marching without opposition towards the French frontier--Von Kluck towards the south-west and Von Buelow towards the crossings of the Sambre. By the evening of the 20th, Von Buelow's guns were bombarding Namur. So much was known to the leaders of the Allies: of the strength of the advancing armies they knew little.

To oppose these two armies--for of the seven German armies already in position we shall consider only these two--the Allies were disposed as follows: Directly in the route of Von Buelow's army, should he pass Namur, lay the Fifth French Army, under General Lanrezac, with its left resting on the river Sambre at Charleroi, and its right in the fork of the Meuse and the Sambre. This army, it should be noted, made a junction in the river fork with another French Army, the Fourth, under General Ruffey, which lay off to the south along the Middle Meuse, watching the Ardennes. On the left of the Fifth French Army, along a line presently to be defined, lay the British Expeditionary Force, facing, as it seemed, with equal directness, the line of advance of the army of Von Kluck. Subsidiary to the Fifth French Army and the British Force were two formations, available for support: a cavalry corps of three divisions under General Sordet, stationed to the south of Maubeuge, and, out to the west, with its base at Arras, a corps of two reserve divisions under General D'Amade. Both these formations will be heard of during the subsequent operations, and it is important to remark that General D'Amade's two divisions were at this time, and throughout the first days of the fighting, the only considerable body of Allied troops in the eighty miles of territory between the British and the sea.

The line occupied by the British ran due east from the neighbourhood of Condé along the straight of the Condé-Mons Canal, round the loop which the canal makes north of Mons, and then, with a break, patrolled by cavalry, turned back at almost a right angle towards the southeast of the direction of the Mons-Beaumont road. The whole of the canal line, including the loop round Mons,--a front of nearly twenty miles,--was held by the Second Army Corps, and the First Army Corps lay off to its right, holding the southeastern line to a point about nine miles from Mons. There being no infantry reserves available in this small force, General Allenby's cavalry division was employed to act on the flank or in support of any threatened part of the line. The forward reconnaissance was entrusted to the Fifth Cavalry Brigade, assisted by some squadrons from General Allenby's division, and some of its detachments penetrated as far north as Soignies, nine miles on the way to Brussels. In the occasional encounters which took place with the enemy's Uhlans, to the north and east, our cavalry had always the best of it; then, as always in this war, when the opportunity has occurred, mounted or dismounted, they have proved themselves the better arm. Their reconnaissance was more than supplemented by four squadrons of the Royal Flying Corps under the direction of Major-General Sir David Henderson.

Throughout the Saturday our men entrenched themselves, the North-Countrymen among them finding in the chimney-stacks and slag-heaps of this mining district much to remind them of home. The line they held was clearly not an easy line to defend. No salient ever is, and a glance at the map will show that this was no common salient. To the sharp apex of Mons was added, as an aggravation, the loop of the canal. It was nevertheless the best line available, and, once adopted, had been occupied with that double view both to defence and to attack which a good commander has always before him. The first object, when an enemy of unknown strength attacks, is to hold him and gain time; the line of the canal supplies just the obstacle required; it was therefore held, in spite of the salient, and arrangements made for a withdrawal of the Second Corps should the salient become untenable. If, on the other hand, the enemy should be beaten back, the Second Corps, pivoting northeast on Mons, could cross the canal and move forward in line with the First Corps, already in position for such an advance. If, finally,--for a commander, like a good parent, must provide for everything,--a general retirement should become necessary, the British Commander-in-Chief had decided to rest his right flank on Maubeuge, twelve miles south of Mons: and here was his First Corps ready for it, clustered about the roads that lead towards Maubeuge, and able, from this advantage, to cover the retirement of the Second Corps, which had fewer facilities in this way, and would have farther to travel. Tactically the arrangements were as good as could be made.

When we come to the strength and direction of the enemy's attack, we are on more doubtful ground. His strength on the British front was estimated at the time, according to all the available information, both French and English, to be at most two army corps, with perhaps one cavalry division, which would have made an equal battle; and it was not unnaturally supposed that he would attack in the general direction of his advance; that is, from the northeast. From an attack in this strength and from this direction we had nothing to fear. As it turned out, however, both the estimate of strength and the supposition of direction were inaccurate. The enemy, making full use of the wooded country in these parts, which gave excellent concealment, and strong enough to throw his forces wide, was, as we shall see, engaged on something much more ambitious; a movement which, had it succeeded (as against any other troops it might well have succeeded), would have brought disaster on the whole Allied army.

At what hour precisely the Germans began their attack on the Mons position is uncertain. Some say at dawn, others just after noon. What is certain is that between 12 and 1 P.M. on Sunday the 23d, some of the men of the Royal West Kents, in support on the outskirts of Mons, were having a sing-song and watching the people home from church, and, feeling quite at their ease, had sent their shirts and socks out to wash, for all the world as if on manoeuvres. It is an interesting little scene, and one which would have seemed incomprehensible to the Germans, who by this time pictured our little army cowering in its positions. The abruptness with which the scene changed is no less characteristic. When it was reported that the enemy had turned up "at last" and that "A" company was hard-pressed at the canal, there was no more thought of sing-songs nor even of the dinner "which the orderlies had just gone to fetch"; socks and shirts appeared as if by miracle; and when the "fall-in" went, every man was there, equipped and ready for anything. It is an ordinary incident, and for that reason important; in any institution, whether it be an army or a household, it is the ordinary incidents that count. It is typical of the spirit of an army which has puzzled many even of its admirers by its strange combination of qualities: boyish ease and hilarity coupled with manly fortitude and discipline, and a most perfect and unassailable confidence in its weapons, its leaders, and itself.

The attack had most certainly begun; and it began, as was expected, at the weakest and most critical point of the line, the canal loop, which was held by the Third Division. This division had the heaviest share of the fighting throughout the day, maintaining, longer than seemed humanly possible, a hopeless position against hopeless odds, the Second Royal Irish and Fourth Middlesex of the Eighth Brigade, and the Fourth Royal Fusiliers of the Ninth Brigade, particularly distinguishing themselves. The bridges over the canal, which our men held, after some preliminary shelling, were attacked by infantry debouching from the low woods which at this point came down to within three hundred or four hundred yards of the canal.