assing through Belgium. But they would not be nearer to Paris.

When the French saw, in the opening days of the war, that forts were
of no permanent value against the German guns they left the forts on
the hills above Verdun as they had abandoned the Vauban works and
moved north for a few miles. Here they dug trenches, mounted their
guns in concealed positions, and stood on the defensive, as they were
standing elsewhere from Belgium to Switzerland. There was now no
fortress of Verdun, and Verdun city was nothing but a point behind the
lines of trenches, a point like Rheims, or Arras. The forts of the rim
were equally of no more importance and were now empty of guns or
garrisons. If the Germans, by a sudden attack, broke all the way
through the French trenches here it would be quite as serious as if
they broke through at other points, but no more so. There was no
fortress of Verdun and the Verdun position commanded nothing.

The Battle of Verdun, as it is disclosed to an observer who stands on
Fort de la Chaume, a mile or two west and above Verdun and in the
mouth of the trough we have described, was this: On the west bank of
the Meuse, four or five miles northwest of the town, there is a steep
ridge going east and west and perhaps 1,100 feet high. This is the
crest of Charny, and it rises sharply from the flat valley and marches
to the west without a break for some miles. On it are the old forts of
the rim.

Three or four miles still to the north is a line of hills which are
separated from each other by deep ravines leading north and south. Two
of these hills, Le Mort Homme (Dead Man's Hill) and Hill 304, have
been steadily in the reports for many weeks. They are the present
front of the French. Between one and two miles still to the north are
other confused and tangled hills facing north, and it was here that
the French lines ran when the great attack began in the third week of
February. On this side the Germans have advanced rather less than two
miles; they have not reached the Charny Ridge, which is the true and
last line of defence of the Verdun position, and they have not
captured the two hills to the north, which are the advanced position,
now the first line.

When I was in Paris before I went to Verdun there was a general belief
that the French might ultimately abandon the two outer hills, Dead
Man's and 304, and come back to the Charny Ridge, which is a wall
running from the river west without a break for mi