_The road climbs the northern slopes of the_ Berru Hill, across numerous German trenches. _At the bottom of a short run-down, opposite the village of Berru, is a crossing of four ways. The road leading to the fort is the one straight ahead._
_On the right, among the_ numerous defences, is a German cemetery containing a monument to the dead, ornamented with somewhat rudimentary carving and bearing an epitaph dedicated to the memory of the German soldiers who fell in the battles around Rheims.
_The road continues up the slopes of Berru Hill, to the right of the way leading to the_ auxiliary battery of the fort of =Vigie de Berru=. _The top of the hill is soon reached_, on which the fort, known as the "Vigie de Berru," stands. This fort was little bombarded, and is practically intact.
=Berru Hill=, on account of its height, its sulphurous and ferruginous waters, flint quarries, and fertile soil, was inhabited in pre-historic times. At the summit, a _campignien_ workshop, and farther down, above the springs which supply the village with water, a neolithic station have been discovered. Thousands of knives, arrow-heads, scrapers, saws, and other primitive tools have been unearthed. In the Gallo-Roman times the village must have been fairly important, judging by the vestiges of the ancient buildings discovered at the foot of the hill. It was near Berru that the _Gaulish helmet_, now in the National Museum of St. Germain, was found. Towards the end of the 16th century (about 1575), during the Leaguers' struggles around Rheims, the village was fortified, to protect it from pillaging by the soldiers. The moats and glacis which surrounded it are still visible to the south, where, covered with trees, they adjoin the gardens. Subterranean places of refuge, the entrance to which is no longer known, formerly existed underneath the village.
_From the fort, the road, winds down the opposite slopes of the hill. At the bottom of the latter, leave on the right the road to the_ =Fort of Nogent l'Abbesse,= _seen on the high ground to the right._
[Illustration: ENTRANCE TO BEINE VILLAGE BY THE ROAD TO NOGENT L'ABBESSE]
(_See Itinerary, p. 160, and summary of the Military Operations, p 154._)