Such, in brief outline, is the story which has been told in our two former volumes. It is the story of the most ruthless and determined assault that has ever been made upon the liberties of mankind in the whole history of the world. We see master minds plotting and planning for long, secret years, watching and waiting for an occasion to swoop down upon unsuspecting neighbours and rob them of life and freedom and the fruits of their toil. We see them launching millions of men, armed with every death-dealing device that fiendish ingenuity can frame, against a little peaceful people that dares to stand in their way. The earth shakes with the roar of gigantic guns and the thunderclaps of bursting shells. Fortresses crumble to shapeless ruin; homesteads are given to the flames; temples of God are profaned and despoiled; monuments of art and piety are blotted out; cities are shattered; young and old, man, woman, and child, are given to the sword, and wherever the battle has raged there are ghastly heaps of dead and dying, "friend and foe in one red burial blent."
Onward sweep the conquering legions, with pillars of cloud by day and pillars of fire by night, and it would seem that nothing human could give them pause. Armies recoil before them; but strive as they may, they cannot overwhelm them. Victory sits upon their banners, when suddenly those whom they have hunted and harried across the fair fields of France spring forward with undaunted fire and vigour, and the torrent is stayed. Then it is swept back, and soon the invaders are hemmed in by a ring of steel, against which they fling themselves in baffled rage like a trapped tiger against the bars of his cage.
Such is the story of seventy-seven days of bloodshed, horror, destruction, and woe—days which can never be forgotten while the memory of man endures.
CHAPTER II.
SOME GERMAN THEORIES OF WAR.
Before I proceed with my story, let me call your attention to certain theories of war with which the German General Staff began the campaign. By a theory of war I mean some plan or scheme which, in the judgment of those making it, is likely to prove of great advantage, but which can only be proved to be so by actual practice. Some of the German theories turned out to be right, others wrong, as we shall see.
If you were to witness a field day of British troops you would notice that the infantry make their attacks in long, thin skirmishing lines. The men are widely spread out, and as they advance they offer a small target to the guns of the enemy. Their losses are thus reduced to a minimum. The Germans, on the other hand, believe in making their attacks with their men massed together in close formation.
Troops attacking in close order have certain advantages over those attacking in open order. First, they can begin their attack with the least possible delay. Suppose a hundred men are marching forward in fours, and are about to make an attack. If they are to spread out widely time will be needed for them to deploy. (See Fig. 2, p. [19].) But if they go forward packed close together as in Fig. 1, p. [18], they can attack much more quickly. You can easily understand that the quicker a blow is delivered, the more likely it is to be successful, for the defenders are given little time in which to make preparations for resisting it.
Then, again, an attack delivered in mass formation brings much more weight to bear on the part of the enemy's line against which it is directed than an attack in open order. If, for example, a hundred men are hurled against a front of a hundred yards, the force with which they can assail it is much greater than it would be if the same hundred yards of front were attacked by fifty men. Where, as often happens, troops have to advance on a narrow front, say against a bridge, a causeway, a street, or a defile, they must attack in close order if they are to succeed.