February 23.

All day long we sat in our earth hut or passed crouching along the trenches visiting the different points of observation. What a difference a few inches make! At each more exposed point no care seemed enough. The whole day bullets passed above us, sometimes singing—or as George said "wailing"—about fifteen yards off, but most of them embedded themselves in our hill, sometimes kicking away with a ricochet or exploding. Often there were sharp salvos from several rifles at once aimed mostly at the loopholes where our sharpshooters lay ready; men were shot through the forehead in this way.

In the afternoon I saw a fire light up in some German trenches by the river, and it quickly spread along their lines. A figure like an insect stood out shovelling at the flames and some of our men shot at it; the German passed down the slope but came again, this time going back at a run. The flames spread further until they were at last extinguished from below. We ourselves got nothing except bullets, and none of our men were wounded. There was no excitement and practically no reply.

It was considered that the enemy was wasting his powder, in a nervous fear of attack.

But all the day we saw, from our vantage-point, shell after shell raining on neighbouring positions. At one time attention was given to the high ground behind us, and a large hut in which I had halted the night before went up in flames, and in a few minutes seemed to have disappeared altogether. However, only a cow was killed, and except for two huts I found the position unchanged when I passed back here in the evening. No wonder that our own artillery did not deign to reply till the evening, when it lighted up a big flame in a small town beyond the river.

Southward across the flat ground which we had traversed in the dark the cannonade was more furious and had more meaning. Here there was a projecting bluff where our front came close up to the river before receding sharply from it and taking an altogether different direction. This was doubly an angle. It was a salient landmark in the curve of the whole Russian line from a western front against Germany to a southern front against Austria, and was therefore one of the points from which the conquering Russian march through Galicia threatens the junction of the two allies. The lie of the ground made it still more a challenge to the enemy, as the advanced trenches on this side were opposed to a fire from both sides and even partly from the rear. On this devoted hill the enemy's artillery, strongly reinforced, poured an unending torrent of shells. We could see them burst almost without interruption—the heavy explosive shell for driving the men from their shelter followed by the two shrapnels for catching them in the open. In all some eight hundred shells must have been lodged on the hill on this day, and in the evening a large hut on the top lit up like an illuminated fairy castle.

No fewer shots were fired the next day, and when I was later able to get to this ground, it was all harrowed up with enormous holes even in the gullies that ran crosswise through the hill itself. The men crouched in the trenches where death threatened any exposed movement and the falling shells often carried the works away wholesale, wounding and killing large numbers.

A wounded officer, much loved by his men, was asked by them what they could do to pay the enemy back, and he answered, "Sit and Wait."

This time the cannonade was not, as so often with the Austrians, simply a nerve-stricken discharge of ammunition. When the hill, and especially the line of our trenches, had been covered with shell, and the defenders had been long enough reduced to a condition of paralysis and impotence, a whole division of the gallant Tirolese advanced on the projecting angle of the line. These are the best troops that Austria has left, and they were opposed to parts of two Russian regiments. They ensconced themselves at night in rifle pits on a lower ridge of the hill, and forcing their way up found lodgment in a small wood and even occupied some disused trenches only fifty yards from the Russians. They planted a flag; and the fire of their artillery, which was this day wonderfully accurate, continued to pound the Russians over the heads of the Tirolese infantry. An attempt was made to break through the Russian line at the point of the angle, which was also the junction of the two defending regiments.

And now came the reply. Standing up under the cannonade the Russian infantry, with the support of its machine guns, poured in such volleys that everything in front of it went down. The rush to break through was beaten out and backward, the trenches occupied by the Tirolese became a line of corpses; no attempt was made to resist the bayonet; Russian troops on the flank passed down towards the river and took the enemy in flank; the whole attack, or what was left of it, rolled down the hill, leaving 1300 corpses in the wood and in the open; a number of prisoners, wounded and Red Cross men were left behind; and next day retreating columns, without even their baggage, were seen marching off into the hills beyond the river.

Prisoners told me they had not eaten for four days, and that enteric and typhus were rampant in their trenches, which were often full of water. They gave no good account of their officers, and they said that both they and Tirol were sick of the war. I found many dead in the Russian trenches, all killed by the enemy's artillery. The fire was then intermittent, and we were still obliged to act on the defensive; but the men were perfectly unperturbed. As a Russian private put it when I asked him to compare the Austrian soldier with the Russian: "He is a man, too, but we have rather more vigour, rather more boldness, more inclination for it, and we are anyhow winning. It might be added that we are steadier." A modest and quiet estimate enough at the moment of a signal victory against odds and natural conditions.

February 26.

In the bandaging-room every description of suffering is seen, and many ways of meeting it. What strikes one most is the difference between the Russians and the rest. In general the Russians have an altogether stronger physique and therefore a much firmer and sounder morale. Some of the younger men lie there under treatment as if they were not ill at all and were simply having football injuries patched up. Such was Alexey of Yaroslav, who kept a fine ruddy colour and chatted away jollily about the market gardeners at Lake Nero as he arched his broad back and had his numerous wounds attended to. He was wounded in a scouting expedition, but crawled back of himself to the Russian lines; and when he was carried out of the hospital he behaved like an ordinary traveller going on a journey. He had no intention of going to Russia and spoke of his return to the ranks as "a matter of course." Many of these wounded write begging their officers to keep their places open for them. Some lie glancing at their serious wounds as they are treated, with a healthy and indifferent eye. The head wounds are the most trying to the morale; they always make men look weak and unequal to things. But even here the Russian temper shows itself. Ivan, a married peasant, had two nasty holes in his head, but he talked all the while he was being treated with a loveable simplicity, and even his exclamations of pain were only little appeals to the sisters, full of a natural courtesy. Once when the knife was a long time in his head, he protested mildly, "Enough, gentlemen!" There was great alarm when he suddenly rolled off the dressing-table on to the stone floor; but this proved to be the turning-point in his recovery, and he was soon afterwards joining with the others in his ward singing peasant songs. The Armenians are sometimes a frailer people; but there was one man with a great heart, who had both his legs smashed while bringing in an officer from under fire; one leg had been amputated, and delay in first aid had induced a mass of gangrene; the man was doomed; but he held out for day after day, and nothing but a dull, strong groan escaped him until at last he succumbed under his sufferings; to the end he was always asking after the officer whom he had saved.

The Germans show a much greater consciousness of their wounds, but take a quiet pride in conquering them. Will and purpose are triumphant, and these men return sooner than others to a normal outlook on the little businesses of life. A Tirolese, badly wounded in the head, at first took a little too much trouble to keep up his self-respect before strangers, but later talked away freely, though he was very troubled that he would go back to his sweetheart with the brand of a prisoner of war. The Austrian Germans were frailer and more gentle. Two of them in particular, both officers, won golden opinions from all who met them. They were men of a happy disposition, of real culture and of great delicacy of mind. There was not the slightest difficulty in talking with them about the war, because they bore no grudge against any one, not even against the Emperor William, whose unwisdom they regarded as the main cause of their country's misfortunes. These two showed the greatest patience under treatment, talking meanwhile of their army, literature and music, and regarding their wounded limbs as children who were being gradually persuaded to be good.

Much the saddest sight in the bandaging-room were the little Polish boys who had been wounded in villages during the operations, mostly by shrapnel. There were eleven of them in the hospital, and they almost filled one ward. They were all pretty little fellows, remarkably well made and with something martial in their bearing; all of them wore round their necks little silver religious medals. It was very painful to see them minus an arm or a leg, or still worse with some body wound which could only look natural on a full-grown soldier. Most of these children were from ten to thirteen years of age. They were bright and smiling in the bandaging-room, and seemed to have no more regret for themselves than they would have had for their own broken toys. But Poland will be covered with such after the war. There may be a renewed, there may be a united Poland, but anyhow there will be a Poland of cripples. That is why I continue to hear everywhere, like a burden that ever repeats itself, the beautiful Polish national air "In the Smoke of Fires." Its solemn tones meet one everywhere, now hummed by passers-by, now ground out endlessly by a barrel organ. I came one day on to the street humming it myself, when an old Pole at once, with the grace of his nation, took off his hat and solemnly bowed to me. It is the motto of the Polish population on whichever side of the Russian frontier; and may the purification of which it speaks lead to happier things: for no nationality has been tempered in a harder school than that of Poland.

Nothing could exceed the kindness of the Russian staff in dealing with all these various patients. There is, of course, no distinction of nationality or condition; the sisters play with the children, find all sorts of little questions or other interests to distract the attention of those under treatment, and bring them back to lighter mood, as soon as the actual pain is passed. A Russian hospital, even with all the afflictions of war, gives out an atmosphere of home of which there is frequent mention in the letters which the prisoners send off to their distant relations.

March 1.

My friend "Wiggins" is a very remarkable person. Heaven knows what he doesn't manage, and it would be difficult to say what he doesn't know. Take England, though Wiggins has many other languages and knowledges. Wiggins's English, learnt in childhood, is of the most daring and comprehensive kind and runs to the writing of doggerel verse. The history of the English Church he knows far better than most English clergymen, and the development of the English Constitution he both knows and understands better than some English professors. He will write, for instance, "Please send me more books on the period of transition from Constitutionalism to Parliamentarism." Parliamentary procedure he has studied night after night in the Distinguished Strangers' Gallery; and his toast when he was dined in the House of Commons in 1909 was "to the glorious traditions of the Parliament of Great Britain." He is very well up in all the detail of our Army and Navy, is thought a good judge of English shorthorns, and hopes to send his son to Winchester.

Wiggins has done no end of work for the close friendship of his country with England. His quick resourceful mind and his ties with men in all departments of Russian politics and public life here have for years been mobilised to this object, which is the mainspring of all his great and untiring efforts. He has never lost heart when events went against him or when some favourite plan was blocked, and was always ready for another go. He is a good man and a brave man.

War has brought Wiggins and me together in novel surroundings. He has a liking for all that is venturesome and an innocent predilection for anything that partakes of conspiracy. Wiggins sits and collects all the military telegrams from the different fronts, including the western; Wiggins reads, answers and transmits private telegrams from Russia to other countries. Wiggins goes through the letters found in the enemy's trenches, and his staff is competent to deal with all the Babel of languages of Austria. Wiggins interrogates the prisoners and fixes the movements of the enemy's troops; there is a delightful caricature of him, standing like a wild boar at bay, among a crowd of gaping Austrians. Wiggins looks after the aeroplanes; and sometimes goes himself on the most perilous of scouting expeditions. On one of these I found with him a man of the most quaint simplicity, an artist, who used to sit down between the lines and sketch the enemy's positions. He described with an impersonal unconcern how the bullets passed him. "But what do you do when you have finished?" I asked. "Oh, I go on to another position." "But surely it is very dangerous work?" "Yes, I suppose there are about ninety-nine chances in a hundred of my getting killed; but I haven't any children. I should rather like to do my work from an aeroplane; I think that would be safer."

"Wiggins" asked my help in reading some of the letters from the trenches. One way or another, I have seen a good many of these. The great thing that strikes me is that they are so good—that the war after all brings out the best of every one. The Italian letters (of soldiers in the Austrian army) are particularly graceful and pretty; but then most Italians are gentlefolk. One writes: "I hear that T. is a prisoner and with the Russians and that they are much better off than in the line of fire." Another, hoping for the end of the war by Christmas, writes: "For the Babe Jesus we hope for peace." "Angelina" writing to "Carissimo Gustavo" ends thus: "If we are meant to be married, few letters are enough; and if we are not, no letters are any use."

I came out on the muddy little square and to my surprise caught the notes of a melody that was for many years prohibited in Poland. It was "Poland is not ruined yet," the battle-song of the Polish legions that fought under Dombrowski against Russia for Napoleon and for Polish independence. The words were different but not in spirit; they were the famous "Slavs come on." I was surprised, because I was in purely military surroundings at the staff of our army. But the men who were singing were all Slavs of non-Russian origin, they were a military unit in Russian uniform and marched round the square in front of Radko Dmitriev, who, with all others present, stood to the salute. To these troops he then distributed crosses and medals of the George for signal bravery, and they sang him another Slavonic air, a Bulgarian hymn in honour of himself. Behind him stood a number of Czech (Bohemian) prisoners; and the troops next played the Bohemian salute and the Czech National Hymn; some of the prisoners were in tears. Turning to them, the General said that as Slavs they could have no doubt as to the welcome that awaited them in Russia, where all that was possible would be done for their comfort, and that when the war was over they would return home, and he hoped that they would find their country free. The last words were, at his desire, repeated to them by the interpreter.

No wonder that the Slavs of Austria are coming over in great masses and begging for employment on the Slavonic side; while the fictitious unity of Austria, a mechanism for turning to German uses a country which is three-quarters Slavonic, is crumbling before the eyes. German ambitions are being reduced to count only on the services of instruments that are really German.

March 9.

I crossed the river and followed the line of the entrenchments. The men were resting in the evening before their earth-burrows. I passed along to the corner of our positions; in the half-light one could stand on the earthworks and see without being shot at. The enemy, who were Hungarians, were only six hundred yards off. Between the two lines ran a broad causeway built in time of peace, part of a great dam of which sections are occupied by us and other sections by the enemy. Here, where for a short distance it becomes neutral, all sorts of queer things are possible. Our scouts can pass under partial cover along either side of it, and constantly do so. The enemy makes no counter-moves; his advance sentries stand only just outside his wire entanglements, and creep in and report the moment they see any movement outside; he does not even open fire. The Russian soldier, who here, as elsewhere, has a complete moral and physical superiority, goes out on little night raids, sometimes in small companies, sometimes alone, to hear the conversation of the enemy, which if Slavonic can be readily understood by him, or, still better, to catch a "tongue," that is, to bring home a captive sentinel for information. This is why the enemy's sentries retreat. If fire were opened, it would only tell the Russians just what they want to know, namely, in what strength the positions are occupied.

I should like to have stayed here, but there were other things to see; so, with a soldier guide, I passed over some flat, marshy ground to a forward angle of our lines. We found our way by passing the field telephone through our hands, which is also a good means of seeing that it is in order. In the dusk, with the sense of danger and mystery around us and stray bullets sometimes coming from the enemy, my companion spoke in short and simple sentences, of which one would like to have preserved every word. "He" (the German) must be having a bad time; why doesn't he see it? We are drawing in on him from all sides; the Austrians will be no use to him; they are nervous and fire at everything, and seldom hit anything; our people only fire to hit.

In a stone cellar with nothing above it, for the whole village was destroyed soon after it was taken, there are gathered the officers of the battalion. The commander, Lukich, is a genial, communicative man who has knit them all together into a little family; indeed, two of the captains are cousins, and the commander has living with him in his mud hut his nephew, a boy of fifteen, who has been allowed to spend his holidays at the war. Not many of those who set out for the war are left now, and that alone makes a closer brotherhood among the rest. They all smile at Lukich's inventiveness and resource, and are all very fond of him.

Lukich gives elaborate instructions for the night's scouting. Pavel Pavlovich, whose turn it is to go, is a splendidly built man with a great head and big brown eyes: "an ideal fighting man," I am told. He is down with a very bad chill, and reports himself quite unfit. Lukich says that he always has to send out sick scouts. "Don't laugh," says Pavel Pavlovich; "I can hardly keep on my legs." However, without further words he gets ready for his night's job. Half-an-hour later he appears in a long white dressing-gown which hangs carelessly over his huge figure, and with him are thirty picked men—for there are always plenty of volunteers for this work—drawn from different companies. All are clad in white, and when first I stumbled on them in the darkness, though I knew they were there, I took them for a row of posts. Lukich made them a little speech, telling them that some one from their English allies had come to see them and that he hoped they would do well.

Their job was to crawl some one thousand yards, to overhear the conversation in the enemy's trenches and judge of the numbers there, to catch a sentry if possible, to cut through some of the wire entanglements, and, above all, to throw some hand-grenades into the Austrian lines. Each man had a definite task; the bomb-throwers were trained men, and several carried huge scissors for cutting wire. As the Austrians sometimes pass an electric current through the wires, these scissors often have wooden handles.

The men passed at once into the darkness, and we waited on the line of our trenches. Nothing happened for some time. Various figures appeared from the neutral ground: sentries and patrols, who gave the impression that all this ground was Russian. At last, at the request of a soldier, we took cover (the soldiers are always trying to put their officers in greater safety than themselves), and directly afterwards there was a big thud, and flash went the first bomb. The next moment the Austrians were shooting wildly in all directions; but very soon after the firing had died down the second bomb went up, followed by another excited discharge from the enemy. This showed that our scouts had stayed close outside the Austrian lines; and among those around us, too, there was a sort of buoyant audacity. "They'll come away now?" I asked. "Oh no; they've several more bombs with them;" and soon after the calm of night had returned up went No. 3. We waited till six bombs had been lodged in this way, and each time there was the same nervous discharge of musketry, bullets flying everywhere, but no one being hit.

After a time Pavel Pavlovich came back, as if from a football match. He had left a reserve in the rear, sent watchers in various directions, and taken the rest forward. Not a man was hurt, and every detail of his instructions had been carried out. Pavel Pavlovich was a different man, full of life and spirits; and, to complete his satisfaction, there appeared in our cellar at this very moment his nearest friend, a brother officer wounded earlier in the war through the head and only to-night returned to the regiment. "We must leave those two alone," said Lukich; "they are like man and wife, and no one will get a word out of either of them."

March 11.

The staff of the V regiment was in the usual hut, clean, comfortable and decorated with religious pictures, as most of these Polish cottages seem to be. It was the usual family party, the little colonel being a sort of paterfamilias, the major a kind of uncle, and the younger men like cousins of different degrees. It was very interesting when the reports came in from other parts of the huge front and the day's changes were filled in on the maps—as usual, on the whole satisfactory.

The colonel of artillery was a bronzed man whose face was a mixed suggestion of a raven and of a kind Mephistopheles. He was a strong Conservative, and had friendly discussions with the chronicler of the regiment, a highly cultivated Liberal with a beautiful voice and the features of a youthful Mr. Pickwick. The war brings all sorts of political views together, and the exchange is always free, equal and without rancour.

When I got to know these good people, I told them I thought they spent a lot of time in copying out verses. "Position warfare"—standing in the trenches—is not an eventful life; and while I was with the regiment three sets of verses were put on the machine and circulated to the battalions. One of these, with a number of jokes about "Wilhelm," was written by a soldier in the ranks; and another was the composition of a non-commissioned officer, also of this regiment. This second was headed by the word which is in every one's thoughts here, "Forward," and contained one verse which had almost the smoothness and simplicity of Pushkin, and is, therefore, not for translation. The third set came from Pickwick Junior, and I give a rough rendering of it which, I am afraid, only spoils it—

These are the simple thoughts that are in most people's minds here—the more so the nearer one is to the front. There one finds least of all doubt of the blessings of peace, and least of all doubt of the need to go to the end, and of the certainty of the final result. But Russia has done and is doing a giant's task, and one will meet cripples at every turn for many a year to come.

My friends possessed an interesting little book in a black paper binding which they kindly lent to me. It was the song-book of the German army, which, with a soldier's Prayer-book, is carried in every German knapsack. It is called "War Song-book for the German Army, 1914," and was issued by the Commission for the Imperial Book of Folk-songs. Roughly, about the ten best things in German patriotic and military song are to be found here, with a few of the best-known folk-songs and a number of inferior ditties which vainly attempt to be light. Prussia has more than her share, for there are very few good Prussian songs, though such as there are are military. "Fredericus Rex" and "Als die Preussen marschirten vor Prag"—surely an unfortunate reminiscence in the present war—are both historic and have the merit of plainness. The year 1813, a year of liberation and not of aggression, gives three magnificent songs: "The God that bade the iron grow," by Arndt, and "Lützow's wild hunt" and the "Sword Song" of Körner, the latter written a few hours before the author of "Lyre and Sword" met his death in a cavalry charge at the battle of Dresden. But, of course, I expected also to find—and am sure that I should have found in God-fearing 1870—the same writer's "Prayer in Battle," one of the most real and masculine of hymns, and his soul-stirring "Landsturm." As to the omission of the "Landsturm," an Austrian prisoner explained it to me by saying, "This is no war of liberation." Of the less specially national songs there is Schiller's magnificent picture of the soldier of fortune, "Wohlauf Kameraden aufs Pferd, aufs Pferd," some of the verses of which have certainly been too faithfully followed in Poland. One finds also the top thing in German war lyric, "I had a trusty Comrade" of Uhland—a word-perfect poem which I shall always associate with the Saxon grave outside Saint-Privat where I heard it sung by veterans of 1870. There is also the simple trooper's song "Morgenrot"; I should have put in "Die barge Nacht," but one verse is certainly too plain-spoken for present German hopes. Martin Luther's "Safe stronghold"—"Now thank we all our God," sung by Frederic's soldiers on the battlefield of Lützen—and the Evening Prayer—these are the other best things in the collection; but it is spoilt by the unnecessary and improbable allusions to the successful wooing of French and Russian damsels, and beer is too much mixed up with Bible.

I left my friends singing. The Raven, with a plaintive and sentimental look, was with bent head putting in his bass to the admirable tenor of Pickwick Junior. My own contribution was about the "leaders" who "marched with fusees and the men with hand-grenades" (British Grenadiers). One scout, who usually works alone, had taken an unexploded Austrian shell back into their very lines, made a small bonfire round it, and was waiting outside for it to explode; but the result, when I left, was not yet known.

March 13.

I have just visited "The Birds," a very tight place for the Russian soldier to sit in. I was in this part once before, for it was here that Dr. Roshkov set up his tent, or, to be more exact, his earthwork bandaging room in the foremost trenches.

The divisional general was kindness itself; for I stumbled on him in the darkness by opening a wrong door, and his revenge was to ask me in and offer me a bed. The next day I visited the divisional lazaret, where an English lady, Miss Kearne, is working with admirable skill and devotion for the Russians. Nearly all the wounded came from "The Birds," and nearly all had been wounded while sitting in the trenches or looking through the embrasures—that is, without taking any risks, which in "The Birds" all are strictly forbidden to court.

One soon felt one was coming to a warm place. The driver of my army cart explained that the open space over which we were passing was often covered with stray bullets, and there, sure enough, were the Austrian trenches just across the river. The village on our side had a high church, now smashed by the Austrian fire into an imposing ruin. Around it the shells continue to fall freely, and women and children going for water along the village streets are sometimes hit by stray bullets. Roshkov and his comrades have been sent to another part of the front; but a Red Cross "flying column" from the Union of Russian towns is working here under fire, and I met one of its students on horseback taking wounded to the rear.

I delivered a greeting from England to the scouts who were drawn up in the village, and then set off with their leader for the advance posts across the river—as I may say, "The Birds Proper." The chief scout was almost a boy, who had joined the army as a volunteer only at the beginning of the war. He was a Musulman, with a most determined face and a manner of complete ease and indifference. He explained that we were passing over ground often swept by the fire, and added casually, "You've a bad coat; it is fur-lined; the fur might stick in your wound and give you lockjaw, so that you would probably die." Whether he was right or not I have no idea. The soldiers who accompanied us insisted on walking above the covered way, until we told them that we should join them unless they came down to us.

At last we passed some trenches and came out into the open above the river. It is the peculiarity of "The Birds" that we hold a strip of land across the river a mile and a half long, but nowhere more than 300 yards deep. When the Russians rectified their line after the advance to Cracow, they decided to retain certain vantage-points of this kind; however cramped the position and however difficult the conditions of defence, the advantage will be felt when, as on the San earlier, the time comes for another move forward. These advanced lines are connected with our side by bridges which are constantly under fire, as the favourite offensive of the Austrians is a hail of artillery; yet they have never succeeded even in endangering the communications, and their frequent musketry fire is disregarded.

We were able this time to cross the bridge at a walk, and passed along the lines, guesting with different officers, and ultimately taking up our quarters in a spacious earth hut ten yards from the front, which was protected by a high line of excellent earthworks. One advanced post which we visited was only sixty yards from the enemy, and in general the distance from trenches to trenches was 400 to 200 yards. Artillery fire is seldom brought effectively to bear here, but a shower of bullets is kept up, mostly explosive, as one can tell from their splutter; and the enemy have made machines for lodging bombs of various kinds at this short range within our trenches. There is little work for scouts here; the distance is too short, and the opposing sentries are often not more than twenty-five yards from each other. My young host reassuringly mentioned that shrapnel would penetrate our roof, and in the night there was the constant thud of bullets striking against our shelters, while often our door was lit up by the reflection of the frequent rockets sent up by the enemy. Inside, however, our accommodation was first-rate, and we soon slept soundly.

Next morning we went along the front line. The men were everywhere in their places, this line being fully occupied day and night. I had been told I must not stand anywhere behind an embrasure, so we took our view in peeps, mostly from the side. At one point we looked over the top of the works, with the result that there was an immediate volley. One man had been wounded by a bomb in the night, and another was shot through an embrasure, as the shadow made by a head at once draws fire. Some soldiers were busy making little mirrors, so as to see from the side; another had made a bomb-throwing machine out of an Austrian shell, which he fired off in front of us, the officer first calling out to two exposed soldiers, "Here, Beard and Black Collar, get out of the way!" One man's hand was shot through an embrasure.

The most difficult part of the lines was on one of the flanks, where they passed close to the river and were separated from the Austrians at one point by a distance of only twenty-five yards. Earlier it was worse. The two lines were eight yards apart, the bayonets actually crossed over the earthworks, and the Austrians held their rifles over their heads in order to fire down into the Russian trenches. At that time a flank fire also swept these trenches, which were now protected by many transverses. Yet I found the men perfectly cool and natural, just going about the work as they would have done any other.

The bridge on our return was only under a partial fire; but the enemy was again heavily shelling the village.

March 15.

From "The Birds" I passed on to a rather similar position occupied by another regiment. In this case only a small section beyond the river was held, and the Austrian trenches were at a distance of 800 to 1000 yards. This meant a good deal of difference. The enemy was not pestering the advance posts with bombs at short range and incessant musketry fire. The approach was again over a plain bare except for some patches of trees, and there was again a lofty church, this time of particularly handsome outlines, ruined by the Austrian artillery fire. From afar its two towers looked like severed and half-twisted stalks. The Austrians evidently feel sure that all churches are observation points for the Russian artillery. In this they are quite wrong. The Russians in general avoid all such use of churches; I know of many cases in this war in which churches have figured as points of vantage, but always for the Austrians. In more than one case, after the Austrian retreat, telephones for spy's communications have been found attached to the altars, and once a priest was caught at this work.

We left our horses at a ruined building and crossed the bridge. The advanced works were deep and well constructed but, as at "The Birds," the trenches were often full of water, and one had to walk along them frog-wise with a foot pressed against each side. This did not affect the actual shelters of the officers and men, which were dry and fairly comfortable, with lots of straw. One could look through the embrasures or even in some parts over the top of the works, without being likely to confuse the Austrian lines with the Russians as one did at "The Birds." At one place, however, there was an unusual sight. A covered way actually ran without interruption direct from the one line to the other and was often used by the scouts of either side. At the Russian side it came right up to the wire entanglements and the rampart, and here there were always stationed sharpshooters with loaded rifles commanding it for about fifty yards. The enemy's lines were, of course, very plainly visible.

In January a considerable action took place within this narrow compass. The Austrians came out in force and tried to storm the trenches. They swarmed up to the wire entanglements—over which the Russians in general took less trouble than the enemy, as they ordinarily have the confidence of the aggressive—but they were beaten off with terrible loss. Blue uniforms covered all the space between the two lines. Those who fell nearest to the trenches were buried by the Russians without delay; but the Austrians made no attempt to bury their dead lying between, and their fire makes it quite impossible for the Russians to come out for this purpose. Thus, two months after the engagement, I saw these bodies still rotting there; it will soon be spring; and with the two lines so close the danger of infection is pressing for both sides. It would only need a truce of three hours to remove it, and the Russians would gladly make this arrangement and do the work. It seems to me one of those matters which even in this war could be dealt with by some international association, and I have communicated the details, through Prince Dolgorukov, to the Peace Society of Moscow.

As usual in the regiments, and more especially in the trenches, I delivered with the wish of the colonels a greeting to the men from England; and it is one of my chief interests, in making these visits, to see how warmly it is returned, usually with some variant of the Russian military response, "We are glad to do our best"—such as, for instance, "We'll have a try together and finish him." Here the men were particularly cordial. There was the usual interchange of news with the officers as to the eastern and western fronts. I think I may repeat that there is nowhere a more generous appreciation of England's work in the war than in the front lines of the Russian army. The attack on the Dardanelles, which promises to be the most decisive blow that has yet been dealt, arouses the greatest enthusiasm; and the military preparations of England, their wholeheartedness and thoroughness, are a tremendous source of confidence to the Russians. How many times it has been said to me: "With England with us, we know we shall make a clean job of it." Here an officer quoted his father, who had always told him, "Where England is, there things go right," The support is not only moral. The spirit in the two countries is so identical that I frequently find in my letters from England the same phrases, word for word, as I am hearing in conversation here. But it is much more than that; and when it becomes known how close, detailed and far-reaching is the co-operation between the three chief Allies, I am sure that it will be found that no alliance was ever more close or more effective.

Our reappearance on the bridge drew a few bullets. In general all this firing has very little result, and our people do not take the trouble to reply to it. As to artillery, I am sure they fire more than twenty shells to every one of ours. They do it in a routine way at fixed times for an hour, two hours or three at a time. Our artillery lets it pass till it becomes a nuisance and then, with infinitely superior precision, plumps a few shells straight into their lines. This sight I have witnessed more than once from our infantry trenches, which might be miles from our guns but were only a few hundred yards from the marks that they aimed at. It was interesting to see the immediate rebound of spirits among our infantry, who had been sitting almost without reply under the aimless crash and roar of the enemy's fire. By instinct they at once looked freely over the ramparts as privileged spectators, and called out to each other "Got him again," as the smoke of our shells rose from the enemy's line. At such times, indeed, the Austrian fire stops almost immediately; and in one place, after the first Russian shell, a commanding voice came to us from the other side: "Corporal, cease firing."

March 26.

The bombardment of Tarnow has continued. It is now nearly three months that it has gone on intermittently. Yesterday I was walking along a street when the heavy bustling goods-train sound of a big shell came rattling close overhead. There was a crash somewhere near, and a few soldiers who were close to us laughed and picked up a jagged segment. The street seemed full of people at once, and all moving toward where the shell had fallen. An old soldier with a cut face came moodily toward me, so I took his arm and walked with the crowd, as it was taking the direction of the chief local hospital, in which I often worked.

I was afraid that the hospital itself was hit. Far as it was from the railway or anything of military importance, it had more than once had the attention of the German heavy artillery. In January, while I was in this hospital, a shell passed over us so near as to take the breath of the heavily-wounded Austrians who were lying there, and lodged about two hundred yards off, reducing a house to ruins. Some weeks later another shell lodged on an open space about 150 yards off. The Russian sisters of mercy, under Miss Homyakov, never lost their heads for a minute and set about reassuring the wounded; but these last, who were themselves entirely helpless and could not distract their attention by helping any one else, were very agitated. No one was more indignant than the wounded Austrian officers, especially a colonel from Hungary, who regarded the German shot as without any kind of justification. The Russian Red Cross staff were urged from some sides to move the hospital to a safer place, but the sisters absolutely refused, because to transport many of the wounded would have meant death to them. The Commander of the Army conferred the George medal on them for their courage.

As I now neared the hospital, I saw a huge rent in the building in front of it, which was mostly unoccupied. A whole wall of this huge building was torn out, and the iron staircase within was twisted into fantastic shapes. At the door of the hospital, nearly all the windows of which were broken, stood a crowd of townspeople, mostly women and children bringing in wounded. The operating-room was full; on one side an old man, on another a wounded girl with blanched face, and in an ante-room a woman with a wounded baby. Here the local Polish medical staff works hand in hand with the Russians; and with remarkable expedition the wounded all received first aid within half an hour.

Twenty minutes, however, had hardly passed when a second shell banged into something else close to us. I found a little Polish boy, previously amputated here, crouching in the corridor and shivering with fear: I had to carry him back to his ward. Not more than 250 yards off there was a large crowd looking at the new big shell pit (the shell came from a 12-inch gun). In a garden lay the corpse of a girl of twenty, terribly mangled, so that no head was to be distinguished; and her father, running up, cried as if his heart would break and fell beside her. The people, who are of course Austrian subjects, were furious.

Two days later the Commandant put up posters announcing that, on the statement of a captured Austrian officer, these guns are served by a native of Tarnow.

Throughout the bombardment there have been hardly any Russian troops in the town, and it is the local population that suffers. The closeness of so many shell pits near the hospital suggests that this is one of the regular "numbers" or aims of the German artillery.

March 30.

The fall of Przemysl, which will now no doubt be called by its Russian name of Peremyshl, is in every way surprising.

Even a few days before, quite well-informed people had no idea that the end was coming so soon. The town was a first-class fortress, whose development had been an object of special solicitude to the late Archduke Francis Ferdinand. Of course it was recognised that Peremyshl was the gate of Hungary and the key to Galicia; but, more than that, it was strengthened into a great point of debouchement for an aggressive movement by Austro-Hungary against Russia; for the Russian policy of Austria, like her original plan of campaign, was based on the assumption of the offensive. It was generally understood that Peremyshl was garrisoned by about 50,000 men, that the garrison was exclusively Hungarian, and that the commander, Kusmanek, was one of the few really able Austrian commanders in this war. The stores were said to be enough for a siege of three years. The circle of the forts was so extended as to make operations easy against any but the largest blockading force; and the aerodrome, which was well covered, gave communication with the outside world. An air post has run almost regularly, the letters (of which I have some) being stamped "Flieger-Post." As long as Peremyshl held out, the local Jews constantly circulated rumours of an Austrian return, and the Russian tenure of Galicia remained precarious. The practical difficulties offered to the Russians by Peremyshl were very great; for the one double railway line westward runs through the town, so that all military and Red Cross communications have been indefinitely lengthened.

My friend "Wiggins" did his part toward the taking of Peremyshl. The air-postmen, on their long journey to the fortress, are often shot at and sometimes brought down. An Austrian airman found himself compelled to descend on our ground; "Wiggins" sent a cart to be ready for him as he alighted, and that night all his papers were worked through. Among them was the now well-known army order of Kusmanek, announcing that the only way of safety lay through the enemy's lines, and that the men must conquer or die. But side by side with it was a letter from an Austrian staff officer to his wife. He explained that he took this opportunity of eluding the military censor, that a sortie was determined on, but that it was not likely to succeed, and that as to danger his wife need not feel anxious, as the staff did not go into the firing line. Word was sent off at once to the blockading army to expect the sortie.

For weeks past the fortress had kept up a terrific fire which was greater than any experienced elsewhere from Austrian artillery. Thousands of shells yielded only tens of wounded, and it would seem that the Austrians could have had no other object than to get rid of their ammunition. The fire was now intensified to stupendous proportions and the sortie took place; but, so far from the whole garrison coming out, it was only a portion of it, and was driven back with the annihilation of almost a whole division.

Now followed extraordinary scenes. Austrian soldiers were seen fighting each other, while the Russians looked on. Amid the chaos a small group of staff officers appeared, casually enough, with a white flag, and announced surrender. Austrians were seen cutting pieces out of slaughtered horses that lay in heaps, and showing an entire indifference to their capture. Explosions of war material continued after the surrender.

The greatest surprise of all was the strength of the garrison, which numbered not 50,000 but 130,000, which makes of Peremyshl a second Metz. Different explanations are offered; for instance, troops which had lost their field trains and therefore their mobility are reported to have taken refuge in Peremyshl after Rava Russka, but surely the subsequent withdrawal of the blockade gave them ample time for retreat. A more convincing account is that Peremyshl was full of depôts, left there to be supports of a great advancing field army. In any case no kind of defence can be pleaded for the surrender of this imposing force.

The numbers of the garrison of course reduced to one-third the time during which the food supplies would last; but even so the fortress should have held out for a year. The epidemic diseases within the lines supply only a partial explanation. The troops, instead of being all Hungarians, were of various Austrian nationalities; and there is good reason to think that the conditions of defence led to feuds, brawls, and in the end open disobedience of orders. This was all the more likely because, while food was squandered on the officers, the rank and file and the local population were reduced to extremes, and because the officers, to judge by the first sortie, took but little part in the actual fighting. The wholesale slaughter of horses of itself robbed the army of its mobility. The fall of Peremyshl is the most striking example so far of the general demoralisation of the Austrian army and monarchy.

Peremyshl, so long a formidable hindrance to the Russians, is now a splendid base for an advance into Hungary.

April 1.

I am afraid to-day, which, by the way, was Bismarck's birthday, is a bad date to put to any anticipations as to the war. But things seem to be taking a more definite direction than for some months past, and one may say that the possibility of decisive events is now in sight.

If one glances along both fronts, western and eastern, one sees, I think, only a single point at which a really decisive blow, military and political, is possible; it is, of course, the junction on the eastern front of Austro-Hungary and Germany. This has been clear to every one for some time past. But one may go further. The greatest strength of our enemies, both political and military, lies in two parts, Prussia and Hungary; and the gap between Prussia and Hungary is a very much wider one than the Austro-German frontier. In this gap lie Slavonic peoples, the Czechs (Bohemians), Moravians and Slovaks, whose representatives in arms have shown by extensive surrenders that their sympathies are rather with us than with the enemy. A number of mountain chains, the Carpathians, Giant Mountains, Erzgebirge and Böhmerwald, give this group rough geographical boundaries.

Germany, under the lead of Prussia, is a powerful and compact unit which has so far given itself heart and soul to this war. Divisions in the future here are by no means impossible. There have been brawls even in this war between Prussian and Bavarian troops (in the Argonne); and it is not difficult to picture a return of the old jealousies which less than fifty years ago put South Germany and Saxony into the opposite camp to Prussia. Here, too, the Böhmerwald, Thüringerwald and Erzgebirge have a traditional political and military significance; but such divisions are not at present in sight, and can only follow on decisive events on the western front. Prussia is at present not at all likely to be troubled by them.

It is very different with Hungary. What an extraordinary position this valiant people holds, drowned, as has been said, in an ocean of Slavs, and what vigour it has shown in maintaining it. The Magyar from Asia has planted himself on the rolling plains of the Theiss and Danube and, though he does not inhabit the surrounding mountains, he has managed to grip them into a strong kingdom with good geographical boundaries. He has made himself the equal, almost the predominant partner with Vienna and the Austrian Germans in the Austro-Hungarian state, and his strength rests in the deprivation of the surrounding Slavs of any equal voice in the destinies of this monarchy. He has gone wholesale for the intimate connexion between Austro-Hungary and Germany which makes the first an instrument of the policy of the second, with many incidental gains to himself at the expense of the Slavs.

Now for the Magyar has come a time of reckoning. Russia, the big brother of the Slavs and his own hereditary enemy, stands at his door. The protecting glacis of Galicia has been torn away and Peremyshl, the road out and the road in, has fallen. Even on the south there is a victorious enemy, the Serbian, who has just claims on some of his territory. To east, the sky is equally cloudy for him. Transylvania, a mountain barrier whose loss would leave him defenceless on this side, has a large Rumanian population, which his oppressive policy has driven to its natural affinities; and Rumania seeks the realisation here of her traditional ambitions.

The Russians are fighting their way from hill to hill through the Carpathians. The Austro-Hungarian army has suffered severely in each of the many counterstrokes which it had to attempt in the interest of the German plan of common defence. The cavalry is practically gone and the infantry is very exhausted. Sacrifice made to Germany at the beginning of the war, when so many of the Austro-Hungarian guns and motors were sent to the western front, have left their marks on the Hungarian artillery. The Carpathians are like a fan, and might perhaps have been held from the inside, but they have at many points been lost step by step; and once they are crossed, the converging passes will bring the Russians together into a compact mass on the further side.

There is one strong man in Hungary, Count Tisza, and he still reserves his hand. He is fighting meanwhile the desperate battle of the Austro-German connexion, to abandon which is to put Hungary at the mercy of Russia and to sign the abdication of the Magyars' mastery over his Slav subjects; but this seems to be the result which awaits him almost inevitably.

Germany is for every reason bound to do all that she can to save Hungary. But the Russian advance, whatever direction it takes, must make an ever-widening gap between the two allies.

April 4.

I had known the airmen for some time. Sometimes I met them discussing sporting enterprises with their chief in the conspirative quarters of "Wiggins." Sometimes I dropped in at their spacious lodging in the town, where everything, meals, talk or plans, seemed to go with a peculiar briskness and lightness; in particular there was this touch about any of the several services which they rendered me. It was Russian in spirit, but in manner very reminiscent of England. Several of the airmen might be English, and one of them they call "the Englishman."

On every fine day we see the aeroplanes above the town, and at different points on both sides there are batteries for firing on them. There are no longer duels of airmen on the eastern front; there were two or three, but now they are apparently forbidden on both sides. It was felt to be waste to lose a competent airman in order to kill one of the enemy. This means that there is no such attempt on either side to drive the enemy from the air, as was anticipated by Mr. Wells. Thus on both sides the airman has come to stay, and the whole significance of his work is not in fighting but scouting. It is, of course, far the most valuable scout-work that can be done; altogether wider and more far-reaching than any other kind; and there can hardly be any doubt that in the future no Chief of Staff but will have to fly and to fly often. On nearly every one of Napoleon's battlefields one will find some commanding point from which he fought and won; there is no such point at Borodino or Leipzig, but that helps to explain why these battles were not won. Now, with the scope of operations and of pitched battles enormously enlarged, there has come also the ideal way of seeing.

On the other hand, the earth does not give up without a fight. Batteries capable of any direction and almost any elevation can guard those parts where the enemy's eye is most to be avoided. Experience on this side shows that the airman can be kept out of such parts.

The contest is an interesting one to watch. The airman has first to fetch inland, that is away from his own lines in order to get as much height as possible. The guns can hit far higher than the airman will fly, that is if they wish to see anything. The Austrian flyers are therefore well within range, and the Russians, who take more sporting risks, often go not much more than half the height of the Austrians. In this connexion one must remember the infinitely greater precision of the Russian artillery. On a fine day the buzz of the aeroplanes and the boom of the batteries are among the most customary sounds here. One sees the little puff of shrapnel at different points in the blue sky; the aeroplane always makes off as soon as possible, and it is seldom hit. It is hard to hit the motor, though I have seen an airship which we struck on one of its cylinders; shots on the wings or tail are seldom dangerous. The man who knows least of what is happening is the airman himself, for the noise of his motor drowns any other.

April 6.

Yesterday I went out to the aerodrome. I was given some breakfast in a cottage, and saw the different types of machines while waiting for the Chief of the Section. I was also shown the little missiles which the Austrians and Russians respectively let fall: the Austrian is like a pointed thermometer and the Russian is like a rounded letter-weight with little wings. After a while there came over the high level ground a tall man with a swinging stride and a little grizzled man whose walk and manner spoke of quickness and decision. This last was the Chief of the Section, and he has a great reputation among Russian airmen. Two of the smaller machines went out scouting. One seemed at first a little unsteady, but the other made a splendid take-off and rose like a bird; soon one of them returned, having gone far beyond the enemy's line in an hour and a half. My turn came next, and I was seated in a larger machine with a most capable chauffeur, who sat in front of me. He cried: "Contact obtained"; the men fell back for a moment, and then we rushed smoothly along the ground, soon rising into the air. We made a circle above the town, returned over the aerodrome, saluted our friends and then struck away inland away from the front to get the necessary elevation. We passed over a map of ponds and villages and copses, all clearly marked in the bright sunshine, with the long ridge of the snowy Carpathians to the right of us. Then we turned and swept higher over the same ground as before straight for the lines. In front, at right angles to us, lay the dividing river like a long, twisted ribbon, and as soon as we neared it we swept to the right and along it. All the different points at which I had stayed came out clear in the sunlight. Here was the piece across the river where I had seen the scouting; there were "The Birds" with the high ruined church behind them; further came the smaller outpost; and in the distance lay the marshes in the neighbourhood of the Upper Vistula. We again faced about and this time passed right over the river which divided the hostile lines, following it further southward by the broken bridge and to the main road, near the point where I had sat at night among the sentries and to the hills which had been the scene of the action with the Tirolese. But for me the main interest of this, my first air ride, was that suddenly the unknown land beyond the fatal line was as clearly outlined as all that was so well known to me. Till now I had seen here a field and a line of ramparts, there a river with trees, and there again a hill. It is true that sometimes I had had good field-glass views of a given landscape with signs of life, but now to the naked eye both sides were for the first time parts of one common world, the dividing line ran thin and almost undividing, and all was alive. There occurs to one the notable description by Tolstoy of Nicholas Rostov looking across the field. The wonderful and real things that that field meant were gone. The tremendous and human struggle of all Europe was become a simple problem of science; one had mounted to the skies and reached what Napoleon, with his heartlessness and his seeing mind, had called "the celestial side of the art of war." What would he have given for this view, where his trained eye could have marked down not only the numbers indicated by slight symptoms, but the full bearing of each, suggested by the flash of genius so typical of him. Surely it was a measure of magnificent consolation for the enormous widening of the area of combat.

The dull flats beyond the river rose to higher ground eastward, and there on a high wooded plateau ran the railway dead straight, and at one point a stationary train marked the centre of many of our troubles, the point from which the 42-centimetre guns had been bombarding Tarnow. As our aeroplanes flew along the river, there flicked out from a copse a shot from a masked Austrian air-battery, posted there to keep off the too curious eye. I was told afterwards that there were other shots, but we did not see or hear them.

We returned as we came, making a great circuit away from the lines and wheeling always nearer to the earth. We made a straight drive over the aerodrome while the company of airmen stood at the salute, and after circling once more over the town came to the ground. We had had an hour's run, and our highest elevation was 1200 metres. It appeared that there had been awkward currents of wind and that we had wobbled a good deal, but it had not seemed so to me, and what I remembered was a smooth, regular motion and a broad back and a cool head in front of me.

April 7.

My flying friends have a small but very interesting collection of letters which, with the leave of the authorities, no doubt on both sides, have been exchanged between them and the airmen of the enemy. It is headed simply, "Correspondence with the —th Austrian Section of Aviators." It opens with a letter from the Russian Chief of Section: "Airmen of yours have been taken prisoner in civil costume. They said that our officers have also, which we doubt. Please let us know what is the character of the serious wound of Lt. X, taken prisoner by you on January —th." This note was dropped on the Austrian aerodrome with two letters from Austrian prisoners. As the answer was delayed, the Russians dropped a second note, this time in German, on the same place. It reported that the captive Austrians were unwounded and proceeds: "Your note picked up at —— on the ——th of March leaves the impression that our first message has not reached you; we therefore would respectfully ask you to answer our note. We also send a friendly-foemanly request that you will give us news of our airman, Lt. ——. He was taken prisoner on the —th of January and was wounded. We should like to know how it happened and whether the wound is slight or serious.—The Russian Flyers."

To this the following answer was received from the Austrian Chief of Section: "My hearty thanks for your letter, which I have just got. I am sorry that I have not had time to drop on you a photograph of the machine of Lt. ——. On March the —th and the —th we have dropped you news of your airmen taken prisoners [the names follow]. I therefore repeat that all four were unwounded and have probably been transported to the prettiest part of our country, Salzburg. Lts. —— and —— got a shot on their sparking apparatus. I have myself had a talk with Lt. ——. I saw no signs of any wound. In future every note of yours will be answered, and the answer will be dropped on your aerodrome.—With best greeting, Your ever devoted enemy, August, Baron von Mandelslob."

To this the Russians replied, under name and address of the Austrian Chief of Staff: "Our hearty thanks for yesterday's note which dropped straight on our aerodrome. We are sorry not to be able to tell you to what part of our country your airmen have been sent, but we think that the address will soon be sent you by earth-post by the prisoners themselves. The Albatross was shot to pieces, about thirty bullets in the wings and body. One bullet hit the propeller, but made only a smooth hole without any fissure. The two airmen, Lts. —— and —— are unhurt. With this note we shall drop on you two letters from the prisoners. Please address your next note as follows (——). God greet you.—The Russian Flyers."

The Austrians continued: "A few days ago our airmen, Captain ——, Oberleutnant ——, Oberleutnant ——, Professor D—— and two lieutenants with two airship chauffeurs, left Przemysl in a balloon and are lost. We beg you friendly-foemanly to drop on our aerodrome news of these officers" [three signatures]. Baron von Mandelslob also writes: "Many thanks for your last lines about the loss of our Albatross. I am sorry to say that we have not for some time had the honour of seeing Russian airmen among us on the ground. Will you be so kind as to forward to Omsk the accompanying note to our captive airman, Lt. ——? We will try to get the address of your airmen prisoners, and then you will be able to write to them. Best greeting."

The Russians reply: "A happy Easter. Many thanks for yesterday's letter. Your note will be sent at once to Lt. ——. On March —th we received a communication about three balloons from Pzremysl. It was signed by Captain Kahlen. As we do not know this gentleman, we address to you, with the friendly request to forward to him. All the three balloons landed in Russia. We have only private news of them, and understand that all the airmen were alive and well. We ask you to forward the four accompanying letters to the proper addresses. We have been waiting for an answer to our letter of the —th, and that is why these letters are late. What was wrong with your motor yesterday? We thought we should soon have the honour of seeing the enemy's airship land on our aerodrome. Best greeting and Easter wishes to all the gentlemen of the —— Section of Aviators.—The Russian Flyers." This letter was dropped on the Austrian aerodrome, and also on the same day an Easter egg and a large box of Russian cigarettes. On Easter Sunday an enormous Easter egg, with the inscription in Russian "Christ is risen," was dropped from an aeroplane and, having a parachute attached to it, fell slowly on the Austrian lines.

April 8.

It was Easter Eve. A wide awning had been set up, and in front of it an altar with flaming lights all round it. The tall priest served the Liturgy with wonderful spirit; sometimes it was a hurried and fervent whisper; sometimes his voice rose to a battle-cry, as when he powerfully swayed the Cross almost as if it were a weapon. On the grass, grouped in chance masses, stood the soldiers of the N regiment, most of them holding lighted candles, with their officers gathered in front. The young colonel stood near the priest; through Lent he had shown the example of rigorous fasting. On the other side was a strong choir of soldiers, led with the slightest movements of the hand.

The service begins with a time of waiting; then there are movements of expectancy, and the priest retires, as if to see whether the coffin of the Saviour is still in its place. He comes back and whispers, "Christ is risen," and these words, which are themselves in Russian like a whisper ("Christos Voskres") are taken up by the choir, first very softly and later rising to a song of triumph.

The service ends with the Eucharist. The words "Lift up your hearts" were a moment of wonderful spirit and elevation. The priest took the Sacrament on bended knees with the greatest reverence and feeling, and administered it to two of the soldiers.

Now every one, beginning with the colonel, approached in turn to kiss the Cross. Then each turned to his neighbour and gave the threefold brother's kiss, with the words "Christ is risen," to which comes the answer, "He is risen indeed." All the officers gave the kiss to the priest and the colonel. From the neighbouring lines shone out two projectors, whose lights crossed to form the first letter of the name of Christ—X.

We drove off to the officers' mess, which was in a large cottage. At the crowded tables there reigned the spirit of brotherhood. After the Emperor's toast the colonel and the regiment drank to King George and England, and all stood waving their glasses and roaring hurrah, while I went round and touched glasses with each. My toast was that the alliance should last on after the war. We had other toasts, the sisters of mercy, the colonel's wife, and above all the regiment. It was well on in the early morning when the young officers on horseback escorted their guests back to the town.

On Easter Sunday some of the Red Cross people went out to the front. At this point both sides had agreed not to shoot, and the men came out of their trenches and fraternised across the Dunajec, the Russians producing a harmonium. Newspapers were exchanged; and an Austrian officer sat down and wrote some impromptu verses, which he fastened to a stone and threw across. The verses began very peaceably, but had an unexpected end which, my friends felt, would be specially interesting to me. I give them in German with a translation—