Chapter III: Part 3

Germany insists that a fortnight intervene between the application for a visé and the beginning of the trip. This is to enable her officials to make the necessary investigations, and then to communicate the facts to Berlin and to the traveler's port of arrival.

All travel between America and Germany is through Copenhagen, Stockholm, or Rotterdam. From Copenhagen the traveler enters Germany through Warnemunde; from Stockholm he enters through Sassnitz; and from Rotterdam through Bentheim. Upon his arrival at one of the three neutral cities he must begin the proceedings afresh....

Upon arrival at Warnemunde (the methods throughout the empire are standardized, and are the same at every other entrance point) the travelers are shunted into a long low wooden shed, carrying their hand baggage, having previously surrendered the checks for their heavier luggage. Upon entering the place they are given numbers, and in return surrender their passports to brisk, keen-eyed, non-commissioned officers, whose efficiency has been increased by long practice.

II--"SEARCHED" BY THE SECRET POLICE

Once in the room, the travelers are not permitted to leave except through one door, and that they pass only when their numbers are called. Barred windows and armed sentries prevent any trifling with this system. The numbers are called one by one except in the case of husbands and wives, who are permitted to go through together--and when this is reached, the traveler passes through into a second office, where he is questioned as to his identity and the photographs on the passports are verified.

While he is undergoing this questioning he is being overheard and carefully watched by numbers of the _geheim-Polizei_ (secret police), some of whom are in uniform and others of whom masquerade in civilian attire as new arrivals. If there is any error in his papers it is developed at this point, and he is at once turned about and sent back to Copenhagen. But if it is a case of _alles in Ordnung_ (everything in order), it is so reported, and he is ushered into another room, where, having passed the first two inquisitorial chambers, he is submitted to the grand ordeal, that of search.

And what a search it is! Unless one's credentials are exceptionally strong, one is stripped and one's mouth, ears, nose, and other parts of the body examined. One's fountain pen is emptied, every piece of paper taken away, including visiting cards, and even match-boxes are confiscated. Finger rings, umbrellas and canes are inspected. If bandages are worn, these must be stripped off, too. No distinction is drawn between men and women beyond the fact that women are of course examined before female inspectors.

The bodily search having been completed, that of the clothing is begun. Every article of apparel is felt over carefully and exposed to a strong light for fear there may be writing on the lining. If there is the slightest reason for suspicion, the travelers are given a sponge bath of water with a large admixture of citric acid, which has the effect of making apparent any writing on the body that may have been done with invisible ink. The Germans say that these precautions have been necessitated by the ingenious ruses employed by spies, whose entrance into the country is considered a greater menace than is their departure, since in entering they bring with them instructions to their confederates already within the empire awaiting orders.

The next step is the examination of the baggage, and this is done in a manner to make the American customs inspection seem childish. The interior and exterior measurements of the trunks are taken to guard against false sides, tops, and bottoms, and then one by one every article the trunks contain is put through a separate inspection....

Every sort of liquid is confiscated. The perfumes of the women are poured into a big tub, and such liquors as the men may be carrying are treated in a similar manner. The contents of travelers' alcohol or spirit lamps are carefully emptied into air-tight containers for later use. The reason for the drastic regulation against taking any liquid, however small the quantity, into Germany was the danger of the fact that high explosives such as nitroglycerine can be carried in small vessels. On several occasions, the Germans say, railroads and bridges have been blown up by the enemy travelers who carried the means of destruction in this way. In this connection the additional precaution is taken by the authorities of prohibiting all travelers from putting their heads out the windows of the coupés while crossing bridges.

All written or printed matter, such as books, newspapers, pamphlets, magazines, is taken away. Upon request the traveler may have these forwarded to his point of destination after they have been censored and deleted. As every point on the German border is carefully guarded, it is virtually impossible for any one to enter the country except at stated points. All the roads are closed, and the border fields are carefully patrolled.

Upon his arrival in Berlin, or wherever he may be bound, the traveler must present himself in person at the nearest police station. There his passport is again viséd, and he is given official permission to remain for a given period. But every time he makes a trip he must report himself going and coming....

III--THE COUNTRY THAT WENT "SPY MAD"

In every hotel are to be met spies in the form of guests, waiters, chambermaids, telephone operators, and bartenders. In the early part of the war these last proved their worth often, for men otherwise cautious and reticent became outspoken under the influence of a few Scotches or cocktails, which are still in vogue in Germany despite their American origin.

At one of the biggest of the Berlin hotels it is a noticeable fact that all the floor waiters are young, active, highly intelligent men. When they are asked why they are not serving at the front all have excuses on the score of health. The truth is that they are all governmental agents whose duty it is to familiarize themselves with the details of every visitor's business. That they do well. Every stranger's papers are thoroughly investigated, no matter how securely they may be locked up, before he has been in the city two days, assuming he leaves them in his room. Two members of the American diplomatic corps who made short stays in Berlin can tell singular stories on this point.

The chief of the floor waiters at this hotel--and it is illustrative of all the others--is a polished-mannered young fellow of about thirty-two who speaks English, French, Italian, Spanish, and Danish with the same facility that he reads them, and he reads them as well as he does his native German. I noticed the chief of the telephone operators, who while discharging the duties of his lowly job wore livery, attending the races in an English sport-coat, with glasses strung over his shoulders, and he went to and from the course in a taxicab, the height of luxury in wartime Berlin. One would hardly credit his income solely to the measly wages he received from his work at the switch-board. He, too, as well as his assistants, was an accomplished linguist.

It must not be thought that espionage is confined to the Americans. On the contrary, even the subjects of Germany's allies receive this attention. Austrian, Bulgarian, or Turkish, it makes no difference; all are put under the scrutiny of the secret eyes and ears of the Kaiser. Almost it is more difficult to obtain a passport permitting one to travel to Austria than it is to obtain one for a journey to America, and the examination at the Austrian border is just as severe as at the frontier between Germany and Denmark.

German spies travel on all the transatlantic liners running from Denmark, Sweden, Norway, and Holland to America, and back again. They find out as much as they can about their fellow-travelers, so that the secret police may be forewarned as to whom and what they are to receive. These agents are rarely employed by the German Government for the secret transmission of mail; that is usually done by men of solid reputation, American or other neutrals who are persuaded to accept the task on the ground of a service to the empire. Obviously, they must be violently pro-German before they are asked to assume the undertaking.

The difficulty of communication is one of the severe hardships that the German Government and people suffer. Mails to and from the empire are seized by the Allies, and if delivered at all, are so belated as to make them valueless. Only such cables as the Allies choose to pass are permitted transmission. Male Germans are not permitted to travel on the seas. So German communication is restricted to the wireless, to supposedly neutral couriers, and to submarines, both of the commercial type as the _Deutschland_, and of the war type, which have been secretly conveying important German mail to Spanish waters, where it is loaded upon friendly neutral vessels, which carry it into Spanish ports and thence forward it to America and other points. This last method has been a carefully guarded secret of the German Government. Mail sent out by Spain is not seized and censored by the Allies....

IV--A VISIT TO GENERAL LORINGHOVEN

To get the official view of the situation held by the officers of the general staff, I called on General von Freytag-Loringhoven at the general staff building in Berlin, where the great Moltke long presided. He received me in a room the distinguishing features of which were maps, not only showing the disposition of the German forces, but immense wall-sized ones on which were diagrammed the present locations of the Allies, showing their number, their commanders (designated by name and locations of headquarters), with their relative ranks indicated by little parti-coloured flags. I had just returned from the Somme, and as I saw how each of the French and British lines was clearly marked, I expressed my surprise.

The general smiled.

"Yes, our intelligence department is pretty thorough," he said, "but it is no better on the Somme than our enemy's is, for in France, where we stand on occupied soil, almost every civilian is an aid to the Allies.

"But despite that, despite all the French and English can do at the Somme," he went on, "they will never break through."...

I asked the general for his impressions of the French and British soldiers. He answered:

"The French are better soldiers. They are better schooled and drilled. They have been at it longer and they are enormously brave and sacrificing. But the British are proving their worth, too. They are all of them warlike and like to fight, but they don't know how as yet. You can't make a soldier in a few weeks or months; it takes time and patience.

"The French artillery is exceptional. The French artillery officers have always been of high repute. They are teaching much to the English and Russians, and these forces are showing a corresponding betterment.

"Because of their greater experience, I should say the French are better officered than the English. The Russian officers are a poor lot. There is no sympathy between them and their men. The men are brave enough, but are sheep-like in their lack of intelligence...."

In September, I stood in the general's field headquarters and watched the big guns drop shells all around the famous "windmill of Pozières" on the high ridge which had been taken by the British and was being used by their artillery observers, who gamely held on, although the position was anything but comfortable.

While we watched the bombardment a squadron of English fliers passed overhead. I ducked and made for the bomb-proof.

"Don't worry," said the general, "the fliers rarely bomb us. Our aviators generally leave their generals' headquarters alone, and they usually do the same by us. It is a sort of understood courtesy."...

While I stood in his observation-point with Wenninger an iron-gray quartermaster sergeant passed. He had been in the east against the Russians as well as in the west. In reply to my question as to his opinion of the schools of fighting, he answered:

"I'd rather face twenty infantry attacks from the Russians than bring up food to the first lines here (British). Their damned artillery makes it hell."

V--"AT THE SOMME, I MET VON PAPEN"

At the Somme I met Captain von Papen, the former German military attaché, who was sent home by America. After six weeks on the firing line he was made chief of staff to General Count Schweinitz, commanding the Fourth Guard Division and holding the Grevillers-Warlencourt-Ligny line. He has proved himself an efficient officer.

Captain Boy-Ed, the naval attaché, who was sent back to Germany at the same time, is now chief intelligence officer at the admiralty in Berlin. He is very bitter toward America, while von Papen is friendly. Dr. Dernburg, the other propagandist who was returned to the fatherland, is philosophical as regards his work in America, and is without rancour over his treatment. He is living in Berlin, working on housing plans for the poor, but he has lost the confidence of his Government....

All the world knows Hindenburg. Germany's Iron Man, the hero of the Masurian Swamps, a colossal wooden statue of whom stands opposite the Reichstag in the Sieges-allee, the Avenue of Victory, in Berlin's Tiergarten. But who is Ludendorff?

Ludendorff is Germany's man of mystery, the grim, inscrutable, silent man whose picture is on sale in every shop, whose name is in every mouth, but whose real personality is hidden even from his own countrymen.

Ludendorff is Hindenburg's indispensable right-hand man....

There are those who say that Ludendorff is Hindenburg's brain, and that Hindenburg's greatest successes have been planned by his silent, retiring assistant. Hindenburg, when in the mood, becomes very talkative and chatty, and at such times he often attributes his success to his assistant. There is a perfect harmony between the two; Ludendorff plans and Hindenburg decides....

On August 28 (1914) it was announced that the Russians were fleeing across the border. The news grew. Five army corps and three cavalry divisions had been annihilated. More than ninety thousand prisoners were taken. Tannenberg, one of the greatest victories of the war, had changed the whole face of affairs in the east.

There have been bigger battles and longer battles, and there have been battles of more significance in the history of the war, but there has been no other battle in which the result has been so overwhelming and complete a victory for either side.

Just what happened at Tannenberg and in the Masurian Swamps is still a secret. There have been stories that a hundred thousand men were drowned in the swamps. There have been tales of dikes released and men swept away in a swirl of rushing waters. All that is known certainly is that a Russian army disappeared.

(This American war correspondent then gives his impressions of men and events within the German Armies, telling many interesting tales of Boelcke, the German "knight of the air" who shot down thirty-eight enemy aeroplanes before he was killed in collision with one of his own German machines.)

FOOTNOTE:

[8] All numerals relate to stories herein told--not to chapters in the original sources.

"DIXMUDE"-AN EPIC OF THE FRENCH MARINES

_Story of the Murder of Commander Jeanniot_

_Told by Charles Le Goffic of the Fusiliers Marins--Translated by Florence Simmonds_

The story of the French Marines is one of the epics of the World's
Wars. Such is the story of the Bretons. At Dixmude, under command
of their own officers, retaining not only the costume, but the soul
and language of their profession they were still sailors. Grouped
with them were seamen from all the naval stations. The heroism of
these sailors is told in the volume entitled "Dixmude," published
by _J. B. Lippincott Company_. From these interesting stories, we
here relate "The Murder of Captain Jeanniot."

[9] I-GREAT HEARTS OF THE FRENCH MARINES

I had opportunities of talking to several of these "Parigots," and I should not advise anyone to speak slightingly of their officers before them, though, indeed, so few of these have survived that nine times out of ten the quip could be aimed only at a ghost. The deepest and tenderest words I heard uttered concerning Naval Lieutenant Martin des Pallières were spoken by a Marine of the Rue des Martyrs, George Delaballe, who was one of his gunners in front of the cemetery the night when his machine-guns were jammed, and five hundred Germans, led by a major wearing the Red Cross armlet, threw themselves suddenly into our trenches.

"But why did you love him so?" I asked.

"I don't know.... We loved him because he was brave, and was always saying things that made us laugh, ... but above all because he loved us."

Here we have the secret of this extraordinary empire of the officers over their men, the explanation of that miracle of a four weeks' resistance, one against six, under the most formidable tempest of shells of every caliber that ever fell upon a position, in a shattered town where all the buildings were ablaze, and where, to quote the words of a _Daily Telegraph_ correspondent, it was no longer light or dark, "but only red." When the Boches murdered Commander Jeanniot, his men were half crazy. They would not have felt the death of a father more deeply. I have recently had a letter sent me written by a Breton lad, Jules Cavan, who was wounded at Dixmude. While he was in hospital at Bordeaux he was visited by relatives of Second-Lieutenant Gautier, who was killed on October 27 in the cemetery trenches.

"Dear Sir," he wrote to M. Dalché de Desplanels the following day, "you cannot imagine how your visit went to my heart.... On October 19, when my battalion took the offensive at Lannes, three kilometers from Dixmude, I was wounded by a bullet in the thigh. I dragged myself along as best I could on the battlefield, bullets falling thickly all around me. I got over about five hundred meters on the battlefield and reached the road. Just at that moment Lieutenant Gautier, who was coming towards me with a section, seeing me in the ditch, asked: 'Well, my lad, what is the matter with you?' 'Oh, Lieutenant, I am wounded in the leg, and I cannot drag myself further.' 'Here then, get on my back.' And he carried me to a house at Lannes, and said these words, which I shall never forget: 'Stay there, my lad, till they come and fetch you. I will let the motor ambulance men know.' Then he went off under the fire. Oh, the splendid fellow!"

II--TALES OF THE BRAVE "PARIGOTS"

"The splendid fellow!" Jules Cavan echoes Georges Delaballe, the Breton, the "Parigot." There is the same heartfelt ring in the words of each. And sometimes, as I muse over these heroic shades, I ask myself which were the more admirable, officers or men. When Second-Lieutenant Gautier received orders to take the place of Lieutenant de Pallières, buried by a shell in the trench of the cemetery where Lieutenant Eno had already fallen, he read his fate plainly; he said: "It's my turn." And he smiled at Death, who beckoned him. But I know of one case when, as Death seemed about to pass them by, the Marines provoked it; when, after they had used up all their cartridges and were surrounded in a barn, twelve survivors only remaining with their captain, the latter, filled with pity for them, and recognizing the futility of further resistance, said to his men: "My poor fellows, you have done your duty. There is nothing for it but to surrender." Then, disobedient to their captain for the first time, they answered: "No!" To my mind nothing could show more clearly the degree of sublime exaltation and complete self-forgetfulness to which our officers had raised the _moral_ of their men. Such were the pupils these masters in heroism had formed, that often their own pupils surpassed them. There was at the Trouville Hospital a young Breton sailor called Michel Folgoas. His wound was one of the most frightful imaginable: the whole of his side was shaved off by a shell which killed one of his comrades in the trenches, who was standing next to him, on November 2. "I," he remarks in a letter, "was completely stunned at first. When I came to myself I walked three hundred meters before I noticed that I was wounded, and this was only when my comrades called out: '_Mon Dieu_, they have carried away half your side.'" It was true. But does he groan and lament over it? He makes a joke of it: "The Boches were so hungry that they took a beef-steak out of my side, but this won't matter, as they have left me a little."

Multiply this Michel Folgoas by 6,000, and you will have the brigade. This inferno of Dixmude was an inferno where everyone made the best of things. And the _battues_ of rabbits, the coursing of the red German hares which were running in front of the army of invasion, the bull-fights in which our Mokos impaled some pacific Flemish bull abandoned by its owners; more dubious escapades, sternly repressed, in the underground premises of the Dixmude drink-shops; a story of two Bretons who went off on a foraging expedition and were seen coming back along the canal in broad daylight towing a great cask of strong beer which they had unearthed Heaven knows where at a time when the whole brigade, officers as well as men, had nothing to drink but the brackish water of the Yser--these, and a hundred other tales of the same kind, which will some day delight village audiences gathered round festal evening fires, bear witness that Jean Gouin (or Le Gwenn, John the White, as the sailors call themselves familiarly[10]), did not lose his bearings even in his worst vicissitudes.

Dixmude was an epic then, or, as M. Victor Giraud proposes, a French _geste_, but a _geste_ in which the heroism is entirely without solemnity or deliberation, where the nature of the seaman asserts itself at every turn, where there are thunder, lightning, rain, mud, cold, bullets, shrapnel, high explosive shells, and all the youthful gaiety of the French race.

And this epic did not come to an end at Dixmude. The brigade did not ground arms after November 10. The gaps in its ranks being filled from the dépôts, it was kept up to the strength of two regiments, and reaped fresh laurels. At Ypres and Saint Georges it charged the troops of Prince Ruprecht of Bavaria and the Duke of Würtemberg in succession. Dixmude was but one panel of the triptych: on the broken apex of the black capital of the Communiers, on the livid backgrounds of the flat country about Nieuport, twice again did the brigade inscribe its stormy silhouette.

But at Ypres and Saint Georges the sailors had the bulk of the Anglo-French forces behind them; at Dixmude up to November 4 they knew that their enterprise was a forlorn hope. And in their hands they held the fate of the two Flanders. One of the heroes of Dixmude, Naval Lieutenant Georges Hébert, said that the Fusiliers had gained more than a naval battle there. My only objection to this statement is its modesty. Dixmude was our Thermopylæ in the north, as the Grand-Couronné, near Nancy, was our Thermopylæ in the east; the Fusiliers were the first and the most solid element of the long triumphant defensive which will one day be known as the victory of the Yser, a victory less decisive and perhaps less brilliant than that of the Marne, but not less momentous in its consequences.

The Generalissimo is credited with a dictum which he may himself have uttered with a certain astonishment:

"You are my best infantrymen," said he to the Fusiliers.

We will close with these simply, soldierly words, more eloquent than the most brilliant harangues. The brigade will reckon them among their proudest trophies to all time.

III--STORY OF MURDER OF DR. DUGUET

On October 25 (1914), we had not yet received any help from the inundation. Our troops were in dire need of rest, and the enemy was tightening his grip along the entire front. New reinforcements were coming up to fill the gaps in his ranks; our scouts warned us that fresh troops were marching upon Dixmude by the three roads of Essen, Beerst, and Woumen.[11] We had to expect a big affair the next day, if not that very night. It came off that night.

About 7 o'clock the Gamas company went to relieve the men in the southern trenches. On their way, immediately outside the town, they fell in with a German force of about the same strength as themselves, which had crept up no one knew how. There was a fusillade and a general _mêlée_, in which our sailors opened a passage through the troop with bayonets and butt-ends, disposing of some forty Germans and putting the rest to flight.[12] Then there was a lull. The splash of rain was the only sound heard till 2 A.M., when suddenly a fresh outbreak of rifle-fire was heard near the Caeskerke station, right inside the defences. It was suggested that our men or our allies, exasperated by their life of continual alarms, had been carried away by some reckless impulse. The bravest soldiers admit that hallucinations are not uncommon at night in the trenches. All the pitfalls of darkness rise before the mind; the circulation of the blood makes a noise like the tramp of marching troops; if by chance a nervous sentry should fire his rifle, the whole section will follow suit.

Convinced that some misunderstanding of this kind had taken place, the Staff, still quartered at the Caeskerke railway station, shouted to the sections to cease firing. As, however, the fusillade continued in the direction of the town, the Admiral sent one of his officers, Lieutenant Durand-Gasselin, to reconnoiter. He got as far as the Yser without finding the enemy; the fusillade had ceased; the roads were clear. He set out on his way back to Caeskerke. On the road he passed an ambulance belonging to the brigade going up towards Dixmude, which, on being challenged, replied: "Rouge Croix." Rather surprised at this inversion, he stopped the ambulance; it was full of Germans, who, however, surrendered without offering any resistance. But this capture suggested a new train of thought to the Staff: they were now certain that there had been an infantry raid upon the town; the Germans in the ambulance probably belonged to a troop of mysterious assailants who had made their way into Dixmude in the night and had vanished no less mysteriously after this extraordinary deed of daring. One of our covering trenches must have given way, but which? Our allies held the railway line by which the enemy had penetrated into the defences, sounding the charge.... The riddle was very disturbing, but under the veil of a thick, damp night, which favored the enemy, it was useless to seek a solution. It was found next morning at dawn, when one of our detachments on guard by the Yser suddenly noticed in a meadow a curious medley of Belgians, French Marines, and Germans. Had our men been made prisoners? This uncertainty was of brief duration. There was a sharp volley; the sailors fell; the Germans made off. This was what had happened!

Various versions have been given of this incident, one of the most dramatic of the defence, in the course of which the heroic Commander Jeanniot and Dr. Duguet, chief officer of the medical staff, fell mortally wounded, with several others. The general opinion, however, seems to be that the German attack, which was delivered at 2:30 P.M., was closely connected with the surprise movement attempted at 7 o'clock in the evening on the Essen road and so happily frustrated by the intervention of the Gamas company. It is not impossible that it was carried out by the fragments of the force we had scattered, reinforced by new elements and charging to the sound of the bugle. This would explain the interval of several hours between the two attacks, which were no doubt the outcome of a single inspiration.

"The night," says an eye-witness, "was pursuing its normal course, and as there were no indications of disturbance, Dr. Duguet took the opportunity to go and get a little rest in the house where he was living, which was just across the street opposite his ambulance. The Abbé Le Helloco, chaplain of the 2nd Regiment, had joined him at about 1:30 A.M. The latter admits that he was rather uneasy because of the earlier skirmish, in which, as was his habit, he had been unremitting in his ministrations to the wounded. After a few minutes' talk the two men separated to seek their straw pallets. The Abbé had been asleep for an hour or two, when he was awakened by shots close at hand. He roused himself and went to Dr. Duguet, who was already up. The two did not exchange a word. Simultaneously, without taking the precaution of extinguishing the lights behind them, they hurried to the street. Enframed by the lighted doorway, they at once became a target; a volley brought them down in a moment. Dr. Duguet had been struck by a bullet in the abdomen; the Abbé was hit in the head, the arm, and the right thigh. The two bodies were touching each other. 'Abbé,' said Dr. Duguet, 'we are done for. Give me absolution. I regret....' The Abbé found strength to lift his heavy arm and to make the sign of the cross upon his dying comrade. Then he fainted, and this saved him. Neither he nor Dr. Duguet had understood for the moment what was happening. Whence had the band of marauders who had struck them down come, and how had they managed to steal into our lines without being seen? It was a mystery. This fusillade breaking out behind them had caused a certain disorder in the sections nearest to it, who thought they were being taken in the rear, and who would have been, indeed, had the attack been maintained. The band arrived in front of the ambulance station at the moment when the staff (three Belgian doctors, a few naval hospital orderlies, and Quartermaster Bonnet) were attending to Dr. Duguet, who was still breathing. They made the whole lot prisoners and carried them along in their idiotic rush through the streets. Both officers and soldiers must have been drunk. This is the only reasonable explanation of their mad venture. We held all the approaches to Dixmude; the brief panic that took place in certain sections had been at once controlled."

IV--STORY OF MURDER OF COMMANDER JEANNIOT

"Commander Jeanniot, who had been in reserve that night, and who, roused by the firing like Dr. Duguet and Abbé Le Helloco, had gone into the street to call his sector to arms, had not even taken his revolver in his hand. Mistaking the identity and the intentions of the groups he saw advancing, he ran towards them to reassure them and bring them back to the trenches. This little stout, grizzled officer, rough and simple in manner, was adored by the sailors. He was known to be the bravest of the brave, and he himself was conscious of his power over his men. When he recognized his mistake it was too late. The Germans seized him, disarmed him, and carried him off with loud '_Hochs!_' of satisfaction. The band continued to push on towards the Yser, driving a few fugitives before them, and a part of them succeeded in crossing the river under cover of the general confusion. Happily this did not last long. Captain Marcotte de Sainte-Marie, who was in command of the guard on the bridge, identified the assailants with the help of a searchlight, and at once opened fire upon them. The majority of the Germans within range of our machine-guns were mown down; the rest scattered along the streets and ran to cellars and ruins to hide themselves. But the head of the column had got across with its prisoners, whom they drove before them with the butt-ends of their rifles.[13] For four hours they wandered about, seeking an issue which would enable them to rejoin their lines. It was raining the whole time. Weary of wading through the mud, the officers stopped behind a hedge to hold a council. A pale light began to pierce the mist; day was dawning, and they could no longer hope to regain the German lines in a body. Prudence dictated that they should disperse until nightfall. But what was to be done with the prisoners? The majority voted that they should be put to death. The Belgian doctors protested. Commander Jeanniot, who took no part in the debate, was talking calmly to Quartermaster Bonnet. At a sign from their leader the Boches knelt and opened fire upon the prisoners. The Commander fell, and as he was still breathing, they finished him off with their bayonets. The only survivors were the Belgian doctors, who had been spared, and Quartermaster Bonnet, who had only been hit in the shoulder. It was at this moment that the marauders were discovered. One section charged them forthwith; another fell back to cut off their retreat. What happened afterwards? Some accounts declare that the German officers learned what it costs to murder prisoners, and that our men despatched the dogs there and then; but the truth is, that, in spite of the general desire to avenge Commander Jeannoit, the whole band was taken prisoners and brought before the Admiral, who had only the three most prominent rascals of the gang executed."

FOOTNOTE:

[9] All numerals relate to stories herein told--not to chapters in the original sources.

[10] "When we passed through the streets of Ghent they were full of people shouting, 'Long live the French!' I heard one person in the crowd call out, 'Long live Jean Gouin!' He must have known them well." (Letter of Fusilier F., of the island of Sein.) Le Gwenn, which has been corrupted into Gouin, is a very common name in Brittany. [Compare the current English nickname "Jack Tar."--TR.]

[11] "Germans of the regular army coming from the direction of Rheims. The Boches we had had to deal with so far had been volunteers or reservists." (Second-Lieutenant X.'s note-book.)

[12] Not without losses on our side. "Saw Gamas, who has had fourteen of his men killed to-night, among them his boatswain Dodu." (Second-Lieutenant Gautier's note-book.)

[13] Here there seems to have been some confusion in the eye-witness's account. He leads us to suppose that Dr. Duguet's ambulance was in the town, and that the Germans who killed him and wounded the Abbé Le Helloco went on afterwards to the bridge with their prisoners. "As a fact," we are now told, "the affair took place between the bridge--which the head of a column had crossed by surprise, driving before them a number of Belgians, sailors, and perhaps some marauders--and the level crossing near the station of Caeskerke where the column was finally stopped. It was in this part of the street that Dr. Duguet had his dressing-station; and it was there, too, that Commander Jeanniot, whose reserve post was at Caeskerke, came out to meet the assailants. And it was the fields near the south bank of the Yser to which the column betook itself, dragging its prisoners with it, when it found the road barred."

A BISHOP AT THE FRONT WITH THE BRITISH ARMY

_Told by the Right Reverend H. Russell Wakefield, Bishop of Birmingham_

This is an account of how the Bishop, accompanied by the Lord
Mayor of Birmingham, went to the fighting lines to visit the staff
at headquarters. They were at times within thirty-five yards of
the German trenches. His impressions have been recorded in a
volume published by _Longmans, Green and Company_, from which the
following incidents are taken.

[14] I--THE HUMOUR OF BRITISH "TOMMIES"

Whenever, in future, I am inclined towards a fit of pessimism, I shall shut my eyes in order to see once again, with the vision of the spirit, a stalwart Britisher of the Worcester Regiment, not very far from the German lines, on a certain afternoon, when a most appalling thunderstorm was raging and some German shells were falling. He was munching the thickest slice of bread and jam that I have ever seen, and looking with a mild contempt at the intruding figure of an unknown padre whom a considerable number of his comrades were greeting because they recognised in him their Bishop. He put down now and again his refreshment in order to do some bit of work, but he was just as calm and collected as if he had been in his Worcestershire village and not in the trenches.

That which carries our men through so many difficulties is another thing which impressed me--namely, their unfailing sense of humour; a humour which is never really hurtful even when exercised upon some one deserving of satire. When he christens a road along which there are a couple of miles of Army Service carts "Lorry Park," when he finds every kind of strange anglicising for Flemish or French words, we know that he is not only having some fun for himself, but also providing amusement for those who come after him. The same humour shines out when he is in hard case. A chaplain told me that he had been addressing informally some wounded men who had just arrived from the trenches. He was expatiating upon the glories of the Victoria Cross because he noticed some of the men came from a regiment one of whose number had recently received that coveted distinction. Suddenly his eloquence was disturbed by a voice proceeding from a man, both of whose feet were swathed in bandages, who remarked, "Never mind the Victoria Cross, give me the Victoria 'Bus!" Obviously the soldier's sense of humour was conquering his pain, and his remark made the rest of the party forget their sufferings for a short time....

II--FRANCE BLEEDS FOR CIVILIZATION

As one who saw the French during the war of 1870, when--being a boy--I was very susceptible to impressions, I can hardly express the difference I notice between the nation then and now. In the former war there was excitement, impulsiveness, overconfidence, want of ballast; to-day there is quietude, earnestness, and withal, assurance of eventual victory. More than once I journeyed through a considerable part of the French lines, and I assert with confidence that the Army of France at the present time is incomparably superior to that which she placed in the field in 1870. As to her civilians, I only saw women, children, and old men; I did not, in all my thousand miles of travel, discover a single able-bodied person of military age out of uniform.

The harvest, a very good one, was in full swing. Every family was out in the fields, all doing something towards the in-gathering. I have a picture now before my eyes of seven people, all undoubtedly coming from the same house, working away hard, whilst at the tail end of the procession appeared what might have been the great-grandpapa, no longer capable of bending down for harvesting, but who, nevertheless, had his piece of work in carrying about the baby, who, of course, could not be left behind alone in the house. The whole nation is doing its utmost.

III--"HOW I WENT TO THE TRENCHES"

On one occasion after motoring through towns that are a household word, both at home and with our Allies, towns which have seen the Germans in them and then driven out of them, places where the buildings are practically level with the ground, the limit for vehicular traffic is reached and one goes forward on foot. Soon you reach a cutting in the ground and you begin to walk along a trench. You turn now and again either to right or left, seeing sign-posts telling sometimes in comic language and sometimes only by number the name, as it were, of the underground street; you then rise a little and find yourself walking in the inside of houses so shattered that you cannot tell much about what they originally were until you are told that they formed a street in a little overgrown village of which nothing is left, and the last inhabitant of which was the station-master, who refused to leave though there was neither train, station nor house for himself left, because so long as he remained on the spot he could claim his pay. Forcible measures had at last to be used to secure his departure. Where you are walking you are yourself hidden from the enemy, but are within the range of their fire. You are taken up to an observation post, where one of your companions incautiously takes out a white pocket-handkerchief and is hurriedly told to put it back in his pocket.

You come down again and proceed cautiously along trenches. Now and again shells pass over, and your careful guide looks to see in what direction they are falling, as, though he is quite unconcerned for himself, he knows that he is responsible for the safety of the troublesome visitor. You are told to keep your head down and not to show, for the moment at any rate, any desire to view the landscape. Soldiers are dotted about here and there, all of them ready to give a kindly greeting, and then at last you reach a point where you are told not to speak loudly because practically only a few yards away is the enemy, who, were he to hear conversation, might think it worth while to throw over a hand grenade. What looks like a tiny bit of glass at the end of a short stick is there before you, and you are asked to look into it; when you do the enemies' trenches are visible to you. Beyond an occasional ping against a sandbag, you have heard nothing to note the existence of rifle fire, except that the men you have passed have got these weapons to hand. You tell the men at the advanced posts how proud their country is of them, how thankful you are to have seen them, how you pray that God may bring them back safe to their homes; you get rid of all cigars or cigarettes you may have upon you, wishing that you had thousands more, and then you return home, varying perhaps the route through the communication trenches.

On another occasion our way took us through a town which is absolutely razed to the ground and is still under shell fire. There I saw two soldiers busy with spades, and I asked what kind of fortification they were putting up, to which, with a broad grin, one replied that they were looking for souvenirs. He was kind enough to give me a complete German cartridge case, for which he refused to take any remuneration. Going on a little farther in this town, we went down some steps and found ourselves in an underground club full of soldiers, who were having a hot meal, were reading papers and playing games, everything being presided over by perhaps the most magnetic person I met on my travels, a young Chaplain to the Forces, who would not wish his name to be mentioned, though there is probably no one out at the Front who will not know to whom I refer. When we went from this place towards the more advanced trenches, I was taken along a road which looked perfectly harmless, when suddenly a stalwart Scotchman told my companion and myself that we must get off it at once as it was a favourite target for German Maxims. Never was a General more obediently submitted to than was this, I believe, private soldier. It was on this occasion that we had tea in the dugout of the Colonel, who bears a name distinguished in English naval, military and sporting life. A characteristic of the German trenches which I noticed on this and other occasions, was that their sandbags seemed to be generally white in colour, at any rate in those of the first line. Leaving the trench on this particular day, we had to go through an almost alarming thunderstorm, which in the course of half an hour made a sea of mud of the place which had been quite dry before. It was curious to notice how petty the sound of the guns appeared as compared with the artillery of heaven.

Pathetic incidents occur and touching scenes are visible on these journeys to the Front. One looked in the trenches upon little mounds and crosses, marking the resting-places of men who had been hurriedly, but reverently, buried. There they are side by side with their living comrades, who are doing their work whilst their brothers sleep. Dotted all about the country are little cemeteries, which tell of devotion unto death, and which remind one of all the sorrow this war has caused. It is strange to see how religious emblems appear to have been strong against shell. Constantly you would see a church almost totally destroyed and yet the crucifix untouched, and who will ever forget that sight which can be seen for miles around, of the tower which has been almost shattered to pieces and yet the statue of the Virgin and Child, which was near the top of it, though bent over completely at right angles, still remains, as it were blessing and protecting the whole neighbourhood.

IV--"SEE GOD THRO' CLOUD OF SMOKE"

This leads to the consideration of the religious condition of our troops as affected, first, by the churches and worshippers of France, and, secondly, by their own experience in this war. More than one mentioned the pleasure felt at the sight of the little wayside shrines which they passed on their march. Others commented upon the large numbers of people they saw flocking to their early communion....

What his experience of war is doing for the soldier in regard to religion is remarkable. It would have been possible that the sight of humanity striving to the death and inflicting horrible suffering might have made our young fellows despair of Christianity. They might have argued that it was of no avail to teach the religion of Jesus when no effect was produced upon international conduct; but they have been able to look more deeply into matters and to realise that not Divine intention was at fault, but human refusal to follow true teaching. They have been able to see God through the cloud of smoke raised by shot and shell, and the Presence of the Divine has not been obscured by the horrors of war. Conscious of the seriousness of the work in which they are engaged, feeling every moment the nearness of eternity, our soldiers have in no craven spirit, but with a due remembrance of their relationship to God and to eternity, turned to religion as a stay in the hour of conflict....

Although I must refrain most reluctantly from saying anything about the great military personages whom I met in France, and with whom I was so greatly impressed, I may perhaps refer to two French persons of distinction, in no way connected with the war, whom I was privileged to meet. First there is that outstanding personality the Mayor of Hazebrouck, Abbé Lemire. He and I were brought together because he is a clerical municipal dignitary and I was the first clergyman who was ever a mayor in this country. He, however, does more than I have ever been able to do, because he is a member of the Chamber of Deputies, and here in England the doors of the House of Commons are still shut against the clergy....

He is an extraordinarily winning personality, and as we walked through the streets of his city every woman and child and old man had something to say to him. With one he would discuss the imprisonment of a soldier son in Germany; with another the fact that a married daughter had had a bouncing boy who would be, so prophesied the Abbé, a soldier of France in years to come. To another in deep mourning he had a word of comfort to give; until at last I said to him that he appeared to be not only _le maire_ but also _le père_ of Hazebrouck....

Another beautiful character is the present Archbishop of Rouen. Carrying well his seventy-six years, thanks in no small measure to the loving care of his secretary, the great dignitary has passed through the recent critical time for his Church, retaining throughout his breadth of view and his sweetness of nature. Turned out of his official residence, he has built himself another, beautifully situated, in the grounds of which may to-day be seen English doctors and nurses, and even wounded, resting and gaining health. The morning upon which I saw him I had been celebrating the Holy Communion in the chapel of what once was his palace. When I asked him whether he felt any objection to this being done by our English clergy, he answered, "Certainly not." And then, after a moment's thought, he went on: "After all, what does it matter whether one celebrates in one vestment and another in a different one, if at the root of things we are the same?"

(The Bishop now relates his impressions of the various countries engaged in the War, all of which, with the exception of Japan, he has visited. He believes that the War is to result in a great spiritual awakening throughout the world.)

FOOTNOTE:

[14] All numerals relate to stories herein told--not to chapters in the original sources.

SHORT RATIONS--THE TRUTH ABOUT LIFE IN GERMANY

_An American Woman in Germany_

_Told by Madeline Zabriskie Doty_

Miss Doty made two trips of exploration to Europe during the War.
She is one of the few "foreigners" who were permitted to visit
prison camps and industrial factories in Germany. It has remained
for this American woman to bring out of Germany some of the most
interesting sidelights. It is a graphic account of the tragedy
which reveals the conditions within the German Empire. Miss Doty
talked with the German women in the factories, the mothers with
their babies, finding everywhere the tragedy of suffering almost
beyond human endurance. The following reminiscences are from
her book: "Short Rations," published by the _Century Company_:
Copyright 1917.

[15] I--STORY OF WOMAN WHO WANTED TO SELL HER CHILD

I awoke to find myself in Germany.... Hamburg is a city of sleepers. Its big hotels, its many stores, its impressive buildings stretch out endlessly, but within all is still. All that modern industry and the ingenuity of man can achieve has here been flung upon the land, and then the force that created it has vanished, leaving these great monuments to rot, to rust, and to crumble. The tragedy of unused treasures is as horrible as rows of dead. A city seems visibly dying....

A crowd of children is gathering just below. School is out, and they are surrounding an object of interest. One or two women join them. There is no passing populace to swell the throng. We approach and see in the centre of the crowd of children a woman crouched upon a bench. She is dirty, ragged, and dark in colouring.... On the ground at her feet is a baby just big enough to walk. It also is dirty, and possesses only one ragged garment. The mother sits listless, gazing at her child. It is evident she is soon to be a mother again. There is great chattering among the children. I turn to my companion for explanation.

"The woman wants to sell her child. She says she hasn't anything to eat. She isn't a German mother. Of course, no German mother would do such a thing. You can see she isn't good. She is going to have another baby."

A school-child gives the toddling baby some cherries. She eats them greedily. My hand goes to my pocketbook, but my companion pulls me away. If I bought the baby, what could I do with her on a trip through Germany?...

II--THE SECRET GRIEF OF GERMANY

But before I leave Germany the spies get on my nerves. What was at first amusing becomes a nuisance. I feel exactly as though I am in prison. I acquire the habit of looking out of the corner of my eye and over my shoulder. These spies are as annoying to their countrymen as to me. The people detest them. They grow restless under such suppression. Free conversation is impossible, except behind closed doors. Between German spies and the spies of other countries supposed to be at large, public conversation is at a standstill. Everywhere are signs--"_Soldaten_"--"_Vorsicht bei gespröchen Spionengefahr_."...

In spite of the concealment of the wounded, the population begins to understand its loss. One night I went to the station (at Berlin) to see a big detachment leave for Wilmâ. They had all been in war before. Their uniforms were dirty and patched. They sat on benches clinging to a loved one's hand, or stood in listless groups. No one talked. They were like tired children. They needed food and bed. The scenes of farewell were harrowing.