IN THE FOREIGN LEGION
BY
ERWIN ROSEN
LONDON
DUCKWORTH & CO.
HENRIETTA ST. COVENT GARDEN
1910
_All rights reserved_
Printed by BALLANTYNE & CO. LIMITED
Tavistock Street, Covent Garden, London
PROLOGUE
Once upon a time there was a young student at a German University who
found life too fresh, too joyous, to care very much for professors and
college halls. Parental objections he disregarded. Things came to a
climax. And the very next "Schnelldampfer" had amongst its passengers a
boy in disgrace, bound for the country of unlimited possibilities in
search of a fortune....
The boy did not see very much of fortune, but met with a great deal of
hard work. His father did not consider New York a suitable place for
bad boys, and booked him a through passage to Galveston. There the
ex-student contracted hotel-bills, feeling very much out of place,
until a man who took a fancy to him gave him a job on a farm in Texas.
There the boy learnt a good deal about riding and shooting, but rather
less about cotton-raising. This was the beginning. In the course of
time he became translator of Associated Press Despatches for a big
German paper in St. Louis and started in newspaper life.
From vast New York to the Golden Gate his new profession carried him:
he was sent as a war correspondent to Cuba, he learned wisdom from the
kings of journalism, he paid flying visits to small Central American
republics whenever a new little revolution was in sight. Incidentally
he acquired a taste for adventure. Then the boy, a man now, was called
back to the Fatherland, to be a journalist, editor and novelist. He was
fairly successful. And a woman's love came into his life....
But he lost the jewel happiness. The continual fight for existence and
battling for daily bread of his American career, so full of ups and
downs, was hardly a good preparation for quiet respectability. Wise men
called him a fool, a fool unspeakable, who squandered his talents in
light-heartedness. And finally a time came when even his wife to be
could no more believe in him. The jewel happiness was lost....
The man at any rate recognised his loss; he recognised that life was no
longer worth living. A dull feeling of hopelessness came over him. And
in his hour of despair he remembered the blood of adventure in his
veins. A wild life he would have: he would forget.
He enlisted as a soldier in the French Foreign Legion.
* * * * *
That man was I. I had burned my boats behind me. Not a soul knew where
I was. Those who loved me should think that I was dead. I lived the
hard life of a légionnaire; I had no hopes, no aspirations, no thought
for the future; I worked and marched, slept, ate, and did what I was
ordered; suffered the most awful hardships and bore all kinds of
shameful treatment. And during sleepless nights I dreamed of love--love
lost for ever....
Some five hundred years I wore the uniform of the Legion. So at least
it seemed to me.
Then--the great change came. One day there was a letter for me.
Love had found me out across a continent. I read and read and read
again.
That was the turning-point of my life. I broke my fetters, and I fought
a hard fight for a new career....
Now the jewel happiness is mine.
ERWIN ROSEN
HAMBURG, 1909
CONTENTS
PAGE
CHAPTER I
LÉGIONNAIRE!
In Belfort : Sunrays and fear : Madame and the waiter : The
French lieutenant : The enlistment office of the Foreign Legion
: Naked humanity : A surgeon with a lost sense of smell :
"Officier Allemand" : My new comrades : The lieutenant-colonel :
A night of tears 1
CHAPTER II
L'AFRIQUE
Transport of recruits on the railway : What our ticket did for
us and France : The patriotic conductor : Marseilles : The gate
of the French Colonies : The Colonial hotel : A study in blue
and yellow : On the Mediterranean : The ship's cook : The story
of the Royal Prince of Prussia at Saida : Oran : Wine and
légionnaires : How the deserter reached Spain and why he
returned 16
CHAPTER III
LÉGIONNAIRE NUMBER 17889
French and American bugle-calls : Southward to the city of the
Foreign Legion : Sidi-bel-Abbès : The sergeant is not pleased :
A final fight with pride : The jokes of the Legion : The wise
negro : Bugler Smith : I help a légionnaire to desert : The
Eleventh Company : How clothes are sold in the Legion : Number
17889 35
CHAPTER IV
THE FOREIGN LEGION'S BARRACKS
In the company's storeroom : Mr. Smith--American, légionnaire,
philosopher : The Legion's neatness : The favourite substantive
of the Foreign Legion : What the commander of the Old Guard said
at Waterloo : Old and young légionnaires : The canteen : Madame
la Cantinière : The regimental feast : Strange men and strange
things : The skull : The prisoners' march : The wealth of
Monsieur Rassedin, légionnaire : "Rehabilitation" : The Koran
chapter of the Stallions 48
CHAPTER V
THE MILITARY VALUE OF THE FOREIGN REGIMENTS
A day's work as a recruit : Allez, hurry up! : The Legion's
etiquette : A morning's run : The "cercle d'enfer" and the lack
of soap : The main object of the Legion's training : Splendid
marchers : Independent soldiers : Forty kilometres a day :
Uniform, accoutrements, baggage, victualling : The training of
the légionnaire in detail : The légionnaire as a practical man :
Specialties of the Legion : Programme for a week in the Legion :
The légionnaire as a labourer 77
CHAPTER VI
"THE LEGION GETS NO PAY"
The money troubles of the Legion : Five centimes wages : The
cheapest soldiers of the world : Letters from the Legion : The
science of "decorating" : The industries of the légionnaires :
What the bugler did for a living : The man with the biscuits : A
thief in the night : Summary lynch law : Herr von Rader and la
Cantinière : "The Legion works--the Legion gets no pay!" 105
CHAPTER VII
THE CITY OF THE FOREIGN LEGION
The daily exodus to town : Ben Mansur's coffee : The Ghetto :
The citizens of Sidi-bel-Abbès and the légionnaires : How the
Legion squared accounts with the civilians : A forbidden part of
the town : Primitive vice : A dance of a night : The gardens :
The last resting-place of the Legion's dead 117
CHAPTER VIII
A HUNDRED THOUSAND HEROES--A HUNDRED THOUSAND VICTIMS
The hall of honour : A collection of ruined talents : The battle
of Camaron : A skeleton outline of the Legion's history : A
hundred thousand victims : A psychological puzzle : True heroes
: How they are rewarded : The chances of promotion : The pension
system of the Foreign Legion 135
CHAPTER IX
"MARCH OR DIE!"
The Legion's war-cry : A night alarm : On the march : The
counting of the milestones : Under canvas : The brutality of the
marches : The légionnaire and the staff doctor : My fight for an
opiate : The "marching pig" : The psychology of the marches :
Excited nerves : The song of imprecations 155
CHAPTER X
THE MADNESS OF THE FOREIGN LEGION
An unpleasant occurrence : The last three coppers : The Roumanian
Jew from Berlin : Monsieur Viaïsse : The Legion's atmosphere : The
Cafard demoniacs : Bismarck's double : Krügerle's whim : The
madness of Légionnaire Bauer : Brutal humour : A tragedy 176
CHAPTER XI
THE DESERTERS
The Odyssey of going on pump : Death in the desert : The
Legion's deserters : A disastrous flight in a motor-car : The
tragic fate of an Austrian engineer : In the Ghetto of
Sidi-bel-Abbès : The business part of desertion : Oran and
Algiers : The Consulate as a trap : The financial side of
desertion : One hundred kilometres of suffering : Hamburg
steamers : Self-mutilation : Shamming : In the Suez Canal :
Morocco, the wonder-land 197
CHAPTER XII
A CHAPTER ON PUNISHMENTS
The return of the poumpistes : The scale of punishments in the
Legion : Of spiteful non-commissioned officers : The Legion's
axiom : Sad history of Little Jean : The punishment machine :
Lost years : A légionnaire's earnings in five years--francs,
127.75 : The prisons in the Foreign Legion : Pestilential
atmosphere : Human sardines : The general cells : Life in the
prison : On sentry duty among the prisoners 226
CHAPTER XIII
SOME TYPES OF VICE
A variety of human vices : The red wine of Algeria : Shum-Shum :
If there were no wine 248
CHAPTER XIV
MY ESCAPE
In the Arab prison : The letter : Days of suffering : Flight! :
The greedy "Crédit Lyonnais" : Haggling in the Ghetto : The palm
grove as a dressing-room : On the railway track : Arab policemen
: Horrible minutes : Travelling to Oran : Small preparations :
On the steamer _St. Augustine_ : Marseilles : Ventimiglia : Free
255
CHAPTER XV
J'ACCUSE
Two years after : Shadows of the past : My vision : Public
opinion and the Foreign Legion : The political aspect of the
Foreign Legion : The moralist's point of view : The "Legion
question" in a nutshell : A question the civilised world should
have answered long ago : Quousque tandem...? 274
CHAPTER I
LÉGIONNAIRE!
In Belfort : Sunrays and fear : Madame and the waiter : The French
lieutenant : The enlistment office of the Foreign Legion : Naked
humanity : A surgeon with a lost sense of smell : "Officier Allemand" :
My new comrades : The lieutenant-colonel : A night of tears
Another man, feeling as I felt, would have preferred a pistol-bullet as
a last resource. I went into the Foreign Legion....
It was evening when I arrived in the old fortress of Belfort, with the
intention of enlisting for the Legion. Something very like
self-derision made me spend the night in the best hotel.
Awakening was not pleasant. The sunrays played hide-and-seek upon the
lace of the cover, clambered to the ceiling, threw fantastic colours on
the white little faces of the stucco angels, climbed down again,
crowded together in a shining little heap, and gave the icy elegance of
the room a warm tone. Sleepily I stared at their play; sleepily I
blinked at the enormous bed with its splendid covering of lace, the
curious furniture, the wonderful Persian rug. Then I woke up with a
start and tried to think. A thousand thoughts, a thousand memories
crowded in upon me. Voices spoke to me; a woman's tears, the whispering
of love, a mothers sorrow. And some devil was perpetually drumming in
even measure: lost, lost, lost for ever....
For the second time in my life I felt the Great Fear. An indescribable
feeling, as if one had a great lump in one's throat, barring the air
from the lungs; as if one never could draw breath again. I had once
experienced this fear in the valley of Santiago de Cuba, when one of
the first Spanish shells from the blockhouse on San Juan Hill burst a
few feet from me. This time it was much worse.
Ah well, one must try to forget!
I dressed with ridiculous care, paid my bill in the "bureau," and
earned a lovely smile from madame for my gold piece. Ah, madame, you
would hardly flash your pretty eyes if you knew! The head waiter stood
expectant at the door, bending himself almost double in French fashion.
He reminded me of a cat in bad humour.
I gave him a rather large silver piece.
"Well, my son, you're the last man in this world who gets a tip from
me. Too bad, isn't it?"
"Je ne parle pas...."
"That's all right," said I.
I walked slowly through the quaint narrow streets and alleys of
Belfort. Shop after shop, store after store, and before each and every
one of them stood flat tables packed with things for sale, taking up
most of the pavement. Here was a good chance for a thief, I thought,
and laughed, marvelling that in my despair the affairs of the Belfort
storekeepers could interest me. Mechanically I looked about and saw a
house of wonderful blue; the city fathers of Belfort had built their
new market-hall almost wholly of sapphire-blue glass, which
scintillated in the rays of the sun, giving an effect such as no
painter has as yet been able to reproduce. I felt sorry that a building
of such beauty should be condemned to hold prosaic potatoes and
greenstuff. Vivacious Frenchmen and Frenchwomen hurried by hustling and
jostling each other in the crowded streets.... Don't hurry about so.
Life is certainly not worth the trouble!
Ironical thoughts could not alter matters, nor could even the most
wonderful blue help me to forget. I must get it over.
A very young-looking lieutenant came up the street. I spoke to him in
my rusty college French:
"Would you please to direct me to the recruiting office of the Foreign
Legion?"
The officer touched his "kepi" politely and seemed rather astonished.
"You can come with me, monsieur. I am on the way to the offices of the
fortress."
We went together.
"You seem to be German?" he said. "I may be able to assist you. I am
adjutant to the general commanding the fortress."
"Yes, I am German, and intend to enlist in the Foreign Legion," I said,
very, very softly. How terribly hard this first step was! I thought the
few words must choke me.
"Oh, la la...." said the officer, quite confounded.
He took a good look at me. I seemed to puzzle him. Then he chatted (the
boy was a splendid specimen of French courtesy) amiably about this and
that. Awfully interesting corps, this Foreign Legion. He hoped to be
transferred himself to the "étrangers" for a year or two. Ah, that
would be magnificent.
"The Cross of the Legion of Honour can be earned very easily in
Southern Algeria. Brilliant careers down there! Oh, la la! Eh bien,
monsieur--you shall wear the French uniform very soon. Have you
anything particular to tell me?"
Again that curious glance.
I answered in the negative.
"Really not?" the lieutenant asked in a very serious tone of voice.
"No, monsieur, absolutely nothing. I have been told that for the
Foreign Legion physical fitness is the only thing required, and that
the recruiting officers cared less than nothing about the past lives of
their recruits."
"You're quite right," said the lieutenant; "I asked in your own
interest only. If you had special military knowledge, for instance,
your way in the Legion could be made very easy for you."
Some time later I understood what he meant. Now I answered that I had
served in the army like all Germans.
Meanwhile we had reached a row of small buildings. Into one of them the
lieutenant went with me, up a flight of steep, rather dirty stairs,
into a dingy little office. At our entrance a corporal jumped up from
his seat and saluted, and the officer spoke to him in a low tone. Then
my little lieutenant left and the corporal turned to me.
"Eh, enter la Légion?" he said. "Mais, monsieur, you are not dressed
like a man desiring to gain bread by becoming légionnaire! Votre nom?"
I reflected for an instant whether I should give my right name or not.
I gave it, however. It did not matter much.
"Eh, venez avec moi to the others. The médecin major will be here in a
minute."
So saying the corporal opened a door and gave me a friendly push. I
drew back almost frightened. The atmosphere of the close little room
was unspeakable. It was foul with the smell of unwashed humanity,
sweat, dirt and old clothes. Long benches stood against the wall and
men sat there, candidates for the Foreign Legion, waiting for the
medical examination, waiting to know whether their bodies were still
worth five centimes daily pay. That is what a légionnaire gets--five
centimes a day. One of the men sat there naked, shivering in the chill
October air. It needed no doctor's eye to see that he was half starved.
His emaciated body told the story clearly enough. Another folded his
pants with almost touching care, although they had been patched so
often that they were now tired of service and in a state of continuous
strike. An enormous tear in an important part had ruined them
hopelessly. These pants and that tear had probably settled the question
of the wearer's enlisting in the Foreign Legion.
A third man, a strong boy, seemed very much ashamed of having to
undress. These poor men considered nudity a vile and ugly thing,
because, in their life of poverty and hunger, they had forgotten the
laws of cleanliness. They were ashamed, and every move of theirs told
it. There, in the corner, one of the men was shoving his shoes
furtively as far as possible under the bench, that the holes in them
might not be seen, and another made a small bundle of his tattered
belongings, thus defying inspection.
A dozen men were there. Some of them were mere boys, with only a shadow
of beard on their faces; youths with deep-set hungry eyes and deep
lines round their mouths; men with hard, wrinkled features telling the
old story of drink very plainly. Nobody dared to talk aloud. Occasional
words were spoken in a hushed undertone. The man beside me said softly,
the fear of refusal in his eyes:
"I've got varicose veins. D'you think they'll take me...?"
My God, the Foreign Legion meant hope for this man--the hope of regular
food! The daily five centimes were for him wages well worth having!
The atmosphere was loathsome. I stared at this miserable crowd of
hopeless men, at their filthy things, at their hungry faces; I felt
like a criminal in the dock. My clothes seemed a mockery....
After what seemed an eternity of waiting the officers came in. A fat
surgeon, an assistant and my lieutenant. I would have given something
to have asked this doctor why in all the world these men could not be
given a bath before examination....
First the doctor pointed at me.
"Undress!"
While I was undressing, the officers kept whispering together, very
softly, but I could hear that they were talking about me, and that the
lieutenant said something about "Officier Allemand."
I smiled as I listened. It was very funny to be taken for a quondam
German officer. I suppose they took me for a deserter; it certainly
must have been rather an unusual event to find a well-dressed man
enlisting in the Legion.
The well-dressed man felt annoyed at this curiosity, this openly shown
pity. It was absolute torture to me. How very ridiculous it all was--I
fumbled at my watch-chain, trying to take off the little gold
sovereign-case in order to open my waistcoat--I fumed at the stares of
the officers who should have been gentlemen.... The looks of the doctor
said plainly:
"Humph, the fellow actually wears fine underclothes!"
Why should they stare at me? Had I not the same right as these other
poor devils to go to perdition in my own way? Why should they make it
so hard for me in particular? Then I understood how human their
curiosity was, and how ridiculous my irritability. The first step was
made. I began slowly to understand what it meant to enlist in the
Foreign Legion as a last refuge.
I stood there naked before the médecin major, who adjusted his
eye-glass as if he had a good deal of time to spare, and who took a
long look at me. I stared quietly back at him. You may look as long as
you wish, I thought, you fat, funny old fellow with a snub nose. You
surely aren't going to complain of my physical condition.
"Bon," said the doctor.
A clerk wrote something in a book. This finished the ceremony. The
doctor did not bother about such trifles as examining the lungs, heart
or eyes. He was for simplifying things. Monsieur le major decided with
a short look in each case, as the other men took their turn. Three men
were refused. An old woman could have diagnosed their condition at a
glance--they were cases for a hospital, and their doing military
service was absolutely out of the question. The man with the varicose
veins, however, was at once accepted. Bon! I could see how happy he was
over his good fortune, and I envied him. The man had hope....
* * * * *
Before a small window in the wall we new recruits waited, half an hour,
an hour. At last the window was opened and the corporal put out his
head.
"Snedr!" he called.
Nobody answered.
"Snedr!!" he yelled, getting angry.
Still no reply.
Finally the lieutenant appeared beside the corporal, and looked over
his list.
"Oh," he said, "the man does not understand. Schneider!"
"Here!" answered one of my new comrades at once.
"Your name is Schneider?" the lieutenant asked.
"Yes, sir."
"Very well, in French your name is pronounced Snedr. Remember that!"
"Yes, sir."
"Sign your name here."
The man signed. One after the other the new recruits were called to the
little window, and each signed his name, without bothering to look at
what he signed. I came last this time. The lieutenant gave me a sheet
of hectographed paper, and I glanced quickly over its contents. It was
a formal contract for five years' service in the Foreign Legion between
the Republic of France and the man who was foolish enough to sign it.
There were a great many paragraphs and great stress was laid on the
fact that the "enlisting party" had no right upon indemnification in
case of sickness or disability, and no claim upon pension until after
fifteen years of service.
"Have you any personal papers?" the lieutenant asked me suddenly.
I almost laughed in his face--he was such a picture of curiosity. In my
German passport, however, I was described as "editor," and I had a
notion that this passport was much too good for an occasion like this.
While searching my portfolio for "personal papers" I happened to find
the application form of a life insurance company, with my name filled
out. I gave this to the lieutenant with a very serious countenance. It
was good enough for this. The officer looked at the thing and seemed
quite puzzled.
"Oh, that will do," he finally smiled, and gave me the pen to sign.
I signed. And under my name I wrote the date: October 6, 1905.
"The date was unnecessary," said the lieutenant.
"Pardon me," I answered. "I wrote unthinkingly--it's an important date
for me."
"By God, you're right," said he.
In single file we were marched to the barracks. One of the French
soldiers who met us on the way stopped, and threw up his hands in
laughing astonishment:
"Eh!"
And then, making a wry face, he yelled, in a coarse sing-song:
"Nous sommes les légionnaires d'Afrique...."
* * * * *
Half an hour later three new recruits of the Foreign Legion, the
recruit Schneider, the recruit Rader and the recruit Rosen, sat in a
little room belonging to the quarters of the 31st French Regiment of
Line. All three were Germans. Rader opened the conversation.
"My name's Rader. Pretty good name, ain't it, though it isn't my name,
of course. I might have called myself von Rader--Baron von Rader--while
I was at it, but I ain't proud. What's in a fine name, I say, if you've
got nothing to fill your stomach with? No, the suckers may call me
Rader. My real name is Müller. Can't use it! Must have some regard for
the feelings of my people...."
"I mustn't hurt their delicate feelings," he repeated with a great roar
of laughter.
Then a long knife on the table attracted his attention. He took it up,
mimicked the pose of a grand tragedian, opened his mouth and swallowed
the knife, as if twelve-inch blades were his favourite repast. All at
once the knife lay upon the table again, only to vanish in the
coat-sleeve of Herr von Rader and appear again rather abruptly out of
his left trousers pocket.
"I'm an artist," Herr Rader, alias von Rader, alias Müller said with a
condescending smile. "A good one, too. Strictly first class. Why, these
monkeys of Frenchmen don't know nothing about art! Would they
appreciate a true artist? Not a bit of it. Boys, since I hopped over
the frontier and made long nose at the German cop I left on the other
side with a long face, I haven't had much to eat. Remarkably less than
was good for my constitution. So Herr von Rader went to the dogs--to
the Foreign Legion, I meant to say. What's the difference--if they
don't treat me with proper respect, I'll be compelled to leave them
again. On French leave! Scoot, skin out, bunk it--see?"
Then Herr von Rader fished a number of mysterious little boxes out of
innumerable pockets, inspected them carefully, turned round to mask his
artistic preparations, turned to us again--and his wide-opened
satyr-mouth emitted a sheet of flame! Little Schneider (he was very
young) stared at the phenomenon with startled eyes.
"Grand, ain't it?" said Herr von Rader quietly. "I've a notion that
this coon isn't going to waste his resources on French Africa. Oh no!
Some fine day I'll give the niggers of Central Africa a treat. I'll go
partners with some big chief and do the conjuring part of the business.
Heap big medicine! There's only one thing worrying me. How about
drinking arrangements? Palm-wine, ain't it? Boys, if only they have
such a thing as beer and kümmel down there!--Say, old fellow (he turned
to me) what do you think about this French absinthe?"
I mumbled something.
"Awfully weak stuff!" said Herr von Rader sorrowfully. "No d--d good!"
If the comical fellow had known that, with his drollery and his
fantastic yarns, he was helping me to battle with my despair, I suppose
he would have been very much astonished....
There was a good deal of story-telling: about the hunger and the misery
of such "artistes" of the road; about the little tricks and "petty
larcenies," by means of which the ever-hungry and ever-thirsty Herr von
Rader had managed to eat occasionally, at least, on his wanderings over
the roads of many countries; about drinking and things unspeakable.
Most of the stories, however, told of hunger only, plain and simple
hunger.
Then Schneider's turn came. His story was very simple. A few weeks ago
he was wearing the uniform of a German infantry regiment garrisoned at
Cologne. He was then a recruit. One Sunday he had gone drinking with
some other recruits and together they made a great deal of noise in the
"Wirthshaus." The patrol came up. As the non-commissioned officer in
command put Schneider under arrest, the boy shoved his superior aside,
knocked some of the soldiers of the patrol down and took to his heels.
When he had slept off the effects of his carouse in a corner, he got
frightened and decided on flight. A dealer in second-hand clothes gave
him an old civilian suit in exchange for his uniform. As a tramp he
wandered till he reached the French frontier, and some other tramps
showed him how to get across the frontier-line on a dark night. In the
strange country hunger came and----
"We always talked about the Legion. All the other Germans on the road
wanted to enlist in the Legion. Anyway, I never could have gone home
again. My father would have killed me."
"No, he wouldn't," said Herr von Rader wisely. "You would have got all
sorts of good things. It's all in the Bible. Yes, it is...."
The door opened and a sergeant came in.
"Is the légionnaire Rosen here?"
I stood up.
"The lieutenant-colonel wishes to speak to you. Come along to the
parade-ground."
"... Keep your hat on," said the lieutenant-colonel. He spoke pure
German. "No, you need not stand at attention. I have heard of you and
would like to say a few words to you. I have served in the Foreign
Legion as a common soldier. I consider it an honour to have served in
this glorious corps. It all depends on yourself: men of talent and
intelligence have better chances of promotion in the Legion than in any
other regiment in the world. Educated men are valued in the Legion.
What was your profession?"
"Journalist ..." I stuttered. I felt miserable.
The stern grey eyes looked at me searchingly. "Well, I can understand
that you do not care to talk about these things. However, I will give
you some advice: Volunteer for the first battalion of the Legion. You
have a much better chance there for active service. We are fighting a
battle for civilisation in Algeria and many a splendid career has been
won in the Legion. I wish you good luck!"
He gave me his hand. I believe this officer was a fine soldier and a
brave man.
* * * * *
Herr von Rader of the merry mind and the unquenchable thirst slept the
easy sleep of light-hearted men; I heard the German deserter groan in
his sleep and call for his mother. All night long I lay awake. The
events of my life passed before me in mad flight. I was once more a boy
at college; I saw my father standing by the dock at Bremerhaven and
heard his last good-bye and my mother's crying.... Back to America my
waking dreams carried me; I saw myself a young cub of a reporter, and
remembered in pain the enthusiasm of the profession, my enthusiasm--how
proud I was, when for the first time the city editor trusted me with a
"big thing," how I chased through San Francisco in cabs, how I
interviewed big men and wormed details out of secretive politicians ...
how I loved this work and how sweet success had tasted. Lost, lost for
ever.
Forget I must--I tried to think of the time in Texas, the life on the
Brazos farm, where hundreds of negroes had learned to respect me--after
a little shooting and more kindness shown them in their small troubles;
I tried to glory in remembrance of hard riding and straight shooting,
of a brutal but gloriously free life. Why should I not live a rough
life now? I should be on active service in the Legion. Crouching down
behind my rifle in the firing-line, waiting for the enemy. I would have
a life of excitement, a life of danger. Hurrah for the wild old life!
Grant me adventures, Dame Fortune!
But fickle Lady Fortune would not grant even a night's oblivion. During
the long night I fought with a wild desire to scream into the darkness
the beloved name.... I fought with my tears----