The conquerors returned in triumph to their camp.  But Ginkell was not content with the advantage which he had gained.  He was bent on cutting off all communication between Limerick and the county of Clare.  In a few days, therefore, he again crossed the river at the head of several regiments, and attacked the fort which protected the Thomond Bridge.  In a short time the fort was stormed.  The soldiers who had garrisoned it fled in confusion to the city.  The Town Major, a French officer, who commanded at the Thomond Gate, afraid that the pursuers would enter with the fugitives, ordered that part of the bridge which was nearest to the city to be drawn up.  Many of the Irish went headlong into the stream and perished there.  Others cried for quarter, and held up handkerchiefs in token of submission.  But the conquerors were mad with rage; their cruelty could not be immediately restrained; and no prisoners were made till the heaps of corpses rose above the parapets.  The garrison of the fort had consisted of about eight hundred men.  Of these only a hundred and twenty escaped into Limerick.118

This disaster seemed likely to produce a general mutiny in the besieged city.  The Irish clamoured for the blood of the Town Major who had ordered the bridge to be drawn up in the face of their flying countrymen.  His superiors were forced to promise that he should be brought before a court martial.  Happily for him, he had received a mortal wound, in the act of closing the Thomond Gate, and was saved by a soldier’s death from the fury of the multitude.119 The cry for capitulation became so loud and importunate that the generals could not resist it.  D’Usson informed his government that the fight at the bridge had so effectually cowed the spirit of the garrison that it was impossible to continue the struggle.120 Some exception may perhaps be taken to the evidence of D’Usson; for undoubtedly he, like every Frenchman who had held any command in the Irish army, was weary of his banishment, and impatient to see Paris again.  But it is certain that even Sarsfield had lost heart.  Up to this time his voice had been for stubborn resistance.  He was now not only willing, but impatient to treat.121 It seemed to him that the city was doomed.  There was no hope of succour, domestic or foreign.  In every part of Ireland the Saxons had set their feet on the necks of the natives.  Sligo had fallen.  Even those wild islands which intercept the huge waves of the Atlantic from the bay of Galway had acknowledged the authority of William.  The men of Kerry, reputed the fiercest and most ungovernable part of the aboriginal population, had held out long, but had at length been routed, and chased to their woods and mountains.122 A French fleet, if a French fleet were now to arrive on the coast of Munster, would find the mouth of the Shannon guarded by English men of war.  The stock of provisions within Limerick was already running low.  If the siege were prolonged, the town would,