TWO HUNDRED THOUSAND!

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXV, Issue 10713, 2 September 1914, Page 4

TWO HUNDRED THOUSAND!

The cables told us a few days ago that th.e German fosse 8 in the present campaign were already estimated at 200,000. How the estimate was arrived at, we are not told.. Nor are we informed of the probable casualties 011 the sido of the Allies. It is fair to assume, however, from the descriptions of the battle s that have been fought, the reckless daring of the Germans, and their onward march in close formation in the face of a withering fire from fortresses and machine guns, that their loss has been enormous. Never in ttie history of the world have so many human lives been sacrificed in so short a time. And th.e grim earnestness of the campaign has only just begun. What the ultimatelloss s will he, one shudders to think. But the ruthless ravages jof this desperate war will not bo confined alone to those engaged in the battlefield. Millions of innocent women and children will be deprived of their homes, their breadwinners, their means of subsistence. The gaunt spectre of famine and starvation already hangs over t.ho cities and towns of Europe. What the end of it will be, is too terrible for contemplation. And this in the. twentieth century, when we boast of our (civilisation and our Christianised humanity!