November 21, 1914. 
LAND 'AND WATEE 
strategics and tactics, much the most notable fea- 
ture of the week has been the repulse upon Novem- 
ber 11th of the Prussian Guard by the British 
forces in front of Ypres, that is, to the east of the 
town and to the south-cast of it. But in an exami- 
nation of the military movements that ^vill decide 
the campaign this incident is but one of the innu- 
merable incidents of the same type ^vhich have 
marked the whole of this month's fighting in Flan- 
ders : violent bombardment of the Allied position 
by the enemy's heavy artillery ; following upon this 
an advance of infantry pressed this time rather 
further home than usual; the lost ground re- 
covered and a counter advance made by the Allies. 
The episode was, however, remarkable for its very 
heavy casualty list on both sides, and particularly 
upon that of the Prussian Guard. There is a 
tragically ironical character in this famous corps, 
which is that so much of its recruitment is taken 
from those provinces of the modern German 
Empire which most detest the Prussian name, and 
even from those two provinces of Alsace and Lor- 
raine whose subjection to Germany is what we 
know it to be. But indeed the whole of this sin- 
gular campaign of political liberation is studded 
with incidents of the sort. One-quarter of the 
Austro-Hungariau Army is racially akin, and 
some fraction of it at least spiritually akin with its 
Russian foe. And to the north Germany is using 
Polish troops for the destruction of Poland. It 
is not the least remarkable character in this war 
that the Allies are fighting free from an anomalous 
political burden of this kmd which, though it has 
little weight in the first stages of a campaign, will 
have very great and increasing weight the moment 
the enemy's defensive begins to cnamble. South 
of Ypres there has been a more notable flexion in 
the line, although when one considers what the 
enemy's effort has been for now a month past, and 
the immense extent of the struggle proceeding 
from the Vosges to the sea, this flexion is insigni- 
ficant enough. It consists in the enemy's having 
pushed to the point of St. Eloi on the road between 
Messines and Ypres, and further in his having 
occupied Neuve Eglise. The former of these in- 
dentations into tie Allied line has not come to 
mean so much as it seemed to threaten when news 
was first heard of it. The ground lost was in pajt 
retaken and no further forward movement of the 
enemy resulted. The second local action, the oc- 
cupation by the enemy of Neuve Eglise, has this 
significance, that it gives the enemy the first slopes 
of a ridge from which it is possible to shell Armen- 
tiercs. 
But these very small movements which thrust 
out the line of the Allies somewhat to the north 
of Ypres, and give it so curious a serpentine forma- 
tion to the south are, we must always bear in mind* 
utterly insignificant compared with the task which 
the enemy has set before himself, and the corre- 
sponding task which the Allies have set before 
themselves: how insignificant can best be appre- 
ciated by comparing the two lines upon the sketch 
map representing the approximate fronts of a 
fortnight ago and to-day, and seeing how very 
nearly they correspond. It is the enemy's busi- 
ness to break through the Allied line. Pushing it 
back 3,000 yards in one place and allowing it to 
come forward 2,000 yards in another is of no 
effect compared with the gigantic business oi 
breaking through a third of a million men with the 
concentrated effect of half a million. Of that 
breaking through there is not the least sign, 
though already quite 200,000 German effectives 
have been put out of action during the last few 
weeks in the attempt. The task of the Allies is 
simply to maintain this line until the exhaustion 
of the offensive, coupled with pressure upon the 
Eastern front, shall lead to a retirement upon the 
part of the enemy, and in this task their success 
continues to be uniform from the junction of the 
Oisc and the Aisne right up to the North Sea. 
There is no more of moment to be said at the 
time of writing this (Tuesday evening) upon 
the movements in the Western field of operations. 
I will conclude by continuing that examina,- 
tion of the contrast between the strength of the 
two parties in this great war which, under the form 
of an analysis of losses a fortnight ago, and last 
week under the form of an analysis of the German 
claims to prisoners, I have already begun in these 
columns. 
THE CONTRAST IN STRENGTH. 
THE REAL SUPPLY OF MEN. 
I propose this week to complete our survey 
of the contrasting strength of the two groups of 
belligerents, and particularly to examine the ques- 
tion of the supply of men available upon either side. 
I have in these columns last week and the 
week before attempted two estimates concerning 
the relative strength of the Allies and the Ger- 
manic Powers, their enemies. 
At least I have attempted an estimate of Ger- 
man (not Austrian) losses to date, and I have 
further gone into the question of military supply 
open to the Germanic Powers, and of the real num- 
ber of Allies whom they hold as prisoners. 
These figures were diminished in value by the 
fact that the circumstances of such a vvar as this, 
and in particular the necessity for discretion with 
regard to any information or suggestion that might 
be of use to the enemy, prevented a corresponding 
estimate of the total losses upon the Allied side, 
of the total enemy- prisoners held by the Allies, 
and even of the whole field of military supply open 
to the Allies. It must be enougli to say that in 
the matter of military supply France, England and 
Belgium are wholly, Eussia nearly wholly, open to 
the supply of the world, while the enemy is almost 
blocked — in the case of rubber absolutely blocked 
— from obtaining supplies other than those to be 
found within his own territory or within that of 
adjacent neutral countries. 
In the matter of prisoners, wounded and un- 
woundcd, there is certainly a balance against us 
still, even when wc add up the results of East and 
West. In the matter of total losses there is a 
very heavy balance indeed against the enemy. And 
if among those losses, wc count in particular the 
a* 
