Victory on the Allied left in Northern France and West Flanders is confidently expected by the troops. Apparently the fighting is going well and the German position becoming increasingly unfavourable. Throughout yesterday the enemy vigorously attacked the Allied front, only to be beaten back after suffering heavy losses. These tactics are one more proof of the pressure under which the Kaiser's armies are giving way. The generals are evidently doing their utmost to check the Allies, but of a genuine offensive there is no sign.
About Nieuport, on the Belgian coast, where the Allied front reaches the sea, the British navy has lent the armies valuable aid. Three heavily armed monitors, bought by the Admiralty from Brazil, for whom they were completing in England when war broke out, steamed in close to the shore, and by shelling the German flank powerfully assisted the Belgian troops. Yesterday, says the Paris official statement, the battle was violent between La Bassee and the coast, but nowhere did the Germans obtain any success.
Russia is more than holding her own. Petrograd, which has been studiously moderate in its reports about the fighting in Poland, now announces a German retreat from before Warsaw. The enemy are falling back utterly routed. It has been obvious for several days that Germany's first effort to force a way over the Vistula had failed; the failure now appears to have been costly. Russia's claims find unwilling support in the Berlin wireless circular, which has taken to announcing ╥no result╙ and ╥no change╙ on the Polish front.
