been driven out of Egypt and the British forces crossed the border into
Palestine. On March 7 they captured El Khulil, southeast of Gaza.

By November 22 the British had pushed within five miles of Jerusalem, on
the northwest, and on December 7 General Allenby announced that he had
taken Hebron. Jerusalem thus was virtually cut off on all sides but the
east.

HISTORICAL INTEREST TO CHRISTIANS.

In sentimental and romantic aspect the capture of Jerusalem far exceeds
even the fall of fable-crowned Bagdad. The modern City of Jerusalem
contains about 60,000 inhabitants, and is the home of pestilence, filth
and fevers, but in historic interest it naturally surpasses, to the
Christian world, all other places in the world. Since the days when
David wrested it from the hands of the Jebusites to make it the capital
of the Jewish race Jerusalem has been the prize and prey of half the
races of the world. It has passed successively into the hands of the
Assyrians, Babylonians, Greeks, Romans, Persians, Arabs, Turks, the
Crusaders, finally to fall before the descendants of that Richard the
Lion-hearted who strove in vain for its possession more than 700 years
ago.

Early in January, 1918, evidence was forthcoming that Germany was
preparing to make a final drive on the Western Front to break through
and capture some English and French channel ports before America could
be of any great assistance to the Allied forces. As a result Great
Britain determined to call 500,000 more men to hold the Huns, and
Premier Lloyd George issued a stirring appeal to Labor affected by the
Manpower Bill, which provided for the increase taken largely from the
labor forces.

The German intent to launch an offensive was indicated by the withdrawal
of German lines north of Italy when important defensive positions were
abandoned, and dummy soldiers were left in trench to conceal movement to
the rear. Warnings of a great submarine offensive on American boatlines
to France, to be joined with a big drive on land, were received by
Secretary of War Baker, and on February 2, the American troops occupying
a sector of the Lorraine front in France faced the first big bombardment
in what was preliminary to the most bitter drive Germany had attempted
in four years of warfare.

SINKING OF THE TUSCANIA.

True to their promise the German submarines started their portion of the
offensive and sunk the U.S. troopship "Tuscania" a few days later off
the coast of I