IN AN APPLE ORCHARD
We remained on the Amiens front nearly three weeks, and we were lucky
enough not to have much rain, for we were in trenches where there were
no dugouts.
The transport mess was in an apple orchard, one of the great old
orchards of Picardy where in days before the war, happy peasants picked
the apples to make the golden cider.
There were many troops quartered in this orchard, as the trees offered
shade and screened us fairly well from the ever baleful eye of enemy
airplanes. Yet almost every evening we were bombed. We would hear
the signal of his approach long before the whir of his motor became
audible. We would be sitting in groups, sometimes around little fires
of wood or charcoal, talking in low voices, when suddenly there would
come three shrill blows of a whistle, the kind used by referees of
football matches. Instantly water would be poured on fires, or a few
shovelfuls of earth would be thrown over the bright embers, and then
a hurrying and scurrying to trenches; the sounds of laughter and
pleasant talk would die away with the hissing of the expiring fires.
Then profound silence, save for the champing of horses tethered at one
end of the orchard under the trees. Presently from far up in the sky,
coming nearer and nearer, would sound that peculiar err-rum, err-rum,
err-rum, which left no uncertainty in our minds as to whose airplanes
were approaching.
Sometimes they would go far beyond us and we would hear the terrific
crash and explosion as their bombs dropped in our back areas; sometimes
they would drop near our own lines and we would lie there waiting.
From a certain point in the orchard we had a very good view of many of
our observation balloons, far in our rear. I remember one day, while
a group of us were sitting talking, suddenly hearing from high in the
air near one of our balloons the quick rat-tat-tat of machine-gun fire.
Immediately all eyes were raised in time to see a German airplane swoop
down from a bank of clouds perilously near our observation balloon. The
enemy was firing from his machine-gun, for every three or four seconds
we could see the flash of phosphorous as the tracer bullet sped through
the sky. If one of those touched the great silk bag of gas--it did, and
almost simultaneously there was a burst of dark-red flame, fringed with
black, waving out from the balloon. There was a cry of consternation
from many voices in the orchard as two figures were seen to jump from
the aerial car of the balloon. We held our breath. Then with a spring,
one after the other, the white parachutes opened, and we breathed a
sigh of great relief as they came gracefully to the earth.
Our observation balloons must have been doing excellent work, for after
this Fritz was very busy bringing them down. One afternoon the same
airplane actually brought down, one after the other, five balloons.
Then, as it started on its return flight, it seemed to be flying very
low. Immediately every machine-gun in the area began firing on him.
There must have been thousands of bullets soaring towards the speeding
’plane; but it is very difficult to judge, from the ground, distances
in the air.
Suddenly the machine stopped in its course and came spiralling
slowly downwards. A great cheer burst from hundreds of throats and
simultaneously the machine-guns ceased to fire. There was complete
silence in the camp as we watched the falling airplane. But we had
reckoned without our host; for suddenly it ceased to fall, then like
a lark shot gracefully up, up, till it reached a safe distance. Then
with admirable audacity it looped the loop, and finally winged its way
towards home.
What did we do, gentle reader? For a few seconds, overcome with
amazement, we stood there gazing skywards, then from all over the area
there were sounds of clapping hands as we good-humoredly applauded “Old
Fritz.”