hours for me by the visibility of great and universal problems. We have
now been for five days in the front line, with exceedingly hard work,
hampered by the terrible mud. As our days have followed each other, and
as my own struggle against the frightful sadness of my soul continued,
the military situation was growing more tense, and the preparation for
action was pushing on. Then came the announcement of the order of
attack. There was only a day left--perhaps two days. It was then I wrote
you two letters, I think those of the 13th and 14th; and really, as I
was writing, I had within my heart such a plenitude of conviction, such
a sweetness of feeling, as give incontrovertible assurance of the
reality of the beautiful and the good. The bombardment of our position
was violent; but nothing that man can do is able to stifle or silence
what Nature has to say to the human soul.
One night, between the 14th and the 15th, we were placed in trenches
that were raked by machine-guns. Our men were so exhausted that they
were obliged to give place to another battalion. We were waiting in the
wet and the cold of night when suddenly the notice came that we were
relieved. We could not tell why. But we are here again in this village,
where the men deluge their poor hearts with wine. I am in the midst of
them.
Dear mother, if there is one thing absolute in human feeling, it is
pain. I had lived hitherto in the contemplation of the interesting
relations of different emotions, losing sight of the price, the
intrinsic value, of life itself. But now I know what is essential life.
It is that which clears the soul's way to the Absolute. But I suffered
less in that time of waiting than I am suffering now from certain
companionships.
_February 16, 9 o'clock._
DEAR BELOVED MOTHER,--I was at dinner when they came to tell me we were
off. I knew it would be so; the counter-orders that put off the attack
cost us the march of forty kilometres in addition to the fatigues we had
to undergo in the first line. As we were leaving our sector I noticed
the arrival of such a quantity of artillery that I knew well enough the
pause was at an end. But the soul has its own peace. It is frosty
weather, with a sky full of stars.
_February 19_ (sent off in the full
swing of battle).
One word only. We are in the hands of God. Never, never, have we so
needed the wisdom of confidence. Death prevails, but it does not reign.
Life is still noble. Friends of mine killed and wounded yesterday and
the day before. Dearest, our messengers may be greatly delayed.
_February 22._
We are in billets after the great battle. And this time I saw it all. I
did my duty; I knew that by the feeling of my men for me. But the best
are dead. Bitter loss. This heroic regiment. We gained our object. Will
write at more length.
_February 22_ (1st day in billet).
DEAR BELOVED MOTHER,--I will tell you about the goodness of God, and the
horror of these things. The heaviness of heart that weighed me down this
month and a half past was for the coming anguish to be undergone in
these last twenty days.
We reached the scene of action on the 17th. The preparation ceased to
interest me; I was all expectation of the event. It broke out at three
o'clock: the explosion of seven mines under the enemy's trenches. It was
like a distant thunder. Next, five hundred guns created the hell into
which we leapt.
Night was coming on when we established ourselves in the positions we
had taken. All that night I was actively at work for the security of our
men, who had not suffered much. I had to cover great tracts, over which
were scattered the wounded and the dead of both sides. My heart yearned
over them, but I had nothing better than words to give them. In the
morning we were driven, with serious loss, back to our previous
positions, but in the evening we attacked again; we retook our whole
advance; here again I did my duty. In my advance I got the sword of an
officer who surrendered; after that I placed my men for guarding our
ground. The captain ordered me to his side, and I gave him the plan of
our position. He was telling me of his decision to have me mentioned,
when he was killed before my eyes.
Briefly, under the frightful fire of those three days, I organised and
kept going the work of supplying cartridges; in this job five of my men
were wounded. Our losses are terrible; those of the enemy greater still.
You cannot imagine, beloved mother, what man will do against man. For
five days my shoes have been slippery with human brains, I have walked
among lungs, among entrails. The men eat, what little they have to eat,
at the side of the dead. Our regiment was heroic; we have no officers
left. They all died as brave men. Two good friends--one of them a fine
model of my own for one of my last pictures--are killed. That was one of
the terrible incidents of the evening. A white body, splendid under the
moon! I lay down near him. The beauty of things awoke again for me.
At last, after five days of horror that lost us twelve hundred men, we
were ordered back from the scene of abomination.
The regiment has been mentioned in despatches.
Dear mother, how shall I ever speak of the unspeakable things I have had
to see? But how shall I ever tell of the certainties this tempest has
made clear to me? Duty; effort.
_February 23._
DEAREST BELOVED MOTHER,--A second day in billets. To-morrow we go to the
front. Darling, I can't write to-day. Let us draw ever nearer to the
eternal, let us remain devoted to our duty. I know how your thoughts fly
to meet mine, and I turn mine towards the happiness of wisdom. Let us
take courage; let me be brave among these young dead men, and be you
brave in readiness. God is over us.
_February 26_
(a splendid afternoon).
DEAR MOTHER,--Here we are again upon the battlefield. We have climbed
the hill from which it would be better to praise the glory of God than
to condemn the horrors of men. Innumerable dead at the setting-out of
our march; but they grow fewer, leaving here and there some poor stray
body, the colour of clay--a painful encounter. Our losses are what are
called 'serious' in despatches.
At all events I can assure you that our men are admirable and their
resignation is heroic. All deplore this infamous war, but nearly all
feel that the fulfilment of a hideous duty is the one only thing that
justifies the horrible necessity of living at such a time as this.
Dear mother, I cannot write more. The plain is settling to sleep under
colours of violet and rose. How can things be so horrible?
_February 28_ (in a billet).
DEAR BELOVED MOTHER, AND DEAR BELOVED GRANDMOTHER,--I am writing to you,
having just struggled out of a most appalling nightmare, and out of
Dantesque scenes that I have lived through. Things that Gustave Doré had
the courage to picture through the text of the _Divina Commedia_ have
come to pass, with all the variety and circumstance of fact. In the
midst of labours that happily tend to deaden one's feelings, I have been
able to gather the better fruits of pain.
On the 24th, in the evening, we returned to our positions, from which
the more hideous of the traces of battle had been partly removed. Only a
few places were still scattered with fragments of men that were taking
on the semblance of that clay to which they were returning. The weather
was fine and cold, and the heights we had gained brought us into the
very sky. The immensities appeared only as lights: the higher light, a
brilliance of stars; the lower light, a glow of fires. The frightful
bombardment with which the Germans overwhelm us is really a waste of
fireworks.
I lay in a dug-out from which I could follow the moon, and watch for
daybreak. Now and again a shell crumbled the soil about me, and deafened
me; then silence came again upon the frozen earth. I have paid the
price, I have paid dearly, but I have had moments of solitude that were
full of God.
I really think I have tried to adapt myself to my work, for, as I told
you, I am proposed for the rank of sergeant and for mention in
despatches. Ah, but, dearest mother, this war is long, too long for men
who had something else to do in the world! What you tell me of the kind
feeling there is for me in Paris gives me pleasure; but--am I not to be
brought out of this for a better kind of usefulness? Why am I so
sacrificed, when so many others, not my equals, are spared? Yet I had
something worth doing to do in the world. Well, if God does not intend
to take away this cup from me, His will be done.
_March 3_ (in a billet).
This is the fourth day of rest, for me almost a holiday time. Rather a
sad holiday, I own; it reminds me of certain visits to Marlotte. These
days have been spent in attempts to recover from physical fatigue and
moral weariness, and in the filling up of vacant hours. Still, a kind of
holiday, a halt rather, giving one time to arrange one's impressions, so
long confused by the violence of action.
I have been stupefied by the noise of the shells. Think--from the French
side alone forty thousand have passed over our heads, and from the
German side about as many, with this difference, that the enemy shells
burst right upon us. For my own part, I was buried by three 305 shells
at once, to say nothing of the innumerable shrapnel going off close by.
You may gather that my brain was a good deal shaken. And now I am
reading. I have just read in a magazine an article on three new novels,
and that reading relieved many of the cares of battle.
I have received a most beautiful letter from André, who must be a
neighbour of mine out here. He thinks as I do about our dreadful war
literature. What does flourish is a faculty of musical improvisation.
All last night I heard the loveliest symphonies, fully orchestral; and I
am bound to say that they owed their best to the great music that is
Germany's.
After my experiences I must really let myself go a little in the
pleasure of this furtive sun of March.
_March 5_ (6th day in billets).
I wish I could recover in myself the extreme sensibilities I felt before
the fiery trial, so that I might describe for you the colours and the
aspects of the drama we have passed through. But just now I am in a
state of numbness, pleasant enough in itself, yet apt to hinder my
vision of things present and my forecasts of things to come. I have to
make an effort to keep hold of eternal and essential things; perhaps I
shall succeed in time.
And yet certain sights on the wasted field of war had so noble a lesson,
a teaching so persuasive, that I should love to share with you the great
certainties of those days. How harmonious is death within the natural
soil, how admirable is the manner of man's return to the substance of
his mother earth, compared with the poverty of funeral ceremonial!
Yesterday I thought of those poor dead as forsaken things. But I had
been present at the burial of an officer, and it seems to me that Nature
is more compassionate than man. Yes indeed, the soldier's death is close
to natural things. It is a frank horror, a horror that does not attempt
to cheat the law of violence. I often passed close to bodies that were
gradually passing into the clay, and their change seemed more comforting
than the cold and unchanging aspect of the tombs of town cemeteries.
From our life in the open we have gained a freedom of conception, an
amplitude of thought and of habit, which will for ever make cities
horrible and artificial to those who survive the war.
Dear mother, I write but ill of things that I have greatly felt. Let us
seek refuge in the peace of spring and in the treasure of the present
moment.
_March 7, half-past ten._
DEAR BELOVED MOTHER,--I am filling up the idleness of this morning. I am
rejoicing in the clear waters of the Meuse that give life to dales and
gardens. The play of the current over weeds and pebbles makes a soothing
sight for my tired eyes, and expresses the calm life of this big village
that is sheltered by the Meuse hills. The church here is thronged with
soldiers who possess, as I do, a definite intuition of the Ideal, but
who seek it by more stated and less immediate means.
I am to board for a fortnight in the house in which, nearly two months
ago, our joyous company used to meet. To-day I have seen the tears of
these same friends, weeping to hear of the wounded and the dead.
I received your sleeping-sack, which is quite right. I am worried with
rheumatism, which has spoilt many of my nights in billets these two
months past.
Darling mother, here is a calm in the noise of that barrack-life which
must now be ours. As there are none here but non-commissioned officers,
they are all ordered to hard jobs, and I shall renew my acquaintance
with brooms and burdens. We have been warned; we shall have to work with
our hands. And so we learn to direct others.
_March 7_ (another letter).
Soft weather after rain. Bells in the evening; flowing waters singing
under the bridges; trees settling to sleep.
_March 11._
DARLING MOTHER,--I have nothing to say about my life, which is filled up
with manual labour. At moments perhaps some image appears, some memory
rises. I have just read a fine article by Renan on the origins of the
Bible. I found it in a _Revue des Deux Mondes_ of 1886. If later I can
remember something of it, I may be able to put my very scattered
notions on that matter into better order.
I feel as though I were recovering from typhoid fever. What I chiefly
enjoy is water; the running and the sleeping waters of the Meuse. The
springs play on weeds and pebbles. The ponds lie quiet under great
trees. Streams and waterfalls. On the steep hillsides the snow looks
brilliant and visionary. I live in all these things without forms of
words. And I am rather ashamed to be vegetating, though I think all must
pass through this phase, just removed from the hell of the front. I eat,
and when my horrid rheumatism allows, I sleep.
Don't be angry with my inferiority. I feel as though my armour had been
taken off. Well, I can't help it.
_5 o'clock._
I am a good deal tired by drill. But the fine air of the Meuse keeps me
in health. Dear mother, I wish I might always seek all that is noble and
good. I wish I might always feel within myself the inspiration that
urges towards the true treasures of life. But alas! just now I have a
mind of lead.
_March 14, Sunday morning,
in the Sabbath peace._
DEAREST MOTHER,--Your good, life-giving letters have come at last, after
my long privation, the price I paid for my enjoyment of rest. The pretty
town is waking in the haze of the river, the waters hurry over their
clean stones. All things have that look of moderation and charming
finish that is characteristic of this part of the country.
I read a little, but I am so overtired by the physical exertion to which
we are compelled, that I fall asleep on the instant. We are digging
trenches and trenches.
Dear mother, to go back to those wonderful times of the end of February,
I must repeat that my memory of them is something like that of an
experiment in science. I had conceived violence under a theoretic
formula; I had divined its part in the worlds. But I had not yet
witnessed its actual practice, except in infinitely small examples. And
now at last violence was displayed before me on such a scale that my
whole faculty of receptiveness was called upon to face it. Well, it was
interesting; and I may tell you that I never relaxed from my attitude of
cool and impersonal watchfulness. What I had kept about me of my own
individuality was a certain visual perceptiveness that caused me to
register the setting of things, a setting that dramatised itself as
'artistically' as in any stage-management. During all those minutes I
never relaxed in my resolve to see 'how it was.'
I was very happy to find that the 'intoxication of slaughter' never had
any possession of me. I hope it will always be so. Unfortunately,
contact with the German race has for ever spoilt my opinion of those
people. I cannot quite succeed in quelling a sensibility and a
humanitarianism that I know to be misplaced, and that would make me the
dupe of a treacherous enemy; but I have come to tolerate things which I
had held in abomination as the very negation of life.
I have seen the French soldier fight. He is terrible in action, and
after action magnanimous. That is the phrase. It is a very common
commonplace; our greatest writers and the humblest of our schoolboys
have trotted it out alike; and now my decadent ex-intellectualism finds
nothing better to say at the sight of the soul of the Frenchman.
To Madame de L.
_March 14, 1915._
My mother has told me of the new trial that has just come upon you.
Truly life is crushing for some souls. I know your fortitude, and I know
that you are only too well used to sorrow; but how much I wish that you
had been spared this blow! My mother had written to me of the lack of
any news of Colonel B., and she was anxious. It is the grief of those
dear to us that troubles us out here. But there is in the sight of a
soldier's death a lesson of greatness and of immortality that arms our
hearts; and our desire is that our beloved ones might share it with us.
Be sure that the Colonel's example will bear magnificent fruit. I know,
for I have seen it, what heroism transfigures the soldier whose leader
has fallen.
As for myself, the time has been rife with tragedies; throughout I have
tried to do my duty.
I saw all my superior officers killed, and the whole regiment decimated.
There can be no more human hope for those who are cast into this
furnace. I place myself in the hands of God, asking of Him that He would
keep me in such a state of heart and soul as may enable me to enjoy and
love in His creation all the beauty that man has not yet denied and
concealed.
All else has lost proportion in my life.
_March 15_ (a post-card).
DEAR BELOVED MOTHER,--I suppose that by now you know my good fortune in
getting this platoon. Whatever God intends for me, this halt has given
me the opportunity of regaining possession of myself, and of preparing
myself to accept whatever may befall me. I send you my love and the
union of our hearts in the face of fate.
_March 17._
A charming morning. A white sun swathing itself in mist, the fine
outlines of trees on the heights, and the great spaces in light. It is a
pause full of good luck. The other day, reading an old _Revue des Deux
Mondes_ of 1880, I came upon an excellent article as one might come upon
a noble palace with vaulted roof and decorated walls. It was on Egypt,
and was signed George Perrot.
Yesterday my battalion left these billets. I am obliged to stay behind
for my instruction as sergeant. How thankful I am for this respite,
laborious as it is, that gives me a chance of recovering what I care for
most--a clear mind, and a heart open to the spirit of Nature.
I forgot to tell you that a day or two ago, during the storm, I saw the
cranes coming home towards evening. A lull in the weather allowed me to
hear their cry. To think how long it is since I saw them take flight
from here! It was at the beginning of the winter, and they left
everything the sadder for their going. And now it was for me like the
coming of the dove to the ark; not that I deceived myself as to the
dangers that had not ceased, but that these ambassadors of the air
brought me a visible assurance of the universal peace beyond our human
strife.
And yesterday the wild geese made for the north. They flew in various
order, tracing regular formations in the sky; and then they disappeared
over the horizon like a floating ribbon.
I am much gratified by M.C.'s appreciation. I always had a love of
letters, even as a child, and I am only sorry that the break in my
education, brought about by myself, leaves so many blanks. I keep,
however, throughout all changes and chances, the faculty of gleaning to
right and left some fallen grain. Of course, as I leave out the future,
I say nothing of my wish to be introduced to him in happier times--that
is out of our department just now.
I have written to Madame L. It is the last blow for her. The fate of
some of us is as it were a medal on which are struck the image and
superscription of sorrow. Adversity has worked so well that there is no
room for any symbol of joy. But I think that this dedication of a life
to grief is not unaccompanied by a secret compensation in the conviction
that misfortune is at last complete; it is something to reach the
high-water mark of the waters of sorrow. The fate of such sufferers
seems to me to be an outpost showing others whence tribulation
approaches.
Day by day a new crop is raised in the little military burial-ground
here. And, over all, the triumphant spring.
_March 20._
Our holiday is coming to an end in sweetness, while all is tumult and
carnage not far off. I think the regiment has had a long march.
_March 20._
DEAR BELOVED MOTHER,--After so many graces granted me, I ought to have
more confidence, and I intend to do my best to give myself wholly into
the hands of God; but these are hard times. I have just heard of the
death, among many others, of the friend whose bed I shared in our
billet. He had just been appointed Second Lieutenant. Mother dear: Love.
That is the only human feeling we may cherish now.
_March 21._
DEAR GRANDMOTHER,--As the day of trial draws near I send you all my
love. I can do no more. We are probably called upon to make such a
sacrifice as forbids us to dwell upon our ties. Let us pray that the
certitude of Goodness and Beauty may not fail us when we suffer.
_March 21, Sunday, with
lovely sunshine._
DEAR BELOVED MOTHER,--I think that we may be kept here one day more, and
that we shall leave on Tuesday. I don't know where I shall rejoin my
battalion, or in what state I shall find it, for the action seems to be
violent and long. Rumours are very contradictory as to our gains. But
all agree as to the large number of casualties. We can hear a tremendous
cannonade, and the good weather no doubt induces the command on both
sides to move.
I should have wished to say many things about the noble Nature that
surrounds us with its glory, but my thoughts are gone on in advance,
there where the sun does not see men gathered together to honour him,
but shines only upon their hatred, and where the moon, too, looks upon
treachery and anguish.
The other day, overlooking this great prospect of earth welcoming the
spring, I remembered the joy I once had to be a man. And now to be a
man----
Our neighbour regiment, that of R.L., has returned with a few of its
companies reduced to some two-score men.
I dare not now speak of hope. The grace for which one may still pray is
a complete sense of what beauty the passing hour can still yield us. It
is a new manner of 'living one's life' that literature had not foreseen.
Dear Grandmother, how well your tenderness has served to keep me up in
my time of trial.
_March 22._
A splendid sun; looking on it one is amazed to see the world at war.
Spring has come in triumph. It has surprised mankind in the act of
hatred, in the act of outrage upon creation. The despatches tell us
little, fortunately, of what is happening.
Being now these twenty-one days away from the front, I find it difficult
to re-accustom myself to the thought of the monstrous things going on
there. Indeed, dear mother, I know that your life and mine have had but
one object, one aim, and that even in the time we are passing through,
we have never lost sight of it, but have constantly tried to draw
nearer.
Therefore our lives may not have been altogether useless. This is the
only thought to comfort an ambitious soul--to forecast the influence and
the consequences of its acts.
I believe that if longer life had been granted me I should never have
relaxed in my purpose. Having no certainty but that of the present, I
have tried to put myself to the best use.
_March 25._