During July and August there were no general engagements of importance in the Western theatre of war. The deadlock continued. The troops along the Western battle lines were, however, subjected almost daily to violent artillery bombardment. By August 22 the British line in northern France and Flanders had been lengthened from 40 miles to over 100 miles, with over 800,000 troops on the firing line. German submarines were very active in the war zone during the month of August, over 170 merchant steamships of more than 500 tons displacement and nearly 2,000 noncombatant lives being the awful toll to date of this new method of warfare. The British transport Royal Edward was torpedoed and sunk August 14 by a German submarine in the Aegean Sea. Nearly 1,000 lives were lost. The transport had on board a force of 32 officers and 1,350 men, in addition to the ship's crew of 220 officers and men. The troops consisted mainly of reinforcements for the 29th Division and details of the Royal Army Medical Corps. FALL OF WARSAW Warsaw, the capital of Poland, was taken by the Germans August 5. Bavarian troops under the command of Prince Leopold carried the forts of the outer and inner lines of the city's defenses, where the rear guards of the Russian troops made a tenacious resistance. The German armies under Gen. von Scholz and Gen. von Gallwitz advanced in the direction of the road between Lomza, Ostrov and Vyszkoy and fought a number of violent engagements. The brave and desperate resistance of the Russians on both sides of the road between Ostrov and Rozan was without success. Twenty-two Russian officers and 4,840 soldiers were taken prisoners. The Germans also captured seventeen machine guns. The fall of Warsaw marked the culmination of the greatest sustained offensive movement of the war. Thrice before Teutonic armies had knocked at its gates, only to be denied by the strength of its defenses and the resistance of the forces holding it. Warsaw lies on the Vistula, 625 miles southwest of Petrograd and miles east of Berlin. It is an important industrial center and its population is estimated at not far from 900,000. The great Russian fortress of Kovno was captured by the Germans August 17. More than 400 cannon were taken. The fortress was stormed in spite of the most stubborn Russian resistance. The capture of Kovno was the most important German victory in the East after the taking of Warsaw. Kovno fell under the eye of General von Hindenburg. The capture of the fortress was the first personal triumph of the "old man of the Mazurian lakes" since the great Austro-German campaign in the East was inaugurated. The six great forts defending the city from the west and southwest were simply blown to pieces by the incessant pounding of Germany's great 42-centimeter guns and a host of minor pieces. The forts were under direct attack for scarcely a week, demonstrating again the superiority of modern artillery over fort structures built by man.