They are lost, they are lost, so fast follows the foe, riding in furious haste to gather the trophies of the fight. A great cloud of dust rises before them, but I can see the faces of the men as the squadrons diverge to pass the village, and note the laughter and the shouts of those fair-haired troopers with the scales upon their shoulders. Suddenly the leader, riding like Scarlett at Balaclava, twenty lengths in front, leans back in his stirrups, checks his charger in his headlong career, and throws his hand high above his head. The trumpeter beside him raises the trumpet to his lips, but ere the notes ring out they are drowned in a loud roar of musketry. I had forgotten the Chasseurs in the orchards; the Germans had never suspected their presence. The surprise is complete; the disaster overwhelming. Magazine after magazine is unloaded, and thousands of bullets find an easy target in the seething, struggling mass, just now advancing so magnificently in all the pride of order and victory. Round the village the scene is indescribable. The slaughter is terrible, and in a few moments the squadrons that had passed unscathed on either side come flying back in the utmost disorder, pursued on one side by dragoons, on the other by hussars. The valley is covered to right and left with a dense crowd of horsemen, galloping in all the excitement of the flight and the pursuit, whilst the German batteries on the bridge pour shell after shell into the surging crowd, regardless whether their mark is friend or foe. I have little time to reflect on the skill with which the trap had been set and baited. My friend the Commandant calls me from my eyrie, and before I had time even to note the trace of the stirring events I had seen passing before me, the Chasseurs are retreating from the village at a pace which puts my Rosinante to the trot. Very soon we hear the jingle of the cavalry in rear. The dragoons are retiring also, and as I look back across the valley I can see the long screen of scouts falling back slowly across the valley, so still and peaceful but an hour agone, and now strewn with the awful _débris_ of the conflict. Such was the first phase of the battle of the 29th of June. ‘_C’est un apéritif_,’ remarks the Commandant. GREAT VICTORY OF THE FRENCH. FULL DESCRIPTION OF THE BATTLE.