At Kosienice, which saw some of the hardest fighting in the war, two regiments crossed the Vistula--the Vistula, mind; and those who have seen it will know what that means--under fire and in face of two German corps and three Austrian; another brigade of 3 K came along the river from a Russian fortress on the western bank, marching knee-deep through marsh and water with the general at its head. The two regiments that crossed moved forward to a vast forest near the river, and there they had an hour and a half's bayonet fighting--one may imagine what that means. An enormous number of officers went down; the B's lost forty, and the S's in the course of those five days had seven successive officers killed while commanding the regiment. In the midst of the bayonet fighting, when most of the Russian officers fell, some of the Germans shouted out in Russian, "Don't fight your own men!" and in the confusion which followed the Russians left the forest and lay, half in marsh and with only the most elementary cover, under a devastating artillery fire; however, they held their ground on this bank of the river, and, as soon as they were reinforced, they again moved forward and scattered the Germans, drove them off westward, and then pushed the Austrians, in more than a week of fighting, beyond Kielce, where they feasted their triumph with the old corps song, "God has given victory." After this followed arduous fighting in the Czenstochowa region. Later the corps went to the eastern Carpathians to stem an Austro-German advance, and it was thence brought rapidly across to the assistance of our army when the tremendous artillery impact of the enemy fell on Galicia between Gorlice and Tarnow. I first saw General Irmanov the day he had entered Kielce. He is one of the most remarkable and sympathetic figures of the whole war. I saw what seemed an old man of middle height, of sturdy figure, with a curious outward kink in his walk as of one who had lived much on horseback; he has a singularly peaceful and gentle face, with a high colour and grey hair and beard; a child-like simplicity and directness blended with a fatherly benevolence; but the suggestion of different ages ends, when one sees much of the General, in one's forgetting age altogether. The voice is a mild, high one which sometimes comes out like a little bark. I had a long talk then with General Irmanov, and for every one of my questions got a clear and full answer. Irmanov was not a General Staff officer; in peace and off duty he lives a quiet domestic life in his mountain home. His staff is like a family; there is a peculiar smartness and spirit in the salute when the General appears and all line up to greet him. He mounts without delay and is off in a moment; he is one of the fastest riders in the army, and in a few minutes his suite, trained riders as they are, are all streaming behind him.