The position, then, on Saturday morning, the 29th, was:
(a) The Force was retiring, not too severely pressed by the enemy, but with continuous rear-guard actions.
(b) Two new French Armies (the 6th and 7th) were coming into position on our left, by Amiens and Roye.
(c) On our immediate right was the 5th French Army, the one which had suffered so badly after the fall of Namur.
(d) Generally, the French forces on the east were being steadily pushed back by the very strong enemy advance.
On that morning the Commander-in-Chief received a visit from General Joffre, and this is what took place. I quote from Sir John French's second dispatch:
"I strongly represented my position to the French Commander-in-Chief, who was most kind, cordial and sympathetic, as he has always been. He told me that he had directed the 5th French Army on the Oise to move forward and attack the Germans on the Somme with a view to checking pursuit.
"I finally arranged with General Joffre to effect a further short retirement towards the line Compiègne—Soissons, promising him, however, to do my utmost to keep always within a day's march of him."
It may be noted here (although, of course, we did not know it till much later) that, owing to the German advance on the west, Le Havre was evacuated as the British base, and the organisation, stores, hospitals and everything, were rushed at half a day's notice right down to St. Nazaire, at the mouth of the River Loire. It was an amusing episode in the war, and quite a happy little yarn it would make; "but that is another story," as Kipling says.
On the Saturday evening the Force was got on the move again, heartened and not a little refreshed. The country-side now was as lovely as any district in France. Gentle, undulating downs, crowned by the beautiful forest of Ligues, and besprinkled with dainty little villages and stately châteaux. If these lines should chance to be read by the mayor and mayoress of a certain little village hard by Compiègne, I would beg them to believe that the officer whom they so graciously entertained for those brief hours remembers their kindness with the deepest gratitude, and records the day as one of the most perfect he has ever spent. Officers and men made so many good friends even during those crowded hours of life, only to realise with heartfelt sorrow that perhaps half a day later their kindly hosts must have been engulfed by the tide of invasion.