termined all that was to follow.

While the fate of Landrecies still hung in the balance, and before the
surrender of the town, Pichegru had, in another part of the long line,
scored one of those successes which in any game or struggle are worse than
losing a trick or suffering a defeat. It was one of those successes in
which one gets the better of one's opponent in one chance part of the
general contest, but so triumphs without a set plan, with no calculation
upon what should follow upon the achievement, and therefore with every
prospect of finding oneself in a worse posture after it than before.

To take an analogy from chess: Pichegru's error, which I will presently
describe, might be compared to the action of a player who, taking a castle
of his opponent's with his queen, thereby leaves his king unguarded and
open to check-mate.

Wherever men are opposed one to the other in lines, each line having the
mission to advance against the other, it is a fatal move to get what
footballers call "'fore side": to let a portion of your forces advance too
far from the general line held by the whole, and to have the advanced part
of that portion thus isolated from the support of its fellows. Such a
formation invites a concentration of your opponents against the isolated
body, and may lead to its destruction.

It was precisely in this position that Pichegru placed a portion of his
forces by the ill-advised advance he made down the valley of the Lys to
Courtrai.

Taking advantage of the way in which the main forces of the allies were
tied to the siege of Landrecies, the French commander wisely moved forward
the whole of his forces to the north and west, pushing the enemy back
before him to the line Ypres-Menin, and besieging Menin itself. But most
unwisely he not only permitted to advance, but himself directed and led, a
body of 30,000 men (the command of General Souham) far forward of this
general movement: he actually carried it on as far as the town of
Courtrai.

The accompanying sketch map shows how much too far advanced this wedge
of men (so large a contingent to imperil by isolation!) was beyond the
general line, and, to repeat the phrase I have just used, a metaphor which
best expresses my meaning, Souham and his division, by Pichegru's direct
orders, had got "'fore side."

[Illustration]

The only excuse that can be pleaded for Pichegru's folly in this matter,
was the temptation presented by the weak garrison o