The artillery were distributed freely by batteries along the front of the line, and some held in reserve; but there was no concentration of artillery. The proportion of each line seems to have been, out of 50,000 infantry, for the advanced posts, 6000 men; in main or first and second line, 31,000 men; in reserve, 13,000 men. These were formed when in line two, three, or even four deep, and Shaw Kennedy formed Von Alten’s Division, each battalion (or pair of battalions) in column on a front of two companies, whence they at first formed line to re-form column and square when attacked by cavalry. The whole of the front was covered by skirmishers. But it will be noticed again how much stronger the right wing is than the left, owing to the rooted and unfounded conviction that Wellington held that his right would be chiefly assailed. And yet it is evident that if the weak left wing were once broken through, the battle might be lost. Thus the proposed point of junction of the Allied armies, the junction that could alone inflict a telling disaster on the French, this which was all-important to allied as distinctive from local success, was more or less _en l’air_. On the French side also there were three lines, and these formed and marched in eleven columns, of which four were to form the first, four the second, and three the third line. They executed the movement in the most perfect order. The first line was composed of Reille’s Corps, 15,000 strong, in two lines of columns, ranks three deep, and having on its left the light cavalry of the corps (fifteen squadrons in three lines); and D’Erlon’s Corps (16,000 strong and similarly formed), the eleven squadrons of its own light cavalry in three lines being on its right. The second line was composed of, from the left, Kellerman’s Cuirassiers; in two lines fifty feet apart, Lobau’s Corps, in mass of battalion columns; and the light cavalry of Daumont and Subervie and Milhaud’s Cuirassiers. In the third line was Guyot’s heavy cavalry of the Guard, then the Guard itself, drawn up in a column six lines deep, and on its right the Lancers and Chasseurs of the Guard under Lefebvre. When any attack was made, the attacking force formed into a smaller number of larger columns (D’Erlon’s Corps, for example, forming five), and all were thickly covered by light infantry skirmishers.