French twelve hundred thousand and Sir John French's army fighting
one against four. To make sure of saving Paris as the Germans
swung their mighty flanking column through Belgium, Joffre had to
draw in his lines. The Germans came over the hills as splendidly as
the French had gone. They struck in all directions toward Paris. In
Lorraine was their left flank, the Bavarians, meant to play the same
part to the east that von Kluck played to the west. We heard only of
von Kluck; nothing of this terrific struggle in Lorraine.

From the Plateau d'Amance you may see how far the Germans came
and what was their object. Between the fortresses of Epinal and of
Toul lies the Trouée de Mirecourt--the Gap of Mirecourt. It is said that
the French had purposely left it open when they were thinking of
fighting the Germans on their own frontier and not on that of Belgium.
They wanted the Germans to make their trial here--and wisely, for
with all the desperate and courageous efforts of the Bavarian and
Saxon armies they never got near the gap.

If they had forced it, however, with von Kluck swinging on the other
flank, they might have got around the French army. Such was the
dream of German strategy, whose realization was so boldly and
skilfully undertaken. The Germans counted on their immense force of
artillery, built for this war in the last two years and out-ranging the
French, to demoralize the French infantry. But the French infantry
called the big shells marmites (saucepans), and made a joke of them
and the death they spread as they tore up the fields in clouds of
earth.

Ah, it took more than artillery to beat back the best troops of France in
a country like this--a country of rolling hills and fenceless fields cut by