en, should have been across the Marque before dawn, should have pushed
back the French forces outside Lille, and should, long before noon, have
been covering those fields between Roubaix and Lille with their advancing
squadrons and battalions. There was no sign of them. If, or when, the
French body near Lille were free to advance and attack the Duke of York's
left flank, there was no one between to prevent their doing so. That great
body of the third and fourth columns, more than half of all the men who
were advancing from the Scheldt to meet Clerfayt, had failed to come up to
time. That was why the Duke of York desired to push no further than
Roubaix, and even to leave only an advance guard to hold that place while
he withdrew the bulk of his command to Lannoy.

But his decision was overruled. The Emperor and his staff, who, following
up the march of this third column, were now at Templeuve, thought it
imperative that Mouveaux should be held. Only thus, in their judgment,
could the junction with Clerfayt (who, though late, must surely be now
near at hand) be accomplished. And certainly, unless Mouveaux were held,
Otto could not hold his advanced position at Tourcoing. The order was
therefore sent to York to take Mouveaux. In the disastrous issue that
order has naturally come in for sharp blame; but it must be remembered
that much of the plan was already successfully accomplished, that Clerfayt
was thought to be across the Lys, and that if the French around Courtrai,
and hitherward from Courtrai to Tourcoing, were to be cut off, it was
imperative to effect the junction with Clerfayt without delay. Had
Clerfayt been, as he should have been at that hour in the afternoon of
Saturday the 17th, between the Lys and the line Mouveaux-Tourcoing, the
order given by the Austrian staff to the Duke of York would not only have
been approved by the military opinion of posterity, but any other order
would have been thought a proof of indecision and bad judgment.

Upon receiving this order to take Mouveaux, York obeyed. The afternoon was
now far advanced, very heavy work had been done, a forward march of nearly
six miles had been undertaken, accompanied by continual
fighting--latterly, outside Roubaix, of a heavy sort. But if Mouveaux was
to be held before nightfall, an immediate attack must be made, and York
ordered his men forward.

Mouveaux stands upon one of those very slight crests which barely
diversify the flat country in which