The rest of the engagement was very much a repetition of the affair at Ste. Généviève on a larger scale. But there was one big difference. In spite of the gravity of the situation on the Marne the Kaiser had journeyed to the eastern front to give to his armies there the encouragement of his presence and authority—or for another reason. Exactly when he arrived no one seems to know, but he was certainly in Lorraine on September 8th, that is to say, the day before his first five armies began their retreat from the Marne. That seems to me to be a fact of some significance. On the 8th and even on the 9th the line of the first five German armies still stretched from near Paris south of Compiègne across the Marne, well south of Epernay and Châlons, to a point not so very far north of Bar le Duc, before it curved north of Verdun on its left and came down again on the other side of the Meuse almost to the Rupt de Mad, which flows north-east from near Commercy, to fall into the Moselle at Metz. Then there was a gap of some miles where neither French nor Germans had any considerable force, and after the gap, on the east side of Rupt de Mad, the German line began again with the Sixth and Seventh Armies.
On September 8th it was still possible that the first five German armies might hold their ground against the French and English attack. On September 8th it was still possible that the Sixth Army under the Crown Prince of Bavaria might break through the opposition of General de Castelnau’s army, and open up the way to Nancy and Toul. Nothing could have been better timed. The Germans were a little late (say about three weeks) in carrying out their original programme, but the correspondence between the two parts of it was exact, almost to a minute. Only two things were necessary to carry out the famous “hook” and begin the encirclement of the main armies of the Allies: the first five armies from von Kluck to the Crown Prince had to stand firm; the other two, under von Heeringen and the Crown Prince of Bavaria (and the Kaiser) to advance. It is not surprising that the Great War Lord chose to place himself with the two armies which were to advance. It was (or it should have been) even leaving out of account the possible triumphant entry into Nancy, incomparably the more interesting and picturesque position. Any soldier, let alone any War Lord, would have given all that he most prized to lead the armies that were to carry out the actual work of completing the circle by taking the French and English armies from Bar le Duc to Paris in the rear. It is at least highly probable that that was what was in the Kaiser’s mind. He went to Lorraine, not to encourage the Bavarian armies in a forlorn hope, but to secure the front seat for the display of the final tableau.