These orders were what we know them to be: he was to march southward and westward and strike the Lys at Wervicq. He was to arrive at that point at or before nightfall, for in the very first hours of the morrow, Saturday, and coincidently with the beginning of the advance of the five columns from their southern posts, he was to cross the Lys and to proceed to join hands with those columns in the following forenoon, when the heads of them would have reached the neighbourhood of Tourcoing and Mouveaux. Bussche, with the first column, his 4000 Hanoverians, had no task during that day but to proceed the mile and a half which separated Warcoing from the little village of St Leger, and, with the head of his column in that village, prepare to pass the night and be ready to march forward long before dawn the next day. Field-Marshal Otto, with the second column, was similarly and leisurely occupied marshalling his 10,000 Austrians and his contingent of British cavalry, so that the head of his column was at Bailleul ready also to advance with the early, dark, small hours of the ensuing morning. The Duke of York, with his third column of similar numbers, or somewhat less, was performing a precisely similar task, and ordering his men so that the head of that column should reach Templeuve by evening and be ready to march at the same moment as the others did, shortly after midnight. All these three, then, were absolutely ready, fresh from fatigue and in good order, upon that Friday evening at their appointed posts. It is here necessary, as we are chiefly concerned with the British forces, to detail the composition of this third column which the Duke of York commanded. It consisted of twelve battalions and ten squadrons, with a further reserve of sixteen British squadrons under General Erskine, which cavalry lay somewhat south of Templeuve, but ready to follow up the advance when it should begin. It was made of two portions, about equal in numbers, British and foreign. The foreign half was composed of four squadrons of Austrian Hussars and seven battalions of infantry, two Hessian and five Austrian. The British half was composed of a Brigade of Guards counting four battalions, with portions of the 14th, 37th, and 53rd Foot, while the British cavalry accompanying it (apart from the squadrons under Erskine) were six squadrons drawn from the 7th, 15th, and 16th Light Dragoons. It is to the credit of the young commander[4] that this third column was the best organised, the most prompt, and, as the event proved, the most successful during the advance and the most tenacious in the subsequent defeat.