Continually retreating, the emperor, who was with MacMahon's army, at last found himself at Sedan, safe, as he hoped, for a brief breathing space, from the attacks of the two Prussian army corps which were following in his rear. He had been warned repeatedly that he must not return to Paris without a victory. "The language of reason," he remarked, "is no longer understood at the capital." On Aug. 30, 1870, the retreating French were concentrated, or rather massed, under the walls of Sedan,[1] in a valley commonly called the Sink of Givonne. The army consisted of twenty-nine brigades, fifteen divisions, and four _corps d'armée_, numbering ninety thousand men. [Footnote 1: Victor Hugo, Choses vues.] "It was there," says Victor Hugo, "no one could guess what for, without order, without discipline, a mere crowd of men, waiting, as it seemed, to be seized by an immensely powerful hand. It seemed to be under no particular anxiety. The men who composed it knew, or thought they knew, that the enemy was far away. Calculating four leagues as a day's march, they believed the Germans to be at three days distance. The commanders, however, towards nightfall, made some preparations for safety. The whole army formed a sort of horse-shoe, its point turning towards Sedan. This disposition proved that its chiefs believed themselves in safety. The valley was one of those which the Emperor Napoleon used to call a 'bowl,' and which Admiral Van Tromp designated by a less polite name. No place could have been better calculated to shut in an army. Its very numbers were against it. Once in, if the way out were blocked, it could never leave it again. Some of the generals,--General Wimpfen among them--saw this, and were uneasy; but the little court around the emperor was confident of safety. 'At worst,' they said, 'we can always reach the Belgian frontier.' The commonest military precautions were neglected. The army slept soundly on the night of August 31. At the worst they believed themselves to have a line of retreat open to Mézières, a town on the frontier of Belgium. No cavalry reconnoissance was made that night; the guards were not doubled. The French believed themselves more than forty miles from the German army. They behaved as if they thought that army unconcentrated and ill-informed, attempting vaguely several things at once, and incapable of converging on one point, namely, Sedan. They thought they knew that the column under the Prince of Saxony was marching upon Châlons, and that the Crown Prince of Prussia was marching upon Metz. "But that night, while the French army, in fancied security, was sleeping at Sedan, this is what was passing among the enemy.