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Show 1 RUSSIANS STOP I THE OFFENSIVE , II ) Germans Are Slaughtered in II Their Attacks on the If J Kovno Forts. Hip Petrograd, Aug. 12. The bank ot II ! tfie Niemen forms the worst stumbl- lljllr JnB blck tne Germans have had to jBJjf , encounter. On it many thousands ot Mtt I todies have been left behind by the (M I enemy, who Is still on the south bank WJi of the river. JIHjl The German efforts against the njr i fortress ot Kovno have cost them injli ! more dearly than any previous at- Ifim tempts at storming during the eastern Milli campaign. They brought up by rail Unit I an raotor t-heir heaviest artillery and ! Ill I tried boldly to take by main force Iffir ' what ordinarily would have required ill R ' prolonged operations. If j, i They used an entire army and ' fi ' spared neither men nor shells in or- . fi j der that they might take Kovno I 111 ' quickly. They lost a colossal number ! r J f ' men n tr5''nS to prevent the gar- j JDjji j rison of the fortress from repairing jljjf the damages. ' . JMjj, i On the third day of their attack the JML Germans became more insistent in IIIIe their assaults on the western and jijjf, northwestern sections of Kovno, Sji i which protrude for five or six miles I r IIj I between the lower Niemen and the Jljjp i river Yessa. Wjh The Russians made a counter-attack fHlh i destroying three German battalions i mh ; and capturing many men and machine ' m il guns, JMl ' Kovno is tne chief obstacle to the ill If German effort to obtain control on Iffllf ' both banks of the Niemen. Hence H j their continued desperate efforts to Hit reduce the fftrtress which is to be ill i' ' tlie base ? tue Russian llne when jffi F ' the regrouping of the czar's armies In Mir, ; the south is completed. Ilti I i Von Mackensen In the south has ) mi i been frustrated by the change of I j j', ! front of the Germans on the Narew ' Irlll ' rom the soutllward to the eastward. j gjlj ! When Von Woyrsch's army stepped t Hit ! In between the latter and the fourth JEj I Austrian army, whose purpose it was ; jpl I to cut off the Russians from Brest- jyic LItovsk, this operation was foiled. I EQj! The Russians fought so desperately mil that, although Mackensen was sup- jjljf ported by seven or eight corps, and I Mi had the best technical means of war- Sjw fare at his command, including point poi-nt j: sonous gases, this attempt to pierce mil tno Russians' front on the right bank -j Hit of the VIeprz failed and the enemy y n has now been, repulsed twenty miles Kill back to the river TJkherka. i 8 1 Experts here regard the Russlon front us favorable, The Zlota-Lipa-Dnlester line is very secure, the Narow-Bug line varies according to the stubbornness of the offensive conducted con-ducted by the Austro-Germans, and the Niemen front Is secure, while the Dvina-Niemen front Is gradually moving mov-ing to the westward. The results of the mobilized Industry Indus-try ot Russia are beginning to be observable ob-servable in the armies' work in the field, in which confidence daily becomes be-comes more evident. |