hamlet is flanked on the south and in front by an outlying wood, the
Niederwald. Behind the Grosser Wald the ground sinks away to the valley
in which runs the Bitsch-Reichshofen railway. In front of MacMahon's
position lay the village of Wörth, deep in the valley of the Sauerbach.
The invader would therefore have to carry this village or cross the
stream, and press up the long open slopes on which were ranged the
French troops and batteries with all the advantages of cover and
elevation on their side. A poor general, having forces smaller than
those of his enemy, might hope to hold such a position. But there was
one great defect. Owing to de Failly's absence MacMahon had not enough
men to hold the whole of the position marked out by Nature for defence.

Conscious of its strength, the Prussian Crown Prince ordered the leaders
of his vanguard not to bring on a general engagement on August 6, when
the invading army had not at hand its full striking strength[38]. But
orders failed to hold in the ardour of the Germans under the attacks of
the French. Affairs of outposts along the Sauerbach early on that
morning brought on a serious fight, which up to noon went against the
invaders. At that time the Crown Prince galloped to the front, and
ordered an attack with all available forces. The fighting, hitherto
fierce but spasmodic between division and division, was now fed by a
steady stream of German reinforcements, until 87,000 of the invaders
sought to wrest from MacMahon the heights, with their woods and
villages, which he had but 54,000 to defend. The superiority of numbers
soon made itself felt. Pursuant to the Crown Prince's orders, parts of
two Bavarian corps began to work their way (but with one strangely long
interval of inaction) through the wood to the north of the French left
wing; on the Prussian 11th corps fell the severer task of winning their
way up the slopes south of Wörth, and thence up to the Niederwald and
Elsasshausen. When these woods were won, the 5th corps was to make its