LAND 'AND WATEE 
February 13, 1915. 
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■^ iRotf^-iCcxidn under 
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present probable position, with the corresponding 
line in the same region indicated in the sketch map 
appearing last week, which I here reproduce. 
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Whether the considerable reinforcements 
along the Bukovina front, which we know to 
include German troops — probably Bavarian for 
the most part — include new German formations or 
not we cannot gather from the evidence. And that 
is a pity, because our judgment of the future of the 
campaign at this stage very largely depends upon 
our discovering whether the enemy has begun to tise 
his new formations yet or not, and, if so, in what 
numbers. 
It is already more than six months since .the 
first mobilisation : he must in such a space of%ime 
have had full opportunities for training, and from 
what we know of him he must surely have hM them 
ready provided with a sufficient equipment. The 
more of his new formations that may now be actu- 
ally present, or that may have been present in the 
1 recent fighting, the less reserve is there to be used 
for the renewed oftensive upon the west. 
It is possible that in the captures of the next 
few days, if our ally continues to press across the 
central portion of the range, we shall have in more 
detail the evidence upon this very important pomt 
which is at present lacking. 
THE WESTERN FRONT. 
There is upon the western front in the present 
week nothing to record of any importance, at the 
moment of writing, Tuesday evening. The front 
has fluctuated in no point ai^preciably, and, save 
for the engagement of two or three battalions m 
the heart of the Argonne, there has not apparently 
been any attempt at a movement. 
It is hardly worth remarking that the German 
official communique has been at the pains of deny- 
ing that the considerable effort made at the eud 
of January (round about January 27), which effort 
was broken with the loss of perhaps 20,000 men, 
had no connection with the Emperor's birthday. 
It was, according to the German version, no 
more than a coincidence. Whether these things 
are coincidences or no only has this value to a 
student of the war : that if the non-military motives 
at work are as strong as Vv'e believe them to be they 
are some guide to the state of mind of the enemy. 
There is no more in it than that. I forget, for 
instance, on exactly what date it was that the Ger- 
mans went through the Arc de Triomphe in Paris 
after the cessation of hostilities in 1871, but if any- 
one will look up that date and see whether it cor- 
responds to a particularly strong German effort in 
the west it will help him to form his judgment. 
Hitherto it has undoubtedly been true that these 
almost religious exercises have influenced the plans 
of the enemy in some degree. 
THE CASUALTIES. 
The official returns of the total casualties to the 
4th of February in the British contingent of the 
Allied armies, coupled with a recent publication of 
the Prussian lists, affi)rd8 a new opportunity for the 
comparison of wastage. 
Our casualties here will be found to support 
the general conclusions which have been arrived at 
In these notes with regard to the former rate of 
wastage in the Allied service and in the enemy's, and 
to prove how much heavier is his than ours. 
The British casualties are just over one hundred 
thousand, and that means, roughly, 25 per cent, of 
all those who have at one moment or another crossed 
the sea. These figures are very nearly In the same 
proportion as those which can be deduced from the 
French declaration late last autumn — allowing for 
the passage of time since that declaration was made. 
It is interesting to compare such rate of 
wastage with the official German figures : but it is 
Impossible, luifortunately, to accept the official 
German figures as the equivalent of the English, 
and that for two reasons : First, the Germans do 
not put down the cases of lightly wounded ; secondly, 
there Is no compendlary German declaration of 
casualties to date, but only the publication of long 
lists, which are necessarily imperfect and belated ; 
as are, for that matter, the newspaper lists published 
on our own side. 
The fundamental factor in any such calculation 
is the relation of wounded to killed. It has 
repeatedly been affirmed in these notes that a 
6* 
IV 
