eady to sacrifice to
the higher claims of the safety of France. Their roles were thus
curiously reversed. The Emperor reasoned as a sound patriot and a good
strategist. MacMahon must have felt the same promptings, but obedience
to the Empress and the Ministry, or chivalrous regard for Bazaine,
overcame his scruples. He decided to plod on towards the Meuse.

The Germans were now on the alert to entrap this army that exposed its
flank in a long line of march near to the Belgian frontier. Their
ubiquitous horsemen captured French despatches which showed them the
intended moves in MacMahon's desperate game; Moltke hurried up every
available division; and the elder of the two Alvenslebens had the honour
of surprising de Failly's corps amidst the woods of the Ardennes near
Beaumont, as they were in the midst of a meal. The French rallied and
offered a brisk defence, but finally fell back in confusion northwards
on Mouzon, with the loss of 2000 prisoners and 42 guns (August 30).

This mishap, the lack of provisions, and the fatigue and demoralisation
of his troops, caused MacMahon on the 31st to fall back on Sedan, a
little town in the valley of the Meuse. It is surrounded by ramparts
planned by the great Vauban, but, being commanded by wooded heights, it
no longer has the importance that it possessed before the age of
long-range guns of precision. The chief strength of the position for
defence lay in the deep loop of the river below the town, the dense
Garenne Wood to the north-east, and the hollow formed by the Givonne
brook on the east, with the important village of Bazeilles. It is
therefore not surprising that von Moltke, on seeing the French forces
concentrating in this hollow, remarked to von Blumenthal, Chief of the
Staff: "Now we have them in a trap; to-morrow we must cross over the
Meuse early in the morning."

The Emperor and MacMahon seem even then, on the afternoon of the 31st,
to have hoped to give their weary troops a brief rest, supply them with
provisions and stores from the fortress, and on the morrow, or the 2nd,
make their escape by way of Mezieres. Possibly they might have done so
on that night, and certainly they could have reached the Belgian
frontier, only some six miles distant, and there laid down their arms to
the Belgian troops whom the resourceful Bismarck had set on the _qui
vive._ To remain quiet even for a day in Sedan was to court disaster;
yet passivity characterised the French headquarters