LAND AND WATER 
SeptemLer 26, 191-4 
retirement upon the other ])ivoted upon the neigh- 
hourhoocl of Yerdun ; while the ^Vestern extremity of 
the Gennan line, where was massed the hirgcst hody 
of men (like the swelled end of a club), made straight 
lor Paris. 
Tliis tidal movement lasted ten days, from 
August 24th to September 2nd-3rd. At the end of 
it, in the early part of the fii-st week of September, 
from AVednesday, September 2nd (the anniversary of 
Sedan), to Friday, September 4th, tlie main Gennan 
mass in the west stood in touch with the fortifica- 
tions of Paris, and the complete success of the German 
phin seemed assured. 
This Avestcrn extremity of the German line where 
the largest single mass of troops was gathered imder 
the command of A'on Kluck (it is generally known as 
the 1st Gennan Army) was apparently about to attack 
the outer works of Paris. It had come south of Senlis 
and Creil, through the woods of Chantilly and Erme- 
nonville, and had come out upon the great open plain 
which stretches for a day's march to the north-east of 
the capital, within a mile or two of an extreme range 
from the forts. It had met the most extended 
batteries of the defence. 
At this moment, after the middle of the first week 
of September, ended the first phase. The invasion 
had pressed in a great bow south of Eevigny in the 
veiy woods of Argonne, south of Yitry, south of 
Sommesous, south of Sezanne — right up to this 
l)lain just north-east of Paris. Everything was 
ready for the final blow. 
Tlie immediate business of the Geimans was to 
lii-eak the Allied line where it sagged most, near Yitry, 
to drive half of it eastward against the Gennan armies 
in Lon-atne ; the other half of it beyond or into Paris — • 
the investment of which ca2:)ital Avould then have been 
undertaken. 
Just then it was discovered, probably by the ainnen 
of A"on Kluck's army, that the French commanders 
had accumulated, behind the screen of the Paris 
fortified zone, a very much larger reserve than the 
Germans had allowed for. For this had Joffre 
weakened his mainline, or rather refused to strengthen 
it as it fell back. On this secret hoard had the French 
relied for turning the tide. There Avas a moment's 
liesitation upon the part of Yon Kluck whether to 
retire from this menace by the way he had come or to 
march rapidly across the numerically inferior troops 
in front of him (before this French reserve could come 
up) and so to join and help the two great Gennan 
masses on his left, from Sezanne to "\^itr\-, in breaking 
the French central line. 
He decided for the latter and bolder course. 
With the end of that week, the 5th and 0th of 
September, he was undertaking this flank march. 
His boldness was disastrous to the whole German 
plan. The numerically inferior forces, along the face 
of Avhich he marched, included the British contingent, 
with the Gth French Army on its left, and upon 
its right the 5th French Army. These were the 
troops Yon Kluck had driven before him from Mons 
and Charicroi. Periiaps he thought them exhausted. 
Far from it, they immediately took the counter- 
offensive (backed by this Paris reserve coming up in 
gi;eater and greater numbers from beliind and from 
within the fortiiications of Paris), stopped the whole 
of the German movement, and began to assume the 
initiative. 
During all that week-end A'on Kluck fought 
desperately along the Oiircq to save his com- 
munications. He handled the matter so well that he 
cHicl save them, but he was compelled to a precipitate 
retreat, the British and the French 5th Ai-mv 
pressing him back over the Marne between 
Meaux and Chateau Thieny, while the French 
Cth Army, and its reinforcements from the reserve, 
crossed the Oiircq. The fighting in this quarter during 
all the week-end and the beginning of the next or 
second week of September, from Sunday, the Gth, to 
Wednesday, the 9th, was exceedingly heavy, and Avill 
be known to history as the Battle of ^leaux. 
It was not until Thursday, September 10th, that 
a true result was reached, and that Yon lOuck's 
genei'al retreat began. 
This retreat was handled so well that in the next 
two and a half days it had covered the whole distance 
to the river Aisne and the neighbourhood of Soissons, 
some of the Gennan regiments being compelled to 
marches of over twenty miles a day, and none to 
inarches of less than iifteen. Yon Kluck's retreat 
was not only rapid but was also so strongly conducted 
that his losses in prisoners and cajitured guns were, in 
comparison with his great numbers, insignificant. At 
the end of the Aveek, on Satiu'day, Sei^tember 12th, he 
was upon the Aisne and about to take up those 
defensive positions to the north of that river which 
had evidently been most carefully examined and 
chosen before the war broke out, and upon Avhich so 
desperate a resistance has been offered during the last 
ten days. 
Yon Kluck's retreat over these forty miles and 
more of country involved, of course, a coiTCsponding 
retreat u2:)on the j)art of the two great German masses 
lying successively to his left, between his own Anny 
and Yerdun ; and while he was taking up his defensive 
position upon the Aisne before Soissons //lej/ fell back 
through the Plain of Champagne until they were in 
line with him along the continuation of that defensive 
position ; which continuation runs north of Eheims 
and along the river Suippe to the forest of Argonne. 
By Sunday, September iuth, the whole mass of the 
German forces — much more than a million men— was 
standing at bay along the line marked ujion the general 
map at the head of this, which line extends from the 
Argonne, past Phcims and Soissons, to the river Oise 
at a point between Noyon and Com2)iegne. 
Thus ended the second phase of the Westei'n 
campaign^a general German retreat across the river 
Manie, pressed everywhere by the advancing Allies, 
])robably to be known in history as the Battle of the 
Marne. 
The third phase oj^ened upon Monday, 
September 14th, and is still in progress. It consists 
in a vast defensive action undertaken by the Germans 
all along this line of 80 miles and more which they 
occupy from the Oise to the Ai-gonne ; a chosen and 
prepared defensive position, which is among the 
strongest and the best in Western Em-ope. The 
nature of that position and of the action dependent 
upon it, the points in which it has been pressed back, 
the points upon which the Gennans have found it 
possible to advance, their chances of success and 
failure are the main object of our study in this week's 
notes, and must next bo described in detail. 
THE DEFENSIVE POSITION. 
The original defensive position taken up by the 
Gennans, when on Sunday, September 13th, they 
turned after their retreat to face their pursuers is here 
seen to run in a fairly even line east and west 
from the Forest of Argonne to the Oise River, 
along a line of heights varying in character from 
east to west. The main position is marked in a 
broken line. 
