LAND AND WATER 
October 31. 1914 
steep bauks. and bears the name winch aU such clefts 
have in western Lorraine— the word " Rupt, which 
moans the " breach " or " break " of the Miul. It is con- 
tinued above the rail-head to the high plateau country 
iust underneath the extraordinarily regular hue ot 
further coveri.g heights called " The Hills of the 
lileuse." 1 • i.1 J 
Beyond this again going westward is the deep 
trench of the Meusc in which St. Mihiel lies. From 
^J'hiaucourt the shortest road to St. Mihiel is up 
alon- the north edge of the valley, then through Woin- 
ville and so straight through the HiUs of the Meuse to 
St. Mihiel. There is an alternative, lower, longer and 
on the whole better road, from Thiaucourt to the mam 
Coramercy-Pont-a-Mousson road, between Flirey and 
Eambucoui-t, whence a branch road goes through 
Apremont to St. Mihiel. 
To appreciate how naiTOW the German " conidor 
has here become, it is enough to point out that Apremont 
—in the south road— was taken and held by the French 
weeks ago, lost, retaken again, and is now held. One 
may take the line of the road all the way from Pont- 
a-Mousson to St. Mihiel and say that all excejit the 
last three or four miles of it between Apremont and 
St. Mihiel marks what the French hold from the south ; 
that is, what is held by the garrison of Toul and by 
the forces that are operating northwaixi from that 
foi-tress. On the north the corresponding garrison of 
Verdun and the forces operating from it southwards 
have got within long range of the other road from 
St. Mihiel through Nonsard and Woinville to 
Thiaucourt. The French olHcial communique (of 
Tuesday) jn-oves that even taking that long range of 
heavy guns at an extreme the Germans hardly hold 
eight miles at the mouth of the funnel : not five miles 
at the extremity of the funnel where they touch the 
Meuse at St. Mihiel itself. The situation here is 
extraordinary, cannot be accidental in the German 
plan, must be intended at least for some future move. 
Meanwhile the whole thing is just like the fighting in 
the Argonne, an example of the exceedingly close grips 
that fairly equal forces can maintain nowadays with 
the rifle, the machine gun, and the spade. Nor can 
anything unlock such a grip save very considerable 
reinforcement at some one point. 
THE EASTERN THEATRE OF WAR. 
On the Vistula what has happened is this : 
(1) First, and much the most important point, 
the German plan of holding the Eussian forces (pre- 
sumably along the line of the Vistula Eiver itself), of 
crossing that river, of occupying Warsaw at one end of 
the line, Przemysl and the upper reaches of the San at 
the other end, and by the success of such an offensive 
movement of pushing off theEussian pressure, hasfailed. 
The Eussian pressure upon Germany and Austria 
has not indeed begun or nearly begun. It is a long 
cry from the checking of the German plan to an 
invasion of German territory. But at any rate the 
Gcnnan plan in its entirety has certainly failed. The 
occupation of Warsaw was absolutely essential to it, 
and so far from occupying Warsaw, the strong German 
force of some five army corps advancing upon that 
town has been beaten right back, even a point so far 
west as Lodz is out of Gennan occupation, and pretty 
well all the country north of the Pllica is now in 
Eussian hands. Our first point is, then, that the 
holding of the slow Eussian advance so that Germany 
should be free to send large reinforcements to the west 
has proved impossible. 
(2) But the Austro-Gennan ^ine as a whole has 
not fallen back. The attempt is still maintained to 
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'III, 
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Tua; MiiN- posITIO^• in tus east. 
push the Eussians eastward at the southern end of 
their position: the attack goes on below Sandomii-, 
along the San, and before Przemysl. 
It is a thing worth noting in these great modern 
actions that the new scale upon which they are fought 
has put an end to some of the unquestioned rules of 
older warfare. In an action upon a front even of 
eight mUes or ten, to be outflanked meant that your 
whole body fell back if it could. But in an action— 
or, rather, a series of actions — upon a front of over 
two hundred miles, you have much more time to 
consider wdiether it is really necessary for all your 
forces to fall back or no when you are outflanked. 
Here is the Austro-German line aU alon^ the 
Vistula threatening Warsaw and Novo Georgievsk 
on the north, and "sigorously attacking Przemysl 
upon the south. Its northern extremity is badly 
beaten in front of Warsaw and the whole of its left 
outflanked. Between the Pilica Eiver and Warsaw 
it is turned right back and thrust even beyond Lodz. 
The attempt of the Germans to cross the Vistula at 
Ivangorod is also beaten. They make no real footing 
at the crossing of Jozefdw, and' the Eussians in their 
turn cross in force at Solec. It is evident that the 
Avliole original Austro-Ger.nan lino A— B — C has 
been bent back on its left, A B, to a position D B. 
That is an attitude which would have meant, in the 
older warfare, the retirement of the remainder, B C. 
Because in the older warfare the people who had 
outflanked you could be down upon your centre and 
l)ehind it in an hour or two. But to-day you have 
days to decide in, and of that retirement from the 
Vistula — of the Gennan retirement from the Upper 
Vistula at least between Jozefow and Sandomir — • 
there is as yet no sufiicient indication. 
Eemember that from B to C is a very long week's 
marching. It is an immense distance : and remember 
further that an advance on the south whereby the 
Germanic allies crossing the San or the Upper 
Vistula near Sandomir should push the Eussians well 
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