Produced by Al Haines.
*JOFFRE AND HIS ARMY*
BY
*CHARLES DAWBARN*
AUTHOR OF "FRANCE AT BAY," ETC.
MILLS & BOON, LIMITED
49 RUPERT STREET
LONDON, W.
_Published_ 1916
IN MEMORY OF
GENERAL GALLIENI
TO WHOM THIS BOOK
WAS DEDICATED
(BY PERMISSION)
*FOREWORD*
This book is intended as a presentation card to the French army. It is
a plain story for plain people, and there has been a deliberate
avoidance of any technicalities. In it you will find references to the
leading figures in the fighting organisation of France--Joffre and his
most brilliant collaborators; and I have tried to render just homage to
the "poilu," who is the French common soldier. Perhaps the most
touching thought about that man, whose deeds of glory and pure heroism
will inspire the poets for many a long year, is that he represents not
the soldier of profession, but the soldier drawn from the most peaceful
occupations. Practically the first great encounter of the French with
the Germans in the battle of Charleroi, and the subsequent retreat,
accounted for a large part of the regular army, and more or less placed
_hors de combat_ the greater number of its officers. That professional
force was replaced by the Reserve and later supplemented by the youngest
classes--men culled from the very heart of pacific France. They came to
the trenches with all their civilian instincts--it was a peasant and
bourgeois army--but in an amazingly short space of time they were vying
with the old soldier in the brilliance of their exploits, in their
ability to endure supreme hardship with the greatest gallantry, and
without complaint: an extraordinary story of adaptability. And it came
to pass in the process of time that there was the army at the front and
the army in the rear: the army of the field and the army of the munition
factory, recruited from different elements, for the men in the trenches
were the peasants, the sons of agricultural France; and the army of the
factories--the munition workers--was composed of the artisan and typical
town dweller. And it is as well to remember, when the question of the
future of France, after the war, arises, that the peasant supported to a
great extent the physical sufferings of the war, the danger of death and
mutilation, the exposure in the trenches, the cold and damp, whilst the
townsman was harnessed to the intensive labour of producing shot and
shell for infantry and guns. I do not insinuate that the townsman
shirked the more bitter task. Each time a demand was made upon him,
involving sacrifice of life, he also was ready to rise to any height of
abnegation. And in the more mechanical branches of the war, such, for
instance, as artillery and aviation, it was often a townsman who was the
hero, and who gained, by some glowing deed, the precious symbol of the
war cross and even, perhaps, the Legion of Honour. A pure Parisian was
Guynemer, the sergeant pilot, who, on a monoplane where he was pilot and
combatant, bore down six German machines in as many months, and won thus
his stripes as sergeant, the military medal--the highest military award
in France--the Legion of Honour and the War Cross with seven palms; and
all this at the age of twenty-one. Indeed, in every enterprise that
demanded skill and daring the townsman was to the fore. But it is not
possible to differentiate in the heroism displayed by the French. The
historian will never point to the bravery of one class and the timidity
of another, for there has been bravery everywhere--bravery and heroism
of the most sublime sort poured out with lavish hand to the eternal
glory of France.
In these pages I have sought to give a glimpse of the "poilu" at work in
the trenches, that one may peep a little through the shutters of his
soul. For the mind of the "poilu" is strangely barred and curtained,
more strictly than the windows in any English east-coast town. The
outsider is not permitted to see the light within. Question him and he
will proudly boast his vices; concerning his virtues he is silent, and
quaintly ashamed; and to understand the mentality of the "poilu," to
discover what manner of man he is, one must rub shoulders with him in
everyday life. Upon some of these familiar visits I hope my readers
will accompany me, at least in imagination, and will gather some insight
into the character of the Soldier of France. I shall, indeed, have ill
performed my task if I have failed to show how valiant he is in facing
mortal danger, how uncomplaining in the midst of monotonous peril, and
in the worst discomforts--waiting the order to attack without the least
murmuring, with soldier-like acquiescence in the bitter cold of a
winter's night or in the chill of early spring. He has forged in a
surprisingly short time the _ame militaire_; he has exhibited an amazing
adaptability. Some had supposed him ill-disciplined, incapable of the
highest military virtues. "Is this a school treat?" exclaimed an
outraged Britisher as a detachment of French soldiers slouched, singing
and whistling down the road. Yes, a sloppy and disorderly lot they
looked, their clothes dirty and ill-fitting, and hung around with their
kit like travelling caravans. Surely such men were no soldiers! There
was a large section of English opinion convinced that the Frenchmen
would not fight; that, probably, was the German idea also. What, then,
has effected the transformation? How has the "poilu" become inspired by
the highest military courage, and for weeks and weeks, as at Verdun,
sustained the most devastating bombardment? Ah! that is the secret of
this war, that is the secret of the French temperament, that secluded
soul, which is not always what it seems to be. It ever carries in it
the seeds and possibilities of greatness: seeds that lay dormant until
this war germinated them and they developed into the glorious flower of
achievement. In an instant this quick and imaginative people awoke to
the necessities of the war; they had every reason to realise its
meaning; it was only too plain. There it was, written in blood and
carnage in the invaded departments. England, of course, lacked that
object-lesson. Merely the Zeppelins reminded her of the "reality" of
the war, with their pitiable toll of innocent lives; and moreover, the
attitude of the authorities, far from insisting upon the realisation of
the war and its horror, tended to starve the imaginative side of the
campaign. There were, of course, the scenes at the recruiting meetings,
the posters and the rest: but that, after all, was undignified, a little
pathetic, and sometimes even rang false; the great diapason of the
Country's Call was but rarely sounded. "Your country needs you," said a
theatrical-looking poster; but did it really need one? One had to be
sure of that. And yet, in spite of these disadvantages, in spite of a
despairing and exasperating silence about the achievements and daily
heroisms of the army in the field--until one began to think that the
only records other than the meagre _communique_, were the casualties--in
spite, I say, of these drawbacks, in spite of the paucity of the appeal,
the response of the young men to this voluntary call was stupefying in
its splendour and spontaneity, so that the French were able to
say--though they did not always say it with satisfying eloquence--again
the fault of those who did not trouble to let them know precisely what
the splendid English army and English organisation were doing--that
never had the world given such a picture of sacrifice, of absolute,
undiluted courage. The men of England were splendid, and only the
Government, so ill-adapted to the exceptional, limped painfully, slowly
and awkwardly, behind public opinion, instead of springing in front to
direct it.
I have said that people at home were not always sure that the French
would be equal to the enormous strain put upon them by the tragic events
of the invasion, by the systematised savagery of a relentless foe.
Perhaps they had dipped into history and become inspired by that
wonderful picture that Alfred de Musset draws in _La Confession d'un
Enfant du Siecle_. A generation pale, nervous and feverish was born
during the wars of the Empire. "Conceived between two battles, raised
in the colleges to the roll of drums, thousands of children looked about
them with sombre eyes and shrinking, quivering muscles. From time to
time their fathers, stained with blood, appeared, raised them on their
chests shining with decorations, and then, placing them on the ground,
remounted their horses.
"There was only one man living then in Europe: the rest filled their
lungs with the air that he had breathed. Each year France gave three
hundred thousand young men to this man; it was the tax paid to Caesar,
and if he had not had that mob behind him, he would not have been able
to carry out his plans. Never were there so many nights without sleep
as in the time of this man; never has one seen so many desolated
mothers, never such silence, the hush around the shadow of death. And
yet there was never so much joy, so much life, so much war-like music in
hearts. Never was there such pure sunlight as that which dried up all
this blood. It was the air of this sky without a cloud, where shone so
much glory, where so much steel glittered, that the children were then
breathing. They knew well that they were destined to the hecatombs, but
they believed Murat to be invulnerable, and one had seen the Emperor
pass immune through such a hail of bullets that one doubted whether he
could die. Death was so fine then, so great, so magnificent in its smoky
purple.... The cradles of France were shields and coffins also. There
were no longer any old men, but corpses and demi-gods. Nevertheless,
France, widow of Caesar, felt suddenly her wound. She began to fail and
slept with so heavy a sleep that her old kings, believing her dead,
wrapped her in a white shroud. The old, grey-haired army returned, worn
out with fatigue, and the fires on the hearths of deserted chateaux
sadly rekindled."
The war is over; the children no longer see sabres and cuirasses; Caesar
is dead, the portraits of Wellington and Bluecher hang in the
Consulates. Anxious children sit on the ruins of the world, the
children that were born at the breast of war, for the war. They had
dreamed during fifteen years of the snows of Moscow and of the sun of
the Pyramids. Every one was tired, used up, exhausted. The light of
life had gone out. The children, when they spoke of glory, were urged
to become priests, priests when one spoke of ambition, love and hope;
and, whilst life outside was so pale and shabby, the internal life of
society took on an aspect silent and sombre. The habits of students and
artists were affected; they became addicted to wine and women. And then
De Musset speaks of the influence that Goethe and Byron--the two finest
geniuses of the century according to Napoleon--exercised over Europe.
"Can't you put a little honey in the fine vases you make?" he asks of
Goethe; and of Byron he questions, "Have you no well-beloved near your
dear Adriatic?" and adds that though perhaps he, personally, has
suffered more than the English poet, he believes yet in hope and blesses
God. It is the reign of despair. "The ills of the century come from
two causes," he says: "the people who have experienced the Revolution
and Waterloo carry two wounds in their hearts. All that was, is no
more; all that will be, is not yet. Do not look elsewhere for the
secret of our ills."
Could he have foreseen the terrific experience through which France was
to pass a hundred years from Waterloo, how his tone would have altered
into deep commiseration. And yet it is interesting to compare this
picture of the years following the Napoleonic wars and the exhaustion
which then revealed itself--the utter hopelessness of every one--with
the condition to-day when, with the first pale beams of the sun of
peace, France is thinking of the future, already discounting the profit
that will be obtained by her victorious and long-suffering arms. What
great repose has she not merited? What great reward of peace and
plenty? This generation has fought, has given its life with unheard-of
prodigality that the new generation may not have to fight. It has
purchased freedom at the terrible price of blood--freedom from the
slavery of Germany. No. De Musset's picture is no longer true, but it
is doubtless this portrait of a puny, bloodless, spiritless France which
impressed itself, all the more vividly because of the splendour of the
word-painting, upon the foreign observer, and it was perhaps these
students of French history who moulded English opinion. De Musset's
powerful description was photographed upon the brain, and few realised
that the conditions of which he spoke were transitory, and that France
had emerged triumphant from her darkest hour when the pulse of her being
was but a thread. The France of to-day is not bowed down with despair,
but is buoyed with invincible hope. Hope in the morrow, hope in the
recreative genius of her people--of their marvellous powers of
recuperation. It is pleasant, it is comforting, to note the contrast,
to observe the salutary change the century has brought; the France of De
Musset shuddered, demoralised, over the cold embers of conflict--a
conflict gigantic as it then seemed, but small in face of the sacrifices
of the Great War. Even the agonies of Napoleon's invasion of Russia
cannot compare with the hecatomb, the awful onslaught that Joffre had to
meet and defeat. Glory to the "poilu," to his courage and constancy. He
has saved France; he has gained for her the sweet and fruitful repose of
a century wherein her inventive industry and creative genius may be
revived; wherein she may excel in the arts, in the most splendid works
of peace; wherein she may prove to be the torch-bearer of advanced
civilisation, the pioneer--only a prudent and alert pioneer--no longer
the dupe to illusions, of that beatific time when there shall be no more
war.
Nor in this picture of fighting France must one forget the wife and
daughter of the "poilu"; their work has been splendid. In no direction
has the national spirit been more finely emphasised. I recall a visit
to a typical factory in the east of France, some twenty miles behind the
lines, where the workers were women. I was struck by their positive
fanaticism. Upon the walls hung mottoes, just as in pious English homes
one sees texts of Scripture. One in particular caught the eye by its
terse and vivid eloquence: "Bad work may kill your brother!" And I can
well believe that there was no bad work in that factory. There was no
question of wages; they were never discussed; no one thought of them;
they were of no importance. Wages, disputes, strikes! when the men were
fighting a life and death struggle a few miles away, and when you could
hear plainly the hoarse rattle of the guns when the wind lay in the
right direction? Impossible! Instead of striking, women worked
themselves to death and often were carried fainting from their tasks
after a twelve and fifteen hours' day. And what an example the masters
set of untiring devotion. Addressing the Creusot workers in the
twenty-first month of the war, M. Albert Thomas, head of the Ministry of
Munitions, spoke of chiefs who had kept to their duties for eighteen
hours at a stretch. For them, at least, there were no restorative
week-ends and pleasant breaks in public fetes--nothing but a continuous,
back-aching and brain-wearying round. First to realise the shortage of
the shells, some six months before the English, the French displayed
astounding energy in remedying the defect. Their ant-like industry and
powers of organisation, rivalling even the vast enterprises of America,
attracted a world-wide admiration as great as for their heroism in the
field. And if it awakened an equal homage, its presence was even less
suspected than those martial qualities for which, after all, history
gives credit and the brilliant proof though we had forgotten it in this
talk of perpetual peace, in an atmosphere of material prosperity and a
super-civilisation bordering on decadence.
These things are faintly reflected in my pages together with some
appreciation of the English. Sometimes it is a little pale, that praise
for the gallant ally: the cause of it I have shown already in a
rudderless Governmental policy and a Press starved into undue reticence
by the Censor. The harm of it was seen in querulous articles from
Boulevard pens. "France has borne the brunt, France has bled, let
others now do their share." That was during Verdun, when the trumpets
had blown the fame of France over the wide earth and there was no note
resonating for England--in spite of her casualty list. Had the
chroniclers, then, forgotten the glorious stand of the English in the
Great Retreat, how they had saved the French army from being crumpled up
by Von Kluck's furious attacks on the left wing, and how they had shown
unparalleled resistance against overwhelming odds? No; the French have
not forgotten, it is engraved eternally in their hearts. Those who seem
to forget adopt a political pose; yet it is necessary to reassert the
facts, not to diminish the "poilu," but rather that we may "realise" him
the more, that we may regard him as a brother for whom we have laboured
and fought, for whom we have shed our blood. England, by her early
heroism in the war, contributed to the full development and glory of the
French soldier. It is not the least of our satisfactions that we have
helped to build the proud monument whereon is emblazoned the
imperishable record of his victories. Thus may we cry with greater
fervour, "Vive la France! vive son armee!" If we know that army and
know its chiefs, we shall be the readier to protest our faith.
*CONTENTS*
CHAP.
FOREWORD
I THE AWAKENING
II THE THREE-YEARS LAW
III DEVELOPMENT OF THE NATIONAL ARMY
IV JOFFRE--HIS ORIGIN AND RECORD
V PREPARATION
VI JOFFRE IN ACTION
VII THE SECOND IN COMMAND
VIII THE ORGANISATION OF MUNITIONS
IX FRENCH DISCIPLINE AND LEADERSHIP
X GALLIENI AND HIS POPULARITY
XI GALLIENI AND HIS COLONIAL EXPERIENCE
XII THE HERO OF THE OURCQ
XIII THE MILITARY POWER OF ENGLAND
XIV SOME TYPES OF COMMANDERS
XV CHARACTERISTICS OF THE FIGHTING
XVI MILITARY COMMAND AND THE REVOLUTION
XVII THE SPIRIT OF THE TRENCHES
XVIII TRENCH JOURNALS AND THEIR READERS
XIX THE AIRMAN IN WAR
XX THE "POILU'S" HOSPITAL
*JOFFRE AND HIS ARMY*
*CHAPTER I*
*THE AWAKENING*
"Rather than submit to the slavery of the Germans, the whole French
nation would perish." These words of General de Castelnau are no idle
boast--the coloured eloquence of a General who wishes to hearten his
troops: they are a simple statement of fact. France has left behind
eloquence and embroidered phrases: her commerce, her agriculture, her
arts are gone. She has only one business, that of fighting: her men are
all mobilised. And behind them stand the old, the young, the women and
children, waiting their turn, should that turn come. And if France ever
lies under the German heel, at least of the French people there will be
none left to weep. That is the spirit animating the army of Joffre,
that army whose exploits must have impressed even the most
unimpressionable by their continued splendour. Never was finer heroism
displayed than theirs. And they recognised from the very first the
desperate character of the enterprise. It was not a war of chivalry.
There has been no incident as at Fontenoy when Lord Hay, addressing the
French guards, invited them to fire first. The Germans carried no
sentiment of any kind into the battlefield, where their sole endeavour
was to overcome the adversary, and any means were considered legitimate.
To them the doubtful honour of the most diabolical inventions for
destroying life. This is not the atmosphere--the atmosphere of
asphyxiating gas--where chivalry thrives, and the French character,
legends, and traditions of fighting, are utterly opposed to such
scientific barbarities. "These civilised savages inspire me with more
horror than cannibals," said Flaubert. But far from being overcome and
dismayed by German barbarism, the French showed an instant spirit of
adaptation; the hideous conceptions of the Hun brain were hurled back to
them across the trenches. And horror begets horror. Officers, from the
most accomplished generals down to the subalterns, learned with
astounding speed the new art of war--this terrible, unscrupulous, brutal
combat which, after fearful carnage in the open, as at Verdun,
constantly ran itself to earth, settling down into trench war of the
most monstrous description.
Protracted trench warfare, it has been said a thousand times, is quite
contrary to the French disposition, which is all dash and go and
impulse. But to-day we shall have to revise our views, no doubt, and
find that the French have mixed with their audacity, with their natural
quickness of thought and action and their high receptivity, some of that
resistance and tenacity which are characteristically British. Confirmed
Anglophiles in France attribute this phenomenon to the moral influence
of ourselves--a flattering and satisfying doctrine to our own
self-esteem. But the appearance of this "new" virtue extended to all
parts of the population, and was so universal that we cannot credit this
grand attribute of the French in the hour of their great adversity to
anything but their own innate qualities. It was exhibited by mayors of
communes, even the most remote, who have been exposed to the brutalities
of the invaders; by the clergy to a conspicuous degree--nothing was more
touching and remarkable than their absolute devotion in the most
nerve-racking conditions. It was shown, indeed, by the whole of the
civil population, young and old, and especially by women. How splendid
they were! They did their work with extreme quietude, with a positive
genius for adaptability, and no illustrated paper published photographs
of their uniforms--for they had none. On the first day of the
mobilisation the French women turned into the fields to gather the
harvest the men had left on the ground. They had no time to choose a
suitable costume; no need of exhortations from the Board of Agriculture.
They were left to do the work, and they did it without fuss and without
parade. Such examples of determination, tenacity, sheer self-sacrifice,
courage and abnegation existed in all directions, diffusing a golden
light over the country, just as the coloured windows at the Invalides
bathe the tomb of Napoleon in a splendid effulgence.
In the army itself the adaptability of its leaders is a thousand times
exemplified by the manner in which erudite soldiers who have taught
tactics and strategy in the War School, along certain lines, suddenly
confronted with the problems of actual war, have seen that they were
quite other than those laid down in the text-books, and thereafter have
speedily adapted themselves to the new conditions. Some failed, and
there arose the rumour of many enforced retirements from active command.
But the inference to be drawn from this was not always correctly stated.
The generals in most cases were not incompetent; they correctly applied
the old war rules to the situations as they arose; but they were not
sufficiently supple; they did not adapt themselves to the new
conditions. The officers who proved the most successful were, for the
most part, the colonels and majors, who in a few months obtained
important commands.
The classic instance of this is General Petain, who, when the war broke
out, was a colonel, and rose with breathless rapidity to take supreme
command of the armies at Verdun during that terrific fight which
occupied many weeks of the Spring of 1916. Romantic as such a rise may
seem to be, it is as well to remember that the new commander was
eminently qualified by reason of his long preparation to occupy such a
position. He possesses one of the finest brains in the army--which in
France for long has been an intellectual profession--and had so trained
it that he was able at once to take advantage of the new conditions of
warfare which have so materially changed since the area of war was
charted for the guidance of commanders.
When the war broke out, France was not ready. We in England have been
often accused of our lack of foresight; but the fact that France, living
under the shadow of war, at least since the Agadir incident, was
unprepared seems to have been incredible folly. How is it to be
explained? The explanation is politics, and the pleasant, but alas!
entirely false, atmosphere created by the dreams of pacifists. Whilst
Germany planned war and prepared for it in the most cold-blooded manner,
France was dreaming of peace and behaving as if war were a thing of the
past. All her preoccupations were pacific; to her purblind politicians,
the real danger was either a struggle between Capital and Labour--and
there were not wanting signs that this was probable--or else a largely
imaginary conflict between the dispossessed Church and the State. And,
again, there was a large party in the nation led by the persuasive
eloquence of Jaures which urged that universal peace was a practical
reality. France herself did not want to fight, England showed no
bellicosity; Germany, it was true, through her governing classes,
displayed a disquieting tendency to bully, but the heart of the
people--was not that pacific? Had not Socialism, and the doctrine of
the brotherhood of man, taken firm root? The French Socialists were
convinced that it had. And so they argued war was a practical
impossibility; for, certainly, this great mass of German opinion,
penetrated with Socialism and with the ultra-pacific doctrines which go
with it, would never permit the nation to be drawn into war for the
benefit of the fire-eaters and directors of the great war machine. The
wish was father to the thought, and these misguided but well-meaning
people were always seeing across the Vosges evidence of the same
beneficent principles that manifested themselves at home. The French
Socialists were, indeed, to a great extent anti-militarist: did it not
take two to make a quarrel? Was it likely that they would be wantonly
attacked when they had not the least intention of attacking anybody?
Very naturally, I think, they argued in that strain--and the great fault
was that the directors of opinion in France, as in England, made no
effort to explore the dark waters of political probability. It was
pleasant to walk ruminatingly along the banks and to dream that the good
time would always continue. The bomb-shell of the invasion brought the
awakening. In a certain sense English politicians were more to blame
than the French, chiefly because no one of them with their hard
practical Anglo-Saxon sense really believed in universal
brotherhood--there was no Jaures to capture the public imagination by
the witchery of words. England realised clearly enough that war between
France and Germany was, sooner or later, inevitable, and the high
failure of these self-same politicians was that they did not bring home
to the public conscience the no less inevitable intervention by England.
"But we are not scaremongers! There was too much talk already about the
sword and keeping one's powder dry," say the apologists. But it is
precisely in a pacific interest that the so-called leaders of the nation
ought to have spoken. Mathematics is the base of war--and of its
prevention; and in this case the sum was easy: merely two and two make
four. If England had displayed the precaution that she adopts in other
affairs--the caution of the typical citizen safe-guarding his own
personal interests--then Germany would have thought a long while before
crossing the frontier and would still have been thinking about it.
Knowing what we do of the Teuton temperament, revealed more particularly
in the report of the camp at Wittenberg, we are convinced that Germany
would have hesitated long had she not had the quasi conviction of an
easy victory. Everything points to that: the rapid defeat of France,
and then a swift turning upon Russia, whose mobilisation is proverbially
slow and whose armament was known to be ludicrously inadequate.
Undoubtedly a little plain speaking as well as definite and resolute
preparations for eventualities would have done much to prevent war.
Forces are blind and superior to man, but war was made by man, and man
sets the current that renders it inevitable; then, the same human energy
directed at the right time and right place could have prevented it.
Nor was there in England the same anti-militarism which prevailed in
France amongst a large section hypnotised by the engaging doctrine of
high-minded theorists. There was no anti-militarism, for the reason
that there was no militarism; England was not a military power. And
thoughtful Frenchmen have been immensely impressed by the speed with
which she became one. The unchanging England had become changed out of
all recognition. I remember that when Rodin went first to England, he
was struck by the eighteenth-century aspect of the people and their
institutions. In the houses and in the streets he met types such as
Gainsborough and Lawrence painted. Their clothes even had not changed,
for though English women nominally wear French fashions, they
individualise them and adapt them to their own tastes. And this
friendly observer was constantly meeting in the unchanging women
evidences of the eternal England in their classic features and fresh
complexions, their dignified carriage, splendid shoulders and fine open
countenances. Even the clothes--the broad hat and the use of scarfs and
trinkets for the adornment of the person--signified the same thing.
And in military matters this faithfulness to the past was every whit as
pronounced. The English Army was unchanging in its traditions, habits
and customs, in its equipment and even in its names. As M. Germain
Bapst, the French battle historian, has pointed out, the names of
commanders remained unaltered from the Peninsular War and Waterloo to
the Crimea. Men purchased commissions in the British Army until after
the Franco-German War, and only a quarter of a century has elapsed since
soldiers were whipped. In 1894 there were forty-six sentences of this
sort carried out. There was little or no change in the army from the
Crimea to the Boer War. Lord Roberts and Lord Kitchener were the two
magicians who awakened England from her lethargy.
And then consider the continuity of tradition in the English regiments:
they bear on their standards the names of the old victories, and their
history and achievements can be traced for hundreds of years. Not so
with the French regiments. Their identity has been lost in the shifting
sands of the Revolution. To quote one instance: the Regiment of
Piedmont, which existed in the time of Henry VIII, became a departmental
regiment, then the Third of the Line, and then the Seventh--it is
impossible to keep pace with its changes. Practically the history of
regiments in France stops at the Revolution. That was the moment of
great changes when everything was swept away and new principles
established. England the immutable, France the fluid, enthusiastic,
passionate, artistic, wildly given over to new ideas what singular
destiny has brought the two together as comrades and allies on the field
of battle in a union much closer than in the Crimea, where, however,
Canrobert came to the same conclusion as Foch, who repeated the
eulogium, at an interval of sixty years, to General Delannes, a former
chief of staff: "Once the British Army has agreed to do something, the
thing is done." The unchanging spirit, then, the bull-dog tenacity,
that tremendous grip that never lets go--these British qualities blend
and render powerful the Latin temperament, with its quickness of
comprehension and adaptability. Slow to see a new fact, still slower to
excite himself, John Bull is the ideal character to play the waiting
game, that game of exhaustion of the war. The more wonderful, then, in
the eyes of the French that he should have made so prodigious a military
effort.
Eminent French military critics have dealt with all the phases of the
movement for raising men, first by the old traditional system of
voluntaryism, then by graduated processes of compulsion. The result was
an army whose peer the world had never seen, either for the high
training of the men or the quality of the equipment. Already in the
Spring of 1916 the English artillery was more numerous than the French,
especially in heavy guns. It is true that the shooting of those pieces
was not as good as that of our Allies, and that the French sent
instructors to coach the English in their own methods; but one need not
be surprised that we had not immediately acquired the full science of
artillery usage upon which the French have specialised for many years.
In the strict co-operation of two armies of differing nationalities
working together in the field there must be necessarily certain
difficulties and differences, and it is certain that the French did not
always comprehend our methods of fighting. The English "stick it out"
is often opposed to their own notion of a judicious retreat. For
instance, the "marmites" are falling fast upon the front-line trench;
there is a danger of the trench caving in and burying its occupants.
Realising the situation, the French withdraw their men to the second
line--perhaps three hundred yards behind the other. The British,
however, will not countenance this strategic move; they remain; their
own flank is exposed. Two rival principles are here in play. Say the
British: "Better remain in the trench, because, on the morrow, you must
win it back again by a counter-attack which is a wasteful process."
"No," say the French, "retreat in time and save your men; you can get it
back at a less cost than if you stayed and ran the risk of being
decimated by the big shells."
You may see, no doubt, much of the same spirit in the question of
guarding or abandoning sections of the line which are difficult to keep.
For instance, the French probably would have given up long ago the
salient at Ypres, which the English maintained at a considerable cost,
mainly for sentimental, at least, for moral reasons, whereas the French
would have urged that there was a line behind that would have given a
better and easier frontier to defend. None, however, can estimate the
moral value to the French of the mere presence at their side of their
old rivals and antagonists; and the effect of contingents arriving in
France from far-off Canada and Australia, New Zealand and the Cape, has
been quite extraordinary. Almost inconceivable, also, has been the
material help that Britain has extended to her Allies. To France alone
we have advanced L500,000,000, a wonderful achievement in itself, and we
have also supplied unending stores of coals, steel, boots,
clothing--material of all sorts.
Of the "poilu," too, I shall often speak, but you will never realise how
big he is--this sometimes unlikely-looking man, hung about with pots and
pans and cumbered with all sorts of strange impedimenta. And he is
often a poet as well as a hero. I wish you could read the letters from
him I have been privileged to see, written under the hail of bullets and
in the thunder of the big guns. His courage and undying spirit shine
through these tender communications which lose so much in the
translation, which are untranslatable, in fact--for one cannot translate
a perfume or a colour, nor can you put upon cold paper the complexion of
a kiss. The "poilu" is peculiarly French in the mood and manner of his
life, in his apparent slackness, in the speed with which he braces up at
the proper moment, his disgust and objection to mere unintelligent
parade, his amused disdain of the "panache," his admiration for and
whole-hearted devotion to a man capable of understanding and drawing him
out, able to appeal to the particular form of his patriotism, and to
fire him with a holy zeal for a holy cause--to a man, in fact, who
combines a species of apostolic fervour, a winsomeness and appeal, with
the sterling qualities of a real leader of men. Of such men I shall
presently speak--men who inspire devotion like Mahomet over his
followers, men who bring out the spirituality of war--if so be that one
is allowed to speak of its spiritual side. For amidst the awful wreck
of war--the sufferings it entails, its thousand miseries, the break-up
of the home, the desolation of hearths, and the abominations practised
upon civilians by the drunken or cynical soldiers of the Kaiser--there
are incidents, as great and as sublime as ever immortalised the saints
and martyrs dying for their religion, suffering nameless tortures that,
in their quivering flesh, they might represent, for ever, the sustaining
power of God. Of such heroism, of such priceless sacrifice this war is
full--so full, that one knows not where to begin, and certainly would
not know where to end, in a recital of deeds of valour and of splendour,
irradiating poor human nature with a glow of glory whose beams will
reach Eternity. Yet this war, despite its horror, despite the fact that
it has filled the streets of every big town in France with a melancholy
line of cripples, of men hopelessly maimed, who must go through the
remainder of their existence on this earth with diminished vigour, has
taught lessons and inculcated warnings which must continue through the
years to bear their fruit and point the way to the right road as well as
constituting a danger-signal to national shortcomings.
"Quit yourselves like men." The war will not have been in vain if this
lesson is laid to heart. Let us have no more cant; no more false
sentiment; no more idle dreams and castles built upon the foundations of
a civilisation that does not exist. If, after nearly 2000 years of
Christianity, we have not learnt to love one another, let us not, at
least, pretend we do--until we are awakened by a Hymn of Hate. The
Peace of the future is to the strong, to the country that is alive to
the menace of war, to the nation constantly vigilant, to a people
standing to arms. France, with her woman's soul, clung to a belief in
civilisation that should make war unthinkable. But the nations that
emerge from this war will have lost their illusions; they will have
grown old and wise, and perhaps a little hard. Yet, at least, they will
have learnt to face facts; they will not cry Peace when there is no
peace. No, the policy of the nations will be directed by hard facts;
the horrors of the camp of Wittenberg are seared into our souls. Dreams
and idealism must have no place in our national affairs; such pleasant
pastimes bring too rude an awakening.
*CHAPTER II*
*THE THREE-YEARS LAW*
During the Summer of 1913, it became evident that France had to change
her military law to enable her to cope with the new forces Germany had
arrayed against her. The growth of the Imperial effectives was quite
remarkable. They had been increased by new legislation to 876,000; the
cover troops, that is, those placed along the frontier in readiness for
immediate service, were reinforced by 60,000 men and 500 pieces of
artillery. To these numbers must be added the enormous total of the
reserve: 4,370,000. Such masses were quite unknown to Europe and
inspired legitimate alarm, not only in France, but amongst the other
nations. The French Army numbered 567,000 of the active, and 3,980,000
of the reserve, namely, 700,000 fewer than the Germans. Again, of this
number, 50,000 were employed in Northern Africa, and the infantry mass
was further depleted by the creation of artillery regiments, machine-gun
sections and aerial squadrons. It was time, therefore, to act.
When the German Emperor went to Tangiers in 1905, few French people
ignored the significance of the step. And when, in 1911, the _Panther_
anchored off Agadir, each one realised that it was a new menace, a new
challenge to the right of France to Morocco, notwithstanding that "scrap
of paper," the Algeciras Conference. The presence of the cruiser was a
protest against the settlement by France of the Moroccan Railway
question and against the march of French columns on Fez, which was the
symbol of French possession. On both occasions, Parliament went
hurriedly to work to vote extra credits, realising the state of
unpreparedness, and then sank into its habitual indifference to these
matters. But now it was no longer possible to postpone the question of
effectives. The German advance was so real that France was forced to
take note of it on pain of being relegated, definitely, to an inferior
position. It was soon apparent that if the discussion revealed some of
the vices of the French Parliamentary system, it also demonstrated that
Parliament could rise, on occasion, above party and give an example of
enlightened patriotism. The Government of the Republic, indeed, was
more alive to its duty than the Imperial Government, which, forty-five
years before, had not had the courage to support Marshal Niel's motion
for universal service. It was on the eve of the elections and it had
its own policy to pursue. It was again the eve of the elections in
1913, but the spirit of the country had changed; temporisation was no
longer possible. "Let the Chamber tell me the sum it will place at my
disposal and I will say in what measure I can organise the National
Mobile Guard," cried Marshal Leboeuf, in the discussion under the Second
Empire. It was a preposterous attitude to adopt, quite in consonance,
however, with the lack of seriousness of the period. On the very brink
of the war, the Government actually proposed to reduce the annual
contingent!
The discussion in 1913 was remarkable for several things. One was its
great length: it lasted three months; another was the prolixity and
poverty of the speeches; hardly one contained the germ of a great idea.
The striking contributions in this mad welter of talk could be counted
on the fingers of one hand. The majority of deputies, until convinced
of the error of their ways, persisted in treating the question as if it
were political rather than patriotic. Day by day they mounted to the
tribune and delivered orations as empty as air. An exception was the
great speech of M. Andre Lefevre, who had been Under Secretary of State
for Finance, some years before, and had resigned "because he had not
enough to do." This novel reason proved his originality; nor was it
belied by his methods in the rostrum. He was not eloquent in an
ordinary sense; there was no attempt at phrase-making; his facts spoke
for themselves. His rather homely appearance gave instinctive force to
his unadorned style, but his manifestly deep concern for his subject
obviated all need of rhetoric. Thus his sentences were sharp and
telling, and free from all pose or attempts at persuasion; and, perhaps,
because of that, they carried a double conviction. Facts and figures
were so downright in their character that none could dispute them.
He showed that Germany had spent a colossal sum upon her military
preparations, and had been indefatigable in their continuance. He
showed that, during the preceding thirty years, France had spent
L110,000,000 as against L188,000,000 on the part of Germany. Who was
responsible for this disparity of such danger to the country? M.
Lefevre showed that no party in the State could escape from censure. In
1868, each section of the body politic was united--to do nothing: the
Republicans, because they would not "turn France into a barracks"; the
Bonapartists, because they feared the effect of any action upon their
popularity at the elections; and the Government, because it had not the
energy to stand against a cry of "reaction."
But if M. Lefevre's speech represented the sound view of the situation,
the contribution of M. Jean Jaures presented features of brilliant
generalisation, expressed in lofty language, which always appeals to
Frenchmen. His counter proposition had but one defect: it would not
have worked. None the less, it was attractive in the abstract and had
much to recommend it. Its weaknesses were in the details, which were
too fantastic and shadowy for a people who knew what war was and had
drunk deep of the bitter cup of defeat. The Socialist leader based his
argumentation on the principle of: "la nation armee." The only way to
meet the situation was to utilise, fully, the reserve, he insisted. And
in this he was right, as the Great War has shown. Germany's initial
advantage, apart from heavy cannon, machine-guns and a more intensive
training of her troops, was due to her rapid mobilisation of reserves.
But the Socialist leader failed, notwithstanding his talents, when it
came to working out his scheme. And yet the House, fascinated and
half-convinced, cheered him repeatedly--but it voted the other way. This
is a common attitude in assemblies which distinguish between personal
success and political expediency. The deputies, indeed, could not
withhold their support from General Pau, who, with General Joffre, was
the special commissioner of the Government. Yet so much was admirable
in the scheme of M. Jaures that, had he not been known for his
anti-militarism--and therefore suspect--he would have fared much better.
What was the matter with France in a military sense? It was a question,
was it not, of effectives? But the birth-rate must be arraigned for
that. Whatever was done, declared Jaures, that primary fact could not be
disavowed. The Germans were more prolific than the French and,
consequently, had more soldiers. "The Three-Years Law is mere
plagiarism of the Germans," he said, with an impassioned gesture such as
Jean Weber has so happily caricatured. "You are beaten in advance!" he
shouted. "Notwithstanding the Three-Years Law you will have an
inferiority, at the outset, of 200,000. Thus the sacrifice demanded will
aggravate the malaise. The equilibrium, already disturbed, will be
further accentuated to the extent of 20,000 a year." The population of
France was only 43,000,000 and that of Germany 70,000,000. In face of
this inequality it was essential that every citizen should be trained to
arms. But when he came to this part of the subject, the Socialist
orator fell short of his first flights. He was pathetically inadequate.
He proposed a military service of eighteen months, then of a year, and
finally, from 1918, onwards, of six months. Before their embodiment,
the young men were to train for one day a month, and, after their
liberation as reservists, one day every quarter.