general muster[b] of his forces, on the 26th of August, in the Pitchcroft,
the meadows between the city and the river. A few of the neighbouring
gentlemen with their tenants, not two hundred in number, obeyed the
call;[1] and it was found that the whole amount of his force did not
exceed twelve (or according to Cromwell, sixteen)[2] thousand men, of whom
one-sixth part only was composed of Englishmen. But while a few straggling
royalists thus stole into his quarters, as if it were to display by their
paucity the hopelessness of his cause, the daily arrival of hostile
reinforcements swelled the army in the neighbourhood to more than thirty
thousand men. At length Cromwell arrived,[c] and was received with
enthusiasm. The royalists had broken down an arch of the bridge over the
Severn at Upton; but a few soldiers passed on a beam in the night; the
breach was repaired, and Lambert crossed with ten thousand men to the right
bank. A succession of partial but obstinate actions alternately raised and
depressed the hopes of the two parties; the grand attempt was reserved by
the lord general for his

[Footnote 1: They were lord Talbot, son to the earl of Shrewsbury, "with
about sixty horse; Mr. Mervin Touchet, Sir John Packington, Sir Walter
Blount, Sir Ralph Clare, Mr. Ralph Sheldon, of Beoly, Mr. John Washbourn,
of Wichinford, with forty horse; Mr. Thomas Hornyhold, of Blackmore-park,
with forty horse; Mr. Thomas Acton, Mr. Robert Blount, of Kenswick, Mr.
Robert Wigmore, of Lucton, Mr. F. Knotsford, Mr. Peter Blount, and divers
others."--Boscobel, 10.]

[Footnote 2: Cary's Memorials, ii. 361.]

[Sidenote a: A.D. 1651. August 23.]
[Sidenote b: A.D. 1651. August 26.]
[Sidenote c: A.D. 1651. August 28.]