BATTLEFIELD OF SELO.

Taranaki Daily News, 18 September 1917, Page 2

BATTLEFIELD OF SELO.

HEAVY BLOW TO AUSTRIA, London, August 2T. Correspondents furnish grttesome accounts of a visit to tlie battlefield at Selo, where the Italians have sliced most deeply into the heart of the Austrian resistance. Mr. Percival Gibbons, telegraphs:—ltaly is not playing at war. Sho pays the price of her victories. The currency with which she pays lies under a vehement sun, awaiting burial. But within Selo itself was a veritable massacre. The air was poisoned from heaps of dull grey corpses of Austrians slaughtered by the Italian bombers. The Italians had to face a veritable maze of machine-gun positions, which would have been impregnable without the preparatory bombardment. The British guna alone fired 15,000 shells on tho first day. The booty at Selo is incalculable. It includes numerous howitzers, and an Austrian brigade headquarters underground, which was fitted up with every luxury. Another correspondent has reported that tho Austrian Emperor, Karl, personally witnessed the retreat from Monte Santo. A visit to the captured position enables one to grasp the terrible tusk with which General Cadorna was faced, for each mound afforded protection for the Austrians, whoso machine-gun muzzles only showed over tho crest. Once theso were rushed every cavern clump of bushes, and bit of shattered trench became the scene of a fierce hand-to-hand struggle for a few yards of the mountain side.