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Updated: May 16, 2025
The attack had failed, and even William saw that it was hopeless any more to hurl his troops against the shield-wall, but the manner in which the English irregulars had been induced to break their array led him to try by a feigned retreat to induce them to repeat their error.
The two armies advanced towards each other; and on the seventeenth of May joined battle at Czaslaw, where the Austrians at first gained a manifest advantage, and penetrated as far as the Prussian baggage; then the irregulars began to plunder so eagerly, that they neglected every other consideration.
Still, after all deductions, the greater loss of the defendants casts doubt, either upon their marksmanship or upon the prevalent theory that the effects of modern weapons are revolutionary. As a historical fact, a front attack upon intrenched men, even irregulars, has been a desperate business as far back, at least, as Bunker Hill and Fort Moultrie.
Another half hour and I should have been in the hands of the irregulars, who were skirmishing and burning, killing and plundering, as they followed the eastern side, the two armies being hotly engaged in the forests along the crest of the mountains above us around Ostrog.
Propitious heaven must sure a hero save Like Paris handsome, and like Hector brave! I have seen many regiments since, and many ferocious-looking men, but the Ahmednuggar Irregulars were more dreadful to the view than any set of ruffians on which I ever set eyes.
The rest of the loss was among the irregulars, 495 of whom took part in the engagement. By the operations described in the last chapter, the whole of the regions bordering on the Niles were cleared of hostile forces, dotted with military posts, and brought back to Egyptian authority. The Khalifa, however, still remained in Kordofan.
"It is a good job," said General Clavering, "that the rebels succeeded in getting away. If we had cut off their retreat we might have had some hard fighting. There is nothing nastier than tackling a rat in a corner. It is a much simpler business to cut up flying men. All beaten troops straggle and desert. Irregulars, operating in their own country, simply melt away after a defeat.
"Measured by this morning's work, Captain Forney, these irregulars of yours seem well able to give a good account of themselves," I ventured. He shook his head doubtfully. He was but a boy in years, but war is a shrewd schoolmaster, and this youth, like many another on the fighting frontier, had matriculated early. "You've seen us at our best," he amended.
No attack was made upon the rear-guard, though great numbers of Austrian hussars, and other irregulars, had appeared the evening before within cannon-shot of the Prussian camp.
Permission was given to us volunteers, and to divers light parties of irregulars, to open on any of the French of whom we might get glimpses, as little was expected from us in the charge. Nearly an hour was consumed in approaching the point of attack, owing to the difficulties of the ground, and the necessity of making frequent halts, in order to dress.
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