I overtook the main body of our Cavalry Division (i.e. the one attached to the immediately following Corps, with which I have for the present joined fortunes) near Tourteron—a village lying some seven miles north of the Aisne—late last night, and learnt that there was certain to be a sharp tussle next morning; for patrols reported large masses of French troops in the valley of the Aisne about Vouziers, and from a neighbouring hill we could see the reflection of their bivouac fires, while southward we heard the noise of trains passing constantly and at short intervals on the line from Rheims to Monthois.

At 3 A.M. the headquarter orders reached us, and at 4.30 we were on the move—pretty smart work, considering the number of hands through which orders had to pass. I followed the General’s staff, who had kindly given me permission to do so.

Our mission was evident, viz., to seize the high land beyond the Aisne, to cover the passage of the stream by our infantry.

On the way reports came in that a large body of French troops, at least a Corps, was moving to meet us by the same road, and it became evident that it was a race between us who could reach the long stretching downs of Vaux Champagne in our front first, and in sufficient strength to hold them. That our cavalry could be there in time was clear; indeed, our scouts were already far beyond it, but how to hold it was another matter, about which I should have liked information, but did not dare to ask for it.

We cantered forward, and drew up on the downs about 7.15. I found the situation very much like one I saw at the French manoeuvres last year near Lesmont, when infantry and artillery, both without scouts in advance, raced for a similar hill, and met at the top with results disastrous for the artillery.

The ground was exactly similar, and deserves a word or two of explanation. The downs of Vaux form, as it were, a T piece to a long central ridge. We were standing on the cross-head, and looking southward a corresponding transverse ridge limited our vision at 2500 to 3000 yards, and between the two lay two valleys trending east and west from the central neck, the slopes gentle and unbroken, with a slight convexity in cross section. If we were ten minutes too late the infantry would be in the hollows out of the line of sight of our batteries, and our fate would be a matter of minutes.

We had only three batteries on the spot, and where were the others? I did not know, and dared not ask, and as etiquette prevented my going in front of the General, I had not the consolation of studying his face; all I noticed was that he was smoking very quietly and reflectively. Northward, a mist lay over the river, and all the valley was still; the minutes seemed like hours. At length my ear caught the sound, so well known to me, of the roll of gun-carriages and clatter of harness, and out of the sea of mist below I suddenly saw the helmets and heads of the gunners arise, and then I knew that, confident in the reports of the cavalry, our General was going to try, and to succeed, in the same manoeuvre in which the French last year, without cavalry, had so conspicuously failed; for these new comers could only be the Corps Artillery, and with eighteen to twenty batteries in line on this height in time, I felt certain no infantry could hope to capture it. The enemy, however, was not far off, for isolated shots were now heard from the southward, and our cavalry videttes came in view, falling back before his advance.

Our guns were brought up behind the brow and unlimbered, but kept back below the sky-line, and every one was ordered under cover, where we waited for some ten minutes. Then suddenly the order was given to load and run forward by hand. I crept to the front and there saw extending half-way down the opposite slope the leading lines of a whole French Division deployed for action. A more perfect target it would have been impossible to devise. Next moment eighteen batteries at least were pouring their fire into this defenceless mass, and the further hillside became a scene of slaughter unequalled in the annals of warfare except, possibly, at Eylau.

The guns were all laid for the leading line, there was no question of ranging at all—for the distance was not more than 1200 yards—some of the French threw themselves down and attempted to reply, but in a few moments the smoke and dust from our bursting shells enveloped them, and their bullets began to fly higher. The following lines pressed on to the leading ones, thus making the target denser, and now the gunners changed from shrapnel to common shell, with high explosive bursters, and we saw limbs and trunks of men thrown high in the air above the dust-clouds, whilst even the screams of the wounded reached us above the din. It was ghastly beyond the power of description, and I dropped back to look the other way, and there saw the whole of our Cavalry Division trotting forward to reap the harvest the guns had sown.

They were at this moment in column of regiments, each regiment wheeled up by troops, and moving perpendicularly to the prolongation of the enemy’s line. I lost sight of them for a moment as I cut across the hill, and when I next saw them they had wheeled into line and were bearing down on the enemy obliquely across his front, so that six successive lines were available to ride down all resistance. The first two lines increased their squadron intervals, and opened their files to about half a horse’s length, and then, at about 500 yards from the enemy, the gallop was sounded. The outer sections of the French endeavoured to wheel up to meet them, but a last salvo from the two flank batteries with shrapnel seemed to tear them away, and the next instant the cavalry were on them. For a moment the line was a bit unsteadied, but its pace did not check. The French rose and fired after them, and many fell, but the second line, 300 yards in rear of the first, was on them, and then the third and fourth, and now I understood why the German cavalry carry lances. The first line kept up its pace to the end, and then rallied beyond it and came back through them again; the fifth, not yet engaged, trotted round and charged in from the front, and the sixth moved off up the hill to watch the flanks. The confusion now defied description, the French firing like lunatics in every direction, and the whole mass taking an uphill direction, thus masking the fire of the French guns, which had been in action within a few minutes of the commencement of our fire, and had replied pluckily to the guns on our side specially reserved to deal with them; but now, in the confusion, our lancers got amongst them and succeeded in destroying most of the teams. It was 8 A.M. when the first gun fired, it was 8.20 when the cavalry charged, and since then, perhaps, twenty minutes more had elapsed—a whole Infantry Division had been destroyed. But our position was by no means without cause for anxiety, nor could we hold the ground we had won; we knew French reinforcements were at hand, for we heard guns open on our cavalry beyond the hill, and these soon began falling back in disorder.

What would we not have given for a brigade of Bersaglieri or of French Chasseurs—I thought of one I had seen last autumn that marched nine kilometres in forty-five minutes, and wished we had it with us now.

Our leading companies were still a couple of miles away; heading more to the left, I moved along the ridge till I reached a point whence I could overlook what was going to happen.

About two miles to the south-east I saw a French brigade with six batteries of artillery, moving forward, formed for attack in their conventional manner. The guns came into action to the eastward, and almost at the same moment the Prussian divisional batteries also unlimbered, but the French found their range first, and so occupied the attention of the Germans that the infantry this time passed unscathed down the same slope which, on the other flank, had proved so disastrous to them. It was now evident, from the form of the ground, that the two infantries would butt up against each other at about two hundred yards, and victory would probably fall to the side which was quickest ‘on the drop,’ as the Americans say. Both sides were rapidly approaching one another, the Prussians still in line of company columns, the French in a dense line of skirmishers. Presently the former ‘front formed line,’ their drums began to beat, and the whole advanced in ‘parade march,’ dressed as on the passing line. Suddenly, and simultaneously, the French line dropped to the ground, the Prussians halted and came to the ready; for a moment they stood motionless. Then the French, finding, I suppose, that on the ground, they could not see, sprang to their feet, and that instant there was a glint of light along the line as the rifles came to the present, and the next second the scythe of death swept over the French, and they fell in swathes. But the Prussians began to fall too, and the French supports were closer at hand, and fed the fighting line more rapidly, but their fire was not equally in hand. I could hear the Prussian volleys and mark the course of each distinctly. For five minutes the struggle raged—the roar of musketry was deafening—but above it I again caught the beat of the drum, and saw the second Prussian line advancing. When it was almost close on the first, the shrill whistles sounded, the fire partially ceased, and, headed by their officers, the whole sprang forward with a rush. But the French did not give; their reserves, too, were close at hand in company columns; the fighting line rallied on these, and all dashed forward together. But no bayonet encounter followed. Both sides halted at about thirty paces, and again the magazine fire blazed out, telling on the French clumps much more rapidly than it did on the Prussian line—for a single bullet pierced ten or a dozen bodies. Then presently the French masses became ragged towards the rear—they bagged outwards like sacks, and began to move with increasing speed down the hill, and at this moment two squadrons of divisional cavalry, who had slipped out between the guns and the infantry, swept down on them from flank to flank.

They probably did not do much damage, but they separated the infantries—and a number of French batteries now appeared on the further hill, and compelled the Prussians to fall back also.

The artillery duel now began again—but lasted only a short time, for the French evidently only meant to break off the fight, and as soon as the wreck of the infantry were in safety, the firing ceased, and the guns withdrew.

The Germans were in no condition for immediate pursuit. They had to wait for the remainder of the corps to close up, and to rally the cavalry.

It was now about 11.30—and to the eastward on the high ground overlooking the Aisne about Vouziers we could see the flashes of a long line of guns, and in the plain below dark masses of troops.

About four we moved forward, and about six bivouacked near a place called Dricourt, whence I write this. I learn that our scouts discovered a whole Corps moving down on our flank this morning from St. Remy, but about 10 A.M., hearing presumably of the result of the action at Vaux, they bent off southward, and are evidently now on our front. It appears the French Corps we fought to-day came on with one division deployed for action on its left, a brigade in echelon on the right. The corps artillery between the two and the remaining brigade in reserve. Where the cavalry was we do not know.

Another French corps was defeated about Vouziers. So we have the wreck of two Corps, and the whole of one for certain, in our front for to-morrow, for our outposts are in contact along the whole line. How many more we may find I cannot tell, but we are two days clear ahead of their calculated mobilisation, and these two days’ fighting must have seriously deranged their plans.

The men are rather sober; they have seen death for the first time, and the slaughter caused by our new shells is most horrible to look at. Besides, only few of them were engaged in the actual fighting line, and the remainder do not yet know from experience the intensity of the passion for blood which seizes them when once they have taken active part in the slaying.

It has been a wise measure to let the massed bands play to-night, and I have never experienced anything more moving than the sound of the last great hymn, sung by all the men, with which the ‘Zapfenstreich’ winds up.