The Sun.
London, England, 1870-12-01 00:00:00

THE DUKE OF MECKLENBURG'S RAID.

An account of the advance of the Grand Duke of
Mecklenburg, who commands on the extreme right of the
German line south of Paris, is given by a German cor-
respondent. This writer, whose letter is dated the 23rd,
says that the Duke had originally led his army in a north-
westerly direction, after having united his forces at
Angerville with the corps of General von der Tann,
in order to touch the French Army of the West,
tinder Xdratry and Charette, the strength of which
had been greatly over-estimated by the exaggerated
accounts brought in, "as we were led to believe
that the whole of the Army of the Loire had
availed itself of the railway, and had been transferred
to the west." This latter hypothesis has, however, not
been confirmed. The Grand Duke took up a position,
therefore, in a line with the Eure, so that the 17th
Division, under General Treskow, formed his right, and
the Corps of General von der Tann his left wing, the
22nd Division forming the centre. Upon both wings a
large force of cavalry is posted. To the left is Prince
Albrecht, who at the same time keeps up the commu-
nication with Prince Frederick Charles by way of,
Etampes, and further southerly to the right the divisions
of Count Rheinbaben and General Schmidt (formerly
Prince William of Mecklenburg's), stretching away to the
north, and covering the flanks. The right wing came
thus into battle at Dreux,which was captured by General
Tresckow, after a short but furious engagement.
On the 18th the forward march toward Chateauneuf took
place, and on the 19th two minor engagements were suc-
cessfully fought with the enemy near Digny, the Meck-
lenburg army having changed its front and marched in a
south-westerly direction. The Grand Duke could report
with truth that the enemy had been beaten back on all
his lines. The mountainous country and the fog com-
bined rendered our advance one of great difficulty. On
the 21st we fell in with the enemy again near La Loupe,
to the south of Digny, who, attacked with great ardour
by our troops, was compelled to retire with the loss of one
gun, which fell into the hands of a battalion of the 83rd
Regiment. On the following day, the 22nd inst.—i.e„
yesterday—the march forward was continued, and the
mportant town of Nogent le Rotrou was occupied by our
troops, greatly to the astonishment of everyone, without
resistance.

Herr Wachenhusen, one of the ablest of the German
war writers, notices that the Grand Duke's troops had hard
work in clearing the woods on the way of march. The
French had many old soldiers amongst them :—" The
head-quarters of the Grand Duke seem at length, after
incessant perambulation for the last ten days, to
have found a resting place. All is now quiet ; the cold
fog, penetrating through everything, still hangs over the
town and the woods, in which the Bavarians were this
morning busily occupied in driving out the numerous
bands of Frenchmen that were hidden there. It is certain
the tirailleurs of the enemy must have ventured to
approach the town before daybreak, for half a dozen shots
struck the walls of my Chinese Swiss castle, the garden
of which had yestesday been tolerably well provided with
grenades from our battery. The country about here is very
favourable to the operations of the enemy, as it Is well
supplied with shelter, which the dense woods reaching to-
wards Fontaine in the north, and Digny in the west, pro-
vide in abundance. He crouches here in the low brush-
wood, and thus his peculiar mode of warfare receives op-
portunities for fully developing itself. Our soldiers in
fighting upon this line have scarcely once aeon a French
uniform, excepting those of prisoners, as the enemy
always fire behind shelter. Nothing is to be done with
cavalry in such a country."

THE SIEGE OF PARI'I.
WRY A SORTIE WAS NOT MADE.

A German writer undertakes to explain the failure of
the French in Paris to make a sortie on November 19th,
as they were expected to do. He says :—" As it appears,
and well informed persons assert it, the fault does not lie
with Trochu ; on the contrary, he had made 'every pre-
paration, even to the minuteet details, for another great
effort. When, however, everything was ready for a
start, first the mobilised National Guard, and then a por-
tion of. the Mobile Guard, most decidedly refused to allow
themselves to be led to the shambles. The sortie could be
of no practical use, they declared, and it was therefore
unnecessary to send a couple of thousand of human
beings to certain -death. In short, they would
not march out. Whilst the discussion was going on, a
deputation from the linesmen at the forts reached General
Troceu with the announcement that they likewise refused
to make the proposed sortie, if they they could not reckon
positively upon being supported by the Mobiles with a
reserve ready for fighting in their rear. Under these cir-
cumstances the idea had to be given up, It such a state
of things really exists in the besieged city, a decisive
catastrophe must be looked for shortly. It is possible
that Paris was suffering on the 19th from one of those fits
of depression which alternate continuously with bursts of
wild joy, and that she may have by this time recovered
from her depondency. Paris is never to be depended
upon."