ATTILA (to Little Willie): "Speaking as one barbarian to another, I don't recommend the neighbourhood. I found it a bit unhealthy myself." (Attila's victorious progress across Gaul was finally checked on the plains of Châlons.)] [Illustration: VERY MUCH UP A Champagne Counter-Offensive] On the 15th the Germans launched their great offensive. On the 20th they recrossed the Marne, and are now entitled to complain that General Foch not only took over the French and British armies, but has recently started taking over a good part of the German army. The neighbourhood has never been a healthy one for the Huns since the days of Attila. Fritz has crossed the Marne and recrossed it--according to plan--and is already on the way to the Aisne. The battle of the rivers has begun again, but on new lines. Yet this amazing turn of the tide has been taken very quietly in France and England. The Allies have rung no joy-bells; they are content with doing their best to give Germany no occasion for further indulgence in that form of jubilation. And Germany is meeting them more than half way, their authorities having ordered a supplementary requisition of those church-bells which were exempted when the first confiscation was made. "At this heavy hour," said von Kühlmann to the Reichstag, "none of us fully realise what we owe to the German Emperor." That was a month ago; the realisation of their indebtedness has since advanced by leaps and bounds. There are now 1,000,000 Americans in France. But the Kaiser and his War-lords are still passing their victims through the fire to the Pan-German Moloch, and threatening to send German generals to teach the Austrian Army how to win offensives. It is even reported that the Germans contemplate placing the ex-king of Greece on the throne of Finland. Fantastic rumours are rife in these days; but there is only too good reason to believe the report that the ex-Tsar, the Tsaritsa, and their daughters have all been murdered by their brutal captors at Ekaterinburg. It seems but yesterday when Nicholas was acclaimed as the Saviour and regenerator of his people, and now Tsardom, irrevocably fallen from its high estate, has gone down amid scenes of butchery and barbarity that eclipse the Reign of Terror in France.