_August._--I have had a letter from Belfort from my son telling me
that it had taken him seventeen hours to get from Paris to Belfort.
There was indescribable enthusiasm in every place he passed through.
The women were crying and laughing at the same time, as if they were
mad, climbing up to the doors and decorating them with flowers, kissing
the soldiers and filling the carriages with food and cigarettes.
On all sides there were cheering and bravoes and cries of "_à bas
l'Allemagne_," and "_Vive la France_"--in fact such scenes of
enthusiasm as stimulate courage and awaken patriotism in hearts in
which they seemed to be numb.
And now, after this long, exciting journey, Paul is alone in Belfort,
with nothing to do but to guard the balloons, when all the time he is
dying to be in the fighting round the town. He says, "Sometimes the
thought of you and of Her seems to hover over me like two great white
birds on a dark plain. It is painful but exquisitely sweet, and I drive
away these two birds because they unman me."
Ah! my dear son, what a sorrow parting with you is!
* * * * *
Yesterday evening, as I was leaning out of my window, I heard a train
passing, and soldiers shouting "To Berlin." Ah! God grant that they may
get there! and I cried as I thought of my son: Where is he? Why can't
he write to me? Is he still at the aerodrome?
This morning the butcher said to me, "There is no more beef or mutton,
we have only got veal." All the better; I wish we did not have to eat
at all.
* * * * *
Yesterday, as I was going to bed, about ten o'clock, one of these
trains was passing down the valley. The effect was striking: I could
scarcely see the carriages, there were so few lights in the train, but
a plaintive sort of melody was issuing from one of them. The unending
line of vans full of soldiers playing the tunes of their country as
they go to their death, above them a blood-red crescent moon--it was
a terrible and unforgetable sight. I shall never forget that phantom
train.
Oh, my son! where are you?
* * * * *
We spent the day at the station serving out food and drink to the
soldiers traveling to Paris and then on North. They were all so happy,
singing and laughing and promising to bring us the Kaiser's head.