INCE December, 1916, when the Rumanian Army fell back behind the Sereth River, Rumania has found two-thirds of its territory invaded by the enemy and its remaining area reduced to the one province of Moldavia. Here the Government, after a hasty exodus from Bucharest, established itself at Jassy with all the institutions of the country, and with the greater part of the population of the capital and the larger cities-Braila, Buzen, Craiova-and even a fairly large contingent of the rural population from Muntenia, Bukowina, and Transylvania. It is Moldavian Rumania, cut off from all communications with Europe, save through Russia, that has had to furnish a refuge for the exiles, hastily improvise hospitals, barracks, offices for the various Government departments from Bucharest, lodge and feed the refugees, care for the wounded and dying soldiers, and provide, besides, for the needs of the Russians co-operating with the Rumanian Army.

Moldavian Rumania found itself denuded of almost everything; even the yield of cereals, important in ordinary times, was scarcely sufficient, because the country's chief agricultural production comes from the plains of the Danube. Even with its cereals, the cattle that have disappeared, and the oil wells that have been destroyed, Rumania had to import some of these commodities before the war. Also meat, butter, milk, vegetables, oil, fats, firewood, had reached very high prices by the beginning of 1917. Colonial commodities and coal were almost totally lacking, clothes and shoes very scarce.

Finally the scarcity of food created a terrible epidemic of spotted typhus, to which were added epidemics of intermit

tent fever, cholera, and dysentery. Many physicians and nurses of both sexes succumbed to the scourge in tending the patients. It was while struggling against all these difficulties that Rumania, with the help of her allies, achieved her military and economic reorganization and prepared her social transformation. She has done more; she is even giving thought to the period after the war.

Reorganizing the Army

So far as Rumania's military reorganization is concerned, it has been largely the work of the French mission commanded by General Berthelot and seconded by the devotion of all the Rumanians, from the King to the most humble soldier.

The army had undergone very heavy losses during the retreat, but it had not been reduced to the point of not being able to reorganize. The men from 16 to 50 years had been called to the colors, and in the course of the Winter the army was re-established. About 50,000 wounded were restored to health, and the effectives were increased: (1) by the new recruits of 17 to 18 years, (60,000 in a separate contingent;) (2) by the men of 42 to 50 years; (3) a very large contingent of recuperated men-exempted, excused, invalided men of the period before the war; (4) by a great number of men from the rear who were poured into the fighting regiments.

The officers had suffered less heavy losses, proportionally, and in the course of reorganization the staffs were entirely reconstructed. Schools for officers were established in several centres of Moldavia. Many superior officers were removed and replaced by younger men whose ability had been demonstrated in the course of the campaign. General

Averscu, who had shown his courage, energy, and military capacity, was named for the commanding position to which his conduct had entitled him. The long delay of the Winter was utilized by all the officers in becoming familiar with French methods; these have now replaced the old methods, which were rather German than Rumanian.

The morale of the men has completely changed in this new atmosphere. The warlike qualities of the Rumanian soldier, which are of the first order, have been perfectly understood and brought out by the officers of the French mission.

Military Equipment

All the efforts made by Rumania before the war to furnish a suitable equipment for its army had been insufficient, as Rumania has no large manufacturing industries. At the beginning of the campaign whole divisions could be seen with nothing but the old equipment, and many of the men were without shoes. During the four months of fighting the stocks could not be replenished, and if the Germans found nothing of this sort in the territory which they occupied, it was because the nation's military supplies had long been exhausted.

At the present moment, (October, 1917,) the improvement is noteworthy. The men are wearing the French helmet. The boot has disappeared and is replaced by the legging. In general the men now look like French troopers.

The German guns and other war material predominant at the moment of Rumania's entry into the conflict have been replaced largely by French arms— field artillery, machine guns, repeating rifles-which the Rumanian soldier handles skillfully. France has provided most of these arms. The artillery is well mounted, the accessories for the heavy guns are ample, the anti-aircraft guns are very good. The knife bayonet has been replaced by the French bayonet.

The army also has an abundance of telephones, of wire, and of trench tools, which were lacking in the Autumn of 1916. The equipment, besides, continues to be increased and completed by constant arrivals, which come by way of Russia.

New Sanitary Measures

The engineering service has developed in a way unknown before the war, and the system back of the lines has been completely recast; the food supply methods are modeled on those of the French Quartermaster's Department, and are working admirably. Aviation, too, is developing.

The epidemics have been checked by sanitary measures, in which Dr. J. Cantacuzene has especially distinguished himself, and by the creation of numerous hospitals, isolation camps, hygienic precautions, police surveillance; everything has been foreseen and realized, thanks to the activity and courage of Rumanian, French, and English physicians, such as Dr. Clunet, Dr. Bottesco, and many other victims of duty and of science, who have not hesitated to sacrifice their lives. The nurses, with the Queen at their head, have given them devoted aid.

The chief cause of the spread of epidemics was scarcity of food, and this has been effectively combated, first by measures of restriction and the prevention of monopoly, then by stimulating farm labor in Moldavia, and, finally, by improving transportation. The Autumn sowing was done in time, and the harvest promises to be abundant. It inIcludes all the Rumanian cereals, which are of excellent quality. As for petroleum, a few wells are still running very near the front, in the district of Bacau, and are sufficient to provide for the needs of the railways.

Transport facilities, unfortunately, are very meagre in Moldavia, and the food supplies had to be brought in all last Winter over the single railway that connects Rumania and Russia by way of Ungheni. The famine was due primarily to lack of transport. The chaos of the Russian railways during the last months of the old régime was accountable for the fact that Russia could then send only four carloads of food a day for the Russian Army, the Rumanian Army, and the civil population of the country, which exceeds three millions. The new Russian régime immediately improved this situation by sending twenty-five carloads a

Stretcher Bearers Painfully Making Their Way Through the Mud During the Battle of Flanders. Some of Them Are

Nearly Knee-Deep in the Mud.

(British Official Photograph.)

day. It is thus doing all it can to supply Rumania with wheat, oil, coal, farm products, fish, clothes, and shoes.

The gold reserves of the Rumanian National Bank, which amounted to $120,000,000 at the time of the declaration of war, were put in a safe place when the Government was removed to Jassy. Contributions have been paid in Moldavia under fairly good conditions. Important loans have been made to Rumania by her allies-notably by England, which has lent her $200,000,000-and the Rumanian Government is using these funds entirely for armament.

Social Reform Measures

While fighting famine and fever, and while toiling to restore her army, Rumania has at the same time been busy transforming her social organism in behalf of fuller democracy. For some years before the war the Rumanian Parliament had been at work on an important project of agrarian reform, which was to lead to the partition of private domains and the distribution of State lands among the peasants.

A large number of Rumanian peasants were formerly land owners, for an old national tradition held that the defender of the soil should possess a share of it, and that after a war the soldier, whatever his rank, should be rewarded with a fair allotment of land. But many events during the Turco-Phanariot period helped to dispossess the Rumanian soldier-laborer of his property. After 1848 the peasants again became proprietors to some degree, but in the subsequent years the rapid increase of population, which, by inheritance, involved the dividing of small farms into still smaller parcels, had reduced the peasant class to a rural proletariat. The people lived by work in the fields, but not their fields.

This abnormal situation has long been a matter of concern to political thinkers in Rumania, without distinction of party. For fifteen years they had been preparing the way for agrarian reform, first by

isolated attempts, then notably by the creation of farmers' unions and rural banks, which produced excellent results. The Government, which was already studying the question when the war came, and which had put it into the legislative program, could not leave it in suspense, and, after providing for the most urgent needs of the moment, hastened to take it up again.

Germany Takes a Hand

Aside from these general reasons, a new danger threatened to plunge the country into an era of internal troubles. The Germans, through their agents and spies, who had been swarming for forty years in Rumania, knew the social situation there to its minutest detail; they were not slow in using the agrarian troubles as a weapon.

In order to attract the sympathies of the rural population in the invaded regions, and to procure supplies without expense, they gave private estates unconditionally to the peasants. This manoevure, which obliged the peasant to work without wages for Germany-under the fallacious pretext that he was being taught agriculture and was enriching himself-did not prevent the Germans from driving this same peasant, with cudgel blows, to dig trenches under the bullets of the Rumanian soldiers. At the same time that Germany was assuring herself provisions during the war she was preparing a bloody revolution in Rumania after the coming of peace.

The Rumanians had to parry this scheme. King Ferdinand was the first to offer his domains, and in several proclamations to the soldiers he solemnly promised them agrarian reform and universal suffrage. The Government of Mr. Bratiano, which Take Jonescu and three Conservative Ministers have joined, thus making the "Cabinet of Sacred Unity," has just caused Parliament to pass these two reform measures, which are so fully in harmony with the democratic principles of the Entente Allies.