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from civilisation. Paved streets; solid and good, if not exactly handsome, buildings; first-class hotels and cafés; electric trams and comfortable, cheap cabs; luxurious public baths; well-stocked

, Mr. Noel Buxton, M.P., writing of Sofia and other

eat cities of Europe. The buildings represent utility, means fairly adapted to ends, but with no cumbrous decoration or ponderous display. These capitals are bureaucratic settlements, devoted to the deliberate ends of national government with a minimum of waste, strictly appropriated to use alone, rendering their service to the nation as a counting-house renders its service to a

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ty. From here, symbolised by the rivers and roads running down on each side, has extended, and will further extend, the power of modern education, of unhampered ideas, of science and of humanity. From this magnificent view-point Sofia stretches along the low hill with the dark background of the Balkan beyond. Against that background now stands out the new embodiment of Bulgarian and Slavonic energy, genius, and freedom of mind, the gre

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acquaintance, which came to me during the armistice that followed the first phase of the war, Sofia showed as still clean, well managed, admirable, but, oh, so deadly dull. The system of partial seclusion of the wo

hey had made up their minds for quite a considerable time that the wrongs of their fellow-nationals in Macedonia and Thrace would have to be righted by force of arms. Attempts on the part of the Powers to enforce reforms in the Christian provinces of Turkey had, in

for their war. I think the standard of their artillery arm, and the evidence of the scientific training of their officers, prove to what extent their training beforehand had gone. Most of the officers in high command I met at the front had been trained at the Military College at St. Petrograd, some of them at the Military College at Turin, and others again at a Military Co

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they had an inclination to ease the pressure on their Christian subjects in the Christian provinces. Perhaps knowing-perhaps not knowing-that they were unready for war themselves, but feeling t

your preparation for war-perhaps a very expensive preparation, perhaps a preparation which has involved very great co

zen of fighting age was engaged either at the front or on the lines of communication. Before the war, every Bulgarian man, being a soldier, was under a soldier's honour; and the preliminaries of the war, the preparations for mobilisation in particular, were carried out wit

ion was designing and planning leaked abroad. Because the whole nation was a soldier, and the whole nation was under a soldier's honour, absolute secrecy could

ich were made between the Balkan Allies for carrying on the war. The Bulgarian people had made up their minds to do the lion's share of the work and to have the lion's share of the spoils, for the Bulgarian people knew the state of corruption and rottenness to which the Turkish

n army made a stand and the decisive battle of the campaign was fought. The Turks were utterly routed and fled in confusion towards Constantinople by Tchorlu. Had an enterprising pursuit on the part of the Bulgarians been possible, the Bulgarian army undoubtedly would have then entered Constantinople and the Christmas Mass would have been said at St. Sophia. But the strength of the Bulgarian attack was exhausted by the tremendous exertions of marching and fightin

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sance, the Bulgarian guns searching the Turkish entrenchments to discover their real strength. Only once during the day was the infantry employed; and then it was rather to take the place of artillery than to complete

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kish entrenchments. Once a fort was taken but had to be abandoned again. The result of the day's fighting is indecisive. The Bulgarian forces have driven in the Turkish right flank a little, but have effected nothing against the central positions which bar the road to

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their otherwise fine organisation there has been one flaw, the medical service. Among this nation of peasant proprietors-sturdy, abstemious, moral, living in the main on whole-meal bread and water-illness was so rare that the medical service was but little regarded. Up to Chatalja confidence in the rude health of the peasants was justified. They passed through cold, hunger, fatigue and kept

was almost impossible in any case that the Bulgarian army should have forced the Chatalja lines without a railway line to bring up ammunition from their base.

rful obedience to the most exacting demands and absolute secrecy. But it seemed to me that at the stage when the battle of Lule Burgas had been fought and won, there was a very serious mistake. (I am not writing now in the light of the ultimate result, for I expressed this view to Mr. Prior, of the London Times, in voyaging with him from Mustapha Pasha to Stara Zagora in November 1913.) There was a very serious mistake in the policy of "masking" Adrianople. I have reasons for thinking that that was not the original plan of the soldiers. Their strategy was

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rom Sofia to Constantinople passed through Adrianople. Except for that railway there was no other railroad, and there was no other car

he rail-head at Seleniki, close to Chatalja, they could come not by railway but by a tramway, a very limited railway. If Adrianople had fallen, the railway would have been open. The Bulgarian railway service had, I think, something over one hundred powerful locomotives at the outset of the war, and whilst it was a single line in places, it w

afterwards with a set of fast horses, and the least period for the journey was five days. From Kirk Kilisse there was a line of light railway joining the main line. But on that line the Bulgarians had only six engines, and, I th

hem by the politicians saying, "We must hurry through, we must attempt something, no matter how desperate it is, something decisive." But, apart from the high opinion I have of the Bulgarian generals, the fact remains that after Adrianople had been attacked in a very h

if the Bulgarian generals had really designed to carry the lines of Chatalja without first attacking Adrianople, they miscalculated seriously. But I do not think they did. It was probably a plan forced upon them by political authority, feeling that the war must be pushed to a conclusion someho

ere not allowed to be sent through to his paper. He sent a humorous message to his editor, that he could not send photographs of guns, "it being a military secret that the Bu

epret nanochi." Arguing by similarity of sound, the Bulgarian soldier affected to believe it meant "Spit five men on your bayonet." It was the common camp saying that it was the duty of the infantryman to impale five Turks on his bayonet, to show that he had conducted himself well. The Bulgarian infantrymen had devised a little "jim" in regard to bayonet work, which I had

with regard to aim and to the bursting of shrapnel, and their firing from concealed positions was also good. But I never saw enterprising work on their part; I never saw

e I was walking across country, and I had separated myself from my cart. I arrived at the bridge at eight o'clock at night, and found a vedette on guard. They took me for a Turk. I had on English civilian green puttees, and green was the colour of the Turks. It was a cold night, and I wished to take refuge at the camp fire, waiting for my cart to come. Though they thought I was a Turk, they

(The water, unfortunately, he took wherever he could get it, by the side of his route at any stream he could find. There was no attempt to ensure a pure water supply for the army.) I do not think that without the simplicity of commissariat it would have been possible for the Bulgarian forces to have got as far as they did. There was an entire absenc

e seen at Seleniki, which is the point at which the rail-head was, within thirty miles of Constantinople as the crow flies, ox-wagons, which had come from th

The railway got choked, and even the horse failed, but the ox never failed. There were thousands of ox-wagons crawling across the country. These oxen do not walk, they crawl, like an insect, with an irresistible crawl. It reminded me of those armies of soldier ant

horse. The ox-wagon moved slowly; but it always moved. If the ox-transport had not been so perfectly organised, and if

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cer thought the ox-cart was derogatory to the dignity of the army. If we had been able to say that th

n supply of the army at the front, which I suppose must have numbered 250,000 to 300,000 men. That army had got right away f

uld fight. But further, every family put its surplus of goods into the war-chest. The men marched away to the front; and the women of the house loaded up the surplus goods

ded beforehand. But so great was the voluntary patriotism of the people that this machinery practically had not to be used in any compulsory form. Goods were brought in voluntarily, wagons, cart-horses, and oxen, and all the surplus flour and wheat, and-I have the official figures from the Bulgarian Treasurer-the goods which were obtained in this way totalled

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