LAND AND WATER 
October 23, 1915. 
lie has to do is to j»et the Serbians out of the 
little district. A, the size of a niodiuni or rather 
small English couiitv, which forms the Serbian 
angle separating Bulgaria from Hungary. 
While in order to get the whole north-eastern 
corner and control the railway from Bulgaria 
through Xish to Sofia, he only needs to clear and 
occupy the north-eastern quarter of this small 
State "beyond the line B— C. As the Austro-Ger- 
mans are coming down from the north, while the 
Bulgarians can strike in flank from the cast, the 
position of the Serbians, gravely inferior in luim- 
ber to their two enemies combined, is, by every 
analogy of military history, untenable. If they do 
not wish to be surrounded by superior forces they 
rau.st fall back from this north-eastern angle. For 
their superiority of numbers leaves the Bulgarians 
free not only to exercise pressure on the eastern 
border of the A'.E. corner, but also to attack right 
behind the Serbians the railway through Uskub 
which supplies them. 
But meanwhile thei-e are two other forces at 
work. The first is the comparatively tardy ad- 
vance of the northern enemy, the reasons of 
which will be discus-sed in a moment. The second 
is the presence at Salonica of what are already 
considerable bodies of the Allies, French and 
English, and the beginning of the advance of the 
vanguard of these to the aid of the Serbians. 
Let us take these elements in their order. 
I say that the Austro-German advance across 
the Danube front has been more tardy than was 
expected. It has also probably been more cosily 
than was expected. 
The front across which the Austro-Gercians 
are forcing their way southward toward the Ser- 
bian mountains is in all the turns of the river 
nearer 80 than 70 miles long— this is without men- 
tion of the diversions upon the Drina to the west. 
The first eft'orts at crossing, made after the ac- 
cumulation of heavy munitions had been fully 
prepared and the hea\y pieces for commanding 
the river crossing put into position, began upon 
iWednesday, October 6. The last news we have 
relates to Monday morning, October 18. We are 
dealing, therefore, with ten full days of effort and 
with the action perhaps of 10, perliaps of 12 divi- 
Bions, possibly even 14. Nearly the whole of 
this force— all except the small bodies operat- 
ing to the west of the Drina— is fighting to 
torce the Serbians southward from the Danube 
Its weapon for effecting this is, of course the 
heavy gun. The Austro- Germans have a great 
mass of heavy pieces with their munitionment 
accumulated for this special eflort. The Serbians 
and the Bulgarians lack heavy pieces with which 
to keep down their enemy's distant fire 
.V f 'T^ ^^^^"^^^ ^^ familiar by this time with 
the Austro-German use of heavy artillery in the 
war, a development in which the Austro-German 
alliance owes its successes mainly to the Austrian 
branch, as a siege train has proved sui^erior to the 
old permanent works. Even in the field it gave 
them for months a-ainst the Russians such an 
immense advantage in the destruction of trenches 
that they com pe led the Russian retirement we 
fifrV^!"'/''^'""^ ¥^^'^ ^'^^' fo^ir months. In 
the West it was only after long delay that the 
. Allies caught up with the enemv in the number 
of their nmnitionment. Now we have clearly 
surpas.sed them in the West and dominate more 
and more in this arm. The Balkan States have 
no opportunity of making such pieces or for 
munitioning them in any adequate number. 
Heavy artilleiy thus used batters the trenches 
opposite to it at will and from a distance where 
it is perfectly safe against anything but its peer. 
If you bring heavy guns thus against an enemy 
who has none, or very few, you can destroy his 
trenches by way of preparation to the infantry 
attack. Having done this you launch your in- 
fantry, which, with more or less loss, and with 
more or less success, according to its quality, 
occupies the territory you have thus prepared. 
The enemy, having this superiority, was 
bound to force the Danube, the river obstacle. 
And he did, as a fact, effect his crossing after two 
or three days' preparation at three main points, 
or groups of points : (1) The group Ram and 
Graditze — east of this, towards Roumania, began 
the gorge of the Danube and the thick wooded 
country where his heavy artillery was of less 
effect. (2) In the open country where the river 
Morava comes into the Danube. Its valley is the 
main trench projecting southward into the hill 
country and carries the railway from Semendria 
which joins the main line from Belgrade to Nish. 
(3) The crossing in force was made above and 
below Belgrade. 
Now when we examine the success achieved 
at each of these points we notice something which 
is surely significant of the fighting. 
The German progress was at first exceed- 
ingly slow and at a rate almost directly controlled 
by the openness of the ground. In order to appre- 
ciate the value of this point let us note the points 
u Sketch 11. 
Where the enemy crossed near Belgrade, 
above and below that town, he found before him 
hill country, fairly open and gradually rising to 
the culminating point of the height called Avala, 
520 metres above the sea, or say, roughly, 1,500 
feet above the river; distant from the outer 
suburbs of the city not much further than the 
heights to the south of London are distant from 
the Thames. The enemy reached, after ten days' 
effort, the summit of Avala, and, roughly, the line 
running from Ritopek on the Danube to a corre- 
sponding point above Belgrade on the Save. Be- 
fore him was hill country of the same sort. The 
true mountain country begins 30 miles south. 
In the next sector, which we may call that of 
Semendria, he obtained in the same space of ten 
days a larger area, precisely because he was deal- 
ing with easier ground and the greatest width 
was just where he had flattest country in front of 
Pozarevac. This plain is the combined mouth 
plain of the Mlaw^a and Morava rivers. He liad 
on the tenth day of his effort advanced on the 
right hand of this belt only to the ridge just 
beyond the brook Riala, which flows into the Mor- 
ava south of Semendria. On the right the belt he 
held gets narrower and narrower as the hill 
country develops. 
What his position was last Saturdav on the 
third sector, where the hills reach the river— that 
is, from Ram to Graditze— we were not told, but 
apparently he was held at this point immediately 
u])on the bank. '' 
Now this slow progress, corresponding to the 
ease ot the territory over which it was made, is, 
1 say, surely significant. It means that the whole 
advance depends upon the immediate superiority 
