h corps train had blocked
the road at Chene, thus cutting off that of the 7th. On the other hand,
an important part of the _materiel_, all the forges of the artillery,
had mistaken their road and strayed off in the direction of Terron; they
were now trying to find their way back by the Vouziers road, where they
were certain to fall into the hands of the Germans. Never was there such
utter confusion, never was anxiety so intense.

A feeling of bitterest discouragement took possession of the troops.
Many of them in their despair would have preferred to seat themselves on
their knapsacks, in the midst of that sodden, wind-swept plain, and wait
for death to come to them. They reviled their leaders and loaded them
with insult: ah! famous leaders, they; brainless boobies, undoing at
night what they had done in the morning, idling and loafing when there
was no enemy in sight, and taking to their heels as soon as he showed
his face! Each minute added to the demoralization that was already rife,
making of that army a rabble, without faith or hope, without discipline,
a herd that their chiefs were conducting to the shambles by ways of
which they themselves were ignorant. Down in the direction of Vouziers
the sound of musketry was heard; shots were being exchanged between the
rear-guard of the 7th corps and the German skirmishers; and now every
eye was turned upon the valley of the Aisne, where volumes of dense
black smoke were whirling upward toward the sky from which the clouds
had suddenly been swept away; they all knew it was the village of
Falaise burning, fired by the uhlans. Every man felt his blood boil in
his veins; so the Prussians were there at last; they had sat and waited
two days for them to come up, and then had turned and fled. The most
ignorant among the men had felt their cheeks tingle for very shame as,
in their dull way, they recognized the idiocy that had prompted that
enormous blunder, that imbecile delay, that trap into which they had
walked blindfolded; the light cavalry of the IVth army feinting in front
of Bordas' brigade and halting and neutralizing, one by one, the several
corps of the army of Chalons, solely to give the Crown Prince time to
hasten up with the IIId army. And now, thanks to the marshal's complete
and astounding ignorance as to the identity of the troops he had before
him, the junction was accomplished, and the 5th and 7th corps were to
be roughly handled, with the constant menace of disas