There were five successive lines of permanent French trenches, each with
its entanglement of barbed wire, supported on iron posts. German pioneers
cut their way through the first entanglement before the general attack,
but it was necessary for the others to make the advance across the
exposed positions under fire.
These attackers, however, were General Von Kluck's veterans, who, after
the famous dash on Paris, the battle of the Marne and the retirement to
the Aisne, had remained in comparative inactivity since the middle of
September.
They succeeded in sweeping across the plateau, first in the center and
then on the eastern flank, carrying trench after trench by storm in an
interrupted and irresistible attack.
The French retired from the plateau. Then they gave up the valley below
and retreated across the river. The Germans advanced through the valley.
The narrow turnpikes had become great cemeteries. Four thousand German
troops, engaged in the work of burying the dead as fast as they fell, had
been unable to clear the field of even their own dead after eight days,
while the field was strewn with the bodies of French infantrymen, in
their far-to-be-seen red-and-blue uniforms, swarthy-faced Turcos,
colonials, Alpine riflemen and bearded territorials.
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