ounter-attacks, but little or no progress
was made. The Germans had regained the initiative, and the British army
was forced to dig itself in along the line of battle. On the 18th of
September General Joffre changed his plans and began to push forces up
on the Allied left in order to envelop the German right flank. To give
this movement a chance the enemy had to be held on the front, and the
cavalry were called on to take their turn in the trenches--a duty which
before long became very familiar to them. But the Germans extended and
reinforced their line for a similar outflanking movement. These
enveloping attempts did not cease until the opposing armies were ranged
along a line of trenches stretching from the Swiss frontier to the coast
of Belgium.

During the battle of the Aisne, from the 12th to the 15th of September,
the British forced the passage of the river and captured the Aisne
heights including the Chemin des Dames. Thereafter fighting degenerated
into a sullen trench warfare, culminating on the 26th of September and
the two following days in a series of fierce attacks by the Germans.
These attacks were repulsed and were not again renewed.

On the 12th of September Lieutenant L. Dawes and Lieutenant W. R.
Freeman, of No. 2 Squadron, had a notable adventure. They left in the
morning to carry out an aerial reconnaissance to St.-Quentin. A little
south of Anizy-le-Chateau, between Soissons and Laon, their machine
began to rock and vibrate in the air, as if the tail were loose. They
planed down at once, and landed in a small field, finishing up in a
wood, where they damaged their undercarriage, wings, and airscrew. Large
German columns were on the roads on both sides of them, within about two
hundred yards. Taking only a biscuit and some tubes of beef extract with
them, they hid in another wood close by. Some German cavalry came up to
the machine, and then went all round the first wood, but found nothing,
and after an hour and a half went away. The two officers lay hid until
the evening, and then started in the direction of the Aisne, some eight
miles distant. During the night they passed several German pickets, but
the war was young, the spirit of exhilaration still prevailed in the
German army, and the pickets were making so much noise that they passed
unobserved. At 3.0 in the morning they reached the Aisne, where they lay
down and slept. At 6.0 they were wakened by the firing of a gun close
by, and realized th