Warsaw-Dantzig railways, the ground is hi_gher and better suited to military operations. Here the German government had encouraged the peasants to build houses of stone with very heavy loop-holed walls toward the Russian frontiers. They were practically blocic-houses and did the Germans some good service in checking the advanchig Russians. They were proof against the only light artillery which the Russians were able to bring up. But even after the Russians had captured them they were no great shelter to the invaders, because the walls on the German side were thinner and afforded no protection against German artilkry. Many of these blocic-houses were also connected by soteret tmderground telephones with stations Some years before the war a land company of promoters had proposed to reclaim this re gion for agricuhnre. Hundreds of square miles were to be cleared of forests. The lakes and swamps were to be drained and the wild cotnstry turned into prosperous farms for German peas ants. Von Hindenburg energetically opposed the reclamation sdiesne, It is said he hurried to Berlin and interviewed the kaiser in pertson; he pointed out that this eastern wilderness was worth to Germany many army corps and a dozen fortresses. Why destroy the defense which Nature had provided and throw one of the oldest provinces of the Prussian monarchy open to easy Russian attack? His arguments prevailed and the wilderness remained.
To the east and west of the Masurian Lakes, however, near the Kovno-Koangsberg and the further to the, west, so that after Russians had advanced, Gelman spies were able to send in forinasion of their movements. Very few de fense trenches had been dug by the Germans, and most of their barbed wire was still stacked up in coils when the Russians made their first invasion.
The speed with which Russia mobilized came as a surprise and shock to the Germans in East Prussia. On 3 August, only two days after the declaration of war, the German garrison in Memel, on the Baltic Coast, just inside the German frontier, was called upon to drive back a Russian detachment from Libau. A few days later Russians did actually occupy Tilsit on the lower Niemen, where a century before Napoleon and Alexander I had met to divide the world between themselves. Another indi cation of the speed with which Russia moved may be seen in the fact that Gourko's cavalry division, which in peace time had its quarters in Moscow, was mobilized and transported so rapidly and efficiently that it was able to de train at Suwallci on 6 August and to cross the frontier before daylight on August. It pushed on quiddy to Marggrabowa on the German strategic railway, cut the line, de stroyed the station and telegraph and telqphone wires and seized valuable information as to the German plans and the location of troops. These cavalry patrols, sent forward to reconnoitre the situation, were speedily followed by the two main Russian armies which were to invade East Prussia— the army of the Niemen under Gen eral Rennenkampf and the army of the Narev under General Samsonov. ' The 1st Army under Renneidcampf wits to move rapidly westward from the Niemen along the line of the Kovno-Koenigsberg Railway, where the ground was good. It would drive back the smaller German force opposed to it and threaten Koenigsberg from the east. The
2d Army under Samsonov, moving northwest from the Narev and Bug rivers, between the railways running into East Prussia from Bialystok and Warsaw, would advance more slowly through the difficult cotmtry of the western half of the Masurian Lake Region. Having passed this barrier it would reach the main-line railway from Berlin to Petrograd, which passes through Eylau and Allenstein. It would then be on good ground, would join up with the lst Army, and together the two armies could close in on Koenigsberg; or leaving Koenigsberg besieged they could advance to the Vistula and menace Berlin. For three weeks all went so successfully that Russian hopes ran high. On 27 August, in anticipation of victory, a fete was held in Petrograd, and by the sale of flags $100,000 was raised to be given to the first Russian soldier who entered Berlin. But 27 August marlcs the high-water mark of the East Prussian venture, as one may see by fol lowing a little more closely each of these armies.
General RennenIcampf had under his com mand the four army corps whose regular head quarters were comparatively near the frontier — the 2d (Grodno), the 3d (Wilna), the 4th (Minsk) and the 10th (ftiga); he had also the 1st and 5th rifle divisions and Gourko's cav alry division. By the end of August he had also the support on his left flank of a new 10th Army under General Pflug, composed of two of the best-trained army corps— the 22d (Fin land) and the 3d Siberian— two divisions of the famous Cavalry Guards from Petrograd, and six less well-trained divisions of reserves (53d, 54th, 56th, 57th, 72d and 76th). But not counting these later arrivals, Rennenkampf had in the army of the Niemen nearly 200,000 of Russia's best troops. He, therefore, consider ably outnumbered the Germans under von Francois. He accordingly pushed rapidly across the frontier with his main force about 10 August and occupied Stallupoenen, the station just inside the Prussian frontier, where the strategic railway parallel to the frontier crosses the main line from Berlin to Petrograd. Fif teen miles farther west, at Gumbinnen, the Ger mans felled thousands of trees to make an abattis for their hastily constructed trench posi tions. They hoped thereby to protect Inster burg, 10 miles farther west, where the main line railway crosses the Pregel. Insterburg was important strategically, both as a railway centre and as an outpost for the defense of Koenigsberg, the capital of the province. But on Sunday, 16 August, Rennenkampf bom barded Gumbinnen effectively. Then, in a dashing frontal attacic, he rushed the German positions. A Russian flanking movement aimed at the Insterburg Railway caused von Francois to give up the trenches in front of the town on 20 August. The Germans fell back as -hastily as possible to the cover of the heavy protecting guns of the circle of forts around Koenigsberg, where they were shut in. A Russian detach ment had already occupied Tilsit on the lower Niemen and the tsar's flag was hung out from the ancient tovtn hall, where it fluttered tri umphantly for three weelcs. By the fourth weelc in August, about the time the F-nglish were beginning the retreat from Mons, Remelt kampf had successfully occupied more than a third of the sacred soil of East Prussia.