Chapter III: Part 3

(The Russian narrator tells many tragic stories of "Meeting the Fugitives;" "Along the Kief Road;" "The Forests of Mogilef," and many other vivid sketches of Russian suffering.)

FOOTNOTES:

[3] All numerals relate to stories herein told--not to chapters in the book.

[4] A notorious district in Moscow, where beggars, tramps and thieves congregate, and where there are many doss-houses.

THE ADVENTURES OF AN AMERICAN ATTACHÉ

_A Despatch Bearer in the Diplomatic Service_

_Told by Eric Fisher Wood, Attaché at the American Embassy in Paris_

This young American tells of his experience in the Diplomatic Service
in Europe during the Great War. Ambassador Herrick placed him in
charge of the interned Germans, Austrians and Hungarians in France.
He was sent to the front four times where he saw parts of the battles
of the Marne and the Aisne and the struggle for Calais. His most
interesting adventures, however, was as a despatch bearer between
the American Embassies of practically all the European countries. He
tells how he carried secret documents between Ambassador Herrick,
Ambassador Gerard, Ambassador Page, Ambassador Penfield. This gave
him unusual diplomatic opportunities for seeing and hearing things
of extraordinary interest and significance. These are related in his
book: "The Note Book of an Attaché" (_The Century Company_: Copyright
1915) which gives sidelights on some of the most stupendous events of
the last one hundred years.

[5] I--A STORY OF THE STRANDED AMERICANS IN PARIS

When the war-storm suddenly loomed over Europe at the end of July, 1914, I was quietly studying architecture in the Ecole des Beaux-Arts at Paris. When Austria-Hungary declared war on Serbia on July 24th, the atmosphere of the city became so surcharged with excitement that to persist in study was difficult. Within a week I myself had been swept into the vortex of rushing events, from which I did not emerge until seven months later....

_Paris, Tuesday, August 4th._ When I arrived to-day the _Chancellerie_ presented an astounding sight. Around the outer door were huddled a compact crowd of Germans, men and women; they pressed about the entrance; they glanced furtively over their shoulders and their blue eyes were filled with dumb apprehension. Inside the _Chancellerie_ was chaos. Hundreds of Americans and Germans crowded together seeking audience and counsel. German women sank down in corners of the halls or on the stairs, weeping for joy to have found a haven of refuge. Scores of Sovereign American Citizens stood in the busiest spots and protested with American vehemence against fate and chance. Each S.A.C. was remonstrating about a separate grievance. Most of them reiterated from time to time their sovereignty, and announced to no one in particular that it was their right to see "their Ambassador" in person. They demanded information! They needed money! They wished to know what to do with letters of credit! What was "the government" going to do about sending them home? Was Paris safe? Would there be immediate attacks by Zeppelins? Could they deposit their jewels in the Embassy vaults? Were passports necessary? WHY were passports necessary? They asked the same questions over and over, and never listened to the answers....

II--IN THE AMERICAN LEGATION AT BERNE

_Berne, Saturday, November 28th._ Donait and I left Paris at nine last evening for Lyons, Culoz, and Geneva with dispatches for Berlin. For many reasons we are particularly anxious to see Germany and Austria in war time, and look forward keenly to the experience which we face.

We arrived in Geneva at noon. We were very tired, for our train and compartment were overcrowded and we had to sit up all night. The responsibility of the sack of official papers which we carried, and on which one of us had constantly to keep his mind, hand, and eyes, was an additional element of fatigue.

* * * * *

Our legation in Berne has always been the most isolated, humdrum spot on earth. People stationed here nearly died of ennui; nothing ever happened, until all Europe suddenly was plunged into the conflagration of war, and then Berne became, of necessity, the clearing house for the continent for dispatches, mail, telegrams, money, prisoners, and refugees. Every telegram which the American Embassy in Paris sends to the Embassies in Germany, Austria, or Italy is directed: "American Legation, Berne. Repeat to Gerard"--or Penfield or Page, as the case may be....

Donait and I were sent by Minister Stovall to make a verbal report on the situation of the Germans in France to Baron Romberg, the German Minister to Switzerland. I was much impressed in this my first touch with a German official. He is rather small, slim of body, but keen of mind, with excellent repose and control. Like all German diplomats, he speaks faultless English. A startling evidence of the efficiency of the German Information Bureau was furnished by the fact that he already knew to the minutest details nearly as much about my work in Paris in caring for German subjects as did I myself.

_Tuesday, December 1st._ We reached the Swiss-German frontier at noon to-day. We descended from the train at Basle and drove three miles to the frontier. Here there were two barriers straight across the road, the nearer one guarded by numerous Swiss soldiers; the farther, some twenty yards behind, by soldiers wearing the spiked helmet. Before we were allowed to pass the first barrier our papers and luggage were minutely examined by Swiss military and customs officers. We then walked across the twenty yards to the second, or German, barrier, where we were conducted into a little guard-house. Here some dozen soldiers were sleeping or playing cards on cots in the background along the walls. An efficient sergeant examined our papers and then allowed us to pass the second barrier into Germany, showing marked respect for the Herr Lieutenant and the Herr Attaché....

I was momentarily embarrassed and self-conscious when first I found myself rubbing shoulders with gentlemen in spiked helmets. During the past four months I had seen them only as prisoners or dead men, and their only greetings had been by way of their shells and bombs....

III--AWAKENED BY THE SECRET SERVICE MEN

_Mannheim, Wednesday, December 2d._ At half-past seven this morning I was awakened from a sound sleep by a pounding at my door. I climbed sleepily out of bed and, in pajamas, opened the door to two extremely polite and suave Secret Service men who, nevertheless, examined my papers with the greatest thoroughness and as carefully cross-questioned me as to my race, color, and previous condition. They asked to see my dispatches, whose seals they studied in order to be certain that I was really carrying some sort of official messages. Having listened with close attention to my story, they asked me out of a clear sky where Donait was and why he had left me. They capped the climax by reminding me that at Leopoldshöhe I had told the sergeant we were bound for Berlin, which was exactly what I had told him, not having considered the brief stop at Mannheim of sufficient importance to be mentioned. When they had received a satisfactory explanation of the discrepancy (the conversation having staggered along in German, of which my knowledge is limited) they thanked me politely and withdrew....

IV--AT THE AMERICAN EMBASSY IN BERLIN

_Berlin, Thursday, December 3d._ Donait and I had a whole compartment to ourselves last night, which shows how normally German railroads are running. We arrived in Berlin at eight o'clock this morning, bathed, dressed, and had breakfast, at eleven o'clock presented ourselves at the American Embassy and delivered our precious dispatch pouch to Mr. Grew, the First Secretary....

The Emperor is in popular estimation not much lower than God Almighty, and the two seem inextricably mingled in the public mind. The world-wide amusement created by "_Me und Gott_," or by the Emperor's firm conviction that he and he alone is worthy of divine aid and approval, is an amusement not shared by any Germans. If you say to them, "the Emperor seems to think the German people are the one race chosen of God and that He works only for them and their advancement," the Germans will promptly and emphatically reply: "Why, of course; all our past history proves that." The God they appeal to, however, is the God of Battles of the Old Testament and of the ancient Hebrews, who slew His enemies, destroyed nations, and annihilated races, who was cruel and vindictive.

* * * * *

_Berlin, Friday, December 4th._ In Berlin, restaurants, cafés, theaters, and concerts are going at full blast. Donait, Iselin, and I, who have for months been working like dogs in Paris, which is as dull as a country village and where cafés close at eight and restaurants at nine and no places of amusement are open other than a few poor cinemas, are thoroughly enjoying the contrast....

People who one day read the announcement of the death of a son, a father, or a brother, are seen the next day in the streets or cafés going about quietly, expressing or betraying neither sorrow nor regret. The loved one has died "_für Gott, für König, und für Vaterland_." That is glory enough, and neither the Emperor nor the people feel that it is appropriate to mourn for one who has died for his country....

_Berlin, Sunday, December 6th._ About the atrocities in Belgium there is, apparently, no question, but considering the way the Germans controlled themselves in France, some explanation of their brutality farther north in Belgian Flanders is necessary. The Germans say that the cruelties were not all on one side; that the Belgians practised sniping, impeded the German army, and mutilated German wounded. The only one of these charges that seems to have been proved is that of sniping, but even if other cruelties were committed it must be remembered that the moral status of the Belgians was entirely different from that of the Germans. The Belgians were aroused to blind fury by the disregard of their neutrality rights and the unwarranted invasion of their peaceful country....

Recently I had a long conversation with a German statesman of ambassadorial rank, who spoke with intense feeling of the plight of the thousands of German subjects, men, women, and children, who had been caught in France at the opening of the war and interned in detention camps. He said: "It is ridiculous for the French to suspect any of these people of being spies, for German spies are not weak or unprotected, but strong, picked men and women, highly trained to make technical observations."

_Tuesday, December 8th._ I went to the American Embassy this morning to obtain the necessary paper for my departure to-morrow for Vienna. Mr. Grew called me into his private office and said that Ambassador Gerard was particularly anxious that I should go to London instead as he had dispatches of the utmost importance to send and would feel indebted to me if I could take them. He warned me that the undertaking would not be pleasant or altogether safe. I promptly accepted the mission,--indeed such requests are, in the Army, the Navy, and the Diplomatic Service, made only to be accepted. I am to leave Berlin Thursday morning at 8:59 and go through Germany and Holland to Flushing, where I shall take a boat across the North Sea to Folkestone and thence to our Embassy in London.

V--ON THE WAY TO HOLLAND--SHADOWED BY DETECTIVES

_Thursday, December 10th._ Soon after the train left Berlin this morning I judged that I was being shadowed. When it pulled out of the station there were four people, including myself, in the six-place compartment, the two middle seats being vacant, one on my left as I sat next the window and the other diagonally facing me. Soon after the train was well started two men came in and occupied these seats. This in itself was suspicious, since people do not seek seats while a train is in motion. Both moreover had the air of being detectives. I, by this time, know the type well, for I have been constantly shadowed ever since my arrival in Germany and am perfectly certain that my rooms have several times been searched while I was absent. I simply continued to behave with the greatest possible circumspection, the two detectives meanwhile staring at me constantly with fixed intensity.

It was a bit unpleasant because I did not certainly know the nature of the dispatches I carried, but realized that they were extremely important. They were in a small leather mail pouch, padlocked and sealed, which I had set on the floor between my feet and knees. Everything went quietly for some two hours. I could not look out of the window in towns and yards because I might have seen troop-trains, factories, etc., and that would have been "indiscreet." The part of Germany from Berlin to Holland is utterly flat and uninteresting, so that there was no pleasure in looking at the countryside between stations. I pretended to doze, or read three German weeklies which I had bought. One of these finally precipitated matters. It was the _Fliegende Blätter_, a comic paper of about the class of _Life_ or _Punch_. There was in it a joke in German argot which had been too much for my scant knowledge of the language and the courier who had escorted me from the Embassy had by the merest hazard translated it for me. In my desperate efforts to amuse myself I was looking through this sheet again and encountering this joke thought, "If I don't write down the English I shall forget it." Whereupon I took out a pencil and wrote the translation interlinearly.

Soon afterwards one of the detectives got up, went out into the corridor, and came back with three conductors who, in Germany, of course, are military officials. The three civilians who had shared the compartment left us as if they had been rehearsed. One of the detectives then suddenly burst into a perfect berserker rage, getting quite purple in the face, and snatching up the _Fliegende Blätter_ proceeded carefully to turn over the pages again and again, holding each page against the light. It was altogether melodramatically ridiculous. Taking the paper from me in this way, although inoffensive, was perhaps within his rights since it concerned me only in a personal and not in an official way, and so I sat quite calmly in my seat and, biding my time, made no move of any kind. I paid no attention to the conductors, judging the detective to be the kingpin and the conductors merely dragged in as a matter of routine. None of them could read English and they chose to regard the interlineation (one line of about ten words) as extraordinarily suspicious.

The detective asked me for my passports and did so without going through the customary formality of showing his police card. I demanded as a matter of routine that he do this and began to draw out of my pocket the large envelope in which I keep all my documents in order to take out my Eagle-stamped German courier's paper. Without complying with my request he grabbed for this envelope, while at the same moment someone jerked at the bag which was between my knees. All this was an affair totally different from that of the _Fliegende Blätter_. I had thoroughly thought out what I would do in an emergency if German officials should attempt to take my pouch from me, and had decided that I should make enough of a resistance so that there should be no possibility of disputing the fact that physical force had been used and an assault committed. This would "let me out," since a dispatch-bearer cannot be expected successfully to defend himself against the whole German army. Incidentally I might add that interference in any way with the dispatch-bearer of a neutral country is a very heinous international and diplomatic sin. I therefore jerked my envelope of papers rudely out of the detective's hand and gave him a vigorous shove, resisting an almost overwhelming temptation to hit him with all my might on his fat, unprotected jaw. I had half risen to my feet, meanwhile keeping a grip on the dispatch bag with my knees, and at the same time I vigorously swung my hips and freed myself from the man below. The detective struck the opposite wall of the compartment and bounced off toward the doorway, where he and the conductors stood jabbering and waving their arms and ever getting more and more purple in the face.

VI--OUTWITTING THE PRUSSIAN SPIES

Finally the detective showed his police card, and I then extended to them my Eagle-stamped courier passport, following it with my Embassy credential and my certificate of identity or personal passport. These three made a complete case and I refused to show anything more, insisting that my status had been adequately established. The officials continued to jabber and argue, having been continuously impolite during the entire episode, a mode of behavior which was a notable divergence from my previous experiences with agents of the Imperial Secret Service. The chief detective, whose name was Werther, continued to hang around, trying to talk with me, evidently determined to get further information about my plans.

I do not pretend to judge whether all this was mere accidental clumsiness and rudeness on the part of stupid detectives or if it was something very much deeper, prompted by someone higher up. One is, however, inclined to doubt inefficiency in the Prussian Secret Service and there may have been reasons why German authorities would count it of great importance to know the contents of my pouch....

I was followed constantly thereafter, as previously, the men being cleverly changed at every opportunity. My every step was dogged. At Wesel a detective sat at the same table in the station restaurant while I ate dinner. Such being the case I was, to say the least, a bit annoyed.

At Essen during a fifteen-minute wait for a change of trains, I withdrew to one end of the platform after having rechecked the two big mail-sacks. I was standing alone, with a detective, as usual, off in the background, when a man who looked a typical raw-boned Englishman drew near and hung around, staring at me. I looked him up and down and then turned my back thinking, "Another detective!" It was impossible to believe that an Englishman could be, of all places, in Essen. He finally approached me, saying in English of a most perfect and pronounced British accent, "Are you an American?" I replied, "Yes, are you a police officer? If so, please show me your card." He replied, "No, I am in a delicate position. I am trying to go to England this evening. I have American papers. You must see me through. I am ----." I cut him short by saying that I regretted, etc., and deliberately walked away. From that time on this man dogged me everywhere, trying to pass through gates with me and to get into the same compartments, even following me to the same hotels and restaurants, and trying to make anything he could out of my presence. I never lost sight of him for long until we finally set foot in England, where he did finally arrive, in spite of some very close shaves. I last saw him giving me a very ugly look as I landed at Folkestone. Whatever his nationality, he certainly was a spy in the German service.

VII--SAFE ARRIVAL AT EMBASSY IN LONDON

_London, Saturday, December 12th._ We had an exciting trip across the North Sea, taking zigzag courses to avoid mine-fields and sighting numerous destroyers and one sunken ship. We successfully avoided either hitting a mine or running into a torpedo. The boat was packed down with Belgian and French refugees. One Luxembourger had been a whole month getting to Flushing from his home in Belgium. I was much relieved when I arrived at Victoria Station with my pouch and found a clerk from the Embassy waiting for me, and still more relieved when we had deposited all the bags safely at their destination.

* * * * *

_Sunday, December 13th._ Imagine the face of any British telegraph operator if I were to hand him a cable saying: "I am leaving again for Berlin and Vienna," which is exactly what I am to do. I return immediately with dispatches from England to our Embassies in Germany and Austria. My plans are subject to modification by official orders, but I shall probably remain in Berlin only one day and then go to Vienna and Budapest. The bag I am to take to Berlin contains not only official dispatches, but a large sum of money....

_On the North Sea, December 16th._ It has been a wonderful stormy day to-day; as an officer said: "a typical North Sea winter day"--a leaden sky, roaring wind, smothers of rain, great black-green waves all flecked and blotched in white, big sea birds and little gulls dipping down the wave valleys and soaring up the wave mountains, and the ship taking the most foolish and impossible angles....

Two hours out a British destroyer came dashing up in our wake, making two feet to our one. She was a most picturesque sight, long, low, and speedy, painted black; her towering knife-prow thrust out in front and the long, low hull strung out behind. She "brought us to" with a shot across the bows, and as we wallowed in the trough of the sea, she went by to starboard fairly shaving our side. The officer on her bridge, over which great waves of spray and water broke at every moment, "looked us over" and then bellowed orders to our captain through a megaphone....

VIII--EXPERIENCES AT THE EMBASSY IN VIENNA

_Vienna, Saturday, December 19th._ I remained in Berlin only one day and started this morning for Vienna with dispatches, arriving late in the evening after an uneventful fourteen-hour journey.

_Sunday, December 20th._ I presented myself at the American Embassy this morning and delivered my dispatches....

_Monday, December 21st._ I had a walk and talk with Ambassador Penfield this morning; took luncheon with Mr. Grant-Smith and went afterward to the Embassy. Later in the afternoon I went with Count Colloredo von Mansfeld to the Austro-Hungarian Foreign Office and then called on the Countess Potatka to whom I had brought letters of introduction.

_Tuesday, December 22d._ After luncheon to-day Mr. Grant-Smith presented me to Wilhelm Prince zu Stollberg Wering Rode, Conseiller of the German Embassy in Vienna, who made an appointment with me for Thursday.

I am meeting many officials, American, German, and Austrian, but at present I cannot, without indiscretion, state just what they discuss....

_Thursday, December 24th._ I made a verbal report to Prince zu Stollberg this morning on the situation of German subjects in France. After luncheon I had a most interesting talk with Mr. Nelson O'Shaughnessy, of Mexican fame, who is Conseiller at the Embassy. Later I went for a most delightful automobile ride with Ambassador Penfield....

* * * * *

Count Berchtold, whom I have seen on several occasions, is a wiry man of medium height, always grave, intent and all-observing under a mask of stolidity. He never "talks" and seldom speaks. When he does he is terse and speaks out of one corner of his mouth as if reluctant to let the words escape. He is, however, noted for the most unfailing and perfect manners. It is said he can hear perfectly every separate conversation that may be carried on in any room where he happens to be present, and not only hears what is spoken but catches every little motion or hint of important matters. Such is the man whose hand struck the match that lit the long-prepared conflagration in which the total military casualties alone already far exceed five million.

* * * * *

IX--IN A CASTLE AT BUDAPEST

_Budapest, Tuesday, December 29th._ I left Vienna at nine o'clock this morning and reached Budapest at two. I had tea with Mrs. Gerard, who is in Budapest visiting her sister, Countess Sigray. I called at the home of Count Albert Apponyi to leave my card and letters of introduction. I dined with Mrs. Gerard and the Count and Countess Sigray.

* * * * *

The Austrian Emperor is a little man, slightly stooped, rather shriveled-up and possessed of a pair of keen, shrewd eyes. He is an able follower of the Emperor Ferdinand who once replied to the statement that a certain one of his subjects was a patriot by saying: "I don't care if he's patriotic for the country, but is he patriotic for me?" Franz Josef is cold, pitiless, and does not hesitate to ruin in a moment his most faithful servitor if he is at any time guilty of failure, or commits a blunder. Even when a minister or general is forced to carry out an order in spite of strong protests, he has relentlessly broken him if any catastrophe has resulted. A notable case is that of the general who commanded the Austrian armies in the battle of Sadowa.

At the request of the Countess X. I had written to her mother, the Countess W., before leaving Vienna, and found her answer awaiting me at the Consul's office when I arrived in Budapest. I learn that she also communicated with Count Berchtold, the Prime Minister of the Empire, with Count Szecsen, ex-Ambassador to France, and with the Hungarian Premier, so that in case I missed her letters (she sent me one to Vienna and one to Budapest) these gentlemen would see to it that I went to visit her, as she wished to thank me personally for what I had been able to do for her daughter, and also to hear direct news of her grandchildren.

I left Budapest early this afternoon and arrived after dark at Békéscsaba, which is about half-way to Belgrade. I was met by a major-domo who appropriated my luggage and led me to a private car on a private railroad belonging to the Countess. We started immediately and ran in about twenty minutes to the gate of the estate where she usually resides. Here I was carefully transferred into a waiting carriage and was tenderly tucked into numerous fur rugs by two or three strong men. The two splendid horses turned through the gates for a ten-minute drive across a beautiful park to the castle--and such a castle! It is equal in size and charm to some of the famous French châteaux along the Loire which I studied last spring.

I was carefully unpacked again under a splendid porte-cochère and ushered by numerous flunkies into the presence of the Countess. She received me in a tremendous room with a lofty ceiling, and in a preliminary talk of an hour she took off the first keen edge of her appetite for news.

My bedroom is perfectly huge and has two ante-rooms--for the personal servants whom I do not possess. We dined at eight, there being at the table, besides the Countess, a daughter and her companion, a Frenchwoman. During dinner the Countess mentioned that the war necessitated frequent readjustments in the management of her estates; that the military authorities had recently taken another five hundred of her men for service in the army. She asked me if I enjoyed hunting and, upon receiving an affirmative answer, said that she would send me for an hour or two with the pheasants in the morning. She warned me that the shooting would be poor because no care had been taken of the preserves since her sons departed for the war.

X--WITH THE HUNGARIAN NOBLEMAN

_Saturday, January 9th._ Yesterday on my arrival in Budapest I found awaiting me an invitation from Count Albert Apponyi to visit him at his castle at Eberhard, near Pozsony. I left Budapest at eight, reached Pozsony about eleven, and drove to Eberhard, where I was received by the Count.

I was extremely impressed on meeting Count Apponyi. I had anticipated something unusual, but he was quite beyond my expectations. He is about six feet three inches tall, has a splendidly erect carriage, and is a most impressively handsome man. He has a broad, well-shaped forehead sloping back steeply, splendid blue-gray eyes, the biggest, thinnest nose in the world, enormous nostrils, a strong, sensitive mouth, and a grayish, square-cut beard. The "grand old man of Hungary" looked up to his title.

He has been a member of the Hungarian Parliament for forty-two years and has several times held ministerial portfolios....

He has twice been in America. He has several times visited ex-President Roosevelt at the White House and at Sagamore Hill, and the Colonel has been a guest here at Eberhard....

At luncheon there were as guests the Count and Countess Karolyi Hunyadi and two of their sons, and the Countess Herberstein, whose husband is a general in the army.

_Sunday, January 10th._ I had the honor of a very interesting walk and talk with Count Apponyi this morning. Among other things he said: "I sometimes let my younger daughter (aged 12) play with the children of the peasants on the place. It gives her an understanding of life, and besides, there is no one of her own age and rank in this part of the country." This for a Hungarian nobleman is an extremely democratic remark.

(And so this American Attaché continues to write in his notebook the impressions which he received on his official journeys through the war-ridden countries, which were so soon to become the enemies of his own country. His diary is one of the most interesting records of the war.)

FOOTNOTE:

[5] All numerals relate to stories herein told--not to chapters in the book.

'NEATH VERDUN--BEHIND THE CROWN PRINCE'S ARMY

_By Lieutenant Maurice Genevoix--Translated by H. Grahame Richards_

This extraordinary narrative by a young Lieutenant in the French
Army gives the most vivid impression that has been recorded of the
Great War. The author was a student at the Ecole Normale, Paris, at
the outbreak of the War. He received his baptism of fire in August,
1914--and what a baptism it was! It has been truly said by critics
that his narrative is one which will be read and reread and handed
on to posterity. He lays bare the soul of the War. Under his magic
touch, we stand at Verdun; we see the army at "The Crossing of the
Meuse"; we stay with them through "The Days of the Marne"; we march
with them "Behind the Crown Prince's Army"; we fight with them "In
the Woods." We here reprint portions of his narrative by permission
of his American publishers, _Frederick A. Stokes Company_.

[6] I--STORY OF THE LIEUTENANT AT VERDUN

Half-past one in the morning! Kit bags on the ground, rifles piled, lines in sections of four, at the edge of a little wood of birch trees struggling for life on a stony soil. The night is cold. I place a listening post well forward and return and seat myself near my men. The stillness is palpitating; the passage of time interminably long-drawn. The dawn begins to lighten the sky. I look around me and see the pale and tired faces of my men.

Four o'clock. A dozen rifle shots to the right cause me to leap to my feet just as I am making myself comfortable. Out of a small neighboring wood a dozen Uhlans are flying at a gallop--they must have passed the night in the covert.

The day breaks clear and fresh. My Nubécourt bed-fellow produces his inexhaustible flask, and we sip a drop of brandy which possesses no bouquet at all and seems like raw alcohol. The Captain joins us at last and explains the situation in a few words:

"A German army corps," he says, "is marching towards the southeast, having for flank-guard a brigade which follows the valley of the Aire. The --th Corps is going to engage the said German corps, while it remains for us to deal with the flanking brigade."

For the first time I am going to experience war in all its reality!

* * * * *

Clac! Clac! Two bullets have struck immediately to my left. The noise at once surprises and slightly amazes me; these bullets seem less dangerous when they sing and whistle. Clac! Clac! Stones, pieces of dried earth, spurts of dust fly into the air; we have been seen and they have got the range of us. Forward! I am leading, seeking a ditch, a slope, a fold in the earth wherein to shelter my men after the first rush--even the hedge of a field, or anything which will render them less visible to the Boches will do. A movement of my right arm shortens the line by half. I hear the tramp of feet, the rustle of the stubble lying in our course. And while we are running forward the detachment in support fires rapidly but steadily. Then when I raise my cap, that detachment in its turn charges at the double, whilst all around me my men's rifles come into play and speak unceasingly.

A strangled cry to the left. I have scarcely time to see the man sprawl flat on his back, his two legs still moving as though to carry him forward. A second, and all his body stiffens and then relaxes and the man is no more than an inert thing, dead flesh which to-morrow the sun will commence to decompose.

Forward! To remain still would cost us more dearly now than the most furious assault. Forward! The men are falling rapidly, stopped dead in full course, some crashing prone without a word, others halting and staring stupidly, while feeling with their hand for their wound. And they say: "I have got it," or, "Mine has arrived!" Often it is no more than a single expressive word. Almost all of them, even those whose wounds are slight, turn pale at the shock.

* * * * *

"Oh!..." The cry escaped a dozen of us at once. A high explosive burst clean among the Saint Maixenter's platoon. And he, I saw it distinctly with my own eyes, received the shell full in his body. His cap vanished into space, a part of his coat, an arm. And there he is lying on the earth a shapeless mass, white and red pulp, a body stripped well-nigh naked, shattered. His men, finding themselves leaderless, give way and scatter.

* * * * *

We march through an inferno of smoke, from time to time obtaining a glimpse, through momentary clearings, of the village and the river running beneath the trees. But there is no truce to the shells which follow us in hundreds.

I recollect passing one of my sergeants being carried by two of the men on crossed rifles; he pointed out to me speechlessly, his torn and blood-stained shirt and his side terribly lacerated by an explosion. I could see the raw edges of the flesh....

I march onwards and onwards exhausted and stumbling. I take a long gulp of the water that remains in my flask. Since yesterday evening I have eaten nothing.

When we reach the edge of the stream, the men halt and throw themselves down and commence to lap the muddied waters like dogs.

It must be seven o'clock now; the sun is sinking into a bed of virgin gold. The sky above us is a pale and transparent emerald. The earth darkens, colors vanish. It is quite dark by the time we leave Sommaisne. We become mere shadows trailing along the road.

* * * * *

Not a wink of sleep. The noise of the shells hurtling through the air is constantly in my ears, while the acrid and suffocating fumes of explosives haunt my nostrils. Scarcely yet is it midnight before I receive orders to depart. I emerge from the trusses of wheat and rye among which I had ensconced myself. Bits of stalk have slipped down my collar and up my sleeves, and tickle me all over. The night is so dark that we stumble over the stones and irregularities of the ground. We pass very close to some 120's drawn up behind us; I hear the voices of the artillerymen, but only with difficulty can I distinguish the heavy sleeping guns.

* * * * *

Hallo! The German guns are speaking early this morning! Before us shrapnel is bursting noisily and spitefully. Over the plain they have thrown a barrage. Nevertheless we have to go through it. Our first section detaches itself; in a line, long-drawn and thin, it moves across the fields towards a small wood which the captain has indicated as the objective. Rifles crackle away to the left. Bullets sing and throw up the dust about the marching section. Then shrapnel bursts right over the men. The undulating line becomes still, taking cover behind a ridge of earth shaped like a gigantic caterpillar.

II--STORY OF THE CHARGING GERMANS

"Hurrah! Hurrah! Vorwärts!"

How many thousands of soldiers are surging down upon us then? The moist earth quivers beneath the tramp of their heavy feet. Most surely must we be smashed to pieces, trampled down, broken. For there are not more than sixty of us all told, and how may sixty men extended in single file hope to resist the tremendous pressure of these ranks upon ranks of men rushing down upon us like a herd of maddened buffaloes?

"Rapid fire! _Nom de Dieu!_ Fire!"

The crackling of the rifles rends the air; spurts of flame shatter the darkness. The rifles of my platoon have spoken simultaneously!

And now there is a gap in the very heart of the charging mass. I hear shrill screams of agony as of beasts mortally stricken. The dark figures divide to flow right and left, just as if, before the trench, and extending its whole length, a tempest had raged and laid men to the earth, as the breath of the gale bends down the growing wheat.

Some of the men about me say:

"Look, Lieutenant! See, they are lying down!"

"No, my friend! It is not so. They have fallen down!"

And ... (Censored.)

Once more I repeat:

"Fire! Fire! Let them have it! Put it into them! Fire!"

* * * * *

"Hurrah! Vorwärts!"

I am surrounded by Boches; it seems impossible that I can escape, separated as I am from all my men. Nevertheless I grasp my revolver in my hand and pray only I may be permitted to give a good account of myself.

Suddenly I am sprawling face downwards, nose to the earth, having stumbled over something hard and metallic. Lying in the mud is the body of a dead German whose helmet has rolled a little away from him. Instantly an idea seizes me. I pick up the helmet and place it on my own head, passing the strap beneath my chin to secure it.

There follows a mad flight for the safety the chasseurs will afford. Without hesitating a second, I rush by groups of Boches who are wandering about doubtfully, their original plans having been rather upset by our fusillade. As I pass them I cry:

"Hurrah! Vorwärts!"

Like them, too, I keep repeating the word to which they seem to attach great importance, which is:

"Heiligtum!"

The rain stings my face: the mud adheres to my soles until only with difficulty can I raise boots which have become enormously big and heavy. Twice I fall on my hands and knees, only to rise again and instantly resume my flight, notwithstanding my aching legs. Singing and whistling bullets pass over me into the darkness beyond.

Out of the blackness at my feet a man rises and the words on his lips are French.

"Is it you, Letty?"

"Yes, Lieutenant; I've got one in the thigh."

"That's all right, old man; we'll get there yet!"

Already there are no more harsh-voiced brawlers around us. Manifestly they must reform before continuing the assault. So I throw away the helmet and replace my cap of which I have taken good care.

Before reaching the chasseurs I overtake four Boches, in each of whom, either in the back or in the head, I put a revolver bullet. Each one drops in his tracks with a long, strangled cry.

(Censored.)

* * * * *

Skirting the base of a steep slope, I pass through a fire zone where the bullets in hundreds, whining and shrilling, tear up the soil all about me. Then I encounter a group of men, standing at the foot of a tree. There is a dying officer in the center, supported against the tree-hole. A glimpse I have of a dark blue tunic wide opened, of a shirt stained with bright blood. The wounded man's head sags heavily down to his shoulder, and in the whitened, tortured face, moist from fearful agony, I recognize my own major.

But I must not stay!

* * * * *

I question a lieutenant who is marking the fall of the shells through his glasses, shaking from head to foot the while from excitement.

"Things going well? Eh?"

He turns towards me. The joy which fills him is plainly legible in his face. He laughs exuberantly:

"I should say they are going well. The Germans are giving way--deserting their positions like rats a sinking ship."

He laughs once more. "Listen to our 75's! They are making them dance like madmen! That is the way to carry on, what? They are being kicked in the sterns now, the swine!"

A staff captain on foot is watching the delighted gunnners. He laughs also and repeats several times in a loud voice: "Good! Very good!"

III--STORIES TOLD AFTER THE BATTLE

Heavily and dreamlessly I sleep, and awake to find myself in precisely the same attitude as that in which I flung myself down the preceding night. The straw wraps me in grateful warmth, rather moist, perhaps, because the water in my saturated clothes has evaporated during the night....

We find that in the night the torrent has well-nigh filled the trenches with liquid mud. Some sappers, however, come to our assistance, and, thanks to them, we are able to shelter ourselves from the worst of the downpour.

The men work easily, flinging jests one to the other. The incidents of the night attack are revived and acquire a totally new force by reason of the simple words in which they are related.

"I was all right at the beginning," says Martigny, one of my men. "But all at once, while I was still firing, down toppled a Boche right on top of me, without so much as a "by your leave!" I was on my knees and he lay across my calves. It's not easy to fire in such a position as that! Little by little the weight forced my knees down into the mud; the water rose almost up to my hands: how was I to refill my magazine? I could not see the animal, but you can take my word for it, he was heavy."

And a second:

"A good job for me that I was once fencing-sergeant in the regulars! Otherwise I should not be here now. Not even time to fix my bayonet before I found one of the ugly pigs on top of me with his skewer. I thought to myself: 'What's all this about? But you are going to find you can joke once too often, my Boche!' And there we were all in and at it. I parried a thrust with the stock of my rifle, but what sort of defence could I put up, seeing that my weapon was much shorter than his? Only he didn't manage to get his bayonet into me!... There wasn't even a cartridge! I tell you that Boche kept me jumping from side to side until I felt like dying from weariness. You know what a job it is to parry, when you can no longer feel your own fingers? Still jumping, I said to myself: 'What in the name of glory are those asses right and left fooling about? Are they going to stand by and see me knocked out?' Oh! but they were there all right, and it was Gillet to the right who put a bullet into him while he was pausing to take a breath. Then I stuck on my bayonet and filled my magazine. There were others still coming up, you understand!"

"Sons of pigs, these Boches!" rasps a miner from the North. "And what mugs they are too, _Mon Dieu_! When I saw them swarming over towards me, 'Martin,' said I to myself, 'you're done for this time!' And then: 'Hurrah!' they're off! Bang, bang, bang! And I knew no more."

"Martin, you are babbling," grunts a huge Champenois, who is smoking his pipe and listening with eyes atwinkle. "Hammer away at the earth, seeing that is what you were born for; but don't mix yourself up in conversations, because you can't talk."

He spits on his hands, rubs them against each other, and taking up his pick starts digging again with long, steady, powerful strokes.

* * * * *

In the evening we go into the village. I stroll slowly towards the barn where my section is billeted. In the square, a group of noisy soldiers is gathered before a house which has nothing in particular to distinguish it from its neighbours. With much pushing and stretching of necks they are contriving to scan a big placard stuck on the wall....

The first word that encounters my eyes, however, gives me a violent shock. I can see nothing else but that word, which instantly seizes upon my excited imagination and seems to presage things marvellous, superhuman, incredible. The word is:

"Victory!"

It sings in my ears, that word. It echoes through all the streets, it bursts on me like a triumphant fanfare.

"Victory!" Thrills pass through me, enthusiasm seizes upon me and stirs me so violently as to make me feel almost sick. I feel that I am too small to contain the emotion to which the sacred word gives rise.

"_The retreat of the 1st, 2nd and 3rd German Armies is becoming
pronounced before our left and centre. In its turn, the enemy's 4th
Army is beginning to fall back to the north of Vitry and Sermaize._"

So that is it, then! We have been progressing everywhere. We have grappled with them, badly torn them, wounded them! Oh! that it may run and run, that German blood, until every particle of strength shall have streamed out of them!...

IV--STORIES OF THE GRAVES--AND CROSSES

_Marats-la-Grande._ We do not pass through the village. Some mounted batteries are passing and scaling the sloping fields towards the road. The riders are shouting and whipping their horses, already straining at the collar. Poor beasts! So thin that one can count their ribs, sides chafed raw by the harness, heads hanging, they strain and strain until their laboured breathing is audible, while their large bleared eyes speak eloquently of their sufferings.

A grave; two posts have been tied to form a cross! On the horizontal one a deep notch has been made with a knife, revealing the white heart of the wood. Someone has written in pencil the name of the soldier whose body is lying in the earth, his uniform for his shroud. The number of his regiment, his company and the date of his death, the 9th of September, are also inscribed. Four days! Only four days ago that decomposing something lying beneath the mound of earth was a man in the full flood of life, hoping, perhaps, soon to be reunited to the dear ones waiting for him. Four days!... His parents would not have heard yet.

More graves. They are not laid out in any particular order, or even in groups. At irregular intervals, they line the road we are following, which is no more than a trampled-down track over fresh grass between trees in leaf. Everywhere one can see these sad little crosses, on almost all of which a red cap hangs. Without halting, the men read aloud the inscriptions. The 8th of September, the 9th of September, the 10th of September....

And here is one which is not marked with the little cross of branches. A stake has been simply driven into the ground, bearing a burnt-in inscription to tell passersby the name of the dead man; on the newly-turned earth some white stones have been arranged in the form of a cross--they seem to protect him who lies there better and more intimately.

Hastily-made graves, turned out with small trenching tools, how I wish you were much deeper! Your lines suggest the shape of the body you hide from our eyes. The rain must have soaked you these last days and nights! But at least calm and peace are with you. The enemy is far away, never to return. Guard well, then, your poor dead, until the day dawns when the old men and women shall come to demand of you the bodies of their loved ones!

We march onwards a few minutes longer and reach a bare plain studded with shell-craters. The sun is sinking, the rays of its golden light striking obliquely. Mutilated horses are lying about, their stiff legs crossed or thrust up towards the sky.

V--TRAMP! TRAMP! TRAMP! ALONG THE ROAD OF CORPSES

"Fall in!"

New orders have just arrived and we are to move on again.

Before leaving, I pick up a fragment of shell over which I stumbled. It is fifty centimetres long by fifteen wide, with jagged edges like the teeth of a saw. I contemplate this terrible thing lying heavy in my hand. To what kind of a shell, swift and growling, must it have belonged? This fragment must be one of those which cleanly sweep away an arm or leg, tear off a head, or cut a man completely in two. And holding it thus in my hand, heavy and cold, I remember a poor little cyclist who was killed close to us in Septsarges Wood--one leg taken away at the hip and the lower part of his abdomen laid open.

Trees and a shimmer of green on a wide road, away to the north. Night is falling. Suddenly through the grayness we find ourselves looking upon some ruins--we have reached Erize-la-Petite.

* * * * *

Another road skirting the line which links Rembercourt with Vauxmarie and Beuzée. In the ditches, hunched up or stretched at full length, are human corpses. A single corpse is a rare spectacle. As a rule they are lying huddled together as if seeking to warm each other. The failing light reveals blue coats and red trousers; Frenchmen; more Frenchmen, in fact nothing but Frenchmen! Judge my enthusiasm on finding some Boches among them! I fall out several times to make sure that these really are Boches. The foe cannot have had the time to hide away that lot!

The night becomes black and corpses are no longer visible. But they are always there, at the bottom of the ditches, on the slopes at the very edge of the road. We realize their presence even in the dark. By shielding the eyes and peering hard, it is possible to see the eerie heaps which have lost all resemblance to that of which they are made....

Not a word in the ranks; nothing but the regular tramp, tramp, before and behind me; occasionally someone coughs, a little dryly, or a man spits. That is all. It must be cold, yet my head and hands are burning, and my will struggles to subdue an uncontrollable inclination to turn to my right where the cool waters of the Aire, flowing by the roadside, are betrayed by the stagnant pools under the trees.

An unexpected halt! The men bump their noses against the packs of the file in front. Confusion and much swearing. Then quick commands:

"Quartermasters prepare rations for distribution."

It is the best of all signs. The day's march is ended.

* * * * *

Come! Head erect and fists clenched! No more of that weakness that a moment ago assailed me. We must look unmoved on these poor dead and seek from them the inspiration of hate. It was the Boche in his flight who dragged these sorry things to the side of the road, who arranged this horrid spectacle for our express benefit, and we must never rest until the brute has drunk our cup of vengeance to the dregs.

Impotent and childish is the fury that only inspires us with rage and the passion for vengeance instead of fear, as our foe hopes and believes.

Besides, every step forward now presents us with eloquent testimony of the completeness of the defeat they have suffered--helmets torn and pierced by our bullets, crushed and shattered by our shells; rusty bayonets; broken cartridge-belts, still full. To the left of the road in the fields are some overturned ammunition wagons and gun-carriages in pieces, the horses lying dead in a heap. In the ditch is the carriage of a shattered machine-gun; one can see the hole made by the shell--a 75. What a state the gun on that carriage must have been in! And the machine-gunners? At the bottom of the hole! Ammunition belts of coarse white canvas lie coiled in puddles.