ompleted. On the other side, the Germans were also
busily making preparations to provide against every possibility in
case of retreat. New lines of defenses were constructed across
Belgium; formidable complex trenches guarded by barbed-wire
entanglements; concrete bases for heavy guns connected by railways;
and a large fortified station was erected. These preparations rendered
possible a very rapid transportation of troops and munitions to
Brabant and Antwerp.

The fighting on the western front during August, 1915, may be
described as a fierce, continuous battle, a lively seesaw of capturing
and recapturing positions, followed at regular intervals by the
publication of the most contradictory "official" reports from the
German, French, and British headquarters. Many of them gave
diametrically opposite accounts of the same events. In the first week
of the month the Germans made furious attacks against the French
positions at Lingekopf and Barrenkopf. All through the Argonne forest
the combatants pelted each other with bombs, hand grenades, and other
newly invented missiles. Several determined attempts were made by the
Germans to recapture the positions lost at Schratzmannele and
Reichsackerkopf, but the French artillery fire proved too strong.
Soissons was again bombarded; desperate night attacks were delivered
around Souchez, on the plateau of Quennevieres, and in the valley of
the Aisne; local engagements were fought in Belgium and along parts of
the British front; trenches were mined and shattered, while aeroplanes
scattered bombs and fought thrilling duels in the air. The Belgians
were forced partly to evacuate their advanced positions over the river
Yser, near Hernisse, south of Dixmude. In the Argonne the Germans, by
a strong infantry charge, penetrated the first line of the French
trenches, but were unable to hold their ground.

On August 9, 1915, a squadron of thirty-two large French aeroplanes
carrying explosives, and accompanied by a number of lighter machines
to act as scouts, set out to bombard the important mining and
manufacturing town of Saarbruecken, on the river Saar, in Rhenish
Prussia. This was where the first engagement in the Franco-Prussian
War of 1870 was fought. Owing to mist and heavy clouds, only
twenty-eight of the aeroplanes succeeded in locating the town, where
they dropped one hundred and sixty bombs of large caliber. A number of
German aviators ascended as soon as the flotilla's arrival ha