the approval of the Dutch, and was judged impracticable even by Eugene unless Lille were first captured as a place of arms. Ultimately it was decided, notwithstanding the closing of the Scheldt and Lys, to undertake the siege of Lille; and all the energies of the Allies were turned to the collection of sixteen thousand horses to haul the siege-train overland from Brussels. During the enforced inaction of the army for the next few weeks, the monotony was broken only by the arrival of a distinguished visitor, Augustus the Strong, Elector of Saxony and King of Poland, together with one of his three hundred and sixty-four bastards, a little boy of twelve named Maurice, who had run away from school to join the army. We shall meet with this boy again as a man of fifty, under the name of Marshal Saxe, at a village some twenty miles distant called Fontenoy. At length the preparations for the siege were complete, and the huge convoy set out from Brussels for its long march. Now, if ever, was the time for the French to strike a blow. Vendôme in the north at Ghent and Berwick in the south at Douay had, between them, one hundred and ten thousand men: the distance to be traversed by the convoy was seventy-five miles, and the way was barred by the Dender and the Scheldt. Such, however, was the skill with which the march was conducted that the French never succeeded even in threatening the vast, unwieldy columns, which duly reached their destination without the loss even of a single waggon. ◆Aug. 1/12.◆ Of all the achievements of Marlborough and Eugene, this seems to have been judged by contemporary military men to be the greatest.[50]