ts on the five-yard line. Then, just in the nick of time, the
whistle blew. The game was over. The Austrians had to hurry home.
They had staked everything on a sudden and overwhelming onslaught by
which they hoped to smash the Italian defense and demoralize the
Italian armies in time to permit at least half their eighteen
divisions and nearly all of their heavy guns being withdrawn in a few
weeks and rushed across Austria to the Galician front, where they were
desperately needed to stay the Russian advance.

By the beginning of the last week in June the Austrian General Staff,
recognizing that its plan for the overwhelming of northern Italy had
failed disastrously, issued orders for a general retreat. The
Austrians had planned to fall back on the positions which had been
prepared in advance in the mountains and to establish themselves, with
greatly reduced numbers, on this practically impregnable line, while
the transfer of the divisions intended for the Carpathians was
effected. But General Cadorna had no intention of letting the
Austrians escape so easily. In less than a week he had collected from
the garrisons and training camps and reserve battalions an army of
500,000 men. It was one of the most remarkable achievements of the
war. From all parts of Italy he rushed those half million men to the
Trentino front by train--and despite the immense strain put upon the
Italian railways by the rapid movement of so great a body of troops,
the regular passenger service was suspended for only three days. (At
that same time the American Government was attempting to concentrate a
force of only 150,000 men on the Mexican border; a comparison of
Italian and American efficiency is instructive.) He formed that army
into brigades and divisions, each complete with staff and supply
trains and ammunition columns. He organized fresh bases of supply,
including water, of which there is none on the Asiago plateau. He
provided the stupendous quantity of stores and ammunition and
equipment and transport required by such an army. (It is related how
Cadorna's Chief of Transport wired the Fiat Company of Turin that he
must have 545 additional motor-trucks within a week, and how that
great company responded by delivering in the time specified 546--one
over for good measure.) Almost in a night he transformed the rude
mule-paths leading up onto the plateau into splendid military roads,
wide enough and hard enough to bear the tremendous traffic to w