found the ford, and the Irish, seeing them approach the bank of the river fearlessly, concluded they were deserters and refrained from firing. After them plunged in sixty armored English grenadiers, led by Captain Sandys, a noted military dare-devil, and these were followed by the main body under Mackay, another experienced commander. The hour was six in the morning of June 30, and, after one of the bravest defences of which we have record, Athlone, through the infatuation of St. Ruth, was in English hands before noon on that eventful day. And so it came to pass, that after a conflict of more than a year, the defensive line of the Shannon was, at last, broken. It is estimated by most historians that Ginkel’s total loss amounted to 1,200 men and that of St. Ruth was somewhat greater, owing to the surprise. Among those killed in St. Ruth’s army were two colonels, named McGinness, Colonel MacMahon, Colonel O’Gara, Colonel Richard Grace, who fell in defence of the bridge on the 29th, and the French adjutant-general. Few officers of note fell on the English side. Ginkel, during the siege, “expended 50 tons of gunpowder, 12,000 cannon balls, 600 bombshells, and innumerable tons of stone, hurled from the mortars, when the shells were exhausted.” After the capture, the English found only a mass of ruins, and it took De Ginkel several days to put the place in some kind of repair. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ CHAPTER III The Irish Army Falls Back and Takes Post at Aughrim—Description of the Field—Disposition of the Irish Forces—Baal Dearg O’Donnell’s Apathy