'And in that direction, you know, we could fall back on Mézières,' said Maurice. But at that very moment a first cannon shot was fired from St. Menges. Shreds of fog were still trailing in the depths, and a vague mass of men could just be espied marching along the defile of St. Albert. 'Ah! there they are!' resumed Maurice, instinctively lowering his voice, and without naming the Prussians. 'Our line of retreat is cut off!'
It was not yet eight o'clock. The cannonade, which was increasing in violence in the direction of Bazeilles, could now also be heard on the east, in the valley of the Givonne, which they were unable to see. At this moment, indeed, the army of the Crown Prince of Saxony was emerging from the Chevalier Wood and advancing upon the First Corps in front of Daigny. And now that the Eleventh Prussian Corps, marching upon Floing, was opening fire on General Douay's troops, the battle had begun on all sides, from north to south, over an expanse of several leagues.
Maurice had just realised what a deplorable blunder had been made in not withdrawing upon Mézières during the night. And although he had only a dim notion as to what might be the exact consequences of the blunder, he was instinctively apprehensive of danger, and gazed with disquietude at the neighbouring heights overlooking the plateau of Algeria. Allowing that they might not have had sufficient time to retreat on Mézières, why, at all events, had they not occupied those heights, with their backs to the frontier, so that they might, at all risks, have made their way into Belgium in the event of a defeat? Two points appeared particularly threatening, the round Hattoy hill, above Floing on the left, and the so-called Calvary of Illy, crowned by a stone cross rising between two lime trees. On the previous day General Douay had sent a regiment to occupy the Hattoy hill, but this isolated position being considered dangerous the men had fallen back at dawn. As for the Calvary of Illy, its defence had been entrusted to the left wing of the First Army Corps. All the vast bare expanse, dented with deep valleys from Sedan to the Ardennes, was there; and evidently the key of the position was at the foot of that cross and those two lime trees, whence one could sweep all the surrounding country.