. Scarcely had the last howls of the blizzard faded away when
the machine was again set in motion.

South of Dukla and Lupkow and north of Uzsok fighting was resumed
with intense vigor. Painfully digging through the snowdrifts the
Austrians retired from the Smolnik-Kalnica line, now no longer
tenable. Storm hampered the pursuing enemy, who captured the Cisna
railway station on April 4, 1915, with all its rolling stock and
large stores of munitions.

On April 6, 1915, a Russian communique announced that "during the
period from March 20 to April 3, 1915, we took prisoners in the
Carpathians, on the front from Baligrod to Uzsok, 378 officers,
11 doctors, and 33,155 men. We captured 17 guns and 101 machine
guns. Of these captives 117 officers, 16,928 men, 8 guns, and 59
machine guns were taken on a front of fifteen versts (10 miles)."

The Russians again advanced along their whole front on April 4,
1915; forcing their way along the Rostoki stream, they carried
the village of Rostoki Gorne with the bayonet and penetrated the
snow-bound Rostoki Pass. Their first line arrived at a Hungarian
village called Orosz-Russka, five miles from Nagy Polena, at the
foot of the pass. The Austrians attempted to drive them back, but
they held their ground.

While fortune was steadily following the efforts of the czar's troops
in the Lupkow-Uzsok sector, the German War Staff were preparing
their plans for the great decisive blow that was soon to be struck.
South of the Carpathians, barely thirty miles away, formidable
reenforcements were collecting; they arrived from the East Prussian
front, from Poland, and even from the west, where they had faced
the French and British. There were also new formations fresh from
Germany. General von der Marwitz arrived in the Laborcza Valley
with a whole German army corps. These gigantic preparations were
not unknown to the Russians; they, also, strained every nerve to
throw all available reenforcements behind and into the battle line,
strengthening every position _except one_. South of the Lupkow the
Germanic forces opened their counteroffensive on April 6, 1915.
Official reports on the first day's fighting differ somewhat. The
Russians admit a slight German advance, but assert that they were
able to withstand all further attacks. The Germans, on the other hand,
claim great successes and the capture of 6,000 Russian prisoners.

The Germanic armies in this case, however, certainly did advance,
for th