Category: Science-Fiction & Fantasy

The Great War of 189-: A Forecast

The following narrative appeared originally in the pages of _Black and White_, the work being the outcome of consultations between some of the most eminent authorities upon modern warfare and international politics. The story has been carefully revised, and is now reprinted in...

Chapters

5. Part 5

A way was cleared for the advancing cohort as if by magic. The ladder, still supporting the painter, was drawn up lengthwise before the statue, and the workman knelt to his task...

14. Part 14

Whatever may be the ultimate purposes of the Italians in regard to an Algerian expedition, we think that there will now be no injury to the public service in letting it be known...

16. Part 16

About two miles to the south-east I saw a French brigade with six batteries of artillery, moving forward, formed for attack in their conventional manner. The guns came into acti...

18. Part 18

The Mother Country is so indifferent to our aspirations and our needs, that she has never given herself the trouble to recognise the gravity of this special cause of complaint....

12. Part 12

Amid breathless silence, Lord Kimberley rose. In a few cautiously worded sentences he expressed a hope that Lord Salisbury would be able to give an unqualified contradiction to...

8. Part 8

A yell of savage fury rose from the storming columns of the Russians, who had thus been stopped in their career and baulked of their objective in this most bloody and calamitous...

25. Part 25

Moreover, it gradually came to be known that, without being aware of it at the time, the English Fleet in the Baltic had conferred another all-important service upon Germany on...

10. Part 10

While talking to Salem Bey Agris—the gentleman to whose good offices I am indebted for the conveyance of this hurried despatch, at least, as far as Erzeroum—a poor horse hobbled...

19. Part 19

During the night, however, a cavalry division belonging to the 2d Army—which had moved round our rear while the action was going on—beat up the bivouacs of the French, falling f...

24. Part 24

Events in India had not developed with any great rapidity—in fact, all those who have studied the question were fully aware that, rapid as has been the approach of Russia toward...

21. Part 21

The Khedive seemed for a moment overcome. Then he drove quickly away. The farewell of the native populace to the troops as they marched through the streets was pathetic in its e...

15. Part 15

Before daylight, our reckoning brought us so close up to Toulon, that, as we had lost sight of the enemy three hours before, signal was made to slow down, and at daylight we cou...

9. Part 9

Nevertheless, they were hemmed in fast enough. That was made plain by the fact that at least five small French cruisers had turned up at daylight a long way inshore of where I w...

7. Part 7

The Cossacks being thus flung back on their infantry, whose movements were of an unaccountably slow and confused kind, our guns dashed up to the top of the bluff, which had form...

13. Part 13

Events have ripened fast since last week. Russia, on May 16, on hearing of the dispatch of our troops to the East, declared war against us. The excitement against us in France h...

20. Part 20

A powerful force of Artillery was kept back about two miles from Varna in a favourable position in order to give support to our troops in the event of any disaster. But it was t...

3. Part 3

There is no doubt good cause for the grave fears at present agitating Porte and Palace. By his foolishly near-sighted policy of pandering to the wishes of whatsoever Power bulli...

6. Part 6

We were eager enough in the morning to see what had happened, but there seemed to be no ships absent. One of the battleships was, however, evidently very much down by the head,...

22. Part 22

The situation is inexplicable. The foe is at the gates. The outposts have been driven in, and it said that two of the forts have been surrendered. All day long a great stream of...

23. Part 23

The Prussians stagger beneath the shock. Lines shake and waver; here give back, and there lie still and motionless; columns, though far away, break and dissolve under the shrapn...

11. Part 11

Just before sending off this despatch news reaches me of a decisive battle which has also been fought on the Galician frontier between the combined Russian forces thereabouts an...

17. Part 17

It was known that for years past the Russians had been erecting batteries and placing mines to guard the approaches to their harbour, and were there no other way of advancing to...

4. Part 4

‘But, gentlemen, I do not require to tell you that the duties and functions of a commander are very different now from what they were at the beginning of this century, not to sp...

2. Part 2

(_Sunday Night._) I date this message from Philippopolis, whence indeed it will be despatched on our arrival there to-morrow; but, as a matter of fact, it is written in the slee...

1. Part 1

The following narrative appeared originally in the pages of _Black and White_, the work being the outcome of consultations between some of the most eminent authorities upon mode...

26. Part 26

‘And now, Sir Charles, quitting the storied “War of 189—” for a moment, I would like to ask you a question or two as to the character of the warfare of the future, the circumsta...