is the French
infantry delivered an attack which gave it possession of the western
part of the village. Here they made prisoners. At the Bois-le-Pretre,
northeast of Pont-a-Mousson, the Germans blew up with a mine four of
the French advanced trenches which were completely destroyed. The
Germans gained a footing there, but the French retook the first two
trenches and a half of the third. Between the Bois-le-Pretre and
Pont-a-Mousson, in the Haut de Rupt, the Germans made an attack which
was repulsed.

In Champagne, before Hill 196, northeast of Mesnil, on March 19, 1915,
the Germans, after violently bombarding the French position, made an
infantry attack which was repulsed with heavy losses.

In the Woevre, in the Bois Mortmore, on March 20, 1915, the French
artillery destroyed a blockhouse and blew up several ammunition wagons
and stores. At La Boisselle, northeast of Albert, the Germans, after a
violent bombardment, attempted a night attack which was repulsed with
large losses.

The Germans bombarded the Cathedral of Soissons again on March 21,
1915, firing twenty-seven shells and causing severe damage to the
structure. On the same day Rheims was bombarded, fifty shells falling
there.

Near Bagatelle the French, on March 22, blew up three mines; and two
companies of their troops stormed a German trench in which they
maintained their position in spite of a strong counterattack. Five
hundred yards from there, the Germans, after exploding two mines, and
bombarding the French trenches, rushed to an attack on a front of
about two hundred and fifty yards. After some very hot hand-to-hand
fighting the assailants were hurled back in spite of the arrival of
their reenforcements. The French artillery caught them under its fire
as they were falling back, and inflicted very heavy losses.

The French then retreated some fifteen meters at Vauquois on March 23,
1915, when the Germans sprayed one of their trenches with inflammable
liquid.

CHAPTER XXV

CAMPAIGN IN ARGONNE AND AROUND ARRAS

There were some weak places in the French line from Switzerland to the
North Sea; and one of them was that part in the region between the
Forest of the Argonne and Rheims. General Langle de Cary was in
command of the army which held this section. It requires no military
genius to comprehend that the French center and the right wing from
Belfort to Verdun were not safe until the Germans had been forced back
across the Aisne at eve