campaigns--worked with a will; but the English regiments, composed of lazy, careless, and ignorant recruits, whose officers were no better soldiers than their men, would not take the trouble to run up shelters or dig trenches to drain their camping-grounds. Fever soon broke out with appalling results. Out of the 14,000 troops assembled at Dundalk, 1700 died on the spot, 800 perished on the waggons in which the sick were carried to the coast, 3800 died in the hospitals of Belfast. The losses in the XVIIIth regiment are not known, but from Schomberg’s confidential report on the troops under his command it seems to have suffered less than other corps. Writing on October 23, 1689, the Marshal says: “Meath’s (18th Foot), best regiment of all the army, both as regards clothing and good order, and the officers generally good. The soldiers being all of this province, the campaign is not so hard on them as on others.” Early in November James gave up the attempt to entice Schomberg out of his entrenchments and went into winter quarters. The Marshal promptly followed his example, holding the country between Lough Erne and Belfast with a chain of fortified posts, and establishing his headquarters at Lisburn, where the XVIIIth was placed in charge of his personal safety. The staff of the regiment must have been hard-worked in the spring of 1690, for recruits streamed in so fast that in June it was nearly the strongest corps in the British army, standing on parade six hundred and seventy-eight officers and men. For several months there was constant skirmishing along the line of outposts; but no movements of importance took place until June, when William III. arrived at Carrickfergus with two hundred and eighty-four transports and many vessels laden with stores. Though this great mass of shipping was escorted by a ludicrously small squadron of only six men-of-war, it was not attacked on the voyage, for the French had neglected to send a fleet to cruise in the Irish seas, thus leaving the line of communication across St George’s Channel uninterrupted. When the reinforcements brought by the King had landed, the army in Ireland reached the respectable total of about 37,000 men, of whom 21,000 were British, and the remainder Huguenots, Dutch, and Danes--continental mercenaries whom William had imported to lend solidity to his recently raised English regiments.