On paper the extrication of Sir Horace's force seemed in truth an impossibility. Three British divisions, very imperfectly entrenched, were awaiting the onset of seven German divisions, flushed with uninterrupted victory, and backed up by an overwhelming preponderance in artillery. Both flanks of the British force were practically in the air, the only protection on the right being the 1st and 3rd C.B. at Le Souplet, and on the left Allenby with another two Cavalry Brigades at Seranvillers. As a buffer against the German army corps which was threatening the British flank from Tournai, two Cavalry Brigades were clearly a negligible quantity. Desperate diseases call for desperate remedies, and the C. in C. had recourse to the only expedient in which lay a hope of salvation from the threatened flank attack, should it come. General Sordet was at Avesnes with three divisions of French cavalry, and the C. in C.--with all the persuasion possible--put the urgency of the situation before him. The railways were no help; they ran all wrong; cavalry alone could save the situation; would he go? General Sordet--with the permission of his chief--went. It was a forty mile march, and cavalry horses were none too fresh in those days. Still he went, and in the end did great and gallant work; but not on the morning of the 26th. On that fateful day--or at least on the morning of that fateful day--his horses were ridden to a standstill, and he could do nothing. LE CATEAU The battle of August 26th is loosely spoken of as the Cambrai--Le Cateau battle, but, as a matter of fact, the British troops were never within half a dozen miles of Cambrai, nor, for that matter, were they actually at Le Cateau itself. The 5th Division on the right reached from a point halfway between Le Cateau and Reumont to Troisvilles, the 15th Brigade, which was its left-hand brigade, being just east of that place. Then came the three brigades of the 3rd Division, the 9th Brigade being north of Troisvilles, the 8th Brigade on the left of it north of Audencourt, with the 7th Brigade curled round the northern side of Caudry in the form of a horseshoe. Beyond was the 4th Division at Hautcourt. The whole frontage covered about eight miles, and for half that distance ran along north of the Cambrai to St. Quentin railway.