AUSTRALIA WILL BE THERE.
1st Verse.
You've heard about the Emden
That was cruising all around,
Sinking British shipping
Where'er it could be found,
Till one bright Sunday morning
The Sydney came in sight—
The Emden said good night.
Chorus.
Rally round the banner of your country,
Rally round the banner of your King.
On land or sea,
Wherever you be,
Keep your eye on Germany.
For England, home and beauty,
Have no cause to fear.
Should old acquaintance be forgot?
No, No—No, No, No.
Australia will be there,
Australia will be there.
2nd Verse.
With Kitchener in our Army
And French in our cavalry fine,
You bet those German bandsmen
Are in for a lively time.
And there's Winston Churchill
To guide our Navy grand;
With this fine lot we'll make it hot
For the poor old Fatherland.
Chorus.
3rd Verse.
We don't forget South Africa
When England was at war;
Australian Light Horsemen, my boys,
Were always to the fore.
Archie Norris and Billy Cook
Have now all kissed the Book.
Chorus.
[CHAPTER III.]
BOELCKE'S LAND OF PROMISE.
On the 28th of October, six Halberstadters and Aviatiks attacked two English aviators in the neighbourhood of Pozières. During the fight six fresh enemy machines came to the assistance of their friends. At the end of five minutes of furious fighting two German machines collided. Pieces of the machines fell, and one of them descended toward the East. The fight lasted 15 minutes, at the end of which time all the enemy machines were driven off.
It is probable that it was during this fight that Captain Boelcke was killed. It was, in fact, at this date that the German wireless stated that Boelcke had been killed owing to a collision in the air.
In a letter which he wrote to a friend a few days before his tragic and still unaccountable death, Boelcke, the best-known and most successful of the German aviators, said:
"The Somme front is a positive land of promise. The sky is filled with English airmen."
Boelcke expressed, under the guise of a kind of sporting self-congratulation, the astonishment of his fellows at the way in which the British flying service had developed.
A large number of documents found upon German prisoners give evidence of a no less striking kind upon the same point.
"Our air service," says one of them, "practically ceased to exist during the Battle of the Somme. At times the sky seemed black with enemy machines."
Another says:
"We are so inferior to our opponents in our air service that when hostile machines fly over our own lines we have no recourse but to hide ourselves in the earth. Now and then a few of our machines attempt to go up, but it is only a drop in the bucket."
6. A BRITISH AEROPLANE.
Finally, for one must not pursue this subject too far, a General Order has been issued to the German Army to the effect that when troops are marching they must halt and take cover whenever a British machine is known to be in their vicinity; for the English are in the habit of flying sufficiently low over the invaded territory to use their machine-guns against moving troops and convoys.
To this evidence from enemy sources I may perhaps add my own. I assert, then, as definitely as it is possible to do it, that one of my most agreeable surprises, during my visit to the British front, was the discovery of the great numbers and unceasing activity of the British aeroplanes. Whether I was in the firing-line or behind it, my attention was being constantly drawn to the movements of the British air service.
On the 15th of September the total number of hours during which flying was carried on upon the British front was 1,300. Reckoning that each aviator flies, on an average, for two hours, it is possible to form an idea of the number of machines which were in the air on that day.
During the last Battle of the Ancre the British planes of every kind, for bombing, fighting and directing the gunfire, seemed always to be over the German lines; and on one fairly still day I was able to count as many as 30 of them in the air at once, and this on a comparatively narrow sector.
Behind the lines I went to see numerous aviation camps, instruction camps, depôts of munitions, etc. They were like so many beehives, models of organisation, order and method. The pilots, the observers, the mechanics, everyone, seen at close quarters, gave me an impression of a very unusual power and intelligence, and inspired me with the same confidence with which their own mastery of the air has so long filled them, ever since, indeed, they wrested it from the enemy.
Perhaps it may not be labour lost if, in order to get a right understanding of the present very satisfactory and praiseworthy position, we review shortly the history of British military aviation since the beginning of the war.
England had not wished for war, nor had she prepared for it, and while aviation seemed to her a marvellous achievement of the human brain, she was far from thinking that she was bound to make use of it in order to injure mankind. This is why her military air service, like her whole Army, was in no more than an embryonic condition when she found herself faced with the grim reality of this war.
Far more than the exigencies of the campaign on the continent, it was the repeated raids of the Zeppelins over England which caused her to devote herself to the development of her aviation.
The undertaking bristled with difficulties. We should be wrong, were we in France, to suppose that we are the only people the story of whose aviation has been marked by crises. Our Allies, though their practical nature is proverbial among us, were forced to experiment and grope their way for a long time before they could arrive at a solution of the many knotty problems of aerial defence.
A complete lack of any central authority, a division or responsibility between the various staffs, nobody to decide as to how machines should be employed or how built, waste of every kind—the English have experienced all these troubles. But how admirably they have surmounted them! The proof is that now the only resource of the Germans is a servile imitation.
This spirit of imitation among the Germans has shown itself most markedly in these last weeks, during the process of the Battle of the Ancre. The Germans set out by collecting a large number of aeroplanes on a very narrow front. Then they began to show some signs of taking the initiative with a daring to which we were little accustomed.
Did they really hope to wrest the mastery of the air from the English? I do not know. In any case their attempt began badly; for when, 40 in number, they met 30 of the British machines, they could discover no better way of saving themselves than by flight, after a quarter of their number had been put out of action.
It was about this time that General von Groener, a man of energy and resolution, called upon the German aeroplane factories to increase their output; and that Mr. Lloyd George in England, while giving publicity to this new effort of Germany, exhorted his fellow-countrymen not to allow themselves to be overtaken by their enemy.
Boelcke may rest in peace. His land of promise can only grow greater and breed birds more rapidly.
After this, what need one say more of the technical skill and the often heroic courage of the British aviator?
The French and British airmen form, indeed, one great family of heroes, and our men have, in King George's Army, cousins who are as like them as brothers.
At this point I will do no more than offer for your consideration a document and a story.
The document is a letter, sent from Germany to his friends by an English aviator, Lieutenant Tudor-Hart, on the 25th of this July. I should blame myself were I to alter one word of it.
"I was," he writes, "with Captain Webb at between 12,000 and 15,000 feet above the German lines, when we saw eight German machines coming towards us from the South-west. They were higher than we were, and we went towards them to attack them. Two of them passed about 300 yards above our heads. I opened fire on one and they replied together.
"I signed to Webb to turn so that I might fire at the other machine, behind us; but he made a spurt forward with the machine. I looked round to see what had happened, but Webb pointed to his stomach and fell forward upon the controls. I fancy he must have died almost immediately. His last thought had been to save the machine.
"It at once began to swing in the direction of the German lines, and I was compelled to return to my machine-gun, in order to fire on a plane which was getting too close. The other machines never stopped firing at us. My only hope was to make for our lines, but I could not manage to push Webb out of the pilot's seat, and I was obliged to manœuvre above the hood.
"I had to fire so often that it became impossible for me to guide the machine. At last, constantly under fire, I planed down towards a field near by and tried to land. I saw a number of men with rifles, and I thought that I might be killed before being able to set the machine on fire.
"One wing having struck the earth, the machine was smashed, and I was thrown out. I got off with one side paralysed, one ankle and one rib broken. I was very well treated, and the German flying men behaved towards me like sportsmen and gentlemen."
It is in this way that the paladins of this war both conduct and express themselves.
And now for the story.
There was once in England a rich man who interested himself in Art and Politics. His name was Lord Lucas. Life had always smiled upon him, and he had returned her smile. Had he wished it, he might have spent his life in slippered ease and lived from day to day without a care.
Choosing, rather, to become a soldier, he joined the Expeditionary Forces during the South African War. He was wounded and lost a leg, but this in no way deterred him from being of service to his country.
When the European War broke out, Lord Lucas was the Minister for Agriculture in the Asquith Cabinet.
He felt shame to be engaged in such a vapid business as Politics now appeared, and he resigned. Next we find him volunteering for the British air service. In spite of his artificial leg, he went through his training, was hurt, got cured, and returned to his work and never rested until he had flown over the German lines. One day Lord Lucas, millionaire, artist, ex-Cabinet Minister, and, above all, soldier, failed to return to his squadron. The Boches alone know whether he is dead or a prisoner.
The man who told me the story of this splendid life was the best friend of Lord Lucas, and he was worthy to be it. I asked this soldier, a peer himself and himself wounded, if in England, as in France, commissions in the air service were much sought after. In reply, he pointed to two great birds, and said: "We admire them, Monsieur, as you do, and, like you, we envy them."
[CHAPTER IV.]
THE SQUARE JAW.[A]
[A] Of the two articles which follow, the first ("The Square Jaw") was written on the 9th of December, during the crisis caused by the successive resignations of Mr. Lloyd George and Mr. Asquith.
The second ("The Moral of the British Armies") was written on the 19th of the same month, the day after Germany made her official offer of peace.
The British soldier does not concern himself with Politics. It is not in his character to do so; moreover, any such conduct is against the rules of his profession. And so, since discipline "is the first weapon of Armies," the British soldier respects it above everything else.
The Englishman has a passion and a profound respect for method. Method requires that Politics should be the business of Ministers and Politicians, and that war should be carried on by soldiers. Method, says the Englishman, demands that everyone should stick to his own work and his own place. Without this, anarchy must ensue. Now there cannot well be anything less anarchical than the British Army.
It is their order and discipline which most powerfully and most quickly impress the Frenchman who is permitted to live for a time among the Armies of England. These qualities, let me hasten to add, are also the least superficial, and thus afford the surest test of the value of these Armies.
Observe that it is not by collecting together a body of indifferent natures, passive temperaments and personalities more or less irresponsible, that this order and discipline have been infused into the British Army. The level of capacity of this Army is, moreover, by no means a low one; for it is one of the most intelligent Armies in Europe or in the whole world. The common soldier is not of one class, to the exclusion of all others. He does not represent one section only of British opinion. His corporate mind is therefore in no way a limited one.
As a volunteer, he thronged into England, at the beginning of the war, from every quarter of the globe, and by this voluntary act at once proclaimed his intelligence. To-day, as a conscript, he represents, more than ever before, the completeness of his country's will.
As for the officers, who differ from our own in their essentially aristocratic character, in them we see the direct expression of all those qualities of brain and heart which distinguish the leading elements of British society.
And so, if this army does not concern itself with Politics, if it is thoroughly disciplined, if it contents itself with "making war," it is because it prefers to do these things.
It is, moreover, excellently informed of everything which happens outside itself, whether in England or elsewhere, and in this respect differs considerably from the German Army which lies beyond its trenches. A Boche prisoner, recently taken, owned that neither the newspapers of his country nor any letters ever reached the German troops in the front lines. As each day comes, its history is told to our enemies by word of mouth only; that is to say, after the fashion which best suits their rulers.
Among the English there is very little heard or said about peace, or about the objects for which they are fighting; but they read, and they read continually. The soldier follows the course of events as well in his letters as in his newspaper.
And in what does his knowledge consist? What does he know?
He knows that the Army to which he belongs owes much to that French Army which he admires so deeply, and by whose side he is proud to fight for the interests which their natures share. He knows that to the British Army is secured, from now onwards, one of the chief factors of invincible and victorious strength—numbers. He knows approximately the number of his effectives, and he would gladly, by crying it aloud, shake the confidence of the enemy and confirm that of his friends.
He knows also that the second factor of his strength—material—while it is already considerable and probably equal to that which his opponents possess—does not represent a quarter of what the coming year will produce. He knows, from having done it again and again since July, that not only can he resist the enemy, but defeat him; and he awaits confidently the hour of triumph.
Hence his firm, his unshakable determination to obtain victory on his own terms; hence, also, it follows that no thought or hope of a premature peace ever disturbs his mind.
And if no one else remained to fight, he would go on, for—he says it himself, and one cannot but believe him—he has "a square jaw."
It is important, in the present condition of affairs, that the French public should make no mistake as to the opinions of the British soldier concerning the war and its sure conclusion.
About this no one can be under any delusion. Everywhere on the British front there is but one opinion—that the war must be carried through to the end; that is to say, till the inevitable victory of the Allies has come to pass; and that it would be a crime against the Homeland, the Allies and those comrades who have fallen, to listen to proposals for a peace which would be consistent with neither the intentions nor the interests of England and her Allies.
During my visit of two months I have seen the larger part of the British front from the Somme to the Yser. Everywhere I have met with the same spirit of determination. This state of mind may be explained in various ways; the perfect confidence which the British Army feels in its Commander-in-Chief, Sir Douglas Haig, "the lucky," as the soldiers call him; the regular growth in the numbers of the effectives, which, though I may not disclose these figures, exceed the estimates of them usually made in France; the tremendous development of material and in the output of munitions; the magnificent successes gained on the Somme and the Ancre, which have given rise to the certainty of being able to defeat an enemy formerly said to be invincible; etc., etc.
Without doubt, the war goes slowly. Tommy admits it, but he begs you to observe—and justly—that on every occasion when his infantry has come to grips with the Germans it has invariably beaten them.
"Besides," he thinks, "perhaps it is not absolutely essential, in order to win the war and place England and her Allies in a position to dictate their own terms, that our Armies should hurl themselves forward in one final and costly advance over the shattered lines of the Germans." The British soldier is fond of comparing the Western battle front to an immense boxing ring, of which the complex systems of barbed wire which stretch from the North Sea to Belfort form the ropes. The war, on the West, has been fought within these limits since the Marne. It is possible that it will see no change of position up to the end.
7. CANADIANS FRESH FROM THE TRENCHES.
But, as in a boxing match, it is not necessary, in order to win, to drive one's opponent over the ropes and out of the ring; in the same way it may happen that the German Army is "knocked out" in the positions where it is fighting to-day.
That, at least, is the opinion of the British soldier.
It is, indeed, no more than a paraphrase of that dictum, pronounced not long ago by General Nogi, and as true of the ring as it is of war: "Complete victory is to him who can last a quarter of an hour longer than the other fellow."
Tommy has no intention—no more than has his friend the poilu—of playing the part of "the other fellow."
[CHAPTER V.]
THE RELIEF.
The scene is an old trench of the French first line. It is midday. It is raining. It goes on raining. It has always rained. The sector is fairly quiet, and has been for an hour or so. Tommy sees a chance to write a letter.
Here in his dug-out—a miserable shelter which oozes water everywhere—squatted on the straw that becomes filth the moment it is thrown down, he is telling his friends in Scotland all his small sorrows and hopes; he is wishing them "A Happy New Year."
Suddenly his pen falters; the writer considers, stops writing, and, addressing the second-lieutenant as he goes by: "Beg pardon, sir," he asks, "may I say that they have moved out?"
"Certainly not," says the lieutenant, apparently horrified by such a question. "It is absolutely forbidden to say anything about this business. Do you understand, all of you?"
"But—but," someone ventures to say, "everyone in England knows about it already. The papers ..." and they show the lieutenant some newspapers which have come that morning. The officer takes them, glances at them, smiles, and says: "Oh, these journalists!"
On the front page of the paper a striking photograph is exhibited, showing an incident of the taking over by the British of the French front. Underneath is the following description:
"Tommy takes over the French trenches. French soldiers looking on at the arrival of British troops who are relieving them. This important operation took place at the front, at Christmas-time, silently, secretly and with complete success. The enemy, who was in many places no more than a few yards distant, never had any suspicion of this change, which has greatly extended the British lines and eased the strain which our gallant Allies have endured upon the Western front.
"This military manœuvre affords the best reply to the manœuvres of Germany in the direction of peace."
And so Tommy continues his letter in some such fashion as this:
"Now that the thing is done, I may tell you that we have left the sector of —— in order to come down farther South, where we have relieved the French. It has been a fine chance to see our brave Allies at work, and I am tremendously proud to have taken their place in the lines.
"The thing has been done very well, although it wanted a lot of care and was very dangerous. You can imagine that if the Boches had had any notion of what we were at, they would not have failed to do their level best to stop us or make it difficult for us; for it must make them very savage to see our 'contemptible little Army' always extending its flanks, without wearing thin anywhere, and so setting free first-rate troops for the French to use elsewhere.
"We came among the Frenchmen on Christmas Day.
"The roads were all as busy as on the day before the offensive on the Ancre in front of Beaumont-Hamel. We never stopped meeting French troops and wagons, which were going back towards the railway.
"We exchanged civilities with the poilus which neither they nor we understood the least bit. But I may tell you that it was pretty clear to me that they were not sorry to be giving up their places to us.
"On the 25th of December, after supper, we left our last camp and marched through the night for many hours, till we came to this French trench where I am writing to you now.
"The poilus were at their posts. It'll be a long time before I forget that sight.
"Although they were far dirtier and more tired than were we, the French, as they themselves say, 'had the smile.' If we had been allowed to make any noise, we should have cheered them. But we were only 38 yards from the Boche line.
"The officers and the non-commissioned officers gave the orders in whispers. They had interpreters to help them.
"As for me, I was at once told off to do sentry in the place of a great French chap, with a beard, who was a good 15 years older than I.
"As I understood a bit of French, I was able to make out most of what he said to me.
"'Good evening, my lad,' says he. 'You're a good fellow to come and let me out of this. Shake hands, won't you?'—I didn't understand everything; French is so difficult—and he added: 'And now, young 'un, open your eyes and keep them skinned.'
"Then he gave me a great deal of very sound advice, showing me in which directions I must keep a good look-out, and telling me to have a care of a blackguardly German machine-gun which never has done sweeping their parapet.
"When he had finished with this he took his rifle out of the loophole, and I put mine there in its place. And that's how the big relief was carried out on Christmas night."
At this point Tommy was forced to interrupt his long letter, for the Germans had at last got news of the relief and were attacking the sector. In vain.
Next day Tommy finished thus:
"My poilu was right. This corner can hardly be called a quiet one, and Fritz is a bad boy, there's no doubt about it. Thanks for your Christmas parcel. The pudding was A1. Good-bye.
"Tommy."
[PART III.]
THE ARMIES OF THE NORTH.
Flat calm on both sides of the Ancre; calm—or something like it—on the Somme. Let us take advantage of this apparent truce to get into rather closer touch with the British Army.
By this eight-day tour (though it has seemed, while we have been making it, a kind of intermezzo between two acts of the offensive) we had intended, particularly, to demonstrate to ourselves, by our study of the events and those who have enacted them, the dauntless determination with which our Allies, not satisfied to defend the heroic heritage which these battlefields of 1915 have bequeathed to them, now prepare for the future.
In telling these experiences, one has to play the Censor over oneself. And so we may say nothing of the most important things of all. Everywhere throughout this countryside mighty Armies, in the most perfect secrecy, are doing their business, scattering, with prodigal hand, the seed of future victory. And the harvest will surely be gathered. And if, at this time of heart-breaking uncertainty, our journey enables us to do no more than declare that great things are assuredly preparing, this alone will make it worth our having undertaken it.
We did not set out, we three, with our permits from the General Headquarters, to make a sentimental pilgrimage over the battlefields that lie between Lorette and the trenches of French Flanders. No; it was a reconnaissance that we made—into the Future. These sketches of the British Armies are, thus, no more than a study of latent forces.
[CHAPTER I.]
THE PREPARATION OF THE CANADIANS.
We spent the first two days among the Canadians. Let me recall a few of their performances. They sustained, in front of Ypres, the first great gas attack launched by the Germans. During the offensive in Picardy, being sent into the front line on the 15th of September or thereabouts, they stormed Courcelette and Martinpuich, and consolidated their forward positions on one side towards Grandcourt, on the other towards Le Sars. The rest of them kept the enemy contained.
To sum them up—an Army full of robust qualities, an Army of young athletes, inured by their own home-life to the physical hardships of the trenches, regardless alike of cold, fog and mud. An Army, too, of formidable size, since to-day its numbers are greater than those of the whole British Expeditionary Force of 1914.
We saw them in their lines—in camp. Our guides were certain young officers from Quebec, who spoke an archaic, melodious French, that was most pleasant to hear. Their names also sounded oddly in our ears; more than one of them recalled the old sailor names of Cherbourg, Saint Malo and Lorient. They told us what joy they found in fighting for their two Homelands—England and France.
While we were crossing a wood near A——, one of them told me, gravely: "I have been here since our good God made the little apples to grow, but I have known neither regret nor weariness. Rather has this life in France this springhead of my race, made me know myself each day more truly."
These men and their leaders, indeed, do neither their training nor their fighting from any other motive than duty. Their fighting has a kind of mystical quality, the passion of a young people, which makes them, behind their battle lines, a family of brothers, and, when they engage, an army of warriors who will lay down their lives for one another.
A few miles from the enemy, behind a redoubt, where thousands of French graves lie scattered, one of their divisions occupied some huts which our engineers had built. Almost everywhere the notices were written in French. In one immense system there were trenches of a hundred shapes all jumbled together. We saw, here, a demonstration of a surprise attack against a machine-gun emplacement on a redoubt of the German pattern. This manœuvre was no more than an illustration of theory. The captain who had charge of it had, during the previous night, himself led an attack against the Germans. From it he had returned with three things—a slight wound, two prisoners and the Military Cross.
Elsewhere, at the edge of a mine-crater, we listened to a lieutenant grounding his men in the art of trench-digging. A trench should be made irregularly, in accordance with the natural variations of the soil. All of which the lieutenant summed up thus: "To do this job well you must do it badly."
A company of Canadian gunners were practising with a trench-digging machine, invented in England, which had done well on the Somme. Suddenly one of them, to his horror, perceived that a shell which stood among a hundred others was smoking. By some unaccountable means its fuse had caught fire, the match was burning, and in a few seconds, perhaps in one, the shell would burst. Were it to do so, the whole of this store of ammunition must go aloft, with the gunners and us and all.
And so this gallant little Canadian who has seen the danger, gives the alarm, and while we flatten ourselves into the mud, picks up the shell in his plucky hands and throws it with all his strength out in front of the battery, where it bursts—and no one a penny the worse.
We could have fallen, for very joy, upon the neck of the gallant lad who had just saved all our lives. It would have been so silly to be killed in such a fashion, miles away from the enemy!
Farther on they were learning to handle a new trench-mortar. We were privileged to observe a little barrage fire. It made a noble shindy in the fog and a magnificent disturbance of the soil. These guns have been only recently introduced, but they are installing great numbers of them along the whole British front with a view to the winter campaign, for they have been an immense success. The Germans, in this field, at least, of experimental operations, have acquired this information at considerable cost to themselves.
In the same way we followed the open-air training of the machine-gun men. More or less every man has to go through it, so that if necessary he may be able to do this work. It is the picked gunners, who have shown what they can do in actual fighting, who teach the beginners the use of this terrible weapon, and it is with a most entertaining air of "the old soldier" that they give their instruction.
We saw the periscope rifles at work, the bomb-throwing and grenade-throwing rifles and other strange and terrible weapons of which one may not tell. What a rare museum we will be able to make up after the war! The collections of arms from the Middle Ages will sink into insignificance beside it. It would appear that for inventing ways of killing his fellows, the imagination of Man knows no bounds.
We came upon some sturdy Canadians, their hats stuck in their belts. A stout band of leather was round their heads. Slung across his shoulders one carried two heavy boxes loaded with shells; another, without any effort, carried one of his comrades. These exercises were explained to us in this way. "It is the method of the Red Indians that the Canadians have cleverly adapted to the purposes of supplying their trenches or carrying their wounded. With it, one has no need to be a Hercules." With this system, strength yields to skill. They showed us a man who can in this way walk easily with a piano on his back. "It would come in handy for shifting a broken-down tank!" said our guide with a grin.
Here we are at the Canadian Headquarters, an 18th-century château whose walls are hung with early Flemish masters.
"France sends us welcome guests."
The man who gives us this genial reception is none other than General Byng, Commander-in-Chief of the Canadian detachment in France. He is a handsome fellow, slender, solidly built. In him an immense strength is found united to an exquisite courtesy.
Hardly have we become his guests before he is showing his confidence in us by permitting us to share in his secrets.
He has brought us in front of a huge map representing the field of his operations. On it he shows us, with a most worthy pride, the dispositions of all his divisions, brigades and battalions.
While we are chatting, an officer of the Intelligence comes in. He has an unfortunate piece of news for the general, and so for us—the fall of Bucharest.
"At dawn this morning," he says, "the Boches began cheering in their trenches. Then they pushed up above their parapets placards which told us that the Rumanian capital had been taken. Also, one of our listening-posts got a German wireless put purposely into English, which said: 'Bucharest is taken. Hurrah!'"
For a serious moment or two we are silent.
Then someone ventures: "That's a nuisance!"
Another silence. The square jaws set a little more firmly. Then: "Carry on!" says our host.
[CHAPTER II.]
ARRAS, THE WOUNDED TOWN.
While I was in the British lines I visited Arras.
Everyone knows that since February of this year this ancient town has been included in that part of the front which is held by our Allies.
Soldier or traveller, whoever enters the ruins of Arras, is subject to the strictest regulations, which have been imposed for the sake of the security of individuals and the preservation of the general order. The steel helmet is obligatory, as is the gas mask.
Numerous notices instruct us "not to move about except upon the footpaths and hugging the walls. It is absolutely forbidden to use the middle of the roadway." A useful precaution in a town whose outskirts are held by the Germans.
The town is divided into districts. On notice-boards are posted various directions such as, "Rendezvous Place No. 1." For there is no longer any Grande Place or Petit Place or any other spots whose names are known to the people of Arras—only Place 1, 2, 3, and so on.
I have noted, in this connection, the following, as a novel example of organisation and forethought:
"To civilians. You are not required to concern yourselves with military matters. If you talk about such things, you may come under suspicion."
A civilian warned is a civilian armed.
Such was Arras when I saw it in November, 1914, after the first bombardment, and so it was, or nearly so, when I saw it yesterday. And it was the same sorrow that I felt as I passed along those empty streets, where not one house is to be seen that has not received its wound, more or less mortal. The dismal impression may have been strengthened by yesterday's wretched weather.
8. ARRAS.
We often say of some provincial town: "It is a dead-alive place." The phrase should be changed, or else it should be used henceforth only about such towns as Arras, Ypres or Verdun.
For two years not only the Germans but the weather also have been active to help the work of destruction; the Germans with their never-ceasing bombardment, the weather by destroying without hope buildings which might, till lately, have perhaps been saved. Everything rusts and crumbles under the rain, and in many places the wind has finished their work for the guns. Grass sprouts among the ruins; moss grows on stone and timber. The work of Death goes on, slowly but surely.
It is not a little astonishing to meet civilians now and then in Arras. Here and there the white head of some old man or woman appears from a cellar or from behind a bit of wall. There are some hundreds of such French people, who have refused to leave their homes.
They have sent away the "jeunesse," as they say, so that the Boches may have no more children to kill. They, the old folk, propose to stay and look after their ruins.
Yesterday I saw a woman come out of the half-open door of a little shop. She may have been 65 years old. Over the door was the sign, "Washing done here." She was a washerwoman.
I spoke to her.
"My dear lady," I said, "are you not afraid to stay here?"
"Bah, Monsieur!" she replied. "A little sooner, a little later. What does it matter at my age?
"I had a grandson," she went on. "He was just 20 when the Boches came. They killed him close by here in 1914. My girl died of grief. The father is fighting somewhere or other. And so I came back. Here at least I can go now and then to pray for my boy. But not beside his grave. The Boches are there. That's where it is, Monsieur, on the other side of the road."
And she pointed to where the enemy lay, close by.
He is there, close by. You feel him; you hear him. For two years he has held the suburbs of Blangy, Ronville and Saint Sauveur. You hear his firing as if it was beside you. It is all street fighting here. In one place, indeed, there is no more than the width of a little street, four or five yards, between the trenches.
For the moment, however, this sector is quiet.
The chief amusement of the Boches is incendiarism. On regular days and at regular hours of the day it pleases them to light great bonfires in the town. This is how they manage it.
First they throw a few incendiary bombs at the prey which they have singled out. When the fire has been started and the firemen have come running to fight it, the Boches enliven the situation with shells, in the hope, I suppose, of feeding the flames with some human victims.
It is vastly entertaining!
As we came back we made the acquaintance of some very noteworthy British soldiers. They call them Bantams.
The distinguishing feature of these men is their height, which is below the average. There was a certain number of men in England who had been rejected for service in the ranks because of their shortness. As they were very keen to fight, somebody thought of forming them into a special division.
And so the Bantam Division came into being. And these little cocks can fight to the death, like those in whose battles the villages of Northern England used to delight; and, little though they are, they grow, if one may say so, at once to the size of Titans.
[CHAPTER III.]
THE GROUND OF HEROIC DEEDS.
Last year the ground that we are treading, this cold and rainy December day, saw played out one of the most terrible acts of this terrible war. It shook for weeks together during May and June, 1915, to the thunder of vast opposing artilleries. Thousands of men moved over it and drenched it with their blood.
This ground has seen the French Army, in a transport of courage, bind for an instant the wings of victory; it has seen our battalions burst at racing speed over trenches that were deemed impregnable; it has seen Petain's men storm the Vimy Ridge and win a sight of the plain, the goal of their desires, their promised land....
It has seen that!
I own frankly that, as I write these impressions, I am in the grip of an emotion which I do not even try to conquer. Perhaps it is because these events of May and June, 1915, are already so distant that time has magnified their tragic splendour till they have acquired a sort of legendary quality.
We reached this battlefield through the wood of Bouvigny, which lies to the North-westwards of the crest of Notre Dame de Lorette. In this wood, which is all close thickets and has few large trees, just before the attack of May, an entire French division succeeded in gathering without being discovered by the enemy.
You can still see clearly, at the Southern edge of the wood, the first French trenches, in front of which, in October, 1914, after the evacuation of Lille, the German hosts were stopped in their march to the West. The breaking flood has eaten deeply into the slopes, as the sea has done along the Breton Coast.
Two years will soon have passed over this devastated spot. The grass and the moss have begun to take possession of the abandoned trenches, to conceal the shell-holes and the dug-outs, to cover up the vast wreckage of the battle, the dear relics of our soldiers. Nevertheless, we see everywhere evidence of the madness with which they fought hereabouts in May and June, 1915. Years, centuries, I believe, must pass before every sign of these things will be gone.
No doubt the bones that one often finds scattered here and there, refused by the ground, will crumble away and will return little by little to the dust from which they came; these little nameless crosses, made out of two sticks of different lengths fastened together, will vanish; but on the spurs of Lorette, as at Carency, or at Ablain Saint-Nazaire, there will always be something that will speak of the spring of 1915—the ground.
We were anxious to see the ruins of the chapel. We found them only with great difficulty. At last at the angle of a trench we came upon its brick foundations and a small monument, set up since 1915 by some pious hand. In a frame of wood and corrugated iron are three plaster figures, the Holy Family, which were formerly in the chapel, with this inscription:
"Memorial of the Holy Family of the Santa Casa of Notre Dame de Lorette. August, 1916. The Guides and Protectors of valiant soldiers."
This monument cannot be said to be erected—since it is buried—but it hides itself away in that part of the spurs of Lorette whence the eye looks out beyond over the whole district. In clear weather one sees the whole panorama of the German and French lines. One can trace their windings by Angres, Lievin and Lens, and good eyes can follow them right up to Lille. It is quite common, at any rate, to see the people of this invaded piece of France going about their business in the streets of, for example, Lens.
Opposite, to the East, are the chalky heights of Vimy, a little higher than the ridge of Lorette, on which we are standing. Their summits are at present held by the enemy.
We could not fail, while we were at Ablain, to compare the effect of the 1915 gunfire with that of 1916. This comparison can, indeed, be made wherever fighting had taken place before the Somme offensive.
In the sector of Ablain, Carency and Souchez our artillery had delivered a weight of shell, in May and June 1915, such as had never been known before. The enemy had been stunned by it. Yet, what a different effect was wrought by the artillery during the Somme offensive. At either Ablain, Carency or Souchez it is still possible to see that there is a village, and even to rebuild it in imagination. The skeletons are still standing.
But in Fricourt, Mametz, Thiepval and all the other villages which were under fire in 1916, not one stone remains upon another. In 1915 it was destruction; in 1916 annihilation. The advance made in the construction of artillery is written in the soil in unmistakable characters, and no one who is not an expert can conceive how the science of levelling things with the earth might be brought to any greater perfection. Our further advance along these lines must, one would say, be made downwards.
It is with deep regret that we leave these immense cities of the dead, where so many Frenchmen sleep under the sympathetic wardenship of our Allies.
[CHAPTER IV.]
A DINNER OF GENERALS.
This evening on our return from the lines we found the following invitation:
"Dear Sir,—The General in Command will be very happy if you can dine with him at eight o'clock."
We were, to tell you the truth, in such a state of dirtiness, so horribly muddy and so tired, that at first we wondered if it was possible for us to accept. But an invitation from a General—a General in Command—amounts to an order. And so we made a quick toilet and betook ourselves to the Head Quarters.
They had been established a mile or two from the little Flemish town, in a château built in the style of the Italian Renaissance, which we were able, unfortunately, to admire by moonlight only.
The General, who was surrounded by a brilliant company of Generals and Colonels, received us in the drawing-room. He made us welcome in the purest French, saluting us as the representatives of the Press of an Ally.
General Horn, commanding the 1st British Army, is a man about 60 years old. In this command he has succeeded Sir Douglas Haig, who is now Commander-in-Chief of the British Forces. He is a tall man with a youthful carriage. His whole person is instinct with the force of a great leader. His eye is cold and stern, while thick, grizzled brows add to the severity of his glance. But he is a ready and an agreeable talker. It is clear that this leader, who holds in his hand the lives of 200,000 men, is, also, a splendid gentleman.
Once at table we are overwhelmed with attentions. Our hosts vie with one another in showing kindness to the Frenchmen. Here are men whose names are already famous throughout Great Britain; one day this war will make them known to the whole world.
We meet again, particularly, a number of faces which we have already encountered during our travels. General Byng, for instance, whom I have already had the honour to introduce to you; Curry, a General of Division, a square-set John Bull in uniform, with eyes that are peculiarly quick and intelligent. A man of business in time of peace, he won his General's scabbard during the first Battle of Ypres. (An English General is to be known by the crossed scabbard and sword, in gold, on his epaulettes.)
He said, speaking of this sector of his:
"I am proud to command my men in positions which you have made glorious." Brave heart! He has wept for his men. Here again is Brigadier Kitchen; 45, fair, blue eyes, well set up, a kindly face; he looks like a younger Kitchener. He has a career behind him, for he fought in South Africa. Full of fire, he should be a wonderful leader of men, of the order of Gouraud or Mangin.
Yet others——
And we talk. We talk as one talks round a table, that is, a little about everything. Our hosts listen with a lively interest to such news—it is fresh for them—as we can give them of the changes that have recently taken place among the military and political leaders of France. They are careful to keep their opinions on these matters to themselves. At the most one can see that certain names are in good odour among them.
It is impossible also not to speak of Rumania, whose capital has just been taken. There is no doubt that what is happening in Rumania is vexing to our Allies, but they are not disturbed. My neighbour, without intending to do so, comforts my heart by proving to me mathematically that the misfortunes of Rumania cannot bring any happiness into Germany. He speaks of these things with a confidence in which sentiment has no part, but rather the scientific knowledge of the war—if one may say so—which is his.
It is from him that I glean this comforting detail—that the Germans have organised special companies to serve during the days on which the advances are made. Their troops in the front lines have now so little willingness and, indeed, power to fight, that it has been necessary to form special companies which the enemy moves hither and thither to meet any particularly strong attacks.
"Perhaps when we get to that point," said one of the Generals near us, "we shall begin to hear them bleating for peace."
"You are very certain of your men?" one of us asked him.
"They are full of beans," said he.
[CHAPTER V.]
WAR IN THE BLACK COUNTRY.
Trains follow each other every quarter of an hour—endless trains, 60 truck-loads and more, all bearing the mark of five big French companies.
Some of these convoys seemed to have been borrowed from a museum of obsolete railways. The couplings rattle, the buffers are out of joint, and the brakes squeak. Others come from Belgium. One can easily see by the repairs that they have undergone all the horrors of war. Others, again, emblazoned with the arms of Essen or Alsace-Lorraine, red in colour and cumbersome, are obviously prisoners of war.
9. THE COMMANDER-IN-CHIEF.
A Minister has actually dared to bring about a real mobilisation of transport. He has ordered the seizure of all trucks in good condition, and the captured have gone to the front. All of them are overflowing with every species of coal. Coal! When one thinks of the shortage in Paris and the provinces of France, one can appreciate the sight of these millions of tons being rushed back from the front. Coal is the black bread of war. At the level crossings the British regiments going up into the line naturally give way to the greater urgency of these supply trains.
We have just come back from visiting, under the guidance of a Staff-Major, the land of shafts and mines. Certainly, war is being waged there, but in a curious way, as if it were added on to ordinary existence. B——, N——, les M——, V—— are so many stages in our sooty pilgrimage!
In front of V——, after having wandered in these endless streets with houses of miners' dwellings, all exactly alike, we come upon a huge slag heap, 800 yards high, like some black pyramid. The neighbouring pits, with their sheds, lifts and air-shafts, are working as usual. We pass a party of miners, solemn and resolute-looking people, their ages varying from 16 to 40, who are going to relieve the workers in the galleries 200 yards below soil.
These civilian workers have just decided to do another hour a day. They, too, have behaved like heroes.
The smoking pits are not a stone's throw from the smoking cannons.
The howitzers concealed in the Black Country alternate their "boom!" with the sharper "crack!" of trench mortars. A London motor-'bus, ingeniously disguised, crowded with soldiers inside and out, is carrying a whole platoon of armed men to the shelter of one of these slag heaps which line the roads.
Here, owing to the nature of the soil, the trenches cannot be dug down. Thousands of pumps would be wanted to dry this sector alone.
The Royal Engineers have overcome the difficulty by having recourse to the old system of breastworks. Here redoubts, facing all ways, strong points with sloping parapets, buttresses, bastions, half-moons, etc., are made with sandbags—the triumph of improvisation like the inventions of a Pacciotto or a de Vauban. But more numerous than the Tommies are the groups of women carrying baskets of provisions for their menfolk.
Under the guidance of the General Commanding the Artillery of the Army, we visited some batteries of 9.2 howitzers, those magnificent weapons of destruction. What ruses! What profligate conceits are used to hide these monstrous treasures from the enemy aircraft! After the war we must consecrate a whole chapter to those obscure painters, designers of "take-in's," who, working in the open country, succeed in faking the skyline and every aspect of the earth—nay, all Nature herself.
A forward observing officer hidden somewhere on the ridge, which used to be called the Hohenzollern Redoubt, has just rung up to say that he has spotted some enemy transport moving in the mist behind their lines. The map reference is immediately verified and the range ascertained. A junior subaltern blows his whistle. In a second N.C.O.'s and men are in position. Then they open fire, disturbing the peaceful landscape. Just beside the battery was a beautiful pond with two swans—the most unwarlike thing in the world. Five minutes later we hear that the shooting was good and the transport was scuppered.
In these miners' dwellings and allotments, where war and humdrum life are so strangely intermingled, there are many alarms. Aeroplane bombs, gas attacks and hostile bombardments. When the siren starts, everyone—women, children, old men and soldiers—go quietly into the cellars and come up again when it is all over, as if it was the most natural thing in the world.
Such is the life in the coal country. The Tommies in the trenches, the artillery in the fields and gardens and the workmen in the mines. Endless strife above ground, endless labour below, each night, each day, the same.
France should honour these miners of Artois and Flanders just as much as her soldiers.
[CHAPTER VI.]
THE ART OF SAVING.
Our hosts were very anxious to show us their Base at Calais, and, the visit being over, we fully realise their reasons. The fact is they have achieved miracles of hard work and organisation, of which they are justly proud.
Dare I say that we had not taken full advantage of the port previous to the war? It is possible that in this matter, as in so many others, the war will have taught us useful lessons.
Why should Germany have consented to make such bloody sacrifices on the Yser if Calais had not been a prize of great value?
A complete study of a base like Calais would require days and days. We had only a few hours, and we only saw a few things, but things of the utmost meaning, as the reader will see.
Everyone knows that the wear and tear of an army in the field is not merely concerned with losses in men. There is a huge combustion of materials which is almost as important. Even when there is no actual offensive there is considerable wastage of material, as also of men.
But just as the commanders of fighting units have taken appropriate measures to spare the human animal, such as sending troops back to rest for a certain time, so the heads of army administration have devised means of saving every article of "war-soiled" material. It is this organisation that we have seen at work in Calais. Nothing could be more instructive.
There exists in each British division at the front a divisional salvage company, whose duty it is to clear up a battlefield and collect somewhere behind the lines all damaged equipment—rifles, uniforms, bayonets, guns, empty cases, machine-guns, helmets, leather waistcoats, boots, etc.
This poor material, dirty, rusty, even blood-stained, is sorted out at the salvage dump and sent down to the base by train. We saw one of these trains arrive at Calais, and we were able to see some of the ingenious devices invented for dealing with this curious hotch-potch. All this takes place in an old sawmill, which has been enlarged to five times its natural size since the beginning of the war. A thousand skilled British workers and two thousand French women are now employed in the workshops. Most of the women are, in normal times, lacemakers in the town.
The men, skilled labourers in uniform, work by time, not by the piece. They earn eighteenpence a day—i.e., 6d. more than the ordinary Tommy in the trenches.
The women, of all ages, are used for light and not very exhausting work, and they earn on the average 3 francs a day (the trades-union price). What miracles take place! In the "snob-shop," the ammunition boots, glorious souvenirs of the front, which come back in a shocking state, are examined and repaired. Twenty thousand pairs a week. The hopeless pairs are made into laces. One woman can make 150 per day.
At the saddlery, harness and leather, covered with mud and blood, are cleaned as good as new. At the forge, wheels and couplings of gun-carriages are repaired. Elsewhere the essential parts of the guns are examined and all missing sections replaced.
In another place the dixies and camp-cookers, all dented and rusty, are cleaned and re-soldered. Old petrol tins are made into trench braziers. Steel helmets recover their form, picks and shovels their handles, and all the iron that cannot be made use of is sent back to the foundry to be melted down for ammunition.
Over the door of this war factory might be inscribed the motto of Lavoisier, with a slight addition:—
"Here nothing new is made, but nothing old is wasted."
The science that is taught and practised is the science, hitherto too little known, of economy.
That is the reason why many men of the world (and others) should, like us, visit this base.
[CHAPTER VII]
"BROTHERS IN ARMS."
The Times, through the medium of its distinguished representative with the British Army, Mr. Robinson, has recently published a very laudatory and somewhat flattering article on the attitude of the French soldier and the civil population of France towards the British Expeditionary Force.
"It must not be forgotten," said the great journal of the metropolis, "that we are foreigners in France. Thus the spectacle of good-comradeship which we witness every day is altogether honourable to our French hosts."
We must be allowed to say in our turn that never before has it been so easy to practise the military virtue of comradeship, for my countrymen are fully alive to the tact and perfect courtesy of the officers and men of King George.
There is nothing to add to what has been known from the beginning about the relations of the soldiers of both countries. Even before the military prowess of Great Britain had been proved on the field of battle, her collaboration in this war was desired by our soldiers and civilians alike. We will always remember with emotion the fateful days of 2nd and 4th August—when we asked ourselves, "Will England fight with us?" Then, when that foolish Emperor of Germany talked of General French's "contemptible little Army," we had in France the presentiment that the British Army would be able to take its revenge.
Recent events have confirmed the early promise of fine achievements; the battle of the Marne, the two battles of Ypres, Neuve Chapelle, Loos, the Somme, and the Ancre have sealed the friendship of the two armies.
Equally courageous and loyal, sharing the same ideas about the original aims of the war, enduring the same hardships, patiently bearing common misfortunes, and jubilant alike over common victory, the Tommy and the "Poilu" have become "chums" that will be difficult to separate.
Two sorts of "agents de liaison" have helped in the good work—these are the French interpreters and the Staff officers of the French Mission to the British Army.
The former, a goodly number, well chosen, well-bred, and well educated, have been, each in his own unit, sowers of the good seed of Franco-British friendship.
The latter, a very small number (the result of careful sifting), having a consummate experience of war, most of them possessing honourable wounds, highly educated, some writers of reputation, known all over the world—such as the author of "Quand on se bat"—deserve our utmost thanks for their work with our Allies which they have carried out so brilliantly.
The question of the relations of the British Army with the civil population is delicate in appearance only. As a matter of fact, a mutual goodwill from the very start has removed all suspicion of awkwardness and strain.
The danger was obvious. In the records of history it is impossible to find a case of a country tolerating without a murmur the presence of a foreign army, even an allied army. This miracle has been rendered possible by the goodwill of the French, fully understood and recognised by our friends, and by the tact and common sense of the British.
Far from assuming an attitude of conquerors, which would most certainly have estranged the sympathies of the patriotic inhabitants of North-West France, the British have rigorously respected our manners and customs.
Our administrative organisation has been maintained. We have still our prefects and sub-prefects, our tribunals, justices of the peace, savings banks, postal services and schools, living in absolute independence in the midst of the British war machine.
Better still, our own military organisation still exists. In every part of our country occupied by the British our Army has its representatives, such as workers on the roads, Army Service Corps units, and military police.
All this crowd, civilians and soldiers alike, "carry on" without the smallest hitch or quarrel with our British guests. This occupation of our territory, carried out with so much understanding and discipline, could not possibly cause any discontent among our peasants.
Over and above the protection of a rich district, the British Army has developed commercially a great number of ports and inland towns, has created industries hitherto unknown, increased the railways, put to the utmost use the resources of the country, and, in fact, has improved local commerce in every respect.
Those who listen to the vile insinuations of the Germans and impute to the British the desire of remaining in France after the war, little understand the love of every British citizen for his native soil and his respect for our own independence.
In order to divide our two friendly nations the Germans must find another trick. Some money, great sympathy, and, alas! many dead, are all that will be left of our friends in France after the war.[B]
[B] From the last despatch of Field-Marshal Sir Douglas Haig:
"I cannot close this Despatch without alluding to the happy relations which continue to exist between the Allied Armies and between our troops and the civil population in France and Belgium. The unfailing co-operation of our Allies, their splendid fighting qualities, and the kindness and goodwill universally displayed towards us have won the gratitude, as well as the respect and admiration, of all ranks of the British Armies."
10. THE PRINCE OF WALES.
[PART IV.]
IMPRESSIONS OF "NO MAN'S LAND."
[CHAPTER I.]
AS IN A PICTURE OF EPINAL.
Yesterday I met the Prince of Wales in the lines. The Prince of Wales! What does that name not say to a Frenchman!
It was about four o'clock in the afternoon. A small, soaking rain was falling over the dismal plateau where once stood so many smiling villages and fair woods, now ruined, whose names, immortalised by British valour, must live forever in history.
It was close on nightfall. Through the sticky, heavy mud troops and wagons crawled towards the firing line. The men, with naked chests that defied the bitter cold, sweated furiously under the load of their equipment. Horses with huge, hairy feet, mounted by Australians like so many cowboys, struggled, foaming, to drag the huge lorries through the deep ruts of the roadway.
Men from the pioneer battalions, directed by Engineers, worked with pick and shovel to drain away the water, to rebuild the fallen embankments, or to fill up boggy places. So while the guns roared, methodically and in silence the Army prepared the soil for Victory.
Suddenly, into this microcosm of the war, came a body of horsemen, climbing towards us up the slopes of the plateau. At their head rode a lad whose features were so refined and so delicate that I could not choose but remark him.
I have already met in the British battle lines several faces of this kind. They are almost feminine. They are like miniatures.
My eyes—may I be forgiven—dwelt upon this boy with a complete lack of respect. He looked between 18 and 20 years old at the most. He had cocked his cap a trifle over his left eye, and his fair head was cropped close as rabbit's fur.
"Did you recognise him?" someone asked me.
"Who?"
"The Prince of Wales."
The Prince of Wales had gone by.
It was only then that I noticed the British soldiers standing to attention and saluting the Prince with "eyes right" as he went along amongst them. The officers, too, saluted him with more ceremony than is usual. And he, as he rode slowly past, very charmingly acknowledged the salutes.
I have learned only this morning that a little farther on, at the highest part of the plateau, the Prince left his horse and—this is a thing that he is very fond of doing—joined a relieving party for a piece of its journey. He returned in the evening to the simple quarters which are his.
A Staff Captain at twenty-three, the Prince, heir to the Crown of the British Empire, is a pattern of the best soldierly qualities. He can only live happily among the soldiers, with whom he is prodigiously popular.
It is said that he would have liked to do still more.
One day he asked permission of Lord Kitchener, who was then Secretary of State for War, to perform the ordinary duties of an officer with his regiment, the Grenadier Guards. He proposed to lead his men in an advance.
But Kitchener refused absolutely, and we can imagine the valiant argument which ensued between Prince and Sirdar—the one all youth and pluck, the other concerned alone with the welfare of the Empire.
The Prince ultimately was obliged to yield to reasons of State. It was a soldier's first victory—over himself.
[CHAPTER II.]
A HERO AFTER THE MANNER OF ROLAND.
December.
General Vaughan Campbell, Brigadier of the —th Infantry Brigade, having done us the honour to pay us a visit, invited us, for this Thursday, to share his meal.
The General has made his winter quarters in a country house, beside which there is a duck-pond. An English breakfast awaited us; that is to say, a hearty welcome, no ceremony, and food of the best.
Outside in the park, under the trees that the hoar-frost loads, the brigade band favours us with the liveliest melodies from Bric-à-brac, The Girl in the Taxi and, above all, those Bing Boys, who seem fated to eclipse Tipperary itself in the general favour. It is three degrees below freezing-point. All round the band they have had to set a circle of braziers. I am on the General's left, a particular distinction which I purchase at the cost of sitting with my back against an open window, where I become the sport of a whole battlefield of draughts. But it is a cheap price for the company of General Vaughan Campbell.
This is one of the most popular men in the British Army. He must surely be the youngest of its Generals, for he is not yet 38. This very month King George has still further swelled the number of his orders by giving him the Victoria Cross. Only 250 men in the whole Army can boast of this honour.
The man's quality is evident. He is strength and good nature personified. With his rider's legs, his broad, short body, muscular yet supple, he is the picture of a sporting Englishman. The merry eye betrays the simple heart. The wind and the open-air life have tanned his face like a seaman's. He wears, moreover, an odd little cat's moustache, two red, bristling tufts, which makes one think of the traditional musketeers of Louis XIV. A little time ago I saw him run in a two-mile race against some of his younger Staff Officers.
This General is a hero; a hero in that great style which glorifies every gallant action with the touch of chivalry. One evening in the trenches he performed a feat worthy of Roland.
The story is well known. In September last General Vaughan Campbell was a Colonel in the Guards. His regiment held the first line, immediately next to the Germans.
One evening the order came to attack at midnight. It fell to the Coldstreams to undertake this dangerous business. It was a sweet and tranquil autumn night. The men fought with sleep, harder to resist than any pain. But the hour for the attack had come.
This Colonel has a knightly soul. He perceives that his men, far from their home, living for ever in holes, and mud and fog, sometimes lose their vision of the true meaning of this war. It is their souls that must be stirred. And the Colonel, who used to be the keenest Master of Fox Hounds in Shropshire, recollected that he had among his things a hunting-horn whose call was clearer than any cornet's.
He got his men together, gave them the word to "go over," and then, jumping on to the parapet, blew "gone away" with the full strength of his lungs. As if in this fierce summons they heard the very voice of their own country, the Coldstreams, wild with delight, charged madly on the heels of this new Roland. The call of the horn sounded weirdly through the night above "No Man's Land." It is to these men like the bagpipes to the Highlander; a voice from the Homeland and the call of the Empire.
Colonel Campbell is the first man in the enemy's trench. His cat's moustache has become a tiger's. Even with his horn he lays about him. With it he stuns the first Saxon he meets, to whose dazed eyes he seems like some spectre from another age. And two lines of trenches are taken.