s. In the following paragraphs will be found gathered
reliable reports based on the keen observation of men who in their
capacity as special correspondents of various newspapers had
opportunities to collect and observe facts at close range and the very
vicinity where they transpired. They come from various sources, but
chiefly from the narrative of a war correspondent published in the
Munich "Neueste Nachrichten," who was himself an eyewitness of what he
describes. Although they refer more especially to that part of Russia
that is situated between the Galician border and the fortress of
Brest-Litovsk--the region of the Bug River--they might have been
written equally well of any part or all of the eastern theatre of war,
for they are typical of what happened throughout that vast territory
that stretches from the eastern front as it stood at the time of
Warsaw's fall in the beginning of August, 1915, to that other line
that formed a new front, much farther to the east, when the German
advance into Russia came to an end in the latter part of October,
1915:

"The first anniversary of the war had just passed. Again summer was
upon us, like in those days of mobilization. The atmosphere was full
with memories of the beginning of the campaign. Out of Galicia an
endless column rolled to the north into Poland. The old picture: the
creaking road, overloaded with marching troops, with artillery lustily
rolling forward, with caravans of supply trains. Repeating itself a
thousandfold, the sum total of the mass deepened the impression and
made the idea of the 'supreme command of an army' appear like a fairy
tale. Supply wagon after supply wagon, mile after mile, in a long,
never-breaking chain!

"The greater the distance of the observer, the deeper becomes the
impression of the general impulse of advance, of the sameness of its
direction and motion. Can we see a difference as compared with earlier
times? Can we notice if the new class of soldiers are equal to the
older; if the horses are in the same good condition as before? All in
all, it is the same play, even if with new actors in its parts, which
was acted before us during the very first days of the war, never to be
forgotten: a variety of types, unified by the purpose that was common
to all.... Of course, the close observer will always be able to make
distinctions. To him all soldiers are not just soldiers. Through their
uniforms he will recognize the farmer, the artisan, the f