HEPBURN'S veterans remained in garrison at Mentz, recruiting in vigour and in numbers, until the beginning of March, 1632, when they proceeded to Frankfort on the Maine, and, advancing from thence to Aschaffenberg, were reviewed in the fields before the town on the 6th of March, by the King of Sweden. From Aschaffenberg the brigade continued its march to Weinsheim, where it was reviewed by the Elector Palatine, who complimented this distinguished body of Scots on the high character it had acquired for deeds of valour. After this review the brigade advanced with the army to invade Bavaria, and on the 26th of March it appeared before _Donawerth_ on the Danube, when the King posted part of the troops on the heights above the town. On the following day, a battery having been constructed to command the bridge, the enemy made a furious sally, and, having driven back some Swedish troops, captured the guns; but a number of HEPBURN'S veterans rushing forward sword in hand, the Bavarians were repulsed and driven back into the town. During the night, Sir John Hepburn marched his brigade with great silence five miles up the Wernitz, and having crossed the river, returned by the opposite bank to an angle which commanded the bridge over the Danube, where he posted his musketeers behind garden-walls and hedges, and formed the pikemen into three bodies under the cover of the enclosures. At day-break the enemy's garrison attempted to force its way through the besieging army; eight hundred musketeers rushed suddenly out of the town towards the bridge where HEPBURN'S men were posted, when the Scots musketeers opened a destructive fire, and before the smoke had cleared away, the pikemen came cheering forward to the charge, while the musketeers drew their swords and joined in the attack, and the enemy's column was broken and cut to pieces. Many of the Bavarians fled towards the town; HEPBURN'S veterans, following in full career, entered the town with the fugitives, and made great slaughter in the streets. Meanwhile, the enemy's troops, which sallied on the other side of the town, were also nearly all destroyed. The governor escaped, but he saved only a small portion of his garrison. Thus Donawerth was captured in forty-eight hours after the army appeared before the town; and in this exploit the gallant veterans under Sir John Hepburn acquired new laurels.[30] This success enabled the King to penetrate into Bavaria; and in the early part of April HEPBURN'S BRIGADE took part in the brilliant enterprise of forcing the passage of the river _Lech_ in the face of a superior army, and the success which attended this daring exploit alarmed one half of Europe, and astonished the other.