Belgium by causing it to become a dangerous salient. An advance of this character would also have compelled a rectification of the German line further south, and therefore, of course, have effected the delivery of more French soil from the invaders.

The actual distances involved in this project were not by any means a serious consideration. Much greater distances, often over very difficult country, had been traversed in the space of a few days or weeks by armies in the other theatres. The difficulty lay in the immense strength and depth of the German fortified lines. The distance from the British line to Cambrai, notable as the place where the British halted and made a stand in the retreat from Mons to the Marne, was about twenty miles. The distance to Mons itself (within the Belgian frontier of course) was about fifty miles. Thus the first stage in a great offensive undertaken from this point with the ultimate object of driving the Germans back to the Rhine involved an advance of about forty miles. It is true that even with this stage accomplished the Germans would have remained entrenched in the Ardennes, would still have held a portion of the French territory further south, and would still have retained nearly all the Belgian flat lands in their grip; but notwithstanding this, a highly important district of France would have been recovered, and in a break of this magnitude the Germans might well have lost two or three hundred thousand men in prisoners alone. The distance from the point where the British offensive opened to the German frontier, near Aachen, is about 160 miles in a straight line.

After the terrific bombardment, which had become the usual preliminary effort in an offensive, and which in this case lasted several days, the French and British infantry moved to the assault on July 1. It will be remembered that the British line ran about two miles east of Arras and about five miles east of Albert. Between these two towns the line bent somewhat westwards, so that the British line here made a concavity looking towards Germany. The northern extremity, or left wing, of the offensive was situate eight or nine miles north of the Ancre, in the neighbourhood of a village named Gommecourt; and the southern extremity was near the village of Fay, about an equal distance south of the Somme. The line thus fell naturally into three sections: (1) the position north of the Ancre, which was British, (2) the section between the Ancre and the Somme, which was also almost wholly British and was the scene of the most severe fighting, and (3) the section south of the Somme which was French.

The assault along the whole of this selected part of the line was launched at 7.30 a.m. on July 1. South of the Somme the French were fortunate in finding the Germans relatively unprepared, the enemy having deemed the French army incapable of any really serious offensive after its losses in the battles before Verdun. Thus the French immediately made considerable

progress in the direction of the small town of Peronne, which lay about six miles east of the original French lines. On the left wing, the section between Gommecourt and the Ancre, the British advanced to the attack at the same time as the infantry were set in motion further south, and after heavy losses entered the German advanced trenches in many places; but in this section the German guns had never been properly mastered, and before the evening the enemy succeeded in killing or driving back the British, and recaptured their trenches.

Although the British losses were heavy north of the Ancre, it was in the centre that the most fearful fighting occurred. The length of the line between the Ancre and the Somme was about twelve miles. Over the whole of this section the British advanced in the first day, the progress being most marked on the right, where it was helped by the French successes, and least important on the left, where the troops were liable to be enfiladed owing to the failure north of the Ancre. On either side of the main road from Albert to Cambrai the British pressed forward. The villages of La Boiselle, Mametry, Montauban, and Fricourt were seized in the first rush. On the way to Cambrai, the first two small towns which the British were approaching were Combles and Bapaume, the latter being on the above-mentioned main road to Cambrai, about ten miles beyond the British front. For seven miles northwards of the Somme the British troops advanced to a depth of over a thousand yards, and northwards again as far as the left bank of the Ancre smaller advances were made. This was accomplished in one day. In the first two days the British captured 3,500 prisoners and the French about 5,000, but few guns were taken.

At first the largest advances were made by the French, whose extreme left wing extended across to the right bank of the Somme and whose immediate objective was Peronne. On either side of the main road from Bray to Peronne the French pushed forward, and in three days they advanced to a depth of three miles on a front of about six miles and captured the small villages of Frise, Feuillères, Herbecourt, Flaucourt (three miles from Peronne), Assevillers, and Fay. On the third day the French took over 2,000 prisoners. The village of Estrées marked the southern limit of the French line of advance. On July 4 and 5 the French, who were commanded by General Foch, gained more ground, and on the north bank of the Somme captured the village of Hem. This was the most rapid part of the offensive, and during these few days the French once more used their cavalry, a striking incident, for no cavalry had dared to show itself for many months. By the 9th, in spite of counterattacks by the enemy, the French had advanced as far as Biaches, situated only one mile from Peronne. By about the 10th of the month it became apparent, however, that neither the French nor the British were advancing at the speed necessary for the attainment of any dramatic success. For speed is an essential

element in an offensive of this kind. All experience of the war showed that if the fortifications of the defending side were to be crushed in and burst, with the consequent loss of a large number of guns and prisoners, and causing a general retreat, it must be done quickly, within the space of a few days. The Germans accomplished this a dozen times against the Russians in 1915, and General Brussiloff succeeded in doing it more than once against the Austrians in 1916. But the French failed to do it in Champagne in 1915, the Germans failed to do it at Verdun, and the British and French were not successful in their similar attempt on the Somme. When a fortified line is burst asunder, and the attacking side breaks right through into the open country, a general retreat and great losses in prisoners and guns necessarily ensue. But when an attacking army can only creep forward by stages of a few hundred yards, in an offensive lasting for weeks, the consequence is, not that the same result is achieved more slowly, but that the same result is not attained at all. The extreme slowness of the advance enables the defenders to save nearly all their guns, to avoid any serious losses in prisoners, and during the lapse of weeks to extend their fortifications backwards, so that the fortified line is not burst at all, nor even diminished in depth. The line is merely moved backwards, and a price is exacted from the defenders, but, inevitably, a more severe price is paid by the assaulting army. This is what happened at Verdun, and this is what happened on the Somme.

The casualties during an offensive under these conditions are least serious whilst it is successful, and most terrible when it begins to fail. When the infantry get through, they do so because the hostile resistance has been previously crushed by the artillery, and they are therefore not exposed to any very destructive fire. Contrariwise when an infantry assault fails, the reason is that the troops come up against a fire in which no assault can live, their own guns not having been able to master the defending guns and machine guns. Thus the British casualties south of the Ancre were heavier in the second week than in the first; and for a few days in this second week the daily casualties numbered about 10,000 to the British alone. It was at this point that the advance was brought to a stop by the devastating fire of the German guns, which the British guns could not silence. Fortunately, however, a large proportion of the casualties were slight wounds, and the British losses for the whole month of July were not nearly up to an average of 10,000 a day, the total not exceeding 130,000.

At various points, however, the British continued to creep forward. On July 10, the village of Contalmaison was won, after having changed hands several times. Fierce fighting took place in Trones Wood, south of the village of Longueval. A party of the Royal West Kent regiment were the first to reach Trones Wood, but then the tide of the British advance ebbed,

and they were left within the German lines. For forty-eight hours they held their own in this position. Then the Germans, on July 14, brought up a large force to overwhelm them. The German commander summoned them to surrender, but this was refused. The Germans were just about to annihilate the party when there was once more a general British advance, which came swarming into the wood, and saved the heroic West Kents. The fighting continued with unceasing violence, the Germans delivering constant counter-attacks, but these were almost uniformly repulsed. Having reached Biaches, the French could make no more head way. The Germans having recovered from their first surprise at the French offensive were successful in their defence of Peronne. Longueval, Bazentin le Grand, and Bazentin le Petit were won by the British, however, in the middle of the month. On one occasion the British used cavalry for the first time since 1914-detachments of the Dragoon Guards and Deccan Horse. By July 17 the British had captured altogether fifty-four guns, sixty-six machine guns, and nearly 11,000 prisoners. In the same period the French took eighty-five guns, eighty-nine machine guns, and 12,000 prisoners. In comparison with the numbers engaged these figures are, of course, not large. At the end of July the British made an advance along the main road to Bapaume, and took the village of Pozières, lying over two miles from the spot at which the original British line crossed the road. The maximum depth of the British advance in July was slightly over three miles.

As regards the rest of the Western Front, the district of Verdun was the only sector in which severe fighting took place. All through April, May, and June the Crown Prince of Prussia continued his offensive against this city, but his advances were most meagre and his losses fearfully heavy. The Germans captured Fort Vaux on June 6, and by a terrific assault a fortnight later they succeeded in taking Fleury and Thiaumont (hamlets in advance of Douaumont and only three miles from Verdun itself), on June 23; but the British offensive on the Somme paralysed the German effort on the Meuse, and in all probability was the chief means of saving Verdun from capture.

THE CONQUEST OF GORIZIA.

During August an important victory was gained by the Italian Army, which more than compensated the kingdom for the defeats in Tyrol and Venetia in May. Several times since the beginning of the war the right or eastern wing of the Italian Army had attempted to capture by bombardment and storm the important Austrian town of Gorizia (or Görz), which was the capital of one of the smaller provinces of the empire. The Austrian defences in the eastern section of the Italian front did not at any time run along the frontier, but were some considerable distance within the frontier, seven or eight miles to the

east of that line, on the east bank of the river Isonzo. It was the line of the Isonzo, not the frontier, which the Austrians attempted to defend. In this attempt they were never at any time more than partially successful. They did, indeed, succeed for many months in holding the most vital reaches of the river, in the immediate vicinity of Gorizia, but both below Gorizia and above Tolmino, the Italians had forced the barrier and had established themselves several miles beyond the river. From Plezzo southwards the entire front was in Austrian territory, and from Plezzo to Tolmino the opposing lines were situated, at the beginning of August, several miles to the eastward of the Isonzo. From Tolmino southwards to about five miles below. Gorizia, however, the Austrians held the line of the river. But from the village of Petreano to the coast immediately south of Monfalcone, the Italians held both banks of the river, and in places were six or seven miles to the east of it.

On August 4, General Cadorna, the Italian Commander-inChief, commenced a general assault upon the Austrian defences in this region. The attacks were strongest firstly to the east of Monfalcone (which the Italians held), and down to the coast, that is, in the district called "the Carso," and secondly, immediately above and below Gorizia. The assault on the Carso plateau was the first to be driven through in earnest, and the Austrians appear to have rushed troops down to this southern sector, and so to have weakened their line farther north to an unwise extent. It is more than possible that the attack in the Carso was deliberately intended by General Cadorna as a feint designed to distract the enemy's attention from the somewhat later, and more serious, assault upon Gorizia itself. However that may have been, this was the effect produced. The assault upon Gorizia developed on the 6th, when the Austrian lines had been weakened in the manner stated.

Gorizia is dominated by two heights, Monte Sabotino to the north-west and San Michele to the south-west, the former being the tactically more important hill. The Italians had almost obtained possession of both these hills in their earlier attacks upon Gorizia in 1915, but on these occasions the storming troops had never been able to maintain their ground. This time they were successful, and by the 8th the summits of both hills were entirely in the hands of the invaders. The great bridge across the river, the western approaches to which the Austrians had held up to this date, was now swept by the Italian guns on these heights, and it was obvious that the fate of Gorizia was sealed. On August 9 Italian troops took possession of the town.

This victory was a notable and remarkable achievement, and was a much greater success than any gained by the FrancoBritish armies farther north. It must not be forgotten, however, that whereas the desperate offensive of the French and British troops encountered the extremely formidable resistance of the German Army, the Italians in their offensive only had to

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