have been
150,000. The Russians hurriedly retreated from German soil.

The time had now come for the Germans and Austrians definitely to assume
the offensive. A strategic blow in Galicia imperiled the whole Russian
front and compelled a general retreat of the Russian armies in Galicia
and Poland. In June both Przemysl and Lemberg were recaptured by the
Central Powers. By September all of Russian Poland had been conquered.
Russia had lost 65,000 square miles of thickly populated territory. But
the land was so thoroughly plundered by the German conquerors that many
of the people died of starvation.

BULGARIA ENTERS THE WAR.--The sympathies of the Bulgarian government
had been with the Central Powers from the beginning of the war. Bulgaria
had not forgiven the neighboring Balkan states for their treatment of
her in the second Balkan war (1913). Against Serbia her feeling was
particularly bitter. The Allied disaster at Gallipoli and the military
successes of Germany and Austria in Poland and Galicia in the spring and
summer of 1915 led the Bulgarians to believe that now was the time for
them to strike. In October Bulgaria declared war upon Serbia, thus
definitely taking her stand as an ally of the Central Powers.

Bulgaria's entrance into the war was followed by simultaneous invasions
of Serbia from Austria and from Bulgaria. Under these blows the Serbians
were crushed. Together with her neighbor and ally, brave little
Montenegro, Serbia was overrun by her enemies. The cruelties inflicted
upon the Serbian population by the invading Bulgars are said to have
been fully as horrible as those which had taken place during the
conquest of Belgium in 1914 and of Poland in 1915.

There was serious danger that the government of Greece would follow the
lead of Bulgaria and also enter the war on the side of the Central
Powers. This was prevented by two things. In the first place, a majority
of the Greek people favored the cause of the Allies and were opposed to
Bulgaria. In the second place, the Allies promptly landed an army at
Salonica. Later on, they removed Constantine, the pro-German king of
Greece, and placed his son Alexander upon the throne.

THE EAST AT THE CLOSE OF 1915.--On the eastern front 1915 had been a
year of failure. The Gallipoli campaign had been a humiliation for the
Allies. The Russians had been driven from Russian Poland and from the
Austrian province of Galicia. Bulgaria had joined the Central Powers,
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