The man whom I have summarily sketched was invested by Joffre with the dignity of his Chief-of-Staff and the title of Major-General. The life-long friend became the chief aid in his deliberations, and the virtual leader on the Western Front, leaving to the highest in command the larger issues of a world-wide campaign. Even in Republican France there is thus place for the _croyant_ and the aristocrat, as the names of Delangle de Gary, de Maud’huy, and D’Urbal show. *CHAPTER VIII* *THE ORGANISATION OF MUNITIONS* One of the many surprises of the war was the vast place given to munitions. Not even the most careful calculator had foreseen the enormous consumption of war _matériel_ that would result from a long continuance of trench warfare. The Germans had reckoned on an expenditure of 35,000 shells a day, and the French on about half that; the actual consumption was often 100,000 shells on each side. Both French and German had based their figures on a rapid war, and, had the invaders’ plans been realised, Paris would have been occupied and the French opposition paralysed in a fortnight. But this was reckoning without Joffre, without England, and without "General Chance," one of the most important factors in any war. Ammunition, by reason of its vast rôle, became as engrossing and as vitally important as the actual fighting. For it soon became apparent that in this war of _matériel_ he would win who could most quickly assemble the largest quantity of guns and shot and shell. The Germans began with an immense advantage, for they had accumulated secretly a mass of machine-guns estimated at 50,000, leaving the Allies hopelessly in the rear in this respect. But even their perverse intelligence did not fully grasp the logical outcome of their own preparations, or foresee that, their first plan having failed, they would be caught inevitably in their own toils.