in German guns and German gunnery was not ill-founded. This was
the first of the open-air siege conflicts, and the French army had no
guns which could be used against the German heavy artillery. Hence it
followed that the brilliant work of the Sixth French Army on this first
day of the battles of the Marne achieved no important result, for the
long-range hidden howitzers, manned by expert German gunners and well
supplied with ammunition, defied all attempts at crossing the little
stream of the Ourcq.

This first day's fighting on the Marne revealed one of France's chiefest
needs--heavy artillery. The French light quick-firing gun was a deadly
weapon, but France had neglected the one department of artillery in
which the Germans had been most successful--the use of powerful motor
traction to move big guns without slackening the march of an army.
General von Kluck's artillery was impregnable to the French. Indeed, the
Germans could not be dislodged from the Ourcq until the British
Expeditionary Force sent up some heavy field batteries. It was then too
late for the withdrawal from the Ourcq to be of any serious consequence
in determining the result along the battle front.

The afternoon of that day, when the Zouaves were driving the Germans
across the Ourcq with the bayonet and were themselves effectually
stopped by the German wall of artillery fire, General Joffre and Sir
John French met. At last the British commander received the welcome news
from the generalissimo that retreat was over and advance was about to be
begun.

"I met the French commander in chief at his request," runs the official
dispatch, "and he informed me of his intention to take the offensive
forthwith by wheeling up the left flank of the Sixth Army, pivoting on
the Marne, and directing it to move on the Ourcq; cross and attack the
flank of the First German Army, which was then moving in a southeasterly
direction east of that river.

"He requested me to effect a change of front to my right--my left
resting on the Marne and my right on the Fifth Army--to fill the gap
between that army and the Sixth. I was then to advance against the enemy
on my front and join in the general offensive movement. German troops,
which were observed moving southeast up the left bank of the Ourcq on
the Fourth, were now reported to be halted and facing that river. Heads
of the enemy's columns were seen crossing at Changis, La Ferte, Nogent,
Chateau-Thierry, and Mezy.

"Co