OVER THE MARNE TO THE AISNE
The morning of September 5th was very hot, but the brigades could easily
be found, and the roads to them were good. There was cheerfulness in the
air. A rumour went round--it was quite incredible, and we scoffed--that
instead of further retreating either beyond or into the fortifications
of Paris, there was a possibility of an advance. The Germans, we were
told, had at last been outflanked. Joffre's vaunted plan that had
inspired us through the dolorous startled days of retirement was, it
appeared, a fact, and not one of those bright fancies that the Staff
invents for our tactical delectation.
Spuggy returned. He had left us at Bouleurs to find a bicycle in Paris.
Coming back he had no idea that we had moved. So he rode too far north.
He escaped luckily. He was riding along about three hundred yards behind
two motor-cyclists. Suddenly he saw them stop abruptly and put up their
hands. He fled. A little farther on he came to a village and asked for
coffee. He heard that Uhlans had been there a few hours before, and was
taken to see a woman who had been shot through the breast. Then he went
south through Villeneuve, and following a fortunate instinct, ran into
our outposts the other side of Tournan.
We all slept grandly on mattresses. It was the first time we had been
two nights in the same place since Dour.
We awoke early to a gorgeous day. We were actually going to advance. The
news put us in marvellous good temper. For the first time in my
recollection we offered each other our bacon, and one at the end of
breakfast said he had had enough. The Staff was almost giggling, and a
battalion (the Cheshires, I think) that we saw pass, was absolutely
shouting with joy. You would have thought we had just gained a famous
victory.
Half of us went forward with the column. The rest remained for a
slaughterous hour. First we went to the hen-house, and in ten minutes
had placed ten dripping victims in the French gendarme captain's car.
Then George and I went in pursuit of a turkey for the Skipper. It was an
elusive bird with a perfectly Poultonian swerve, but with a bagful of
curses, a bleeding hand, and a large stick, I did it to death.
We set out merrily and picked up Spuggy, Cecil, and George in the big
forest that stretches practically from the Marne to Tournan. They
thought they had heard a Uhlan, but nothing came of it (he turned out to
be a deer), so we went on to Villeneuve. There I bought some biscuits
and George scrounged some butter. A job to the 3rd Division on our right
and another in pursuit of an errant officer, and then a sweaty and
exiguous lunch--it was a sweltering noon--seated on a blistering
pavement. Soon after lunch three of us were sent on to Mortcerf, a
village on a hill to the north of the forest. We were the first English
there--the Germans had left it in the morning--and the whole population,
including one strikingly pretty flapper, turned out to welcome us in
their best clean clothes,--it may have been Sunday.
We accepted any quantity of gorgeous, luscious fruit, retiring modestly
to a shady log to eat it, and smoke a delectable pipe. In a quarter of
an hour Major Hildebrand of the 2nd Corps turned up in his car, and
later the company.
Pollers had had a little adventure. He was with some of our men when he
saw a grey figure coming down one of the glades to the road. We knew
there were many stray Uhlans in the forest who had been left behind by
our advance. The grey figure was stalked, unconscious of his danger.
Pollers had a shot with his revolver, luckily without effect, for the
figure turned out to be our blasphemous farrier, who had gone into the
forest, clad only in regulation grey shirt and trousers, to find some
water.
Later in the afternoon I was sent off to find the North Irish Horse. I
discovered them four miles away in the first flush of victory. They had
had a bit of a scrap with Uhlans, and were proudly displaying to an
admiring brigade that was marching past a small but select collection of
horses, lances, and saddles.
This afternoon George smashed up his bicycle, the steering head giving
at a corner.
We bivouacked on the drive, but the hardness of our bed didn't matter,
as we were out all night--all of us, including the two, Grimers and
Cecil. It was nervous riding in the forest. All the roads looked exactly
alike, and down every glade we expected a shot from derelict Uhlans.
That night I thought out plots for at least four stories. It would have
been three, but I lost my way, and was only put right by striking a
wandering convoy. I was in search of the Division Train. I looked for
it at Tournan and at Villeneuve and right through the forest, but
couldn't find it. I was out from ten to two, and then again from two to
five, with messages for miscellaneous ammunition columns. I collared an
hour's sleep and, by mistake, a chauffeur's overcoat, which led to
recriminations in the morning. But the chauffeur had an unfair
advantage. I was too tired to reply.
Grimers, who cannot see well at night, was terrified when he had to take
a despatch through the forest. He rode with a loaded revolver in one
hand, and was only saved from shooting a wretched transport officer by a
wild cry, "For God's sake, look what you're doing."
The eldest Cecil reported a distinct smell of dead horses at the obelisk
in the forest. At least he rather thought they were dead donkeys. The
smell was a little different--more acrid and unpleasant. We told him
that there were eight dead Germans piled at the side of the road, and we
reminded him that it had been a sweltering day.
We were terribly tired in the morning. Spuggy, George, and Orr went off
to Paris for new bicycles, and we were left short-handed again. Another
tropical day.
The Skipper rode the spare bike with great dash, the elder Cecil and I
attendant. We sprinted along a good straight road to the cobbled,
crowded little town of Faremoutiers. Then we decided to advance to
Mouroux, our proposed headquarters. It was a haggard village, just off
the road. We arrived there about twelve: the Germans had departed at
six, leaving behind them a souvenir in the dead body of a fellow from
the East Lancs. crumpled in a ditch. He had been shot while eating. It
was my first corpse. I am afraid I was not overwhelmed with thoughts of
the fleetingness of life or the horror of death. If I remember my
feelings aright, they consisted of a pinch of sympathy mixed with a
trifle of disgust, and a very considerable hunger, which some apples by
the roadside did something to allay.
I shall never forget Mouroux. It was just a little square of old houses.
Before the Mairie was placed a collection of bottles from which the
Sales Boches had very properly drunk. French proclamations were
scribbled over with coarse, heavy jests. The women were almost
hysterical with relieved anxiety. The men were still sullen, and, though
they looked well fed, begged for bread. A German knapsack that I had
picked up and left in charge of some villagers was torn to shreds in
fierce hatred when my back was turned.
It was very lonely there in the sun. We had outstripped the
advance-guard by mistake and were relieved when it came up.
We made prisoner of a German who had overslept himself because he had
had a bath.
I rushed back with Grimers on my carrier to fetch another bicycle. On my
return my engine suddenly produced an unearthly metallic noise. It was
only an aeroplane coming down just over my head.
In the late afternoon we marched into Coulommiers. The people crowded
into the streets and cheered us. The girls, with tears in their eyes,
handed us flowers.
Three of us went to the Mairie. The Maire, a courtly little fellow in
top-hat and frock-coat, welcomed us in charming terms. Two fat old women
rushed up to us and besought us to allow them to do something for us. We
set one to make us tea, and the other to bring us hot water and soap.
A small girl of about eight brought me her kitten and wanted to give it
me. I explained to her that it would not be very comfortable tied with
pink ribbons to my carrier. She gravely assented, sat on my knee, told
me I was very dirty, and commanded me to kill heaps and heaps of
Germans. She didn't like them; they had beards!
You know those fierce middle-aged Frenchwomen of the _bourgeois_ class,
hard as Scotsmen, close as Jews, and with feelings about as fine as
those of a motor-bus. She was one of them, and she was the foremost of a
largish crowd that collected round me. With her was a pretty girl of
about twenty-two.
The mother began with a rhetorical outburst against all Germans,
anathematising in particular those who had spent the last fortnight in
Coulommiers, in which town her uncle had set up his business, which,
though it had proved successful, as they all knew, &c., &c. The crowd
murmured that they did all know. Then the old harridan chanted the
wrongs which the Germans had wrought until, when she had worked the
crowd and herself up to a heat of furious excitement, she lowered her
voice, suddenly lowered her tone. In a grating whisper she narrated, in
more detail than I cared to hear, the full story of how her daughter--to
whom she pointed--had been shamefully treated by the Germans. The crowd
growled. The daughter was, I think, more pleased at being the object of
my sympathy and the centre of the crowd's interest than agonised at the
remembrance of her misfortune.
Some of the company coming up saved me from the recital of further
outrages. The hag told them of a house where the Germans had left a
rifle or two and some of our messages which they had intercepted. The
girl hesitated a moment, and then followed. I started hastily to go on,
but the girl, hearing the noise of my engine, ran back to bid me an
unembarrassed farewell.
I rode through Coulommiers, a jolly rambling old town, to our billet in
a suburban villa on the Rebais road. The Division was marching past in
the very best of spirits. We, who were very tired, endeavoured to make
ourselves comfortable--we were then blanketless--on the abhorrent
surface of a narrow garden path.
That night a 2nd Corps despatch rider called in half an hour before his
death. We have heard many explanations of how he died. He crashed into a
German barricade, and we discovered him the next morning with his eyes
closed, neatly covered with a sheet, in a quaint little house at the
entrance to the village of Doué.
At dawn (Sept. 8th) the others went on with the column. I was sent back
with a despatch for Faremoutiers, and then was detailed to remain for an
hour with Cecil. Ten minutes after my return the Fat Boy rode in,
greatly excited. He had gone out along the Aulnoy road with a message,
and round a corner had run into a patrol of Uhlans. He kept his head,
turned quickly, and rode off in a shower of bullets. He was
tremendously indignant, and besought some cavalry who were passing to
go in pursuit.
We heard the rumble of guns and started in a hurry after the column.
Sergeant Merchant's bicycle--our spare, a Rudge--burnt out its clutch,
and we left it in exchange for some pears at a cottage with a delicious
garden in Champbreton. Doué was a couple of miles farther on.
Colonel Sawyer, D.D.M.S., stopped me anxiously, and asked me to go and
see if I could recognise the despatch rider's corpse. I meditated over
it for a few minutes, then ran on to the signal-office by the roadside.
There I exchanged my old bike for a new one which had been discovered in
a cottage. Nothing was wrong with my ancient grid except a buckled back
rim, due to collision with a brick when riding without a lamp. One of
the company rode it quietly to Serches, then it went on the side-car,
and was eventually discarded at Beuvry.
I found the Division very much in action. The object of the Germans was,
by an obstinate rearguard action, to hold first the line of the Petit
Morin and second the line La Ferté to the hills north of Méry, so that
their main body might get back across the Marne and continue northward
their retreat, necessitated by our pressure on their flank. This retreat
again was to be as slow as possible, to prevent an outflanking of the
whole.
Our object was obviously to prevent them achieving theirs.
Look at the map and grasp these three things:--
1. The two rivers--the Petit Morin debouching so as to cover
the German left centre.
2. From La Ferté westwards the rivers run in deep ravines,
hemmed in by precipitous thickly-wooded hills.
3. Only two bridges across the Marne remained--one large
one at La Ferté and one small one at Saacy.
When I arrived at Doué the Germans were holding the Forest of Jouarre in
force. They were in moderate force on the south bank of the Petit Morin,
and had some guns, but not many, on the north bank.
Here is a tale of how glory may be forced upon the unwilling.
There were troops on the road running south from Jouarre. They might be
Germans retreating. They might be the 3rd Corps advancing. The Staff
wanted to know at once, and, although a despatch rider had already been
sent west to ride up the road from the south, it was thought that
another despatch rider skirting the east side of the Bois de Jouarre
might find out more quickly. So the captain called for volunteers.
[Illustration: THE MARNE
(LAGNY _TO_ CHÂTEAU-THIERRY)]
Now one despatch rider had no stomach for the job. He sat behind a tree
and tried to look as if he had not heard the captain's appeal. The
sergeant in charge had faith in him and, looking round, said in a loud
voice, "Here is Jones!" (it is obviously impolitic for me to give even
his nickname, if I wish to tell the truth). The despatch rider jumped
up, pretended he knew nothing of what was going forward, and asked what
was required. He was told, and with sinking heart enthusiastically
volunteered for the job.
He rode off, taking the road by La Chevrie Farm. Beyond the farm the
Germans sniped him unmercifully, but (so he told me) he got well down on
the tank and rode "all out" until he came to the firing line just
south-west of the farm to the north of Chevrie. Major Buckle came out of
his ditch to see what was wanted. The rifle fire seemed to increase. The
air was buzzing, and just in front of his bicycle multitudinous little
spurts of dust flecked the road.
It was distinctly unpleasant, and, as Major Buckle persisted in standing
in the middle of the road instead of taking the despatch rider with him
into his ditch, the despatch rider had to stand there too, horribly
frightened. The Major said it was impossible to go farther. There was
only a troop of cavalry, taking careful cover, at the farm in front,
and--
"My God, man, you're under machine-gun fire."
So that's what it is, murmured the despatch rider to himself, not
greatly cheered. He saw he could not get to any vantage point by that
road, and it seemed best to get back at once. He absolutely streaked
along back to D.H.Q., stopping on the way very much against his will to
deliver a message from Major Buckle to the Duke of Wellington's who were
in support.
He gave in his report, such as it was, to Colonel Romer, and was
praised. Moral: Be called away by some pressing engagement _before_ the
captain calls for volunteers. May _Gott strafe_ thoroughly all
interfering sergeants!
The Headquarters Staff advanced in an hour or so to some houses. The 3rd
Corps, consisting of the 4th Division and the unlucky 19th Brigade, had
pushed on with tremendous dash towards Jouarre, and we learnt from an
aeroplane which dropped a message on the hill at Doué that the general
situation was favourable. The Germans were crowding across the bridge at
La Ferté under heavy shell fire, but unluckily we could not hit the
blighted bridge.
It was now midday and very hot. There was little water. We had been
advancing over open fields without a vestige of shade.
Under cover of their guns the Germans fled across the Petit Morin in
such confusion that they did not even hold the very defensible heights
to the north of the river. We followed on their heels through St Ouen
and up the hill behind the village. Three of us went on ahead and sat
for two hours in a trench with borrowed rifles waiting for the Germans
to come out of a wood. But it began to rain very hard, and the Germans
came on the other side and were taken by the Cyclists.
It was just getting dark when we rendezvoused at the cross-roads of
Charnesseuil. The village was battered by our guns, but the villagers
did not mind a scrap and welcomed us with screams of joy. The local inn
was reopened with cheers, and in spite of the fact that there were two
dead horses, very evil-smelling, just outside, we had drinks all round.
We were interrupted by laughter and cheers. We rushed out to see the
quaintest procession coming from the west into Charnesseuil. Seventy odd
immense Prussian Guards were humbly pushing in the bicycles of forty of
our Divisional Cyclists, who were dancing round them in delight. They
had captured a hundred and fifty of them, but our guns had shelled them,
luckily without doing much damage to the Cyclists, so loading up the
prisoners with all their kit and equipment, and making them lead their
captors' bicycles, the Cyclists brought them in triumph for the
inspection of the Staff. It was a great moment.
I was very tired, and, careless of who passed, stretched myself at the
side of the road for a sleep. I was wakened an hour later, and we all
went along together to the chateau. There we slept in the hall before
the contented faces of some fine French pictures--or the majority of
them,--the rest were bestially slashed.
At the break of dawn (Sept. 9th) I was sent off to the 14th Brigade,
which composed the advance-guard. Scouts had reported that Saacy had
been evacuated by the enemy. So we pushed on cautiously and took
possession of the bridge.
I came up with the Brigade Staff on a common at the top of the
succeeding hill, having been delayed by a puncture. Nixon, the S.O.,
told me that a battery of ours in position on the common to the south of
the farm would open fire in a few minutes. The German guns would reply,
but would be quickly silenced. In the meantime I was to take shelter in
the farm.
I had barely put my bicycle under cover in the courtyard when the
Germans opened fire, not at our guns but at a couple of companies of the
Manchesters who were endeavouring to take cover just north of the farm.
In the farm I found King and his platoon of Cyclists. Shrapnel bullets
simply rattled against the old house, and an occasional common shell
dropped near by way of variety. The Cyclists were restive, and I was
too, so to relieve the situation I proposed breakfast. King and I had
half a loaf of Saacy bread and half a pot of jam I always carried about
with me. The rest went to the men. Our breakfast was nearly spoilt by
the Manchesters, who, after they had lost a few men, rushed through the
farm into the wood, where, naturally enough, they lost a few more. They
besought the Cyclists to cover their retreat, but as it was from
shrapnel we mildly suggested it was impossible.
The courtyard was by this time covered with tiles and pitted with
bullets. We, close up against the wall, had been quite moderately safe.
The shelling slackened off, so we thought we had better do a bunk. With
pride of race the motor-cyclist left last.
The 14th Brigade had disappeared. I went back down the track and found
the General and his staff, fuming, half-way up the hill. The German guns
could not be found, and the German guns were holding up the whole
Division.
I slept by the roadside for an hour. I was woken up to take a message to
2nd Corps at Saacy. On my return I was lucky enough to see a very
spectacular performance.
From the point which I call A to the point B is, or ought to be, 5000
yards. At A there is a gap in the wood, and you get a gorgeous view over
the valley. The road from La Ferté to the point B runs on high ground,
and at B there is a corresponding gap, the road being open completely
for roughly 200 yards. A convoy of German lorries was passing with an
escort of infantry, and the General thought we might as well have a shot
at them. Two 18-pdrs. were man-handled to the side of the hill and
opened fire, while six of us with glasses and our lunch sat behind and
watched.
It was a dainty sight--the lorries scooting across, while the escort
took cover. The guns picked off a few, completely demolishing two
lorries, then with a few shells into some cavalry that appeared on the
horizon, they ceased fire.
The affair seemed dangerous to the uninitiated despatch rider. Behind
the two guns was a brigade of artillery in column of route on an
exceedingly steep and narrow road. Guns firing in the open can be seen.
If the Germans were to spot us, we shuddered to think what would become
of the column behind us on the road.
That afternoon I had nothing more to do, so, returning to the common, I
dozed there for a couple of hours, knowing that I should have little
sleep that night. At dusk we bivouacked in the garden of the chateau at
Méry. We arrived at the chateau before the Staff and picked up some
wine.
In the evening I heard that a certain captain in the gunners went
reconnoitring and found the battery--it was only one--that had held up
our advance. He returned to the General, put up his eyeglass and
drawled, "I say, General, I've found that battery. I shall now deal with
it." He did. In five minutes it was silenced, and the 14th attacked up
the Valley of Death, as the men called it. They were repulsed with very
heavy losses; their reinforcements, which had arrived the day before,
were practically annihilated.
It was a bad day.
That night it was showery, and I combined vain attempts to get to sleep
between the showers with a despatch to 2nd Corps at Saacy and another to
the Division Ammunition Column the other side of Charnesseuil.
Towards morning the rain became heavier, so I took up my bed--_i.e._, my
greatcoat and ground-sheet--and, finding four free square feet in the
S.O., had an hour's troubled sleep before I was woken up half an hour
before dawn to get ready to take an urgent message as soon as it was
light.
On September 9th, just before dawn--it was raining and very cold--I was
sent with a message to Colonel Cameron at the top of the hill, telling
him he might advance. The Germans, it appeared, had retired during the
night. Returning to the chateau at Méry, I found the company had gone
on, so I followed them along the Valley of Death to Montreuil.
It was the dismallest morning, dark as if the sun would never rise,
chequered with little bursts of heavy rain. The road was black with mud.
The hedges dripped audibly into watery ditches. There was no grass, only
a plentiful coarse vegetation. The valley itself seemed enclosed by
unpleasant hills from joy or light. Soldiers lined the road--some were
dead, contorted, or just stretched out peacefully; some were wounded,
and they moaned as I passed along. There was one officer who slowly
moved his head from side to side. That was all he could do. But I could
not stop; the ambulances were coming up. So I splashed rapidly through
the mud to the cross-roads north of Montreuil.
To the right was a barn in which the Germans had slept. It was littered
with their equipment. And in front of it was a derelict motor-car
dripping in the rain.
At Montreuil we had a scrap of bully with a bit of biscuit for
breakfast, then we ploughed slowly and dangerously alongside the column
to Dhuizy, where a house that our artillery had fired was still burning.
The chalked billeting marks of the Germans were still on the doors of
the cottages. I had a despatch to take back along the column to the
Heavies. Grease a couple of inches thick carpeted the road. We all
agreed that we should be useless in winter.
At Dhuizy the sun came out.
A couple of miles farther on I had a talk with two German
prisoners--R.A.M.C. They were sick of the war. Summed it up thus:
Wir weissen nichts: wir essen nichts: immer laufen, laufen, laufen.
In bright sunshine we pushed on towards Gandeln. On the way we had a
bit of lunch, and I left a pipe behind. As there was nothing doing I
pushed on past the column, waiting for a moment to watch some infantry
draw a large wood, and arrived with the cavalry at Gandeln, a rakish old
town at the bottom of an absurdly steep hill. Huggie passed me with a
message. Returning he told me that the road ahead was pitiably
disgusting.
You must remember that we were hotly pursuing a disorganised foe. In
front the cavalry and horse artillery were harassing them for all they
were worth, and whenever there was an opening our bigger guns would
gallop up for a trifle of blue murder.
From Gandeln the road rises sharply through woods and then runs on high
ground without a vestige of cover for two and a half miles into Chézy.
On this high, open ground our guns caught a German convoy, and we saw
the result.
First there were a few dead and wounded Germans, all muddied. The men
would look curiously at each, and sometimes would laugh. Then at the top
of the hill we came upon some smashed and abandoned waggons. These were
hastily looted. Men piled themselves with helmets, greatcoats, food,
saddlery, until we looked a crowd of dishevelled bandits. The German
wounded watched--they lay scattered in a cornfield, like poppies.
Sometimes Tommy is not a pleasant animal, and I hated him that
afternoon. One dead German had his pockets full of chocolate. They
scrambled over him, pulling him about, until it was all divided.
Just off the road was a small sandpit. Three or four waggons--the
horses, frightened by our shells, had run over the steep place into the
sand. Their heads and necks had been forced back into their carcasses,
and on top of this mash were the splintered waggons. I sat for a long
time by the well in Chézy and watched the troops go by, caparisoned with
spoils. I hated war.
Just as the sun was setting we toiled out of Chézy on to an upland of
cornfields, speckled with grey patches of dead men and reddish-brown
patches of dead horses. One great horse stood out on a little cliff,
black against the yellow of the descending sun. It furiously stank. Each
time I passed it I held my nose, and I was then pretty well used to
smells. The last I saw of it--it lay grotesquely on its back with four
stiff legs sticking straight up like the legs of an overturned table--it
was being buried by a squad of little black men billeted near. They were
cursing richly. The horse's revenge in death, perhaps, for its
ill-treatment in life.
It was decided to stay the night at Chézy. The village was crowded,
dark, and confusing. Three of us found the signal office, and made
ourselves very comfortable for the night with some fresh straw that we
piled all over us. The roads were for the first time too greasy for
night-riding. The rest slept in a barn near, and did not discover the
signal office until dawn.
We awoke, stiff but rested, to a fine warm morning. It was a quiet day.
We rode with the column along drying roads until noon through peaceful
rolling country--then, as there was nothing doing, Grimers and I rode to
the head of the column, and inquiring with care whether our cavalry was
comfortably ahead, came to the village of Noroy-sur-Ourcq. We
"scrounged" for food and found an inn. At first our host, a fat
well-to-do old fellow, said the Germans had taken everything, but, when
he saw we really were hungry, he produced sardines, bread, butter,
sweets, and good red wine. So we made an excellent meal--and were not
allowed to pay a penny.
He told that the Germans, who appeared to be in great distress, had
taken everything in the village, though they had not maltreated any one.
Their horses were dropping with fatigue--that we knew--and their
officers kept telling their men to hurry up and get quickly on the
march. At this point they were just nine hours in front of us.
Greatly cheered we picked up the Division again at Chouy, and sat
deliciously on a grass bank to wait for the others. Just off the road on
the opposite side was a dead German. Quite a number of men broke their
ranks to look curiously at him--anything to break the tedious, deadening
monotony of marching twenty-five miles day after day: as a major of the
Dorsets said to us as we sat there, "It is all right for us, but it's
hell for them!"
The Company came up, and we found that in Chouy the Germans had
overlooked a telephone--great news for the cable detachment. After a
glance at the church, a gorgeous bit of Gothic that we had shelled, we
pushed on in the rain to Billy-sur-Ourcq. I was just looking after a
convenient loft when I was sent back to Chouy to find the Captain's
watch. A storm was raging down the valley. The road at any time was
covered with tired foot sloggers. I had to curse them, for they wouldn't
get out of the way. Soon I warmed and cursed them crudely and glibly in
four languages. On my return I found some looted boiled eggs and
captured German Goulasch hot for me. I fed and turned in.
This day my kit was left behind with other unnecessary "tackle," to
lighten the horses' load. I wish I had known it.
The remaining eggs for breakfast--delicious.
Huggie and I were sent off just before dawn on a message that took us to
St Rémy, a fine church, and Hartennes, where we were given hot tea by
that great man, Sergeant Croucher of the Divisional Cyclists. I rode
back to Rozet St Albin, a pleasant name, along a road punctuated with
dead and very evil-smelling horses. Except for the smell it was a good
run of about ten miles. I picked up the Division again on the sandy road
above Chacrise.
Sick of column riding I turned off the main road up a steep hill into
Ambrief, a desolate black-and-white village totally deserted. It came on
to pour, but there was a shrine handy. There I stopped until I was
pulled out by an ancient captain of cuirassiers, who had never seen an
Englishman before and wanted to hear all about us.
On into Acy, where I decided to head off the Division at Ciry, instead
of crossing the Aisne and riding straight to Vailly, our proposed H.Q.
for that night. The decision saved my life, or at least my liberty. I
rode to Sermoise, a bright little village where the people were actually
making bread. At the station there was a solitary cavalry man. In Ciry
itself there was no one. Half-way up the Ciry hill, a sort of dry
watercourse, I ran into some cavalry and learnt that the Germans were
holding the Aisne in unexpected strength. I had all but ridden round and
in front of our own cavalry outposts.
Two miles farther back I found Huggie and one of our brigades. We had a
bit of bully and biscuit under cover of a haystack, then we borrowed
some glasses and watched bodies of Germans on the hills the other side
of the Aisne. It was raining very fast. There was no decent cover, so we
sat on the leeward side of a mound of sand.
When we awoke the sun was setting gorgeously. Away to the west in the
direction of Soissons there was a tremendous cannonade. On the hills
opposite little points of flame showed that the Germans were replying.
On our right some infantry were slowly advancing in extended order
through a dripping turnip-field.
The Battle of the Aisne had begun.
We were wondering what to do when we were commandeered to take a message
down that precipitous hill of Ciry to some cavalry. It was now quite
dark and still raining. We had no carbide, and my carburetter had
jibbed, so we decided to stop at Ciry for the night. At the inn we found
many drinks--particularly some wonderful cherry brandy--and a friendly
motor-cyclist who told us of a billet that an officer was probably going
to leave. We went there. Our host was an old soldier, so, after his wife
had hung up what clothes we dared take off to dry by a red-hot stove, he
gave us some supper of stewed game and red wine, then made us cunning
beds with straw, pillows, and blankets. Too tired to thank him we
dropped asleep.
That, though we did not know it then, was the last night of our little
Odyssey. We had been advancing or retiring without a break since my
tragic farewell to Nadine. We had been riding all day and often all
night. But those were heroic days, and now as I write this in our
comfortable slack winter quarters, I must confess--I would give anything
to have them all over again. Now we motor-cyclists are middle-aged
warriors. Adventures are work. Experiences are a routine. Then, let's be
sentimental, we were young.
[Illustration: THE AISNE
(SOISSONS _TO_ VAILLY)]