less hot on the French [fire of anthracite-coal VERSUS flame of dry
wood, which latter at last sinks ASHY!]--and ended in total defeat
of the French. The French Infantry by no means behaved as their
Cavalry had done. The GARDES FRANCAISES [fire burning ashy, after
seven hours of flaming], when Grammont ordered them up to take the
English in flank, would hardly come on at all, or stand one push.
They threw away their arms, and plunged into the River, like a
drove of swimmers; getting drowned in great numbers. So that their
comrades nicknamed them 'CANARDS DU MEIN (Ducks of the Mayn):'
and in English mess-rooms, there went afterwards a saying:
'The French had, in reality, Three Bridges; one of them NOT wooden,
and carpeted with blue cloth!' Such the wit of military mankind.

"... The English, it appears, did something by mere shouting.
Partial huzzas and counter-huzzas between the Infantries were going
on at one time, when Stair happened to gallop up: 'Stop that,' said
Stair; 'let us do it right. Silence; then, One and all, when I give
you signal!' And Stair, at the right moment, lifting his hat, there
burst out such a thunder-growl, edged with melodious ire in alt, as
quite seemed to strike a damp into the French, says my authority,
'and they never shouted more. ... Our ground in many parts was
under rye,' hedgeless fields of rye, chief grain-crop of that sandy
country. 'We had already wasted above 120,000 acres of it,' still
in the unripe state, so hungry were we, man and horse, 'since
crossing to Aschaffenburg;'--fighting for your Cause of Liberty, ye
benighted ones!

"King Friedrich's private accounts, deformed by ridicule, are, That
the Britannic Majesty, his respectable old Uncle, finding the
French there barring his way to breakfast, understood simply that