TRIALS OF THE TRENCHES.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LVII, Issue 189, 19 January 1915, Page 3

TRIALS OF THE TRENCHES.

GOING ABOUT BAREFOOT. HOW YICTORY WILL COME. The latest story by "Eye-Witness," the ollicial recorder with the British Stall', says: "The river Lys is flooded, and in siime places on both sides we have had to evacuate the trenches. The wet clay is ta adhesive that even the stoutest boots give way under the strain. In order to keep as dry as possible many of the. men go barefoot down the long communication trenches, and only resume their boots and seeks when they reach the drained fire trenches. The life is monotonous, because continual wor.': is required to keep the trenches dry nod intact aided to vl.ich there is the constant eif -rt by each side to gain the mastery, the sniping and the sapping, bombardment 1-y mortal? and hand gravities, the con-.-iruetii'ii and repair of -mt.anglemei'ts, and the digging of trenches by night within close range of tbe enemy's sentries. The importance of establishing superiority in trench warfare does not consist only of material results, but also of | the moral ascendance which is gained.' I There is a great deal of sickness in the | .German ranks, and a considerable number of cases of typhoid. Some units have 'been temporarily withdrawn owing to this. The struggle has entered on a new' I phase, the allied forces having taken the initiative. But the fact that the Germans are acting on the defensive does not mean that they have abandoned attacking. The German defensive is founded on the axiom that the weaker the force is and the harder it is pressed the more persistently should it attack. If we retain the initiative the Germans will become conscious that ultimate victory I is not attainable while the final consequence of repeated small successes may he that the enemy will be forced to abandon important points, like towns, 1 vai'- ay stations, and river crossings, and I fall back on another line of defence.

'■lt must not, however, be thought tli.it this is other thfm a very slow and laborious process, or that the result is within immediate reach. Every trench gained represents lost ground for which the enemy has expended much blood and treasure, and is a step forward in the process of attrition which will eventually bring the war to a conclusion. To find 11 parallel of the general features of the warfare now being waged, it is necessary to go back to the days when the nations sought to defend their territoritic3 by means of a continuous line of entrenchments and fortifications. Instances are the Great Wall of China, and the Roman Wall in Great Britain, while, curiously, the part of Flanders where the British are now operating was, in the early eighteenth century, defended by such lines. The method of overcoming Ibis resistance does not differ in principle i iYiiiii that employed in the eavlv davs." jv ■■■■•.•" ' '^'^^a&siP