As we witness the armies moving along what was once the frontier between Poland and Russia proper we shall find the plain of Poland dips into a region which apparently was once a vast lake which drained into the Dnieper, but the outlet becoming choked, this stagnant water formed into those immense morasses known as the Pripet Marshes, forming over two-fifths of the whole province of Minsk and covering an area of over 600 square miles.  Even when more than 6,000,000 acres have been reclaimed by drainage, the armies found some of these marshes extending continuously for over 200 miles.  In the upper Pripet basin the woods were everywhere full of countless little channels which creep through a wilderness of sedge.  Along the right bank of the Pripet River the land rises above the level of the water and is fairly thickly populated.  Elsewhere extends a great intricate network of streams with endless fields of bulrushes and stunted woods.  Over these bogs hang unhealthy vapors, and among the rank reeds there is no fly, nor mosquito, nor living soul or sound in the autumn.

Not even infantry could pass over this region—­not to consider cavalry or artillery, save in the depth of a cold winter when the water and mire is frozen.  Even then it would be impossible to venture over the ice with heavy guns.  An invading army must, therefore, split in two parts and pass around the sides, and nothing is more dangerous than splitting an army in the face of the enemy.  It is behind these vast marshes that we shall find the Russians planned to make their first determined stand.

Here, too, the Russians expected to have the advantage of being surrounded by their own people, for this is the country of the White Russians, so called on account of their costumes.  Here the purest Slavic type is preserved; they have not blended with other stocks, as the Great Russians with the Finns and the Little Russians, farther south, with the Mongols.  For a while this territory was subject to the kings of Poland, who oppressed its inhabitants most barbarously, from the effects of which they have not even fully recovered.  To-day White Russia is one of the poorest and most backward parts of the empire.  And even yet the great bulk of the landlords are Poles.

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CHAPTER XLIII

AUSTRIAN POLAND, GALICIA AND BUKOWINA

Let us now pass ahead of the armies into the southern section of the eastern front.  Here we have to consider only Austrian Poland, Galicia and Bukowina, for here there is much less swaying back and forth, the Russians maintaining their lines much more steadily than farther north.  This section is an undulating terrace which slopes down to the Vistula and the Dniester; behind rise the Carpathian ranges, forming the natural frontier between the broad, fertile plains of Hungary and Russia.  Here the population is quite dense,