om the front during the bloody struggle
before Verdun told tragic tales of the fighting. "I watched the assault
of the Germans upon the village of Milancourt, near the Meuse," said a
wounded Frenchman. "They came in solid ranks, without a word, loading
and reloading their rifles without cessation. Our seventy-fives fell
among them, and then the mitrailleuses entered into action. It was no
longer a battalion. It was a few scattered groups of men that one saw,
torn by a rain of shells and bullets, squeezing close against each other
as though for mutual protection.

"On the border of Montfaucon I saw one of these groups disappear at
one blow, as if they had been swallowed into a marsh. Our shells! What
frightful work they did. Never will I forget those fragments of human
beings that fell just at my feet. Never can I forget that terrible
picture.

"I followed the attack on Haumont and Samogneux. The field of battle
was lighted as if in full day by star shells. Black masses of Germans
advanced, protected by their artillery, while ours remained silent.
Finally our artillery began, and then the enemy ranks wavered, halted
and disappeared.

"Our guns had waited until the Germans were in a little hollow all
arranged for the massacre. In a little while there lay the bodies of
some 2,000 or 3,000 Germans. They occupied some villages, but their
attack on Verdun has failed after terrible losses."

GERMAN SUBMARINE ACTIVITIES

The sinking of British and French ships, and sometimes neutral vessels,
by German and Austrian submarines continued during the month of
February. On February 27 the Peninsular & Oriental Line steamship
Maloja, of 12,431 tons, was sunk by a torpedo or mine only two miles off
the Admiralty pier at Dover, with a loss of 155 lives, including many
passengers, men, women and children, en route to India. Dozens of
craft went at once to the rescue, and one of them, the Empress of Fort
William, a vessel of 2,181 tons, was also torpedoed or struck a mine and
sank nearby. Of the Maloja's passengers and crew, 260 were rescued.

On February 28 the great French liner La Provence was sunk in the
Mediterranean with a loss estimated at 900 lives. It had a displacement
of 19,200 tons, length 602 feet, beam 65 feet, and had been in the
service of the French Government as a troop transport.

Under new orders to their submarine commanders, in spite of protests by
the United States Government, Germany and Austria inaugurated