ulfilled boasts.

"The enemy began by massing a surprising force on the western front.
Tremendous energy and organizing power were the marks of his supreme
efforts to obtain a decision. It was usually reckoned that the Germans
maintain on all fronts a field army of about seventy-four and a half
army corps, which at full strength number three million men. Yet, while
holding the Russians from Riga to the south of the Pripet Marshes, and
maintaining a show of force in the Balkans, Germany seems to have
succeeded in bringing up nearly two millions and a half of men for her
grand spring offensive in the west. At one time her forces in France and
Flanders were only ninety divisions. But troops and guns were withdrawn
in increasing numbers from Russia and Serbia in December, 1915, until
there were, it is estimated, a hundred and eighteen divisions on the
Franco-British-Belgian front. A large number of six-inch and twelve-inch
Austrian howitzers were added to the enormous Krupp batteries. Then a
large proportion of new recruits of the 1916 class were moved into
Rhine-land depots to serve as drafts for the fifty-nine army corps, and
it is thought that nearly all the huge shell output that had accumulated
during the winter was transported westward.

"The French Staff reckoned that Verdun would be attacked when the ground
had dried somewhat in the March winds. It was thought that the enemy
movement would take place against the British front in some of the
sectors of which there were chalk undulations, through which the rains
of winter quickly drained. The Germans skilfully encouraged this idea by
making an apparent preliminary attack at Lions, on a five-mile front
with rolling gas-clouds and successive waves of infantry. During this
feint the veritable offensive movement softly began on Saturday,
February 19, 1916, when the enormous masses of hostile artillery west,
east, and north of the Verdun salient started registering on the French
positions. Only in small numbers did the German guns fire, in order not
to alarm their opponents. But even this trial bombardment by shifts was
a terrible display of power, calling forth all the energies of the
outnumbered French gunners to maintain the artillery duels that
continued day and night until Monday morning, February 21st.

[Illustration: Photograph]
AMMUNITION FOR THE GUNS
Canadian narrow-gauge line taking ammunition up the line through a
shattered village.

[Illustration