Both sides took shelter behind pine-trees; and very little execution was done, though the firing went on nearly all day. At last the Germans took post in a thick wood, and it became clear they had been playing with us all these hours while their sappers placed this copse in a state of defence. The discovery was rather humiliating; but these things occur in war, and it was not the only occasion on which our cunning opponents "came the old soldier" over their denser, slow-thinking foes. But in spite of their slyness they were beaten. Some Russian battalions got behind the wood, and its defenders were compelled to run for their lives. They ran very well, but most of them were captured; and we passed the second night in the nice, nest-like little hovels they had prepared for their own accommodation. The German dearly loves his comfort and good cheer. They never seemed to be short of food, and we took carts laden with wine that had been made in France and must have been sent hither at much trouble and expense only to find its way down Russian throats in spite of the Czar's teetotal proclamation. I think the German troops must be taught to make bivouacks and huts, they are such adepts at the work; and render their dens so comfortable by a hundred little devices that show they have previously studied the art of adapting everything to their own welfare and ease. Needless to say, the plunder of houses and cottages was utilized for furnishing these temporary abodes. There was now no doubt that the Germans were retreating; but they were doing so in that leisurely way which indicated that their retirement was anything but a rout; and I foresaw that it would not be long before they turned again with renewed ferocity. I do not think that the troops we had been opposed to were some of the best that Germany could put in the field. In some battalions there did not appear to be a man under forty years of age: in others they were all boys: and these last named were amongst the best fighters. I passed over ground strewn with the dead of one of these battalions, and not a lad of them seemed to be much over twenty years; some were not more than sixteen or seventeen. Many stories were brought to us of what had taken place in other districts. All agreed that the Germans had not succeeded in entering Warsaw; but it was reported that a fleet of aeroplanes had sailed over the city and dropped bombs. Only private houses had been wrecked; not much damage done, and the "hostile aircraft" had soon been driven away. As nothing was said about the bringing down of any of these aeroplanes, I felt pretty sure that they had all escaped the Russian fire. The Germans had not left much for them to destroy in their retreat; and I never learned from whence they had come, or whither they went when they had completed their fell work. We saw nothing of them in our district.