rbidding height, called Kara Hodjali (the Black Priest), which
the French were fortunate enough to take before the Bulgarians came up
in force. It was this height which enabled them, when the Bulgarians
did swarm down on them, some days later, to hold their position. From
October 30, 1915, until November 5, 1915, the fighting here was
furious, but finally the Bulgarians were driven back. Meanwhile,
however, the advance had been delayed and Vassitch, after holding
Veles a week, was forced to retire to Babuna Pass again.

From Krivolak to the pass was twenty-five miles, due east. For fifteen
miles the road lay across a rolling plain, to the River Tserna, as the
Macedonians and Serbians called it, or Tcherna, meaning "Black," in
Bulgarian. Beyond that rose steep and difficult mountain ridges, which
the Bulgarians had occupied and fortified. Yet Sarrail determined to
make an effort to force his way across.

By this time reenforcements had arrived from Saloniki, so he began
moving across the plain through Negotin and Kavadar to the Tcherna.
This stream, though narrow, was deep and unfordable. It could be
crossed only in one place, by a small plank bridge, at Vozartzi.

On November 5, 1915, the French troops began crossing this bridge and
scaling the heights before them, some of whose peaks towered fully a
thousand feet above the river. And here it was that they first heard
the booming of the Serbian guns, on the other side of the ridge.

Sarrail now advanced his men northward, along the west bank of the
Tcherna, and next day he delivered an assault on the Mount of the
Archangel, ten miles below Vozartzi. Here was the center of the
Bulgarian positions, and here their lines must be pierced, if Babuna
Pass was to be reached.

But not only was this position well fortified, but the Bulgarians were
in superior force to the French. Moreover, as soon as Todoroff heard
of what was going on, he hurried reenforcements to the Bulgarians on
Mount Archangel. And this Sarrail knew; yet, without hesitation, he
began the assault.

At the first attack the Bulgarian advance lines were driven out of the
villages at the base of the mountain. The French continued their
advance, and on November 10, 1915, they began a circling movement
which resulted in the Bulgarians being squeezed out of Sirkovo, a
village some distance up the mountain.

But by this time the Bulgarian reenforcements were beginning to
arrive, and by the end of the second w