Along the embankment, along the banks of the creek, in little gullies and dips of that _cul de sac_ of a bay, they had pegged down their gains as the jumping-off places for their assaults on the gallery of heights overlooking the stage of their indomitable tenacity. They were fighting against better than German veterans--German specialists. The prisoners they took usually yielded not in bodies but as individuals or small groups, wounded, exhausted, surrounded by dead. Two out of three of those in the Cornay region were machine-gunners or chosen non-commissioned officers who were trusted to fight to the death and make the most of their sacrifice by their skill. First and last the 82nd captured 277 machine-guns, as the harvest of its courage at close quarters. On the morning of the 10th it brought its field guns close up behind the infantry, assigned roving guns to its battalions, and placed its Hotchkiss guns and its little 37's in the front line, which smashed machine-gun nests at point-blank range. Now the All-Americas took Cornay for the last time, clearing its streets and cellars; swept up the valley and over the ridge above Cornay; and sprinting patrols entered Marcq in the plain beyond, while from the conquered higher ground they looked down upon the bend of the river toward Grandpré, where it passes between the Argonne and the Boult Forests. At last the trough of the Aire with both its walls was ours from Varennes past Cornay. The taking of the gap of Grandpré which brought us in face of the heights beyond may wait upon an account of the action of the 1st and 32nd from October 6th to 11th. XVII VETERANS CONTINUE DRIVING The 1st marking time--A fumble gives one height--Relying on the engineers--The triangle of hills--A tribute from the enemy--The Arrow Division also pointed at the whale-back--Which resists intact--Still the 1st goes on--"As good as the 1st." As soon as the 82nd's attacks on the river bottoms were well under way, the 1st was to make another rush, driving its wedge ahead of the 82nd's front over the hills of the eastern wall. On the 6th, the day before the All-Americas took Hills 180 and 223, and the day before the Pennsylvanians of the 28th took Châtel-Chéhéry, the 1st was due to mark time; and so also was the 32nd--still holding the block of the Morine and Chêne Sec woods and withdrawn from Gesnes,--which was in turn dependent for further advance upon the movement in the Aire trough. The flanks of the two divisions, left out of _liaison_ as a result of the viciously confused fighting of the 5th, must join up.