The Sun.
London, England, 1870-10-17 00:00:00

THE BATTLE OF ORLEANS.

Details of the battle of Orleans seem to be very difficult
to come at, but both the railway and the telegraph wires
having been cut very little information has managed to
get through the gap. " From what I can gather," says
the correspondent of the Telegraph, in his letter
dated October 14th, "it would seem that Bourges
received news of the events of Monday very
much earlier than this city. Troops were im-
mediately despatched from that place towards
Orleans, and reached the scene of action about midnight ;
scarcely any of the regiments were drawn up before the
dawn of Tuesday. When the two detachments united
they were full forty thousand strong. About the order of
the battle I can give you no hint at all ; my informants
are not military men, and, indeed, appear to
have been too much excited to notice movements. All
that they seem distinctly to have comprehended was the
gradual closing in of the Prussian troops, and the retire-
ment, slow at first, but growing more precipitate each
moment, of the defenders. By two o'clock it was a rout
of the Weissenburg character—a shameless sauve qui peat.
Which class of soldiers, linesmen or Mobiles, first gave
the signal for flight, is disputed. My information goes,
that in Monday's combat the Mobiles were seized with
panic, but that yesterday (Tuesday) the regulars
frankly refused to fight at all, and loafed about the town
in gangs, while the Mobiles, National Guards, and Papal
Zouaves nobly attempted to withstand the enemy. By
three o'clock Orleans was invested on three sides, the
railway, on which already trains had ceased to run, was
out, and the open country towards the east was covered
with fugitives. Shells were falling in the suburbs, and
several houses had already taken fire when my informants
left. Not oven such broad outlines of the
engagement do the authorities supply. I do
not believe that they possess any information.
If a battle could be in progress all day long, only sixty
miles away, the Government first warned of the event a 4
nine o'clock in the evening—as it is said to have been
the case with Monday's fight—anything in the way
of ignorance is probable. The telegraph wires were
out at Meung at half-past one in the day, although a
brief despatch published is dated from Orleans,
3 p.m.' At about that time the station-master at
Meung caused it to be known, not by means of the tele-
graph apparently, that the enemy was in sight. From the
same moment, excepting the very unsatisfactory and sus-
picious report from ' Orleans, 3 p.m." a veil fell over the
battle-field. What we know is on the report of the fug;-
tives. They describe the panic as being terrible, the rout
sitter and complete; but I have met with none who
stayed to witness the effect of the Prussian
shells, or who know whether the city has been
actually occupied. There was no force to prevent
au occupation if it were desired. Late last night and
early this morning a large proportion of the troops
still quartered here were despatched eastward,
though their exact destination is not easily to
be found out. Some say it was Chiteaudun, where
the two thousand cavalry of whose approach we
heard last night have, within twelve hours, after
the manner so usual with Prussians, swelled to a corps
d'armee. Others believe—and these are the greater num-
ber—that the Government is determined to expend its
last man in avenging the two defeats of Orleans. I cannot
yet tell you which of the stories is correct, nor give any
facts at all about the combat said to be going on
all day at Chateaudun. We have not heard of any troops
there, but Mobiles and National Guards are scattered
round everywhere. Besides, chaos is so firmly esta-
blished again, that one would not be surprised to hear
of some corps d'armtSe which had been completely for-
gotten."

THE BRIGHTON COACH.—" The old coaching
days I" How fondly memory looks back into mild lang
syne, when as boys we rattled to and from school on the
old Highfiyer. And what a coach that was I nine miles
an hour from end to end. Was there another like it in
the kingdom ? Certainly not. And then the coachman
and the guard : where could their equals be found
for civility, joviality, and skill ? Nowhere. How
we who lived in country towns turned out to see
the coach come in, and what an event that was !
And what delightful travelling it was, perched
up above the hedges on a fine balmy brisk day,
with a pleasant companion or two, a good cigar, and a
cheerful stopping-place every twelve miles or so. Ah it
was a delicious style of travelling, to be sure ; and dis-
tance even lends enchantment to the view of that night
when it rained and froze alternately, and the horses
skated to the nearest post house and stopped there, or
when the snowdrift lay so deep that we had to be dug
out, and so on. All this is no doubt doubly pleasant to
look back to ; but it is doubtful whether we
should like to be a couple of days or so
getting down to the West, or could with equan-
imity put up nowadays with the skating and
digging-out aforesaid. Thinking of these far-off times, one
is almost startled to read the announcement that the
Brighton coach has ceased to run for the rest
of the season. The Brighton coach ! An antediluvian
curiosity, surely. Ages ago even, the Brighton age comes
back upon our memory as something past and gone for
ever. Still, there is a coach that runs all through the
summer to and from Brighton and London, thoikh many
of our readers may not be aware of it ; and, if we may
judge from the announcement of the proprietor, it would
seem to answer fairly, and the trade by it appears to be
increasing. Having tried a journey to Brighton by it, we
can safely say that, if the traveller is nothurried we do not
know a more agreeable mode of transit to Brighton than
to take a seat at Hatchett's on top of the coach, and
trundle along during the pleasantest part of a summer
day through a delightful country. Experto