IV. THE FIRST FIGHTS ROUND VAUX 50 V. ROUND THE WASHING-PLACE 62 VI. REFLECTIONS ON DEATH 77 VII. THE ENEMY’S EVIDENCE 82 VIII. FROM MARCH 30 TO MAY 31 95 BOOK III THE STRANGLEHOLD I. STONES AND MEN 113 II. THE STRANGLEHOLD TIGHTENS IN THE WEST 120 III. THE STRANGLEHOLD TIGHTENS IN THE EAST 141 BOOK IV THE LAST WEEK I. THE BATTLE AT THE FORT 153 II. THE FORT APPEALS 164 III. THE SORTIE 179 IV. SOME ONE RE-ENTERS THE FORT 188 V. THE LAST WORDS 192 BOOK V THE DÉNOUEMENT I. THE GERMAN ACCOUNT 201 II. THE FINAL EFFORT 215 III. THE HARVEST OF THE FUTURE 224 THE LAST DAYS OF FORT VAUX BOOK I I THE FORT In the great squadron of forts which shield Verdun from a distance, like a fleet marshalled on the open sea in front of a harbour, Fort Vaux might claim the rank of a cruiser. More modern than Souville and Tavannes, which are caponier forts, not so vast or so fully equipped as Douaumont, whose girdle contains a vast quantity of turrets, cupolas, casemates, barracks, and strongholds, it plants its levelled walls more firmly in the soil. Built of masonry about 1880, it was reconstructed in concrete after the invention of the torpedo-shaped shell (1885), then in reinforced concrete, and was not finished till 1911. To the north of the main road from Verdun to Metz, _via_ Étain, it mounts guard over the fortress, facing Thionville. At one end of a tableland which is framed by the Douaumont range and the wooded knolls of La Laufée, and is sundered from them by narrow dales, it seems to emerge from the mouth of a river fringed with hills, to cleave with its prow the Woevre plain. The sea of Woevre washes its north-eastern slopes, these being at first precipitous and making dead ground, then they change to a gentle gradient up to the ditch bordered by its transverse galleries. Two villages built along the bottom, Vaux-devant-Damloup in the north and Damloup in the south, escort it as merchantmen escort a great battleship.