the enemy for a much longer period. But the
foothills over on the eastern side of the plain had been passing into
the hands of the Serbians operating in that region. These forces were
now passing to the northward of the city, though the marshy plain
still intervened. They were advancing toward the head of the valley.
Should they succeed in reaching this point, where the highway to
Prilep passed, they would cut off the retreat of the Bulgarians.

But there was still another road by which the Bulgarians might have
retreated: the highway leading through Resna to the upper part of Lake
Ochrida. Had this been open they might have risked the blocking of the
Prilep road. But, as was later indicated by the reports, the Italians
had by this time advanced above Koritza and were not only in touch
with the Russians operating around Kastoria and the lower part of the
Prespa and Ochrida lakes, but they were skirting the western shore of
Ochrida and threatening to advance on Monastir by this very highway.
Thus the Bulgarians were threatened from two directions--by the
Italians, who were turning their right flank, and by the Serbians, who
had broken through their lines in the foothills east of the Monastir
plain. There is probably no doubt that they could have held off all
frontal attacks from the heights above Monastir. Thus they were
squeezed, rather than driven, out of the city.

On the night of the 18th the German and Bulgarian forces in the city
quietly withdrew and retreated along the Prilep road to the head of
the valley. At 8 o'clock the following morning, on November 19, 1916,
exactly a year since the Serbians had been driven out of the city by
the Austrians and Bulgarians, the Allied forces marched into the
Macedonian city, and an hour later the flag of King Peter once more
floated above the roofs. Apparently the Bulgarian retreat had been too
long delayed, for before reaching the head of the valley they were cut
off by the Serbians and only escaped after heavy losses, both in
killed, wounded, prisoners, and materials. At the same time the
Serbians effectually closed the road, taking several villages and all
the dominating heights.

From a military point of view the fall of Monastir was not of vast
importance; it was of about the same significance from a tactical
aspect as Bucharest. But from a moral and political aspect it was of
immense importance. Though only populated by some 50,000 of mixed
Turks, Vlachs (Rumanians),