further from the front the fewer the deaths, because so
many have died already.

"In the nearest hospitals to the front, half the wounded, and on some
days more than half, die where they are put. Often they die in the
ambulance, and one's care in drawing them out is wasted, for they will
never feel again. I found one always took the same care, though the
greenish-yellow of the exposed hands or feet showed the truth. Laid on
the floor of the main hospital itself, some screamed or moaned, some
whimpered like sick children, especially in their sleep, some lay quiet,
with glazed eyes out of which sight was passing. Mere fragments of
mankind were there extended, limbs pounded into mash, heads split open,
intestines hanging out from gashes. Did those bones--did that exquisite
network of living tissue and contrivances for life--cost no more in
the breeding than to be hewed and smashed and pulped like this?
Shrapnel--shrapnel--it was nearly always the same. For this is, above
all, an artillery war, and both sides are justly proud of their
efficiency in guns."

GOVERNMENT RETURNS TO PARIS

Confidence of safety having been restored in the French capital, the
Paris bourse reopened on December 7, after having been closed since
September 3. President Poincare transferred his official residence back
to Paris from Bordeaux on December 9 and a meeting of the French cabinet
was held in Paris on December 11, for the first time since the capital
was threatened by the German advance at the end of August.

BRITISH NAVAL VICTORY

In the second week of December the British navy avenged the defeat of
Rear Admiral Cradock's squadron off the Chilean coast in November, when
a powerful special fleet, under Vice-Admiral Sir Frederick Sturdee,
encountered the German cruiser fleet, under Admiral von Spee, off the
Falkland Islands and practically destroyed it. Only one of the five
German cruisers escaped. The flagship Scharnhorst, the Gneisenau, the
Leipzig and the Nurnberg were sunk in the action, which lasted for five
hours, and the German admiral with three of his sons and most of the
officers and men of the German crews perished. The British losses were
inconsiderable.

This sea fight in the South Atlantic was the most important engagement
in which British men-of-war had participated since the era of Napoleon.
The sailing of the British fleet in quest of Admiral von Spee's
squadron had been kept secret and the news of the victory was there