The Russian advance is now much more complete in southern Poland and is better lined up with the forces in Galicia. This advance tends to secure the Russian position on the northern frontier, where any German initiative becomes daily more hazardous. The ordinary fresh yearly Russian contingents mean an increase of half a million men. The arrangements for the wounded provide, if necessary, for over a million. _November 8._ I have just made a journey over the country lying between Warsaw and Cracow, where the Russian advance is now proceeding. My previous communication spoke of the original line of Russian defence along the Bug, and the later and more advanced line along the Vistula and the Narew. Present events are rapidly converting the new advance west of Warsaw from a counterstroke into a general transference of the sphere of operations and a most valuable rectification of the whole Russian line. In East Prussia the Germans are being slowly driven back by a double turning movement. Further westward the northern frontier of Poland is well secured. The Russians have now occupied and hold firmly Plock, Lodz, Piotrkow, Kielce and Sandomir, as also Jaroslaw and all the other passages of the river San. A glance at the map will show the importance of this line, which is only a stage in the general advance. On the repulse of the German attack on Warsaw, the enemy was pressed back south-westward in three weeks of continuous fighting. Near Ivangorod, a famous Caucasian regiment forced the passage of the Vistula under the fire of German heavy artillery. The advance guard crossed the broad stream--here unbridged--in skiffs and ferry-boats, and held good under a devastating cross fire till the construction of a pontoon bridge allowed the passage of reinforcements. The supports coming along the river bank from Ivangorod had to advance through flooded swamps almost breast high. Their footing was made good at Kosienice, where desperate fighting took place. Later they made a series of brilliant attacks in forests, after which the Germans were thrown back on Radom. The general advance drove the enemy back beyond Radom and Ilza. At the small town of Szydlowiec the German commandant threatened, as the Russians approached, to blow up the remarkable town hall, in Florentine style, conspicuous for thirty miles around, and the beautiful Gothic church, six hundred years old. The inhabitants offered to ransom them by a contribution of 5000 crowns. The offer was accepted; but twenty minutes later the town hall was blown up, and the church followed at the end of another quarter of an hour. This story was narrated to me with great indignation by the inhabitants.