but not as the big gun travels.  The Italians, therefore, as their contribution to the common effort, are thrusting rather eastwardly towards the line of the Julian Alps through Carinthia and Carniola.  From my observation post in the tree near Monfalcone I saw Trieste away along the coast to my right.  It looked scarcely as distant as Folkestone from Dungeness.  The Italian advanced line is indeed scarcely ten miles from Trieste.  But the Italians are not, I think, going to Trieste just yet.  That is not the real game now.  They are playing loyally with the Allies for the complete defeat of the Central Powers, and that is to be achieved striking home into Austria.  Meanwhile there is no sense in knocking Trieste to pieces, or using Italians instead of Austrian soldiers to garrison it.

II.  THE MOUNTAIN WAR

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The mountain warfare of Italy is extraordinarily unlike that upon any other front.  From the Isonzo to the Swiss frontier we are dealing with high mountains, cut by deep valleys between which there is usually no practicable lateral communication.  Each advance must have the nature of an unsupported shove along a narrow channel, until the whole mountain system, that is, is won, and the attack can begin to deploy in front of the passes.  Geographically Austria has the advantage.  She had the gentler slope of the mountain chains while Italy has the steep side, and the foresight of old treaties has given her deep bites into what is naturally Italian territory; she is far nearer the Italian plain than Italy is near any practicable fighting ground for large forces; particularly is this the case in the region of the Adige valley and Lake Garda.

The legitimate war, so to speak, in this region is a mountaineering war.  The typical position is roughly as follows.  The Austrians occupy valley A which opens northward; the Italians occupy valley B which opens southward.  The fight is for the crest between A and B. The side that wins that crest gains the power of looking down into, firing into and outflanking the positions of the enemy valley.  In most cases it is the Italians now who are pressing, and if the reader will examine a map of the front and compare it with the official reports he will soon realise that almost everywhere the Italians are up to the head of the southward valleys and working over the crests so as to press down upon the Austrian valleys.  But in the Trentino the Austrians are still well over the crest on the southward slopes.  When I was in Italy they still held Rovereto.