On the Northern Railway, Major Kraut’s patrols, who started out from his fortified position at Lembeni, had occasionally scored pleasing successes. Several aeroplanes were brought down, or came to grief, the passengers being captured and the machines destroyed. When the heavy rains had ceased, the enemy commenced his advance from Kahe along the Northern Railway, as well as east of it through the Pare Mountains, and west of it along the Pangani. Hundreds of automobiles and large numbers of mounted troops were observed. In order to avoid the danger of being cut off by the greatly superior enemy, Major Kraut withdrew his main body by rail to Buiko, leaving small detachments in contact with the enemy. In this vicinity, as well as near Mombo, a few actions took place, in some of which our companies drove through the enemy, who tried to block the line, and fired on him from the train. Being in superior force, the enemy was always able, with little trouble, to execute outflanking movements with fresh troops, but their effectiveness was greatly reduced by the difficulty of the country. It seemed, therefore, as though the enemy frequently departed from this idea and adopted a sort of tactics of attrition instead. To-day he would attack with one portion of his force, then let that rest, and put in another the next day, and a different portion again on the third. In spite of all his obvious urging, and his favourable conditions of supply, his advance was fairly slow. Major Kraut’s troops never got into a really difficult situation; on the contrary, they were often able to catch the enemy under fire unawares, and to gain partial successes, which occasionally caused him very considerable losses, such as Captain Freiherr von Bodecker’s rearguard action near Handeni. In view of this concentric advance from all directions, the question arose, what should be done with the main body of the Protective Force now before Kondoa? For an attack the situation was altogether too unfavourable. The problem, therefore, was, what should be the general direction of our retreat? I decided on the Mahenge country. By moving there we should avoid being surrounded, it was fertile, and suitable for guerilla warfare. From there also it would be possible to withdraw further to the south and to continue the war for a long time to come.