As the sunbeams gained more power, I saw that the open slopes of the opposite ridge, more than a mile and a half away, were covered with little groups of horsemen, moving steadily forward, and apparently pressing back our scouts. Even the isolated squadrons to the front began to give back at a walk, when by the corner of a wood on the sky-line, a sudden appearance of dark groups of men and horses, with white electric-looking flashes, betokened the advent of a battery. The explosion of the first shells awakes our cavalry brigade to action. A couple of batteries disengage themselves from the mass of horsemen in rear, and from a knoll to the left of the village our guns are soon replying to the enemy’s challenge. Shrilly the trumpets sound. The dragoons mount, and with jingling scabbards and tossing plumes trot away to where a deep fold in the ground affords them better cover. This movement is not unobserved by the German scouts; I can see them racing back over the hill, and in a few moments, it seems, a dark mass of horsemen appears against the northern horizon, the serried lances standing out clearly against the cloudless sky. Again the shrill blast of the trumpet, and our eighteen hundred dragoons are moving out to meet the foe. With a rush and rattle the rear regiments take ground to either flank, and the long sabres flash from their scabbards. The hussars are retiring rapidly, away to the left of the guns, and the field is left clear for the shock of the opposing masses. My blood tingles with excitement. The sun glints bravely on the brass helmets of the Frenchmen; the dark blue mass a mile away is gathering pace like the mighty breaker of a stormy sea. The lances drop as if by magic, the long line changes its direction, and then wheels inward. I can see the officers turning in their saddles, far in front of their squadrons, signalling with gleaming swords; a hundred seconds will bring them together, when suddenly, to my horror and disappointment, the French slacken speed, and, before I can realise the fact, have turned rein and are riding past the village as if for their lives. Squadrons to the right, squadrons to the left, and a troop or so clattering madly down the ill-paved street. Far above the crash of iron hoofs and the rush of flying squadrons I can hear the hoarse cry of triumph of the foe. Down they come, heads and lances low, racing in pursuit. A last salvo, which sends a score of horses stumbling in their tracks, breaks for a moment the symmetry of that magnificent line, and hurls an officer helpless beneath the thundering hoofs, and our batteries have limbered up and dash frantically, with gunners plying whip and spur, across the plain.

They are lost, they are lost, so fast follows the foe, riding in furious haste to gather the trophies of the fight. A great cloud of dust rises before them, but I can see the faces of the men as the squadrons diverge to pass the village, and note the laughter and the shouts of those fair-haired troopers with the scales upon their shoulders. Suddenly the leader, riding like Scarlett at Balaclava, twenty lengths in front, leans back in his stirrups, checks his charger in his headlong career, and throws his hand high above his head. The trumpeter beside him raises the trumpet to his lips, but ere the notes ring out they are drowned in a loud roar of musketry. I had forgotten the Chasseurs in the orchards; the Germans had never suspected their presence. The surprise is complete; the disaster overwhelming. Magazine after magazine is unloaded, and thousands of bullets find an easy target in the seething, struggling mass, just now advancing so magnificently in all the pride of order and victory. Round the village the scene is indescribable. The slaughter is terrible, and in a few moments the squadrons that had passed unscathed on either side come flying back in the utmost disorder, pursued on one side by dragoons, on the other by hussars. The valley is covered to right and left with a dense crowd of horsemen, galloping in all the excitement of the flight and the pursuit, whilst the German batteries on the bridge pour shell after shell into the surging crowd, regardless whether their mark is friend or foe. I have little time to reflect on the skill with which the trap had been set and baited. My friend the Commandant calls me from my eyrie, and before I had time even to note the trace of the stirring events I had seen passing before me, the Chasseurs are retreating from the village at a pace which puts my Rosinante to the trot. Very soon we hear the jingle of the cavalry in rear. The dragoons are retiring also, and as I look back across the valley I can see the long screen of scouts falling back slowly across the valley, so still and peaceful but an hour agone, and now strewn with the awful dÉbris of the conflict. Such was the first phase of the battle of the 29th of June. ‘C’est un apÉritif,’ remarks the Commandant.