preparing the Government victory. Some one has recalled a conversation
which he had with Joffre at this time. The General sits in an armchair
looking steadily into space. His visitor insists on the impossibility
of increasing the annual contingents to the French Army. But, he says
persuasively, you can supplement the number by enrolling the black man.
"The black man," repeats Joffre, and his mind goes back, no doubt, to
his colonial days. He is again building the railway from Kayes to
Bafoulabe, he is again on the Niger at Goundam, where they brought him
news of Bonnier's massacre with his eleven officers and sixty-four
_tirailleurs_. And he asks suddenly: "But what sacred fire will animate
them? Will they ever equal our own soldiers defending, field by field,
their own soil?" Joffre, indeed, had realised the impotency of numbers
unless animated by the spirit of a great cause. He would not hear of
reinforcing the French regiments by those newly acquired citizens of
France in Central Africa. "No, no," he said; "the Three-Years Law is a
vital question; do not give the enemies of the measure the pretext they
seek."
The Generalissimo went to the Chamber, to act, with General Pau, as
Government Commissioner during the progress of the great debate. I
imagine that the experience was more painful to him than first facing
fire in a Paris fort in 1870. For the Socialist opponents of the Bill
heckled the Commissioners, challenging not merely their arguments but
also their figures. The temptation was strong upon Joffre at times to
retort angrily upon the obstructionists, but he kept his temper and a
cold, even tone of courtesy. In his rare interventions he spoke briefly
and directly to the point, figures in hand. He maintained throughout an
impassive attitude, and looked a formidable figure as he stood
resolutely to his guns dominating the wilderness of talk. Even in the
lobbies of the Chamber, in the _entr'actes_ of the debate, he did not
unbend from his attitude of reserve, which, though it angered the
obstructionists, impressed them in spite of themselves. Here was the
man who could keep his head--the _tete froide_ demanded by Napoleon as
the first essential of a battle-chief. Pau, on the other hand, was much
less calm and was visibly vexed at the shameless opposition. The
fingers of his whole arm (for he had lost the other in the War of '70)
clinched and unclinched as if anxious to meet the foe at close quarters.
Heartily glad to be allowed to return to his labours, Joffre gave
himself more thoroughly than ever to the task of preparation. He
occupied himself more particularly with the question of transports, and
the perfection of the system that he worked out was revealed at the
outbreak of the war, when the Commissariat proved an instant success.
The trenches were well furnished with food. But alas! the medical
service, which depended not upon the General Staff but upon the Ministry
of War, proved in those early days a lamentable failure, for the war had
caught it in a state of transition. The mobilisation, itself, impressed
every observer by its order and regularity; Joffre revealed himself a
master organiser. He was as prepared as man could be with the time and
"material" to his hand. He had trained his body as well as his mind by
a just balance between work and rest and physical exercise. He had the
true soldier's horror of growing soft. As a captain he was out riding
one day when he fell, owing to his horse stumbling, and was carried to
bed with injuries to his head. He spent a few weeks of his
convalescence at Rivesaltes. Fearing that his mental powers were
affected by his accident, he set himself a hard problem in mathematics
to test his brain. At the end of three days' silent work, he cried
suddenly in broad Catalan from his bed to his brother, who was sharing
the room with him, _Soun geuri_ ("I am cured"). The anecdote shows his
strenuous character and detestation of self-indulgence, and also that he
is not quite as reserved by nature as his proud title of _Le Taciturne_
would imply. Joffre's taciturnity, in fact, is self-imposed--part of
his vigorous system of preparation. It comes, also, from the fact that
he is not, naturally, an orator and knows it. Serious and meditative,
his temper is not as severe as some suppose; his sternness in all
questions of discipline has been forced upon him by duty. On the
contrary, it pains him considerably to punish any one, and he suffers as
much as his victims when he has to pass judgment upon serious faults and
incapacity.
His daily habits made him physically hard, just as his studies equipped
him for continuous intellectual labour. The morning gallop in the Bois
on a strong horse, such as would have carried Du Guesclin in his wars
against the English in the moving Middle Ages, and his walk to the
Invalides or the Ministry of War from his distant home in Auteuil gave
him the training he needed. On campaign, the motor-car replaced the
healthier exercise, but even then he managed to take long solitary walks
which reposed his mind and recreated his body. Even the most pressing
matters are not allowed to interfere with his regular rest. To bed at
nine and up at six is a rule maintained even in the heat of battle. He
feels it to be necessary for the equipoise of his constitution. Joffre
has the great Corsican's faculty of suspending his intellectual powers
by a mere effort of the will and thus obtains complete repose of the
cerebral system. His slumbers were childlike even after Charleroi; on
his motor journeys, to points along the Front, he slept profoundly.
This recuperative power is inestimable in a commander upon whom is cast
a vast responsibility. He was often to be seen in his car behind the
lines sunk in restorative sleep, his head inclined to an angle like some
tired Atlas, worn with supporting the world upon his broad shoulders.
This man, eminently French in heart and mind, has consistently trained
for his great position. Nothing has been too great a sacrifice to
secure the victory. To railwaymen, who came to thank him for his praise
of them in the mobilisation, he said: "I work for the salvation of
France and then I shall disappear." Just as he knows the character of
the men under him, he knows the value of his own services to France and
throws both into the balance at moments when every gramme of weight is
of consequence. He seems able to communicate his own confidence and
calm to others--he, so uncommunicative with his low voice, his gentle
and pensive manner. Evidently, in this preparation of the soul for
combat he must shut out the distressing sights and sounds of battle. He
must not think of devastated homesteads and ruined villages, he must not
think of widowed women and weeping children, nor, as he goes along the
line of yesterday's battle, must he think of what lies there, of the
ghostly army that is still presenting arms to him. All these things he
must banish from his mind, in the hardening processes of a great
decision--this man who has never given a contrary order. And yet
_Joffre l'humain_ is as just a title as any which honour him, for it
expresses his natural kindness and desire to save life. And a Socialist
professor wrote, in an organ of his political faith, that if, after the
war, a monument was erected to the great General, no mother need turn
her head away from it. Joffre was touched when he read the phrase, for
he is as proud of his humanity as of those purely military virtues,
which have gone to his preparation.
*CHAPTER VI*
*JOFFRE IN ACTION*
Flechier's panegyric of Turenne might have been written for Joffre, for
it expresses his traits with a curious exactitude. Said the eloquent
Bishop of Nimes of the Marshal: "He was accustomed to fight without
anger, to conquer without ambition, to triumph without vanity....
Bolder to act than speak, resolute and determined within when apparently
embarrassed, there was never a man wiser or more prudent, who conducted
war with greater order and judgment, who had more precautions and more
resources, who was more active and more reserved, who better managed
things for his ends and who showed more patience in allowing his
enterprises to mature. He took measures that were almost infallible,
divining not only what the enemy had done, but what he planned to do; he
could be unsuccessful but he was never surprised. And, finally, this
system was the source of many successful gains. It kept alive that
union of the soldiers with their chief which renders an army invincible;
and it spread amongst the troops a spirit of energy, of courage and
confidence, which enables them to suffer everything."
There is no feature of this admirable portrait which does not fit the
man. Joffre belongs to the same noble line and recommences, it has been
said, the same victory on the same theatre with new forms. The history
of Alsace will enshrine the two names, for both captains fought there
with skill and courage. Turenne's defence of the province occurred
almost two hundred years before its cession to Germany as part of the
spoils of the victors. If, like other men, Joffre has faults he has
also the qualities of greatness. He possesses strength of soul and
knowledge formed by study and reflection, and is yet without pedantry.
He does not allow himself to be guided by sudden flashes of inspiration,
nor does he invent new methods; he prefers a solid system, founded on
poise of mind and body and reinforced by calm and consistent attention.
Thus he brings to his task a clear and even temperament and a profound
and searching judgment. Possessing, perhaps, more character than
personality, he has less imagination than clairvoyance and mental
vigour, and the fact is an assurance to those he commands. He has the
temper to succeed, and is a constant traveller by that road. Slowly his
career has unfolded itself, and, at each stage, his nature has deepened
and his love of country assumed a warmer tone.
Not a gay and debonair officer, born with title and fortune, he is the
son of a working man, who has planned his own career and risen by merit
to the top. I do not propose to catalogue Joffre's virtues, or to offer
an estimate of his strategy--that must be left to other pens, equipped
with the knowledge that staff histories bring, but his career possesses
contours that, in their flowing curves, express the beauty and harmony
of his life. A "masterpiece of will power and equilibrium," he has
known how to inspire the devotion of his soldiers, and this is not the
least of his claims. His ability to extract to the utmost the
allegiance of those who serve and to make appeal to their secret
sympathies is one of his most precious talents. His character,
laborious and unobtrusive, free from ambition, solicitous for the common
welfare, has given him an irresistible hold upon hearts, so that men's
hands stretch out at the moment of action and he is surrounded and
enveloped by an atmosphere of good-will incalculably precious for
concerted action. And the women, who Joffre says, are sublime, give him
stoically their husbands and sons, rivalling in courage those who lay
down their lives. And Joffre, by a mysterious predestination, became the
instrument of that sacrifice, limitless during the war. And he never
called in vain, for, at his first demand, up rose valiant youth ready
and joyous to die for the sweet sake of France. He seems to have the
art of communicating that secret vibration of the soul, which moves
crowds, without so much as opening his lips. It is a southern gift,
belonging to the sunny lands where life runs richly and deeply. And for
this reason, perhaps, the south has become the region of great generals.
By their inventions and manoeuvres they express that species of brimming
talent which turns some into poets and plastic workers, others into men
of action, statesmen, or charmers of the public ear upon stage and
platform. His even temper that takes no umbrage at rival reputations,
that seeks in everything only the good of the cause and its strict
utility, is the right armour for the martial figure. His silence, like
his calm, has its positive and its negative side. It does not spring
from lack of thought, but from seriousness and contemplation, just as
the other is a proof not of insensibility, but of a considered system of
control. Nor is his unshakable determination the sign of obstinacy or a
purblind view, but a bright weapon forged in the recesses of the heart
as a defence against adversity and as the ready instrument of
achievement. Rarely has a man by such simple means, with no eloquence or
artifice, with no advertisement, pose, or pretension, reached such a
pinnacle of authority at once subtle and conceded and giving confidence
to every one.
When President Poincare presented the Generalissimo with the highest
military reward--the Military Medal--he drew a living portrait of the
man: "You have shown in the conduct of your armies qualities which were
not for an instant belied, a spirit of organisation and order and
method, of which the beneficent effects were extended from strategy to
tactics; a cold and prudent wisdom, which knows how to guard against the
unexpected; strength of mind that nothing can shake; a serenity of which
the salutary example spreads abroad confidence and hope."
His popularity is as great a factor in his success as his science and
military skill. It is born of acts of consideration which, in the
opening phases of the war, came to the common knowledge and gave him an
immense hold over his men. This or that journal recorded incidents
which showed his kindness and humanity. He stayed awhile on his way to
the Front to talk to a wounded "poilu," to ask him about his services,
his health, and his family; and a poor woman, who had written to him
begging that her son might be placed in a less exposed position, for she
had lost three since the war began and this one was her sole support,
received from Joffre the reply that she had done enough for the country
and could have back the lad. A dozen instances of the sort, repeated
here and there, created such an atmosphere of good-will that allegiance
was created in advance, and Joffre swayed his army by sheer affection.
The soldier, in the light of Joffre's humanity, understood delay; he
became reconciled to the monotony of trench life, for a forward move, he
knew, would cost limitless lives. No, it was better for the war to drag
on at this slow game of "nibbling" the enemy than to allow a generation
of young lives to be offered to the insatiable god. France could not
afford to be lavish with the blood of her children, since the future of
the race was as paramount as the fortune of the war.
There were some who said that Joffre's cautiousness was overdone; that
the war would have been quickened had he shown greater initiative and
greater energy in seizing more sharply the occasions for an offensive.
The elements for such a judgment are wanting to us all, but at least
this parsimony of life earned him the sublime confidence and esteem of
his troops, as completely as his fearlessness in disciplining those who
failed in the higher command. The fact that he was impartial, that he
was ready, if need be, to chastise his friends, produced a feeling of
security invaluable in such a case. The whole country felt that here
was a man for whom France had been looking, imbued with a sense of
justice, who stood fast to principles, and feared not to apply them.
And in valour, as Emerson has said, is always safety. When the army
heard that a hundred and fifty Generals had been placed _en
disponibilite_, because of failure in the field, then it realised that
Joffre would brook no obstacle to his success.
In a famous interview which he gave to the editor of a provincial
newspaper--a lifelong friend--Joffre declared that Charleroi was lost
largely owing to the failure of the Generals engaged in it. It was not
so much a question of effectives, he insisted, as inferiority in the
higher command. "Long before the war, I saw that a great number of our
Generals were fatigued; certain seemed unfitted for their duty and below
its requirements. I had the intention to rejuvenate the higher command,
but the war came too soon. And there were others in whom I had
confidence who justified it, but imperfectly." Energy must go with
knowledge and experience, he insisted. "Some were my best friends; but
if I am fond of my friends, I am still fonder of France." The words
have become linked with Joffre, and so closely represent him that they
deserve to be graven on the monument that must one day be his when he
has laid aside his sword.
It was this implacable search for efficiency that gave Joffre such
pre-eminence in the army. Yet he is scarcely the type to appeal to the
romantic side of popularity. He is rarely represented on horseback, he
waves no sword, in figure he looks like a comfortable farmer rather than
the traditional soldier; he spends long hours at an office table, and is
suspected of moving armies through a telephone. But his
appearance--sound, robust, suggestive of common sense--accords with his
manner and his methods on campaign. His life in the midst of the terror
and tumult of war is as simple as his routine at the Ministry in times
of peace. There was no fuss or parade about Headquarters, even in the
most acute phases of the conflict. Everything passed as calmly as if a
simple game were being played with counters engaged, instead of
thousands of human lives. Joffre directed the huge machine from a bare
room furnished with a common deal table, a map or two, a black board,
and three cane-bottomed chairs. The privileged visitor who saw him for
a few moments found himself faced by a man with the dark undress uniform
of the Engineers, with no decorations upon the jacket save the three
stars on the sleeve which marked his rank. His conversation, unless the
moment warranted expansion, was scarcely more than monosyllabic. A
simple "yes," or "no," sufficed; why waste time, when moments were
precious? And you went from the room conscious of having met a great
personage, impressive by silence, masterful by the flash of keen but
kindly blue eyes, from beneath protruding eyebrows. In a neighbouring
room was a low murmur of voices on the telephone--officers talking to
the Front or receiving news therefrom--and above their heads a mast
carrying wires stretched into space tingling perpetually with live
whispers of battles, and armies in movement.
This was the nerve centre of the army: a plain building, commodious,
simple, effective, strictly utilitarian. Here a large force of officers
and assistants did the bidding of the chief; here every morning, and
again in the late afternoon, conferences were held between the
Generalissimo and his staff. The inner council consisted of three
brilliant specialists in strategy, gunnery, and transport. With these
he concerted the common measures of the day, the preparation to deliver
or parry attacks. When large and general problems were afoot others of
the Etat-Major were called in; or, it may be that a meeting of
representatives of the Allies, over which he presided with great
authority, called for his wisdom and perspicacity. But each day passed
with great regularity. Joffre lived in an unpretentious villa near his
Headquarters, which changed according to the exigencies of his work.
After his breakfast, over which he wasted no time, he went afoot to his
office, saluted on the way by soldiers and civilians. To the former he
would say: "Bon jour, mon brave!" to the latter, he would vary the
address to: "Bon jour, mon ami!" Children are attracted by him, and
raise their caps or curtsey to gain a smile. Sometimes a little boy
preceded him shouting, to Joffre's infinite amusement: "Vive notre
General!" Thus greeted as a symbol of united France, as the redeemer of
the country, Joffre passed into his Headquarters and was soon plunged in
the problem that absorbed him every hour. Whilst he slept that calm
sleep of his, wires had flashed with news of victory or defeat or with
the common incidents of the Front. "If it is good news, it will keep
until the morning," said Joffre when recommending his officers to
respect his rest; "if the news is bad, you know what to do; everything
has been prepared." In this way he gained a full night's repose,
whatever the happenings between the parallel lines of combatants, or in
the savage thrust of midnight raids and assaults. And he slept on
calmly keeping fresh his energies for the morrow.
And now, when he enters his office, his first duty is to call for the
reports of the night. These he studies closely, and they are then
classified according to the armies to which they belong, in cardboard
covers of different colours. Thereupon takes place the conference to
which I have alluded; and then Joffre, having finished his morning's
work at a time when most men are beginning it, goes out upon a long and
solitary tramp through the countryside. He gives himself freely to his
meditations, knowing that none of the inhabitants, whom he crosses on
his path, will dare to disturb him. Either he thinks of a knotty
question presented by some new move of the enemy, or his mind fashions
one of those electrifying Orders of the Day which have become
world-famous. "The time for looking back has ceased ... die rather than
yield ground." That order, given on the eve of the battle of the Marne,
has become as celebrated as Nelson's signal. Like most men who keep
their thoughts rigidly to themselves, his occasional utterances are full
of a strange force. And Joffre's Orders of the Day have reached a high
order of eloquence and exalted passion.
The events of the day may call Joffre to the Front, whither he goes in a
fast motor-car. On the way he will lunch at a village _auberge_ and
scandalises the proprietor, who has prepared, perhaps, a royal feast--if
he knew in advance the honour to be done him--by the plainness of his
fare. A simple omelette, a little fruit and cheese for a Generalissimo!
Boniface is _bouleverse_! It is incredible! With pious industry a
journalist compiled Joffre's menus during the battle of the Marne. They
were the simple meals of any bourgeois; a plate of roast meat, preceded
by soup or _hors d'oeuvre_ and followed by vegetables and fruit,
constituted the repast. Notwithstanding this sobriety, the General does
not disdain the pleasures of the table; like every good Southerner, he
is something of a _gourmet_, but on campaign he exercises a rigid
self-restraint.
The same disregard for personal discomfort pervades all his
arrangements. When the battle of the Marne raged, the proprietor of a
chateau at Bar-le-Duc, whence Joffre directed operations, placed his
house at the Commander-in-Chief's disposal. Joffre gave the finest
rooms of the house, overlooking a calm and beautiful garden, to the
officers of his suite; he himself, took a front room facing the
Boulevard, and subject, of course, to the street noises; he thinks
nothing of these things. His dinner at eight o'clock, after the day's
work--for he resumes touch with the details of Headquarters towards the
end of the afternoon--is just as simple as the lunch, and Joffre never
varies from this strict _regime_. Thanks to its regularity, he is able
to sustain, without physical change or faltering, the heavy burden of
his role.