which they had thought so excellent for the goose. To begin fighting under such circumstances was an infamy that was only equalled by the employment of German officers bon to advise and to direct the Turks. The Greeks were organizing a foreign legion, but that was another thing, and really it was so frankly in breach of international law that the thing ceased to astonish. But I agree with the Greeks that the employment of German officers with the express sanction of the German emperor in fighting with and for the Turks is a novelty that cannot but be reprobated. The Greeks were at peace with Germany. German ships lay peaceably in Greek harbors. Commerce went on undisturbed, and German goods were allowed free course in Greek markets. The wife of the crown prince is the sister of the German emperor. But all that made no difference. German officers, who had been training the Turkish army, fought with it in the field, nay, directed it. Their influence was visible everywhere in the operations. Some of them were even killed while leading Turkish troops. The correspondents with the Turkish forces, to whom I tender my congratulations on the information and facilities afforded them, which were sadly to seek on our side, made no secret about this and that being done by German officers on their own authority. Nevertheless, this active intervention for one ally against another is surely charged with consequences as a precedent which the intempestive Kaiser can scarcely have foreseen, but which will not be lost on the turbulent element in the world for the future. In fact, International Law seems to have gone into the melting-pot, and mankind may well wait in perturbation for what is to come out of it.

The Greek plan of campaign was to hold on tight to the East Thessalian frontier, strike in by the centre frontier through the Irregulars, and advance in Epirus, where the Turks would be most helpless, as they had not the command of the sea, and railways could not assist them. The

Turkish plan was almost the converse of this: to strike through on the Olympian frontier, to merely hold the frontier of the Khassia Mountains, and to yield not a step in Epirus, letting the last man fall if necessary at Jannina, SO immortally associated with the name of the old Albanian Pacha Ali. It is but just to say that the Greeks have a genuine grievance about this frontier. Jannina and Olympus were both given to Greece by the International Boundary Commission, and a far inferior frontier substituted. Greece for a long time held out against the wrong, but Turkey would not give way, and rather than take up arms, seeing she did secure the bulk of Thessaly, Greece accepted less than had been awarded her. This international hocus-pocus (perhaps designedly) hampered Greece from the first inception of the campaign I now deal with. But what hampered her still more was the fact that Turkey threw into the field a number of troops. well trained, fairly supplied, well in hand, far superior to those that Greece with its small population could possibly produce. From the first the Turks had the preponderance within striking distance of all tactical points. If they mulled their advance at first, if they did not feel the weakness of their opponents at once, we may safely put the fact down to two things-the inevitable difference of opinion between the noninal commanders and the real commanders, between the Turks and the Germans; and the demoralizing influence always brought to bear, since the introduction of the telegraph, on Ottoman commanders in the field by the Seraskierate Council and the Palace Council in Constantinople. It took a week to get over these difficulties. Then all was plain sailing. The Greeks were outnumbered everywhere at once, and that by trained soldiers furnished with a sufficient supply of cavalry, while the Greeks had but five hundred most indifferent "mounted infantry" filling the old rôle of dragoons.

The Greek artillery, on the other hand, was better than the Turkish. It

did get its shells home occasionally, though it had no variety of ammunition. The Turkish fire from first to last was absurdly bad, and, if anything, the attempts to use shrapnel were worse than the practice with the common shell. The Greeks were outrumbered everywhere at once, I have said. From first to last I cannot make out that, apart from the lines of communication, they had more than fortyfive thousand infantry in the field, all told; probably, including the lines of communication and the reserves called out, but not joining the colors in time to affect the result, there were fifty thousand men more or less uniformed, besides artillery and the five hundred cavalry. What artillery there was is uncertain. I have had very different stories told me of the actual strength. Forty batteries was one story; I have seen perhaps forty guns all told, with men. There were a number of long Krupps with a bore not much larger than that of the field guns disposable. But they needed a great deal of hauling. They had eight, rather too small, horses apiece, and then they could move only at a walk. The field guns with six horses were more mobile, but not sufficiently so for good work; they could not get up a gallop with loaded limbers. The mountain batteries were better; they were well appointed in every detail that I could discover, the mules being large and of good quality, while the carriages carried were efficient, if a trifle light. If I say that I have no great fault to find with the handling of the artillery, the statement must be taken with reference to its action in the face of the enemy. For there did not seem to be the slightest notion that there was anything to be regretted in abandoning guns, not in presence of the foe, so long as the breech-pieces could be removed-the modern equivalent for spiking.

When I reached the frontier, just one day late for the very beginning of the regular fighting, the situation was as follows in Thessaly. The Irregulars were across the Turkish frontier at Kalambaka, claiming to have got as

far as Grevena, and to have cut the communication between the Turkish right in Epirus and left in Thessaly. If I have conceived the Ottoman plan of campaign aright this did not much matter, since Epirus was intended to be left isolated if needful. Still, there was a Turkish brigade at or near Grevena trying to bring the Irregulars to an action on definite terms. Practically, we may take it, the two sides held each other here. The centre and pivot of the Turkish left was at Elassona, which had been fortified à la Plevna, though, of course, with differences of detail, according to the nature of the ground. One brigade guarded the pass. The pass, for Boghaz is Turkish for pass or defile or strait, and consequently Boghazi meant the pass par excellence, through which the Xerias, main northern affluent of the Peneus, though generally dry, as its name implies, finds its way, cutting the mountains to Tyrnavos and the Peneus below Larissa. This is probably the pass through which the "millions" of Xerxes found their way into Thessaly, though how they were fed there, or elsewhere, is one of the greatest wonders in all history. The Greeks had also a brigade here, and they had undoubtedly got the command of the pass, though the Turks held on resolutely to its western end at Damasi, where a battery commanded the debouchement from first to last. The Greek infantry showed itself good here on several occasions, but could never get out of the mouth near the Turkish camp, which I examined at my leisure from only a few dozen yards in front of the Greek positions north-west of Tyrnavos. The line of hill-crests hence eastwards was in the hands of the Greeks, save only at the top of the Malouna Pass, where the Turks had a large blockhouse. This pass was formerly a mere bridle track, but the Greeks had made an excellent zigzag road to a rival blockhouse they had established-as good a road as was needed for artillery into Thessaly, though a very painful pull for guns going from Thessaly into Turkish territory. The Turks had improved their

road on the other side, so what had been a difficult defile had become the main road. Here a Greek division held the mouth of the defile, and in my judgment might have held it for a long period if only the pass in question had been concerned. But a few miles of awful ground to the eastwards there was another pass, by a lake called Nezeros (? Nazareth), and a mountain called Analepsis, or the Assumption.

It was not by any means assumed by the Greeks that this rough pass was safe. On the contrary, every precaution was taken about it, and it was held in strength, though not, as events proved, in sufficient strength, which want of troops prevented. East of this again the frontier descended to the Gulf of Salonica, with the Vale of Tempe as its guard. The Greeks had but a few troops here. It seems to have been thought that the access to Thessaly in this direction was too difficult, besides being flanked from Nezeros. But, twenty centuries before, King Philip (V.) of Macedon had brought his army through the Vale of Tempe to meet the Roman Consul Flaminius, and, as many a campaign has shown, difficulties that were thought insuperable by the ancients are scarcely difficulties to moderns, even Turks. Thus a coach road runs through the Pass of Thermopylæ it self, and another flanks it by a still easier route, which no general would now hesitate to take with infantry, if he had enough of them, even though the road had not been made. In any case the Vale of Tempe was but indifferently held by the Greeks, though the very poor outline map, from which most of them worked, itself shows a coast road by Platamona. At length the Turks brought a division across the Malouna Pass which the Greeks had so obligingly made easy for them, and which it was not in their nature to have made so for themselves. Even then the Greeks held the mouth of the defile secure from the slopes of Mount Kritiri on their left to near Derele. A tortoiseshaped hill in the midst of their position gave them the means of hiding a

considerable portion of their force and of deploying it right or left as seemed desirable. But the bulk of their infantry was kept behind stone breastworks, or lining a small banked enclosure, or lying in a belt of grass marked by frequent trees following the dry bed of a mountain stream which sometimes descends from Kritiri to the Xerias. They were kept for four days, more or less shifted about, exposed to Turkish shell-fire and Turkish longrange, or rather unaimed, rifle-fire without permission to return it-indeed without the power of returning it. though the waste of cartridges on other occasions might have led to the idea they would at least take the opportunity of relieving their feelings by letting off a few rounds.

For four days, as has been said, the Turks held the Greeks here, as the Greeks held the Turks. There were a few skirmishes to give variety to the artillery duel of which the Greeks had the best-none of the fighting being of any importance in itself, and what there was conspicuous for the absence on both sides of anything like fire-discipline or fire-control. For hours together the firing would stop, for no ap parent reason; presently it would be resumed without any real purpose being evident. And so four days passed until the twenty-third April, when what has been dignified as the battle of Mati took place. It resembled the other days in nearly every respect. Towards evening the Turks, who had been getting troops by degrees, in small numbers, over the pass, made an ttempt to push on their left from the village of Karatsali towards Derele, but it was defeated by a few battalious in the tree-adorned dip and the Greek artillery, a fresh field battery of which had crossed the lower part of the Xerias coming up from Larissa direct. There was no harm done to the positions or the troops at this point on either side by all the work of the week, save that the Turks had been strengthening their men and that the Greeks were becoming a bit exhausted. It was their Holy Week. They had had

forage on the ground, and teeming with flocks and herds. One good road led by the west to the south, where another fine position closed the way to the capital, and two mountain roads, each at least as good as those by which the Turks had done their frontier-flanking, led south-east to Halmyros and its roadstead, and to the position to the south just mentioned at Domokos. Still the Turks did not pursue. Easter was past, and abundant meat-rations had put the Greek ranks into better heart. They had also got rest, and they had every other night without disturbance till daylight. We heard of fighting at Velestinos, bravely kept up by the brigade left there. But it was evident enough on analysis of the accounts which came to the main body that the Turks had only pushed forward some reconnaissances. Meanwhile, the new supply route from Lamia had been got into good working order. So far as the main position was concerned Volo had ceased to be necessary, and there was almost an army-corps for the defence of Pharsalos itself. If only the position were not too extended for the force a stand might well be made here with some hope of success. If not here, then where? A line of low hills covered the front and concealed even from an enterprising enemy the disposition of the troops.

The heights of Pharsalos, with the old Acropolis, though not surrounded by a mediæval wall as in an illustration I have seen, but only by fragments of far more ancient, indeed, Cyclopean masonry, looked castellated, as many a Scotch or Irish whin-dyke appears to form the outline of a fortress or battery. But our horse-artillery would have made nothing of getting to the top of it. It was admirably suited for mountain guns. The pass to the west of it was easily fortified. The other roads had equal advantages in the way of defence, but nothing was done in this way. Everything was done on the low hills, nothing was done on the main position, for lack of men. Yet, when the cavalry sent in one of their few trustworthy pieces of intelligence that Trikkala, on

the west, from which the Greeks had retired to wisely concentrate their lines, had been abandoned by the Turks, the Greeks at once proceeded to reoccupy it, with the inevitable effect of weakening their centre at Pharsalos. That was just what the Turks wanted. Accordingly they struck full at the centre before noon the next day, and at sunset the Greek main body was in full retreat, without having sustained any defeat more serious than a loss of at most a hundred men, since the two forces, in a battle which looked like nothing so much as a bit of a war-game played by volunteers, never got nearer each other than from 800 to 1,200 yards, and in which the Turks won simply by "turning" to the east, by carrying out the elementary tactical principle of bringing a superiority of force to bear on a tactical point. There was no serious fighting whatsoever, and even the artillery, handled again better in aim on the side of the Greeks, but tactically better on that of the Turks, preferred 5,000 or 4,000 yards to any nearer distance for their efforts.

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The retreat was in full operation when the fighting ceased at sunset. It was conducted almost ostentatiously through the one pass to the west of the town, and it was done in fairly good order, even better than that from Tyrnavos. On reaching Domokos, fine position covering the last stand that could be made short of the old frontier at Furka, above Lamia, it was evident that preparations had been made some days before to hold it. Long guns were in batteries commanding the three apparent roads through the pass, which is some 1,200 feet above the plain in front of it. The slopes, the roads, the crests of the adjacent hills afforded splendid positions for defence by infantry and mountain guns; but, even without the aid of maps-and I saw no big maps save in the hands of correspondentsan eye used to a mountain country had no difficulty in detecting signs of byetracks which showed how the position could be turned. The Greek staff declared, of course, that here would they stand forever, and a day longer; and