Hondezeele, January 19—.
Madame Lemaire has presented the Mess with a bottle of old brandy, and
the doctor is in very good form this evening. He is the true Irish
type; a lover of surprising epigrams.
He says, "We owe to the Middle Ages the two worst inventions of
humanity—romantic love and gunpowder." Again, "The whole reason of this
War is because the Germans have no sense of humour."
But, above all, you must hear his scientific and precise demonstration
of his favourite theory: "Two telegrams contrary in sense, and from
officers equal in rank, cancel one another."
January 4th.
Rode with the colonel and Parker. How delicate and clear the atmosphere
is in this northern part of France! The colonel was highly indignant to
hear that I have never been out hunting.
"You _must_, messiou, it is the only sport. You jump banks as high as
your horse. At eighteen I had nearly broken my neck twice. It is most
exciting."
"Yes," said Parker, "one day I was galloping in a wood and a branch went
into my right eye. It is a miracle I wasn’t killed. Another time——"
He described how his horse fell on the top of him and broke two of his
ribs. Then both of them together, certain of having convinced me:
"You must hunt after the War, messiou."
January 7th.
This morning, I do not know why, some French troops came through
Hondezeele. The village and I were delighted. We like the shrill
bagpipes, but no music in the world is like "Sidi-Brahim" and
"Sambre-et-Meuse."
I was pleased, too, to be able to show Parker these Chasseurs à pied, as
all he had seen of our army were old Territorials. He was much
impressed.
"They are as fine as the Highlanders," he told me.
And then he described the Lennox as they were when he joined as second
lieutenant in Egypt.
"I was forbidden to speak at Mess for six months. An excellent
practice! It taught us to realize how humble we were, and the respect
due to our elders.
"If some ’swelled head’ did not conform to these rules, he soon found
his things all packed up in his room, labelled for England. If he still
refused to understand, he was called up before a subaltern’s
court-martial, and heard some home truths about himself.
"It was hard, but what _esprit de corps_ and what discipline those rough
ways taught us. We shall never see a regiment again like the Lennox of
1914. The officer of to-day has seen active service, it’s true, but as
a matter of fact it is quite sufficient in war to have good health and
no more imagination than a fish. It is in peace-time that one ought to
judge a soldier."
"You remind me," said the doctor, "of the sergeant-major in the Guards
who said: ’How I wish the war would finish so that we could have real
manoeuvres once more!’"
This evening, while the gramophone was raging, I forced myself to
translate into French Rudyard Kipling’s admirable poem, "If."
I showed it in English to Parker whom it describes so well, and we
talked about books. I made the mistake of mentioning Dickens.
"I detest Dickens," said the major. "I never could understand how
anyone could find him interesting. His books are all stories of the
lower classes and Bohemians. I do not want to know how they live. In
the whole of Dickens’ works there is not one gentleman. No, if you wish
to know the _chef-d’oeuvre_ of English novels read ’Jorrocks.’"
January 13th.
A little English telephonist who came to mend our apparatus said to me,
"Telephones are like women, sir. No one really knows anything about
them. One fine day, something goes wrong; you try to find out why, no
good, you swear, you shake them up a bit and all is well."
January 14th.
At dinner an Irish colonel remarked: "I am very annoyed; during my last
leave I rented a house for my family, and now my wife writes that it is
haunted. The owners really ought to tell one these things."
"Perhaps they did not know it," said our indulgent colonel.
"They knew it very well. When my wife went to complain, they got very
confused, and ended by owning up. One of their great-grandmothers has
walked from the drawing-room to her old bedroom for the last hundred and
fifty years. They tried to excuse themselves by saying she was perfectly
harmless. That is possible and I am quite willing to believe it, but it
is none the less annoying for my wife. Do you think I can cancel my
lease?"
I here risked a sceptical remark, but the whole Mess jumped on me.
Irish ghosts are scientific facts.
"But why do phantoms love Irish houses more than others?"
"Because," said the Irish colonel, "we are a very sensitive race and we
enter into communication with them more easily."
And he crushed me with technical arguments on wireless telegraphy.
January 15th.
The colonel, having found out this morning that a motor-ambulance was
going into Ypres, took me with him. In front of the hospital we found
ourselves wedged in by a terrible block of waggons, under a fierce
bombardment.
A horse with its carotid artery cut by a bit of shell, and only held up
by the shafts, was writhing in agony close by us. The drivers were
swearing. Nothing to do but wait patiently in our car, shaken by
explosions.
"Dr. Johnson was right," said the colonel to me, "Whoever wants to be a
hero ought to drink brandy."
Then, as a fresh explosion made the debris of the ruined town in front
of us tremble, he said:
"Messiou, how many inhabitants were there in Ypres before the War?"
January 20th.
We are going to leave Hondezeele. The red-hats are getting agitated and
already one sees the cyclists passing, the natural advance-guard of our
migrations.
We were beginning to love this country: the village and the brigade, so
distrustful of one another a month ago, had become really quite
affectionate. But the gods are jealous.
... Demain, départ de la brigade:
La cornemuse et le tambour
Douneront la dernière aubade
A ces fugitives amours.
Les montagnards aux beaux genoux,
Qui mimaient la danse du sable
Avec des chants graves et doux
Vont danser la ronde du Diable.
La Victoire, un jour, les cherchant,
Les trouvera trois pieds sous terre,
Mais par ces fermes et ces champs
Flottera leur ombre légère.
Et dans nos villages des Flandres...
Interrupted by the arrival of our successors, the Canadians, regarded by
Madame Lemaire and her little boy with great suspicion. _That_ won’t
last long.
*CHAPTER XIV*
A great attack was in preparation; it was a terrible secret jealously
guarded by headquarters; but Aurelle was informed of it several days
beforehand by the German _communiqué_ published in the _Times_, and by
Madame Lemaire’s little boy, who advised him not to repeat it.
However, the division was soon ordered to occupy one of the sectors in
the attack. The padre, optimistic as ever, already foresaw triumphant
marches, but the colonel gently reminded him that the objectives were
simply a ridge, which in peace-time would be called "a slight undulation
in the ground," and two villages already destroyed. The real object was
to engage the forces of the enemy, who were at that moment advancing in
Russia. But this information only redoubled the enthusiasm of the
padre.
"You can say what you like, sir; if we hold this ridge they cannot hold
out in the valley, and we shall break through their line. As for the
retreat of the Russians, that’s capital. The Boche gets farther from
his base, lengthens his lines of communications, and he’s done."
"He is not," said the colonel, "but he will be one day, and that’s all
that matters."
The evening of the offensive, Aurelle received orders from the colonel
to go and act as liaison officer between the headquarters of the
division and some French batteries, which were reinforcing the British
artillery in this sector. He wished the Lennox good luck and left them
for a day.
He spent the night in the garden of the little château where the general
was living. The bombardment thundered on without ceasing. Aurelle
walked up and down the paths of this garden, which had been pretty, but
was now honeycombed with trenches and dug-outs, while camouflaged huts
covered the lawns.
Towards midnight, the rain, the classic rain of an offensive, began to
fall in large drops. The interpreter took shelter in a shed with some
chauffeurs and motorcyclists. He always liked to find himself among this
class of Englishmen, with their strong language and simple minds.
These, like the rest, were good fellows, careless, courageous and
light-hearted. They hummed the latest music-hall airs from London,
showed him photographs of their wives, sweethearts and babies, and asked
him when the damned war would be over. They shared on this subject the
perfect optimism of the padre.
One of them, a little, quick-witted electrician, asked Aurelle to
explain the Alsatian question. And so he told them about Saverne, the
march past of the Strasburg students before Kléber’s statue, the
pilgrimages of the Alsatians to Belfort for the 14th of July Review, and
about the young men who at the age of twenty left family and fortune to
go to France and become soldiers.
They told him that they could understand anyone loving France: it was a
fine country. All the same there were not enough hedges in the
landscape. But they appreciated the thrifty qualities of the women, the
trees along the road, and the out-of-door cafés. They talked with
enthusiasm about Verdun, but many of them had only grasped the idea of
the Entente through Carpentier’s victory in London.
The day dawned; the rain was now falling in torrents; on the lawn, the
grass and soil was trodden into a sticky mass. Aurelle went up to the
château; he met an aide-de-camp whom he knew and explained his orders.
"Oh yes," he was told. "I arranged that myself with the French liaison
officer. If the telephone from the batteries happens to get cut, we
shall have recourse to you. Go into the signalling room and sit down. In
ten minutes from now," he added, "our men go over the top."
The signalling room was the old winter garden. On the wall, a
large-scale map of the trenches showed the British lines in black, and
those of the enemy in red. At two long tables six telephone operators
were installed. Silent officers with red tabs paced calmly up and down
the room, and Aurelle thought of one of Major Parker’s favourite
remarks: "A gentleman is never in a hurry."
As five o’clock struck, the general came in and the officers stood still
and said all together:
"Good morning, sir."
"Good morning," said the general politely.
He was very tall; his carefully brushed grey hair, neatly parted, framed
his fine features. Gold lace shone on the red facings of his well-cut
tunic.
Discovering Aurelle in his corner, he very kindly gave him a little
"Good morning" all to himself, and then he walked slowly, with his hands
behind his back, between the two long tables of the telephonists. The
noise of the guns had suddenly ceased, and nothing was heard in the room
but the authoritative and measured step of the general.
A muffled bell tingled; an operator quietly made a note of the message
on a pink form.
"5.5 a.m.," read the general softly, "10th Brigade. Attack begun, enemy
barrage not very effective, violent machine-gun fire."
Then he passed the telegram to an officer, who stuck it on a long pin.
"Transmit it to the corps," said the general.
And the officer wrote on a white paper: "5.10 a.m. 10th Brigade reports
as follows: Attack begun. Enemy barrage not very effective. Violent
machine-gun fire."
He filed a carbon copy on another pin, and handed the original to an
operator, who, in his turn, read it into the machine.
Inflexibly and monotonously the white and pink messages slowly
accumulated. One brigade was in the enemy’s first line trenches, the
other had stopped before a concreted nest of machine-guns. The general
reinforced them with details from the 3rd Brigade, then rang up the
artillery several times to tell them to destroy the pill box. And these
orders were transcribed on to the pink and white forms. An officer,
standing before the huge map, carefully manoeuvred small coloured flags,
and all this methodical agitation reminded Aurelle of a large banking
house on the Stock Exchange.
Towards six o’clock in the morning, a Staff officer beckoned to him,
and, leading him up to the map, showed him the emplacement of a French
.155 and asked him to go and see the officer, and tell him to destroy at
all costs a certain railway cutting in which one or two enemy machine
guns were still firing. The telephone was no longer working.
Outside everything was calm; it was raining and the road was a river of
yellow mud. The noise of the guns seemed farther off, but it was only
an illusion, because one could see the wicked red light of the shells as
they burst over the village in front of the house.
A few wounded, in hasty field-dressings, bleeding and muddy, were coming
slowly up to the ambulance in small groups. Aurelle entered a little fir
wood; the wet pine-needles seemed delightful walking after the mud. He
heard the guns of the French battery quite close, but could not find it.
He had been told: "North-east corner of the wood." But where the devil
was the north-east? All at once a blue uniform moved among the trees.
At the same moment a gun went off quite close to him, and, turning to
the right, he saw the gunners on the edge of the wood well hidden by
some thick bushes. An adjutant, astride a chair, tunic undone, _képi_
pushed back, was in command. The men served the gun cleverly and
without hurrying, like skilled workmen. One might have thought it a
peaceful, open-air factory.
"_Mon adjudant_," said one of the men, "here is an interpreter."
"Ah, now, perhaps, we shall find out why we can’t get an answer from the
English," said the adjutant.
Aurelle gave him the orders, as the captain was at the observation post,
and the lieutenant trying to repair the telephone.
"Right," said the adjutant, a native of Lorraine with a quiet, sing-song
voice. "We will demolish it for you, young man."
He telephoned to the captain; then, having found the cutting on the map,
began his calculations. Aurelle stayed a few moments, glad to find this
corner of the battlefield with no false romance, and also to hear French
spoken again at last.
Then he took the path back to the château. Cutting across a meadow to
find the high road, he approached the battle-field. A brigade of
reinforcements was going up in line; he passed it in a contrary
direction, with a few wounded to whom he offered a little brandy. The
men who were going up to fight looked at the wounded in silence.
A shell whistled above the column; the heads bent like poplars in a
wind. The shell burst in a deserted field. Then Aurelle, having passed
the brigade, found himself on the road with the informal procession of
wounded men. They had fever, they were dirty, they were bloody; but,
thankful to be out of it, they hurried at the best pace they could
muster towards the haven of white beds.
A company of German prisoners passed, guarded by a few Highlanders.
Their terrified eyes, like those of trained animals, seemed to be
looking for officers to salute.
As Aurelle arrived at the house, he saw two men in front of him carrying
an officer on a stretcher. The officer evidently had some terrible
wound, for his body was covered with dressings through which the blood
had soaked, and was dripping slowly on to the muddy road.
"Yes, Aurelle, it’s I," said the dying man in a strange voice, and
Aurelle recognized Captain Warburton. His good-looking, merry face had
become grave. "O’Grady will not send me to the Duchess’ hospital this
time, messiou," he gasped painfully. "Will you say good-bye to the
colonel for me—and let him write home that I did not suffer much. Hope
that won’t bother you. Thanks very much indeed."
Aurelle, without being able to get out a word, pressed the hand of this
maimed boy who had been so fond of War, and the stretcher-bearers
carried him gently away.
On arriving at the château he found every one as calm as ever, but very
serious. He gave in a report of his mission to the Staff officer, who
thanked him absently.
"How is it going?" he asked an operator in a low voice.
"All right," growled the man. "All objectives attained, but the general
killed. Would go himself to see why the Second Brigade did not come up—a
shell buried him with Major Hall."
Aurelle thought of the grey, smooth hair and fine features of the
general, the gold and scarlet of his facings all soiled by the ignoble
mud of battles. So much easy dignity, he thought, so much courteous
authority, and to-morrow carrion, which the soldiers will trample under
foot without knowing. But already, all round him, they were anxiously
discussing who would be his successor.
In the evening, he went over to the Lennox with the regiment that was
going to relieve them. The first person he saw was the doctor, who was
working in a dug-out.
"I don’t think the regiment did badly," he said. "I have not seen the
colonel yet, but all the men tell me he was a marvel of courage and
presence of mind. It appears, messiou, that we have the record number
of Germans killed by one man. Private Kemble bayoneted twenty-four.
Not bad, is it?"
"No," said Aurelle, "but it’s horrible. Have you looked at Warburton,
doctor? I met him on the road and he seemed very bad."
"Done for," said the doctor. "And his friend Gibbons died here this
afternoon, both legs blown off."
"Oh, Gibbons too. Poor Gibbons! Do you remember, doctor, his talking
about his plump little wife? No doubt at this very moment she is
playing tennis with her sisters in some lovely English garden. And the
bleeding limbs of her husband are there, in that blanket. It’s
terrible, doctor, all this."
"Pooh!" answered the doctor, going to wash his hands, which were covered
with blood. "In three months you will see her portrait in the _Tatler_:
’The beautiful widow of Captain Gibbons, M.C., who is shortly to be
married to——’"
*CHAPTER XV*
The Lennox Highlanders, when the brigade was relieved, were sent for six
days to a muddy field near Dickebusch. Dr. O’Grady and Aurelle shared a
tent, and dined together, the first evening, at the inn of the _Trois
Amis_.
On their return, the stars shone brightly in a dark blue velvet sky.
The soft moonlight lay on the grass of the meadows. A few tents in
which a light was burning resembled great white lanterns; round the
bivouac fires, blown about by the wind, the men sat swearing and
singing.
"War makes light of time," said the doctor, "it is eternal and
unalterable. This camp might be Cæsar’s, the Tommies round their fires,
talking of their wives and their dangers, their boots and their horses,
like the legionaries of Fabius or the veterans of the Grand Army. And,
as in those days, on the other side of the hill, repose the barbarous
Germans by their unyoked chariots."
The burgundy of the _Trois Amis_ inspired the doctor to hold forth like
this.
"This tent is six thousand years old," he said, "it belongs to the
warlike Bedouins who founded the empires of Babylon and Carthage. The
restlessness of the ancient migrating people inspired them with a
longing for the desert every year, and sent them forth from the city
walls on profitable raids. It is this same force, Aurelle, which each
summer, before the war, covered the deserted shores of Europe with
nomadic tents, and it is the dim recollection of ancestral raids which,
on August 1, 1914 holiday time, Aurelle, the time of migrations—incited
the youngest of the barbarians to let loose their Emperor on the world.
It is an old comedy which has been played for two thousand years, but
the public still seem to take an interest in it. It is because there is
always a fresh audience."
"You are pessimistic this evening," said Aurelle.
"What do you call pessimism?" said the doctor, painfully pulling off his
stiff boots. "I think that men will always have passions, and that they
will never cease to go for one another at regular intervals with the
most energetic means which the science of their time can procure for
them, and the best chosen weapons with which to break each other’s
bones. I think that one sex will always try to please the other, and
that from this elementary desire will eternally be born the need to
vanquish rivals. With this object, nightingales, grasshoppers, prima
donnas and statesmen will make use of their voices; peacocks, niggers
and soldiers, of bright colours; rats, deer, tortoises and kings will go
on fighting. All that is not pessimism, it is natural history!"
While talking the doctor had got into his sleeping-bag, and had seized a
little book from a shelf made out of a biscuit box.
"Listen to this, Aurelle," said he, "and guess who wrote it.
"’My regrets about the War are unceasing, and I shall consent to admire
your invincible general when I see the fight ended under honourable
conditions. It is true that the brilliant successes which are your
delight are also mine, because these victories, if we would use fortune
wisely, will procure for us an advantageous peace. But if we let the
moment pass when we might appear to give peace rather than receive it, I
much fear that this splendid achievement will vanish in smoke. And if
fate sends us reverses I tremble to think of the peace which will be
imposed on the conquered by an enemy who has the courage to refuse it to
the conquerors?’"
"I don’t know," said Aurelle, yawning. "Maximilian Harden?"
"Senator Hanno at the Senate of Carthage." said the doctor
triumphantly. "And in two thousand three hundred years some negro
doctor, finding after the Great African War a speech by Lloyd George,
will say, ’These old sayings are sometimes very true.’ Your formidable
European War is about as important, Aurelle, as the fights between two
ant-heaps in the corner of my garden in Ireland."
"It is much more than that to us," said Aurelle, "and it appears to me
that the sort of sentiments it gives rise to are not animal. Do you
think that ants are patriotic?"
"Most certainly," replied the doctor, "the ants must be extremely
patriotic. With them the warriors are highly fed by a race of servitors.
Every season their armies set out to steal the eggs of the weaker
species. Workers are hatched from them, born slaves in a foreign
country. The military citizens are thus delivered from the slavery of
work and these soldiers cannot even feed themselves. Shut up with
honey, and without their nurse-slaves, they die of hunger. That is what
is called civil mobilization. And if this war lasts long enough, one
day, Aurelle, you will see a new human species appear: soldier-men. They
will be born with helmets and armour, impervious to bullets and provided
with natural weapons; the Suffragettes will be the sexless slaves who
will feed these warriors, while a few queens will, in special
institutions, bring national infants into the world."
Thus discoursed the doctor, in the friendly silence of the camp by the
soft light of the moon; and Aurelle, who had gone to sleep, saw visions
of enormous ants in khaki marching by, commanded by the little doctor.
*CHAPTER XVI*
The orderlies brought the rum, sugar, and boiling water. The padre
began patience, the colonel played "Destiny Waltz," and Dr. O’Grady, who
in times of peace was doctor at an asylum, talked about lunatics.
"I had the care of a rich American who thought he was surrounded by a
belt of poisoned gas," he said. "In order to save his life, he had a
special bed made for himself surrounded by a cage of white wood. He
passed his days in this safe shelter, dressed in nothing but a red
bathing suit, writing a book in twenty thousand chapters on the life and
works of Adam. His room had a triple door on which he had carved, ’Gas
carriers are warned that there are wolf-traps inside.’ He sent for me
every day, and when I went in he always said, ’I have never seen any
creatures so stupid,’ so wicked, so rotten, or so dense as English
doctors.’"
"’I have never seen,’" repeated the padre with great satisfaction, "’any
creatures so stupid, so wicked, or so dense as English doctors.’"
"Upon which," continued the doctor, "he turned his back on me, and,
clothed in his red bathing suit, set to work again at the
twenty-thousandth chapter on the works of Adam."
"Here, messiou," interrupted the colonel, who was examining some
official papers, "is some work for you," and he passed over to Aurelle a
thick bundle of papers covered with multi-coloured seals.
It commenced thus:
"From the Stationmaster at B—— to the Military Superintendent of the
Station at B——
"I have the honour to inform you that Mademoiselle Héninghem,
gate-keeper at Hondezeele, complains of the following facts: the English
soldiers camped along the railway line are in the habit of performing
their ablutions in the open air, which is a shocking sight for the lady
in question, who, from the nature of her work, cannot avoid seeing them.
I shall be obliged if you will give orders that this regrettable state
of affairs shall be put a stop to as soon as possible."
(Signature.)
(Seal.)
"From the Military Superintendent of the Station at B—— to the
Superintendent W——
"Transmitted to the proper quarter."
(Signed.)
(Seal.)
"The Superintendent W—— to the D.A.D.R.T.
"I shall be obliged if you will give orders that the camp in question be
surrounded with a fence of sufficient thickness to render the visibility
at fifty yards’ distance practically nil."
"That last man," said Aurelle, "is a polytechnician."
The padre asked what that was.
"A polytechnician is a man who believes that all beings, alive or dead,
can be precisely defined and submitted to an algebraic calculation. A
polytechnician puts, on the same plane, victory, a tempest, and love. I
knew one who, commanding a fortress and having to draw up some orders in
case of aerial attack, began thus: ’The Fortress of X—— will be attacked
by an aerial engine when a vertical line from the engine to the earth
finds the centre of the fortification,’ and so on."
"Do not abuse the Polytechnic, Aurelle," said the doctor. "It is the
most original of your institutions and the best. The personal cult of
Napoleon is so well preserved that each year France presents two hundred
Lieutenant Bonapartes to the astonished Government."
"Go on translating, messiou," said the colonel.
"D.A.D.R.T. to the Superintendent.
"This does not concern me but a division that is resting. You must
address your claim to the A.G. by the intermediary of the French
Mission."
(Signed.)
(Seal.)
"Superintendent —— to the Base Commandant G.H.Q.
"I have the honour to forward herewith, for any action you consider
necessary, a Memorandum concerning a complaint from Mademoiselle
Héninghem of Hondezeele."
(Signed.)
(Seal.)
And so it went on: Base Commandant to the French Mission; French Mission
to the Adjutant-General; A.G. to the Army; Army to the Corps; Division
to the Brigade; Brigade to the Colonel of the Lennox Highlanders. And
it was signed with illustrious names, Colonel, Chief Staff Officer for
the General, Brigadier, Major-General; thus the modest scruples of
Mademoiselle Héninghem of Hondezeele were clothed, in the course of a
long journey, with purple, gold and glory.
"This is a tiresome business," said Colonel Bramble solemnly. "Parker,
answer it, will you, like a good chap."
The major wrote for several minutes, then read out:
"This regiment having left the Camp at Hondezeele two months and a half
ago, it is unfortunately impossible to take the measures desired in the
matter. Moreover, having ascertained the great cost of a fence of
sufficient height, I beg to suggest that it would be more advantageous
to the allied Governments to replace the gate-keeper at Hondezeele by a
person of mature age and proved experience, to whom the spectacle
described herewith would be inoffensive and even agreeable."
"No, Parker, no," said the colonel firmly, "I shall not sign that. Give
me a piece of paper. I will answer myself."
He wrote simply:
"Noted and returned.
"BRAMBLE,
"Colonel."
"You are a wise man, sir," said Parker.
"I know the game," said the colonel. "I have played it for thirty
years."
"Once upon a time," said the doctor, "there were two officers who, on
the same day, each lost something belonging to His Majesty’s Government.
The first one mislaid a coal-bucket; the second a motor-lorry. Now you
must know, Aurelle, that in our army an officer has to pay for anything
which he may lose by negligence out of his own pocket. The two
officers, therefore, received notices from the War Office advising one
that he would have to pay three shillings, and the other that a thousand
pounds would be stopped from his pay. The first one wished to defend
himself; he had never had any coal-buckets, and tried to prove it. He
stopped his promotion, and in the end had to pay the three bob. The
second, who knew a thing or two, just wrote at the bottom of the paper,
’Noted and returned,’ and sent it back to the War Office. There,
following an old and wise rule, a clerk lost the correspondence and the
officer never heard anything more of _that_ little matter."
"That isn’t a bad story, doctor," said Major Parker; "but in the case of
the loss of property belonging to the Government there is a much better
method than yours—Colonel Boulton’s method.
"Colonel Boulton commanded an ammunition depot. He was responsible,
among other things, for fifty machine-guns. One day he noticed that
there were only forty-nine in the depot. All the inquiries, and
punishment of the sentries, failed to restore the missing machine-gun.
"Colonel Boulton was an old fox and had never acknowledged himself in
the wrong. He simply mentioned in his monthly return that the tripod of
a machine-gun had been broken. They sent him a tripod to replace the
other without any comment.
"A month later, on some pretext or other, he reported the sighting
apparatus of a machine-gun as out of order; the following month he asked
for three screw-nuts; then a recoil plate, and bit by bit in two years
he entirely destroyed his machine-gun. And correspondingly, bit by bit,
the Army Ordnance Department reconstructed it for him without attaching
any importance to the requisitions for the separate pieces.
"Then Colonel Boulton, satisfied at last, inspected his machine-guns,
and found fifty-one.
"While he had been patiently reconstructing the lost gun, some damned
idiot had found it in a corner. And Boulton had to spend two years of
clever manipulation of his books to account for the new gun which had
been evolved out of nothing."
"Messiou," said the colonel, "do you remember the gate-keeper at
Hondezeele? I should not have thought it of her."
"No more should I," said Aurelle. "She was very pretty."
"Messiou!" said the padre.
*CHAPTER XVII*
"Doctor," said the padre, "give me a cigar."
"Are you aware, padre, that my cigars were rolled on the bare thighs of
the young girls of Havana?"
"O’Grady," said the colonel severely, "I consider that remark out of
place."
"Give me one all the same," said the padre. "I must smoke a cigar to
help me find a text for my sermon. The quartermaster made me promise to
go and see the motor-drivers who are at the back, and I don’t know what
to talk to them about."
"Look here, padre, I will give you an appropriate text; lend me your
Bible a moment. Ah, here it is. Listen! ’But David said, Ye shall not
do so, my brethren, with that which the Lord hath given us ... but as
his part is that goeth down to the battle, so shall his part be that
tarrieth by the stuff; they shall part alike.’"
"Admirable," said the padre, "admirable! But tell me, O’Grady, how is it
that an old sinner like you knows the Holy Scriptures so well?"
"I studied the Book of Samuel a good deal from an asylum doctor’s point
of view," said the doctor. "Saul’s neurasthenia interested me. His
attacks are very well described. I have also diagnosed the madness of
Nebuchadnezzar. They were two very different types. Saul was apathetic
and Nebuchadnezzar violent."
"I wish you would leave Nebuchadnezzar alone," said the colonel.
"I am very much afraid of asylum doctors," said Major Parker. "Violent,
depressed, or apathetic, we are all mad, according to them."
"What do you call mad?" said the doctor. "I certainly can see in you,
and in the colonel, and Aurelle, all the phenomena which I observed in
the asylum."
"Ugh!" said the colonel, horrified.
"But I do, sir. Between Aurelle, who forgets the war by reading
Tolstoi, and some of my old friends who thought they were Napoleon or
Mahomet, there is a difference in degree but not in nature. Aurelle
browses on novels from a morbid desire to live the life of someone else;
my patients substitute for their miserable life that of some great
personage whose history they have read and whose lot they envy.
"Oh, I know your objections, Aurelle. You know, all the time you are
dreaming of the loves of Prince Bolkonsky, that you are the Interpreter
Aurelle, attached to the Lennox Highlanders, but when Queen Elizabeth is
scrubbing the floor of my office, she does not know that she is Mrs.
Jones, charwoman, of Hammersmith. But incoherence is not the monopoly of
madness: all the main ideas of a sane man are irrational erections built
up, for better or worse, to express his deepest feelings."
"Parker," said the colonel, "can you think of anything to stop him?"
"A No. 5 grenade, sir," said the major.
But the doctor went on imperturbably:
"One of my patients was a country gentleman, who after being a model of
piety for the first part of his life suddenly became an atheist. He
gave carefully thought out reasons for it, and discoursed with a good
deal of erudition on questions of doctrine, but the only true cause of
his conversion to the wrong side was because his wife ran away with the
clergyman of his village. Oh, I beg your pardon, padre, you don’t mind,
do you?"
"I? I have not been listening to you for ages," said the padre, who was
dealing out patience.
"It is just the same thing," continued the doctor, turning to the docile
Aurelle, "with a man who is too refined for the class in which chance
has placed him. At first he is simply jealous and unhappy. Influenced
by these feelings, he becomes violently critical of society in order to
account for his hate and disappointment.
"Nietzsche was a genius because he delighted in persecution. Karl Marx
was a dangerous maniac. It is only when the feelings of discontent
which he tries to explain coincide with those of a whole class, or a
whole nation, that the impassioned theorist becomes a prophet, or a
hero; while, if he confines himself to explaining that he would rather
have been born an Emperor, they shut him up."
"Moral," said the major, "shut up all theorists."
"And the doctor," said the colonel.
"No, not all," said the doctor. "We treat the subject just as the
ancients did. All primitive people thought that a lunatic was possessed
by a spirit. When his incoherent words more or less accord with the
moral prejudices of the time, the spirit is a good one, and the man is a
saint. In the opposite case, the spirit is evil and the man must be
suppressed. It is just according to the time and place and the doctors,
whether a prophetess would be worshipped as a priestess or ducked as a
witch. Innumerable violent lunatics have escaped the cells, thanks to
the War, and their very violence has made heroes of them. And in every
Parliament there are at least five or six undisputed idiots who got
elected for their madness, through the admiration of their
constituents."
"Say five or six hundred," said Major Parker, "and it will be the first
sensible thing you have said to-night."
"That’s because my madness agrees with yours on that subject," said the
doctor.
"Doctor," said the colonel, "you understand treatment by suggestion,
don’t you? I wish you would calm down your hospital sergeant a bit. He
is so nervous that he begins to tremble and becomes perfectly speechless
if I speak to him. I really believe I terrify him. See what you can
do, like a good fellow."
Next morning, Dr. O’Grady sent for Sergeant Freshwater to his tent and
talked kindly to him.
Freshwater, a lean Albino with heavy stupid eyes, owned that he lost his
head whenever the colonel came near him.
"Well, my friend," said the doctor, "we will cure you of that in five
minutes. Sit down there."
He made some passes to create an atmosphere favourable to suggestion,
then began:
"You are not afraid of the colonel, you know he is a man just like you
and me—you rather like talking to him. Look closely at his face when he
speaks to you. His moustache is always cut a little too short on the
left side."
The doctor went on like this for a quarter of an hour describing the
rugged features and funny ways of the colonel, then sent away the
sergeant, telling him that he was cured, and not to forget it the first
time he met his commanding officer.
A few hours later, Colonel Bramble, going out for his lunch, met the
hospital sergeant on one of the duck-boards used for going through the
camp. Freshwater stepped on one side, saluted, and began to laugh
silently.
"Whatever is the matter, sergeant?" said the astonished colonel.
"Oh, sir," replied Freshwater in fits of laughter, "I cannot help
laughing when I look at you, you have such a funny face!"
The colonel, in a few well-chosen words, destroyed the doctor’s learned
suggestions for ever; then, establishing himself in front of the tinned
lobster, he complimented O’Grady on his miraculous cure.
"I have never seen," said the padre, "any creatures so stupid, so
wicked, so rotten, or so dense as English doctors."
"Medicine is a very old joke," said Major Parker, "but it still goes on.
Now, doctor, tell the truth for once: what do you know more than we do
about illnesses and their remedies?"
"That’s right," said the padre, "attack his religion; he often attacks
mine."
"When I was in India," said the colonel, "an old army doctor gave me for
every malady the remedy which just suited me. For palpitations of the
heart, a large glass of brandy; for insomnia, three or four glasses of
port after dinner; for stomachic disorders, a bottle of dry champagne at
each meal. And, as long as one was feeling well, whisky and soda."
"Excellent, sir," said Aurelle. "Before the War I drank nothing but
water and I was always ill; since I have been with you I have adopted
whisky and I feel much better."
"Yes, you look it," said the colonel. "I had a friend, Major
Fetherstonhaugh, who began to have fits of dizziness when he was about
forty; he went to see a doctor who thought it was the whisky and advised
him to drink milk for a time; well, in ten days he was dead."
"And a good thing too," said the padre.
"But I expect——" began the doctor.
"Happy are those who expect nothing," said the padre, "for they shall
not be disappointed."
"What, you too, padre!" said the doctor. "Take care; if you ruin doctors
by your malevolent remarks, I shall found a society for the exportation
to the Colonies of mechanical idols and ovens for cooking missionaries."
"That is an excellent idea," said the padre. "I must see about it."
*CHAPTER XVIII*
The brigade, kept in reserve for the division, was ordered to go and
camp at H——. As a dentist measures the extent of a cavity at a glance,
the men of the Lennox, expert in bombardments, cast a professional eye
over the village. Round the château and the church it was done for:
houses in ruins, pavements torn up, trees smashed. The weaving factory
had been badly damaged. The rest was not so unhealthy, a little knocked
about, perhaps, but habitable.
The house where Colonel Bramble had established his Mess had already
been hit by a shell. It had burst in the garden, breaking the
window-panes and marking the walls. Madame, a dear little old lady,
made light of these blemishes, which had depreciated her house in value.
"Oh, just a shell, _monsieur l’officier_!" she said. "Quite a small
shell; I put the base of it there on my mantelpiece. It’s nothing, as
you can see. True, they make a mess of everything, but I am not afraid
of them!"
The colonel asked her how many windows had been broken.
"I don’t like this house," said the padre, as they sat down to dinner.
"The life of a soldier," replied the colonel, "is one of great hardship,
not infrequently mingled with moments of real danger."
"Be not dismayed, padre," said the doctor. "Shells fall like drops of
water: if it rains much the whole pavement gets wet."
"The Lennox Mess has always been lucky," said Major Parker.
"Luck is nothing," said the doctor.
"One can see you are not a gambler," remarked Aurelle.
"One can see that you are not a mathematician," said the doctor.
The padre expostulated:
"What? Luck nothing? How about little Taylor, killed by a shell in
Poperinghe Station at the very moment that he was arriving at the front
for the first time! You don’t call that bad luck?"
"Not more than if an old habitué like me was wiped out by a whizz-bang,
padre. You are astonished at Taylor being killed the first minute, just
as you would be surprised if, in a lottery of a million tickets, Number
One should win, although that number had obviously as much chance as,
say, 327,645. Someone must be the last man killed in this war, but you
will see that his family will not think it ordinary."
"You are a fanatic, O’Grady," said Parker, "you must have an explanation
for everything; there are more things in heaven and earth than are
dreamed of in your philosophy. I believe, myself, in good luck and bad
luck because I have noticed it: I believe in presentiments because I
have had them, and events have confirmed them. When I was being sent
home, after the Transvaal War, I got an order to embark on a certain
ship. Well, two days before it started I suddenly had a presentiment
that I must avoid sailing in that ship at all costs. I went sick and
waited a fortnight longer. The transport I missed was completely lost
and no one ever knew how. Then again, why are you so certain, doctor,
that aspirin will cure your headache? Because aspirin has cured it
before. Where’s the difference?"
"The major is right," said Aurelle. "To say that you do not believe in
a man’s bad luck because you cannot find it at his autopsy, is like
saying that the tuner has taken the piano to pieces, and therefore
Mozart had no soul."
The quartermaster, who was dining with them that evening, threw his
weight into discussion:
"There _are_ things that cannot be explained, doctor. For instance, I
hit you in the face: you shut your eye—why?"
There was an astounded silence.
"Another instance," remarked the padre at last. "Why is it that if
there is a pause in the conversation, it is always twenty minutes to, or
twenty minutes past, the hour?"
"But that’s not true," said the doctor.
"It was true this time, anyhow," said Aurelle, looking at his watch.
"It may be once or twice," said the doctor irritably, "but it cannot
always happen."
"All right, doctor, all right," said the padre. "You notice it for
several days and I think you will change your mind."
The colonel said:
"My men tell me that if a shell falls on a dug-out where there are
gunners and infantry, the latter are killed and the gunners are spared.
Why?"
"But it is not true, sir."
"And why must one never light three cigarettes with the same match?"
"But you may, sir, it does not matter a bit."
"Ah, there I disagree with you, doctor," said the colonel. "I am not
superstitious, but I would not do that for anything in the world."
"Why do people dressed in green always lose at Monte Carlo?" said
Aurelle.
"But it is not true!" roared the doctor, exasperated.
"It is easy to argue like you," said Parker. "Everything you do not
agree with is not true."
"There are," said the padre, "no creatures so wicked and so dense as
English doctors."
"Messiou," said the colonel, "are the gunners equally lucky in the
French Army?"
"I have often remarked it," said Aurelle, who liked Colonel Bramble very
much.
The colonel therefore triumphed, and tried to put an end to the
discussion, which bored him.
"I am so very sorry," he said, "I cannot give you the gramophone
to-night. I have no more needles."
"That _is_ a pity," said the padre.
The window-panes shook; a big gun went off close to the house. Aurelle
went to the window and saw behind a farm, silhouetted in black against
the orange twilight of the sky, a yellowish smoke, slowly dispersing.
"There’s the old man beginning to strafe again," said the padre. "I
don’t like this house."
"You will have to put up with it, padre; the Staff captain won’t give us
another; he’s a boy who knows his own mind."
"Yes," said the colonel, "he is a very nice boy too; he is one of Lord
Bamford’s sons."
"His father, the old Lord, was a fine rider," said Parker.
"His sister," replied the colonel, "married a cousin of Graham, who was
a major in our first battalion at the beginning of the War, and is now a
brigadier-general."
Aurelle, foreseeing that such an interesting subject, so rich in the
possibility of unexpected developments, would occupy the entire evening,
tried to scribble some verses, still meditating on luck and chance.
"Tu l’as dit, ô Pascal, le nez de Cléopâtre,
S’il eût été plus court ... nous n’en serions pas là."
A new and formidable detonation put the subtle metre of rhyme out of his
head; discouraged, he tried another:
"Croyez pas que je moralise,
Si je vous envoie ces bobards,
C’est que notre mess analyse
Ce soir la question du hasard..."
Another shell fell so close that the colonel got up suddenly.
"They are beginning to bombard the château again," he said. "I am going
to see where that one fell."
Major Parker and the doctor followed him into the street, but Aurelle,
who was again rhyming, stayed with the padre, who had just begun the
same patience for the fourteenth time that evening. The three officers
had gone about a hundred yards when another explosion took place behind
them.
"That one was not far from the Mess," said the doctor. "I am going to
tell Madame to go down into the cellar."
He retraced his steps and found a new shell-hole in front of the house.
The house seemed all right; through the broken window the doctor saw the
padre and called out to him:
"A near thing that time, padre. Are you all right? Where is Aurelle?"
But the padre did not move: with his head leaning on his arms crossed
over the scattered cards, he appeared to be gazing vaguely at the
doctor, who entered at a bound and touched the padre on the shoulder.
He was dead. A piece of shell had entered his temple, which was
bleeding slowly. Aurelle had fallen on the floor. He was unconscious
and covered with blood, but the doctor, bending over him, found that he
still breathed. As he was unfastening his tunic and shirt, the colonel
and Parker arrived with their measured tread and stopped abruptly at the
door.
"The padre has been killed, sir," said the doctor simply. "Aurelle is
hit, too, but I don’t think it is serious. No, it’s his
shoulder—nothing much."
The colonel groaned sympathetically.
Parker helped O’Grady to lay the Frenchman on a table; a crumpled piece
of paper attracted the colonel’s attention; he picked it up and read
with difficulty:
"Pourquoi me fermes-tu les yeux
Lorsque tu me baises la bouche?"
"What is it all about?" he said.
"It belongs to Aurelle," said the doctor.
The colonel carefully folded the little sheet of paper and slid it
respectfully into the young Frenchman’s pocket. Then, after the doctor
had finished dressing the wound and had sent for an ambulance, they laid
the padre on Madame’s humble bed. They all took their hats off and
stood silent for some time contemplating the strangely softened features
of the childlike old man.
The doctor looked at his watch; it was twenty minutes past nine.
*CHAPTER XIX*
Aurelle, on leaving hospital, was attached, while convalescent, to the
English colonel, Musgrave, who commanded a supply depot at Estrées, a
little village well behind the line. He missed the evenings with the
Lennox Mess, but buying fodder and wood took him some way out into the
pretty undulating country with its clear streams, and he loved Estrées,
hiding its innumerable belfries among the flowery hills.
It was a very antique city, and in its youth, in the time of the
_seigneurs_ of Estrées, had played an important part in the affairs of
France. For several hundred years she had defended her ramparts against
the troops of the Kings of England, and from her walls she could see
those same soldiers to-day camped about her, this time as familiar and
courteous guests. Her tenacious burghers had repulsed both Leaguers and
Spaniards with equal success. She now slept in smiling old age, having
seen too many things to be surprised any more, while still retaining
from the times of her glory her casket of beautiful mansions, built
among courts and gardens with the noble simplicity of line dating from
the best periods.
Colonel Musgrave and his officers inhabited the large and handsome house
of the Dutch merchant, Van Mopez, whom Colbert had established at
Estrées to introduce the art of weaving and dyeing cloth. Aurelle liked
to go and sit in the garden and read a History of Estrées written by
Monsieur Jean Valines, correspondence member of the Amiens Academy, and
author of "Nouvelles observations sur les miracles de la chapelle
d’Estrées."
This excellent work contained accounts of the great rejoicings and high
festivals with which Estrées the Faithful had received the Kings, when
they came to kneel and worship at the feet of the miraculous image in
the Chapel of St. Ferréol.
The municipal worthies, between the royal visits, prudently and
carefully preserved the white and blue draperies embroidered with
fleurs-de-lis, and the decorations of painted scenery.
The Revolution had rather upset these domestic arrangements; the
fleurs-de-lis had to be removed and a red fringe sewn along the blue and
white draperies, so that the square of Saint-Ferréol could be decorated
at a small cost for the fête of the Supreme Being. Aurelle loved the
description:
"The cortège, preceded by music and drums, consisted first of a
half-company of the National Guard carrying a banner on which was
inscribed: ’Up with the People, down with Tyrants.’
"Then came the mothers of families carrying their infants in their arms;
children of both sexes clothed in the most beautiful ornaments of their
age—innocence and candour; young girls adorned with their charms and
virtues; and the members of that Society so dreaded by traitors, in
which were united the defenders of the truth, the upholders of public
opinion, and the indefatigable guardians of the people.
"The whole cortège gathered at the foot of a mound erected in the square
of Saint-Ferréol. There, the people of Estrées swore fidelity to the
laws of nature and humanity, and subsequently a group of figures
representing Despotism and Imposture were consumed by flames; Wisdom
arose out of the ashes and on his shield was written: ’I guard the
Republic.’"
Aurelle turned over some pages, very few, for, as Monsieur Jean Valines
said, the happy sterility of the archives of Estrées during the
Revolution recorded no other facts worthy of notice than two fêtes, a
fire, and a flood. Next came the visit of the First Consul. He came to
Estrées accompanied by his wife and several general officers, and was
received by the authorities under a triumphal arch, erected at the
Saint-Ferréol Gate, adorned with this inscription: "The Grateful
Inhabitants of this City swear Allegiance and Fidelity to the Conqueror
of Marengo."
The Mayor presented the keys of the town on a silver dish covered with
bay leaves. "I take them, _citoyen maire_, and I return them to you,"
replied Bonaparte.
"The National Guard lined the route and cries of ’Long live Bonaparte!
Long live the First Consul!’ were repeated enthusiastically a thousand
times. The First Consul visited the Van Mopez factory and distributed a
day’s pay among the workmen. The day ended with illuminations and a
brilliant ball.
"A short time after his marriage with Marie-Louise, Napoleon came back,
accompanied by the Empress. The square of Saint-Ferréol was a
magnificent spectacle, decorated with red and white draperies and
garlands of green leaves. A triumphal arch had been erected with the
inscription: ’_Augusto Napoleoni Augustæque Mariæ Ludovicæ Strataville
semper fidelis_.’"
A few more pages further on and it was March, 1814; for six days no
couriers got through to Estrées from Paris, and then she heard of the
fall of the Emperor.
"At three o’clock in the afternoon, the magistrates, assembled in the
Town Hall, summoned the inhabitants with the ringing of bells. The
Mayor appeared on the balcony of the large hall and proclaimed the
allegiance of the town to the restored Bourbons. The spectators
received this speech with oft-repeated cries of ’Long live the King!’
’Long live Louis XVIII!’ and all put on the white cockade.
"The news soon came that Louis XVIII had landed at Calais and that he
would pass through Estrées. A guard of honour was formed and a
triumphal arch was erected at the Saint-Ferréol gate. It bore this
inscription: ’_Regibus usque suis urbs Stratavilla fidelis_.’
"The clergy from every parish approached to compliment the King, and the
Mayor presented the keys of the town on a silver dish adorned with
fleurs-de-lis. The King replied, ’Monsieur le maire, I take the
flowers, and give you back the keys.’ Then the sailors and footmen
unharnessed the horses from the carriage, and drew him themselves into
the town. The excitement of the crowd was impossible to describe; every
house was decorated with blue and white draperies and green garlands,
mottoes and white flags, covered with fleurs-de-lis.
"The King was present at a _Te Deum_ sung in Saint-Ferréol, and
repaired, still drawn by sailors, to the Abbey of Saint-Pierre, where he
was to lodge the night."
The evening drew slowly in; the quaint, thick lettering of the old book
was becoming indistinct, but Aurelle wanted to finish the melancholy
history of these inconstant people. Skipping the triumphal entry of
Charles X, he came to the July insurrection.
"On the 29th of July, 1830, there were no newspapers; but letters and a
few travellers arriving from Paris announced that the tricolour flag had
been hoisted on the towers of Notre-Dame. A few days later they learnt
that the fighting had stopped, and that the heroic population of the
capital remained in possession of all their outposts.
"Louis-Philippe, accompanied by the Dukes of Orleans and Nemours, soon
after passed Estrées on his way to Lille. He was received under a
triumphal arch by the Mayor and Corporation. Every house was hung with
draperies in the three colours. An immense crowd filled the air with
their acclamations. The King arrived at the square of Saint-Ferréol,
where the National Guard and several companies of _douaniers_ awaited
him.
"The various corps of the urban guards in their best clothes; the
strangeness of the rural guards, with a large number of Napoleon’s old
soldiers in their ranks with their original uniforms; the intrepid
seamen of Cayeux carrying in triumph their fishing prizes, ten old
tricolour banners; the sailors, with their carbines, bandoliers and
cutlasses in their hands, all made the gayest of spectacles, and the
picturesque fête delighted the King and the officers of his staff."
There Jean Valines’ book concluded, but Aurelle, while watching the
garden fading slowly in the twilight, amused himself by imagining what
followed. A visit from Lamartine, no doubt; then one from Napoleon III,
the triumphal arches and inscriptions, and quite lately, perhaps, Carnot
or Fallières receiving from the mayor, in the square of Saint-Ferréol,
the assurance of the unalterable devotion of the faithful people of
Estrées to the Republic. Then in the future: unknown governors, the
decorations, perhaps red, perhaps blue, until the day when some blind
god would come and crush with his heel this venerable human ant-hill.
"And each time," he mused, "the enthusiasm is sincere and the vows
loyal, and these honest tradesmen rejoice to see passing through their
ancient portals the new rulers, in the choice of whom they have had no
part.
"Happy province! You quietly accept the Empires which Paris brings
forth with pain, and the downfall of a government means no more to you
than changing the words of a speech or the flowers on a silver dish. If
Dr. O’Grady were here he would quote Ecclesiastes to me."
He tried to remember it:
"What profit hath a man of all his labour which he taketh under the sun?
"One generation passeth away, and another generation cometh; but the
earth abideth for ever.
"The thing that hath been, it is that which shall be; and that which is
done is that which shall be done; and there is no new thing under the
sun."
"Aurelle," said Colonel Musgrave, who had quietly approached, "if you
want to see the bombardment after dinner, go up to the top of the hill.
The sky is all lit up. We attack to-morrow morning."
And a distant muffled thundering floated on the calm evening air. A
melancholy and ancient peal of bells rang out from the Spanish belfry in
the market-place. The first stars twinkled above the two ironical
towers of the church of Saint-Ferréol and the proud old town fell asleep
to the familiar sound of battle.
*CHAPTER XX*
Colonel Musgrave was drinking his coffee in the handsome _salon_ of the
merchant, Van Mopez; he opened a pink official telegram and read:
"Director of Commissariat to Colonel Musgrave. Marseilles Indian Depot
overcrowded meet special train 1000 goats with native goatherds find
suitable quarters and organize temporary farm."
"Damn the goats!" he said.
His job being to feed Australians, he thought it hard that he had to
bear in addition the consequences of the religious laws of the Hindoos.
But nothing troubled Colonel Musgrave long; he sent for his interpreter.
"Aurelle," he said, "I am expecting a thousand goats this evening; you
will take my motor and scour the country. I must have a suitable piece
of ground in five hours and a small building for the shepherds. If the
owner refuses to let you hire them, you will commandeer them. Have a
cigar? Good-bye."
Having thus disposed of this first anxiety, he turned to his adjutant.
"We now want an O.C Goats!" he said. "It will be an excellent reason for
getting rid of Captain Cassell, who arrived yesterday. _Captain_! I
asked him what he did in peace-time—musical critic of the _Morning
Leader_!"
So that is how Captain Cassell, musical critic, was promoted
goatherd-in-chief. Aurelle found a farmer’s wife whose husband had been
called up, and he persuaded her, at the cost of much eloquence, that the
presence of a thousand goats in her orchards would be the beginning of
all sorts of prosperity. He went in the evening to the station with
Cassell to fetch the goats, and they both passed through the town at the
head of the picturesque flock, herded by ancient Indians, who looked
exactly like the shepherds in the Bible.
Colonel Musgrave ordered Cassell to send him a hundred goats per day for
the front. After the fourth day Cassell sent over a short note by one
of the children from the farm, announcing, as if it were quite a natural
thing, that his flock would be exhausted the next day and asking for
another contingent of goats.
On opening this extraordinary missive, the colonel was so choked with
rage that he forgot to proclaim, according to custom, that Cassell was a
damned fool. The numbers were too simple for an error to be possible.
Cassell had received one thousand goats; he had sent off four hundred,
he ought to have six hundred left.
The colonel ordered his car and commanded Aurelle to take him to the
farm. A pretty, deeply cut road led them there. The buildings were in
the rustic, solid style of the end of the eighteenth century.
"It is a charming spot," said the interpreter, proud of his find.
"Where is that damned fellow Cassell?" said the colonel.
They found him in the kitchen having a French lesson from the farmer’s
daughter. He got up with the easy grace of a rural gentleman whom
friends from town had surprised in his hermitage.
"Hullo, colonel," he said, "I am very glad to see you."
The colonel went straight to the point:
"What’s this damned letter that you sent me this morning? You received
a thousand goats; you sent me four hundred of them. Show me the
others."
The ground behind the farm sloped gently down to a wooded valley; it was
planted with apple-trees. Near a stable, sitting in the mud, the Hindoo
shepherds tasted prematurely the joys of Nirvana.
A horrible smell arose from the valley, and, coming nearer, the colonel
saw about a hundred swollen and rotting carcases of goats scattered
about the enclosure. A few thin kids dismally gnawed the bark of the
apple-trees. In the distance, among the copses which covered the other
side of the valley, one could see goats which had escaped browsing on
the young trees. At this lamentable sight, Aurelle pitied the
unfortunate Cassell.
The colonel maintained a hostile and dangerous silence.
"Isn’t it beautiful, colonel," said the musical critic with soft and
stilted speech, "to see all those little white spots among the green?"
* * * * *
"Could not one," suggested Aurelle on the return journey, "ask the
advice of a competent man? Perhaps goats cannot stand sleeping out of
doors in this damp climate, and perhaps also they are not being fed
properly."
The colonel frowned.
"In the South African war," he said after a silence, "we used a large
number of oxen for our transport. One day these damned oxen started
dying by hundreds, and no one knew why. Great excitement at
headquarters. Some general found an expert, who, after boring the whole
army with his questions, ended by declaring that the oxen were cold. He
had noticed the same sickness in the north of India. There they
protected the beasts by making them wear special clothing. Any normal
individual with common sense could see that the oxen were simply
overworked. But the report followed its course, and arrived at general
headquarters, and from there they wired to India for a few thousand rugs
for cattle.
"So far all went well, the oxen died as fast as ever, the well-paid
expert had a damned good time—up to the arrival of the rugs. It is very
easy to put clothing on an Indian cow who waits patiently with lowered
head. But an African bullock—you try, and see what it’s like. After
several trials, our drivers refused to do it. They sent for the expert
and said to him, ’You asked for rugs for the beasts: here they are.
Show us how to put them on.’ He was damned lucky to get out of hospital
in six months."
That same evening another pink telegram arrived from the Director of
Commissariat:
"Goats arrive at the front half dead pray take steps that these animals
may have some wish to live."
Colonel Musgrave then decided to telegraph to Marseilles and ask for an
expert on goats.
The expert arrived two days later, a fat farmer from the South, sergeant
of Territorials. With the help of Aurelle, he had a long conversation
with the colonel.
"There is one thing," he said, "that goats cannot get on without, and
that is heat. You must make very low wooden sheds for them; without any
openings; let them stew in their own juice, and they will be happy!"
He remarked to the interpreter when the colonel had gone, "Didn’t I tell
them a good tale about their goats, _hé_? In the South they live out in
the open and are as well as you or I. But let’s talk seriously.
Couldn’t you get your English to manage an extension of leave for me, to
look after their beasts, _hé_?"
They had begun to build the huts described by the man from the South,
when the Indian Corps wrote to Colonel Musgrave that they had discovered
a British expert whom they were sending him.
The new seer was an artillery officer, but goats filled his life.
Aurelle, who looked after him a good deal, found out that he regarded
everything in nature from the point of view of a goat. A Gothic
cathedral, according to him, was a poor shelter for goats: not enough
air, but that could be remedied by breaking the windows.
His first advice was to mix molasses with the fodder which was given to
the animals. It was supposed to fatten them and cure them of that
distinguished melancholy which the Indian troops complained of. Large
bowls of molasses were therefore distributed to the Hindoo shepherds.
The goats remained thin and sad, but the shepherds grew fat. These
results surprised the expert.
Then he was shown the plans of the huts.
He was astounded.
"If there is one thing in the world that goats cannot do without," he
said, "it is air. They must have very lofty stables with large
windows."
Colonel Musgrave asked him no more. He thanked him with extreme
politeness, then sent for Aurelle.
"Now listen to me," he said: "you know Lieutenant Honeysuckle, the goat
expert? Well, I never wish to see him again. I order you to go and find
a new farm with him. I forbid you to find it. If you can manage to
drown him, to run over him with my car, or to get him eaten by the
goats, I will recommend you for the Military Cross. If he reappears
here before my huts are finished, I will have you shot. Be off!"
A week later Lieutenant Honeysuckle broke his leg by falling off his
horse in a farmyard. The Territorial from Marseilles was sent back to
his corps. As for the goats, one fine day they stopped dying, and no
one ever found out why.
*CHAPTER XXI*
One morning, Aurelle, seeing an English Staff officer come into his
office in a gold-peaked hat with a red band, was surprised and delighted
to recognize Major Parker.
"Hullo, sir! I _am_ glad to see you again! But you never told me about
that"—and he pointed to the signs of authority.
"Well," said the major, "I wrote and told you that Colonel Bramble had
been made a general. He now commands our old brigade and I am his
brigade major. I have just been down to the Base to inspect our
reinforcements, and the general ordered me to pick you up on the way
back and bring you in to lunch. He will send you back this evening.
Your colonel is quite agreeable. We are camped for the moment next to
the village where the padre was killed; the general thought you would
like to see his grave."
Two hours later they drew near the front and Aurelle recognized the
familiar landmarks: the little English military village with a policeman
holding up his hand at every corner; the large market town, scarcely
bombarded, but having here and there a roof with its beams exposed; the
road, where one occasionally met a man in a flat steel helmet loaded
like a mule; the village, the notice boards, "This road is under
observation," and suddenly, a carefully camouflaged battery barking out
of a thicket.
But Major Parker, who had seen these things every day for three years,
discoursed on one of his favourite themes:
"The soldier, Aurelle, is always done in by the tradesman and the
politician. England will pay ten thousand a year to a lawyer or a
banker, but when she has splendid fellows like me who conquer empires
and keep them for her, she only gives them just enough to keep their
polo ponies. And again——"
"It is just the same in France——" began Aurelle; but the car stopped
suddenly opposite the church of a nightmare village, and he recognized
H——. "Poor old village, how it has changed!" he said.
The church, ashamed, now showed its profaned nave; the few houses still
standing were merely two triangles of stone sadly facing one another;
and the high building of the weaving factory, hit by a shell in the
third story, was bent over like a poplar in a storm.
"Will you follow me?" said the major. "We have had to put the H.Q. of
the brigade outside the village, which was becoming unhealthy. Walk
twenty paces behind me; the sausage balloon is up and it’s no good
showing them the road."
Aurelle followed for a quarter of an hour through the bushes, and
suddenly found himself face to face with General Bramble who, standing
at the entrance to a dug-out, was watching a suspicious aeroplane.
"Ah, messiou!" he said. "That’s good!" And the whole of his rugged red
face lit up with a kindly smile.
"It will be like a lunch in the old days," he continued, after Aurelle
had congratulated him. "I sent the Staff captain out with the
interpreter—for we have another interpreter now, messiou—I thought you
would not like to see him in your place. But he has not really replaced
you, messiou; and I telephoned to the Lennox to send the doctor to lunch
with us."
He showed them into the Mess and gave Major Parker a few details of what
had been happening.
"Nothing important; they have spoilt the first line a bit at E 17 A. We
had a little strafe last night. The division wanted a prisoner, so as
to identify the Boche reliefs—yes, yes, that was all right—the Lennox
went to fetch him. I have seen the man, but I haven’t had their written
report yet."
"What, not since last night?" said Parker. "What else have they got to
do?"
"You see, messiou," said the general, "the good old times are over.
Parker no longer abuses red hats. No doubt they are abusing him in that
little wood you see down there."
"It is true," said Parker, "that one must be on the Staff to realize the
importance of work done there. The Staff is really a brain without
which no movement of the regiments is possible."
"You hear, messiou?" said the general. "It is no longer the same; it
will never be the same again. The padre will not be there to talk to us
about Scotland and to abuse bishops. And I have no longer got my
gramophone, messiou. I left it to the regiment with all my records.
The life of the soldier is one of great hardship, messiou, but we had a
jolly little Mess with the Lennox, hadn’t we?"
The doctor appeared at the entrance to the tent.
"Come in, O’Grady, come in. Late as usual; there is no creature so
wicked and so dense as you."
The lunch was very like those of the good old times—for there were
already good old times in this War, which was no longer in the flower of
its youth—the orderlies handed boiled potatoes and mutton with mint
sauce, and Aurelle had a friendly little discussion with the doctor.
"When do you think war will be finished, Aurelle?" said the doctor.
"When we win," cut in the general.
But the doctor meant the League of Nations: he did not believe in a
final war.
"It is a fairly consistent law of humanity," he said, "that men spend
about half their lives at war. A Frenchman, called Lapouge, calculated
that from the year 1100 to the year 1500, England had been 207 years at
war, and 212 years from 1500 to 1900. In France the corresponding
figures would be 192 and 181 years."
"That is very interesting," said the general.
"According to that same man Lapouge, nineteen million men are killed in
war every century. Their blood would fill three million barrels of 180
litres each, and would feed a fountain of blood running 700 litres an
hour from the beginning of history."
"Ugh!" said the general.
"All that does not prove, doctor," said Aurelle, "that your fountain
will go on running. For many centuries murder has been an institution,
and nevertheless courts of justice have been established."
"Murder," said the doctor, "never appears to have been an honoured
institution among primitive peoples. Cain had no reason to care for the
justice of his country, if I mistake not. Besides, law courts have not
suppressed murderers. They punish them, which is not the same thing. A
certain number of international conflicts might be settled by civil
tribunals, but there will always be wars of passion."
"Have you read ’The Great Illusion’?" said Aurelle.
"Yes," said the major, "it’s a misleading book. It pretends to show
that war is useless, because it is not profitable. We know that very
well, but who fights for profit? England did not take part in this war
to conquer, but to defend her honour. As for believing that Democracies
would be pacific, that’s nonsense. A nation worthy of the name is even
more susceptible than a monarch. The Royal Era was the age of gold,
preceding the Iron Age of the people."
"There’s an argument just like the old days," said the general. "Both
are right, both are wrong. That’s capital! Now, doctor, tell me the
story about your going on leave and I shall be perfectly happy."
After lunch, they all four went to see the padre’s grave. It was in a
little cemetery surrounded by weeds; the ground broken up here and there
by recent shell-holes. The padre lay between two lieutenants of twenty.
Cornflowers and other wild plants had spread a living mantle over all
three graves.
"After the war," said General Bramble, "if I am still alive, I shall
have a stone carved with ’Here lies a soldier and a sportsman.’ That
will please him."
The other three remained silent, restraining their emotion with
difficulty. Aurelle seemed to hear, in the murmuring summer air, the
undying strains of "Destiny Waltz" and saw the padre setting out once
more on horseback, his pockets bulging with hymn-books and cigarettes
for the men. The doctor meditated: "’Where two or three are gathered
together, there I will be in the midst of them.’ What a profound and
true saying! And how the religion of the dead still lives."
"Come," said the general, "we must go, the Boche sausage is up in the
air, and we are four; it is too many. They tolerate two, but we must
not abuse their courtesy. I am going on up to the trenches. You,
Parker, will take Aurelle back, and if you want to go with them, doctor,
I will tell your colonel that I have given you leave for the afternoon."
The three friends passed slowly across the silent plains, which only a
few months before had been the formidable battlefield of the Somme. As
far as the eye could see, there were low, undulating hillocks covered
with thick, coarse grass, groups of mutilated tree-trunks marking the
place of the famous wood, and millions of poppies made these dead fields
glow with a warm and coppery light. A few tenacious rose-trees, with
lovely fading roses, had remained alive in this wilderness, beneath
which slept the dead. Here and there posts, bearing painted notices,
like those on a station platform, recalled villages unknown yesterday,
but now ranking with those of Marathon or Rivol: Contalmaison,
Martinpuich, Thiepval.
"I hope," said Aurelle, looking at the innumerable little crosses, here
grouped together as in cemeteries, there isolated, "that this ground
will be consecrated to the dead who won it, and that this country will
be kept as an immense rustic cemetery, where children may come to learn
the story of heroes."
"What an idea!" said the doctor. "No doubt the graves will be
respected; but they will have good crops all round them in two years’
time. The land is too rich to remain widowed; look at that superb lot
of cornflowers on those half-healed scars."
And truly, a little further on, some of the villages seemed, like
convalescents, to be tasting the joy of life once more. Shop windows
crowded with English goods in many-coloured packets brightened up the
ruined houses. As they passed through a straggling village of Spanish
aspect the doctor resumed:
"Yes, this is a marvellous land. Every nation in Europe has conquered
it in turn; it has defeated its conqueror every time."
"If we go a little out of the way," said Parker, "we could visit the
battlefield of Crécy; it would interest me. I hope you are not annoyed
with us, Aurelle, for having beaten Philippe de Valois? Your military
history is too glorious for you to have any resentment for events which
took place so long ago."
"My oldest resentments do not last six hundred years," said Aurelle.
"Crécy was an honourably-contested match; we can shake hands over it."
The chauffeur was told to turn to the west, and they arrived on the site
of Crécy by the same lower road taken by Philippe’s army.
"The English," said Parker, "were drawn up on the hill facing us, their
right towards Crécy, their left at Vadicourt, that little village you
see down there. They were about thirty thousand; there were a hundred
thousand French. The latter appeared about three o’clock in the
afternoon, and immediately there was a violent thunderstorm."
"I observe," said the doctor, "that the heavens thought it funny to
water an offensive even in those days."
Parker explained the disposition of the two armies, and the varying
fortunes of the battle. Aurelle, who was not listening, admired the
woods, the quiet villages, the yellowing grass of the fields, and saw in
imagination swarms of men and horses riding up to the assault of this
peaceful hill.
"Finally," concluded the major, "when the King of France and his army
had left the field of battle, Edward invited the principal corps
commanders to dinner, and they all ate and drank with great rejoicings
because of the good luck which had befallen them."
"How very English, that invitation to dine with the King," said Aurelle.
"Then," continued Parker, "he ordered one Renaud de Ghehoben to take all
the knights and clerks who knew heraldry——"
"The units," said the doctor, "ought to send up this evening to His
Majesty’s H.Q. a statement of all barons with armorial bearings."
"And commanded them to count the dead, and to write down the names of
all the knights whom they could recognize."
"The adjutant-general will start a numbered list of lords who have been
killed, including their rank," said the doctor.
"Renaud found eleven princes, thirteen hundred knights and sixteen
thousand foot soldiers."
Heavy black clouds were showing up against the brilliant sunshine: a
storm was coming over the hill. By the valley of Renaud’s clerks, they
climbed up on to the summit and Parker looked for the tower from which
Edward had watched the battle.
"I thought," he said, "that it had been made into a mill, but I don’t
see one on the horizon."
Aurelle, noticing a few old peasants, helped by children, cutting corn
in the next field, went up to them and asked them where the tower was.
"The tower? There is no tower in these parts," one of them said, "nor
mill either."
"Perhaps we are wrong," said the major. "Ask him if this is really
where the battle was."
"The battle?" replied the old man. "What battle?"
And the people of Crécy turned back to their work, binding into neat
sheaves the corn of this invincible land.