The achievement on the 17th is worthy to rank with their advance at Third Ypres as a brilliant feat of offensive warfare, and as such it was praised by their comrades in arms. Brigadier-General Ian Stewart of the XIII. Corps Headquarters Staff wrote to Tanner: “I shall always look on the capture of the railway embankment north of Le Cateau as one of the most astounding feats of the War. It will be good for South Africa to know what a brave part her contingent played in the closing chapter of the Great War, and it is no little honour to have been the foremost troops of the British Armies in France when the curtain fell on the greatest tragedy the world has seen.” And when the war was over and the Brigade about to leave the 66th Division, Major-General Bethell wrote in his special order of the day: “In after life if any of you are up against what you imagine to be an impossible task of any description, call to mind the Boche position on the east bank of the Selle river north of Le Cateau, or ask some one who was there to depict it to you. Then remember that the South African Brigade crossed that stream and took that position, which the enemy thought impregnable to attack from that direction, and that, on looking back at it from the enemy’s side, it was hard to understand how the apparently impossible had been done by you.” * * * * * The fighting front of the XIII. Corps was now occupied by the 25th and 18th Divisions, and the 50th and 66th Divisions fell back into reserve. The South African Brigade was in rest billets at Serain till the 2nd November. Haig was now fairly embarked in open warfare, operating in a difficult country of large woods, many small villages, and an infinity of hedged enclosures. His first object was the line from Valenciennes to the Oise-Sambre Canal along the western edge of the Mormal Forest. The enemy had a strong water line in the canal and the Scheldt, and a good defensive position in the forest, but between the northern end of Mormal and the Scheldt was a gap of ten miles, and if Haig broke through the gap the position must crumble. On Wednesday, 23rd October, he struck on a front of fifteen miles, the Fourth Army using two corps, and the Third Army four. This was the beginning of the last great fight of the British Army, the Battle of the Rivers, fought in thick mists and drizzling rain. In two days Rawlinson, Byng, and Horne advanced six miles, and by the last day of October Haig was through the gap. Elsewhere, on the long front of the Allies, Débeney, Mangin, and Guillaumat were each some twenty-three miles from Hirson with an open country before them, and Gouraud and Pershing had broken the resistance in the tangled area west of the Meuse, and were ready for the final push on Mézières and Sedan. Meantime strange things were happening in Berlin. The new ministry which had come into power in Germany in the early days of October had opened