ALONG THE GREAT BETHUNE ROAD
Again and again through these chapters I have felt apologetic for the
luxurious manner in which I frequently saw the war. And so now I
hesitate to mention the comfort of that trip along the British lines;
the substantial and essentially British foresight and kindness that
had stocked the car with sandwiches wrapped in white paper; the good
roads; the sense of general well-being that spread like a contagion
from a well-fed and well-cared-for army. There is something about the
British Army that inspires one with confidence. It is a pity that
those people who sit at home in Great Britain and shrug their
shoulders over the daily papers cannot see their army at the front.
It is not a roast beef stolidity. It is rather the steadiness of calm
eyes and good nerves, of physically fit bodies and clean minds. I felt
it when I saw Kitchener's army of clear-eyed boys drilling in Hyde
Park. I got it from the quiet young officer, still in his twenties,
who sat beside me in the car, and who, having been in the war from the
beginning, handling a machine gun all through the battle of Ypres,
when his regiment, the Grenadier Guards, suffered so horribly, was
willing to talk about everything but what he had done.
We went first to Béthune. The roads as we approached the front were
crowded, but there was no disorder. There were motor bicycles and
side-cars carrying dispatch riders and scouts, travelling kitchens,
great lorries, small light cars for supplies needed in a hurry--cars
which make greater speed than the motor vans--omnibuses full of
troops, and steam tractors or caterpillar engines for hauling heavy
guns.
The day was sunny and cold. The rain of the day before had turned to
snow in the night, and the fields were dazzling.
"In the east," said the officer with me, "where there is always snow
in the winter, the Germans have sent out to their troops white helmet
covers and white smocks to cover the uniforms. But snow is
comparatively rare here, and it has not been considered necessary."
At a small bridge ten miles from Béthune he pointed out a house as
marking the farthest advance of the German Army, reached about the
eleventh of October. There was no evidence of the hard fighting that
had gone on along this road. It was a peaceful scene, the black
branches of the overarching trees lightly powdered with snow. But the
snowy fields were full of unmarked mounds. Another year, and the
mounds will have sunk to the level of the ground. Another year, and
only history will tell the story of that October of 1914 along the
great Béthune road.
An English aëroplane was overhead. There were armoured cars on the
road, going toward the front; top-heavy machines that made
surprisingly little noise, considering their weight. Some had a sort
of conning tower at the top. They looked sombre, menacing. The driving
of these cars over slippery roads must be difficult. Like the vans,
they keep as near the centre of the road as possible, allowing lighter
traffic to turn out to pass them. A van had broken down and was being
repaired at one of the wayside repair shops maintained everywhere
along the roads for this war of machinery. Men in khaki with leather
aprons were working about it, while the driver stood by, smoking a
pipe.
As we went on we encountered the Indian troops again. The weather was
better, and they thronged the roads, driving their tiny carts,
cleaning arms and accoutrements in sunny doorways, proud and haughty
in appearence even when attending to the most menial duties. From the
little ammunition carts, like toy wagons, they gazed gravely at the
car, and at the unheard of spectacle of a woman inside. Side by side
with the Indians were Scots in kilts, making up with cheerful
impudence for the Indians' lack of curiosity.
There were more Ghurkas, carrying rifles and walking lightly beside
forage carts driven by British Tommies. There were hundreds of these
carts taking hay to the cavalry divisions. The Ghurkas looked more
Japanese than ever in the clear light. Their broad-brimmed khaki hats
have a strap that goes under the chin. The strap or their black
slanting eyes or perhaps their rather flattened noses and pointed
chins give them a look of cruelty that the other Indian troops do not
have. They are hard and relentless fighters, I believe; and they look
it.
The conversation in the car turned to the feeding of the army.
"The British Army is exceedingly well fed," said the young officer.
"In the trenches also?"
"Always. The men are four days in the trenches and four out. When the
weather is too bad for anything but sniping, the inactivity of the
trench life and the abundant ration gets them out of condition. On
their four days in reserve it is necessary to drill them hard to keep
them in condition."
This proved to be the explanation of the battalions we met everywhere,
marching briskly along the roads. I do not recall the British ration
now, but it includes, in addition to meat and vegetables, tea, cheese,
jam and bacon--probably not all at once, but giving that variety of
diet so lacking to the unfortunate Belgian Army. Food is one of the
principal munitions of war. No man fights well with an empty stomach.
Food sinks into the background only when it is assured and plentiful.
Deprived of it, its need becomes insistent, an obsession that drives
away every other thought.
So the wise British Army feeds its men well, and lets them think of
other things, such as war and fighting and love of country and brave
deeds.
But food has not always been plentiful in the British Army. There were
times last fall when, what with German artillery bombardment and
shifting lines, it was difficult to supply the men.
"My servant," said the officer, "found a hare somewhere, and in a
deserted garden a handful of carrots. Word came to the trench where I
was stationed that at dark that night he would bring out a stew. We
were very hungry and we waited eagerly. But just as it was cooked and
ready a German shell came down the chimney of the house where he was
working and blew up stove and stew and everything. It was one of the
greatest disappointments I ever remember."
We were in Béthune at last--a crowded town, larger than any I had seen
since I left Dunkirk. So congested were its narrow streets with
soldiers, mounted and on foot, and with all the ghastly machinery of
war, that a traffic squad had taken charge and was directing things.
On some streets it was possible to go only in one direction. I looked
about for the signs of destruction that had grown so familiar to me,
but I saw none. Evidently the bombardment of Béthune has not yet done
much damage.
A squad of artillerymen marched by in perfect step; their faces were
keen, bronzed. They were fine-looking, well-set-up men, as smart as
English artillerymen always are. I watched them as long as I could see
them.
We had lost our way, owing to the regulations of the traffic squad. It
was necessary to stop and inquire. Then at last we crossed a small
bridge over the canal, and were on our way along the front, behind the
advanced trenches and just in front of the second line.
For a few miles the country was very level. The firing was on our
right, the second line of trenches on our left. The congestion of
Béthune had given way to the extreme peace in daylight of the region
just behind the trenches. There were few wagons, few soldiers. Nothing
could be seen except an occasional cloud where shrapnel had burst. The
British Army was keeping me safe, as it had promised!
There were, however, barbed-wire entanglements everywhere, built, I
thought, rather higher than the French. Roads to the right led to the
advanced trenches, empty roads which at night are thronged with men
going to the front or coming back.
Here and there one saw a sentry, and behind him a tent of curious
mottled shades of red, brown and green.
"They look as though they were painted," I said, rather bewildered.
"They are," the officer replied promptly. "From an aëroplane these
tents are absolutely impossible to locate. They merge into the colors
of the fields."
Now and then at a crossroads it was necessary to inquire our way. I
had no wish to run into danger, but I was conscious of a wild longing
to have the car take the wrong turning and land abruptly at the
advance trenches. Nothing of the sort happened, however.
We passed small buildings converted into field hospitals and flying
the white flag with a red cross.
"There are no nurses in these hospitals," explained the officer. "Only
one surgeon and a few helpers. The men are brought here from the
trenches, and then taken back at night in ambulances to the railroad
or to base hospitals."
"Are there no nurses at all along the British front?"
"None whatever. There are no women here in any capacity. That is why
the men are so surprised to see you."
Here and there, behind the protection of groves and small thickets,
were temporary camps, sometimes tents, sometimes tent-shaped shelters
of wood. There were batteries on the right everywhere, great guns
concealed in farmyards or, like the guns I had seen on the French
front, in artificial hedges. Some of them were firing; but the firing
of a battery amounts to nothing but a great noise in these days of
long ranges. Somewhere across the valley the shells would burst, we
knew that; that was all.
The conversation turned to the Prince of Wales, and to the
responsibility it was to the various officers to have him in the
trenches. Strenuous efforts had been made to persuade him to be
satisfied with the work at headquarters, where he is attached to Sir
John French's staff. But evidently the young heir to the throne of
England is a man in spite of his youth. He wanted to go out and fight,
and he had at last secured permission.
"He has had rather remarkable training," said the young officer, who
was also his friend. "First he was in Calais with the transport
service. Then he came to headquarters, and has seen how things are
done there. And now he is at the front."
Quite unexpectedly round a turn in the road we came on a great line of
Canadian transports--American-built lorries with khaki canvas tops.
Canadians were driving them, Canadians were guarding them. It gave me
a homesick thrill at once to see these other Americans, of types so
familiar to me, there in Northern France.
Their faces were eager as they pushed ahead. Some of the tent-shaped
wooden buildings were to be temporary barracks for them. In one place
the transports had stopped and the men were cooking a meal beside the
road. Some one had brought a newspaper and a crowd of men had gathered
round it. I wondered if it was an American paper. I would like to have
stood on the running board of the machine, as we went past, and called
out that I, too, was an American, and God bless them!
But I fancy the young officer with me would have been greatly
disconcerted at such an action. The English are not given to such
demonstrations. But the Canadians would have understood, I know.
Since that time the reports have brought great news of these Canadian
troops, of their courage, of the loss of almost all their officers in
the fighting at Neuve Chapelle. But that sunny morning, when I saw
them in the north of France, they were untouched by battle or sudden
death. Their faces were eager, intent, earnest. They had come a long
distance and now they had arrived. And what next?
Into this scene of war unexpectedly obtruded itself a bit of peace. A
great cart came down a side road, drawn by two white oxen with heavy
wooden yokes. Piled high in the cart were sugar beets. Some thrifty
peasant was salvaging what was left of his crop. The sight of the oxen
reminded me that I had seen very few horses.
"They are farther back," said the officer, "Of course, as you know,
for the last two or three months it has been impossible to use the
cavalry at all."
Then he told me a curious thing. He said that during the long winter
wait the cavalry horses got much out of condition. The side roads were
thick with mud and the main roads were being reserved for transports.
Adequate exercises for the cavalry seemed impossible. One detachment
discovered what it considered a bright solution, and sent to England
for beagle hounds. Morning after morning the men rode after the hounds
over the flat fields of France. It was a welcome distraction and it
kept the horses in working trim.
But the French objected. They said their country was at war, was being
devastated by an alien army. They considered riding to hounds, no
matter for What purpose, an indecorous, almost an inhuman, thing to do
under the circumstances. So the hounds were sent back to England, and
the cavalry horses are now exercised in dejected strings along side
roads.
As we went north the firing increased in intensity. More English
batteries were at work; the German response was insistent.
We were approaching Ypres, this time from the English side, and the
great artillery duel of late February was in progress.
The country was slightly rolling. Its unevenness permitted more
activity along our road. Batteries were drawn up at rest in the fields
here and there. In one place a dozen food kitchens in the road were
cooking the midday meal, the khaki-clad cooks frequently smoking as
they worked.
Ahead of this loomed two hills. They rose abruptly, treeless and
precipitous. On the one nearest to the German lines was a ruined
tower.
"The tower," said the officer, "would have been a charming place for
luncheon. But the hill has been shelled steadily for several days. I
have no idea why the Germans are shelling it. There is nobody there."