136 GENERAL BOURBAKI’S CAMPAIGN. 
merely a fortuitous arrangement of circumstances, because Von Werder 
himself, without any communication with the head-quarter staff, did 
precisely what the head-quarter staff suggested that he should do, and 
all that was necessary when he got his final orders was just to continue 
the arrangements that he had already prepared. The orders were that 
he was to fall back to some strong position west of the fortress of Bel- 
fort, and that he was not to raise the siege of this fortress. With an 
excitable population,—as some officers who were there at the time and 
are now in this room could say better than I can,—with such a popu- 
lation as the French strung to an extraordinary pitch of nervous tension, 
and very properly strung to such a pitch and displaying the most 
enthusiastic devotion to their country, which will redeem many of the 
faults of the French character for ages,—standing out to the last piece 
of bread or the last rat in Paris, and suffering no end of hardships 
willingly if they could only deliver their country,—I say, among a 
population excited to a degree, the raising of the siege of Belfort would 
have produced a tremendous moral effect. Accordingly Von Werder 
was ordered not to raise the siege of Belfort under any circumstances 
whatever, but to stay there, and at the same time he was informed 
definitely that No. VII. and No. II. would come to his aid, and that 
calculating distances, and the time of the year, the bad weather and the 
mountain district through which they had to pass, they might reach him 
some time about the 19th of January. By this map! you will see now 
No. II. and No. VII. going into the passes of Cote d’Or by three places 
between Langres and Dijon, that is 40 miles. They could not pass by 
Langres, it was occupied by the French ; they could not pass by Dijon, 
it was occupied by Garibaldi; but they slidin between the two by three 
passes, all marked on the map, Longueau, Pranthoy and Selongcy, 
between Langres and Dijon. 
A recent military critic says that no finer episode in military history 
can be found than the manner in which Von Werder acted, between 
two fortresses—Belfort and Besangon—50 miles apart. I will not 
go into details, roughly he moved from Vesoul to Villersexel, and then 
took up a position from Delle to Montbeliard and thence to Frahier. 
When Von Werder got with the XIV. to the Lisaine, he was to stand on 
the river till relieved by VII. and II. Meanwhile Bourbaki would 
probably attack him, but Bourbaki moved in exactly the manner in 
which it was suggested he should not move. It was suggested that he 
should expand and move by several roads north of the Doubs and north- 
west of the Doubs and south-east of the Doubs. It was suggested that he 
should march in as broad a front as possible and hem in Von Werder on 
all sides. In point of fact four of his corps came into the limited district 
between the Ognon and the Doubs, a country full of defiles, as is to be 
seen from this map, with plenty of woods and hills and dales and the 
weather being severe in the extreme rendered logistics still more difficult. 
From the very first evil followed Bourbaki. As Freycinet, p. 228, says: 
«The campaign of the east therefore was opened under the most deplor- 
able auspices,” ‘The first thing that went wrong was the railway 
1 The lecture was illustrated by several large maps. 
