CHAPTER IX

Thus ground down and sunk in grief we reached the end of the year. You

must not think that we were as yet urged to desperation. The courageous

inhabitants who, after hours' waiting, got a passport to go to Laon

always came back with the most comforting information.

"The news is very good ... very good. I should not be astonished if the

Germans went away in a short time."

The farmer's wife of the "Huchettes" who daily took milk to Laon--so

many bottles were requisitioned for the Red Cross--mysteriously said

with her forefinger lifted up:

"I have good hope, good hope, that 'our French' will be back before the

1st of January."

And the cannon was ever booming; its voice cheered us; we never got

weary of listening to it and studying it. Once we even believed that it

promised our deliverance. It was the 21st of December, at about eleven

in the evening. Genevieve and I were gloomily reading books held quite

close to the light, when Colette knocked at our door and appeared in her

nightgown:

"Come, come, a battle is being fought just now, don't you hear the

cannon? It is roaring louder than ever."

On tiptoe, for fear we should arouse Mme. Valaine from her sleep, we

went upstairs. Colette's window was wide open; we squeezed together in

the narrow space. Both Genevieve and I got upon the window-sill and

leaned against the frame, whilst the others pressed against the rail in

front. And there, half-dressed, unconscious of the cold, we eagerly

watched the horizon. The action took place in the direction of Vailly.

In fact, the cannon was roaring with a rage never yet heard. Its near or

distant rumbling never ceased for a second, and the bursting shells

succeeded one another uninterruptedly. When certain pieces of ordnance

were firing off full volleys, we felt a quivering all about us, and on

the writing-table the penholder jingled against the crystal of the

inkstand. Our bodies, our souls thrilled with enthusiasm, and the battle

awoke an inward echo. With our minds' eyes we eagerly watched the place

where great things happened. Our hearts flew onward to meet those who

seemed to approach us!... Oh, come, come!

Our eyes were riveted on the horizon in flames, where ever-renewed

flashes showed a red undulation marked with blue spots, or streaked with

the lights of five turning beacons. We saw the shells burst, above,

below, to the right, to the left. The cannonade seemed to slacken.

Listen! listen! A soft breeze brought us the thrilling sounds of sharp

firing, the crackling of machine-guns. Then the hollow voice began

again, and drowned the others.

"Oh," Colette cried out, wringing her hands, "to think that our

brothers, our hearts' blood, are over there! They are fighting ... they

sink to the ground ... they are wounded ... they are dying...."

We trembled, we bit our lips, we said in a murmur:

"If only they were going to break through, if only they came back...."

"Oh, come, come!..."

The whole village was wide awake. Through attic windows anxious faces

were peeping; restless people stood at their garden walls. From house to

house they exchanged impressions.

A young woman of the neighbourhood had rushed to her coffee-mill at the

beginning of the action, and by the time her old father went to the

garden to unearth a precious bottle of _marc_, she had ground all her

small reserve, so that "our French" might have hot coffee on reaching

the village!

Alas, our hopes were once more hoped in vain! Little by little the

firing grew fainter, the cannon less audible; the flames and the lights

died away; and suddenly silence and peace fell upon the village. The

extinguisher was dropped on us again. Speechless and gloomy we went to

bed at two o'clock in the morning, with limbs and souls chilled, and we

did not even try to seek sleep.

The civilians were not the only ones who thought the French likely to

come back. The hussars had spent the whole night on horseback, ready, if

their brothers-in-arms withdrew, to go at full speed to the north: such

were the orders in case of an alarm--at least they said so. Officers,

under-officers, and soldiers were all the more grieved with the

disturbance as they were going to feast and make merry all night in

order to keep Christmas, and were looking forward to such a junketing as

they had never dreamed of in the Marches of Brandenburg. The lieutenant

had visited all the farms of the village, felt a hundred fowls, and

chosen the plumpest and the tenderest. The feathered tribe were waiting

for their last hour in an adjacent shed.

But now to whom would the inheritance come?

"My beautiful fowls," the officer muttered between his teeth, "my

beautiful fowls! Who will eat them? How many a slip is there 'twixt the

duck and the lip!"

The alarm over, Von Bernhausen had not yet recovered his serenity. At

break of day he summoned his host, the farmer, the cook, and the cook's

boy, ordered them to slay, pluck, and roast directly all that bore comb

or webbed foot.

"At eleven," he declared, "we shall eat them every one."

They ate them every one. Crammed to the brim, greatly pleased with

themselves, the hussars strummed on their paunches: "'Tis so much

gained!"

There is no need to say that they began their feast again on Christmas

Day. In order to celebrate this godly day according to old customs,

soldiers of all arms and all localities had looked everywhere for

fir-trees. They were not satisfied with small ones, and in our wood,

near Bucy, they lopped eighteen beautiful Norway pines; they did the

like in other private estates, and even in a public place of Laon, where

the beheaded trees cut a very sorry figure, you may take my word for

it.

Their Christmas Eve supper was very merry, at Morny at least, and till a

late hour of the night we heard the noise of dances, laughter, and

shouts, mingled with women's voices. We civilians spent a poor trembling

Christmas, whose bitter sweetness was made up of fond thoughts of the

absent, and sad remembrances of past years. Christmas ... peace on the

earth ... Christmas ... all the pleasures of our childhood recurred to

our memory.... Good-will to all men.... Christmas, the feast of the one

that said: "Love one another." And the strong still grind down the weak,

hatred and bloodshed prevail everywhere!... The irony of the day brought

to our lips a bitter taste.

On the 31st of December every one had gone to bed as usual; the people

were but slumbering as they were now wont to, when out burst a sharp

firing accompanied by loud shouting. Every one sprang up, all windows

flew wide open, cries arose:

"The French!"

"Listen...."

"Hoch! hoch!"

Oh, despair! they were but the Prussians cheering the New Year. Even

when they enjoy themselves, these people are not harmless. Their guns

were loaded with balls, which passed through several shutters; it was a

miracle that no one was hurt.

If that New Year's Day was not a merry one, it brought with it hope that

is inseparable from everything at its beginning. Deliverance! that was

what we wished one another. And we not only relied on the New Year to

bring it, but to bring it without great delay. Fortunately this

assurance gave us a moral satisfaction, for our material rejoicings were

very scanty. In most houses, in ours for instance, meat did not appear

on the table any more than it had for many a day. Only a few farmers

succeeded in putting a chicken in their pot without the knowledge of the

Germans. For it was understood that all fowls were requisitioned. Their

owners had a right to look after them and to feed them, but not to eat

them. At the butcher's horse-meat was sold--coming of course from

animals killed at the front--and sometimes some coarse beef, which was

obtained by large bribes from soldiers employed at the slaughter-house.

Rather than feast upon such unappetising and expensive meat, we

preferred to eat boiled vegetables. Sometimes frogs' legs varied the

monotony of our daily menu; some of our neighbours managed to buy

venison, poachers being not rare in the German army; and soldiers there

were who profited handsomely from roebucks, which they killed when the

officers turned their backs.

But these few windfalls did not make up for the lack of many things,

hitherto looked upon as indispensable. And what was our alarm on hearing

once that bread itself would run short! On a certain Saturday the people

who went to fetch flour came back with their carts empty; likewise the

following week. No more bread! This bad fortune had been long foreseen,

and to provide against it we had dried slices of bread in the oven, and

thus filled many and many a tin. But seven persons are not long eating

up a reserve of this kind. So by a recipe, which all the village knew, a

dough was made of mashed potatoes and a little flour--every one had

managed to lay by a few pounds of it--and these thin cakes, baked in the

oven, bore some likeness to the food we missed.

Other villages were even less fortunate than ours, and had no bread at

all--officially at least--for a very long time. The farmers who had

contrived to hide corn had to grind it in a coffee-mill or with the help

of a mincing-machine, and the ovens--long unemployed--were again turned

to account when no Germans were present.

On the whole our village did not starve now, as it had starved during

October and November. A few peasants had mysteriously dug up their

potatoes, and sold them just as mysteriously. Besides, through the

Mayor's clever management, the Germans consented to our buying from them

a certain quantity of rice, salt, and sugar. These goods, we heard, were

the remainder of provisions sent to the commissary of stores. They were

sold on stated days, and every inhabitant was entitled to a kilo of

rice, a pound of sugar, half a pound of salt, once a fortnight. It was a

sheer pleasure to chaffer with the invaders; they demanded gold as

payment for their scanty revictualling, but later on they had to content

themselves with a sum partly in gold, partly in silver. They played

hang-dog tricks on the middlemen. Once the Mayor was informed that such

and such goods were to be had to the amount of three hundred francs.

Greatly pleased, he paid in golden cash. He was kept waiting one hour,

then two, then three. At length he was told that he had been deceived.

The provisions were not nearly so abundant as they were first thought;

there was scarcely a hundred francs' worth. The difference was to be

given back to the purchaser. And, indeed, two hundred francs were

returned to him, but the two hundred francs were paid in German notes!

For three weeks we had no bread at all; then the Germans vouchsafed us

flour of their own, so much a day; a loaf made with this powder took the

shape of a small, flat, brown and heavy crown, which gave us such acute

pains that we often preferred being hungry to having our fill of this

dough. We were all poor wretches and starvelings, but we were

fellow-citizens, and we arranged to keep a certain level of the

provisions. But a hundred times more wretched and starving were the

refugees who, when their villages were burned to the ground, had been

shared among the communes throughout the country. For months they had

neither house nor home, and about forty of them had taken shelter in

Morny, where they were huddled in one or two empty houses, lived but

scantily, and slept on straw. Several died during the winter. Laon was

also overrun with hundreds of those poor fugitives, and throughout the

town you were assailed and pursued by small ragged beggars who made you

think of Naples or Marseilles. The poor things moved your pity the more

deeply as you were compelled to think:

"Such is perhaps the fate that is awaiting me."

Indeed, nobody was sure that a whim of the Germans would not turn him

out of doors. It was seen more than once. So many things were

requisitioned. First of all, the invaders laid the absent people under

contribution, and as long as their houses had window-panes and

furniture, they were sufficient for the plunderers. But afterwards? A

large manufacturer of the neighbourhood, M. Vergniaud, had built a

castle a few years before in the Renaissance style, and filled it with

Renaissance furniture. When the rumour of invasion came, the owner took

flight with his household. The first soldiers quartered in the villa

knocked off the sculptures of the cupboards with axes, while others

carried away what pleased them. We saw a china bath taken away to the

trenches; it contained two small pigs. In the luggage of an officer who

lodged in our house there were damask curtains, plates of old Strasburg

ware, and even children's clothes, all of which came from that castle.

In the end what remained of the furniture was taken to the station,

loaded upon railway trucks, conveyed from one place to another for a

fortnight, and then sent to an unknown destination. To Germany or to the

trenches?

Some officers, who lived in Laon, did not approve of the costly

furniture about them, so they sent for three civil prisoners. The orders

they gave them were simple: "Take the furniture into the garden and

break the whole in pieces with your axes; it will serve as firewood."

The house thus cleared, these gentlemen had but to look elsewhere for

the wherewithal to furnish their rooms.

If uninhabited houses contained nothing useful, they requisitioned what

they wanted from those who had stayed at home. Von Bernhausen soon

discovered that he might find many things in our house of which he could

make a good use. First, he was sure that such people as we are overfed

ourselves. In fact, boiled potatoes, boiled carrots, boiled beans,

boiled rice, barley coffee, and nut-tree tea are everywhere looked upon

as choice dainties. So one day the street was ringing with drunken

shouts. We kept silent, attentive to the least sound. "Will they go by

without worrying us?" Oh no! An angry hand rang a full peal, whilst

heavy boots beat rhythmical imprecations upon the gate. The key had

hardly turned in the lock when Sainte-Brute rushed in like a madman,

with two other hussars. Genevieve jumped to avoid the shock of the man:

"Oh, he is drunk!"

These words increased the fury of the non-commissioned officer:

"Drunk ... drunk ... I am drunk.... You dare say it again. It is an

insult to the German army.... You will see ... you will see...."

Genevieve, with folded arms and head erect, as white as her woollen

jacket, faced the non-commissioned officer. She looked at him with such

an air of scorn and defiance that the maniac broke into a new fit of

rage. Bending forward, his fists clenched, his eyes starting from their

sockets, crimson-faced, he foamed at the mouth, he spat out: "Drunk ...

you said I am drunk ... you will go to prison ... you will be put on

bread and water ... sleep on straw ... it will serve you right ...

drunk ... drunk...."

Around us stood the frightened family. The "Blackguard" sneered, and

"Rabbit's Paw," when the madman ceased, took up the burden of abuse. All

of a sudden the sergeant altered his mind and sprang into the cellar.

His companions followed him, and we heard them upsetting empty bottles

and shaking casks. "You may seek for wine, my fine fellows, and if you

find a single bottle I will pour it out for you myself."

In the depths of the cellar Sainte-Brute continued to breathe forth

fury, loading us with violent and obscene insults. Fortunately we did

not understand much of his foul language. Then he came upstairs again in

haste, rushed into the garden, and squeaked:

"Beans ... beans ... beans...."

Like one stupefied, he stopped and gazed at the lawn as if he had

expected the beans to spring up at his call. There was no sign of them.

Then he turned round to me:

"Have you any beans?"

Good Heavens! There was a small sack of big white beans which we had

bought last week, and out of which we hoped to get many a meal! If I

deny that we have any, thought I, these people will go to the attic, and

the first thing they see is the sack of beans, white and fruitful of

promise.

"Hum ... yes, we have a small quantity of beans. But as we bought them,

they cannot be requisitioned."

"How much have you?"

The answer came reluctantly:

"About twenty litres."

"Well, they are requisitioned; you are forbidden to use them."

The callers were about to leave, but the drunken man still wished to

take Genevieve away.

"She must go to prison ... she has insulted the German army."

The "Blackguard," who was almost sober, pulled him by the arm:

"Come away, come away! These people will make a fuss, and it will be

said that we are barbarians!"

Sainte-Brute was loath to let himself be convinced. At length his

unsteady legs took him off, and his acolytes followed him.

"Ah!" cried Genevieve, passing her hand over her forehead with a gesture

as of madness, "to think that all our life we have been respected, that

we have met only polite and courteous people, and now drunken brutes may

insult us in our own house! Why, they talk of putting us in prison, as

though we were old rag-pickers found trespassing."

The neighbours hastened to condole with us, for the shouts of the

soldiers had been heard a mile off. The next intrusion came the

following day. They returned to fetch the beans. This time they were

merry in their cups, they asked for their prey with smiles, and laying

hold of it seemed vastly amused. On leaving they burst out laughing, and

Von Bernhausen, who was waiting for them outside, roared with merriment

as he weighed the sack of beans in his hand.

The Prussians are full of humour.

For three days running, no offensive. Then, one morning, the Hussars

announced themselves, as usual, by shouting, kicking at the gate, and

ringing violently at the bell. They walked in, went through the house,

and right on to the bathroom.

"We want this bath."

It was no use protesting. The bath was taken away. Three days after it

was lying smashed to pieces in the yard of an inn which the Hussars

frequented, and serving as a dust-bin for the sluts of the place.

Then came the turn of the piano.

Some time before Christmas the non-commissioned officer who had

previously searched the house presented himself very civilly:

"You have a piano; I want it for a few days; we shall bring it back to

you after Christmas."

We could not say a word. Weeks glided by; the new year saw many dawns

break; and no one brought back the piano. This harmonious piece of

furniture was the finest ornament of a house which the _garde-voies_ had

made their home. You saw nothing but black coats there; no Hussars, no

convoys. The _garde-voies_ are territorials, elderly, sedate men,

fathers of families, whose stoutness their uniforms cannot conceal. They

smoke pipes as big as beer glasses, and drink beer out of glasses as big

as kegs. They looked scornfully on those who stay at the farm, whose

drunkenness and rakish habits are a cause of scandal to them.

Therefore they kept aloof, searched houses, and requisitioned goods for

their own account, had their private rejoicings, and spent their

evenings amid tobacco smoke and the smells of beer, while they listened

rapturously to patriotic songs or even playful ditties hammered out on

our good-natured piano.

One day a rumour spread. The _garde-voies_ are going away. The sergeant

is already off. In fact, the non-commissioned officer had left our

parts, unmindful of the various pieces of furniture he had "borrowed"

from the inhabitants. It was the moment to go and claim what belonged to

us. The house was about to be cleared under the superintendence of a

corporal, who kindly authorised us to have the piano conveyed home. He

did not care for it any more; he was going away. And the instrument was

put back into our drawing-room. It did not stay there for a great while.

That very evening Von Bernhausen came round, greatly incensed.

"That piano which the _garde-voies_ had? I hear you took it away,

without asking my leave!"

"But it is our piano. It was agreed we should have it back."

"I want it; I will come for it to-morrow at ten. You had no right to

fetch it without orders from me."

Bouillot withdrew, proud of himself. The following day he came back

followed by a vehicle and eight men chosen among the strongest of the

band. All flocked round the piano, pushing, pulling to no purpose.

"I think," said my mother-in-law, "that it would be better for the walls

and for the piano if you passed it directly into the street by the

window."

"Hold your tongue," answered the kind officer, "you know nothing about

it. The piano will go through the passage."

It went through, and took with it much of the wainscot. The Hussars made

a great deal of bustle, sweating blood and water. "Peuh!" Yvonne

whispered in my ear, "those fellows have no muscles, they are but fat.

Two years ago, when we moved to Passy, the same piano was carried in by

a single, small, hunchbacked man. But look at that!"

Bouillot acted the busybody, moved to and fro, jested with his men, and

by way of encouragement gave them sound slaps in the small of the back.

It was easy to see that these people, or at least their forefathers, had

tended the swine in the forests of old Germany. At last by dint of

effort the instrument was taken out of the house, carried along the

pavement, and hoisted into the cart. The Hussars served as horses.

Gee-ho! They rushed forward, but in the courtyard the carriage gave a

start, and the piano--with intent to commit suicide--bounded out and

fell to the ground. After a few convulsions, and one last writhe of

agony, it lay quiet.

"Oh! my beautiful Pleyel," cried Yvonne.

Some fragments of wood had been knocked off; Bouillot picked them up:

"It will be easy to mend." They gave the piano a lift, and made for the

farm. All along the street we saw it skip along in its jolting car; the

ravishers scoffingly waved their hands, and mocked at us until they were

lost sight of behind a screen of snow.

Two days after a new joke of the same kind. Bouillot and his whole gang

broke in noisily:

"I want two chairs."

"All right," my mother-in-law answered, "I will give orders for them to

be brought down."

"No, I will choose them myself."

The Hussars, merry as schoolboys on a holiday, came tumbling one over

the other into the rooms, meddled with everything, poked their noses

everywhere. Von Bernhausen went right to the drawing-room. Those he

wanted were two easy-chairs in the style of Louis XVI.--ancient silk is

matchless for wiping filthy boots upon. This was carrying things too

far. Now an officer had installed himself in our house that very

morning, taking the place of Barbu and Crafleux. Could we not appeal to

him as a last shift?

Antoinette rushed forward, and knocked imperiously at the door of the

newcomer: "Sir, sir...."

She was answered by a growl. Then the door opened slightly, and a

ruffled head appeared.

"Sir, an officer is there who wants to take our furniture...."

But at that very moment Bouillot approached in a whirlwind. He stopped

short at the sight of his brother-in-arms. The two men eyed one another.

"Ah! hum! you here...."

They shook hands coldly. They were face to face, the one immense, the

other small; both had the same rank, the same decoration. Our guest had

been aroused from his afternoon nap. It was three o'clock, the right

time for honest men to sleep. His eyes were swollen, his dress untidy,

and his toes, vexed at being incorrect, wriggled about in his socks. Yet

he undertook our defence. He did not refer, I need hardly say, to

justice or to the Conventions of the Hague. He advanced a single

argument, but it struck home.

"I am quartered in this house."

"Yet this house is one of the best furnished in the village; it is but

right we should fetch here what is wanting."

"... These are my quarters.... I want the furniture that is here...."

At the beginning of the conference the soldiers became serious, and one

after another vanished on tiptoe. Bernhausen at last resigned himself

and went after them. It was our turn now to laugh at the Hussars, when

we saw them go away crestfallen, and heard their chief stammer

explanations.

A few days after, Lieutenant Bubenpech, whom our roof had the honour to

shelter, was appointed commandant in place of Bouillot, by right of

seniority. Thus ended the persecution of which we had been the victims

for two months. The guests of the farm continued their misdeeds and

their extortions, but they avoided our house, which sheltered a power

the rival of their own. We even had the pleasure of seeing the

"Blackguard" come to our house on duty, a bashful, blushing

"Blackguard," and more than that, as polite as a chamberlain in presence

of his sovereign.

However, in the beginning of February, we again had difficulties with

soldiers, coming from the trenches. Twice a week they went through Morny

with heavily laden carts. Oh, these convoys! Monday and Thursday, as

early as four in the morning, the carts rattled through the village, and

noisily shook their empty sides on the pavement. They stopped at the

station where there were large stores of straw, and a few hours later

went back to the front full to the brim. The farmers took great interest

in these personages. Loads, drivers, and carts engrossed their

attention.

"Whatever those lazy-bones do," cried an old peasant, "is badly done,

and ought not to be done."

To tell the truth, there is an art of loading carts with straw. The

first layers should be well placed and should make a solid foundation

according to time-honoured rules. The Prussians' loads always stood

awry, and threatened ruin as soon as they were erected. First one bundle

tumbled over, a second followed, then at a turn of the road the whole

pyramid sank to the ground, hurling the listless drivers headlong into a

ditch. Nearly every time they came to fetch straw the loaders managed to

let it fall, and we watched them rebuild carelessly another tottering

heap, Of course these men were thirsty after their hard toil, and they

stopped at every fountain to refresh ... their horses; as to themselves

they drank anything but water.

Such is, then, the way fifteen soldiers happened to come to our house to

draw water from our pump. Many buckets had been pulled up, and the men

did not go. They went up and down, laughed, opened one door, then

another, ventured into the garden, peeped in at the windows. Genevieve

went to encounter them.

"Do you want anything?"

"Nothing at all. We are pleased to stay here because there are pretty

girls in the house," answered the sergeant in very good French.

"Then, if there is no need for you to stay here, you had better go away;

I want to lock the gate, we never keep it open."

And the men withdrew. Colette, who watched the scene from upstairs, said

afterwards:

"It was very funny! You'd have thought that our sister was driving these

fifteen big louts before her."

No sooner were they in the street than the Germans gazed at one another.

Did it not look as if they had been kicked out of doors!

"Hullo! we are not people to be trifled with!"

They soon gave proofs of it. Suddenly they flung themselves upon the

windows, doors, walls. We were forced to give way, and my mother-in-law

opened the gate. This compliance with their wishes did not abate the

assailants' anger. They rushed into the yard, and poured forth worse

volleys of abuse than ever an Apache of Montmartre could invent.

"Ah," cried the sergeant, grinding his teeth in anger, "you are not

tamed down here; you do not know what the Germans are! Come to Lierval;

you will see there how the people have been curbed. They don't say

anything now.... They hold their tongues, I warrant you...."

One of his men drew the moral of this discourse by aiming his gun at us.

"Franzouss ... all shot."

They stayed two hours, strolling about the yard, muttering insults

between their teeth. To complete our misfortune, the convoy spent the

night in Morny. The men came back in the evening, and the commandant

being away they made the most fearful row we had ever heard, from nine

to eleven, and yet the Hussars were not bad at rough music.

They were not bad at many other jobs. They were acknowledged the most

skilful hunters of hiding-places, and Sainte-Brute, with his acolytes,

spent many a day in wandering through fields and gardens. They sought

for holes that might conceal potatoes, corn, or--generally near to the

houses--wine which they were so fond of. The Conventions of the Hague,

it would seem, allow the invaders of a country to requisition wine, for

the use of the "wounded"; so when the soldiers emptied a cellar or

discovered a _cache_ they declared with gravity that it was all for the

Red Cross. I suppose the Germans bear a likeness to zoophytes, what one

of them absorbs is profitable to the others, and when wine had been

unearthed "for the wounded" the whole pack were drunk for days together.

And these creatures took all--all. They destroyed systematically what

they could not take away. After having despoiled us of our money, they

seized corn, straw, vegetables, wine, milk, eggs. Poultry, cows, oxen,

the very horses which the peasants had bought of them in a bad

condition, and taken good care of, belonged to them, and they alone were

entitled to dispose of them. All that was on the earth and beneath the

earth, all that was growing and living--including the people--were their

own property. They carried off the very paving-stones heaped up on the

wayside to repair the roads. If they stay long enough they will carry

away, cart after cart, the rich, fat earth of our soil, to spread over

and fertilise the barren ground of Prussia. If they could find a means,

with the help of their alchemists who have made a pact with the devil,

they would take away our deep-blue sky in panels; they would drag along

our bracing and mild air to purify the mists of the north.

As they cannot--despite their bargain with the devil--perform such feats

of skill, they wreak revenge on us by spoiling our beautiful country.

Our farmers were furious when they saw the Germans--the first winter

after their arrival--plough up fields throughout the land, unmindful of

the limits and value of the soil. And what splendid tillage was theirs!

Their laziness turned up about ten centimetres of earth; they sowed

seed, and put no manure; before they leave they want to exhaust the soil

of which they are jealous, and which they would like to annihilate. They

cut down nut trees to make butt-ends of guns, and fruit trees to amuse

themselves.

In the forests they committed downright murder. Where it is worth while

they cut down trees of reasonable growth at regular intervals; anywhere

else they break off saplings about one yard from the ground. In the wood

of Festieux I know an immense beech-tree. Its trunk can hardly be

encircled by four men with outstretched arms. In its boughs a nobleman

of the neighbourhood lived for several weeks at the time of the

Revolution. As they found no means to fell this giant, the invaders have

hewn pieces out of it all round, and cut off its upper branches. The

poor tree will not outlive the invasion. On the outskirts of the

villages, along the roads and brooks, the Germans cut down the beautiful

trees, poplars, maples, chestnuts, which gave a poetical charm to the

country. To spoil the land is the aim of our malignant foe. Truly, it

will be long before songs and laughter are heard again in the wasted

country. The nymphs of our groves seek in vain their verdant shades

along the treeless rivulets, and flee away, sighing their elegies. Can

anything be sadder than this? No epic could be more tragical, no ode

could exalt our hearts more than this call, more than this immense

wailing we are ever hearing. It is the very breath of our sullied,

bruised, wounded country, and it will not cease until the day when her

sons return, and striking her soil with their feet will say:

"Mother! O, mother! thy cause is avenged! We come back from the country

of thy foes!"

PART III

"There is no one in the jungle so wise and good and clever and

strong and gentle as the Bandar-log."

"We are great. We are free. We are wonderful. We are the most

wonderful people in all the Jungle. We all say so, and so it must

be true."--"The Monkey-People," RUDYARD KIPLING (_The Jungle

Book_).

CHAPTER X

Herr Bubenpech had hardly been appointed commandant in Morny when the

enemy took a new step in the organisation of the country. From that

moment two or three spectacled scribes gathered together in a large

schoolroom, labelled "Bureau" both in French and in German, and busied

themselves with endless scribblings. They drew up lists of the male

inhabitants of the village, who twice a month had to be present when

their names were called over. They put in writing all the divers tasks

required of the villagers. They kept an account of the allowance of food

sometimes granted to the civilians. They distributed passports and they

superintended requisitions. From the outset Bubenpech seemed eager to

show he was hard to please. The rural constable was ordered to announce

that gold was to be brought to the "bureau," where the owners would be

given bank-notes in its stead, according to the simplest exchange, 100

marks for 125 francs.

Pieces of gold are not readily drawn out of the stockings. Yet a few of

them had to come forth. I am afraid that since then the invaders have

managed to empty them; but at that time they were only at the heel.

By mere chance Morny had as yet paid no more than the contribution of

war which had been levied on the whole country soon after the invasion.

Other villages less fortunate than ours had been overburdened with taxes

upon the most ridiculous pretences. A poor hamlet, Coucy les Eppes, was

fined six times during the space of a few months. First came the general

contribution. Then a fine of half a million francs was imposed upon the

canton of Sissonne, to which Coucy belongs, and every village had to pay

its share. It so happened that in September some soldiers, coming back

from Reims, drove their carts through Sissonne, and as their carts were

loaded with bottles of wine, they drank all the way, and threw empty

bottles behind them. Then came motor-cars, which punctured their tyres

on the broken glass. Great scandal! The civilians were accused of having

put a trap for honest Prussian wheels. Their protestations availed

nothing. The canton was condemned to a fine; the canton must pay; and

Coucy paid like the other communes.

When all houses were searched after the great proclamation of November,

an old flint-lock, kept in memory of an ancestor, was discovered in

Coucy at an old maiden lady's. It never struck the owner that she should

have brought it to the Mayor's house, or hidden it. And suppose the old

maiden lady had shouldered the ancient gun? It is enough to make you

shudder when you think of the danger the German army might have thus

incurred. As quick as could be a few thousand francs were levied on the

village which dared be subversive enough to conceal an old maid and an

old gun. Even then the troubles of the poor village did not come to an

end. A French aviator dropped a bomb on the station, and the bomb

disturbed a few German carriages. The military authority knitted its

brows.

"Why! This Coucy is talked of again! Let it have a good fine, and it

will keep quiet."

For what reasons had this village to bleed itself and borrow from the

town in order to pay the invader twice more, I do not know, but so it

was. Morny's turn was coming. One night a barn of the farm where the

Hussars were quartered took fire, and was soon in a blaze with the straw

it contained. The whole village ran to quench the conflagration. We

stood near-by just long enough to see the peasants put the fire out

with all speed, while the soldiers folded their arms, and were pleased

to be amused. Von Bernhausen and Bubenpech looked on at the spectacle.

Then Von Bernhausen thought proper to rate the Mayor sharply:

"There are not people enough.... Go and fetch civilians.... Be

quick...."

All the able-bodied men of the village were summoned, and they sweated

while the Hussars made sport of them. The _Gazette des Ardennes_, which

took the place of the _Journal de Guerre_ to the very best advantage,

does not relate such accidents in this wise, but I can only narrate what

my eyes have seen.

Bubenpech rubbed his hands. He had found an opportunity to show his

zeal. With all speed he sent a report to the Staff, upon which he

depended, stating that civilians had set the barn on fire out of spite.

He forgot to add that a few hours before the disaster the Hussars had

burnt their dirty, lousy mattresses in the neighbourhood of the said

barn, where, besides, soldiers had been seen smoking many a time with

perfect serenity.

So stout gentlemen in full uniform came to Morny, and with reproachful

looks stalked majestically through the streets. A chance was given us to

atone for the misdeed. If within twenty-four hours information was

lodged against the civilian who had set fire to the barn, the village

might be forgiven. Should the contrary happen, a severe penalty would be

immediately enforced. No denunciation, and for good reasons. The people

were convinced that the soldiers had kindled the straw on purpose. The

military authorities, grieved to the heart, imprisoned, without further

delay, the Mayor and six notable persons. Then they deliberated upon the

matter, and always regretfully imposed a fine of 16,000 francs on the

village. They ordered the other prisoners to be set at liberty after

three days, but kept the Mayor under lock and key for two weeks, ill fed

and worse lodged. M. Lonet and another municipal councillor went the

round of the village, and did their best to get the sum required. They

managed to collect 12,000 francs, and the Germans had to be content with

that for the present. They knew only too well that they would catch us

again.

Besides other cares worried us. In February 1915 our houses were again

searched from top to bottom. It was proclaimed that the inhabitants

should declare the quantity of corn, flour, and vegetables they had in

store, so that the provisions might be requisitioned according to the

needs of the German army. And mysterious sacks, closed baskets, furtive

barrows were seen in Morny. There was an air of haste; men passed close

to the walls, went along out-of-the-way paths, up to attics, down into

holes. When the day of perquisition came--the Germans believed their own

eyes rather than the declarations of the natives--there were tears and

gnashing of teeth. Treasures were discovered, potatoes and corn dug up.

The Germans laid hold of everything; they even despoiled the very poor

of their slender provisions. For instance, our neighbours, the

Branchiers, a very young couple, whose joint ages were less than forty

years, who had only an empty purse and about thirty kilos of potatoes,

were robbed to the very last shred.

That they might not lose a single potato they carefully raked Mme.

Turgau's shed all around, and seized forty, though the poor woman has

four children, who do not live upon nothing. We, in our house, tired of

the war, hid nothing at all. We had possessed for a fortnight four sacks

of wheat, which we had bought from a farmer, who had mysteriously sold

this secret hoard. Where, I beg of you, could you conceal four sacks of

wheat in an honest house? Especially when you know from sad experience

that the perquisitioners perform their office conscientiously. At

Aulnois they had watered a cellar to make sure that the ground had not

been newly dug. At Vaux they had not left twenty centimetres of a

certain garden unexplored. After a long debate we decided to leave

things as they were.

But if peace returns and I am able to build a house, it shall have

hiding-places, wells, tanks, deep dungeons! Hollow walls shall open by

means of secret springs, and two, three, five cellars shall be arrayed

one beneath the other, which, in case of need, shall swallow up whole

herds, to say nothing of a vast reserve of groceries.

Meanwhile, our goods being full in sight, Bubenpech, who, out of

politeness, gave himself the trouble to search our house, visiting every

cupboard and poking his nose everywhere, had been at no pains to

discover them. He declared he was compelled to requisition the corn, but

with a smile he left us our potatoes. Colette was indignant.

"Why! this fellow does not take our potatoes because he wants to be

amiable! And our neighbours have been despoiled of everything! It is a

shame! We must share with the others."

And we did.

A basket to right, a basket to left, a basket over the way, our

provision well-nigh dwindled to nothing. After that we were in the same

state as our neighbours. It is beyond doubt that some people had

managed to save many things, and of course the Germans had surmised as

much. Two or three days after the first perquisitions they dropped in

unawares, and made very profitable visits. Mme. Turgau, for instance,

had succeeded in hiding a sack of wheat, and the soldiers were hardly

out of the way when she baked a loaf to celebrate her good fortune. The

loaf, yellow and round, was displayed on the table, while on the ground

lay the sack, saved from the wreck, and little Lucienne, a slender girl

of twelve, as reasonable as a woman, was grinding corn in a coffee-mill.

Near at hand a dish was already full of flour; after a second operation

of the same kind it would be fit for kneading. The mother was out, the

baby girl, Claire, was busy sucking her thumb, with her admiring gaze on

her sister; the last-born was asleep in its cradle.

Heavy steps broke the silence, big shadows appeared on the door-sill.

"The Prussians!"

The coffee-mill stopped short.

"Ah! ah!" the non-commissioned officer said, "you have corn; you stole

it."

"No, sir, it is just a little bit I have gleaned with mamma."

"You stole it," replied the soldier. "Don't you know that everything

belongs to the Germans? If you have corn you must have stolen it."

And the perquisitioners carried away in triumph the small sack, the

beautiful golden loaf, and even the dishful of half-ground flour. On

coming back, Mme. Turgau found Lucienne in tears, Claire weeping in

imitation of her sister, and Jacquot, ever ready to make an uproar,

screaming at the top of his voice. After these fatal visits we had still

more holes to take in in our belts. Nothing was ever left on our table.

The dishes, few in number, were immediately divided into seven parts,

and every one thought when rising from table: "I could begin again with

pleasure."

The question of light was another plague of our life. The last drop of

petroleum, the last traces of linseed oil had been converted into smoke

a long time before. We were obliged to use horse-oil like our

neighbours.

Horse-oil! Oh! for ever and ever nauseous remembrance! Always

half-congealed, brownish, sticky, stinking, it made its bold

manipulators sick for an hour.

This oil was manufactured by a man in the village when he could procure

a dead horse, not too lean; and as we could not get as much as we had

wished, we had to be sparing of it. The villagers simply poured it into

an old sardine box, and the wick, leaning against the metal brim,

smoked, charred, smelt nasty, and gave as little light as possible.

In spite of our efforts, this half-liquid matter energetically refused

to ascend in the lamp; and we were forced to let it burn openly in a

receptacle of some kind or other, and to support it by an ingenious

system of pins. In fact it was so ingenious that the wick was swamped in

the oil every moment, and we were left groping about the dark room,

whose air was infected with a smell of burnt flesh. Doleful evenings,

still more doleful nights. We no longer slept as we had slept before the

Hussars' serenades. In order to give a larger apartment to Bubenpech,

Genevieve and I had to be satisfied with the "small room" which is on a

level with the yard and icy cold in winter. A simple rush-mat covered

the pavement; the stove was small, the fuel rare, our blanket thin--the

Hussars had requisitioned two others. We went to bed shivering with

cold; our hot-water bottle alone gave us a little life. As to sleep....

One does not sleep much in an invaded country; every moment some

unwonted noise makes you start; and then the rumbling of the cannon

disturbs you, and the thought of the absent sends a thrill through your

heart.

And then you ask yourself: How long? how long? In February 1915 the end

seemed to have been postponed. "Our soldiers will come back next

spring," said the peasants. Resigned to fate, we all waited for their

return, and long were the nights. I know people who went to bed at five

o'clock, without a dinner, for good reasons, and got up at about eight

o'clock. How many pangs and cares thus wandered in the darkness!

Genevieve and I dreaded the shades of evening, and it was often midnight

before we made up our minds to blow out the light. Many a nightmare

startled us, keeping us wide awake for the rest of the night. Who shall

describe the horror of the dreams dreamed during the war? The dreams of

the conquered! Every night brought its own vision, but two came back

with a most distressing obstinacy.

A landscape covered with snow, a great deal of snow, round-topped

mountains, the wind tossing the branches of the fir-trees. It looks like

the Vosges. Why? Posy, are you in the Vosges? How can the wind make such

a noise through the branches? I see but one fir tree black against the

gloomy sky. And I hear it thunder, yet the thunder never roars in

winter. I see a crow whirling round and round before it alights. There

is nothing under the fir tree. But I know something must be there. Here

it is, it is black ... it is long. The crow hovers. I do not stir, my

feet are sunk in the snow. Yet I come nearer, or rather the thing is

approaching. Yet it is exactly what I thought; it is a dead body. Its

uniform is untouched. Its face ... the eye-sockets are empty. Who is it?

who is it? The crow has torn out his eyes! Yet we buried the scout in

Chevregny. Who is it? Oh, God! he that is nearest to me in the world!

Posy!...

I shrieked with terror and I awoke, panting. The wind moaned through the

trees of the garden, and from time to time ceased as if to allow its

raging interlocutor, the cannon, to roar instead of itself.

It was impossible to try to sleep again. But we also used to dream wide

awake. In the invaded country thousands and thousands of people are thus

thinking in the dark. Their hands are clasped in prayer, or clenched, or

convulsively pressed, or relaxed out of utter weariness. It is the hour

when the absent are present. What family has not one or several members

at the front? And for many months an abyss has grown between us which

cannot be crossed. But at night they come back; in the dark we see the

dear faces smile; we watch their familiar gestures, we hear their

familiar voices. Shall we be allowed to see them again here below?

Where are they? where are the strong arms that embraced me when I

murmured, "Posy, I am cold."

Where are the beloved ones? The mothers are at prayers, the mothers are

crying; sisters, wives, all that love shrink with horror at the sights

that pass before their eyes. Where are the beloved ones? They have been

dead perhaps these last six months. Their bodies may be rotting among

barbed wire; they may have been blown to pieces by an explosion, or

swollen by asphyxiating gas, or burnt in the flames, or crushed beneath

earthworks, or riddled by grape-shot, or torn by balls. Their bodies

which have been cherished, cared for, kissed! And we go on hoping for

them, thinking them alive, safe and sound. When shall we know whether

they are dead or alive, whether strong and healthy or moaning upon a bed

in hospital?

Our souls, our eager hearts are longing for delivery, and the day it

comes will perhaps bring with it the bitterest sorrows. Most families

will have to mourn a dead one; the whole country will be sunk in grief:

Rachel weeping for her children and refusing to be comforted. We shall

be despoiled and stripped of everything; we live but for the hope of

meeting again our loved ones, and how many will never come back! And

while they die, we receive their murderers! They sleep under our roofs,

eat the fruits of our labour, and reign over us.

The want of news, the presence of the Germans, such were the saddest

things of our life. Oh, they were present, always present! It was

impossible to forget them even for one moment. They pursued us in our

dreams, they haunted us. How often I have found myself stretched on a

road, on an icy cold road in a barren country. And men came galloping up

with loud shouting, and I could not move, the cavalcade was going to

crush me:

The Hussars! the Hussars!...

Once more I set up a cry; I woke up. Steps, voices resounded in the

street. The officers' evening party was at an end. The key fumbled at

the lock; Bubenpech was coming back. It was one o'clock, or two, or

three. I heard the dogs patter along the yard, they wanted to identify

the visitor. The cannon rumbled with a sluggish sound. The hours were

slow, slow.

At breakfast, Antoinette often said charitably:

"Just mind what I say, mother, one morning you will see the whole of us

come up singing, dancing, laughing, perfectly fit for Bedlam."

To be sure one would go mad for less. Our life was duller than any

one's: fancy six women shut up in a house, having nothing particular to

do, always engrossed by the same tiring thoughts. Leisure is an evil

very difficult to bear in an invaded territory. You wait; you do nothing

else; you seem to be in a condition that cannot go on for long. Work? To

what purpose? For whose sake? And what work to do? Save the men whom the

Germans have requisitioned, and who, of course, tire themselves as

little as possible, every one drags out his days. The baker, the

teachers, and the cobbler are the only persons of the village really

busy. We envied them their occupations, as we had but our needles to

fill up our free hours. Very soon we had darned our old clothes, set

them to rights, and distributed them among the poor. There was a family

of seven children, whose mother had just died, and whose clothes we kept

in decent condition. But it was not enough. We, too, yawned our life

away.

Ten times a day we cried aloud for the means of escape! Escape! To live

again an active life, to see people who are not Germans, to know what is

going on, to live!

A gleam of hope came: it was in the month of March, the garden was

already strewn with snowdrops, primroses, and crocuses. Captivity was

harder to bear than ever. One day the rural constable made an

announcement. He appeared to our eyes crowned with a golden nimbus, and

more dazzling than an archangel; his voice was sweeter than honey. He

said:

"The persons who want to leave the invaded territory to go into other

parts of France may have their names put down at the townhall with the

exception of the men from fourteen to sixty."

This caused so great an emotion among us that we well-nigh quitted this

life suddenly and simultaneously. We kept on the look-out for Bubenpech,

when he should come home, to demand further particulars.

This Bubenpech did not please us at all. It is agreed that no Prussian

could have pleased us. But on the dislike we entertain to the whole race

was grafted a personal aversion to him. He was dark-haired,

middle-sized, short-legged, with a solid torso, topped by a big neckless

head. He had regular features, deceitful eyes, and looked something of a

rake. He was said to be nearly related to a general, and he thought

himself irresistible.

"How dissipated he looks," we said the first time we saw him.

And one of his soldiers whispered in Mme. Lantois' ear:

"Lieutenant, not bad! ... but many women, many women. That's not good!"

In fact Bubenpech led a most dissolute life. He soon brought confusion

upon Morny, and his stay there was the commencement of a debauch that

caused a scandal throughout the region.

With us he was at first all smiles. But our looks soon chilled him, and

he was content with a short bow when he happened to meet one of us,

which was rare, for we carefully avoided him.

"At least," we said, "he is not too dull-witted; he understands that we

look sour at the Germans, and he does not want to have us punished for

it."

We were candid. Bubenpech was not rude and unmannerly like Von

Bernhausen, and therefore his methods were different.

All the same he bore us a grudge for having been insensible to his

charms; only he looked upon revenge as a cold dish. But he swore that we

should pay dearly for the scorn of the Germans, and he waited his

opportunity. He was sure to seize it, even if it limped with a lame

foot.

For the present, he encouraged us to go, and gave most comforting

particulars about the journey, which would be an easy one. The trains

would take thousands of people to Switzerland, and within four or five

days at the farthest we should be in Paris. Would we go, indeed! Rather

than stay behind we would have made the journey in a cattle-truck, upon

our head, or on our knees. Five days to go to Paris, what is that! Even

were we to spend them sleepless, even were we to starve, and be squeezed

tight like sardines in a tin box!

"Who will go?" I inquired. There were some who held back.

"I stay here," declared Mme. Valaine. "Up to now the house has not been

plundered; I want to keep it as it is."

"I stay here," said Colette in her turn. "Do you think I will fly before

the Prussians again? Besides, I have nothing to do in Paris. I will keep

mother company. I saw the French go away; I want to see them come back."

"Then," Yvonne decided, "I will stay too. Shall I go and study music in

Paris when the Prussians are still here? Never. Since mother and Colette

remain, I stay with them. After all, the French can't be long in coming

back."

Mother and daughters insisted.

"Besides," they added, "living will be easier when you are away. If Mme.

Lantois manages to give us one or two eggs or a bottle of milk, this

windfall will not have to be divided into seven parts. For us, all that

is left of our potatoes! For us, the provision of macaroni that is

hidden in the canopy of the bed of 'our Prussian.'"

After a long discussion the thing was settled. We fell into one

another's arms. Every one of us shed a flood of tears, and with feverish

haste we made preparations for our departure.

At the idea that he was going to see his mother again Pierrot had turned

as white as a sheet, and then had begun screaming at the top of his

voice, "Mother! mother! mother!" He jumped, he danced. We had to tell

him that if he were so tiresome we should be obliged to leave him in

Morny, and he became as quiet as a lamb.

Our bags were soon packed, and with thrilling hearts we awaited our

departure.

The announcement of the journey did not arouse the enthusiasm which the

Germans had expected. Bubenpech had given us a grand and imposing

picture of those evacuations _en masse_.

"We purpose," he said, "we purpose evacuating forty per cent of the

civil population. Why should we go on feeding so many useless people?

"We shall but keep back," he went on, "large landowners and the workers

we are in need of. At the end of the month, a train will start every

day; volunteers will first go, then the necessitous."

The number of volunteers were very small. The people reposed no trust at

all in the Prussians.

"Do you think," the women of the village whispered, "that they are going

to take you to France? To a concentration camp rather. You may take my

word for it. Some people have thus left Chauny, and now they are

somewhere in the north ... out in the open country ... up to the knees

in the mud...."

We laughed at them.

"But why should the Germans take charge of us? They would be obliged to

feed us no matter how little they gave us."

It was all of no use. Nobody was willing to go, not even those who

eagerly wished to escape.

The organisers of the convoys were amazed. They determined that certain

persons should go by foul means since they would not go by fair means.

The commandant of every village was ordered to eject so many persons.

The number for Morny was fixed at twenty. There were two volunteers

besides ourselves, an elderly lady, Mme. Charvon, and her granddaughter;

both wanted to go back to Paris. Thirteen reluctant emigrants were then

to be picked up among the people. Bubenpech chose at random a woman from

Braye, her five small children, and her old father, then three orphan

boys, and a family including an invalid father, a mother, and two little

girls.

These had two sons, sixteen and eighteen years old, who would stay

behind if the parents went. They raised an outcry.

"My poor boys!" the mother moaned; "am I going to abandon them like

that? We beg nothing of the Germans! We want only to be left together."

She went to the "bureau," threw herself at the feet of Bubenpech, who

scouted her demand with disdain, and had her kicked out of doors. The

morning we were to start she pretended to be ill, and kept to her bed.

The lieutenant despatched four men who took her out of bed, heedless of

her resistance, and made her get into the cart, with a blanket as sole

wrapper. We heard the poor woman sob while she put on her stays and

petticoats in the jolting cart that took us to Laon. And the folly of it

was that another woman of Cerny wished for nothing better than to go.

"Since my sister and father are sent away," she said, "I choose rather

to go with them; I have no mind to stay here alone with my two babies."

It was not to be. Three persons eager to stay were forced to go; three

others, nothing loath to go, were bidden to stay. Thus had our leaders

settled the matter.

In other villages it was still worse. A man of Barenton set his house on

fire and hanged himself rather than leave. Some persons were sent away

because the Germans coveted their houses for one purpose or another. At

Vivaise the wife of an adjutant was compelled to leave her

well-furnished house for the reason that it pleased those gentlemen. So

a blind woman and her invalid husband, both aged seventy-five, were

banished from Verneuil. In tears they left their small house where they

had lived happily for many a year, their garden, whose fruits were

sufficient for their scanty needs. Besides, they had a few fowls and a

little money, and so they were not in the least a charge upon the

Germans. Of course they expected everything to be plundered and

destroyed, and, weak and old as they were, they saw no hope that they

would ever come back.

We were volunteers, at one moment distressed at the thought that we left

three of our own people in the lurch, at another mad with joy that we

should soon be at liberty, or trembling with fear lest we should hear

bad news of those whose fate was hidden from us.

About the end of March, after many tears had been shed, embraces and

kisses exchanged, after the very dogs had been hugged, we found

ourselves in front of the "bureau" with the other departing travellers.

We all got into two big carts, and sat down on our luggage. The

departures were somewhat delayed. We had to wait for the woman who did

not want to go away.

At ten the carts set out.

"Good-bye, we shall see you later in Paris," Bubenpech cried.

It was the parting kick of the ass.

"Then you will come as a prisoner," replied Antoinette, laying aside all

prudence. The officer broke out laughing and turned a deaf ear. With a

great deal of jolting, the carts took us away, and we soon lost sight of

the pale faces of Mme. Valaine and her daughters. Two gendarmes on

horseback accompanied us. Thus we were enrolled among the emigrants. We

alighted in Laon, and were shown into a huge hall adjoining the station.

The little emigrants of Cerny were still screaming, the refractory woman

had not left off crying. Pierrot felt uneasy, and hung on my arm; we

dragged our luggage along with a great deal of trouble. The hall we were

taken to was already crowded with hundreds of persons. From early

morning the refugees had been arriving in great numbers. Long rough

boards nailed upon four upright pieces of wood served as tables and

benches. Besides the picture of the emperor the walls were chiefly

decorated with vast inscriptions. "God with us" was not absent; nor was

"God punish England," in letters three feet high. The shrieking of the

urchins, their mothers' scolding overtopped the general noise. The old

people looked scared, and did not know what to do. On the rough tables

soldiers put platters of a sticky, greyish soup; a smell of burnt grease

floated in the air. We were waiting for our turn to go to a small room

where three nurses of the Red Cross were busy feeling, searching,

undressing the emigrants as they pleased.

"No papers, no letters?"

At two every one had filed off before these searchers, and we were

ordered to start again. So through the streets of Vaux the pitiful crowd

wended its way to the station, about twelve hundred emigrants surrounded

by soldiers. From their thresholds the inhabitants stared at us. Truly a

more miserable herd never was seen. The Germans had chosen to send away

the poorest among the poor of our villages--bareheaded women, ragged

children, beggarly men, sick people, cripples, idiots. All were laden

and overladen with parcels, baskets, and bundles. There were two or

three carts to convey the heaviest luggage, but every one preferred

keeping what was dearest to him.

We, too, were overladen. We made what haste we could among the grey

crowd. We had walked a mile, I could hardly carry my bag any longer. At

one moment it even dropped from my hands. I approached an officer, stiff

and stout, who seemed to be the manager of the caravan.

"Sir," I besought, "please order a moment's rest.... I can't go any

farther."

"No, no, no halt. If you can't carry your things, ask some one else."

Some one else! That was easy to say. I looked around me despairingly;

the people were all as weary as I.

Pierrot stuck to my arm, Antoinette was somewhere in front, Genevieve

was spent with fatigue. Near us a soldier seemed touched with pity.

"I am sorry I can't help you, but it is forbidden."

At length I caught sight of a big fellow who carried his fortune in a

handkerchief. He was one-eyed, one-armed, but he was willing to take

charge of my bag. I was then able to help Genevieve with hers. We were

saved, we stopped every other minute, put down our common load, and

taking it up again ran forward to fall into place.

Where were we going to? We went on, tramping through the mud, with the

noise of a flock of sheep, and, to crown all, there came on a heavy

rain, which the poor crying children received on their dirty little

noses. We had left the suburbs, and the road now passed through the open

country. At about three miles from the station we perceived an immense

train of third-class carriages that was waiting for us. It was carried

by storm. Each one settled himself. We were but six persons in one

carriage, we and two ladies of Morny, the grandmother and the

granddaughter.

We exchanged congratulations. We had been told that the journey might be

difficult: one of the hardest stages was passed. We sat down to recover

our breath, stretched our stiff limbs, and then looked around us. The

carriages we were in had been used to convey troops; they were bedecked

with inscriptions in pencil. Some without much expense of thought merely

wished that "God should punish England!" Others clamoured for "the death

to those pigs of Frenchmen!" Or stated that "French blood is good."

Pierrot conscientiously rubbed out with his handkerchief as much as he

could. After many manoeuvres, marches, and counter-marches the train

decided to start. It was about four o'clock. Oh, memorable hour! We saw

the gate of our prison open a little! Was it possible that we were

going away? Was it true? Could we say in our turn, "within four days,

Parisse!"

We were made with joy; we kissed one another; then we thought it wise to

put our things in order. This carriage would doubtless serve us as a

shelter as far as the Swiss frontier, perhaps for two or three days. The

first thing, then, was to make ourselves comfortable. Our feet were

cold. Suppose we put on our slippers? No sooner said than done.

When our first joy had somewhat cooled down, and we were properly

installed, we watched the landscape. The train went slowly through a

dull country; the clouds seemed to crawl along the ground, and the mist

moistened the panes of the windows. We had hardly gone an hour when the

train stopped, and left half of its carriages in the station. Then we

resumed our journey, and soon made a second halt. We could not read the

name of the station we were at; we did not know even what line we were

on. The engine was reversed, then stopped some time after with a loud

whistle.

Soldiers went along the carriages and threw the doors open.

"Get down, all, bags and baggage."

Sudden change! In great haste we put on our shoes, tied our shawls and

cloaks together, gathered our bags, and jumped out on the line. Many

cries and calls were heard. At last the train emptied itself; there was

a whistle, and off it moved. There we were, about six hundred of us

standing on a steep bank, and wondering what was going to happen next.

No station was to be seen, the country seemed deserted, pasture-land on

the left, hills stripped by the winter on the right. The emigrants,

uneasy in their minds, bustled about; women fell a-weeping; relations

sought one another; an old man bent with age, and walking awry like a

crab, moved to and fro. "My wife, I have lost my wife." Thus he moaned

to himself, looking for the weak arm that would hold up his greater

debility.

The babies cried with cold. A sharp wind pierced us to the marrow, the

rain cut our faces, and our hearts thrilled with fear, while the night

fell on the anxiety of the miserable herd moving in the fog.

CHAPTER XI

Under the bridge of the railway was a high-road. The soldiers directed

the crowd towards it. "Get down, get down," they cried, gesticulating

all the while. Narrow steps had been cut in the dark slippery ground.

The bank was very steep, yet every one ventured down; the young people

held the old ones; the nimblest carried luggage and infants; the

children tumbled forwards upon all fours. On getting to the road we saw

a few carts waiting for bags and bundles. We abandoned ours into the

hands of the soldiers. Happen what might to our things, our courage

failed us to take charge of them again. Who knew how many miles we were

to walk?

"Go on, go on," our guardians cried.

And the sorry band, so much the more lamentable as they were drenched to

the skin, bent their bodies, and trudged off again. "What does this

unexpected halt mean?" we asked one another with a mixture of curiosity

and dismay. The road with hedges on each side, after we had met with a

bridge and a crossing, took us to a village. Standing in front of their

houses, the people, moved with pity, watched our beggarly crowd go by in

the twilight, dabbling in the mud, and not knowing where they were being

taken to. We did not even know the place we were in. The name we read on

a finger-post did not say anything to us. At the top of the street two

gendarmes on horseback divided the herd into two parts, so many heads to

the right, so many to the left. We were pushed on to the right, we went

to the right. We had left the village, and went down a road bordered

with high trees that led into the open country.

"They were right all the same, those who said we would be landed in the

fields," moaned a woman. Then we took a short cut between two banks. We

were all over mud. At length, on the slope of the hill, we caught sight

of a dark mass, a very large farm with vast outhouses. We had reached

the goal. The lower windows glimmered; a few guards were seen in a room

of the ground floor. We entered the kitchen, where whole beams blazed on

the hearth. The soldiers bustled about. It was no light matter to settle

in a short time--350 persons crowded in together in the courtyard. And

they hurried over the job: so many emigrants in the house, in the

barns, in the stables, in the attics.

"Straw is to be had everywhere; do as you can."

The people did as they could. Moving about kept them warm; it was their

only means. We were among the privileged; we had been presented with a

small room at the angle of the house, on the first story. It was very

scantily furnished: a spring mattress in an iron frame, a child's

bedstead, two trusses of straw.

"Pierrot, your couch would be fit for a king."

We buried him in the straw with his clothes on, and heaped clothes upon

him. He was not cold; he fell asleep.

But we lay, dying with cold, all three on the narrow spring mattress,

and the draught chilled us to the bone. In vain we wrapped ourselves in

shawls and cloaks; we could get neither warmth nor sleep. We had brought

with us a candle, and we let it burn, not without remorse, since we

expected many another night of the same kind. A change of weather

happened opportunely; the wind suddenly rose and swept away the clouds;

we thought there would be a frost. A cold, bleak wind was howling round

the house; the weathercocks creaked, the boards in the half-ruined

sheds cracked, and the 350 emigrants shuddered with cold in the freezing

rooms of the farm and in the draughty barns. A mile and a half away, at

the sugar-mill, 360 others were shivering in halls and cellars. In the

guard-room downstairs the soldiers gave a straw mattress to a poor old

man who had terrible pains in the back, and who did not cease to wail

the whole night long. Upstairs, in the attic, there were forty persons,

among them fifteen children of charity. There was no rest to their

weeping, nor to the patter of their feet. These small refugees, rather

than go down the steep, black steps into a colder, blacker place,

relieved themselves at the angles of the beams, and we saw with horror a

trickle come from between the joists and run down our walls. Twice heavy

steps shook the lobby, the door opened, a voice counted us: "One, two,

three, four...." The soldiers were going their round. Half-frozen, we

ventured downstairs to go and warm ourselves in the kitchen. But it was

already crowded with about forty women with their babies, either in

front of the fire or squeezed together on the benches. The air was

unbreathable, so we went back to our icy chamber. Benumbed with cold,

our limbs gathered up together, our chins on our knees, our feet stuck

in our muffs, with a sore throat and a giddy head we made up our minds

to wait for the morning, to take stock of our situation, and to find out

in what place fate and the Germans had deposited us.

In the whole Thierache, teeming with lovely hamlets, I warrant that

there is no other so pretty as Jouville. It is perched half-way up the

hill on the high-road to Guise, and its houses, first set in a straight

row along the road, soon take a short-cut, and then descend the vale,

where they meet with the purling Serre. They dawdle there in small

knots, and storm a second hill, topped by a white steeple-crowned

church. This building is not in the least handsome, yet it sowed

dissension among the inhabitants. Jouville-East-Hill laid claim to the

pious edifice; Jouville-West-Hill got it. Jouville-East-Hill forthwith

took to free-thinking, flung itself into the socialist party, and swore

it would never cross the Serre to gratify the spiritual needs of its

souls. On the other hand, Jouville-West-Hill took a most serious turn,

swore only by holy-water sprinklers and stoles, and sang nothing but

vespers and matins. Jouville, in ordinary times, gives itself wholly up

to cultivation of apples, to cattle-breeding, and to wicker-weaving.

Each occupation adds a feature to the village. The apple trees fill the

well-kept orchards that hem it all around; those meadows that stretch

afar off feed the cows, and the willows, which will presently be

converted into baskets, form thick hedges and make a draught-board

pattern in the fields. The village, indeed, is packed with osiers, cut,

tied in bundles, placed upright along the streets, and watered by the

brook. So they grow green, and are covered with catkins, just like their

brothers that have not been cut. The houses of Jouville are small, red

and white, beneath a slate hood; their windows laugh a roguish laugh. On

their roofs are fantastic weathercocks, and in front of them small

gardens, in which box-trees flourish, cut into shapes. In short,

Jouville looks at once simple and smart, modest and satisfied, and its

mere aspect should cheer up the way-worn wanderer. Though this rustic

Eden pleased us, we had no mind to take up our abode in it. The day

after our arrival, we managed to ask an officer:

"What is the matter? What are we doing here?"

"Oh, the departure has been postponed, the organisers of the convoy are

not in agreement."

"But how long are we going to stay here?"

"Not longer than a few days; you need not be afraid."

Although we were forewarned, our simple minds would not believe in

duplicity. We were reassured.... A few days would soon glide by. When a

soldier talked of a whole week, he astonished us. The chief cook in the

kitchen, where he was superintending a swarm of busy scullions, dared to

murmur three weeks, and he was hooted at by everybody. In the farm and

in the sugar-mill the emigrants settled themselves as well as they

could. A pitiful place, in which straw was expected to do everything!

The straw served as seats and mattresses, it served as blankets, it

served as shutters and padding. Nothing but straw to preserve oneself

from the cold. And the cold was terrible. I think that we shall never

suffer from anything as we suffered from the cold in Jouville. It was

the icy chill of the seventh cycle of Hell, the chill that pierces you

to the very marrow of the bones; it was the chill of death.... For a

whole week we tried vainly to warm ourselves. The weather was clear; the

wind blew with fury; the frozen ground was as hard as stone; icicles

were dangling from the gutters; and the emigrants' teeth were

chattering. They bent their shoulders, thrust their hands in their

arm-pits, and wandered up and down. Some had on only rough linen

clothes. From the yard they went up to the attic, from the barns to the

kitchen, in quest of a bit of warmth, and they looked so cold that the

mere sight of them heightened your misery.

In the sugar-mill some people had the luck to lodge in rooms that could

be heated. But what of those who dwelt in attics through which the wind

was blowing just as it did outside, or in cellars where they sat in a

perpetual draught? The manifold misery we were the witnesses of was

beyond description. I remember a room in the sugar-mill where about

fifty emigrants had been huddled together--men and women, old people and

children, in ill health or in good. It was a long, icy-cold room, with a

low ceiling, feebly lighted by two deep windows in the shape of

loopholes. At the threshold the odour of sick and dirty humanity

suffocated you; the children's squalling, the mothers' scolding, the

men's rough voices stunned you. In the dimly lighted room you perceived

a path opened through the straw, spread out on both sides, on which you

saw creatures crouched or lying. You stumbled on baskets, kitchen

utensils, and bundles, had to shun wet linen and children's clothes,

which the women had stretched out in the fallacious hope of drying them.

When your eyes got somewhat used to the sober light of the place, you

were able to single out the sick or the old people lying about the

straw, the mothers suckling their babies, the men leaning against the

wall. You saw their pale worn faces, their hands benumbed with cold,

their thin clothes. And if you stopped to talk to them they told you

many bitter, heart-rending stories. In a corner a girl of twenty was at

the last gasp. She had but one lung left, and spat blood, while small

children were playing about her. It was the hopeless horror of a

concentration camp. Yet the commandant of the convoy, a lieutenant of

the reserve, a good man after all, and the father of a family, did his

best with the poor means at his disposal. Once even we saw a tear roll

down his cheek at a distressing sight. The weather being inclement, he

gave orders to have the greater part of the emigrants lodged in the

village. The sick first, then the women and the children would be

provided for. There was great excitement. A choice was made, and after

three days and a good deal of writing, the farm and the sugar-mill had

but a hundred occupants left, all huddled together in the few habitable

rooms. The rest encamped in empty houses, slept on straw, a dozen in a

room. At any rate they were under cover, and could warm themselves or

accept the hospitality of the inhabitants of the village. Such was our

case. Charming people gave us shelter, and placed two rooms at our

disposal. We had beds. After we had spent three nights on a spring

mattress and had shivered all the while, how pleasant it was to go to

bed! But our apartment was not heated, had not been lived in for a long

time, was impregnated with damp, and, chilled as we were, we recovered

warmth only a few days after.

The life of the camp was organised after the military fashion. We were

expected to obey at a glance.

In the morning, as early as half-past seven, the emigrants hastened to

the sugar-mill or the farm, where each was inscribed in the place where

he slept the night before. A grown-up member of each family presented

the cards of those with him. In the two courtyards the emigrants filed

past from right to left, and answered to their names mangled by the

_Feldwebel_. Then came the daily allowance of coffee. Armed with

saucepans, jugs, pots, and cups, women and urchins went to the kitchen

to have them filled. They returned home, and at eleven o'clock, with

porringers, pails, and coppers, they made again for the farm or the

sugar-mill, to bring them back full of soup. Towards evening they wended

their way a third time to fetch coffee for their supper.

About twice a week we were told in the morning that bread would be

distributed at four o'clock. It was another errand to run. Every one

produced his card, and received an allowance for several days. If the

_Feldwebel_ announced: "In the afternoon at three the emigrants will be

passed in review," the whole village was in a flutter. It was no trifle

to drag the old people and the babies out from their heaps of straw, to

hold up the lame, to lead the blind, and to persuade the idiots. The

ragged army, every day more beggarly, hobbled along to one of the

rallying points. In the evening about eight o'clock the drum was beaten

by way of curfew-bell. Every one shut himself up and blew out his

candle, if he had one. Silence spread over the village; the emigrants,

laying aside their cares for a while, fell asleep, and the night beneath

its veil hid unnumbered miseries.

We were forbidden to go out of the village, and a pass was necessary if

we would visit a farm half a mile from the hamlet. We were real

captives, and no communication whatever was allowed with the

neighbourhood. What an organisation, how many rules for such a short

stay! Some people will think ... a short stay! One day followed another,

and they were all alike, and always saw us in Jouville. "Next week the

departure," the Germans said with unshaken impudence. Hope put us to the

torture. One week followed another; we were still there. For two months,

eight long and tedious weeks, we led this life of prisoners, thinking

that the next day would set us free. Every morning, about eight, I left

our lodging to answer to the roll-call. I was generally behindhand, and

ran along the path that led to the farm every day with a hope which sank

and withered. Shall we get news to-day? I hardly dared believe it; yet,

my feet being frozen, my face cut by the wind, I made haste. In April

the weather grew no milder, but the approaching spring was visible. A

few flowers ventured to show themselves along the hedges, and the birds

sang at the full pitch of their voices. Thus, while I ran along, the

blackbirds in rapturous joy whistled each and all: "Fuit, fuit ... she

had faith in the Germans!"

The tomtit ruthlessly and unceasingly twittered: "Sol, sol, mi ... sol,

sol, mi ... you mustn't trust any one ... sol, sol, mi ... and still

less the Germans ... sol, sol, mi...." And the wind jeered at me from

the naked branches, and the bryony's small golden stars laughed in my

face, spreading its wreaths along the path. I reached the farm, and the

women gathered at once round me. If they caught sight of Genevieve or

Antoinette, it was the same thing: we were taken by storm.

"Madam, madam, have you heard any news? When are we going?"

"Alas! within four or five days the officer said, but you know if he is

to be believed."

A strain of protestations showered down:

"You will see, they will leave us here."

"Ah! we shall never go to free France!"

"They will take us to Germany. And we can't go on living here! Our brats

have no more shoes; their clothes are in rags; it is no use to darn

them, they fall in pieces."

"But the worst is that we are hungry. We could stand it, but our

children, our little ones, are hungry."

And it was only too true, we were hungry, every one was hungry. What!

Did the Germans not feed us? Of course they did! And on what! Twice a

day each emigrant got a bowl of coffee. A bowlful or a dishful as you

liked, this lukewarm beverage was not given out with a niggard hand.

Lukewarm it always was, and thin too--stimulants ought not to be

misused,--and blackish with a smell of mud. It was without sugar or

milk, and there was no danger of feeling heavy after you had swallowed

it. If the children fell a-weeping in the night, after having swallowed

one cup of this coffee for their dinner, their mothers knew they were

not going to have an attack of indigestion. We got bread. It was real,

authentic German bread, kneaded and baked by Germans. Coloured outside

like gingerbread, it was turtledove grey inside, and would have looked

rather tempting but for the unbaked or mouldy parts. We supposed that

rye-flour, pea-flour, and potato fecula were largely used in the making

of it. Some pretended that they found sawdust in it too. I could not

affirm this. I was rather inclined to think that chemicals had induced

the heavy dough to rise. When new, this somewhat sour-tasted bread was

nice enough, and we ate it without distrust the first days we spent in

Jouville, as the bracing air gave us an appetite. Alas! it soon caused

us pains in the stomach, sickness, inflammation of the bowels, in short

put our digestive organs out of order. The emigrants ate it all the

same; indeed they could not get enough of it. The first three weeks the

Germans made a show of generosity: every person received a loaf every

third day. The weight of one loaf was supposed to be three pounds, in

reality it never exceeded thirteen hundred grammes. But the daily ration

was sufficient, and nobody complained. Unfortunately the allowance

became more and more stingy; during the last month every one received

one pound every third or even fourth day. One hundred and twenty-five

grammes--our daily pittance--do not represent a large slice, and the

people began to clamour for food. We got soup. We were entitled to a

ladle of soup by way of lunch. Shall I describe this mixture? Is it not

already famous in both continents? Do our prisoners not feast upon it in

Germany? It is a grey, thick substance which curdles like flour paste,

whose chief ingredient is fecula. Each portion contained five or six

tiny bits of meat, coming undoubtedly from over-fat animals, for we

never saw a scrap of lean. A few horse- or kidney-beans, a little rice

or barley, mixed with bits of straw, bits of wood, and other scraps of

vague origin. Antoinette had once a real godsend. She discovered in her

soup-plate ... she discovered ... how can I tell? Oh, shade of Abbe

Delille, inspire me to paraphrases! She discovered one of those

animalcules which ... plague take oratorical precautions! She found a

louse on a hair, the whole boiled. This took away what was left of our

strength, and we swore we would rather waste away, and slowly dry up,

than eat such stew in the future.

"Look at this, madam, look at this hodgepodge," moaned the women. "At

home we would not have given this rotten stuff to our pigs, and now we

must feed upon it, and give it to our children."

M. Charvet, our host, cast a look of dismay at our porringers.

"As to myself, I should die beside this, but I would never taste it."

And yet the emigrants were obliged to eat it. From the first days of our

arrival we set our house in order. Our bedrooms were at Mme. Charvet's,

but we spent the whole day long at the rural constable's. The

constable--a brave old man, wounded in 1870--gave up his large kitchen

to us, and supplied us with wood at very little cost. In a corner of the

kitchen stood a large four-post bed which received at night three of our

protegees: a lady eighty-five years old, and her two grand-daughters

aged seven and twelve years. Mme. Noreau, Mimi, and Miquette were

respectively mother and daughters of a retired officer who lives at

Coucy. Of course the officer and his two sons had not been allowed to

go, and his wife had refused to leave them. But they took the chance of

sending into France the grandmother and the little girls, who had

greatly suffered from their life of privation. From the first evening,

the sight of these helpless figures upholding one another had moved our

pity. They gratefully accepted our proffered friendship and assistance.

This is then the way we came to rule such a large household at the old

constable's. A good oven served at once to heat the room and cook the

food. For excellent reasons our stew was of the simplest. A few eggs,

milk, sugar, and butter were to be had in the village, but as we had

absolutely no other article of food--no meal whatever, no vegetables, no

meat,--we were hungry despite custards and omelettes. I said we had

tried to swallow the soup. We gave it up on account of the adventure

afore mentioned after a fortnight of earnest endeavours. So much the

worse, we said; we will live with empty stomachs. Many others were in

the same plight. We were privileged beings, for only a few among the

emigrants had a little money, enough to get something besides the usual

fare supplied us by our jailers. I leave you to imagine the appetite of

those who were reduced to bread, coffee, and soup in all. And remember

that among them there were two hundred and eighty children under ten

years who were not merely starved, but half-naked as well. The charity

children were more miserable than the others. In the bitter cold weather

they wound rags round their legs by way of stockings; their shoes were

shapeless things, held together by string, their trousers were torn,

their jackets had lost their sleeves, the girls' frocks were in rags.

Their distress melted the people of the village to tears. Jouville has

but four hundred inhabitants, and if their religious and political

passions are lively, their hearts are none the less warm.

Jouville-East-Hill and Jouville-West-Hill showed themselves equally kind

to the emigrants, and not only kind, but forbearing, and the emigrants

needed forbearance. They were not the _elite_, and they were guilty of

many a misdeed. M. Charvet well-nigh died of anger the day he discovered

that his beloved fish-pond had been secretly rid of its finest

inhabitants.

Another farmer was breathless with rage when he saw the potatoes he had

planted the day before dug up in the morning.

Ah, you rascally emigrants! Of course some people will feel deeply

shocked at such behaviour, and deem it a hanging matter--for instance,

well-fed people, secure from danger, who afar off scowl at the Germans,

the emigrants, and the typhus-smitten people with the very same

feelings.

But I who was once numbered with those emigrants, who like them was a

prey to hunger, I could not find the smallest stone to throw at them.

And the inhabitants of Jouville, who were the witnesses of our life,

threw no stone either. None of them caused our chains to be drawn

tighter by complaining to the Germans. For the invaders of the north of

France are very severe to the people who transgress the eighth

commandment ... "Thou shalt not steal."

The Jouvillians did even better. From all quarters they brought to us

and to the school-mistress of the village quantities of clothes fit to

wear, if not new, and these were distributed among the raggedest

refugees. We ourselves, with two others, did our best to clothe the

orphan girls, and the poor things were extremely proud of their new

frocks made up of shreds and patches. Some one gave them wooden shoes,

and the bruised little feet could patter down the stony high-road

without fear. The emigrants soon looked upon us as their private

property, and thought us good for everything. An old woman would come to

us, for instance, with an imperious air:

"I have been told that you are visitors of the poor, and then ..." some

request followed.

The unfortunate visitors of the poor would sometimes have been glad to

live on charity themselves. Well, this reminds me that we did once

receive alms. We were following a path by the river, bordered with

pleasant houses. It was a day of perquisitions, and the soldiers,

having turned everything upside down, had left the quarter which we

were traversing. A good old woman was coming from the river-side with a

loaf in her hand, and the mere sight of the white, light crumb made our

mouths water. The woman stopped, and said with a sidelong glance:

"You see, they don't want to know I have a little flour left. I hid my

loaf in the hole of a willow tree."

She burst out laughing, and we chimed in.

I suppose she noticed our admiring gaze, for she said all of a sudden:

"Would you like to have some?"

She tripped along quickly, and, with short steps, went to her kitchen,

came back with a knife, and cut off two large slices, which she held out

to us. We seized the bread with an avidity hardly tempered with shame,

and stammered out joyful thanks. This moved the compassion of the good

woman:

"Fancy, they are hungry! What a pity! Such lovely girls!"

And so, jumping from one stone to another in the muddy path down the

river, we burst into unrestrained laughter, and we devoured our bread

which was the real bread, the white bread of France. We had, indeed, not

a few windfalls. M. Charvet more than once presented us with one of

those pretty round loaves, which he kneaded and baked himself.

We also were hand in glove with a farmer, who sometimes in secrecy let

us have a few potatoes or a pound or two of flour, and thus gave us the

means of adding something to our meagre fare. A few treats of that kind

helped us to hold out! We looked like corpses, and we were, one after

another, the victims of strange pains caused by the cold, the bread, and

the continual excitement.

Most of the emigrants were ill. Eight of them died. We then had occasion

to see and admire the way in which the Germans organise the sanitary

service for the use of civilians. From the very first day an empty house

had been bedecked with the title of hospital, and adorned with the

scutcheon of the Red Cross. A large room directly opening into the

street was chosen for consultations; two smaller rooms containing

symmetrical heaps of straw served to receive the patients. There was a

permanent orderly in the camp, and a doctor came daily from Marle.

Emigrants, choose what sickness you like! You will be cared for!

And quickly influenza, diphtheria, bronchitis, inflammation of the lungs

burst upon the emigrants. But we soon discovered that it was not easy

to be admitted to the sick ward. I had to call four times on the officer

before they vouchsafed to take away an old couple who, despite the

Siberian cold, lived alone in a barn with big holes in its roof. The

poor woman coughed pitifully, and her old companion could only bring her

lukewarm coffee and heap upon her mountains of straw. She died two days

after she had been transferred to the hospital. An old woman died, her

body was carried away, and quickly another old woman took her place on

the very same couch of straw. A dying woman, utterly unconscious, was

left a week unattended to.

"I assure you the corner she was in was a very sink," said the man who

took upon himself to clean it when the corpse had been taken away. "And

my wife and children had to live in this infected spot!"

Our medical attendant was a young coxcomb, fair-haired,

regular-featured, and harsh-looking. A glass was fixed in his eye. About

half-past nine his carriage, drawn by a pretty horse, pulled up;

carelessly he threw the reins to his groom; he alighted and penetrated

his domain. His Lordship sat down in an easy-chair, crossed his legs,

took a haughty survey of the patients who called upon him, and spoke in

a curt and supercilious tone. He was soon held to be a villainous

fellow.

"He is as wicked as the devil," a woman said, with a look of dismay.

A great many of them wanted their children to be examined by the doctor.

"I would rather die on straw than go to him for myself," a mother

said ... "but, my poor little girl!"

But what was worse, the Prussian doctor did not care a fig for sick

children! We had been told that every baby was entitled to a litre of

milk, which one of the farmers of the village would deliver to the

mother on presentation of a note of hand. But a child above two years

was allowed to drink milk only if the doctor deemed it expedient for its

health. A woman we knew had a little girl not yet three. Six months

before the whole family had fled in a shower of bullets and grape-shot,

and for nearly a month had lived in the depths of a dark stone quarry

with hardly anything to eat. Since then the child had been as white as

wax; she had no strength at all, and she was always staring straight

before her as if she had beheld horrible things.

As she was penniless, the woman was forced to bring her child to this

medicaster.

"Sir, you see my little girl ... I think milk would do her good...."

He had but to write a note, and she would have had it.

"Milk! I haven't any! I keep no cows in my house!" and the doctor burst

out laughing, thinking himself very witty.

"Anyhow," the mother said with her teeth ground, "when he stays at home

there is a brute beast in his house worse than a cow."

Another beggar woman had twins about two years old. One of them ate soup

and bread, and throve like couch-grass. The other, who ever since the

family had left their native hamlet had fed on indigestible things, and

had nowhere to lay her head, had grown pale and sickly. She had ceased

to run alone, took no food, and pined away visibly. Her mother brought

her to the doctor.

"That child! What should I prescribe her? She is ailing on account of

her being French. French children are all rickety and weakly. How am I

to help it? Lay the blame on your race."

Before leaving, the little doctor sometimes gave a glance--a single

one--at the rooms of the hospital, then stepped into his carriage, took

up the reins, cracked his whip, and as harsh-featured as ever put his

horse to a gallop.

However, some attention had to be paid to the sick. The orderly was

there for that purpose. He was a big stout man, whose eyes seemed

starting from their sockets. He did not like to be called up in the

afternoon--he took a nap--and still less in the night. His remedies--the

same for every sickness--were most economical: "Keep on low diet, apply

cold compresses." Yet he understood his business well enough.

Our hostess, Mme. Charvet, a wealthy landowner, suddenly fell ill of a

disquieting haemorrhage. No doctor in the village, not even in the

neighbourhood. We ran in haste to fetch "Goggle-eyes."

"Oh, please, please, come!..."

"Goggle-eyes" lost no time in coming, showed assiduous attention to the

patient, punctured her, and rode on a bicycle to Marle in order to fetch

medicines. A few days after, a poor emigrant, mother of six small

children, was attacked by the same disease. He was sent for in vain; and

left her forty-eight hours without help. It was indeed a miracle that

she did not depart this life.

This proves clearly that to the mind of a German, even though he be a

_Sozial-Democrat_, the skin of a capitalist will ever be superior to the

skin of a starveling.

The physician was not our sole caller. A few other ones came when the

straw was still clean, and when we received a pound of bread a day. A

stout commandant, and three days after, a thin commandant came to visit

the camp. Both the stout and the thin looked extremely well satisfied,

and seemed to say:

"What splendid organisation! How perfectly everything is getting on!

Really, nobody but Germans could settle things like that!"

The thin commandant was escorted by the official interpreter of the

camp. He never asked a question of the people, for many reasons, the

principal being that he did know the language of Voltaire. The very

first day he had given a sample of his talents by asking a youth:

"He ... vous ... combien hannees vous havoir?"

And the boy, stretching his legs and hands, stood there gazing, gaping

at his interlocutor, and his whole countenance answered:

"I don't understand German!"

Therefore mimicry and loud cries bore a great part in the relations

between soldiers and emigrants.

The stout commandant piqued himself on French. In one of the rooms of

the farm he asked:

"You are comfortable here, aren't you?"

And the women, pickled in respect, answered all with one voice:

"Oh, yes, sir, yes!"

"You get good soup, don't you?"

"Oh, yes, sir, yes!"

"You get a lot of bread, don't you?"

"Oh, yes, sir, yes!"

"When you reach France you will tell the French you have been leniently

dealt with, won't you?"

"Oh, yes, sir, yes!"

The stout commandant went away, proud of himself and proud of being one

of those Germans who know how to organise camps for refugees.

"Rely on our saying how we have been dealt with," bantered the old

women, the moment the officers' large backs were turned.

Another caller was a clergyman, who was quite different from the others.

The Rev. Herr Freyer was about thirty-five, he was tall, dark-haired,

with malicious eyes and a turned-up nose. I must say he did his best to

comply with our wishes and serve the cause of the emigrants. From the

very beginning he told us that he was very fond of the French--yes, but

the Germans are all fond of the French--and that his grandmother was of

French descent.

"Why! then she had married a German?"

Well, let us go on to something else.

This man was certainly the cleverest German we had met, or rather the

only clever one we ever met. We were all the more amazed to notice once

more the abyss that separates the French from the German mind. An utter

incomprehension of certain delicacies, a lack of sensitiveness, is

peculiar to them. If they had fallen from the very moon, our ways of

doing and thinking could not be stranger to them.

And in discussion, they are unable to cast out preconceived notions,

which will ever get the better of reasoning and observation.

Herr Freyer certainly wished to show us kindness, and at every turn he

told us things which set our teeth on edge. Yet he wondered to see us

stand up for causes which he had looked upon as lost since a long time.

"How I pity France," he used to tell us, "poor degenerate France!"

And he looked quite scared when he saw our anger, and heard our vehement

protestations. He was still convinced victory would be theirs. On the

other hand, he once declared to us:

"There is a blemish in the character of the Germans ... they are

kind-hearted to a fault. The German nation is thoroughly kind-hearted."

Owing to the circumstances we dared not say all that we wanted to, and

were content to hint at Belgium....

"Oh, so many lies have been told! You ought not to believe such

slanderous accusations. As to myself I know that what you are alluding

to is false; the Germans are too kind-hearted to be guilty of the deeds

they are charged with."

Such is our enemy's mode of reasoning. He denies what they cannot

excuse. It is very easy.

"In Alsace-Lorraine we have been to blame in every way," said the

clergyman to us.

He is making confession, we thought.

"Yes, we have been too kind-hearted, over-indulgent to the people. If we

had had a firmer hand, everything would have got on much better."

This blasphemer had some merit, let us not be too hard on him.