426 A BRIEF SURVEY OF HUMAN HISTORY

the many rats kept their holes. At night, however, these muddy
trenches became alive with armed figures in steel helmets, with
gas-masks and mud-coloured uniforms. Back from the front line
stretched the communication trenches, the support lines, the bat-
teries of artillery, the miles of horse lines, the dressing stations
for the wounded, the ' dumps' of ammunition and supplies of
every kind, the aerodromes, the camps of relieving or attacking
troops. This for most men of the Western Front, was 'the
war', which stretched on interminably for weeks, months, and
years, broken by raids and attacks from either side, but unchanged
in essence until shortly it came to an end. It was truly described
as ' a war of attrition/ "*

The civil populations of the belligerent countries played .
as important and strenuous a part in this war as the com-
batants themselves. Their mobilisation was as vast and in-
tensive as that of the soldiers recruited into the army. As
Mr. H. G. Wells has said : " The armies were millions strong,
and behind them entire populations were organised for the
supply of food and munitions to the front. There was a
cessation of nearly every sort of productive activity except
such as contributed to military operations. All the able-
bodied manhood of Europe (as also of other countries in-
volved) was drawn into the armies or navies or into the
improvised factories that served them. There was an enor-
mous replacement of men by women in industry. Proba-
bly more than half the people in the belligerent countries
of Europe changed their employment altogether during this
stupendous struggle. They were socially uprooted and trans-
planted. Education and normal scientific work was restrict-
ed or diverted to immediate military ends, and the dis-
tribution of news was crippled and corrupted by military
control and 'propaganda' activities." The physical, men-
tal, moral, and economic strain of this Great War was, in-

1. Flenley and Weech, World History, p. 689.