Kirk Kilisse, November 7.—The extraordinary simplicity of the commissariat has helped the Bulgarian generals a great deal. The men have had bread and cheese, sometimes even bread alone; and that was accounted a satisfactory ration. When meat and other things could be obtained, they were obtained; but there were long periods when the Bulgarian soldier had nothing but bread and water. The water, unfortunately, he took wherever he could get it, by the side of the route at any stream he could find. There was no attempt to ensure a pure water supply for the army. I do not think that, without that simplicity of commissariat, it would have been possible for the Bulgarian forces to have got as far as they did. There was an entire absence of tinned foods. As I travelled in the trail of the Bulgarian army, I found it impossible to imagine that an army had passed that way, because there was none of the litter which is usually left by an army. It was not that they cleared away their rubbish with them; it simply did not exist. Their bread and cheese seems to be a good fighting diet.
Seleniki, November 13.—The transport was, naturally, the great problem which faced the generals. I have seen here (Seleniki, which is the point at which the rail-head is), within 30 miles of Constantinople as the crow flies, ox wagons which have come from the Shipka Pass in the north of Bulgaria. I asked one driver how long it had been on the road; he told me three weeks. He was carrying food down to the front. The way the ox wagons were used for transport was a marvel of organisation. A transport officer at Mustapha Pasha, with whom I became very friendly, was lyrical in his praise of the ox wagon. It was, he said, the only thing that stuck to him during the war. The railway got choked, and even the horse failed, but the ox never failed. There were thousands of ox wagons crawling across the country. They do not walk, they crawl, like an insect, with an irresistible crawl. It reminds you of those armies of soldier ants which move across Africa, eating everything which they come across, and stopping at nothing. I had an ox wagon coming from Mustapha Pasha to Kirk Kilisse, and we went over the hills and down through the valleys, and stopped for nothing—we never had to unload once. And one could sleep in those ox wagons. There is no jolting and pulling at the traces, such as you get with a harnessed horse. The ox wagon moved slowly; but it always moved. If the ox transport had not been as perfectly organised, and if the oxen had not been as patiently enduring as they proved to be, the Bulgarian army must have perished by starvation. And yet, at Mustapha Pasha, a censor would not allow us to send anything about the ox wagons. That officer thought the ox cart was derogatory to the dignity of the army. If we had been able to say that they had such things as motor transport or steam wagons, he would have cheerfully allowed us to send it.
But after Lule Burgas, the ox transport has had to do the impossible. It is impossible for it to maintain the food and the ammunition supply of the army at the front, which I suppose must number 250,000 to 300,000 men. That army has got right away from its base, with the one line of railway straddled by the enemy, and with the ox as practically the only means of transport.
Arjenli (Turkey), November 15, 1912.—It is Friday, and we expect to-morrow the Battle of Chatalja. In the little Turkish village of Arjenli, situated on a high hill a little to the rear of the Bulgarian lines, is the ammunition park of the artillery, guarded by a small body of troops under Lieutenant-Colonel Tchobanoff. Coming towards the front from Chorlu, the fall of night and the weariness of my horses have compelled me to halt at Arjenli, and this officer and Dr. Neytchef give me a warm welcome to their little mess. There are six members, and for all, to sleep and to eat, one room. Three are officers, three have no commissions. With this nation in arms that is not an objection to a common table. Discipline is strict, but officers and soldiers are men and brothers when out of the ranks. Social position does not govern military position. I found sometimes the University professor and the bank manager without commissions, the peasant proprietor an officer. The whole nation has poured out its manhood for the war, from farm, field, factory, shop, bank, university, and consulting-room.
Here, at Arjenli, on the eve of the decisive battle, I think over early incidents of the campaign. It is a curious fact that in all Bulgaria I have met but one man who was young enough and well enough to fight and who had not enlisted. He had become an American subject, I believe, and so could not be compelled to serve. In America he had learned to be an "International Socialist," and so he did not volunteer. I believe he was unique. With half the population of London, Bulgaria had put 350,000 trained men under arms. But there was in the nation one good Socialist who knew that war was an evil thing, and that it was better to sit down meekly under tyranny than to take up arms.
Underwood & Underwood
OX TRANSPORT IN THE BALKANS
I followed in the track of the victorious Third Army as it came down through the border mountains on to Kirk Kilisse, then to Lule Burgas, then past Chorlu to the Chatalja lines. At Arjenli I had overtaken them in time to see the final battle, and now sat looking out on the entrenched armies, talking over the position with a serene and cheerful artillery officer. The past week had been one of hardship and horrors. From Chorlu the road was lined with the bodies of the Turkish dead, still awaiting burial. Entering the Bulgarian lines on their right flank that morning, I had tried in vain to succour a soldier dying of the choleraic dysentery which had begun its ravages. But here in the middle of the battle line the atmosphere of noble confidence is inspiriting. The horrors of war vanish; only its glory shows. The men around me feel that they are engaged in a just war. They know that everything that man can do has been done. Proudly, cheerfully, they await the issue.