_August 9, 1916_
_Dear K._,--
It is quiet and cool to-night; the moon is shining just as it will with
you a few hours later, for it is now 9.15 here, and only 3.15 with you.
Last night it was quiet and I slept from half-past nine till seven! The
night before, however, the guns roared all night long and increased in
vigor up to six o'clock in the morning. We were waked up a little after
five o'clock by the scream of a shell which hit somewhere back of us.
The house shook amid the roar, as it always does whenever there is much
firing.
We are quartered in one of the farmhouses belonging to the château,
which is now a hospital. You remember, no doubt, the French farmhouses:
a blank wall on the roadside with only an entrance to the courtyard, a
dark kitchen, a few bedrooms, and a loft with a few sheds out back. The
loft is divided into two parts. We sleep up in the loft on stretchers
propped up from the floor by boxes or our little army trunks. Some
don't prop up their stretchers, but I find it better to elevate mine,
as the rats run all over the floor and incidentally over you if your
stretcher rests on the floor. The fleas seem more numerous near the
floor, and there are spiders, too. I've been pretty well "bit up," but
yesterday I soaked my blankets in petrol and hung them on the line in
the courtyard for an airing, so I think I've left the vermin behind. I
also sprayed my clothes, especially my underwear, with petrol, which
doesn't make much for comfort, except in so far as the animals are
baffled. We are better off than the other Sections, though, for our
house is very commodious, and we have a river to swim in every day. The
river is quite near by, so it is no effort to bathe.
We carry the wounded from the château to the trains. Some trips are
about seventeen kilometers one way, and others are more. As the roads
are well used, they are rather bumpy, so you have to go very slowly.
You do not dash at full speed with your wounded! It is slow work, for,
in addition to the necessity for making the trip as easy as possible
for the _blessés_, you have to dodge in and out among the transports,
which usually fill up the roads. There is a steady stream going and
coming, horses, mules, and auto-trucks. You never saw so many of
either one of the above. Thousands of each kind. You well know the
dust on the roads. We have to drive ahead regardless of the clouds of
dust, so you can imagine what sights we are when we get back to our
farmhouse. Scarecrows, each one. The dust is powdery and comes off
easily, however, so you can get comfortable in a short time. There is
no lagging or loafing; you blow your whistle and the driver of what's
ahead of you gives you six inches of road and you squeeze through and
take a chance that the nigh mule on the team coming the other way
doesn't kick.
[Illustration: AT A DRESSING-STATION NEAR VERDUN]
The _blessés_ are a quiet lot, especially after you give them
cigarettes. I always pass around the cigarettes before starting, for
then I'm sure those _en derrière_ will be quiet. Every now and then you
have a "hummingbird," that is, a _blessé_ who is so hurt that the least
jar pains him and he moans or yells. You can't help him any, so you
just have to put up with it. However, I don't like "hummingbirds," for
you feel that you hit more bumps.
I went to a show down in town where some of the soldiers are _en
repos_. It was wonderful, for there, right within range of the _Boche_
guns, the soldiers were giving one of the best musical shows I have
ever seen. Among the actors--men who only a little while before were
in the trenches--were professional musicians, singers, and actors. It
was not amateurish--in fact, it was highly professional. The theatre
was fitted up more or less like the stage at the Hasty Pudding Club at
Harvard (an amateurish back, however), but everything else savored of
the real Parisian touch. Among the audience were generals, colonels,
under-officers, _poilus_, and five of us (we were invited, inasmuch
as we had lent some of our uniforms for the actors). The soldiers who
could not get in thronged the courtyard and cheered after every song
or orchestra piece. The orchestra was made up of everything in a city
orchestra, including a leader with a baton. You see each regiment is
bound to have professional men in it and they get up the shows. (I saw
my cap walk out on the stage on a fellow with a little head, so it
didn't even rest on his ears, but rather on his nose). On the whole,
it was one of the greatest and most impressive sights I've seen, and
on top of it all, there was a continuous firing in the near distance.
Imagine it, if you can!
We have a cook, a chambermaid,--one of the _poilus_ who is quartered
here, too, and who earns a few sous on the side by serving us,--also a
French lieutenant who is really the head of the Section, a _maréchal de
logis_, and a few other French retainers. They sleep in the same loft
with us. Every night they chatter very late and kid each other about
the fish they caught or did not catch during the day in the river.
They laugh and giggle at each other just like kids. They are awfully
amusing. All the _poilus_ who are _en repos_ fish, although there are
only minnows around here. I asked several to-day how many they caught,
and they said they were only fishing to pass the time. I guess it's a
great diversion, for they all do it. They all bathe, too, every day.
We go in with them, the mules and the horses; probably somewhere else
the _Boches_ are bathing in the same river. Such is life, but we are
extremely lucky to get a chance to wash at all and I'm afraid when we
move from here, for we shall soon be moved to _poste_ duty, we shan't
have the comforts such as are found here.