Ste. Euphraise,
Bligny, and Ville-en-Tardenois, whose rustic dwellings of uncut rubble,
arranged amphitheatre-wise, sheltered some 500 inhabitants. Higher up,
on the uneven surface of the plateau, are scattered villages built on
limestone foundations--tiny fortresses, like Rumigny and Champlat, the
scene of hard-fought battles. Almost the entire surface is covered with
forests of pine and oak and birch. These are the woods of Le Roi,
Courton, Pourcy, and Reims, where hand-to-hand fighting went on for more
than a fortnight, British, Italians, and French succeeding at first in
checking the enemy and then in forcing him back, in those titanic
combats. They were, in reality, genuine mountain battles; for the hills
reach a height of 265 metres, above the level of the plateau, while the
valleys are at least 100 metres deep; and the difficulties of the uneven
surface were greatly increased by the obstacles offered by forests,
vineyards, streams, and the villages, closely packed with stone houses,
which could easily be transformed into fortifications.

[Sidenote: The first great American battle.]

A deep, broad, swampy valley, traversed by an unfordable stream;
surmounted by steep slopes bristling with vineyards, orchards, villages,
and diversified by quarries; above, an entanglement of low hills,
ravines, and valleys, under a mantle of forest--such was the theatre of
operations in which the Americans won their first great victory. A more
difficult terrain could not be desired, or one better adapted to test
the valor of the victorious troops.

But when they had made themselves masters of this battlefield, the
Allies were by no means at the end of their labors; and the difficulties
of the ground to be traversed were still serious in the central portion
of the theatre of operations--the Orxois.

[Sidenote: The Orxois plateau--its soil and relief.]

[Sidenote: A varied landscape.]

The Orxois is a plateau extending north of the Marne to the Soissonnais,
at a mean height of 160 metres. But it is very far from being uniform.
Let us study the nature of its soil, and the relief, that we may
comprehend its aspects more thoroughly. The substratum of the plateau of
the Orxois is the layer of rock called "hard limestone" 30 to 40 metres
in thickness, so much of which is used for building material in the
towns and villages. This layer is almost horizontal, and if there were
nothing superimposed upon it, the plateau would be a practic