power the Austrians were outmatched. General Russky was one of the leading strategists of the new Russo-French school, a quiet, bookish, scholarly man, hardened to war in Manchuria, where he had distinguished himself by bold leading and personal courage. GeneralBrusiloffwasanotherbrilliantandyetsound leader,withhighpracticalexperienceinmodernwarfare. With the two Russian generals was the hero of Bulgaria, General Radko Dmitrieff, who had vanquished the German-trained Turkish army at Kirk Kilisse and other recent battles of the Balkans. He had throwm up his appointment under the Bulgarian government in order to go as a volunteer to help the Slav people in the struggle against the Teuton, whose" intrigues had brought Bulgaria low in the Aour of her victory anddisruptedtheBalkanAlliance. Innumbersthetwoopposing armies seem to have been, in the end, about equal. But the Russian artillery, made chiefly in Ffance, was superior to the Austrian. Moreover, the Austrians had weakened*their artillery to help the Germans in Belgium and France.
In addition to this disadvantage in the jnachinery of warfare, the southerA Austrian army was caught in a moment of disarray. Jis main reinforcement of two army corps was intercepted on August 29 by General Russky and was shattered, and the
victorious Russians moved on and occupied a height known as the Naked Hill, from which they dominated Lemberg. In the meantime General BrusilofTs army, forming the left Russian wdiig, swung round to encircle Lemberg from the south. In so doing it struck against the main southern Austrian army entrenched at Halicz, a fortress town on the Lipa, that pours its turbid waters into the Dniester.
The Austrians were bent on getting round Brusilofi's southern flank and then rolling up the combined Russian forces. But thismanceuvredidnotsucceed. GeneralBrusiloEheldupthe turning movement, and his gallant Bulgarian assistant. General Radko Dmitrieff, made a terrible frontal attack on the enemy on the lower course of tlie Lipa.
The Austrian position was very strong and difficult to assail, with bluffs of volcanic rock and extinct craters; the natural defences had been improved by Austrian engineers, and thirty small forts had been built round H<ilicz. The river passage was, in fact, regarded as impregnable. But the Russian bayonets went over river, rifle pit and trench, while the Russian g\inners
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SOME AUSTRIA REVERSES