_Paris_, April, 1916.
"_La Légation de Belgique a l'honneur de faire connaître à Miss
Spencer que Sa Majesté la Reine la recevra Vendredi prochain, 28
avril, à La Panne, à 2 heures et demie. Miss Spencer est priée de
vouloir bien prevenir La Légation, du lieu et de l'heure ou on
pourrait la faire prendre à Dunkerque ou à Calais._"
For six weeks I had wondered where and how the door to the war zone
would open, and here at last came the answer. "The Belgian Legation has
the honour to inform Miss Spencer that Her Majesty, the Queen, will
receive her on Friday at La Panne at half past two."... It was midnight
when the letter came, too late to do anything until the morrow, when I
must find the way to break all rules for civilians and get out of Paris
in three hours instead of eight days.
My official invitation was certainly a wonderful gate-opener.
Legations, embassy and war office armed me with the necessary papers
in less time than it usually took to reach the sub-clerk in the
commissaire's office. Dressed in my khaki suit and my little brown hat
with the laurel leaves,--funny little hat, since become famous because
so many officers thought I wore the leaves as a presage of victory
in honour of the Allies,--with my small handbag, heavy coat and an
umbrella, I reached the Gare St. Lazare with twenty minutes to spare.
Ahead of me were two English officers, shiny and polished from head to
foot, with their elaborate hand luggage all neatly marked. One might
think they were running down for a week-end at the Casino. On all sides
crowded sky-blue coated _poilus_, the faded dull looking sky-blue which
blends into the horizon and helps to hide the French soldier from the
keen-sighted Boche.
Have you ever stood by the gate to the trains and watched the men come
up to go back to the front? Some come slowly, slouching along in their
stiff boots under the weight of their heavy knapsacks and equipment,
tired-eyed but determined. Others come running up in twos and threes,
cheerful and carefree. Others come with their wives and children, their
mothers, their sweethearts; and these do not talk, unless it be the
tiny tots, too small to know what it is all about. Nor do they weep.
They just walk up to the gate, kiss him good-by and stand aside, and
look as long as their eyes can follow him. Sometimes he turns back,
but not often. I watched a while, then I too went through, showing my
papers to several inquisitive officials in succession.
Everything was quite like ordinary times until we passed E----, where
we lost the last of the civilians on the train except myself. My
compartment was quite empty, and as I stuck my head into the corridor
it seemed as if the rest of the car were also empty. But no, there was
a turkey gobbler in a wooden cage and in a moment a French officer
bending over him with a cup of water. It seemed the gobbler, poor
innocent bird, was on his way to make gay an officer's mess.
Soon we came to what still remains one of the most impressive sights
of my trip, the miles of English reserve camp. Sand dunes, setting sun
and distant sea, and tents, and barracks and tent, and men in khaki
never ending! These bright, happy, healthy faces! Why, as the train
crawled through them, so close I could shake hands out of the window, I
fairly thrilled with the conviction that they could never be beaten. I
wanted to shout at them: "Boys, I'm from over the water too, God bless
you all!" But it choked in my throat, for they came from Canada and
Australia and New Zealand to give their lives for a principle, while
I came from the land "too proud to fight." (To-day, Aug., 1917, thank
God, proudest of all to fight.)
There were the shooting ranges and the bayonet targets, burlaps the
size of a man's torso stuffed with straw, hanging on a clothesline in a
row. The boys stand off a hundred yards and with fixed bayonets charge
the bursting burlap. But now, at sunset, they are sitting around in
groups or playing games, waiting for their evening meal. They have not
faced fire yet, but their turn is coming and they are keen for it.
The officer and the turkey descended at Boulogne and darkness closed
down about the same time. There was only a shaded night lamp in the
car, and the lonesomeness of the unknown began to take hold of me. The
train crawled on about as fast as a horse would jog. I was hungry, as
with civilian-like lack of forethought I had provided myself with no
lunch or dinner. I sat close to the window, looking for the lights of
Calais which never came. The train stopped and a kindly conductor with
a white badge on his arm, which shows that he is mobilized, helped
me to stumble out in the dark. There had been a "Zep" alarm, and not
a single light was visible in the overcast night. I pushed along
with groups of soldiers into the station, where, in an inner room,
an officer sat at a small table with a small shaded safety lamp and
examined passports. He was duly suspicious of me until I showed him
the Legation paper. Stumbling and groping like the blind man in Blind
Man's Buff, I was finally rescued by a small boy who piloted me across
the bridge to a door which he said was the G---- hotel. They refused
to give me food because not even a candle was permitted. In the dark I
went to bed.
Early next morning I looked from the window on an animated square.
Tommies, Tommies everywhere. Was it England after all instead of
France? The Belgian _réformé_ who will carry a limp to his dying day
as his ever-present memory of the great war, and who acted as my
chamberman, could not do enough for me when he heard that I was going
to see his Queen. He spoke of her as of the dearest loved member of his
family. She was a real Queen, he said. She loved and cared for the poor
and suffering. He had even seen her once and she had smiled at him when
he wore his uniform with his _croix de guerre_.
The palace motor came promptly at 12:30 and into it I got with my
little bag, wondering whether I was going into Belgium to remain two
hours, two days or two weeks. I noticed that the car had seen service.
The glass was cracked even where protected by wire netting and the
upholstering was threadbare in spots, but there was nothing the matter
with the engine, and we whizzed along at a goodly pace....
We passed in and out of towns with guards at attention. Even at
the frontier we were not stopped. The country was flat and the
roads fearfully dusty. The heavy motor lorries and trucks which
were constantly traveling with supplies from the base to the front
interested me greatly, as they were the first I had seen in action.
They came in groups of three to thirty, and the boys on the drivers'
seats were so caked with dust I could hardly distinguish their
features. My official motor carried a special horn which cleared the
road of man and beast. The fields on all sides were tilled. I wondered
who the workers were, when what do you think I saw? Forty children in a
row, boys and girls, all ages, from the little tot to the boy who would
next year be in the army, each with a hoe. In front of them stood an
old man who beat time with a stick while the children plied the hoe,
and I warrant they had a happy time doing it.
At last I knew we must be nearing La Panne, for soldiers became more
numerous. There is always one division of the Belgian Army _en repos_
at La Panne. The motor made several sharp turns, and as long as I live
I shall never forget the scene. Warm sunshine, a sandy beach over an
eighth of a mile wide--small breakers--a line of brightly coloured
seaside houses and villas--little sloops on the sea and warships in
the distance--cavalry manoeuvering on the sands--the dunes at either
end and behind neat white veiled nurses and brightly clad convalescent
soldiers on the walk and in the sands--the distant booming of big guns,
probably English--and the nearer sounds of practice rifle and machine
gun firing.
In a small villa I met the Queen, pretty, charming and gracious, with
wonderful eyes that seemed to look straight through me and beyond. We
talked for quite a long time and she asked me what would interest me
most to see in the little corner of Belgian Belgium. I replied that I
should like to see everything that was being done in a constructive
way for the soldiers, civilians, children. With the promise that my
wish would be gratified I took my leave and was then escorted to the
villa of the famous Dr. Depage, where I remained for a week as his
guest. The hospital is a wonder of excellence in every way. Charming
ladies efficiently shoulder the burdens of the trained nurse, and they
and doctors work hours on end when the wounded come in crowds from the
nearby trenches.
At sunset descended an English aeroplane on the beach. In a few minutes
it was surrounded by a couple of hundred men in khaki, just as if they
had sprung out of the ground. Then off it went, gracefully dipping in
a low sweeping curve in front of the "palace," then soaring high as
it struck out to sea. Then the beach guard changed, and suddenly over
the front only a few miles away appeared a Belgian plane with German
shrapnel bursting in little black puffs around it. I went with Dr.
Depage to see the wounded arriving in the ambulances, and I took a
thirty second peep at a leg operation in the doing. At dinner--a very
frugal but good one--we talked of everything except war. And this was
my first day at the front.