There are rumours of an offensive. We go up to the front two days
earlier than usual. On the way we pass a shelled school-house.
Stacked up against its longer side is a high double wall of yellow,
unpolished, brand-new coffins. They still smell of fir, and pine,
and the forest. There are at least a hundred.
"That's a good preparation for the offensive," says Müller astonished.
"They're for us," growls Detering.
"Don't talk rot," says Kat to him angrily.
"You be thankful if you get so much as a coffin," grins Tjaden,
"they'll slip you a water-proof sheet for your old Aunt Sally of a
carcase."
The others jest too, unpleasant jests, but what else can a man
do?--The coffins are really for us. The organization surpasses
itself in that kind of thing.
Ahead of us everything is simmering. The first night we try to get
our bearings. When it is fairly quiet we can hear the transports
behind the enemy lines rolling ceaselessly until dawn. Kat says they
do not go back but are bringing up troops--troops, munitions, and
shells.
The English artillery has been strengthened, that we can detect at
once. There are at least four more batteries of twenty-fives to the
right of the farm, and behind the poplars they have put in
trench-mortars. Besides these they have brought up a number of those
little French beasts with instantaneous fuses.
We are in low spirits. After we have been in the dug-outs two hours
our own shells begin to fall in the trench. This is the third time
in four weeks. If it were simply a mistake in aim no one would say
anything, but the truth is that the barrels are worn out. The shots
are often so uncertain that they land within our own lines. To-night
two of our men were wounded by them.
* *
The front is a cage in which we must await fearfully whatever may
happen. We lie under the network of arching shells and live in a
suspense of uncertainty. Over us Chance hovers. If a shot comes, we
can duck, that is all; we neither know nor can determine where it
will fall.
It is this Chance that makes us indifferent. A few months ago I was
sitting in a dug-out playing skat; after a while I stood up and went
to visit some friends in another dug-out. On my return nothing more
was to be seen of the first one, it had been blown to pieces by a
direct hit. I went back to the second and arrived just in time to
lend a hand digging it out. In the interval it had been buried.
It is just as much a matter of chance that I am still alive as that I
might have been hit. In a bomb-proof dug-out I may be smashed to
atoms and in the open may survive ten hours' bombardment unscathed.
No soldier outlives a thousand chances. But every soldier believes
in Chance and trusts his luck.
* *
We must look out for our bread. The rats have become much more
numerous lately because the trenches are no longer in good condition.
Detering says it is a sure sign of a coming bombardment.
The rats here are particularly repulsive, they are so fat--the kind
we call corpse-rats. They have shocking, evil, naked faces, and it
is nauseating to see their long, nude tails.
They seem to be mighty hungry. Almost every man has had his bread
gnawed. Kropp wrapped his in his waterproof sheet and put it under
his head, but he cannot sleep because they run over his face to get
at it. Detering meant to outwit them: he fastened a thin wire to the
roof and suspended his bread from it. During the night when he
switched on his pocket-torch he saw the wire swinging to and fro. On
the bread was riding a fat rat.
At last we put a stop to it. We cannot afford to throw the bread
away, because already we have practically nothing left to eat in the
morning, so we carefully cut off the bits of bread that the animals
have gnawed.
The slices we cut off are heaped together in the middle of the floor.
Each man takes out his spade and lies down prepared to strike.
Detering, Kropp, and Kat hold their pocket-lamps ready.
After a few minutes we hear the first shuffling and tugging. It
grows, now it is the sound of many little feet. Then the torches
switch on and every man strikes at the heap, which scatters with a
rush. The result is good. We toss the bits of rat over the parapet
and again lie in wait.
Several times we repeat the process. At last the beasts get wise to
it, or perhaps they have scented the blood. They return no more.
Nevertheless, before morning the remainder of the bread on the floor
has been carried off.
In the adjoining sector they attacked two large cats and a dog, bit
them to death and devoured them.
Next day there is an issue of Edamer cheese. Each man gets almost a
quarter of a cheese. In one way that is all to the good, for Edamer
is tasty--but in another way it is vile, because the fat red balls
have long been a sign of a bad time coming. Our forebodings increase
as rum is served out. We drink it of course; but are not greatly
comforted.
For days we loaf about and make war on the rats. Ammunition and
hand-grenades become more plentiful. We even overhaul the
bayonets--that is to say, the ones that have a saw on the blunt edge.
If the fellows over there catch a man with one of those he's killed
at sight. In the next sector some of our men were found whose noses
were cut off and their eyes poked out with their own saw-bayonets.
Their mouths and noses were stuffed with sawdust so that they
suffocated.
Some of the recruits have bayonets of this kind; we take them away
and give them the ordinary kind.
But the bayonet has practically lost its importance. It is usually
the fashion now to charge with bombs and spades only. The sharpened
spade is a more handy and many-sided weapon; not only can it be used
for jabbing a man under the chin, but it is much better for striking
with because of its greater weight, and if one hits between the neck
and shoulder it easily cleaves as far down as the chest. The bayonet
frequently jams on the thrust and then a man has to kick hard on the
other fellow's belly to pull it out again; and in the interval he may
easily get one himself. And what's more the blade often gets broken
off.
At night they send over gas. We expect the attack to follow and lie
with our masks on, ready to tear them off as soon as the first shadow
appears.
Dawn approaches without anything happening--only the everlasting,
nerve-wracking roll behind the enemy lines, trains, trains, lorries,
lorries; but what are they concentrating? Our artillery fires on it
continually, but still it does not cease.
We have tired faces and avoid each other's eyes. "It will be like
the Somme," says Kat gloomily. "There we were shelled steadily for
seven days and nights." Kat has lost all his fun since we have been
here, which is bad, for Kat is an old front-hog, and can smell what
is coming. Only Tjaden seems pleased with the good rations and the
rum; he thinks we might even go back to rest without anything
happening at all.
It almost looks like it. Day after day passes. At night I squat in
the listening-post. Above me the rockets and parachute-lights shoot
up and float down again. I am cautious and tense, my heart thumps.
My eyes turn again and again to the luminous dial of my watch; the
hands will not budge. Sleep hangs on my eyelids, I work my toes in
my boots in order to keep awake. Nothing happens till I am
relieved;--only the everlasting rolling over there. Gradually we
grow calmer and play skat and poker continually. Perhaps we will be
lucky.
All day the sky is hung with observation balloons. There is a rumour
that the enemy are going to put tanks over and use low-flying planes
for the attack. But that interests us less than what we hear of the
new flame-throwers.
* *
We wake up in the middle of the night. The earth booms. Heavy fire
is falling on us. We crouch into corners. We distinguish shells of
every calibre.
Each man lays hold of his things and looks again every minute to
reassure himself that they are still there. The dug-out heaves, the
night roars and flashes. We look at each other in the momentary
flashes of light, and with pale faces and pressed lips shake our
heads.
Every man is aware of the heavy shells tearing down the parapet,
rooting up the embankment and demolishing the upper layers of
concrete. When a shell lands in the trench we note how the hollow,
furious blast is like a blow from the paw of a raging beast of prey.
Already by morning a few of the recruits are green and vomiting.
They are too inexperienced.
Slowly the grey light trickles into the post and pales the flashes of
the shells. Morning is come. The explosion of mines mingles with
the gun-fire. That is the most dementing convulsion of all. The
whole region where they go up becomes one grave.
The reliefs go out, the observers stagger in, covered with dirt, and
trembling. One lies down in silence in the corner and eats, the
other, a reservist-reinforcement, sobs; twice he has been flung over
the parapet by the blast of the explosions without getting any more
than shell-shock.
The recruits are eyeing him. We must watch them, these things are
catching, already some lips begin to quiver. It is good that it is
growing daylight; perhaps the attack will come before noon.
The bombardment does not diminish. It is falling in the rear too.
As far as one can see it spouts fountains of mud and iron. A wide
belt is being raked.
The attack does not come, but the bombardment continues. Slowly we
become mute. Hardly a man speaks. We cannot make ourselves
understood.
Our trench is almost gone. At many places it is only eighteen inches
high, it is broken by holes, and craters, and mountains of earth. A
shell lands square in front of our post. At once it is dark. We are
buried and must dig ourselves out. After an hour the entrance is
clear again, and we are calmer because we have had something to do.
Our company commander scrambles in and reports that two dug-outs are
gone. The recruits calm themselves when they see him. He says that
an attempt will be made to bring up food this evening.
That sounds reassuring. No one had thought of it except Tjaden. Now
the outside world seems to draw a little nearer: if food can be
brought up, think the recruits, then it can't really be so bad.
We do not disabuse them; we know that food is as important as
ammunition and only for that reason must be brought up.
But it miscarries. A second party goes out, and it also turns back.
Finally Kat tries, and even he reappears without accomplishing
anything. No one gets through, not even a fly is small enough to get
through such a barrage.
We pull in our belts tighter and chew every mouthful three times as
long. Still the food does not last out; we are damnably hungry. I
take out a scrap of bread, eat the white and put the crust back in my
knapsack; from time to time I nibble at it.
* *
The night is unbearable. We cannot sleep, but stare ahead of us and
doze. Tjaden regrets that we wasted the gnawed pieces of bread on
the rats. We would gladly have them again to eat now. We are short
of water, too, but not seriously yet.
Towards morning, while it is still dark, there is some excitement.
Through the entrance rushes in a swarm of fleeing rats that try to
storm the walls. Torches light up the confusion. Everyone yells and
curses and slaughters. The madness and despair of many hours unloads
itself in this outburst. Faces are distorted, arms strike out, the
beasts scream; we just stop in time to avoid attacking one another.
The onslaught has exhausted us. We lie down to wait again. It is a
marvel that our post has had no casualties so far. It is one of the
few deep dug-outs.
A corporal creeps in; he has a loaf of bread with him. Three people
have had the luck to get through during the night and bring some
provisions. They say the bombardment extends undiminished as far as
the artillery lines. It is a mystery where the enemy gets all his
shells.
We wait and wait. By midday what I expected happens. One of the
recruits has a fit. I have been watching him for a long time,
grinding his teeth and opening and shutting his fists. These hunted,
protruding eyes, we know them too well. During the last few hours he
has had merely the appearance of calm. He had collapsed like a
rotten tree.
Now he stands up, stealthily creeps across the floor, hesitates a
moment and then glides towards the door. I intercept him and say:
"Where are you going?"
"I'll be back in a minute," says he, and tries to push past me.
"Wait a bit, the shelling will stop soon."
He listens and for a moment his eye becomes clear. Then again he has
the glowering eyes of a mad dog, he is silent, he shoves me aside.
"One minute, lad," I say. Kat notices. Just as the recruit shakes
me off Kat jumps in and we hold him.
Then he begins to rave: "Leave me alone, let me go out, I will go
out!"
He won't listen to anything and hits out, his mouth is wet and pours
out words, half choked, meaningless words. It is a case of
claustrophobia, he feels as though he is suffocating here and wants
to get out at any price. If we let him go he would run about
everywhere regardless of cover. He is not the first.
Though he raves and his eyes roll, it can't be helped, we have to
give him a hiding to bring him to his senses. We do it quickly and
mercilessly, and at last he sits down quietly. The others have
turned pale; let's hope it deters them. This bombardment is too much
for the poor devils, they have been sent straight from a
recruiting-depot into a barrage that is enough to turn an old
soldier's hair grey.
After this affair the sticky, close atmosphere works more than ever
on our nerves. We sit as if in our graves waiting only to be closed
in.
Suddenly it howls and flashes terrifically, the dug-out cracks in all
its joints under a direct hit, fortunately only a light one that the
concrete blocks are able to withstand. It rings metallically, the
walls reel, rifles, helmets, earth, mud, and dust fly everywhere.
Sulphur fumes pour in.
If we were in one of those light dug-outs that they have been
building lately instead of this deep one, not one of us would now be
alive.
But the effect is bad enough even so. The recruit starts to rave
again and two others follow suit. One jumps up and rushes out, we
have trouble with the other two. I start after the one who escapes
and wonder whether to shoot him in the leg--then it shrieks again, I
fling myself down and when I stand up the wall of the trench is
plastered with smoking splinters, lumps of flesh, and bits of
uniform. I scramble back.
The first recruit seems actually to have gone insane. He butts his
head against the wall like a goat. We must try to-night to take him
to the rear. Meanwhile we bind him, but in such a way that in case
of attack he can be released at once.
Kat suggests a game of skat: it is easier when a man has something to
do. But it is no use, we listen for every explosion that comes
close, miscount the tricks, and fail to follow suit. We have to give
it up. We sit as though in a hissing boiler that is being belaboured
from without on all sides.
Night again. We are deadened by the strain--a deadly tension that
scrapes along one's spine like a gapped knife. Our legs refuse to
move, our hands tremble, our bodies are a thin skin stretched
painfully over repressed madness, over an almost irresistible,
bursting roar. We have neither flesh nor muscles any longer, we dare
not look at one another for fear of some incalculable thing. So we
shut our teeth--it will end--it will end--perhaps we will come
through.
Suddenly the nearer explosions cease. The shelling continues but it
has lifted and falls behind us, our trench is free. We seize the
hand-grenades, pitch them out in front of the dug-out and jump after
them. The bombardment has stopped and a heavy barrage now falls
behind us. The attack has come.
No one would believe that in this howling waste there could still be
men; but steel helmets now appear on all sides out of the trench, and
fifty yards from us a machine-gun is already in position and barking.
The wire-entanglements are torn to pieces. Yet they offer some
obstacle. We see the storm-troops coming. Our artillery opens fire.
Machine-guns rattle, rifles crack. The charge works its way across.
Haie and Kropp begin with the hand-grenades. They throw as fast as
they can, others pass them, the handles with the strings already
pulled. Haie throws seventy-five yards, Kropp sixty, it has been
measured, the distance is important. The enemy as they run cannot do
much before they are within forty yards.
We recognize the distorted faces, the smooth helmets: they are
French. They have already suffered heavily when they reach the
remnants of the barbed wire entanglements. A whole line has gone
down before our machine-guns; then we have a lot of stoppages and
they come nearer.
I see one of them, his face upturned, fall into a wire cradle. His
body collapses, his hands remain suspended as though he were praying.
Then his body drops clean away and only his hands with the stumps of
his arms, shot off, now hang in the wire.
The moment we are about to retreat three faces rise up from the
ground in front of us. Under one of the helmets a dark pointed beard
and two eyes that are fastened on me. I raise my hand, but I cannot
throw into those strange eyes; for one mad moment the whole slaughter
whirls like a circus round me, and these two eyes that are alone
motionless; then the head rises up, a hand, a movement, and my
hand-grenade flies through the air and into him.
We make for the rear, pull wire cradles into the trench and leave
bombs behind us with the string pulled, which ensure us a fiery
retreat. The machine-guns are already firing from the next position.
We have become wild beasts. We do not fight, we defend ourselves
against annihilation. It is not against men that we fling our bombs,
what do we know of men in this moment when Death with hands and
helmets is hunting us down--now, for the first time in three days we
can see his face, now, for the first time in three days we can oppose
him; we feel a mad anger. No longer do we lie helpless, waiting on
the scaffold, we can destroy and kill, to save ourselves, to save
ourselves and be revenged.
We crouch behind every corner, behind every barrier of barbed wire,
and hurl heaps of explosives at the feet of the advancing enemy
before we run. The blast of the hand-grenades impinges powerfully on
our arms and legs; crouching like cats we run on, overwhelmed by this
wave that bears us along, that fills us with ferocity, turning us
into thugs, into murderers, into God only knows what devils; this
wave that multiplies our strength with fear and madness and greed of
life, seeking and fighting for nothing but our deliverance. If your
own father came over with them you would not hesitate to fling a bomb
into him.
The forward trenches have been abandoned. Are they still trenches?
They are blown to pieces, annihilated--there are only broken bits of
trenches, holes linked by tracks; nests of craters, that is all. But
the enemy's casualties increase. They did not count on so much
resistance.
* *
It is nearly noon. The sun blazes hotly, the sweat stings in our
eyes, we wipe it off on our sleeves and often blood with it. At last
we reach a trench that is in a somewhat better condition. It is
manned and ready for the counter-attack, it receives us. Our guns
open up in full blast and cut off the enemy attack.
The lines behind us stop. They can advance no farther. The attack
is crushed by our artillery. We watch. The fire lifts a hundred
yards and we break forward. Beside me a lance-corporal has his head
torn off. He runs a few steps more while the blood spouts from his
neck like a fountain.
It does not come quite to hand-to-hand fighting; they are driven
back. We arrive once again at our shattered trench and pass on
beyond it.
Oh, this turning back again! We reach the shelter of the reserves
and yearn to creep in and disappear;--but instead we must turn round
and plunge again into the horror. If we were not automata at that
moment we would continue lying there, exhausted, and without will.
But we are swept forward again, powerless, madly savage and raging;
we will kill, for they are still our mortal enemies, their rifles and
bombs are aimed against us, and if we don't destroy them, they will
destroy us.
The brown earth, the torn, blasted earth, with a greasy shine under
the sun's rays; the earth is the background of this restless, gloomy
world of automatons, our gasping is the scratching of a quill, our
lips are dry, our heads are debauched with stupor--thus we stagger
forward, and into our pierced and shattered souls bores the torturing
image of the brown earth with the greasy sun and the convulsed and
dead soldiers, who lie there--it can't be helped--who cry and clutch
at our legs as we spring away over them.
We have lost all feeling for one another. We can hardly control
ourselves when our hunted glance lights on the form of some other
man. We are insensible, dead men, who through some trick, some
dreadful magic, are still able to run and to kill.
A young Frenchman lags behind, he is overtaken, he puts up his hands,
in one he still holds his revolver--does he mean to shoot or to give
himself up?--a blow from a spade cleaves through his face. A second
sees it and tries to run farther; a bayonet jabs into his back. He
leaps in the air, his arms thrown wide, his mouth wide open, yelling;
he staggers, in his back the bayonet quivers. A third throws away
his rifle, cowers down with his hands before his eyes. He is left
behind with a few other prisoners to carry off the wounded.
Suddenly in the pursuit we reach the enemy line.
We are so close on the heels of our retreating enemies that we reach
it almost at the same time as they. In this way we suffer few
casualties. A machine-gun barks, but is silenced with a bomb.
Nevertheless, the couple of seconds has sufficed to give us five
stomach wounds. With the butt of his rifle Kat smashes to pulp the
face of one of the unwounded machine-gunners. We bayonet the others
before they have time to get out their bombs. Then thirstily we
drink the water they have for cooling the gun.
Everywhere wire-cutters are snapping, planks are thrown across the
entanglements, we jump through the narrow entrances into the
trenches. Haie strikes his spade into the neck of a gigantic
Frenchman and throws the first hand-grenade; we duck behind a
breastwork for a few seconds, then the whole section of trench before
us is empty. The next throw whizzes obliquely over the corner and
clears a passage; as we run past we toss handfuls down into the
dug-outs, the earth shudders, it crashes, dully and stifled, we
stumble over slippery lumps of flesh, over yielding bodies; I fall
into an open belly on which lies a clean, new officer's cap.
The fight ceases. We lose touch with the enemy. We cannot stay here
long but must retire under cover of our artillery to our own
position. No sooner do we know this than we dive into the nearest
dug-outs, and with the utmost haste seize on whatever provisions we
can see, especially the tins of corned beef and butter, before we
clear out.
We get back pretty well. There has been no further attack by the
enemy. We lie for an hour panting and resting before anyone speaks.
We are so completely played out that in spite of our great hunger we
do not think of the provisions. Then gradually we become something
like men again.
The corned beef over there is famous along the whole front.
Occasionally it has been the chief reason for a flying raid on our
part, for our nourishment is generally very bad; we have a constant
hunger.
We bagged five tins altogether. The fellows over there are well
looked after; it seems a luxury to us with our hunger-pangs, our
turnip jam, and meat so scarce that we simply grab at it. Haie has
scored a thin loaf of white French bread, and stuck it in behind his
belt like a spade. It is a bit bloody at one corner, but that can be
cut off.
It is a good thing we have something decent to eat at last; we still
have a use for all our strength. Enough to eat is just as valuable
as a good dug-out; it can save our lives; that is the reason we are
so greedy for it.
Tjaden has captured two water-bottles full of cognac. We pass them
round.
* *
The evening benediction begins. Night comes, out of the craters rise
the mists. It looks as though the holes were full of ghostly
secrets. The white vapour creeps painfully round before it ventures
to steal away over the edge. Then long streaks stretch from crater
to crater.
It is chilly. I am on sentry and stare into the darkness. My
strength is exhausted as always after an attack, and so it is hard
for me to be alone with my thoughts. They are not properly thoughts;
they are memories which in my weakness turn homeward and strangely
move me.
The parachute-lights shoot upwards--and I see a picture, a summer
evening, I am in the cathedral cloister and look at the tall rose
trees that bloom in the middle of the little cloister garden where
the monks lie buried. Around the walls are the stone carvings of the
Stations of the Cross. No one is there. A great quietness rules in
this blossoming quadrangle, the sun lies warm on the heavy grey
stones, I place my hand upon them and feel the warmth. At the
right-hand corner the green cathedral spire ascends into the pale
blue sky of the evening. Between the glowing columns of the cloister
is the cool darkness that only churches have, and I stand there and
wonder whether, when I am twenty, I shall have experienced the
bewildering emotions of love.
The image is alarmingly near; it touches me before it dissolves in
the light of the next star-shell.
I lay hold of my rifle to see that it is in trim. The barrel is wet,
I take it in my hand and rub off the moisture with my fingers.
Between the meadows behind our town there stands a line of old
poplars by a stream. They were visible from a great distance, and
although they grew on one bank only, we called them the poplar
avenue. Even as children we had a great love for them, they drew us
vaguely thither, we played truant the whole day by them and listened
to their rustling. We sat beneath them on the bank of the stream and
let our feet hang over in the bright, swift waters. The pure
fragrance of the water and the melody of the wind in the poplars held
our fancies. We loved them dearly, and the image of those days still
makes my heart pause in its beating.
It is strange that all the memories that come have these two
qualities. They are always completely calm, that is predominant in
them; and even if they are not really calm, they become so. They are
soundless apparitions that speak to me, with looks and gestures,
silently, without any word--and it is the alarm of their silence that
forces me to lay hold of my sleeve and my rifle lest I should abandon
myself to the liberation and allurement in which my body would dilate
and gently pass away into the still forces that lie behind these
things.
They are quiet in this way, because quietness is so unattainable for
us now. At the front there is no quietness and the curse of the
front reaches so far that we never pass beyond it. Even in the
remote depots and rest-areas the droning and the muffled noise of
shelling is always in our ears. We are never so far off that it is
no more to be heard. But these last few days it has been unbearable.
Their stillness is the reason why these memories of former times do
not awaken desire so much as sorrow--a strange, inapprehensible
melancholy. Once we had such desires--but they return not. They are
past, they belong to another world that is gone from us. In the
barracks they called forth a rebellious, wild craving for their
return; for then they were still bound to us, we belonged to them and
they to us, even though we were already absent from them. They
appeared in the soldiers' songs which we sang as we marched between
the glow of the dawn and the black silhouettes of the forests to
drill on the moor, they were a powerful remembrance that was in us
and came from us.
But here in the trenches they are completely lost to us. They arise
no more; we are dead and they stand remote on the horizon, they are
an apparition, a mysterious reflection drawing us home, that we fear
and love without hope. They are strong and our desire is strong--but
they are unattainable, and we know it.
And even if these scenes of our youth were given back to us we would
hardly know what to do. The tender, secret influence that passed
from them into us could not arise again. We long to be in them and
to move in them; we long to remember and to love them and to be
stirred by the sight of them. But it would be like gazing at the
photograph of a dead comrade; those are his features, it is his face,
and the days we spent together take on a mournful life in the memory;
but the man himself it is not.
We could never again, as the same beings, take part in those scenes.
It was not any recognition of their beauty and their significance
that attracted us, but the communion, the feeling of a comradeship
with the things and events of our existence, which cut us off and
made the world of our parents a thing incomprehensible to us--for
then we surrendered ourselves to events and were lost in them, and
the least little thing was enough to carry us down the stream of
eternity. Perhaps it was only the privilege of our youth, but as yet
we recognized no limits and saw nowhere an end. We had that thrill
of expectation in the blood which united us with the course of our
days.
To-day we would pass through the scenes of our youth like travellers.
We are burnt up by hard facts; like tradesmen we understand
distinctions, and like butchers, necessities. We are no longer
untroubled--we are indifferent. We long to be there; but could we
live there?
We are forlorn like children, and experienced like old men, we are
crude and sorrowful and superficial--I believe we are lost.
* *
My hands grow cold and my flesh creeps; and yet the night is warm.
Only the mist is cold, this mysterious mist that trails the dead
before us and sucks from them their last, creeping life. By morning
they will be pale and green and their blood congealed and black.
Still the parachute-rockets shoot up and cast their pitiless light
over the stony landscape, which is full of craters and frozen lights
like a moon. The blood beneath my skin brings fear and restlessness
into my thoughts. They become feeble and tremble, they desire warmth
and life. They cannot endure without sympathy and communion, they
are disordered before the naked picture of despair.
I hear the rattle of the mess-tins and immediately feel a strong
desire for warm food; it would do me good and comfort me. Painfully
I force myself to wait until I am relieved.
Then I go into the dug-out and find a mug of barley. It is cooked in
fat and tastes good, I eat it slowly. I remain quiet, though the
others are in a better mood, for the shelling has died down.
* *
The days go by and the incredible hours follow one another as a
matter of course. Attacks alternate with counter-attacks and slowly
the dead pile up in the field of craters between the trenches. We
are able to bring in most of the wounded that do not lie too far off.
But many have long to wait and we listen to them dying.
For one of them we search two days in vain. He must be lying on his
belly and unable to turn over. Otherwise it is hard to understand
why we cannot find him; for it is only when a man has his mouth close
to the ground that it is impossible to gauge the direction of his cry.
He must have been badly hit--one of those nasty wounds, neither so
severe that they exhaust the body at once and a man dreams on in a
half-swoon, nor so light that a man endures the pain in the hope of
becoming well again. Kat thinks he has either a broken pelvis or a
shot through the spine. His chest cannot have been injured otherwise
he would not have such strength to cry out. And if it were any other
kind of wound it would be possible to see him moving.
He grows gradually hoarser. The voice sounds so desperate that it
prevails everywhere. The first night some of our fellows go out
three times to look for him. But when they think they have located
him and crawl across, next time they hear the voice it seems to come
from somewhere else altogether.
We search in vain until dawn. We scrutinize the field all day with
glasses, but discover nothing. On the second day the calls are
fainter; that will be because his lips and mouth have become dry.
Our company commander has promised special leave with three days
extra to anyone who finds him. That is a powerful inducement, but we
would do all that is possible without that; for his cry is terrible.
Kat and Kropp even go out in the afternoon, and Albert gets the lobe
of his ear shot off in consequence. It is to no purpose, they come
back without him.
It is easy to understand what he cries. At first he called only for
help--the second night he must have some delirium, he talks with his
wife and his children, we often detect the name Elise. To-day he
merely weeps. By evening the voice dwindles to a croaking. But it
persists still through the whole night. We hear it so distinctly
because the wind blows toward our line. In the morning when we
suppose he must already have long gone to his rest, there comes
across to us one last gurgling rattle.
The days are hot and the dead lie unburied. We cannot fetch them all
in, if we did we should not know what to do with them. The shells
will bury them. Many have their bellies swollen up like balloons.
They hiss, belch, and make movements. The gases in them make noises.
The sky is blue and without clouds. In the evening it grows sultry
and the heat rises from the earth. When the wind blows toward us it
brings the smell of blood, which is heavy and sweet. This deathly
exhalation from the shell holes seems to be a mixture of chloroform
and putrefaction, and fills us with nausea and retching.
* *
The nights become quiet and the hunt for copper driving-bands and the
silken parachutes of the French star-shells begins. Why the
driving-bands are so desirable no one knows exactly. The collectors
merely assert that they are valuable. Some have collected so many
that they will stoop under the weight of them when we go back.
But Haie at least gives a reason. He intends to give them to his
girl to supplement her garters. At this the Friesians explode with
mirth. They slap their knees: "By Jove though, he's a wit, Haie is,
he's got brains." Tjaden especially can hardly contain himself; he
takes the largest of the rings in his hand and every now and then
puts his leg through it to show how much slack there is.
"Haie, man, she must have legs like, legs----" his thoughts mount
somewhat higher, "and a behind too she must have, like a--like an
elephant!"
He cannot get over it. "I wish I could play hot-hand with her once,
my hat----"
Haie beams, proud that his girl should receive so much appreciation.
"She's a nice bit," he says with self-satisfaction.
The parachutes are turned to more practical uses. According to the
size of the bust three or perhaps four will make a blouse. Kropp and
I use them as handkerchiefs. The others send them home. If the
women could see at what risk these bits of rag are often obtained,
they would be horrified.
Kat surprises Tjaden endeavouring with perfect equanimity to knock
the driving-band off a dud. If anyone else had tried it the thing
would have exploded, but Tjaden always has his luck with him.
One morning two butterflies play in front of our trench. They are
brimstone-butterflies, with red spots on their yellow wings. What
can they be looking for here? There is not a plant nor a flower for
miles. They settle on the teeth of a skull. The birds too are just
as carefree, they have long since accustomed themselves to the war.
Every morning larks ascend from No Man's Land. A year ago we watched
them nesting; the young ones grew up too.
We have a spell from the rats in the trench. They are in No Man's
Land--we know what for. They grow fat; when we see one we have a
crack at it. At night we hear again the rolling behind the enemy
lines. All day we have only the normal shelling, so that we are able
to repair the trenches. There is always plenty of amusement, the
airmen see to that. There are countless fights for us to watch every
day.
Battle planes don't trouble us, but the observation planes we hate
like the plague; they put the artillery on to us. A couple of
minutes after they appear, shrapnel and high-explosives begin to drop
on us. We lose eleven men in one day that way, and five of them
stretcher-bearers. Two are so smashed that Tjaden remarks you could
scrape them off the wall of the trench with a spoon and bury them in
a mess-tin. Another has the lower part of his body and his legs torn
off. Dead, his chest leans against the side of the trench, his face
is lemon-yellow, in his beard stills burns a cigarette. It glows
until it dies out on his lips.
We put the dead in a large shell-hole. So far there are three
layers, one on top of the other.
* *
Suddenly the shelling begins to pound again. Soon we are sitting up
once more with the rigid tenseness of blank anticipation.
Attack, counter-attack, charge, repulse--these are words, but what
things they signify! We have lost a good many men, mostly recruits.
Reinforcements have again been sent up to our sector. It is one of
the new regiments, composed of young fellows called up during last
year. They have had hardly any training, and are sent into the field
with only a theoretical knowledge. They do know what a hand-grenade
is, it is true, but they have very little idea of cover, and what is
most important of all, have no eye for it. A fold in the ground has
to be quite eighteen inches high before they can see it.
Although we need reinforcement, the recruits give us almost more
trouble than they are worth. They are helpless in this grim fighting
area, they fall like flies. The present method of fighting from
posts demands knowledge and experience; a man must have a feeling for
the contours of the ground, an ear for the sound and character of the
shells, must be able to decide beforehand where they will drop, how
they will burst, and how to shelter from them.
The young recruits of course know none of these things. They get
killed simply because they can hardly tell shrapnel from
high-explosive, they are mown down because they are listening
anxiously to the roar of the big coal-boxes falling far in the rear,
and miss the light, piping whistle of the low spreading little
daisy-cutters. They flock together like sheep instead of scattering,
and even the wounded are shot down like hares by the airmen.
Their pale turnip faces, their pitiful clenched hands, the miserable
courage of these poor devils, the desperate charges and attacks made
by these poor brave devils, who are so terrified that they dare not
cry out loudly, but with battered chests and torn bellies and arms
and legs only whimper softly for their mothers and cease as soon as
one looks at them.
Their sharp, downy, dead faces have the awful expressionlessness of
dead children.
It brings a lump into the throat to see how they go over, and run and
fall. A man would like to spank them, they are so stupid, and to
take them by the arm and lead them away from here where they have no
business to be. They wear grey coats and trousers and boots, but for
most of them the uniform is far too big, it hangs on their limbs,
their shoulders are too narrow, their bodies too slight; no uniform
was ever made to these childish measurements.
Between five and ten recruits fall to every old hand.
A surprise gas-attack carries off a lot of them. They have not yet
learned what to do. We found one dug-out full of them, with blue
heads and black lips. Some of them in a shell hole took their masks
off too soon; they did not know that the gas lies longest in the
hollows; when they saw others on top without masks they pulled theirs
off too and swallowed enough to scorch their lungs. Their condition
is hopeless, they choke to death with hæmorrhages and suffocation.
* *
In one part of the trench I suddenly run into Himmelstoss. We dive
into the same dug-out. Breathless we are all lying one beside the
other waiting for the charge.
When we run out again, although I am very excited, I suddenly think:
"Where's Himmelstoss?" Quickly I jump back into the dug-out and find
him with a small scratch lying in a corner pretending to be wounded.
His face looks sullen. He is in a panic; he is new to it too. But
it makes me mad that the young recruits should be out there and he
here.
"Get out!" I spit.
He does not stir, his lips quiver, his moustache twitches.
"Out!" I repeat.
He draws up his legs, crouches back against the wall, and shows his
teeth like a cur.
I seize him by the arm and try to pull him up. He barks.
That is too much for me. I grab him by the neck and shake him like a
sack, his head jerks from side to side.
"You lump, will you get out--you hound, you skunk, sneak out of it,
would you?" His eye becomes glassy, I knock his head against the
wall--"You cow"--I kick him in the ribs--"You swine"--I push him
toward the door and shove him out head first.
Another wave of our attack has just come up. A lieutenant is with
them. He sees us and yells; "Forward, forward, join in, follow."
And the word of command does what all my banging could not.
Himmelstoss hears the order, looks round him as if awakened, and
follows on.
I come after and watch him go over. Once more he is the smart
Himmelstoss of the parade-ground, he has even outstripped the
lieutenant and is far ahead.
Bombardment, barrage, curtain-fire, mines, gas, tanks, machine-guns,
hand-grenades--words, words, but they hold the horror of the world.
Our faces are encrusted, our thoughts are devastated, we are weary to
death; when the attack comes we shall have to strike many of the men
with our fists to waken them and make them come with us--our eyes are
burnt, our hands are torn, our knees bleed, our elbows are raw.
How long has it been? Weeks--months--years? Only days. We see time
pass in the colourless faces of the dying, we cram food into us, we
run, we throw, we shoot, we kill, we lie about, we are feeble and
spent, and nothing supports us but the knowledge that there are still
feebler, still more spent, still more helpless ones there who, with
staring eyes, look upon us as gods that escape death many times.
In the few hours of rest we teach them. "There, see that waggle-top?
That's a mortar coming. Keep down, it will go clean over. But if it
comes this way, then run for it. You can run from a mortar."
We sharpen their ears to the malicious, hardly audible buzz of the
smaller shells that are not so easily distinguished. They must pick
them out from the general din by their insect-like hum--we explain to
them that these are far more dangerous than the big ones that can be
heard long beforehand.
We show them how to take cover from aircraft, how to simulate a dead
man when one is overrun in an attack, how to time hand-grenades so
that they explode half a second before hitting the ground; we teach
them to fling themselves into holes as quick as lightning before the
shells with instantaneous fuses; we show them how to clean up a
trench with a handful of bombs; we explain the difference between the
fuse-length of the enemy bombs and our own; we put them wise to the
sound of gas shells;--show them all the tricks that can save them
from death.
They listen, they are docile--but when it begins again, in their
excitement they do everything wrong.
Haie Westhus drags off with a great wound in his back through which
the lung pulses at every breath. I can only press his hand; "It's
all up, Paul," he groans and bites his arm because of the pain.
We see men living with their skulls blown open; we see soldiers run
with their two feet cut off, they stagger on their splintered stumps
into the next shell-hole; a lance-corporal crawls a mile and a half
on his hands dragging his smashed knee after him; another goes to the
dressing station and over his clasped hands bulge his intestines; we
see men without mouths, without jaws, without faces; we find one man
who has held the artery of his arm in his teeth for two hours in
order not to bleed to death. The sun goes down, night comes, the
shells whine, life is at an end.
Still the little piece of convulsed earth in which we lie is held.
We have yielded no more than a few hundred yards of it as a prize to
the enemy. But on every yard there lies a dead man.
* *
We have been relieved. The wheels roll beneath us, we stand dully,
and when the call "Mind--wire" comes, we bend our knees. It was
summer when we came up, the trees were still green, now it is autumn
and the night is grey and wet. The lorries stop, we climb out--a
confused heap, a remnant of many names. On either side stand people,
dark, calling out the numbers of the regiments, the companies. And
at each call a little group separates itself off, a small handful of
dirty, pallid soldiers, a dreadfully small handful, and a dreadfully
small remnant.
Now someone is calling the number of our company, it is, yes, the
Company-Commander, he has got one too, his arm is in a sling. We go
over to him and I recognize Kat and Albert, we stand together, lean
against each other, and look at one another.
And we hear the number of our company called again and again. He
will call a long time, they do not hear him in the hospitals and
shell-holes.
Once again: "Second Company, this way!"
And then more softly: "Nobody else Second Company?"
He is silent, and then huskily he says: "Is that all?" and gives the
order: "Number!"
The morning is grey, it was still summer when we came up, and we were
one hundred and fifty strong. Now we freeze, it is autumn, the
leaves rustle, the voices flutter out wearily:
"One--two--three--four----" and cease at thirty-two. And there is a
long silence before the voice asks: "Anyone else?"--and waits and
then says softly: "In squads----" and then breaks off and is only
able to finish: "Second Company----" with difficulty: "Second
Company--march easy!"
A line, a short line trudges off into the morning.
Thirty-two men.