incorporated in a
different regiment. The arranging of the correspondence went forward
in a spacious room; the letters which it was difficult to deliver were
handed over to a number of specialists, who sat in an adjoining
apartment and studied all the changes caused by the transfer of
troops. They found help in an address-book containing a list of all
the field formations. About once every four days, or even oftener, a
new edition of this work was issued. By the middle of December 1914
the eighty-fourth edition was in print."[141]

[141] Karl Hildebrand, _Ein starkes Volk_, p. 108.

This talent for organization, this capacity of thought concentration
in circumstances which tend to strengthen emotion at the cost of
reason, have been constantly displayed by our enemies throughout the
entire struggle of the past thirty years, and never more conspicuously
than during the present war. Every emergency found them ready. The
most unlikely eventualities had been foreseen and provided for.
Private initiative, which "grandmotherly legislation" was supposed to
have killed, was more alert and resourceful than among any of the
Entente nations. Every German is in some respects an agent of his
Government. Each one thinks he foresees some eventuality with the
genesis of which he is especially conversant, and he forthwith
communicates his forecast and at the same time his plan for coping
with the danger to some official. And all suggestions are thankfully
received and dealt with on their intrinsic merits. For such matters
the rulers of the Empire, however engrossed by urgent problems, have
always time and money.

It is instructive and may possibly be helpful to compare this spirit
of detachment from the personal and party elements of the situation,
this accessibility to every call of patriotic duty, this
self-possession under conditions calculated to hinder calm
deliberation, with the hesitations, the bewilderment, the conflicting
decisions of the Entente leaders and their impatience of unauthorized
initiative and offers of private assistance. Outsiders are not wanted.
Their money is not rejected, but nothing else that they tender is
readily received.

In other more momentous matters the Allies also lagged behind their
adversaries. Despite their vast resources and the generous offers of
private help, the care taken of the wounded left a good deal to be
desired. The articles on this subject which were published in the
London Pr