Why had the Germans given up their attempt on Warsaw? The Grand Duke was not content with merely holding Warsaw. While the German guns were hurling their shells at the Russian trenches, General Rennenkampf[159] was making a flank attack on the Germans from the fortress of Novo Georgievsk, lower down on the Vistula. We do not know exactly what happened in this part of the battlefield, but one thing is certain—the German left was attacked with crushing force. It was rolled back from the Vistula, but was still fighting hard; but when Ruzsky, on the 22nd, began to carry all before him south of the Pilitza, it was bound to retreat. Rennenkampf followed it up and retook Lodz, while von Hindenburg sullenly retreated towards his frontier, fighting innumerable rearguard actions by the way. Thousands of his men were sacrificed to prevent stores and guns from falling into the hands of the Russians, and the whole country over which he passed was turned into a desert. In one case the lives of 2,000 men of the rearguard were thrown away in order to save a convoy. The roads which von Hindenburg had made during his advance were blown up; railway lines, stations, bridges, and towers were destroyed, and even the rails were twisted into the shape of corkscrews.
When the Germans ran short of explosives they found other means of destruction. A water-tower, for example, was destroyed by sending a railway engine full tilt against it. Telegraph wires were cut into sections, the posts were broken or sawn through, and the insulators were smashed in pieces. It looked as though the Germans did not intend to travel that road again. But there was method in von Hindenburg's madness. He was devastating all Poland except the northern quarter. This he left intact, because he meant to make another advance through it when the time was ripe. For this reason he retreated, not through the northern quarter of Poland, but towards the south-west.
What were the Austrians in Galicia doing while disaster was thus overtaking the German armies? In the first two months of the war they had been badly led, and had suffered much. But under new leadership they proved themselves far more successful. They swept through Galicia, seized Jaroslav, relieved Przemysl, and nearly recaptured Lemberg. The starving garrison at Przemysl received food and supplies, and was thus given a new lease of life. When, however, the Germans farther north were forced to retreat, the Austrians were bound to do so too. They were, however, in no hurry to retire. They only withdrew to the south of the Upper Vistula when the Russians were beginning to envelop them.
The Grand Duke Nicholas.
Thus ended the first attempt to capture Warsaw. The nut was too hard for von Hindenburg to crack, though he had by no means given up his attempts to crush it. He had been foiled; but, as we shall learn later, he was to come on again and again with wonderful perseverance. For the moment, however, he had failed, and failed badly. While the Allies in the West were only just holding back the desperate assaults of the enemy from Arras to the sea, the Russians were rejoicing in victory, and British newspapers were painting rosy pictures of the Grand Duke leading his triumphant armies within a few short weeks into the German capital. Alas! the hope was vain; rivers of blood were to flow before that happy day was even in sight.
