Further reports from Metz did not afford a clear insight into the situation there. Also on the 18th, "the army had held its position," the narrative ran--only the right wing had changed front. "The troops required two or three days' rest," but the Marshal "counted still on being able to move out in a northerly direction," and fight his way to Chalons by the Montmedy--Ste. Menehould route, if this road was not strongly held by the enemy. In that case, he would march on Sedan, and even by Mezieres, in order to reach Chalons. Bazaine might already have committed himself to the movement thus indicated, and therefore Marshal MacMahon, who was not the man to leave his fellow-soldier in the lurch, instead of marching on Paris, set forth on the 23rd in the direction of Stenay. The suddenness of this decision caused all the preparations for the undertaking to be left unexecuted. At the end of the first day's march the troops reached the Suippe late in the evening in pouring rain. They lacked every necessary, and two Corps remained entirely without food. The Marshal was therefore forced to move his army further northward to Rethel, where large magazines of provisions had been established, and where the railway facilitated the bringing up of stores. Even on the third day's march the army had made little progress eastward. The left wing remained at Rethel, the right reached the Aisne, near Vouziers. On August 26th the main army was still standing between Attigny and Le Chene on the Ardennes canal, while the VIIth Corps and a regiment of Hussars lay in front of Vouziers for the protection of the right flank. While the French army was thus marching eastward by a wide detour, the German forces, which had been put in motion at the same time, were for their part marching due westward. According to orders issued from the supreme Head-quarter at Pont a Mousson, the advance on the enemy, supposed to be at Chalons, was to be effected in such manner that the IIIrd Army, marching on the left of the Army of the Meuse, should have the start by a day's march, so that the enemy, wherever he might stand halted, could be struck simultaneously in front and on his right flank, and thus forced away northward from the direction of Paris. The two armies were to converge as they advanced, and to reach the line of Ste. Menehould--Vitry on the 26th. On the first day's march, the armies still on a front some fifty-six miles long, the Meuse was reached; on the second day, the 24th, they advanced to the line St. Dizier--Bar le Duc--Verdun. The attempts to take the latter place and Toul in the by-going proved unsuccessful.