bitter and prolonged - from three to five years was his forecast; and he realised that the issue would depend upon the last million troops we could put into the field. He began at once to create the armies which should carry out the design of victory. He dismissed, without discussion, the accepted plan of the Government that we should send six divisions overseas to the help of France, that the Territorial Force should be kept at home to defend the country, and that the Special Reserve should feed the Expeditionary Force. As Sir George Arthur says, "he immediately laid his plans for an army of seventy divisions, coolly calculating that its maximum strength would be reached during the third year of the war, just when the enemy would be undergoing a sensible diminution of his resources in man-power." His demand for men was immediately responded to. Fortunately for us, Kitchener had won the complete confidence of the country. Even the Labour members were kind enough to pronounce him "straight," and te withheld from him the opposition which they commonly have ready for those who defend the cause of Empire. His call to arms was heard and echoed from one end of the country to the other. The men flocked to the colours because they knew that the best use would be made of them, that Kitchener would do nothing to outrage or impair their patriotism. "The marvel of the thing," says Sir George

Arthur, "grows as it recedes into the past. We were even now at war, yet we had 'no Army'! The Army had still to be created-the men enrolled, housed, fed, clothed, trained, armed, and equipped; the guns and rifles, with their ammunition, manufactured; the whole organisation and machinery of a mighty military force extemporised." Such was the problem which Kitchener solved. And let it be remembered that he was not content with any makeshift. His extemporised army aimed at the very highest in training and equipment, and the event showed that it did not miss its aim.

The

Nor was the raising and equipping of the new armies the only difficulty which Kitchener had to face. Expeditionary Force, under the command of Sir John French, was retiring before the onslaught of the Germans. Kitchener's instructions were never doubtful. He saw that the essential strategy was for the British Force to keep in touch with the French armies, that everything must be abandoned, even the Channel ports, which endangered this main design. If only the Germans had succeeded in driving a wedge between the British and the French they could have dealt with us separately, and most disastrously affected the spirit both of France and England. Whatever happened, Kitchener was resolute that the French and British should not be separated in the the wisdom of his decision. As Sir George Arthur says, "had we fallen back on the coast instead of upon Paris, there would have been no battle of the Marne."

Thus a very great service was done to the Empire by Kitchener, when, at the end of August 1914, he epposed Sir John French's expressed intention to retire beyond Paris. The news first came to him from General Robb, the Inspector - General of Communications, and he instantly demanded of Sir John the meaning of the message. Little comfort did he get. "I have let General Joffre know plainly," telegraphed Sir John, "that in the present position of my troops I shall be absolutely unable to remain in the front line, as he has now begun his retirement. I have decided to begin my retirement to-morrow, in the morning, behind the Seine. My base is now in the neighbourhood of La Rochelle, and I am forming an advance base at Le Mans." Thus the Commander-in-Chief telegraphed, and on the same day despatched a desperate letter of confirmation, "I feel most strongly," he wrote, "the absolute necessity for retaining in my hands complete independence of action and power to retire on my base when circumstances render it necessary, I have been pressed very hard to remain, even in my shattered condition, in the fighting line; but I have absolutely refused to do so, and I hope you will approve of the course I have

..

coincidence, on the very day on which this letter was written, London was startled by the miserable despatch, placarded in the streets, that as a fighting force the British Army had ceased to exist.

Kitchener's resolve was at once taken. He was determined at all hazards that the British force should not desert the French. So long as the two armies fell back in unison, so long as the Germans failed to separate them, no irreparable harm could be done. Such was his wellfounded opinion, and his first steps were to ask the Prime Minister to summon the Cabinet, and to telegraph to the Commander-in-Chief for an explanation. "I am surprised at your decision," he wrote, "to retire behind the Seine. Please let me know, if you can, all your reasons for this move. What will be the effect of this course upon your relations with the French Army, and on the general military situation? Will your retirement leave a gap in the French line, or cause them discouragement, of which the Germans might take advantage to carry out their first programme of first crushing the French and then being free to attack Russia?" Sir John French's answer merely repeated what he had already said. effective offensive movement," he wrote, "now appears to be open to the French, which will probably close the gap by uniting their inner flanks. But

"An

as they will not take such an opportunity, I do not see why I should be called upon to run the risk of absolute disaster in order a second time to save them."

To argue further by telegram seemed futile, and Kitchener resolved to cross the Channel at once, that he might press upon the Commander-in-Chief the considered opinion of the Cabinet. At half-past one on the morning of September 1st he walked into the bed-room of Sir Edward Grey to tell him that, after consulting the Prime Minister, he had ordered a destroyer to be ready in three hours to take him to Le Havre. The two soldiers met at the British Embassy in Paris, the place chosen by Sir John French, and there Kitchener explained what was the policy of the British Government, without of course any wish to interfere in the military execution of that policy. The result of the conversation was thus summed up by Kitchener: "French's troops are now engaged in the fighting line, where he will remain conforming to the movements of the French Army, though at the same time acting with caution to avoid being in any way unsupported his flanks." Thus was averted a serious calamity, and Kitchener might well look back with satisfaction upon the tact and promptitude with which he had kept the British Army in the field. Four days later began the battle of the Marne.

on

No less a service did Kit

chener render to the Empire when he opposed Mr George's harebrained scheme to concentrate our forces in the East. Mr George, no expert in military matters, had convinced himself, early in 1915, that victory in the West was impossible, and he thought that the country would be furious if the magnificent army, then in the making, were thrown away upon "futile enterprises such as we have witnessed during the last few weeks." His proposal seems ridiculous enough now. It was nothing less than "to establish a considerable reserve in England from which France could be helped if hard pressed - a certain number of men being stationed at Boulogne in case of emergency-and to transfer the whole of the British Army in France-bag and baggage, lock, stock, and barrel and to dedicate the new forces to the Balkans. He sought thus to reinforce Serbia, attraet Italy and Greece to our side, overawe Bulgaria, and possibly to persuade Rumania to join us." Kitchener would have none of it. He declined peremptorily to leave the French in the lurch or to remove any troops from Egypt. And 80 Mr George's famous "stunt came to nothing. The British Army remained where it was to do the work for which it was trained, and Germany was not permitted to overrun France while the British forces were busy with a wild adventure in the Balkans.

When the new armies were in the making, there remained