The Austrians, astounded by this novel combat method, vainly reinforced their light troops by detachments of heavy infantry. Their skirmishers could not resist our numbers and impetuosity, and presently their line, beaten by a storm of bullets, was forced back. The noise of battle, the firing, increased; the defeated troops, hearing commands no longer, threw down their arms and fled in disorder. So fire in line, heavy as it may be, cannot prevail against the power of numerous detachments of skirmishers. A rain of bullets directed aimlessly is impotent against isolated men profiting by the slightest cover to escape the fire of their adversaries, while the deployed battalions offer to their rifles a huge and relatively harmless target. The dense line, apparently so strong, withers under the deadly effect of the fire of isolated groups, so feeble in appearance. (General Renard.) The Prussians suffered in the same way at Jena. Their lines tried fire at command against our skirmishers. You might as well fire on a handful of fleas. They tell us of the English salvos at Sainte-Euphemie, in Calabria, and later in Spain. In these particular cases they could be used, because our troops charged without first sending out skirmishers. The battle of Sainte-Euphemie only lasted half an hour; it was badly conceived and executed, "And if," says General Duhesme, "the advancing battalions had been preceded by detachments of skirmishers who had already made holes in enemy ranks, and, on close approach, the heads of columns had been launched in a charge, the English line would not have conserved that coolness which made their fire so effective and accurate. Certainly it would not have waited so long to loose its fire, if it had been vigorously harassed by skirmishers." An English author, treating of the history of weapons, speaks of the rolling fire, well directed, of the English troops. He makes no mention of salvos. Perhaps we were mistaken, and in our accounts have taken the fire of a battalion for the formal battalion fire at command of our regulations. The same tendency appears more clearly in the work on infantry of the Marquis de Chambray, who knew the English army well. He says that the English in Spain used almost entirely fire in two ranks. They employed battalion fire only when attacked by our troops without skirmishers, firing on the flanks of our columns. And he says "The fire by battalion, by half battalion and by platoon is limited to the target range. The fire actually most used in war is that in two ranks, the only one used by the French." Later he adds "Experience proves fire in two ranks the only one to be used against the enemy." Before him Marshal Saxe wrote "Avoid dangerous maneuvers, such as fire by platoon, which have often caused shameful defeats." These statements are as true now as then.