“And by torchlight. The patrols which the conquerors send out to survey the field of battle carry torches and lanterns, and red lanterns are hoisted on signal poles to point out the places where flying hospitals are to be established.”
“And next morning, how does the field look?”
“Almost more fearful still. The contrast between the bright, smiling daylight and the dreadful work of man on which it shines has a doubly-painful effect. At night the entire picture of horror is something ghostly and fantastic. By daylight it is simply hopeless. Now you see for the first time the mass of corpses lying around on the lanes, between the fields, in the ditches, behind the ruins of walls. Everywhere dead bodies—everywhere. Plundered, some of them naked; and just the same with the wounded. These who, in spite of the nightly labour of the Sanitary Corps, are still always lying around in numbers, look pale and collapsed, green or yellow, with fixed and stupefied gaze, or writhing in agonies of pain, they beg any one who comes near to put them to death. Swarms of carrion crows settle on the tops of the trees, and with loud croaks announce the bill of fare of the tempting banquet. Hungry dogs, from the villages around, come running by and lick the blood from their wounds. There are a few hyenas to be seen who are still carrying on their work hastily further afield. And now comes the great interment.”
“Who does that—the Sanitary Corps?”
“How could they suffice for such a mass of work? They have fully enough to do with the wounded.”
“Then troops detailed for the work?”
“No. A crowd of men impressed, or even offering themselves voluntarily—loiterers, baggage people, who are supporting themselves by the market stalls, baggage waggons and so forth, and who now have been hunted away by the force of the military operations, together with the inhabitants of the cottages and huts—to dig trenches—good large ones, of course—wide trenches, for they are not made deep—there is no time for that. Into these the dead bodies are thrown, heads up or heads down just as they come to hand. Or it is done in this way: A heap is made of the corpses, and a foot or two of earth is heaped up over them, and then it has the appearance of a tumulus. In a few days rain comes on and washes the covering off the festering dead bodies! but what does that matter? The nimble, jolly gravediggers do not look so far forward. For jolly, merry workmen they are, that one must allow. Songs are piped out there, and all kinds of dubious jokes made—nay, sometimes a dance of hyenas is danced round the open trench. Whether in several of the bodies that are shovelled into it or are covered with the earth life is still stirring, they give themselves no trouble to think. The thing is inevitable, for the stiff cramp often comes on after wounds. Many who have been saved by accident have told of the danger of being buried alive which they have escaped. But how many are there of those who are not able to tell anything! If a man has once got a foot or two of earth over his mouth he may well hold his tongue.”
“Oh my Frederick, my Frederick!” I groaned in my heart.
“That is the picture of the next morning,” said the surgeon, in conclusion. “Shall I go on further and tell you what happens next evening?”
“I will tell you that, doctor,” I broke in. “One of the two capitals of the powers engaged has received the telegraphic news of the glorious victory. And there in the morning, while the hyena dance is going on round the trench, they are singing in the churches: ‘Now thank we all the Lord,’ and in the evening there the mother or the wife of one of the men buried alive is putting a lighted candle or two in the window-sill because the city is illuminated.”