At the beginning of the war the Prussian General Staff had (according to Rüstow) assumed that Metz would offer a prolonged resistance, and that the defenders would be certain to make an attempt to interrupt the rail communication between Germany and her troops in the field. To meet the position which might thus be created, it was decided to build from Pont à Mousson to Remilly a field railway which, avoiding Metz, would link up at Remilly with the line proceeding thence to Saarbrück, and so ensure the maintenance of direct rail communication to and from Germany. On August 14, 1870, the day of the rearguard action at Borny, the survey and the levelling of the ground were begun, and three days later a start was made with the construction. Altogether some 4,200 men were employed on the work, namely, 400 belonging to two Field Railway Companies; 800 forming four Fortress Pioneer Companies, and about 3,000 miners from the colliery districts of Saarbrück who had been thrown out of work owing to the war and accepted employment on the railway. The building corps had at their disposal a park of 330 wagons and other vehicles, and patrol and requisition duties were performed for them by a squadron of Cavalry. Notwithstanding that so considerable a force was available for the purpose, the work of building the twenty-two miles of railway took forty-eight days, the line not being ready for operation until October 4. This was in no way a great achievement, and it did not compare favourably with much that was done by the Federal Construction Corps employed in the American War of Secession. It is true that the irregularities of the ground were such as to render necessary numerous cuttings and embankments, and that two bridges and two viaducts had to be provided; but the cuttings were only about 3 feet deep, and the embankments were only 5 feet high, except near one of the viaducts, where they were 10 feet high. The viaducts and bridges were of timber, with spans of about 16 feet. The building of the line was, therefore, in no way a formidable undertaking, from an engineering point of view. Not only, however, did it take over 4,000 men nearly fifty days to make twenty-two miles of line, but the work had been done in such a way that when the autumn rains came on the track settled in many places; traffic on the lines became very dangerous; one of the bridges was washed away by the floods, and almost as many men had to be put on to do repairs as had previously been employed for the construction. Traffic of a very moderate description--each locomotive drawing only four wagons at a time--was carried on for just twenty-six days, and then, happily for the engineers concerned, the developments in and around Metz rendered the line no longer necessary. How the restoration of the traffic interrupted through the explosion of French mines in the tunnel at Nanteuil occupied from September 17 to November 22 has already been told on page 128. RUSSO-TURKISH WAR