The campaign opened with a serious defeat for Russia. The Austrian army crossed the frontier and established contact with the defending forces in the neighbourhood of Krasnik, a little town some fifteen miles across the border. Details of the engagement are very few. Officially, the Russians ignored it, being wholly taken up with the telling the world about their successes in Prussia. What appears to have happened was that the Russians did not expect the enemy to throw forward such strong forces, and were taken by surprise. Heavily superior in point of numbers and well supported by artillery, the Austrians, while unable to break the Russian centre, seem to have successfully carried out a flanking movement. The Russians fought gamely, and inflicted heavy losses on the enemy, but their defeat was inevitable. The Austrians claimed to have captured some thousands of prisoners and much artillery. In view of the results of the battle, it is quite possible that their claims were not exaggerated. The serious results of this engagement were at once apparent. The heaviness of the defeat made it impossible for the Russians to make a determined resistance against the Austrian advance for some time. The Austrians overran Kelche and pressed forward on Lublin. In the course of this advance the Austrians made brave attempts to imitate their German allies. The occupation of Kamenetz Podolski was a good example of their efforts to play the Hun. The town was captured after a sharp engagement, in the course of which the Austrian commander had the misfortune to be slightly wounded. His first act was to demand 200,000 roubles, 200 horsed carts, 800 poods of bread and 60 oxen. Unless this levy were forthcoming by eight o’clock the next morning, the mayor was to be hanged and the town sacked. At the best of times this would have been an almost impossible demand on the resources of Kamenetz, which is only a small town. On the approach of the Austrians the Municipal Treasurer, the bankers and all the wealthy families had fled, taking their riches with them. Nobody in the town had so much as twenty-five roubles in his possession. The mayor went to inform the general that it was impossible to fulfil his demands. The general replied that he would bombard the town unless the whole levy were delivered by eight o’clock.