THE GREAT WAR OF 189 THE BOMBARDMENT OF VARNA ^^ Frontispiece. THE GREAT WAR OF 189 A FORECAST BY REAR-ADMIRAL P. COLOMB COLONEL J. F. MAURICE, R.A., CAPTAIN F. N. MAUDE ARCHIBALD FORBES, CHARLES LOWE D. CHRISTIE MURRAY AND F. SCUDAMORE WITH NUMEROUS ILLUSTRATIONS FROM SKETCHES SPECIALLY MADE FOR ' BLACK AND WHITE' BY F. VILLIERS LONDON WILLIAM HEINEMANN 1895 SECOND EDITION First Edition, December, 1892 NOTE. The following narrative appeared originally in the pages of Black and White, the work being the outcome of consul- tations between some of the most eminent authorities upon modern warfare and international politics. The story has been carefully revised, and is now reprinted in response to a general wish that it should be available in a convenient form. CONTENTS PAGE Attempted Assassination of Prince Ferdinand of Bulgaria, ... 1 Russian Movement upon the Austrian Frontier, ... 26 Interview between General Caprivi and the French Ambassador, . . 30 Departure of Troops to the East, . .... 32 Banquet in the Schloss, .... ..... 33 Ill-treatment of a War-correspondent by the German Hussars, . . 37 The Austrian Plan of Campaign, ........ 40 First Collision of Russian and German Troops, 43 Warlike Excitement in Paris, 44 Declaration of War by France, 52 The German Plan of Campaign, . . . . . . . . 61 The French Plan of Campaign, 65 Public Feeling of England, 66 Battle at Alexandrovo, 71 Occupation of Alexandrovo by the Germans, 74 Capture of Czenstochau by Prince George of Saxony, .... 76 Night Attack by the Russians, 78 Repulse of the German Army, 85 Excitement in Brussels, 86 The Meeting of the Four Fleets, 92 Retreat of French Cruisers, 96 On Board the Flagship, 99 Preparations for the Landing of British Troops at Trebizonde, . . 102 Repulse of the Russians, 106 The Russo-German Campaign Great Battle at Skierniwice, . , . 110 Italy mobilises her Army, and takes the Field against France, . . 121 The Council of War, 124 Italian Route Through the Riviera, 126 Battle of Costebelle, 129 The Landing at Trebizonde, 132 Mobilisation of the" First Army Corps, 138 Russia declares War against England, 147 Declaration of War in London, 148 Contents. PAGE The Position of Affairs, . 158 Preparations in the Mediterranean Meet, 160 The Battle of Sardinia, , ...... 165 The Franco-German Campaign Cavalry Engagement near Ligny, . . 171 Engagement at Vaux Champagne, ..... 178 The Battle of Machault, 184 The War in the far East The Capture of Vladivostock, .... 193 Events in the East of Europe, 199 Arrival of British Troops in the Sea of Marmora, 201 Feeling in Australia, 206 Instructions from the Admiralty, . 211 The Franco-German Campaign The German Advance, ..... 213 Advance of the Second and Third Armies on Paris, 221 The March upon the French Capital, 223 British Campaign in Bulgaria, 225 The Bombardment of Varna, 228 Rout of the Russian Army, 234 The Battle of Kosluji, . . . , 236 Enthusiasm in Cairo, 241 French Intrigues in Egypt, 248 Fierce Battle near Wady Haifa, 252 The Franco-German Campaign Rescue of Pans, 258 Advance of General de Galliifet, 262 Brisk Cavalry Engagement, . . 265 Great Victory of the French, 267 The General Situation, . . J 274 Capture of Sierra Leone by the French, 279 Siege of Herat, 281 Dispatch of Troops by the Canadian Pacific Railway to India, . . 282 Cessation of Hostilities France and Germany, 287 England and Russia, , 289 The Services of England, 293 General Effects of the War, . . ...... 295 APPENDIX. Sir Charles Tapper on Imperial Defence, , 299 An Interview with the Right Hon. Sir Charles Dilke, ,-.,,, 303 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS PAGE The Bombardment of Varna, Frontispiece The Attempted Assassination of Prince Ferdinand of Bulgaria, . , 11 M. Stambuloff, Prime Minister of Bulgaria, appointed Regent after the attempted Assassination of Prince Ferdinand, ,..,., 13 The Bulgarian Mobilisation Troops marching through the streets of Philippopolis, . .... 15 The Servo-Bulgarian Campaign Through Pirot to the Front, . . . 17 An Affair of Outpost The First Shot in the Servo-Bulgarian Campaign, 19 The Occupation of Belgrade ' Here at Last ! ' . . ... . . 21 With the Turks : Admiral Woods Pacha's Fleet of Torpedo Boats steam- ing through the Bosphorus, 24 Russian Infantry Landing at Varna, . 25 The Knights of Malta at Ambulance Work, .41 Extraordinary Scene in the Place de la Concorde : The Mob tearing the Mourning Emblems from the Statue of Strasburg, .... 47 The Naval Battle off Dantzig The Sinking of a Russian Torpedo Boat and Rescue of the Crew by an English Yacht, 58 The Naval Battle off Dantzig Wounded Russians on Board the English Yacht, 60 A Scene in the House of Commons Sir William Harcourt questions the Government, 68 British Troops in the Place Verte, Antwerp, 88 Sinking of the Yacht 'Elaine,' 97 British Troops landing at Trebizonde, 103 The Storming of Skierniwice, 119 Italian Artillery crossing the Mont Cenis, ...... 128 Lord Salisbury addressing the House of Lords on the Question of Peace and War, . 134 x List of Illustrations PAGE The Mobilisation of the English Army Troops marching through the Dock Gates, Portsmouth, .... Reserve Men served with the New Magazine-Rifle, and off to the front to-morrow, * Reading the Mobilisation Order, 145 Declaration of War against Russia from the Steps of the Royal Exchange, 149 Calling Out the Volunteers Parade of the Signallers of the St. Martin's Le Grand Corps, 155 Our Correspondent at the Battle of Vaux Champagne, . . . . 180 The Battle of Machault : The German Cavalry charging the Rallying Squares of the French, 186 The Taking of Vladivostock : Goorkas Protecting the Guns, ... 197 British Transports passing the Dardanelles : Fort Chanak saluting the English Ships, 202 The Sultan, Lord Wolseley, and Sir Clare Ford watching the Passage of the British Fleet through the Bosphorus from the Steps of the Dolma Baghtche Palace, 205 German Cavalry Attack by Night on the French Bivouacs, . . . 220 Scene in the Streets of Rheims : German Troops clearing the Streets of French Rioters, 222 The Battle of Kosluji : Sir Evelyn Wood's Attack on the Russian Forces, 238 Map of the Fight near Varna, 239 Scene outside Shepheard's Hotel, Cairo : Tommy Atkins about to quit Egypt, 243 Soudanese Attack upon a Reconnoitring Party, 254 French Cavalry charging the Prussian Infantry, ..... 270 Our New Route to India : A Sleeping-Car on the Canadian Pacific Railway, 283 Tommy Atkins bargaining with the Indians on the Canadian Pacific Railway, 285 Our New Route to India : Rations on the Canadian and Pacific Railway, 286 Sir Charles Tupper in his Private Office in Victoria Street, Westminster, 300 The Right Hon. Sir Charles Dilke, . . . 30 4 THE GREAT WAR OF 189 THE GREAT WAR OF 189- A FORECAST. IN the following narrative an attempt is made to forecast the course of events preliminary and incidental to the Great War which, in the opinion of military and political experts, will probably occur in the immediate future. The writers, who are well-known authorities on international politics and strategy, have striven to derive material for their description of the conflict from the best sources, to conceive the most probable campaigns and acts of policy, and gener- ally to give to their work the verisimilitude and actuality of real warfare. ATTEMPTED ASSASSINATION OF PRINCE FERDINAND OF BULGARIA. FULL ACCOUNT OF THE MURDEROUS ASSAULT ; CRITICAL CONDITION OF THE WOUNDED PRINCE. (By Telegraph from our Own Correspondent, Mr. .Francis Scudamore.) CONSTANTINOPLE, Sunday, April 3 (via VARNA). Noon. A REPORT has been current here since a late hour last evening, the effect that an attempt has been made to assassinate Prince Ferdinand of Bulgaria, at a mining town named Samakoff, about forty miles south of Sofia. It is said that the Prince, who had been shooting in the Balabancha Balkans, was driving into Samakoff towards evening yesterday, when his carriage was stopped, and he was attacked by a number of men armed with knives and pistols. The Prince's attendants succeeded in saving their master's life and in beating off some and capturing others A The Great War of 189 if tiis assailants, but not before His Highness had been severely wounded. Prince Ferdinand was carried into the house of an American missionary resident in Samakoff, where he now lies. His High- ness's condition is serious, and is rendered the more critical from the fact that there is no very adequate surgical aid obtainable in Samakoff, and it was necessary to telegraph for doctors to Sofia and Philippopolis. The greatest excitement reigns in Constantinople since the receipt of this intelligence, and very grave anxiety is expressed in diplomatic circles as to the possible consequences of this terrible misfortune. EDITORIAL COMMENTS. IT is impossible to overrate the grave significance of this attempted assassination at Samakoff, which in the light of our Correspondent's telegrams would seem to be the prelude to very serious complications in the East. It is, of course, too early to estimate its influence upon general European politics, but we are quite within reason in saying that the dramatic incident may prove to have endangered the peace of Europe. We have long familiarised ourselves with the thought that the Great War of which the world has been in constant dread for some years back, and which is to re-adjust the balance of the Continent, is much more likely to break out in the region of the Danube than on the banks of the Ehine, and the incident at Samakoff may well pre- cipitate the catastrophe. The situation is most perilous, and it is to be hoped that strenuous endeavours will be made by the Powers to chain up the 'dogs of war,' and spare this dying century, at least, the spectacle of their release. Since the Treaty of Berlin patched up the last serious disturbance in Europe, there has been peace; peace, it is true; but a peace subject to perpetual menace, and weighty matter for the consideration of statesmen. Europe has lived, as it were, in armed camps, neutral The Great War of 1 89 3 and watchful; and all the time the nations have prepared against war as though war were at their doors. The dastardly outrage at Samakoff comes at a sorry time. For we repeat our firm conviction, based on long and close attention to the political motives at- work among the nations, that it is on the Danube and not on the Ehine that the torch of war will first be kindled. To a pessimist, indeed, if not to an unbiassed observer, we may well seem of late to have been drawing nearer and nearer to a general war. The world has never been afflicted with more persistent rumours of war. No single day has passed without bringing us its perturbing crop of tremors and apprehen- sions about the stability of the European peace. From week to week the Jewish speculators on all the Bourses of Christendom have been robbed of their sleep, and, worse still, of their dividends, by telegrams as to the secret massing of troops on this or that frontier, and of ruinous uprisings in various subject and down-trodden countries. Now it is the Black Sea Treaty that is going to be forcibly robbed of its entire Dardanelles clauses, and again the Bargain of Berlin is about to be perforated, for the sixth time, by the sword-point of the Czar. Then the Roumanians wake up to find the Russians beginning to hem them in on three sides ; while, again, newspaper readers are horrified by a revelation of the rapacious passions which some dignify by the title of ' principle of nationality,' and others denounce as criminal ' lust of land,' that are on the verge of outbreak at Athens and Sofia, at St. Petersburg, at Belgrade, at Vienna, at Paris, and even at Rome. Where is the wisdom of highly-placed men like the German Emperor and his new Chancellor assuring the world, in addresses from the throne and after-dinner speeches, that the peace of Europe was never more assured than at present, and that the political horizon is without a cloud even of the size of Elijah's ominous and initial speck of vapour ? What is the truth or the wisdom of such assurances, when the thorn of Alsace-Lorraine is still sticking in the flesh of the unforgiving and revengeful French; when Italy still has some territory 'unredeemed;' when Denmark still harbours 4 The Great War of 1 89 a deep grudge against her truculent despoiler ; when even the peace- ful Swedes, who are still animated by the spirit of the Great Gusta- vus, long to free their former subjects, the Finns, from the tyrannical mastery of the Eussiaiis ; when the Spaniards would gladly profit by a European complication even if they shrank from the thought of an audacious coup de main to repossess themselves of Gibraltar ; when the Portuguese, following suit, would never hesitate to kick their British rival in Africa, if they deemed him to be down ; when the Cretans, egged on by the Greeks, are firmly resolved to throw off the galling yoke of the Turks; when ex-ministers like M. Tricoupis stump about the Balkan Peninsula, openly preaching Pan-hellenism and Balkan Federation against the advocates ot disunited nationalities ; when the Servians secretly vow to settle up old scores with their Bulgarian vanquishers, and when these Bulgarian victors themselves, with their Prime Minister more than their Prince at their head, are sternly determined to be free and independent alike of Sultan and of Czar; when Austria continues to cast longing eyes in the direction of Salonica ; and when, above all things, the Colossus of the North, with his head pillowed on snow, and his feet swathed in flowers of the sunny South, has sworn by the soul of his assassinated and sainted father that he will ever remain true to the intention of his sire in exacting a solid equivalent of power, prestige, and territorial foothold on the Balkan Peninsula for all the blood and treasure spent by Russia in the task of 'liberating' the Bulgarians ; when all these things, all these slumbering passions and meditated schemes of aggression and revenge are duly considered, how is it possible for any one, be he sovereign or subject, to lull the world asleep by false assurances of peace which is sooner or later doomed to be broken ? The Triple Alliance will no more succeed in terrorising the souls of all these secret plotters and designers, and in giving them pause, than three inter-locked mountain oaks or firs could stay the downward course of an extended series of separate avalanches, which rend away with them pines, and oaks, and all, in their resistless rush. But has the avalanche, which we thus dread, really and' truly The Great War of 189 5 at last begun to move ? We sincerely trust not, but for the present at least, the omens in the East have an exceedingly ugly and alarming look, and we shall await the arrival of further telegrams with the greatest anxiety. The Triple Alliance is not an embank- ment that can bar the advancing flood of war, but rather a detached fortress which must itself soon incur the danger of being sur- rounded and even submerged by the rushing, whirling waters of European strife. Though the parties to this three-cornered pact have agreed to place their fire-engines, so to speak, at each other's disposal in the event of external danger from fire to their respective domiciles, it is beyond the reach of these Powers to prevent the outbreak of a conflagration, from accident or arson, among the rickety, wind-swept, and thatch-roofed mansions of their neigh- bours ; nor is there any fact better established in connection with fires than that they are used by thieves and anarchists for the purpose of sudden plunder and disorder, at once upon the persons and property of the victims and beholders of such catastrophes. Let us suppose, for example, that as a consequence of this most alarming incident at Samakoff, hostilities should ensue between Eussia and Austria, the former being the aggressor. In that case Germany in virtue of her published Treaty with the Hapsburg Monarchy would almost immediately have to take the field. Now, in such a contingency, is there not a grave danger that France, seizing the golden opportunity for which she has so long been waiting, would at once mobilise her army, and march the greater part of it towards the Rhine ? And is it not certain that the immediate result of such a revengeful step on her part would be that Italy, true likewise to her Treaty engagement with Germany, would make haste to spring upon the flank of the Eepublic ? It is not well to forecast evils, but at the same time it is well to look clearly ahead. We know surely enough the real nature of the feelings with which the Bulgarians are regarded by their ' Liberators/ just as we are equally cognisant of the true character of those who profess to be the Sultan's ' friends,' and who, with the 6 The Great War of 1 89 privilege of most intimate amity, have repeatedly helped themselves to disintegrating slices of his dominions. We need not remind our readers of th bitterness which still rankles in the breasts of the Koumanians at the memory of the manner in which they were 'rewarded' for services rendered at the Gravitza Kedoubt and elsewhere during the war against the Turks ; a bitterness which was only equalled by the rage of the Eussians when they recognised the supreme folly of their conduct in forcing Eoumania to accept the Dobrudja in exchange for Bessarabia, and thus depriving them- selves of a pied b terre and strategical base of operations south of the Danube, in the direction of the grand goal of their ultimate ambition the Golden Horn. It is as much the desire of Eussia to undo this unfortunate bargain as it is to shake herself free from the intolerable shackles that restrain her liberty of action in the Black Sea, and seal up the outlets thereof against her ships of war. Eussia is only awaiting a proper opportunity for accomplishing these two other stages in what she deems to be her destiny (and does not everything come to him who can wait ?) just as she con- tinues to pursue her anti-English policy in Central Asia with steady, disdainful, unresisted strides, ever lessening the distance between her own frontiers and those of India, and thus paving the way for the execution of her policy of preventing the forces of England from being thrown into the balance should any complication arise in the East of Europe. ' And ever,' as Tennyson sang, ' upon the topmost roof the banner of England blew ; ' but that proud banner has now, at last, been blown away by Cossack colonels from the topmost roof of all the ' Eoof of the World ' itself, thus enabling Eussia to overpeer our very Indian plains, and thence despatch her Calebs and her Joshuas to spy out this other land of promise. It may be quite true and, indeed, from all we know of the character of the Czar, we think it is quite true that Alexander in. has a holy horror of war, into which he is determined not to plunge his people ; and we have been assured by the greatest master of modern war, the late Count Moltke, that the period of dynastic conflicts, or struggles resulting from the personal passions and The Great War of 189 7 petulance of rulers, has come to an end, and been succeeded by wars between peoples and nations. This is also quite true ; but it is precisely herein that the greatest danger lurks. For a ruler as witness the case of the present Czar's own father may prove too weak to restrain or deflect the set of the popular tide, and be plunged into a war against his own will. It is also conceivable that the French Government might find it impossible to resist the clamours of the Chamber to embrace the first opportunity and what could be a better one than a general European conflagration ? for ousting the English from Egypt an object which all good Frenchmen deeply have at heart. But it is on the Balkan Peninsula, where there are no rulers or restraining influences to speak of, that popular passions and aspirations must enjoy most unbridled sway ; and therefore it is that we look with anxiety for the further development of this tragic event at Samakoff, which has already thrown the Balkan countries into a state of wild excitement, and all Europe into a fit of ever-increasing alarm. (By Telegraph from our Special Correspondent, Mr. Francis Scudamore.) PHILIPPOPOLIS, April 4. (Sunday Night} I date this message from Philippopolis, whence indeed it will be despatched on our arrival there to- morrow ; but, as a matter of fact, it is written in the sleeping car of a special train by which I am travelling to Ichtiman en route for Samakoff, in company with Drs. Patterson, Stekoulis, and Lelongt. who have been invited by telegraph to meet their Bulgarian col- leagues in consultation at the bedside of the wounded Prince. It is to these gentlemen's courtesy that I owe the privilege of my passage. I am enabled, by the kindness of my friends at the United States Legation, which, as is natural in the circumstances, has received minute information as to the occurrence, to give you a fuller and more authentic account of the Samakoff tragedy of yesterday by which Prince Ferdinand of Bulgaria so nearly lost his life, than is likely to have been transmitted as yet, and of 8 The Great War 0/189 which no doubt garbled first reports have already thrown conster- nation into every European capital. I have already stated that it is in the house of an American missionary that Prince Ferdinand is at present lying. I must now explain that Samakoff, which is nestled in the heart of a picturesque valley formed by the rough triangle of the Kilo Dagh, the Kadir Tere, and the De mir Kapou Dagh at the head of the Balabancha range of Balkans, is not only one of the wealthiest towns in the principality, thanks to the iron mines by which it is surrounded, but is also famous and dear to Bulgarians by reason of the presence there of the American Mission School, whose principals rendered such devoted and signal service to the oppressed Christians throughout the terrible time of the massacres of 1876 and the war of 1877. At that time, when, as will be remembered, to be a Bulgarian was all- sufficient reason for being summarily hanged (if a man), or foully outraged (if a woman), the principal of the school and his courageous wife snatched many victims from the gallows, and rescued from a terrible fate, by harbouring in the mission-house, numerous young girls and children, fugitives from the devastated villages of the Balkan slopes. And when brighter days dawned for Bulgaria, and it became a principality, the services of the American Mission at Samakoff were not forgotten. It became a custom, inaugurated by Prince Alexander and studiously maintained by his successor, for the Euler of Bulgaria to visit Samakoff in an informal manner once or twice a year, for the purpose of inspecting the mission school and complimenting its directors. The snows which have held Samakoff isolated from the rest of the world throughout the past four months, are now just melted, and thus it chanced that Prince Ferdinand, who for a week past had been shooting in th.e hills around Philippopolis, decided to pay his first visit of the year to the missionaries of Samakoff, and had, un- fortunately as it turns out, announced his intention of so doing. The Prince, with this purpose in view, left Philippopolis on Friday evening, passing the night in his sleeping-car, and yester- day morning started in a caUclie from Ichtiman-i-Vakarel, formerly The Great War of 1 89 - 9 the boundary between Bulgaria and the province of Eastern Roumelia, to drive to the little township in the mountains. His Highness has usually been accompanied on these visits by one or other of the ministers, but on this occasion, owing partly, no doubt, to his hurriedly-formed plans, he had with him only one of the aides-de-camp who had been of the shooting-party. The Prince's carriage was preceded by half-a-dozen mounted guards, and followed by a like number, as an escort. This is a precaution which Prince Ferdinand's advisers have prevailed with him, much against his will, to adopt of late, in view of the renewed activity of Russian agents and sedition-mongers throughout the Principality and the neighbouring States, where, indeed, a great anti-Bulgarian and anti-Turkish propaganda has been actively carried on for the past year ; and in view also of the growing apprehension of his advisers that the recent success in this city of assassins in Russian pay, coupled with the immunity from punishment which the Czar's representatives have shown their ability and readiness to secure for them, would prompt the conspirators, soon or late, to fly at higher game than either M. Starnbuloff or the late Dr. Vulkovitch. That his Highness's advisers were in the right has been proved by the attempt of yesterday. The event, however, may be said to offer encouragement at once to would-be regicides and to their intended victims, inasmuch as it has been shown yet once again to the former, how useless as a protection against assassins is the presence of an armed escort, and to the latter, how apt is a well-matured plot to be frustrated by a commonplace accident. The Prince's carriage was expected to reach Samakoff about noon, and shortly before that hour a considerable number of persons had collected in the main street, while small crowds had gathered round the gates of the Prefecture and about the door of the American Mission-house, which is situated in a side street leading off the high road, and where the usual modest preparations had been made for the princely visit. His Highness, on arrival, after halting for a moment or two at io The Great War of 189 the gate of the Prefecture where he did not alight, drove on through the town towards the Mission-house. At the moment when the carriage turned the comer into the narrower street, a man wearing the long black gown and brimless stovepipe hat of a priest of the orthodox church stood forward from the crowd, in which were several other persons dressed as he was, and, raising a revolver, took deliberate aim at his Highness. And then occurred the accident to which, in all probability, Prince Ferdinand owes his life. The cartridge did not explode. The sham priest lowered his weapon slightly, raised it once more, and again pulled the trigger ; but as he did so the pistol barrel was struck up the ball burying itself in the wall of a house across the street and the assassin was seized and firmly held by many willing hands. The whole occurrence had taken but a moment. The Prince, when he saw the pistol levelled at him, had leapt to his feet, with the evident intention of thowing himself upon his murderer. As it was, his Highness's intervention seemed very necessary on behalf of the baffled assassin, who stood in no small danger of being lynched incontinently by his furious captors. The carriage had stopped ; the escort was hastily dismounting, and the Prince, shouting orders to the people to spare their prisoner's life, had alighted, and turning, was in the act of throwing his heavy pelisse to his companion, when sudden as thought a second ruffian sprang from amid the vociferating mob, hurled himself upon the Prince, and thrusting a great, broad-bladed Cir- cassian klianga into his bosom, was away and out of sight almost before any of the bystanders had recovered from this second shock of horror and surprise. His Highness, who had sunk to the ground under the blow, though he did not lose consciousness, was at once carried into the Mission-house, distant a few yards only, and very speedily all the best medical advice obtainable in Samakoff was at hand, while telegrams for further assistance were at once despatched to Sofia and to Philippopolis, the latter place being perhaps more rapidly accessible than the capital. The first examination of the wound The Great War of 189 1 1 showed that the broad knife had turned on the point of a rib very fortunately and had therefore missed, by a hair's-breadtht the envelope of the heart. It was not till to-day that a persisten, recurrence of internal haemorrhage aroused the gravest fears of the Prince's surgeons, and prompted them to appeal to Constantinople for further advice. The pretended priest, when searched, was found to be costumed beneath his robes in the ordinary dress of the petty trader of the THE ATTEMPTED ASSASSINATION OF PRINCE FERDINAND OF BULGARIA. towns here. His long flowing locks proved a wig, and his thick unkempt beard was also false. Upon him, among other papers said to be of great importance, but as to which I know nothing, was found a passport issued by the Eussian Consulate at Odessa no less recently than last month, and bearing the ms& of the Eussian Chancellor at Sofia. The passport is made out in the name of Ivan Bendukdjieff, -and belongs, the fellow avows, to a man, a stranger to him, who left it with him by mistake a week ago. But the authorities entertain few doubts as to the scoundrel's 12 The Great War 0/189 identity with one of the men implicated with Shishmanoft in tlxe recent murder of Dr. Vulkovitch. I have said that the news of this dastardly attempt on Prince Ferdinand's life caused the greatest excitement in Constantinople. There is indeed no doubt that both the Palace and the Porte are very seriously alarmed, as, in view of the Sultan's disgraceful action in the Vu.lkovitch affair, it is only just they should be. It is significant of his Majesty's state ot mind that, when early this (Sunday) morning, first the French and then the Eussian Ambas- sador drove to. the residence of the Grand Vizier, they were unable to see him, orders having been sent from Yildiz ordering the Pasha not to receive them. Sir Clare Ford, on the other hand, had a long interview with the Sultan this morning. PHILIPPOPOLIS, April 4. When the train steamed into the station here, I learned in the restaurant, where everyone wns eagerly discussing the events of the past two days, that the second assassin was captured yesterday afternoon at Banja, as the result of an order widely circulated by both telegraph and horse messengers throughout the country, calling upon all Tchorbadjis, or headmen of villages, to detain any stranger found within their jurisdiction, and at once communicate with the nearest central authority. The man has been identified as one Nicholi Naoum, a very well-known character who, besides being suspected of participation in the murder, last spring, of M. Beltcheff, is known to have been acting for the past six months as a revolutionary agent on the Macedonian frontier. Naoum, who, as leader of a gang of border brigands, has gained a bloody notoriety in connection with various dastardly outrages against society, is believed to have been recently engaged in distributing arms and ammunition among Macedonian villages, and in inciting the Macedonians to molest the Bulgarians dwelling among them. Naoum, when arrested, was found to be provided, like his accomplice, with a Russian passport executed in regular form. He was immedi- ately carried back to Samakoff and confronted with Bendukdjieff, The Great War of 1 89 against whom he at once began to rail as a bungler, making no attempt to exonerate himself, or to deny his share in the tragedy. In this course, perhaps, he was guided by the knowledge that his life was already forfeited for many atrocious crimes before he set his hand against Prince Ferdinand. As a consequence of his last M. STAMBULOFF Prime Minister of Bulgaria, appointed Regent after the attempted assassination of Prince Ferdinand. admission of guilt, a very brief trial was necessary, and the two wretches were hanged this morning outside the house in which they had lodged on Friday night in Samakoff. The Prince is apparently doing well. M. Stambuloff. who, on receipt of news of the disaster, hurried to his master's bedside, remained but one hour in Samakoff, during which time, despite 14 The Great War 0/189 the doctors, the Prince insisted on seeing him, and returned direct to Sofia. Late on Saturday night, at a meeting attended by most of the Ministers, hurriedly convened, he was declared Eegent during the serious illness of the Prince, and for such time as might be necessary, and the formal proclamation in accordance with this decision was issued yesterday morning. SOFIA, April 6. Instead of accompanying Dr. Patterson and his colleagues on a, to me, fruitless expedition to Samakoff, I bid them good-bye at Ichtiman, where they left the train, and came on here. As might be expected, I have found this city boiling with tumultuous emotions, and not only though that were sufficient cause on account of the outrageous attempt on Prince Ferdinand's life. It appears that the Cabinet has received news of the greatest importance from the Macedonian frontier. The assiduous efforts of Eussian agents, who have been actively engaged for the past six months or more not only in the provinces itself, but also in the Greek and Montenegrin borders, in fermenting an anti-Bulgarian rising, are now on the eve of being crowned with success. Already reports have reached the capital of disturbances, caused apparently by raids made across the border at Petrovich and Melnik. That there is a great shifting of troops at present in progress as a result of this intelligence, is not denied. It is said, indeed, though I cannot as yet tell with what truth, that a half division has been ordered to Petrovich, and another like force to Strumnitza. The latest rumour here is to the effect that the movement in Macedonia is as much anti-Turkish as an ti- Bulgarian, and that Turkey is also despatching a large military force to Salonika. If this report be true, it is surely an instance of the irony of fate. In this country it is a matter of common talk that any anti-Bulgarian movement in Macedonia is mainly due to the attitude of Zuknir Pasha, the Vali of Salonika, towards the large Bulgarian element of the popu- lation of the province under his control. This functionary's persistent ill-treatment of Bulgarians has been very frequently re- THE BULGARIAN MOBILISATION TROOPS MARCHING THROUGH THE STREETS OF PIIILIPPOPOLIS, 1 6 The Great War of 1 89 presented to the Porte in notes from this capital as being contrary at once to the interests of Turkey and of Bulgaria. The Principality, it has been said, has consistently refused to take side with those who seek the dismemberment of Turkey, and has claimed a right to expect that the development of the Bulgarian element in Macedonia would not be crushed by Pashas who, by their arbitrary actions, paralyse the intentions of the central government, and prepare the way for events which had better, in the common interest, be avoided. It is needless to say these sensible warnings have been altogether disregarded by the Porte, with the present inevitable result. It is further rumoured here for the place is full of suspicion that in view of certain movements of Servian troops, a large Bulgarian force has been hurriedly thrown forward to strengthen the troops at Eadomir, Trn, and Zaribrod. SOFIA, April 8. The latest reports as to Prince Ferdinand are more favourable than could have been hoped for. The dangerous symptoms have subsided. Internal haemorrhage has been checked. The Prince sleeps and takes nourishment, and his pulse and temperature are satisfactory. Hopes are held out that in a week's time His Highness may be moved from Samakoff. Meanwhile, during the past few days, events have marched so rapidly that people here are prepared for almost any eventuality. There is no longer any attempt to conceal the movements of Servian troops. Great numbers of men are already massed at Nisch and Vranja, and at points on the line of railway between Nisch and Pirot. The main body of the Servian army has its headquarters at Knuzevatz. From Belgrade, we learn of the steady despatch of war material and siege-train to Negotin on the frontier against Widdin, and a telegram from the same source announces the arrival at Nisch of a train of the Ked Cross Society, consisting of eighteen carriages furnished with all the necessary equipment for active service. News from Constantinople is to the effect that the Porte, alarmed at the aspect of affairs in Macedonia, has, in addition to The Great War of i^ 17 the calling out of the last class of rediffs, decided on the formation of five new Army Corps. Fresh levies are to be made in order to form a strong reserve. The transport of rediffs, mainly from Smyrna, Skanderouu, and the Tripolitaine, is being carried on on a large scale. Over 27,000 reservists have already passed through Smyrna. Many of the Austrian Lloyd vessels being engaged in the trans- port of troops to Salonika to guard the frontier line and to reinforce the Bitolia garrison, the Seraskierate is negotiating with THE SERVO-BULGARIAN CAMPAIGN THROUGH PIROT TO THE FRONT. some English shipping companies for additional transport. More than fifty thousand troops are to be employed on the Macedonian border in a line stretching from Mitrovitza on the north, all round to Easlok on the south-east. Their chief stations will be Palanka, with Uskub as base, and Djuma and Neurokoy with Strumdja as base. No further disturbances are reported from the frontier. M. Stambuloff left here last night to inspect the troops on the frontier. I am, of course, unable to give any information as B 1 8 The Great War of 1 89 to their numbers or disposition, but it may be said that Bulgaria is well prepared to resist any attack. It is infringing no rule to say that the Prince's army possesses no fewer than 400 pieces of ordnance of all calibres. The report that his appointment as Eegent has met with disapprobation among a large section of the community here is absolutely without foundation. A trusted agent of the Government has also left here for Berlin, for the purpose, it is understood, of raising a loan in that capital. SOFIA, April 10. We are now at war, and fighting is going forward even as I write. This morning rifle-shots were exchanged between Servian and Bulgarian patrolling parties on the frontier, near Trn, without result on either side. A body of some 300 Servians then crossed the frontier and advanced about a mile, seeking to cut off a party of fifty Bulgarians, who, however, retreated and escaped. Later on heavy fighting was reported in the neighbourhood of Vlassina. How it originated is immaterial. The Bulgarians lost 17 men killed and 54 wounded. This set fire to the torch all along the frontier line. Some time before the official declaration of war, which, though it announced that hostilities would begin at noon to-day, did not reach the Minister for Foreign Affairs here until nine o'clock this evening, reports had been posted up in the cafe's announcing fighting in the vicinity of Planinitza, Beuskedol, Miloslawtzi, Zelene, and Gard, in the Trn district. The Servian Minister, who had twice telegraphed to his Government for instructions during the afternoon, demanded a special train as soon as he had presented the declaration of war, and left half an hour later, under escort, for the frontier. A solemn Te Deum was sung this evening in the Cathedral, M. Stambuloff and the Ministers being present. The streets are crowded no one shows any intention of going to bed ; the popular enthusiasm and confidence are immense, and there is apparently a general sensation of relief at the relaxation of the strain of the The Great War of 189 19 past few days, and a feeling of satisfaction that the dastardly attack on the Prince will be promptly avenged. I am, by the way, authorised to state that, by order of Prince Ferdinand's physicians, all news of these exciting events is rigidly withheld from his Highness. Fresh troops are hourly leaving Sofia and Philippopolis for the front. At the moment of closing this despatch, news comes of an AN AFFAIR OF OUTPOSTS THE FIRST SHOT IN THE SERVO-BULGARIAN CAMPAIGN. important action near Dragoman, with reported defeat of the Servians with heavy losses. SOFT A April 11. There is to be no more fighting. The brilliant and most sanguinary engagement at Dragoman^ which I reported in progress last night, in the course of which the Bulgarians, who were com- pletely successful, drove the enemy back from all their positions on the heights above the pass : an incessant, artillery duel, main- 2O The Great War of 18 9 tained ever since the commencement of hostilities between the heavy Servian batteries before Negotin and the Bulgarian forces garrisoning Widelin, and a very successful unopposed advance along the Vranja road as far as the Morava river by a Bulgarian force, composed of three brigades from Sofia, from Trn, and from Badomir, make up all there is to report of the campaign. For when hostilities were about to be opened this morning near Kumareno, which was evidently held by a large Servian force, an officer bearing a white towel, with a pink fringe, tied to a hedge stake, as a flag of truce, rode out from the Servian lines and demanded a pourparler. It then transpired that the Servians found themselves in a terrible quandary, and were at their wits' end what to do. Late last night a large Austrian force had, without warning, crossed the Save into Belgrade, which city they had taken so com- pletely by surprise that it was not until the morning that the populace was made aware of the presence of the strangers in their midst by the sight of the troops bivouacking in the squares, and the officers quietly breakfasting outside the principal cafes. An Austrian force, said the parlementaire, had also crossed the Danube to Semendria, and there were rumours that another force had crossed the same river at Orsova In these circumstances, with their capital cut off from them, and their young king and govern- ment in a manner locked up, the Servian generals considered they had no alternative but to demand a suspension of hostilities, at least for forty-eight hours, An armistice was therefore granted, much to the Bulgarian leaders' annoyance and disgust. We learn that Austria has notified the Powers that she has occupied Semendria and Belgrade as a precautionary measure, in view of the wanton aggression of Servia. It is here considered unlikely that Bulgaria will have any more trouble from this quarter. On the other hand, however, grave rumours reach us from Constantinople, where apparently there is very great anxiety as to certain mysterious and as yet undefined threats by Bussia. The Turkish capital is, as matters 22 The Great War of 189 stand at present, likely to be the chief centre of interest for some time to come, and I shall therefore return there to-morrow morning. All through the day long trains of Bulgarian and Servian wounded have crept one after another into Sofia. It is note- worthy that a considerable percentage of the sufferers are bright and lively and make light of their injuries. These are men who have been struck by the small nickel bullets of the new rifle, which has been used in pretty equal proportions on both sides. CONSTANTINOPLE, April 15. There is no doubt good cause for the grave fears at present agitating Porte and Palace. By his foolishly near-sighted policy of pandering to the wishes of whatsoever Power bullies him with most brutal persistency, at the risk though it be of injuring a friendly State, the Sultan has, as he is beginning to realise, suc- ceeded in alienating, for the moment at least, the sympathies of all his legitimate friends. By his attitude wilfully perverse and undignified throughout the varying phases of the Vulkovitch episode, his Majesty has aroused throughout Bulgaria deep distrust of himself, and fierce indignation against his ministers and his methods. The inane and futile strivings of the Porte to throw difficulties in the path of the young Khedive, and to cheat him, if possible, of rights clearly accorded and amply paid for, have pro- duced similar sentiments in Egypt and in England. And having, at the cost of much labour and intrigue, achieved this wholly unsatisfactory position of being an object of contempt, suspicion, and obloquy, the Sultan finds himself suddenly but decidedly thrown over by the very Powers with whom he had sought to curry favour. The Russian Ambassador is now too thoroughly pre-occupied with the immediate policy of his own Government to have any further care to wear gloves in his dealings with the Porte, and his mood has so affected M. Cambon, the French Ambassador, that that astute personage, unable to find those sweet professions and gracious persuasion half unmeaning promise, half veiled threat with which he has been wont to dorloter the The Great War of i^ 23 Ministers at Bab Aali come readily to his tongue, has ceased for a fortnight past to hold any other than mere chancellerie com- munication with the Turkish Government. Let it be said at once that, despite very natural indignation, Bulgaria shows every disposition to behave well towards the Suzerain Power. Officially, indeed, her attitude has been in every way admirable. When the Servians opened hostilities, when they declared war, when they asked for an armistice in every phase, in short, of the quarrel, M. Stambuloff apprised, and asked counsel and aid of, the Sultan. To be sure he got nothing for his pains, but it must have been a satisfaction to the Sultan to receive proof that, in one quarter at any rate, he is not regarded as a European Power of merely sentimental importance. . CONSTANTINOPLE, April 16. Fresh alarm was caused here this morning by the discovery that our telegraphic communication has been interrupted at once with Odessa and with Batoum. All inquiries as to the cause of the rupture made by other routes failed to elicit any explanation. Later in the day a vessel of the Cunard line arrived in the Bos- phorus, and her captain lias stated that the Eussian harbour- master at Odessa is detaining all ships, of whatever nationality, in that port. His own vessel, he says, was the last to leave Odessa, and only got away by a chance, the order having reached him when he had already got under way. He states that there were several Eussian ironclads, and quite a fleet of torpedo boats at Odessa, all with steam up, and says that when he was on shore there the day before yesterday the town was full of soldiers, and the approaches to the dockyards crowded with a constantly -increas- ing mass of guns, horses, ammunition, and other war material. CONSTANTINOPLE, April 18. I have received a telegram from my correspondent in Sofia, who tells me that the Bulgarian Government understands that the Russians are preparing an expedition for sea at Odessa, and intend 24 . The Great War of 189 to occupy some portion of Bulgarian territory. The Princely Govern- ment has reason to expect the attack will be directed against Varna, and has called upon the Sultan to aid Bulgarian arms by sending his fleet to guard the Varna roads. The Sultan has as yet made no reply to this request, says my correspondent, but it is not difficult to guess what His Majesty's action will be, inasmuch as Turkey has no single ship of war in condition to be got to sea under a month at the least, and it is more than questionable whether even then any of the ironclads could be completely manned or provided with serviceable ammunition. There are, indeed, some torpedo boats unprovided, I understand, with torpedoes and a WITH THE TURKS : ADMIRAL WOODS PACHA'S FLEET OF TORPEDO BOATS STEAMING THROUGH THE BOSPHORUS. couple of the monitors that did some service in the Danube in the last war. If the Admiralty should elect to place these vessels at the service of the Bulgarian Government, they might be of some use as scouts. But that is about all that Turkey can hope to do for her vassal. Here there is terrible anxiety lest the Eussian expedition be directed, not against Varna or Bourgas, but against the Kavaks, and the Seraskierate is busily taking precautions to meet such a contingency with all the forces available. Despite the recent draining of the Stamboul camp by the despatch of a large force to Salonika, there are still some 45,000 The Great War 0f 189 men in and around the capital. These, with the exception of the Sultan's guard of about 15,000 men, have been distributed along the chain of forts extending from Eoumelie Kavak to the Golden Horn. The telegraph is kept busily at work summoning troops from all parts of the Empire. 15,000 men from the Adrianople garrison are expected to arrive here to-night. The Russian Ambassador is said to be ill. He has not left the Embassy in the Grand Rue de Pera for now almost a week, and refuses to receive any one. Even his French colleague found the door closed to him yesterday. RUSSIAN INFANTRY LANDING AT VARNA. CONSTANTINOPLE, April 19. A Russian force, variously computed at from 50,000 to 70,000 men, occupied Varna this morning. There was some smart resist- ance, but the comparatively small Bulgarian force was powerless igainst the heavy metal of the Russian fleet, and after an hour's lighting was compelled to abandon the position. Coincident with the receipt of this news is the delivery of a 26 The Great War 0/189 note by the Kussian Ambassador suddenly restored to health to the Minister for Foreign Affairs, setting forth that, as a result of the extraordinary and uncalled-for position taken up by Austria, the Czar's Government feels the necessity of acquiring a material guarantee for the maintenance of peace, and will therefore effect a peaceful occupation of Bourgas and Yarna with that end in view. EUSSIAN MOVEMENT UPON THE AUSTEIAN FRONTIER MOBILISATION OF GERMAN ARMY CORPS WILD EXCITEMENT IN BERLIN. (By Telegraph from our Special Correspondent, Mr. Charles Lowe.) BERLIN, April 21 (8.50 P.M.). NEVER since the fateful days of July 1870 has so much excite- ment been caused here as by the news which now seems to be beyond all doubt that Russia, having received an evasive, or, as other telegrams put it, a flatly negative reply to her peremptory demand for the immediate evacuation of Belgrade by the Austrians, has already begun to move down immense masses of troops towards her south-western frontier ; and it is even rumoured that a division of cavalry has suddenly made its appearance near the border, on the Warsaw-Cracow road, at a place called Xiaswielki. This is a grave situation, indeed, as alarming as it is sudden. The Unter den Linden, which is a perfect Babel with the bawling voices of the newsvendors, i? rapidly tilling with crowds rushing hither, as to the main channel of intelligence, from all parts of the city, and the Foreign Office in the AVilhelm-Strasse is besieged by a huge throng clamouring to hear the truth. For on this depends the issue of peace or war for Germany. Let but Russia lay one single finger of aggression on Austria, and Germany must at once unsheath her sword and spring to The Great War of 189 27 her ally's aid. Pray let there be no mistake as to the terms of the Austro-German Treaty of 1879, which was published a year or two ago, for it has often been misinterpreted. Under this instrument a casus fcederis does not arise for Germany in all and any circum- stances of a war between Russia and Austria, but only in the event of the former being the aggressor ; and it looks very much as though Russia were now seriously bent on taking the offensive. Does she really mean to do this ? is the question on every one's lips here, and the excitement of people is equal to their suspense. It is known that an active correspondence by wire is proceeding between here and Vienna, but the authorities are very reticent, and only beg the crowds to keep calm and hope for the best. 9 P.M. I have just returned from the Schloss, whither the multitude, which was unable to gratify its curiosity at the Foreign Office, had surged along to pursue its eager inquiries, but only to find that the Emperor was closeted with his Chancellor, General Count von Caprivi, and his Chief of the Staff, Count von Schlieffen. It was remarked that when both these magnates emerged from their interview with His Majesty, and drove off at a rapid rate, they looked very serious and pre-occupied, paying but little heed to the cheering which greeted their appearance. This only tended to deepen the apprehension of the vast crowd in front of the Schloss, whose fears were further augmented by a rumour (a true one, as I found on tracing it to its source), which spread like lightning, that the Emperor had telegraphed for the King of Saxony, Prince Albrecht of Prussia, Prince-Regent of Brunswick both Field- Marshals as also for Count Waldersee, Commander of the Ninth Army Corps in Schleswig-Holstein, whom the Emperor, it may be remembered, when parting with this distinguished officer, as Chief of the General Staff, publicly designated as the Commander of a whole army in the event of war. 10 P.M. After despatching my last message, which I had the utmost difficulty in doing owing to the frantic mass of newspaper corre- 28 The Great War of 189 spondents of all nationalities struggling desperately into and out of the Telegraph Office, I had the good fortune to meet Baron von Marschall, the amiable and accomplished Foreign Secretary, who favoured me with a brief conversation on the momentous subject of the hour. Yes, he said, it was unfortunately quite true that the Russians were rapidly concentrating their forces towards the Austro- German frontier, and that a sotnia of prying Cossacks, coming from Tarnogrod, had even pushed forward on the Austrian side of the border towards Jaroslav, an important railway junction point in Galicia. He had just received intelligence to this effect from Prince Reuss, the German Ambassador in Vienna, who added that things indeed looked their very worst. ' But this,' I remarked, ' is an act of invasion on the part of Russia, is it not, and means war ? ' The Baron shook his head ominously, and, with a kindly ' come and see me again to-morrow morning/ squeezed my hand and hurried off to see Count Sye'che'nyi at the Austrian Embassy, which stands over against the former home of M. Benedetti, with all its associations connected with the beginning of Germany's last great war. On my way back to the Telegraph Office, where I write this, I encountered, just at the entrance to the Russian Embassy, Unter den Linden, its genial and honest occupant, Count Schouvaloff, who was good enough to return my greeting by motioning me to stop, and telling me that he had just been to see Count Caprivi, and assure him, on the part of his Imperial master, that all these warlike preparations in "Western Poland implied no menace whatever to Germany, with whom Russia had not the least cause of quarrel, but that, nevertheless, so long as Austria threatened to derange the balance of power in the Balkan Penin- sula for her own selfish ends, Russia would be incriminating her- self in the eyes of history if she stood by with folded hands and sought not to safeguard her most vital interests by all the means at her disposal. And as Pitt had created a new world to redress the balance of the old, so Russia was now compelled to re-establish equilibrium in one part of the Eastern Continent of The Great War 0/189 29 Europe by giving the would-be disturber of this equilibrium work enough to engross all his attention in another. ' These were not, of course, the very words/ added the Count, ' which I used to the Chancellor, but they express the exact sense of my communi- cation.' MIDNIGHT. Berlin, which has poured all its teeming million-and-a-half into the streets, is at this hour a scene of the wildest excite- ment, owing to a rumour (and a friend of mine in the General Staff, whom I chanced to meet, confirmed the truth of the rumour), that- the awful and electrifying words 'Krieg, mobil/' had (as in 1870) been already flashed again to no fewer than seven of the twenty Army Corps constituting the Imperial host viz., to the 1st, or East Prussian; the 17th, West Prussian; the 3d, Brandenburg; the 4th, Province of Prussian Saxony; the 5th, Posen; the 6th, Silesian ; and the 1 2th, Kingdom of Saxony. Loud and long was the cheering in front of the Schloss which is thronged by an ever-increasing and excited multitude when this intelligence oozed out, and with one accord (for your Germans are a most wonderful people of trained choral-singers) the whole mighty assemblage burst forth with a battle-ballad, in which some deft patriotic poet had been quick to embody the fears and determina- tions of the last few days under the title of 'Die Weichsd-Wacht,' or the ' Watch on the Vistula ' a war-song which promises to fill as large and luminous a page among the lyric gems of the Fatherland as Schneckenburger's immortal * WacJit am Rhcin' When the frantic cheering which followed the chanting of this stirring battle-anthem had subsided, the Emperor (who has now Completely recovered from the accident to his knee) came out to jow his acknowledgments from the front balcony of the castle ; md on his arm was the Empress holding the hand of the pretty ittle flaxen-haired Crown Prince, who had been routed out of his warm bed at this late and chilly hour to add one crowning touch )f spectacular effect to the tableau which, amid another frenzied 30 The Great War of 189 outburst of ' hochs ' and ' hurrahs/ thus closed the drama of a most exciting and momentous day. INTERVIEW BETWEEN GENERAL CAPRIVI AND THE FRENCH AMBASSADOR. DISPOSITION OF THE GERMAN TEOOPS. (By Telegraph from our Special Correspondent, Mr. Charles Lowe.) BERLIN, April 23. THE excitement of the last few days has now calmed down into the serious and stolid determination, which is the most striking characteristic of the German race, and though it is known that, since the order to mobilise seven Army Corps was issued, M. Herbette, the French Ambassador, has had repeated interviews with General Capri vi, the nation is meanwhile content to suppress its suspicion with regard to the possible nay, probable policy of its western neighbour, and devote all its attention to the develop- ment of events on its eastern border. Certain official telegrams which I have been allowed to peruse leave little doubt that, while the Russians are making a show of massing troops in the direction of Cracow, the real line of their strategic advance is towards the Lemberg side, whence a railway leads across the Carpathians to Buda-Pesth. It is argued here that, had the Russians merely to deal with Austria alone, the likeliest line of their advance would be by way of Cracow and its fortress, which they would endeavour to turn, and then strike for Vienna by the route which has been deemed, on the whole, the easier for them, namely, that which leads to the valley of the Danube across Austrian Silesia, and through the gap between the Bohemian and Carpathian mountains. But with a German army massed in Silesia, and menacing their right flank, the advantages of this route would be more than countervailed, and so the The Great War of 189 ? 1 ussians seem to have chosen an invading route as remote as possible from the German base of attack, namely, vid Lemberg and Stryj. Meanwhile the mobilisation of the seven German Army Corps, enumerated by me in a previous despatch, is in full swing, the reserve men hastening to the colours with great alacrity ; and as the railways are working night and day, all public traffic being suspended, the troops will soon be in the various positions assigned them. The 12th, or Eoyal Saxon Corps, it seems, is to be sent over to strengthen the Austrians, which will appear a wise and tactful disposition, when it is remembered how the Saxons fought shoulder to shoulder with the Austrians at Koniggratz; while Field-Marshal Prince George (brother of the King of Saxony) has been intrusted by the Emperor with the command of what is to be called the Army of Silesia, consisting of the 5th arid 6th Corps, now swiftly concentrating between Breslau (which, being at present an open town, is undergoing rapid circumvallation by a ring of 3arthwork forts armed with Schumann gun-turrets) and Neisse, "he Prussian Crown Prince's point of departure for Bohemia in 1866. On the other hand, a Second Army, consisting of the 3d and tth Corps, to be called ' of the Vistula/ and to be commanded by :he King of Saxony, is swiftly massing round Thorn, that Metz of ,he East; while a Third Army, compounded of the 1st and 17th Dorps (East and West Prussia), and denominated ' of the Baltic/ ms been assigned to Count Waldersee, and is fast taking position on the line flanked by the fortresses of Konigsberg and [xftzen, the task assigned to it being evidently an invasion of the 3altic Provinces and the consequent splitting up and diversion of he Eussian forces from their southern objective. As to the .First md Second German Armies (those of Silesia and the Vistula), a jlance at the map will show that, roughly speaking, they form the >ase ends of a triangle whereof Warsaw is the apex, and that a well- imed advance by road or rail, for both are available, would enable hem to effect a junction (on Moltke's principle of marching eparately and fighting combined, as applied with such brilliant 32 The Great War of 189 success at Sadowa), and give decisive battle to the Russians some- where near Warsaw. But I may not indulge at present in a more detailed forecast of the impending campaign and its incidents. Suffice to say that the Germans promise to keep General Gourko, commanding the Russian forces in Poland, quite as busy as General Dragomiroff, commander at Kieff, and chief director of the operations against Galicia, will be kept by the Austrians themselves on their particular side of the seat of war. DEPARTURE OF TROOPS TO THE EAST. 'THE WATCH ON THE VISTULA.' BERLIN, April 24. I HEAR that the Guard Corps is also about to be mobilised as a precautionary measure. This will, of course, be followed by similar orders to all the rest of the German Army should France assume a threatening attitude, and the signs that she means to do this are increasingly ominous. Meanwhile, the armies of the East are pouring towards the frontier with machine-like order and rapidity. All night and all day long, heavily-laden trains conveying the troops of the 4th Corps have been passing through Berlin, one at the tail of the other, towards Thorn ; and there was tremendous cheering this afternoon at the Central Station, which is littered about with beer barrels and piles of edibles offered by the citizens for the refresh- ment and encouragement of the < lapfere Krieger ' who are going at last to measure their strength with the Muscovites, when the Bismarck Cuirassiers from Halberstadt steamed slowly up to the platform for a stoppage just long enough to let the couple of powerful engines water. Rolls and sausages were showered into the carriages containing these splendid heavy troopers (in whose ranks, The Great War of 189 33 by the way, Lieutenant Campbell of Craignish, a young Argyllshire laird now Eittmeister, like Dugald Dalgetty, and aide-de-camp to the Grand Duke of Coburg-Gotha had captured a French eagle at Mars-la-Tour) ; and when their heavy train again began to move away there arose another ringing cheer mingled with ' Hochs ' for Bismarck (and I wonder how the exile of Friedrichsruh feels at the contemplation of all this !) cheers and ' hochs ' that were responded to by these big, deep-chested fellows roaring out the ' Watch on the Vistula,' which has already spread like wildfire throughout the nation, and kindled its heart into a fine warlike glow, BANQUET IN THE SCHLOSS. OMINOUS SPEECH BY THE EMPEROR. (By Telegraph from our Special Correspondent, Mr. Charles Lowe.) BERLIX, April 25. TO-NIGHT the Emperor gave a grand military banquet in the White Saloon of the Schloss previous to his starting for Thorn that tremendous bulwark on the Vistula over against the Eussian frontier, where the work of concentrating the German troops is proceeding rapidly. At this banquet I was favoured with a seat in the gallery, from which I have witnessed so many pomps and pageants at this Court; and when the third course had been reached, His Majesty (who wore the gala uniform of the Gardes du Corps) rose, and, amid a silence in which you might have even heard the fall of a hair, addressed his guests as follows, in a most resolute and rasping voice : ' Heine Herren, God has willed it that Germany should draw her sword in defence of her ally, and to God's high, holy will we all must bow. German loyalty (< Dcuteche Treue') has ever been one of the most conspicuous virtues of our race, and, if we now failed to prove true to our treaty engagements, we should justly c 34 The Great War of 189 deserve to become a mockery and a byeword among the nations. Eemembering, as I do, the very last words almost which were addressed to me by my beloved grandfather, now resting in God, who conjured me to be considerate towards and cultivate the friendship of Kussia, it is with a heart full of exceeding heaviness that I look forward to the events that are ahead of us. Never- theless, it shall be in the power of no one to say that the German Government was ever wanting in fidelity, or the German army deficient in courage. 'Gentlemen, that courage has been displayed on a thousand glorious battle-fields, and never more so than in those stupendous and heroic encounters which made of us a great and united nation a nation whereof the safety and integrity would be gravely imperilled by disaster, involving, perhaps, disruption to the dual monarchy of our allies. Such a result, gentlemen, we cannot endure; and it is to obviate the bare possibility of such a thing that we are now about to respond to the solemn call of treaty obligations, by placing some of our heroic troops side by side with the brave army of my august friend and ally, His Majesty the Emperor Francis- Joseph ; nor is it to be doubted that this com- panionship-in-arms, among other things, will have the blessed effect of wiping out all memory of our past conflicts and estrange- ments, and of re-uniting, in the bonds of fraternal love and loyalty, the two greatest sections of the mighty and invincible German race. ' Meinc fferren, God is above us, but uncertainty, to some extent, is before us. Within the last few years the science of war has been completely revolutionised, and we are all now about to grapple with military problems which never taxed the powers of our predecessors. As the Supreme War-Lord ( ( oberste Kriegs- fferr') of our armies, I mean to make inspection of such of our forces as are now marshalling themselves on our Eastern marches and also to remain at their head unless which God forf end ! the course of events should call me elsewhere. (Sensation.) ' But, gentlemen, I do not require to tell vou that the duties and The Great War of 189 35 functions of a commander are very different now from what they were at the beginning of this century, not to speak of the time of my invincible and immortal ancestor, Frederick the Great, who inspired his troops by his very presence and directed them in battle ; whereas now all that is nearly left to the modern com- mander-in-chief is to lead his forces up to battle and then leave them to the charge of his subordinates an era in the science of warfare which was inaugurated by that great scientific soldier, lately, alas ! taken from us, who has written his deathless name in indelible letters of gold on the tablets of his country's history. ' Forbidden by the nature and necessities of warfare, as now practised, to be a tactician such as Caesar, or Frederick, or Napoleon, or Wellington the modern commander-in-chief must restrict him- self to the task of strategy, and intrust his colonels and his captains with the duty of beating the enemy in detail. And as a modern battle must necessarily stretch over a vast extent of front, it really resolves itself into a hundred separate combats, in which even company leaders become independent commanders ; and thus, gentlemen, to all of you there is opened up a glorious prospect of doing your duty to your country and achieving a distinction which was reserved to the generalissimos of yore. But though thus every colonel and every captain among you is now a com- mander-in-chief, it behoves you to remember that, what witli smokeless powder, magazine rifles of vast range, and other inno- vations, the conditions of fighting have altered immensely even since Germany last took the field ; but I doubt not that you will all prove true to our highest traditions, and that our brave army, with God's blessing, will once more show the stuff of which it is made. ' Gentlemen, this is a solemn moment, and it is not in a spirit of festive mirth, but rather under the influence of the serious feel- ings which dominate us all, that I ask you to drain your glasses to the health of my august ally, His Majesty Francis-Joseph, Emperor of Austria-Hungary. Hurrah, hurrah, hurrah ! ' To-morrow the Emperor will leave for the frontier, and I have 36 The Great War of \ 89 been graciously permitted by His Majesty to attach myself to his Headquarter-Staff. DEPARTURE OF THE EMPEROR FOR THE EAST. BERLIN, April 26. It is long since the Linden Avenue witnessed such a scene of crowding and excitement as it presented to-day, when the Em- peror (who wore the drill uniform of his Silesian Bodyguard Cuirassiers, named of the Great Elector), drove from the Schloss to the Central Station to take train for Thorn. His Majesty was accompanied by the Empress, who looked very sad, where her august husband only wore a serious mien. The fine sunny weather, balmy already with the fragrance of the budding spring, had lured thousands and thousands into the streets to see the away-going of the Emperor on his first campaign ; and it was only with great difficulty that the demi-squadron of cavalry (Gardes du Corps) escorting the Imperial victoria could advance through the packed and cheering masses of people who thronged every inch of standing-space in Unter den Linden, and reached up to the very house-tops. At one point of its route, just opposite Cafe Bauer, the Emperor's carriage was even brought to a stop ; and it was then that a very excited gentleman (who turned out to be an American admirer of His Majesty) profited by the opportunity to throw a laurel wreath into the Imperial equipage. Quick as thought, the Emperor placed the wreath on the point of his sword-scabbard and tossed it back to his adulator, saying with a smile, ' Wait a little, my friend; let us earn this first 'a sally that was the signal for a perfect storm of cheers on the part of the witnesses of this charming incident, which furnished them with additional reason for lauding the Emperor's modesty and good sense. There was much cheering, hat-waving and fluttering of hand- kerchiefs as their Imperial Majesties who never ceased bowing their acknowledgments threaded their way to the station, on the The Great War of 1 89 37 platform of which was assembled Headquarter- Staff, with the great Household officers and Ministers of State (who looked very grave indeed), and others whom duty or curiosity had brought to see the Emperor off. After conversing for a few minutes with Count Caprivi (who, unlike his predecessor in office, is not to go to the front in the meantime, pending the development of French schemes), His Majesty turned to his sad-eyed consort, whom he embraced with great warmth, and then entered his travelling saloon carriage. In another moment, amid three parting ' hochs/ the train had glided away, carrying with it the first German Emperor who has unsheathed his sword against the Czar of all the Russias. ILL-TREATMENT OF A WAR-CORRESPONDENT BY THE GERMAN HUSSARS. THE BIVOUAC AT THORN. SIGNIFICANT REMARK OF THE EMPEROR. (By Post from our Special Correspondent, Mr. Charles Lowe.) THORN, April 27. FOLLOWING the route taken by the Emperor, I arrived here this morning, thanks to the courtesy of Baron von Tauchnitz (a son of the great Leipzig publisher of the well-known Continental edition of our English classics), who kindly allowed me a place (it was only a standing one) in the train conveying to the front the Magdeburg Artillery Regiment of his command, as well as the Train, or Army Service, Battalion of the 4th Corps. While crossing the bridge from the railway station to claim the quarters that had been assigned me at the ' Black Bear/ my eye and ear were suddenly struck by a strange hubbub going on below. A troop of red-tunic'd Zieten Hussars ('Duke of Coimaught's ') were watering their horses in the Vistula, which has here abroad, placid, 38 The Great War of 189- and majestic course ; and while these thirsty animals were revelling in delicious draughts of the first water they had tasted since leaving Eathenow (their garrison townlet, near Bismarck's native place), their riders were amusing themselves by roaring and laughing at the frantic efforts of what seemed to me to be a big Newfoundland dog to extricate himself from the stream. Presently the poor brute, which to my great astonishment gradually assumed human shape, struggled, spluttering and gasping, on to the shelving bank ; and then it was that I recognised in this buffeted and bedraggled creature, Solomon Hirsch, the well-known correspondent of the Berliner Tageblatt, whose shock head of hair, all touzled and dishevelled, had given him the semblance of canine form and feature alluded to. It appears that poor Hirsch, fulfilling his functions with more zeal than discretion, had already made him- self an object of universal execration at the front by communi- cating to his paper most minute details as to the massing and position of the German troops towards the Eussian frontier, and that being recognised by these rollicking and resentful Zieten Hussar fellows, to whom he had, in an evil moment for himself, appealed for information as to their ultimate destination, this ' curse of modern armies ' was at once set upon, hilariously tossed in a horse-rug, and then contemptuously heaved into the Vistula. I have made a point of dwelling on this serio-comic incident, which I myself was quick to take to heart, as it will serve to explain the absence from my telegrams of all but the most meagre and general references to the positions and movements of the German troops ; and, indeed, I should be worthy the fate of my hapless colleague did I abuse the hospitality which has been so graciously extended to me by revealing unexecuted plans. Indeed, I have only been promised the use of the field arid other telegraph wires on the strict condition that my messages never exceed a limited number of words, which will necessarily restrict my reports to tfce briefest and barest, yet, I trust, sufficient summaries. The Emperor (who was accompanied by the King of Saxony The Great War of 189 39 and other high general officers) has just returned from a rapid ride round the circle of the outer forts, within which the troops are all lying under canvas; and from the top of the Garrison Church Steeple, the highest point in this mighty fortressed town, nothing can be seen but endless vistas of tented bivouacs. Never before has the German soldier been allowed any other night covering in the field but the canopy of heaven, though, indeed, in a country like France, which is, in truth, a land flowing with milk, wine, and honey, and teeming with villages and other opportunities of cantonment, he had comparatively little need of tents. But it is quite a different thing in Eussia, with its raw and rigid climate, its vast, uncultivated, and uninhabited spaces ; and it was in view of the probable contingency of a campaign in such a foodless and roofless wilderness that the General Staff, with that remarkable foresight and wisdom which has always distinguished it, resolved to equip all the Army Corps lying nearest the Eastern frontier with the very best tents procurable namely, such as were at once waterproof, windproof, and even fireproof. For otherwise what ruin might not a spark from a bivouac fire entail upon the tented fields which stretch away in every direction towards the horizon, both here and at Posen, at ^"eisse, and at Konigsberg, reminding one of the hosts, countless as the sands on the sea-shore, of the five kings who encamped over against Gibeon. But I must not omit to record a curious incident which happened as the Emperor was riding past the statue of Copernicus, whose birthplace was Thorn. Just when abreast the monument of that immortal astronomer, His Majesty remarked to his suite : ' Ja, meine Herren, there you see the man who first opened the eyes of the world to the true nature of the solar system ; and I think that with God's help we shall equally be able to assign Russia her proper place in the system of nations/ 4 o The Great War 0/189- THE AUSTRIAN PLAN OF CAMPAIGN. DETAILS OF PREPARATION. (By Telegraph from our Special Correspondent, Mr. Charles Lowe.} THORN, April 29. TO-NIGHT the Emperor (who continues to display wonderfully good spirits and energy) gave a banquet in the hastily furbished-up rooms of the gloomy old Schloss, in honour of Feldzeugmeister Baron Beck, the Chief of the Austrian Staff, who, pending the progress of his well-thought-out mobilisation and massing scheme, which he had set a-going by a simple order from Vienna, had hastily run up here by rail to concert united action with his German colleague, Count von Schlieffen, the present occupier of Moltke's high and responsible office. From a trustworthy source I gather that this was the substance of Baron von Beck's com- o munication : It had been discovered, beyond all doubt, that the main objective of the Eussian invasion was Lemberg, in the direction of which Dragomiroff was concentrating immense masses of troops, drawn from the 4th, 8th, 9th, 10th, llth, 12th Army Corps, in the rear of whom other forces, furnished by the remoter 13th, 16th, 17th and other Corps, were pushing up as fast as the defective railway system of the country would allow them. Austria, on her part, had resolved to combine her defensive forces into three armies one of about 300,000 strong, in East Galicia, on the Dniester; another, about as half as strong (150,000), on the San, with its back on Przemysl, that tremendous bulwark of Middle Galicia; and a third, of about 120,000, near Cracow, that almost equally formidable place d'armes, and key of Western Galicia on the Upper Vistula. But these numbers do not include a force of eight independent Cavalry Divisions, each of four Brigades, or four regiments, which are to be ranked along the Galician frontier at the likeliest points of danger from the mass-raidings of Russian horsemen. THE KNIGHTS OF MALTA AT AMBULANCE WORK. 4 2 The Great War of 1^9 Such were meanwhile the relative dispositions and prospects on either side of the Austro-Eussian border, while, on the other hand, General Gourko, the hero of the Balkans, was concentrat- ing at Warsaw an army consisting of the 5th, 6th, 14th, 15th Corps, and other troops, for the double purpose of holding the Germans in check, and of operating towards Cracow, on the Austrian left flank. Moreover, the 2nd Eussian Corps from Wilna, and the 3rd from Eiga, seemed to be marshalling on the lower Niemen with the view of looking over into Konigsberg ; and of these Muscovite troops in the Baltic Provinces, no less than in Western Poland, Baron Beck trusted that the Germans would give a good and satisfactory account. As a token of his complete satisfaction with the Baron's lucid and hopeful exposition of the military situation, the Emperor, at parting, which was very cordial on His Majesty's part, conferred on the distinguished Chief of the Austrian Staff the Eed Eagle of the first class (with swords), and, at the same time, intrusted him with an autograph missive for his august master at Vienna, (By Telegraph from our Special Correspondent, Mr. Charles Lowe.) THORN, LATER. From my correspondent with the Army of the Baltic at Konigsberg I learn that its mobilisation is now complete, and that Count Waldersee (who has had a bad fall from his horse, but is better again) is burning to make a dash across the frontier and pluck a leaf from the laurel- wreath of General Gourko. The 2nd, or Pomeranian Corps, has meanwhile been appointed to cope with any descent from the Eussian Fleet on the Baltic shore ; while the 9th Corps has been similarly left in Schleswig- Holstein for the double purpose of frustrating any attempted landing in that quarter, and also of keeping an eye on Denmark, whose hearts are practically with the Eussians, and who have not yet forgotten the Eedoubts of Diippel. On the other hand, the fortification of Breslau is proceeding at a rapid rate, Prince Pless and the Duke of Eatibor having lent a The Great War of 1 89 43 little army of their miners to do the necessary pick and spade work ; while the Army of Silesia (under Prince George of Saxony) is now echeloned along the railway line, parallel to the Eussian border, between Kreuzburgand Tarnowitz in utrumque paratus that is to say, ready either for a front march across the frontier on Czenstochau, on the Warsaw railway, or for a flanking movement of support in the direction of Cracow, as occasion may demand. The Austrians, we know, are well forward with their con- centration ; but owing to the fact that the telegraph wires of the Eussians have now ceased to speak to the outer world, and that travellers are neither allowed into nor out of Eussia, we are still very much in the dark with regard to their massings and their movements. To-morrow, however, we mean, if possible, to try and penetrate a little the veil of this mystery. FIEST COLLISION OF EUSSIAN AND GEEMAN TEOOPS. SKIRMISH AT ALEXANDROVO. (By Telegraph from our Special Correspondent, Mr. Charles Lowe.) THORN, April 30. I HAVE just returned from a reconnoitring ride with two squad- rons of the Zieten Hussars, who pushed across the Eussian frontier to within sight of Alexandrovo, the scene of the meeting (of which I had the good fortune to be an eye-witness) between the old German Emperor and the late Czar Alexander n., in September 1879, shortly before the signature of the Austro-German Treaty of Alliance. It is a curious coincidence that the first blood in the present campaign should have been drawn within view of the spot to which the old Emperor greatly against the advice of his irate Chancellor, Bismarck then hastened to conjure the Czar to desist from his warlike operations, and assure him, on the other hand, of his own unalterable determination to keep the peace. 44 The Great War of 189 When we had advanced by the road skirting the railway to within about a mile of Alexandrovo, a gun attached to a body of Cossacks (they were of the Don, as I could make out through my glass, from their blue tunics faced with red) opened fire on us ; and the shell, bursting right in front of our leading troop, killed two horses and seriously wounded one man (a Wachtrneister). So having thus caused the enemy to give tongue, we turned bridle and trotted back, carrying with us the intelligence the rich fruit of our reconnaissance that Alexandrovo was strongly occupied by troops of all arms. Four sotnias of Cossacks came pelting after us, but we were quick to outrun these rampaging gentry, to whom a gun from one of our horse-batteries sent hurtling over a few shells as a parting souvenir of our hasty yet successful visit. WARLIKE EXCITEMENT IN PARIS. (By Telegraph from our Special Correspondent. Mr. D. Christie Murray.} PARIS, April 30. PARIS to-night is in a state of the maddest ferment. For some days past the public have followed with breathless interest the rapid development of events on the Russo-Gennan frontier, and the news of the first skirmish at Alexandrovo, which was printed in Le Soir this evening, has roused the wildest enthusiasm. Long and anxious consultations of Ministers have been held daily, and the Press, with hardly an exception, have been urging on the Government an immediate declaration of war. Many of the better- class Germans have been hurrying from Paris a precau- tion which, in the issue, has been shown to be judicious. When to day's news became known, every trade and artifice was instantly abandoned, and the streets since three o'clock till now have been thronged by vast crowds, pulsating to a more and more impassioned excitement. By four o'clock there were literally fifty thousand people standing in the street with newspapers in their The Great War of 189 45 hands, and every reader was the centre of an excited throng. I was standing opposite the Vaudeville when a man, bearing a prodigious bundle of newspapers wet from the press, came staggering swiftly towards the kiosque. The mob fell upon him, despoiled him of liis burden, and tore open his parcel. There was such a wild hurry to learn the news, and everybody was so eager to be first with it, that scores of the journals were torn to ribbons, and hundreds more were trampled into the mud of the pavement. The proprietress of the kiosque wrung her hands and wept over the spectacle, and a gentleman who, by pressure of the crowd, was forced half-way through one of the windows, vociferously demanded to know the value of the lost journals. The woman instantly became business-like, and appraised them roughly at a hundred francs. The gentleman produced a pocket-book and paid her twice over, shouting noisily, ' I present this glorious news to Paris ! Vive la Russie ! A las la Prusse ! ' That was the first signal I heard, and in one minute the whole boulevard rang with frenzied roar on roar. Omnibuses, public carriages, and vehicles of every description were wedged immovably in the crowd which thronged the horse-road. The drivers rose from their seats, the passengers and occupants of the carriages stood up in their places and roared and gesticulated with the rest. Hundreds of people at once strove to make speeches, and the combined result was such a charivari as can scarcely have been heard since the great day of Confusion of Tongues. I, myself, had occasion to be thankful for that inconquerable English accent which has always disfigured my French. A blond beard and spectacles have always helped me to something of a German look, and to-day has given the few Germans who happen, to be left in Paris such a scare as the bravest of them is not likely to forget. At one moment I was surrounded by a wild section of the mob, whose yells of 'Down with Prussia!' were far too obviously intended to be personal to me. There was nothing for it but to join in the shouting, and I cried ' Vive la France /' and 'A las la Prusse!' as lustily as any of them. There was an 46 The Great War 0/189 instantaneous laugh at the English accent, and I was left alone ; but I could not help thinking what would have happened had I chanced to learn my French mainly in Berlin rather than in London. One unfortunate German is reported fatally injured by the violence of a mob at the Gare dti Nord. He had booked for London, and is said to have carried with him only a small hand- bag, and to have left all the rest of his belongings at the hotel,' in his hurry to catch the train for Calais. The director of the Opera came near to paying with his life for his artistic allegiance to Wagner. Happily for him he was able to take refuge in the house of a friend, and the mob contented itself by keeping up a ceaseless boo-hooing for an hour or more. EXTRAORDINARY SCENE IN THE PLACE DE LA CONCORDE. The wildest manifestation of the afternoon was in the Place de la Concorde, where an immense mob fell to dancing about the statue of Strasburg. Everybody knows the sullen threat with which that statue has been placarded for so many years. It runs ' L. D. P. (the initials standing for " Ligue de Patriotes ") Qui Vive? La France. 1870 18 .' When the prodigious noise created by the mob seemed at its highest, it was cloven, as it were, by a din still greater, and a solid phalanx of men forced a way into the already crowded square. In the centre of this phalanx twenty or thirty men marched, bearing a long ladder, the heads of many of them being thrust between the rungs. In the middle of the ladder was seated a working painter in a blue blouse. The man was literally wild with excitement, and was roaring ' Quatre vingt douze ' to a sort of mad, improvised tune, in which the packed marchers about him joined with the fell stress of their lungs. In one hand the man flourished aloft a pot of red paint, with the contents of which he occasionally bedewed his unheeding companions, some of whom had playfully bedaubed their own and others' features, so that they looked as if they had just come fresh from some scene of massacre. In the other hand EXTRAORDINARY SCENE IN THE PLACE DE LA CONCORDE : THE MOB TEARING THE MOURNING EMBLEMS FROM THE STATUE OF 8TRA8BUKG. 48 The Great War 0/189 the man held aloft a sheaf of brushes, and in an instant the vast crowd seized the motive of his presence there, and the meaning of the rhythmic repetition of ' Quatre vingt douze ! " A way was cleared for the advancing cohort as if by magic. The ladder, still supporting the painter, was drawn up lengthwise before the statue, and the workman knelt to his task. At first it was impossible for him to work, for the bearers of the ladder were jigging to the tune they sang ; but by and by they were persuaded to quiet, and a very striking and impressive silence fell upon the crowd. The man, with great deliberation, and with a much firmer hand than he might have been supposed to own at a time of such excitement, drew the outline of the figures 9 and 2 in white chalk, at as great a size as the space of the placard admitted. His move- ments were watched with an actually breathless interest, and when, after the completion of his drawing, he rose and clasped the knees of the statue in his arms with a joyful and affectionate cry, two or three people in my neighbourhood sobbed aloud. The man knelt down again and filled in with red paint the outline he had drawn. One grim personage, with a squint and a pock-marked face, who held a short, well-blacked clay between his teeth, shouldered me at this moment, and said, ' C?est le sang de la France, ga.' He thought so well of this that he moved away among the crowd repeating it, nudging his neighbours to call attention to the saying, and pointing a dirty forefinger at the red paint of the figures to indicate its meaning. I was waiting for an outburst of enthusiasm when the figures were completed, but to my amazement the mob accepted the proclamation they conveyed with a grave silence, as if it had been in some way authentic and official, and as if for the first time they recognised the terrible significance of the hour. Their quiet did not endure long, for one of their number, having contrived to scramble on to the ladder, clambered up the statue, and amid great cheers tore from it the ragged emblems of mourning which have so long disfigured it. Then came an episode, the like of which would be possible nowhere but in Paris. The whole thing might have been arranged The Great War of 189 49 for scenic effect, and the distinguished artist who made the coup had never, brilliant as his triumphs have been, arrived on the stage at so opportune a moment, or encountered so overwhelming a reception. The new-comer was no other than M. Jean de Reszke, who was on his way to dine with a friend before appear- ing as Faust in Gounod's masterpiece this evening. His coach- man was slowly making way along the crowded road when the great singer was recognised. He was greeted with a roar of applause, and a dozen members of the crowd threw open the closed landau he sat in, while a thousand voices clamoured for ths Marseillaise. The statue had, at that instant, been denuded of its last rag of mourning, and M. de Beszke, who had risen bare- headed in the carriage, was whipped out of it in a trice, and borne, nolens volens, to the figure, and placed aloft on the pedestal. His companion, a lady attired with much distinction, was at first evidently alarmed, but soon gathered the peaceful intention of the crowd, and seizing the meaning of the moment, she stripped from her own shoulders a handsome scarlet cloak, and threw it towards M. de Eeszke. It was immediately passed on to him, and he, with considerable difficulty, and at the risk of a tumble on the heads of the people below him, succeeded in casting the cloak over the shoulders of the statue. At this, all the previous noises which cleft the air of Paris this afternoon seemed as nothing. The cheering was simply deafening and maddening, and lasted for full three minutes. At length perfect silence was restored, and M. de Eeszke began to sing the Marseillaise. He was pale at first, and obviously unstrung at the spectacle of this prodigious audience, and for the first few notes his voice was broken and ineffective. He gathered confidence, however, before he had completed the singing of the first line, and gave the rest of the song with an inspiring vigour and dan. From the beginning of the whole extraordinary scene people had been flocking in from every quarter, and I believe that I am well within bounds when I say that the singer had an audience of a hundred and twenty thousand. The chorus was one of the most D 50 The Great War of 1 89 stupendous and moving things which can ever have been heard by human ears. It rose from the densely-packed mass of humanity in one amazing roll and roar of sound, and its echoes came straggling faintly from the Eue de Eivoli and the Tuileries Gar- dens, from the Avenue des Champs Elyse*es, from the Eue Eoyale, from the Pont de la Concorde, and the embankment on the further side of the river. When the whole song was finished it was redemanded, and was sung through again with undiminished relish both by the soloist and the chorus. Finally, the singer was per- mitted to descend from the pedestal, and was escorted to his carriage. The crowd had taken out the horses, and M. de Eeszke and his companion were drawn away by some hundreds of volun- teers. The great singer's nationality has made him the idol of Paris during all the late days of strained expectation. Every night the Opera-house has been thronged, and every song from his lips has been received with literal thunders of applause. THE PRESIDENT SPEAKS 'A BERLIN!' LATER. The crowd had already begun to thin when the news passed round that the Ministers were in conclave at the Elyse'e. I acted immediately on the first hint I received, and with great difficulty made my way across the Place. I found myself almost at once wedged in anew, this time in a streaming current which set steadily owards the Elyse'e. The crowd grew vaster every moment, for by this time all Paris seemed to have been drawn to that quarter of the town. For a long time there was silence, or what seemed like it after the torrent of noise which had roared so long in all ears, but at last the babble of excited tongues fcegan again, and was intermixed with occasional cries of impatience. These grew in a steady crescendo, until no single voice was audible. & But before things reached that point I had heard a hundre^ excited conjectures as to the course which would be adopted by England at this crisis. By seven o'clock the patience of the mob was quite The Great War of 189 51 outworn. The building, so far as could be seen from the outside, was in complete darkness, and the rumour of the meeting of the Ministers seemed likely to be practically denied. At length, how- ever, a sudden swell in the storm of sound greeted the appear- ance of light at three windows, and certain ill-defined shadows were seen moving on the blinds. One profile was distinct and stationary for a moment, and there was a roar of ' Eibot !' A minute later the blind of the centre window was drawn up, the window itself was thrown open, and the figure of M. Eibot, Minister of Foreign Affairs, was seen. This apparition was the signal for a new outburst in which only the name of the President of the Republic could be distinguished. The air rang with shouts of * Carnot ! Carnot ! ' and M. Ribot having braved this incredible tempest for a few seconds only, bowed and retired. A minute later the President himself appeared. From where I stood his features were invisible, but his attitude was erect, and he stretched out his right hand with an impressive gesture to command silence. It was some time before this injunction was obeyed, but when he was allowed to speak his voice was firm and unusually clear. His words were few and to the point. ' Citizens ! Germany has declared war upon the ally of France. Those gentlemen whom you have appointed as the guardians of the national honour have debated the serious intelligence which has to-day awakened the heart of Paris. It is my duty to tell you that there is no dis- sentient voice amongst them. France will fulfil her pledges ! ' At this point M. Carnot was interrupted by a unanimous outburst of applause, which made speech impossible for a space of at least five minutes. Again and again, when it seemed about to quiet down, it was taken up from distant quarters, and came rolling along like a wave, again to subside and again to be renewed. When order was once more restored the President continued: ' France speaks to-night, and demands of her neighbour that the menace against her ally shall be withdrawn. She couples with that a demand for the surrender of those provinces which were torn from her twenty years ago ! ' 52 The Great War of 189 There was at this more cheering, and yet more. The President retired, and a great deluge of rain which had been threatening to fall all day speedily cleared the streets. The latest and most important of the day's events is yet hardly an hour old, but we seem now to be living in a city of the dumb. Everybody is hoarse with four hours' almost continuous shouting, but the popular excitement is as great as ever. The house of M. Ferry has been guarded by the military, and only the entente cordiale existing between the troops and the populace has saved it from attack. At the moment of writing the Boulevards are again crowded. The reply of Germany is, of course, a foregone conclusion, but it is awaited with, intense eagerness. DECLARATION OF WAS BY FRANCE. DRAMATIC RECEPTION OF THE NEWS BY THE GERMAN EMPEROR. (By Telegraph from our Special Correspondent, Mr. Charles Lowe.) THORN, May 1. FOR this morning the Emperor had ordered a review of all the troops, amounting to about 60,000 men concentrated hereabouts the scene of the parade being a long sweep of meadow-land, not unlike the Champ de Mars at Paris, on the right bank of the Vistula. His Majesty and his Staff took their stand on a con- venient knoll commanding all the ground, and scarcely had the serried battalions of the 3d Corps, with their bristling bayonets glittering in the bright sun, begun to stride along in all their martial and magnificent array, when the march past was inter- rupted by a most dramatic and thrilling incident, I was standing on the outside fringe of the brilliant circle of His Majesty's suite, quietly chatting to Dr. von Leuthold, the Emperor's body physician, when suddenly we saw an orderly officer dash up to his Majesty and deliver a message, which we could discern from the colour of the envelope to be a teleoram. The Great War of 189 53 The Emperor tore it open, glanced through the contents, then looked up, and let his eye wander all round the circle of his suite, as if to note the impression produced upon their minds by the news which His Majesty felt had already been intuitively divined by those about him. ' Ja, meine Herren' he at last said ; ' it is just as we all expected. This is a telegram from General von Caprivi ; France has declared war against us ' (Frankreich hat Uns den Krieg erkldrt.) There was a moment's pause, each man looking at his neighbour to study the effect of this terrible announcement, and then all eyes were again turned on the Emperor, who looked a shade paler than before, but not a whit less calm and resolute. ' Gentlemen,' he said at last, ' this is a serious moment for us all, but the news dismays just as little as it surprises us. Yet I must now leave you, for the danger to the Fatherland is much greater on its western than on its eastern frontier ; and where the danger to the Fatherland is greatest, there also must Germany's Kaiser be. ' Meine Herren, my place as Commander-in- Chief of our armies here will now be taken by that tried and gallant soldier, my dear friend and brother, the King of Saxony, who will, I am sure, bring - honour and victory to our arms. One foe at a time is quite enough, and the sooner we can help our allies to dispose of their invader, the sooner shall we be able to concentrate all our forces and inflict a crushing blow on our hereditary enemy (Erlfeind), who has again, in the most wanton manner, broken loose against us. ' Gentlemen, this is no time for words, when the call to action is tingling through all our veins, so I will only invoke the blessing of God upon the course of our arms in this quarter, and hasten myself to where the peril of our Fatherland is sorest. Adieu, and may each and all of us do his duty throughout the coming period of grievous trial and tribulation ! ' So saying, the Emperor put spurs to his steed and, accompanied only by his immediate suite, galloped off back to Thorn, receiving as he went three enthusiastic ' hochs.' Just as I am closing this despatch information reaches us from 54 The Great War of 189 Berlin of a naval engagement in the Baltic between our fleet and some Russian ships ; but you, in London, will probably hear all the details before they reach us here. WITH THE GERMAN FLEET IN THE BALTIC. We have been favoured with the following letter, under date April 30, from Rear- Admiral Philip Colomb, who has been an eye- witness of the naval operations in the Baltic : I was at Kiel with my yacht when the news of the attempt on Prince Ferdinand's life reached us. The successive telegrams and published news created the greatest excitement among all classes, but especially amongst those connected with the navy. Simul- taneously with the news that Russia had crossed the Austrian frontier, several German cruisers went to sea, and in a day or two a regular fleet began to assemble in the port. I don't understand German, but my wife does, and she told me whenever we met an eager crowd discussing, that it was all about whether the fleet would not be kept to defend the place, and the danger of an attack by the Russian Fleet if the German Fleet did not remain. I thought I had better get out of it, as if such an attack were made it might be awkward for me. I think my wife was so excited about it that she wanted to stay where we were and see it all ; but I thought we might see all there was to be seen in greater safety from the seaside. And then from the conversa- tion of some German naval officers which my wife overheard, I gathered that the navy, at least, believe that it would try to carry war into the enemy's country. There were, however, great dis- cussions about some German coast defence vessels that had not coal supply enough to go up the Baltic, and great arguments as to what ships would go and what would stay. As every day more heavy ships arrived and stayed, while only small ones came and went, I began to think that after all it was most likely that the Germans would not stay quiet to let the Russians ravage their coasts. Then, by the time that nine or ten large turret-ships and The Great War 0/189 55 others, besides several smaller ones, had assembled, I understood that the German armies were about attacking Eussia by way of Konigsberg, as well as to the south. I thereupon made sure that the German fleet would go up in support, even if they were not ready to do more. So the end of it was that I waited till ten big ships and five or six smaller ones got under way, and then I did ditto, and steamed out with them. I was afraid I might be left behind, as my coal supply did not allow me to go at any speed ; but I found the Germans, after putting their big ships into two lines a good distance apart, with some of the smaller ones close at hand on each side, and two or three others a long way in front, steamed quite slowly along, not more than five or six knots. I went in-shore of them, and kept them in sight a couple of miles off. We passed close to Eiigen Island the afternoon succeeding our departure, and the south end of Bornholrn in the night. I made out that we were steering straight, for Libau, which is about 450 miles from Kiel. "We scarcely had seen anything in the shape of a ship except a couple of homeward-bound English trading steamers ; but on the second morning at daybreak I noticed all the German ships had been stoking up, and were making an immense amount of smoke. There was a good deal of signalling going on between the German flagships there were two of these yesterday, one at the head of each line and one or two of the cruisers, which sped away nearly out of sight, and then came slowly back, signalling as they came. The same sort of thing went on on the third morning, when we had got beyond Dantzig, with the difference that two German crurers were seen steam- ing up, one from the southward, and one from the south- westward. The fleet stopped, and a boat from each of these went to the flag- ship and returned, after which there was more signalling, and a boat from every ship went on board the flagship. I suppose the other Admiral and the captains were in them, but I was too far off to make certain. After a couple of hours we all went on again slowly as be- 56 The Great War of 189 fore, but electric and other lights were flashing about all night, so that we were very excited, and made sure that something was in the wind. As a consequence, long before daylight on the fourth morning we were on deck looking out in all directions, and with a good head of steam so as to get out of the way in case of accidents. Sure enough at daybreak there was a great bank of smoke to the northward, and presently I could make out a mast or two sticking up. The two German cruisers, which were five or six miles in front, at once became very busy with their signals, and soon afterwards the whole fleet formed into a single line and turned to the westward, not steaming any faster, but making such clouds of black smoke that they almost hid them- selves from me. It did not seem that the Eussian Fleet I was not sure whether it was or not was closing much, but one or two ships appeared to draw more in front as if to close the two German cruisers. Presently the other cruisers that had kept closer to the fleet also drew out in front, but none of them seemed more inclined to close the strangers than the strangers were to close them. I could not make it out at all. I had always understood that in a modern naval battle, everybody would immediately run at everybody else, and this looked so little like the sort of thing that T was inclined to think that what I saw was only an advance guard of the Eussian Fleet. Yet it looked too large a mass for that, and my doubts were presently set at rest. Signals were made to one of the German cruisers that had come to us the day before, and she presently turned and slowly steamed to the southward. She passed us so very close that I took heart of grace to call out ' Is that the Eussian Fleet ? ' And the answer came back ' Oh ! ye-es, zat is ze Eussians ve sail fight zem ! So ! ' and the steamer went on her way. I began to have some sort of an idea that, perhaps, neither fleet was able to make out the force of the other, and was, therefore, not in a hurry to bring it to action. And this might easily be The Great War of 189 57 so. Though the sky was clear overhead and the water quite smooth, it was misty round the horizon, and so far as the Russian Fleet was concerned, it seemed to me very likely that even the advanced German cruisers were not able to discover more than I could, between the mist and the smoke. But as I puzzled myself over this, I also thought that, perhaps, as the main attack of Germany was going on by land, it might be her game merely to watch the Russian Fleet. For if the Germans were badly beaten at sea, Russia might be left free to land and cut their communications. I had never thought of this kind of thing before, and I quite woke up with a new sort of idea, for I saw quite well that the Russian Fleet could not do anything unless they first thoroughly beat the Germans. ENGAGEMENT OFF DANTZIG SINKING OF A RUSSIAN TORPEDO-BOAT. I was so keen on my new ideas that I wanted to know more about it, and so steamed well to the N.E. to see what the Russian Fleet was like. Just as I did so, I saw a very small Russian steaming away to the south-eastward as if to get the look at the German Fleet which I was going to get at the Russian. She was stoking up tremendously, and evidently going at great speed. Two of the German cruisers in front immediately turned to the eastward to cut her off, but the plucky little Russian did not seem to mind ; they closed one another very rapidly, and some puffs of smoke, followed by distant bangs, showed a little game of long balls. The Russian had evidently much greater speed than the others, and was drawing them astern, but quite away from her own fleet or supports of any kind. All of a sudden I saw she was blowing off steam furiously, and that her speed had slackened, if not dropped altogether. She began to fire more rapidly, and so did the Germans. All three were hidden by the cloud of smoke they raised. My engineer was frightfully excited; he said, 'It was one of them new boilers a-priming/ and that it was all up with the Russian. Sure enough it was, for all three ships pre- The Great War of 189 59 sently came out of the smoke, the little Eussian with the German flag flying over her own. I had got far enough now to see that the Eussian Fleet was much more numerous than the German, but I could only make out six or seven really big ships. But there were a crowd of small ones, and behind, eight or nine little things like those we had seen taking the Excellent* s men for training. I thought it might be dangerous to get mixed up with such a crowd, so I returned to the southward and eastward of the German Fleet. I had noticed that the Eussians were steeyng slowly parallel to the position of the Germans, and night closed, leaving all things in this position. Both sides never left off flashing their electric lights up into the sky and all over the sea, and it really seemed to me as if they must all be a good deal confused by such things. So matters went on till eleven o'clock, when I made my wife go below, while I lay down for a sleep on deck. I was awoke at one o'clock by such a row as never was, the whole German Fleet was a blaze and a roar of artillery. I supposed, of course, a Eussian torpedo-boat attack, but it was impossible to tell what had happened, all one knew was that an attack of some kind had been made. After a very few minutes the fire began to slacken, and some of it I noticed, with an unpleasant sensation, was coining my way. But that, too, soon came to an end. My wife was at that moment beside me again, and she suddenly cried out, ' Hark ! what 's that ? ' I could hear a rushing and a panting sound drawing close to us, and then the ball of white foam that I had seen one night from a torpedo boat. The panting suddenly stopped, and the rushing became fainter and fainter until out of the dark came a torpedo-boat evidently making for the yacht, but very slowly. Just as she was coming alongside there was a sort . of wild cry, and I saw she had suddenly gone to the bottom. Our little boat was down in an instant, and I got hold of somebody floating at once, while the men helped in two Eussian sailors. I found I had hold of a Eussian officer, but he was evidently unable to help himself. I could not get him in but 6o The Great War of 189 we drew him alongside and the men carried him up. I then saw that the poor chap was badly wounded in the shoulder. No one on board could speak Russian, but we laid him down on the deck, and my wife threw herself down beside him with her scissors and began to cut away his dress, while she cried to her maid to bring her water and linen. It was of no use, however. The poor fellow was quite unconscious and bleeding to death. It was all over in ten minutes, and we could do nothing but rever- ently commit the body to the deep. Our other two Russians were THE NAVAL BATTLE OFF DANTZIG WOUNDED RUSSIANS ON BOARD THE ENGLISH YACHT. unwounded, but could not make us understand anything. We put them next day into an English vessel bound to Revel. We were eager enough in the morning to see what had hap- pened, but there seemed to be no ships absent. One of the battle- ships was, however, evidently very much down by the head, and in the course of the morning we saw her quit the fleet for the southward. Everything else was, in fact, in the same position on both sides, and it was evident that a regular battle was no nearer. The Great War oj '189- 61 I presently saw a vessel I think it must have been one of the German Emperor's yachts, from the look of her coming up fast from the southward, and as soon as she got near enough, she began making a long signal. Almost directly, the German ships all turned towards her. They stopped when she reached them, and after she had sent a boat to the flagship, the whole fleet put on good speed, and stood nearly due west, as if for Kiel again. I could not keep up with them, so I am going to Colberg to post this and hear the news. P.S. I have learnt at Colberg that the Emperor's yacht brought news of the declaration of war by France, and orders for the whole German fleet to return to the Jahde at full speed, to avoid being caught between the Eussian and French fleets. The Germans say they sank several of the Kussian torpedo-boats, and that they had their broadside nets out. Only the Oldenburg was struck by a torpedo, the one I saw. She got into Kiel all right, but was badly damaged. It is said that the Eussians are spread along the whole German Baltic coast, and descents are expected. THE GERMAN PLAN OF CAMPAIGN. PROPOSED LINE OF INVASION THROUGH BELGIUM. LONDON, May 3. THE declaration of war by France was the inevitable result of the action of Germany in regard to Russia. Events, indeed, have marched with a ruthless and tragical directness ever since the day, barely four weeks since, when Prince Ferdinand narrowly escaped death from Russian intrigue. In Germany, least of all, can there have been any doubt as to the course France would take. The experience of 1870 must have made abundantly clear to her what would be the outcome of the scenes on the Paris boulevards which our Correspondent has so graphically described. With 62 The Great War of 189 powerful enemies on either flank, Germany cannot afford to adhere to punctilio. With the double contest on her hands she cannot now hope to bring into the battle-fields superior numbers, as in the wars of 1866 and 1870-71 ; prospects of success, as her chiefs well know, lie for her in promptitude of action, in blows struck in unexpected places, in carefully planned efforts to bewilder and divide the forces opposed to her. To strike anywhere at the eastern frontier of the French adversary, barred as it is with almost continuous fortresses from Verdun to Belfort, must necessarily involve prolonged delay, even if the heavy siege-work which is inevitable should be ultimately successful. True, Germany will no doubt be able to foil any offensive on the part of France from the base of the fortified eastern frontier, but merely to do this would be to confine herself to that defensive which is intensely repugnant to her military character. Yet her only opening for the offensive, unless she were to force or obtain by diplomacy a right of way for her armies through neutral territory, of necessity must be by that eastern frontier of France which is coterminous with her own territory, and through or over the chain of fortresses which loom out sul- lenly from behind that frontier line. The ideal line of invasion of France by Germany obviously lies through Belgium. It would turn and negative the chain of French fortresses on the eastern frontier, and give the shortest route through hostile territory to the French capital. Belgium is neutral ground ; her neutrality guaranteed by the Great Powers ; but how vain a pretence is this guarantee is already proved by the latest news from our Berlin Correspondent. It is believed (he states on credible authority), that Germany has been successful in exacting or obtaining from Belgium a secret Convention, whereby the armies of the Empire shall be free to traverse the former State, and to utilise for their purposes the Belgian railway system. The advantages of this arrangement may be said to fairly compensate Germany for the numerical superiority of the French forces over those which she herself is able to bring into the field. The Great War of 189 63 The German plan of campaign, as explained by our Berlin Correspondent, is as follows : Seven of the twenty Army Corps are engaged on the Eussian frontier under the King of Saxony. To cope with France there remain thirteen corps, with a propor- tionate number of independent cavalry brigades. The First Army, under the command of Prince Albrecht of Prussia, is to advance through Belgium by Verviers, Liege, Namur, and Charleroi, and cross the northern frontier of France between Maubeuge and Kocroy, at and about Hirson. The fortresses on the French northern frontier east of Maubeuge are of little account, and there are none on the section specified. The Ardennes and Eifel dis- tricts are regarded as affording considerable protection to the line of communication as far as the frontier, and a further protection will presently be mentioned. It is unfortunate that between Aix and Lie'ge there is available but one line of railway, but the accom- modation is copious on either side of this section, several lines being serviceable right to the frontier. This First Army is to consist of six Army Corps, the Guards, 7th, 8th, 10th, llth, and 16th being those whose respective pro- vinces are nearest to the region of concentration west of Cologne. Among its Corps-commanders are such men as Generals Meer- scheidt-Hullessem, Von der Burg, Von Versen, Albedyll, Von Loe, all distinguished names in the war of 1870-71. The Emperor himself, who of course is Commander-in-Chief of all the German forces in both fields of operations, accompanies this army, after leaving the eastern frontier with General von Schlieffen, the Chief of the great General Staff, and a number of the German princes. The cavalry commander is General the Grand Duke Frederick of Baden. The Second Army is to consist of the 9th, 14th, and 15th Army Corps. The course of action prescribed for this is to advance from Treves through Luxembourg, with the consent of the Grand Duke, following the Treves-Brussels railway as far as Arlon, whence it is to approach the French frontier between the fortress of Montmedy and Sedan, and in this vicinity, while 64 The Great War of 189 covering the communications of the main army, draw on itself the attention of the French field army presumably lying behind the northern section of the French frontier fortresses from about Verdun southward, so hindering it from marching westward to swell the forces opposing themselves to the main German army moving by Namur and Charleroi. Having accomplished this 4 holding ' operation, whether with or without a battle, it is to disengage, move westward below Mezieres, and approach that army after it has crossed the frontier. In performing this arduous task the Second Army will have to encounter the physical difficulties of the Eastern Ardennes, and protect its line of communication running perilously near the frontier. To aid in this work, severe at once, and delicate, it is to be furnished with a strong cavalry force, under the command of Lieutenant- General von Kleist. If from behind the curtain of their eastern frontier fortresses the French are bent on taking the offensive, German strategists, says our Correspondent, freely recognise the impossibility, owing to the diversion through Belgium of the bulk of the German force, of hindering them from over-running Alsace and Lorraine up toward the left bank of the Upper Ehine, where the German fortresses would give them halt. Yet such an advance, if attempted, they will not find quite an unchequered promenade. In Lorraine, Metz, for instance, will somewhat interfere with free transport by rail. In the chain of frontier forts the French engineers have designedly left between Toul and Epinal an un- defended gap or troufo of considerable breadth. Because of the fortifications of the second line of defence this specious interval is greatly in the nature of a trap, but its debouche toward France nevertheless needs to be watched by a strong field force on either flank. Confronting this gap, on the plateau behind the Meurthe, between Luneville and St. Die, with advanced posts about Ramberville, and a strong wide-stretching cordon of cavalry still further forward, the Third German Army, consisting of the 13th Wurtemberg, and 1st The Great War of 189 65 and 2d Bavarian Army Corps, under the command of Leopold, Prince Regent of Bavaria, is to take up its position. The Prince is to make demonstrations from time to time to hold in position the French field-forces on its flanks and rear. If threatened in palpably overwhelming strength, the army has a line of retreat across the Middle Vosges open, striking back in the passes as it retires. Should the gap be judged practical by-and-by because of the withdrawal of the French field-forces to participate in the meUe in the interior of France, instructions how to act will, of course, be sent from the Imperial Headquarters. As soon as the mobilisation of the active army is complete, the Landwehr is to be mobilised with all speed to the last man, and got into readiness to reinforce the armies already in the field, for the Fatherland will be contending against heavy odds, and will need the devotion of all its sons. It should be said that the 2d (Pomeranian) Army Corps is retained in Germany for the protection of the northern coast. THE FRENCH PLAN OF CAMPAIGN. WHILE these preparations have been made by Germany, France has not been idle. According to the latest telegrams from Paris, the original plan of campaign devised by the French Etat-major has undergone modification, now that it has become virtually certain that the main German advance is to be made through Belgium. The contingency that a contributory stroke may be made in that direction had, indeed, been in a measure provided for originally. To meet it four Army Corps were to take up an initial position in the fortress-bound triangle, La Fere-Soissons- Laon. Two were to be on the Meuse between Mouzon and Dun to confront a possible German entrance between Montmedy and Longwy. Three were allotted to the frontier on the extreme south-east, since Italy is a member of the Triple Alliance. The garrison of the Government of Paris was not to move. The remaining ten corps were destined for the eastern frontier from Verdun to Belfort. 66 -The Great War of 1 89 But these arrangements have been dislocated now that it has become apparent that a great German -army is gathering on the eastern frontier of Belgium, with plain intent to strike for Northern France through that State. General Saussier, who holds the high position of Commander-in-Chief of all the French armies, and the chief of staff, General Miribel, have had the sudden task of planning other dispositions. No fewer than seven Army Corps, the 1st, 2d, 3d, 4th, 9th, 10th, and llth, all fur- nished by the most adjacent territorial military ' regions,' are now to constitute the army to be massed in and beyond the La Fere- Soissons-Laon triangle, and beyond toward the northern frontier west of the Givet salient, and this army Saussier himself is to command. An army of two corps, the 5th and 6th, commanded by General Carre de Bellemar, is to line the Meuse on the north- east, as in the original disposition. Seven corps, the 7th, 8th, 12th, 13th, 17th, and 18th, are to constitute the field forces and garrisons of the eastern frontier, divided into two armies, the northern army of three corps commanded by General de Gallifet, the southern of four by the Due de Auerstadt (Davoust). Three corps, the 14th, 15th, and 16th, all of south-eastern domicile, are to watch the Italian frontier from Albertville to Mentone, under the chief command of General Thomassin. The French mobilisa- 'tion was set about appreciably later than the German ; but once begun, no time has been lost, and the rapidity with which it has progressed and is being completed has surprised even those who were most strongly convinced of the regeneration of military France. .PUBLIC .FEELING IN ENGLAND. DEBATE IN THE HOUSE. LONDON, May 3. WHILE, thus armed and fortified, France and Germany stand watching each other across the Rhine, we in England remain in a The Great War of 189 57 suspense profounder than we have experienced any time this side of the Napoleonic wars. The political excitement during the last few days has been intense, and at the prospect now imminent of the violation of the neutrality of Belgium has set the country by the ears. The people, the Press, and the politicians of England are deeply stirred, and the crowded public meeting, called at a few hours' notice, which was held yesterday in London is a proof, if proof were needed, that the Government will be compelled by popular feeling to strain every nerve to avert from ' gallant little Belgium ' the violation of that neutrality, to the maintenance of which Britain stands pledged. The opposition press, ablaze with zeal for the honour of England now that there seems an opening for the charge of snpineness against the Government, shrieks in scathing leaders that the voice of the nation should enforce on the faineant Ministry its imperative duty of addressing vehement remonstrances to the Great Teuton power. The journals favour- able to the Government cannot refrain from addressing strong representations to the Cabinet regarding the uncertain future of Antwerp if Belgium is again to become the cockpit of Europe, and the standing menace to Britain which that great fortress will become if it pass into other hands than those of the Belgians. The House, too, appears equally moved, and not a day has passed but at the question hour a rattle of shrewish interpellations has been shot across the House at the target of the Treasury Bench. The inexplicable composure of Her Majesty's Ministers has, how- ever, at length, broken down before the insistance of the Opposition. On Tuesday, when the German mobilisation over against the eastern frontier of Belgium was well forward, and when there remained no longer any doubt that the army gathering there would traverse that State, Sir William Harcourt rose in his place, every eye in the House centred on him, and with portentous earnestness of aspect and manner, demanded that the Leader of the House should name an early day for a debate on < the grave international questions and eventualities connected with the imminent violation of the neutrality of Belgium, -and the attitude of the ministry in 68 The Great War of 189 relation to those questions and eventualities.' Sir William re- seated himself with, indeed, a brow of care and gravity, as beseemed a statesman dealing with a momentous crisis ; but the A SCENE IN THE HOUSE OF COMMONS SIR WILLIAM HARCOURT QUESTIONS THE GOVERNMENT. lower section of his expressive visage mantled with a conscious complacency which seemed to indicate a conviction that he had propounded something in the nature of a c settler ' for this apparently The Great War of 1 89 69 inertest of Governments. ' Take to-morrow, if you like/ drawled the Leader of the House without rising, and then he actually and visibly yawned. The smirk faded out of Sir William's face at the roar of laughter, irrepressible on the part of the Liberals and Conservatives alike, which followed Mr. Balfour's drawl and yawn. The Opposition papers have vied in vituperation of Mr. Balfour's insouciance, which they described as 'insolence/ 'impertinence/ and 'insult/ One provincial journal congratulates Sir William Harcourt on his self-restraint in having refrained from pulling Mr. Balfour's nose, and another, with startling novelty, compares the latter to Nero fiddling while Home was burning. But yesterday's scene in the House has shown, at least, that the Government, though composed, has not been indifferent. It must have been galling to many of the hot-brained to have observed that when in the afternoon Mr. Balfour lounged into the crowded House, he showed no symptoms of being crushed, or even perturbed, by this avalanche of invective. In opening the debate, the ordinarily bland and gentle Sir William Harcourt displayed a truculent aggressiveness which startled all listeners, so foreign was it to his previously disclosed nature. When he had finished, and the dust had settled a little, Mr. Balfour slowly rose. He spoke as follows : ' Her Majesty's Government were confidentially informed a year ago, both by Germany and Belgium, that those two States had concluded a secret convention, in terms of which, in case of war between Germany and France, Belgium was to permit German troops to pass through her territory and to utilise her railways. It no doubt is a question whether Belgium has any right thus to permit the violation of her neutrality guaranteed by the Great Powers, but the question in the circumstances is an abstract one. Who is to intervene to hinder her ? Not Germany, who has made a bargain with her for the right of violation. Not France, whe violated Belgian neutrality with impunity in 1870, and who, if she now is ready in time, will, in her anxiety to fight the Germans outside the French frontier, assuredly violate it again if, indeed, 7b The Great War of '189 the act can be termed violation when the neutrality is virtually dead already by Belgium's own act. In eastern Europe there is other business on hand just now, than solicitude for the protection of Belgian neutrality. Does the right hon. baronet propose that" England should undertake this task single-handed, and, inter alia, force Belgium against her will to co-operate with us in retrieving, the neutrality she has already surrendered ? We should, and in hostility to Belgium, stand alone, in an attempt to make good the guarantee we entered into conjointly with other Powers ; and 1 say frankly that this is not a Quixotic Government. But when we were informed, in strict confidence, of this convention, we took measures for the interest and protection of C4reat Britain. Those measures may give umbrage in certain quarters ; that we cannot help. We claimed and obtained from Belgium the right to occupy and garrison the great fortress of Antwerp if the convention alluded to should become operative, and to hold that fortress pending the solution of the momentous events now clearly impending on the Continent of Europe. We recognised the impossibility of enduring in Antwerp a possibly hostile neighbour so close to our own street-door, and we resolved and have secured the right to be our own neighbour over the way in the troublous times approaching. During the past week we have been quietly and unostentatiously making some needful preparations. These are now so forward that I may inform the House that a complete division of British infantry and artillerymen 15,000 strong will be embarked at sundry of our ports on the day after to-morrow, and will land at Antwerp on the following morning, being conveyed swiftly in steam transports under the convoy of the Channel Squadron. The division will sail fully equipped with an adequate supply of stores. Its commander will be a soldier Whose name and fame are familiar to us all ; I refer to that distinguished officer, Sir Evelyn Wood. The Belgians hand us over Antwerp as it stands, with fortress, artillery, ammunition, and all appliances for defensive operations which we fervently pray and trust that there shall be no occasion to en^a^e in.' The Great War of 1 89 * ^ The cheering throughout Mr. Balfour's short but pregnant speech had been frequent and hearty ; when he sat down it swelled in volume and force that seemed to shake the roof. Sir William Harcourt, with the best grace he could assume, professed himself satisfied, and the debate collapsed. Late last night it was reported that "the Government asked and received powers to enlist 20,000 men, anti to call out for duty a large number of militia battalions. BATTLE AT ALEXANDEOVO. DEFEAT OF THE RUSSIANS. (By Telegraph from our Special Correspondent, Mr. Charles Lowe.} ALEXANDROVO (IN EUSSIAN POLAND), May 2. As a result of the scouting ride undertaken by a squadron of Zieten Hussars from this place, as mentioned in a late telegram of mine, it was resolved at Headquarters here (and the decision was sanctioned by the Emperor before his return to Berlin en route for the Ehine) to make another reconnaissance, this time in force with the view, if possible, of ousting the Eussians from Alexandrovo and possessing ourselves of that important frontier position ; for that the best defensive is an energetic offensive is a maxim which still forms the chief guiding principle of German warfare. To-day, accordingly, a force consisting of the 6th Infantry Division, under Lieutenant-General Von Schnabeltitz, a combined Cavalry Brigade (Zieten Hussars and 3d, or Kaiser Alexander u. von Eussland, Uhlans), under Major-General von Sabelschlucker ; and two sections (comprising six batteries each, of six guns) under Major Count von Donnerkeil; to-day, I say, this force, starting at dawn, made a rapid march eastward, and was soon across the little stream forming the frontier, where the Eussian outposts who seemed to be singularly supine were quickly driven in by a few 72 The Great War of 189 shots from our advance guard. From a wounded Muscovite, who was shot in the thigh and had to be left behind by his comrades, we learned that Alexandrovo was, after all, not quite so strongly held as our late reconnaissance had led us to suppose, its entire defending force consisting of only one Infantry Brigade, under Major-General Grodnovodsky, with several guns, a few sotnias of Cossacks, and two squadrons of Dragoons. Perceiving, therefore, that we were considerably stronger in all our arms especially our infantry and artillery we made haste to push on towards our objective, and managed, by advancing at the double, to gain the rising ground on our side of Alexandrovo before the enemy could anticipate our design. But it was a close race ; nor was it won by us without a sharp brush, involving several casualties on either side, between one of our Hussar squadrons, under Rittmeister Von Rummelsburg, arid a sotnia of Don Cossacks, who were very bravely led, whoever was their commander. Yon Eummelsburg, who was sent forward with his Hussars to feel the ground in front of our infantry, had just gained the brow of the acclivity in question when he perceived the Cossacks making for the same vantage-ground from the opposite side, and at once charged down upon them in the gallantest style, emptying a few Russian saddles even before the shock, for his regiment was one of those that had been experimentally armed with the new combina- tion lance-rifle the invention of an ingenious locksmith at Potsdam of which the Emperor became enamoured last year, and several of the brave Cossacks had thus succumbed to the impact of lead before they could come within stabbing distance of the equally fatal German spear a notable feature this in fin de sitcle warfare, and one that is likely to impress itself still more vividly in the course of the present campaign. The Cossacks being thus flung back on their infantry, whose movements were of an unaccountably slow and confused kind, our guns dashed up to the top of the bluff, which had formed the bone of contention between us and the Muscovites, and, unlimbering like lightning, began to blaze away at the retreating horsemen The Great War of 189 73 with shrapnel which seemed to do further execution amongst them. Then, laying their pieces at long range and loading with percussion-fuse shells, Donne rkeil's gunners hastened to rain a terrific torrent of destructive projectiles on the railway station of Alexandrovo, behind which Grodnovodsky's infantry had retired for temporary shelter. His guns planted on a rising bit of orchard ground on his left, were energetically enough worked against our batteries, but did us little or no harm, as the Prussian artillerists, always very careful in their selection of a firing position even in the tumult of action, showed little more than the mere muzzles of their guns over the crest of the land-wave, in the rear dip of which the infantry of the 6th Division were lying prone and scatheless in eager readiness to rush on as soon as the cannon of the Russians should be reduced to silence. Nor had they long to wait for this result, for the furious artillery duel had barely lasted an hour when Grodnovodsky's guns were seen to limber up such of them as had escaped dis- mounting and lumber off; and then our impatient battalions, throwing out their first fighting line, fanlike, in skirmishing order, with supports behind and reserves following, all in as machine-like and magnificent order as at a field-day on the Tempelhof Common, began to push forward, the guns firing over their heads all the while as they swarmed down the Eussian-ward slope of our eminence and across the rye and potato fields, still rather wet and cloggy from last night's rain, in front of Alexandrovo. The Russian infantry attempted to debouch from their shell-shattered position behind the railway station and other adjacent buildings, and deploy in line of purpose to stem our steadily advancing tide ; but our guns, which were still able to pound away over the heads of our own battalions, played dreadful havoc with their shrapnel charges among Grodnovodsky's out-manceuvred troops, who were also mown down in great numbers by the fearful fire of our magazine-rifles, of which the murderous volleys appeared to inspire our opponents with a feeling of panic as unfamiliar to them as the effects of smokeless powder ; and, for the first time probably in all 74 The Great War 0/189 the military history of Russia," the soldiers of the Czar positively turned tail and fled before superior numbers and unaccustomed terrors. \ Yet the dead and wounded whom they left behind amply attested the tenacious bravery with which they had fought ; and the losses on our side were not insignificant, including, as they did, the death of Colonel von Degenzieher and Lieutenant Prince Zu Sonnenwalde-Drachenfels-Schinckenstein, a young man as brave as he was handsome, both of the 8th Brandenburg (Prince Frederick Charles's) Infantry Eegiment. Still, the loss of these two gallant officers, and other brave men on our side, was more than compensated for by the capture of Alexandrovo (into which we marched, or rather rushed, witli colours flying, and drums beating) with its rich accumulation of railway rolling stock, which will be far more precious to us than acres upon acres of military stores. How in the Heaven's name the Russians could ever have failed to concentrate, at the very outset of this war, a more formidable defending force around so very important a strategic point as Alexandrovo, is a bewildering puzzle even to those who have busied themselves with the systematic study of the Kussian character ; but, at any rate, there they were and here we are, thanks to the incredible supineness of our foes, their contemptible outpost service, the audacity and sudden swiftness of our movements, and the disastrous surprise which we then sprung upon them. My courier returns with this despatch to Thorn, where I trust he will be able to commit it to the wires. OCCUPATION OF ALEXANDEOVO BY THE GEEMANS. ALEXANDROVO, May 3. IT is not yet twenty-four hours since the victorious 6th Division of the German Army occupied this place, and already it is bristling The Great War of 189 75 on the Warsaw, or south-eastern side, with a most formidable line of earthworks, thanks chiefly to the marvellous exertions of the Engineer Battalion of the 3d Corps, which was quick to arrive here by rail yesterday, within an hour of our triumph the first of the campaign. But, indeed, the spades of all our infantry have also been incessantly at work since they piled their rifles here, it being thought certain that the Eussians will endeavour to get a double amount of work out of their cranky, creaking mobilisation machine, and hasten to deliver a desperate counter-attack, with the view of repairing the disastrous error they have committed an error that has placed us in possession of a railway base of operations of incalculable price. Among other spoils we captured 123 railway waggons of various kinds, and nine locomotives, which, added to the rolling stock that is hourly pouring in from the direction of Thorn, with the remainder of the German Army of the Vistula, now rapidly massing here, render us certain of the means of transport in the event of our deciding to carry the torch of invasion deeper into the heart of Kussia. It is true that the railway from here to Warsaw consists of only a single track, but the gauge, unlike that of all Russian lines on the right bank of the Vistula, is of the ordinary European size, and that in itself is a tremendous advantage for us. Our Army of the Baltic, under Count Waldersee, will be hampered in its forward movements into Eussia, if it decides to push across the frontier also, by the fact that the line from Eydtkuhnen is a broad-gauge one, though, indeed, it is understood that the General Staff- prescient in all things has also made provision for adapting the axles of German lines to the broader gauge of Eussian ; but, on the other hand, the Army of Silesia, under Prince George of Saxony, will enjoy the same transport facilities as ourselves, if it can only manage to effect, like us, a pied a terre on the Warsaw and Vienna line, and we are anxiously awaiting news of its movements. 76 The Great War of 189 CAPTUKE OF CZENSTOCHAU BY PRINCE GEOEGE OF SAXONY. PRINCE ALEXANDER OF BATTENBERG A PRISONER. (By Telegraph from our Special Correspondent, Mr. Charles Lowe.) ALEXANDROVO, May 4. THERE is great jubilation among the troops here, for, following hard on the telegram announcing the Emperor's departure from Berlin to the Rhine amid an unparalleled scene of excitement and enthusiasm, came a despatch reporting that Prince George of Saxony, by dint of forced marches of immense difficulty through the devious moors and marsh-grounds east of Rosenberg and Tarnowitz on the Kreuzburg-Tarnowitz line, had also succeeded in surprising the Russians at Czenstochau, on the Warsaw- Vienna Railway, and, capturing that important place, after a desperate but unavailing resistance on the part of its defenders, who, incredible to relate, consisted of not much more than its usual garrison a brigade of infantry and two brigades of cavalry. But the German losses here were much more serious than with us yesterday, one infantry regiment in particular the 22d Silesian being more than decimated in its desperate, yet successful, endeavours to drive the enemy from a clump of wood, surmounted by a battery a proof that it still continues to be animated by the heroic spirit of its name-chief, Field-Marshal James Keith, whilom of Inverugie and Dunnottar, in the Kingdom of Scotland, who, at its head, met his own death, under the eye of Frederick the Great, when saving the surprised right flank of the Prussian Army from utter annihila- tion by the Austrians at Hochkirch in the Lausitz. These two engagements, then, though on a smaller scale, have been the Worth and Spichern of the present war ; and it now only remains to be seen whether we shall be able to improve upon these initial successes which were due to a great extent, I repeat, to the exceeding swiftness and daring of our own movements, as compared with the incredible slowness of our foes, and the faulti- The Great War of 189 77 ness of their mobilisation process, no less than to the fact that the Russians, imagining the Germans would never dare invade Poland, but remain upon their guard and form a flanking reserve support in Silesia to their Austrian allies, directed the main stream of their mobilisation further to the east, towards Dragomiroff's line of hostile advance upon Lemberg and the Carpathian Passes to the south thereof at Stryj. How Gourko, who is known to be still at Warsaw, though the bulk of his forces must now be well in front of him, will endeavour to cope with the situation thus so suddenly created for him, is naturally the question which occupies all minds here, and it cannot be very long before his intentions are made manifest. Meanwhile the telegrams from Galicia, where our Austrian allies have concentrated the bulk of their forces, are not quite so encouraging, indicating, as they do, less initiative and promptitude of action on their part, as well as considerable difference of opinion in the minds of the Corps and Army Commanders as to whether they ought to remain on the defensive, or espouse an audacious policy of invasion like ourselves, and essay to beard the lion, or rather the bear, in his den. Count von Schlieffen, who proves to be as amiable a man as he is an able Chief of the Staff, tells me that news reached the German Headquarters this afternoon of a tremendous conflict between no fewer than five Cavalry Divisions, three on the Russian side and two on the Austrian, somewhere near Brod, on the Volhynian frontier a conflict which resulted, as it could scarcely otherwise have done from the relative proportion of numbers, in the total defeat of the Austro-Hungarian horsemen. The latter, it seems, were covering the movements of the 3d Austrian Corps, which had been appointed to head an advance in the direction of Dubno ; and when they had been overthrown in a metie which, in its colossal magnitude, recalled the mounted conflicts of the Crusaders, the victorious Russians, rallying and reforming line, swept down upon a detached portion of the ustrian infantry, regardless of the smokeless volleys from the ;8 The Great War of 1 89- Maimlicher repeating rifle, and made awful havoc among; the sturdy men from the Steiermark, taking one whole battalion prisoners, including, it is rumoured/the colonel of the regiment, the 27th, who is none other than Count Hartenati, better .known as Prince Alexander or Battenberg, ex-Prince of Bulgaria a wonderful piece of luck, indeed, for the "Russians, if the rumour proves true. LATER. Later despatches confirm the rumour of Prince Alexander's capture by the Eussians, and add that, when the news became known at DragomirofFs headquarters which are said to be at Dubno there was almost as much jubilation as when the in- telligence of Napoleon's surrender flew like wildfire around the German lines at Sedan. The ex-Bulgarian Prince is to be sent to St. Petersburg, where rooms are being already prepared for him at the Katherinenhof , and meanwhile he has been allowed to retain his sword in order that his unforgiving and exultant cousin, the Czar, may have the satisfaction of receiving it from the humiliated captive's own hands a picture that will eclipse in interest all the romantic in- cidents which have already marked the Prince's strangely chequered career. NIGHT ATTACK BY THE EUSSIANS. FIGHTING BY THE ELECTRIC LIGHT ROUT OF GENERAL GOURKO RETREAT UPON WARSAW. (By Telegraph from our Special Correspondent, Mr. Charles Lowe.) ALEXANDROVO, May 7, 5 A.M. THE German Army of the Vistula has just inflicted on the Eussians another Plevna, and they are now in full retreat towards Warsaw. Such, in brief, is the result of the sanguinary night battle of which I have just been a witness. The Eussians were The Great War of 189 79 the first to practise night attacks as a means of obviating the dreadful losses certain to result from magazine-rifle fire during the day, but they will long have cause to remember their first serious application of the nocturnal principle of modern warfare. By seven o'clock last night the 3d and 4th German Corps had completed their concentration at and near this place, and, after extending the lines of entrenchment begun by the 6th Division on capturing Alexandrovo, had gone into fireless bivouac on both sides of the railway line, their tents extending for about a couple of miles in either direction. Several reconnaissances executed by us during the day had elicited that the Russians were marshalling in great force at a place called Waganiek, and were receiving reinforcements from the right bank of the Vistula, by means of a pontoon bridge which had been thrown across the stream a little higher up, at Dobrowniki; but, owing to the dense masses of cavalry which hovered on their front, concealing their movements as a stage curtain hides from view the shifting of the scenes in a theatre, it was impossible for our scouts to bring back more definite information. One item, however, of their intelli- gence, gathered from a captured Cossack, had a special interest for us, to wit, that the Russian forces immediately in front of us con- sisted mainly of the 5th and 6th Corps, with part of the 4th (including the relics of Grodnovodsky's Brigade), and were under the personal command of General Gourko, the hero of the Balkans. On the strength of this information it was decided to attack Gourko before he got his preparations complete, and for this pur- pose to break bivouac, and start in quest of him at the dawn of day, as Prince Frederick Charles had done with Benedek at Sadowa. I had spent the evening with a particular friend of mine, Captain von Jagdkonig, of Stulpnagel's Brandenburg Infantry Regiment, and was just on the point of setting out with him on a visit of inspection among the foreposts, when a Uhlan dashed up with the intelligence that there were signs of a mysterious com- jnotion.in front, and that something was audible in the otherwise 8o The Great War of 1 89 noiseless night like the distant rumbling of waggon and cannon wheels. Anon other messengers from the front came spurring in with similar news, and as the general purport of all these ' Mel- dungcn ' could no longer be doubted, the bugles were at once set to work, and presently all the silent bivouacs, taking up the shrilling war-note one after the other, like the multiplication of a distant echo, were resonant with the thrilling call to arms ; and thanks to the severe training in the discipline of ' alarms ' which the German army has been put through by the present Emperor since his accession to the throne, the army of the Vistula had all started from its sleep and was standing in perfect battle array, with its face to the suspected foe, within ten minutes of the first trumpet summons. The night was intensely dark, the moon having just gone down behind an impenetrable bank of pitchy clouds, and all fighting seemed to be utterly out of the question. Presently, however, the inky darkness all around us was pierced, one may almost say scattered, by a sudden blaze of light, which, appearing to possess all the illuminating power of the mid-day sun, flashed lightning-like upon us its blinding beams from the murky fore- head of the midnight sky. * The electric light ! ' ran from mouth to mouth, after a moment's bewildered pause, while every one instinctively shaded his eyes from the glare of this all-irradiating and all-penetrating lamp which modern Science had thus hung up to facilitate the work of slaughter, as if the very sun refused to look any longer upon human carnage. For some moments the more than mile-long rays of this blinding ball of light, this detective bull's-eye of modern science, swept round the horizon in front of it, as if uncertain where to fix its focus now shooting beyond, now falling short of us. and anon settling on us and suffusing us with a sea of dazzling light. Presently another, and yet another such luminary burst forth from elevations of pretty equal distances in front of us, and the process of their groping about for our lines revealed to us dense masses of grey and dark- green coated battalions picking their cautious way down the The Great War of 189 81 distant slopes in front of us. For the electric light has this dis- advantage, that in flinging its beams about to discover the locality of foes, it frequently at the same time unveils the whereabouts of friends. This was the case here, but our gunners were on the alert, and next time the focus of the light, in its jerky search- movement, fell on the Russian troops in the course of their stealthy advance towards us, we opened the concert with a scream- ing chorus of shells, accompanied by a rattling orchestration of small-arms. Nor had we long to wait for the antiphone; for next time the search-light managed to flood us with its blinding effulgence, the Eussian batteries, which had been planted on the same elevations, gave lusty voice, and bellowed away at us in most leonine fashion, though their projectiles, being aimed at much too long a range, flew high over our heads and left us scathe- less. Not so, however, the rifle-rain of our enemies, which, first in intermittent showers, and then in a steady downpour, began to fall among our ranks with deadly effect ; and the word was passed from flank to flank for all the infantry to lie down and court the shelter of our field intrenchments, which crested the ridge of our line of battle. Between us and the Eussian infantry there intervened a de- pression in the ground, a little deeper than that which separates Mont St. Jean from Belle Alliance ; but what enhanced the value of this ground to our foes was the fact that their batteries in the rear, planted as they were on the electric light elevations over- looking the terrain, could fire over the heads of their infantry till the latter was pretty well within storming distance of our posi- tion, much in the same way as the guns of the 6th Division had been able to do the other day on the occasion of our first engage- ment, which resulted in the capture of Alexandrovo. The Kussians advanced against us with a steady, stolid courage worthy of the men who had essayed to capture the Sand Bag Battery and storm the redoubts of Plevna ; and as the fitful flashes of the electric light revealed to us, for a few moments at a time, their dense battalions advancing and deploying into the fighting- '& F 82 The Great War had put a stop, and had been told by their colonel to train ' ^rses a httle