war must roll back to the Vosges and the plain of Châlons. [Sidenote: =Winter campaign of Turenne, 1674–75.=] Turenne’s spirit rose to the crisis. Under his orders was an army of veterans capable of endurance and devoted to himself. He determined on a masterly piece of strategy. The Vosges mountains run parallel to the Rhine, fringing the rich river valley at a distance of some twenty miles from the stream, and ever increasing in height and ruggedness as they trend southwards, until from the mountainous, and in winter snow-covered, group of the Belchen they suddenly sweep down to the plain at the famous Gap of Belfort, which divides them from the Jura. While the imperialists were slowly dispersing themselves among the comfortable towns in the river valley between Strasburg and Mühlhausen, Turenne at the end of November retired behind the chain of the Vosges, as if to go into winter quarters in Lorraine. Having put the mountains as a screen between him and his enemy, he suddenly turned south from Lixheim, marched behind the Vosges until he reached the rugged group at the southern end where rise the head-waters of the Moselle. Then dividing his veterans into four divisions he sent them over the mountain passes through the snow in the dead of winter to their rendezvous at Belfort. On the 27th of December the operation was complete. Forty thousand of the best soldiers of Europe were gathered at the top of the rich Rhine valley of Alsace, where the enemy was quietly enjoying himself in unsuspecting security. On the 28th Turenne swept down upon them through the Gap of Belfort, occupied Mühlhausen, defeated the Great Elector at Colmar, and bundled the whole army neck and crop out of Alsace across the river at Strasburg. The Rhine frontier was regained at a blow. Montecuculli was sent for in haste as the only general fit to cope with so terrible an antagonist, but fortune seemed to have deserted his standards. In the spring of 1675 Turenne crossed the Rhine below Strasburg. By a series of skilful manœuvres he forced Montecuculli from the Rhine to the Neckar, from the Neckar back to the Black Forest. [Sidenote: =Death of Turenne, 1675.=]There at Sasbach he obliged him to accept battle in a position in which success was impossible. ‘I have him now,’ said Turenne as he reconnoitred the enemy on July 26th. Almost as he spoke a chance shot struck him on the breast and killed him on the spot. [Sidenote: =Exhaustion of France.=]