One sees this not alone in the--it is more than contempt of
death--in the godlike preoccupation of her people under arms
which makes them put death out of the account, but in the
equal passion and fervour with which her people throughout
give themselves to the smallest as well as the greatest tasks
that may in any way serve their sword. I might tell you
something that I saw of the cleaning out of certain latrines;
of the education and antecedents of the cleaners; what they
said in the matter and how perfectly the work was done. There
was a little Rabelais in it, naturally, but the rest was pure
devotion, rejoicing to be of use.
Similarly with stables, barricades, and barbed-wire work, the
clearing and piling away of wrecked house-rubbish, the serving
of meals till the service rocks on its poor tired feet, but
keeps its temper; and all the unlovely, monotonous details
that go with war.
The women, as I have tried to show, work stride for stride
with the men, with hearts as resolute and a spirit that has
little mercy for short-comings. A woman takes her place
wherever she can relieve a man--in the shop, at the posts, on
the tramways, the hotels, and a thousand other businesses.
She is inured to field-work, and half the harvest of France
this year lies in her lap. One feels at every turn how her
men trust her. She knows, for she shares everything with her
world, what has befallen her sisters who are now in German
hands, and her soul is the undying flame behind the men's
steel. Neither men nor women have any illusion as to miracles
presently to be performed which shall "sweep out" or "drive
back" the Boche. Since the Army is the Nation, they know
much, though they are officially told little. They all
recognize that the old-fashioned "victory" of the past is
almost as obsolete as a rifle in a front-line trench. They
all accept the new war, which means grinding down and wearing
out the enemy by every means and plan and device that can be
compassed. It is slow and expensive, but as deadly sure as
the logic that leads them to make it their one work, their
sole thought, their single preoccupation.