pture of Verdun alone could be of no
particular or material benefit to the Kaiser and his armies. Verdun
was, as it were, merely an empty shell, a sleepy old town in the hollow
by the River Meuse, overshadowed by heights which formed the major
portion of that salient held by our ally. Forts there were in
abundance--forts, as we have said, long since dismantled. Yet in
Germany the tale spread by the German War Staff, that Verdun was
heavily armed and considered impregnable, was thoroughly believed, just
as it was confidently believed that the valour of the Kaiser's soldiers
would snatch it from the enemy.

This terrible World War had come, at this stage, to a period when the
spirits of Germans and Austrians were failing, when some stimulus was
sadly needed, and when the courage of the people was hardly what it had
been when the conflict opened. Who knows? Who can state with
certainty what was the real object of the German War Staff in launching
an attack upon such an impregnable position--impregnable not because of
those dismantled forts and the guns which had once filled them, but
because of the nature of the terrain, those hills with their steep
escarpments, and those positions on the left or western bank of the
Meuse which gave such splendid opportunity to the defenders to outflank
with their guns those attacking the northern portion of the salient.
Perhaps a sensational capture of Verdun was the objective of the
Germans, merely with the idea that it would act as a stimulus to the
peoples of the Central Empires. More likely, finding themselves
getting weaker as the months drew on, and terrible losses reduced their
fighting effectives, the Kaiser and his war lords were determined to
risk all in one mighty effort--an effort which should break through the
French line at Verdun, thus bringing kudos to the armies of Prussia,
and at the same time demoralizing the French soldiers. Who knows?
They may have hoped to dash through the gap thus formed, and once more
advance on Paris. In any case, they were well aware of the phenomenal
rise in power of the British forces. Five million men had volunteered
to fight for king and country; and now, on the top of that, there was
news that Great Britain had adopted conscription; every man up to the
age of forty-one was to become a soldier, was to fight for that liberty
dear to all Britons.

Then, seeing that Germany's forces were rapidly dwindling, a blow must
be struck now--a