ENORMOUS FRENCH CAPTURES.

Rangitikei Advocate and Manawatu Argus, Volume XL, Issue 11387, 2 October 1915, Page 5

ENORMOUS FRENCH CAPTURES.

121 BIG GUNS TO DATE. The most significant cable to-day is that which states that, no private telegrams will be allowed to be sent out of Britain or France to •other nations for forty-eight hours. A° to what is taking place behind ■that dense screen of mystery is"a puzzle we offer for Sabbath speculation. , If there is truth in the cable there is something in progress of treuuyidous portentousness, for no order of the kind has previously gone • forth,'' Col. Repington, the military writer of the London Times, shows us that the breaking through of the German line by our troops has involved danger of attack from the two broken ends and that we have to wait for the French to come up so that they can go forward shoulder to shoulder. The French will get there all right. Their dash and bravery have been wonderful, and about the only role the Bosches played apparently in the recent battle was that of showing they had urgent business elsewhere. The fact that the French captured no less than kit heavy guns indicates that the spoil in munitions and machine guns must have been enormous. In a sprint for life one might as well try to carry a gun that fires Jack Johnsons as a machine gun. In that old land about the Tigris and the Euphrates where the debris of forgotten cities and remains of ancient races lie deep in the soil, we have inflicted a very important defeat upon the Turks and they are jiow retiring post haste to Baghdad, the city of the Arabian Nights, to which our troops are following them. Matters are quite as satisfactory as | could he expected in Russia and Poland. We read no expressed fears now of Russian armies being surrounded and captured and no flamboyant reports from Mackensen, Hindenbnrg and Co. Some of their troops are apparently isolated in almost tracklssss marshes and their heavy equipments sinking in almost bottomless mud. The Russian armies have now solidified their front and we even hear of their hurling a hurricane of shell from one or two sections of their line That is ; distinctly better. Evidently we shall not have to wait long for a vast \ war turmoil in the Balkans. Sir E. Grey has informed the House of i Commons that he views as of the gravest consequences the fact that ! Austrian and German officers are ariving in Bulgaria to command the | Bulgarian armies. That means war. It is. perhaps, just as well. Let I us have Armageddon now and a final sorting up in consequence, I