This movement began in the third week of October, and it is quite evident that, though defeated, the German armies and their Austrian Allies were neither demoralised by their failure nor broken up by the Russian counter-attack. From day to day they showed an energy and tenacity to which it would be unfair to refuse the fullest praise. The retreat was a slow retirement, in which each day there was a series of hard-fought rearguard actions. The great battle-line was now surging westward across the Polish plain, but every step of the way was to be disputed. On October 24 stern fighting that gradually assumed the character and dimensions of another continuous battle or series of sanguinary combats was proceeding for the possession of this frontier. The front extended roughly for about a hundred versts, or sixty-six miles, from Rawa to the south of the river Iljanke. The roads leading to Radom and Petrikau were the scene of particularly close and bloody fighting. North of Rawa the Russian infantry established a marked superiority with the bayonet. In one miserable village (Motchidlo) they buried seven hundred German dead. Four hundred more were accounted for (captured) south-east of Rawa, and two batteries of quick-firers were taken at bayonet-point in the vicinity of Kazimerjefu. Much of this fighting took place over marshy forest-lands, and in weather so bad that the guns often sank to their axles. The forest of Nemglovo was occupied by the Russian advanced troops. More artillery and prisoners were gathered in along the shocking roads leading to Novo Alexandrovo. Indeed, a Russian official report claimed the substantial acquisition, during this stern forest-fighting on October 24-26, of 3,000 men and 50 officers as prisoners, and 8 guns and numerous quick-firers.