The object of General Trochu's sortie of Wednesday week re-
mains still partially unexplained. It was apparently meant to be serious, 100,000 men being held in readiness, a great force of artillery, and the railway mitrailleuses ; but Trochu was either waiting for an army outside which did not come, or for a break- up of the frost which did not happen. The frost was not more severe than in London, but it made it nearly impossible for artil- lery to move. After, therefore, shelling the positions of the Guard, attacking several villages to the east, and carrying two, Evrard and Maison Blanche, and remaining three days out in the cold, Trochu withdrew his forces. In his general order he attri- butes the tielay to the cold, which indeed interrupts all operations. The infantry can get along, but the horses strain at the heavy guns as if they were going up a mountain, and do not move a mile an hour. The German losses amount to some hundreds, the majority of whom seem to have been Saxons, the Saxon Corps having obviously been put in the "hot corner" to do them honour.
