Page:Littell's Living Age - Volume 128.djvu/24

14 At the same date the formation of an auxiliary army, to be composed of Mobiles, National Guards, and francs-tireurs, was decreed. This new army was assimilated in every respect to the regular army, so as to he capable of being amalgamated with it at any moment. Futhermore, all the departments within sixty miles of the enemy were declared to be in a state of war; a committee composed of officers and civil engineers was formed in each of them in order to fortify the department.

On the 3d of November, each department was called upon to provide, within two months, as many batteries as it contained 100,000 inhabitants. All francs-tireurs were ordered to become part of the army in the territory where they might happen to be; every man under forty years of age was called out; camps were formed for concentration and instruction; an intelligence department was established in the war-ministry; civil engineer and civil commissariat services were organized; horses were collected. During November and December seven new corps d'armée were formed, each of them composed of about 30,000 men. But of course these corps were virtually useless; it could not indeed be otherwise. To give one example of the fashion in which they were set going, it is worth while to quote a letter which was written by M. de Freycinet to Captain Jaurès of the navy, when the latter was named general of the 21st corps. This letter has never been published, but it well merits to be known for the sake of the strange picture which it presents. It said: —

"You are appointed general of brigade in the auxiliary army, and are intrusted with the command of the troops who were formerly under the orders of General Fierrêck, with whom you will immediately make arrangements. You will also make arrangements with Colonel Rousseau, who will become your chief of the staff. You will eliminate from the troops of whom I have just spoken all the men belonging to the 16th and 18th corps, and you will send them to their respective chiefs. With the remainder, and with the Mobiles that you may be able to get together, you will form a corps d'armée of forty or fifty thousand men, in three divisions, which will be called the 21st corps, and which you will command.

"You will form your artillery yourself, so as to have eighteen batteries, if you can. You will, also form your proper quantity of cavalry, unless, indeed, it be impossible to do so, in which case we will try to help you. For the organization of your corps in matériel we will give you the necessary powers for making requisitions in the departments of the Manche, Calvados, Orne, Sarthe, Mayenne, Eure et Loir, and Eure. Go on, then. Form your cadres yourself; if you want a few officers we will give them to you; but do your utmost to suffice for yourself, and to quickly get a veritable army into line, formed of all the débris around you, and of the new elements which you will create yourself."

These impossible orders were positively executed! General Jaurès took up his command on 20th November, got together stragglers in all directions, and formed a corps which, when compared with others of the army of the Loire, was singularly solid; for it was that corps which stopped the Duke of Mecklenburg for three days at Le Mans, and fought the last fight of the war at Sillé le Guillaume.

It is needless to pursue further the story of the efforts made in the west. Those efforts serve to show the difference between the tremendous energy of the amateur civilians, and the stolid incapacity of the professional authorities; but that fact, after all, only proves what we knew before—that strong will can attain results which are beyond the reach of indolence and routine. The old system resisted the German army for one month, the new one held out against it for five months — hopelessly, uselessly, madly, it is true — but it held out.

And now let us revert to the question which was implicitly raised at the commencement, and see if we can form a distinct opinion as to the distribution of responsibilities. It cannot be supposed that, even if the French army had been thoroughly well organized, it could have stood successfully before its tremendous foe, for mere numbers would have inevitably beaten it in the long run. But certainly, weak as it was numerically, we are justified, by the nature of the earlier battles of the war, in believing that it could have fought on for months, if only it had commenced the campaign in good order, with supplies and with capable commanders. Whose fault is it that neither order, nor supplies, nor generals were there, and that the entire army was hopelessly vanquished in four weeks, between Woerth and Sedan?

The French press has passionately discussed this question; but, unfortunately, it has almost invariably considered it from political points of view, so as to serve 