The French have had another week of very heavy fighting
on the Chemin des Dames, north of the Aisne, where the Crown Prince, as at Verdun, is exhausting his strength in vain efforts to break the French resistance. The chief German attack was delivered at dawn on Sunday last against the western part of the ridge, between the Pantheon and Froidmont, south of the old fort of Malmaison, which the enemy still holds. The picked " storm troops " and sup- ports, twelve fresh battalions in all, followed up a very short and heavy bombardment so quickly that they gained a long line of trenches. But our Allies were too good for them. Within a few minutes, before the Germans could dig themselves in or put out wire, the French were upon them with a fierce counter-attack and flung them out of most of their gains. On Monday the enemy tried again further east, at Hurtebise, but his columns were dis- persed by the French seventy-fives. The importance of the ridge which our Allies took in the spring is well illustrated by the desperate anxiety of the Germans to recover it, and thus remove a menace to their whole left flank.
