fours. Of those that remained, some broke into the village wine
and beer shops and drank to stupefaction; while others, exhausted
by the efforts of the day, threw themselves down and slept.

Mike was away half an hour.

"I have got an officer's cloak for you, and a helmet with
feathers. I think he must have been a staff officer, who was
killed while delivering his orders. I have got a soldier's
overcoat and shako for myself."

"Capital, Mike! Now I think that we can venture, and we will go
the shortest way. We might very well lose ourselves among these
hills, if we were to try to make a circuit."

Having put the Dutch uniforms over their own, they set out, taking
the way to the left until they came to the main road by which the
British reserve had advanced. Then they mounted their horses.

"It is no use trying to make our way through the broken ground,
Mike. There is another road that goes through Huerne. We will
strike that, and must so get round on the right of the enemy. Even
if we come upon them, we are not likely to excite suspicion, as we
shall be on a road leading from Oudenarde.

"I was noticing that road from the height. It runs into this
again, near Mullen, and the enemy are not likely to have posted
themselves so near to the river."

They rode on through Huerne. The village was full of wounded. No