that the
Russians believed General von Hindenburg in person to be in charge of
the German forces in this sector. In consequence the German troops for
the most part were forced to stand upon the defensive. In the
beginning of March the Russian attacks increased steadily in violence.
They broke against the German positions to the east and south of
Mlawa, according to German reports, with enormous losses. At Demsk, to
the east of Mlawa, long rows of white stones mark common graves of
masses of Russians who perished before the German barbed-wire
entanglements. The Germans point to these as dumb witnesses of the
disaster that overtook forty-eight Russian companies that assaulted
ten German ones. The cold weather at this time had made possible the
swampy regions in which the Orczy rises, and had enabled the Russians
to approach close to the German line of defense.

The Russian attack at this point in the night of the 7th of March,
1915, was typical of the fighting on this line in these weeks. After a
thousand shells from the Russian heavy guns had descended upon and
behind Demsk, a seemingly ceaseless series of infantry attacks set in.
They were carried close up to the lines of wire of the German defense.
Enough light, however, was shed by the searchlights and light balls
shot from pistols to enable the Germans to direct a destructive
infantry and machine-gun fire on the approaching lines. Those of the
Russians who did not fall, fled to the next depression in the ground.
There they were held by the beams of the searchlights until daybreak.
Then they surrendered to the German patrols. Of another attack a few
kilometers farther to the north, at Kapusnik, the Germans reported
that after the enemy had penetrated into their trenches and had been
driven out in a desperate bayonet fight, they buried 906 Russians and
164 Germans.

On the 8th of March, 1915, General von Gallwitz again tried an
offensive with fresh forces which he had gathered. It was thwarted,
however, on the 12th, to the north of Przasnysz. The Germans estimated
the Russian forces which here were brought, up for the counterattack
at some ten army corps and seven cavalry divisions. The Russians in
advancing this time, instead of directing their thrust at Mlawa,
pushed northeastward of Przasnysz along the rivers Orczy and Omulew.
In this sector the Germans counted from the 13th to the 23d of March
forty-six serious assaults, twenty-five in the daytime and twenty-one