The way home, although much longer, proved to be cleaner and more secure, besides having the interest of leading through the old German front line. This was then in the occupation of our reserves, and had consequently been considerably tidied up, but large parts of it were still completely broken down, showing the effect of our bombardment. The shooting had been distinctly good, very few shell-craters were far from the trenches, and a large proportion of the projectiles had either fallen into them or blown in the parapet. But here again the dug-outs must have afforded very excellent protection. Wide shafts, driven straight down from the front wall of the trench at an angle of forty-five degrees with the horizontal, led into hollowed-out chambers twenty feet below the surface that would easily accommodate a couple of dozen men. Each dug-out had more than one shaft, to reduce the chances of men being buried by an explosion filling in the only means of exit. The trenches were everywhere revetted with timber or hurdles, and had a false bottom of wooden gratings to keep the men's feet as dry as possible. If only from the point of view of comfort they contrasted very favourably with our own, through which the homeward track next lay.
Loos, City of the Dead! If in years to come you are ever rebuilt, a task that to the observer of your utter destruction and desolation seems impossible, what strange and gruesome relics will your workmen find! Surely the Spirit of Carnage will for ever haunt those narrow streets and open widespread fields, surely your inhabitants of the future will wake in terror in the September nights to hear ghostly echoes of the then-forgotten struggle, the unceasing whistle and roar of the shells, the rushing footsteps of the charging men, the despairing cries of the bombed wretches in the cellars! And if timid eyes dare lift the curtain to peep fearfully through the windows, will they not see a blood-red moon shining upon streets through which pour the serried columns of the victors, and scent the night air tainted with a faint sickening odour of slaughter? But not alone shall Loos bear its burden of horror, for in how many towns and villages must these scenes be repeated before Peace comes again!
VIII
IN FRENCH TERRITORY
At the beginning of October our battery, owing to reasons of strategy and convenience, changed its position by a matter of about a mile-and-a-half, and by so doing entered an area where the right of the British line joined the left of the French line. The actual point of junction of the lines varies from time to time, as much owing to the two armies' requirements in the matter of billets as for any other reason, and, as it happened, on the very day we moved into our new position, this point was in process of being moved a mile or so northwards. We saw, therefore, the familiar khaki give place to the looped-up blue greatcoat, and when, the desperate struggle to get the battery in order in the minimum time being over, we had time to look round and take note of our surroundings, we found ourselves in French Territory.
I think that the weeks we spent there were the happiest we have ever known, although the life of a gunner is a rough paradise for a man with health and strength—plenty of work, plenty of sport, and complete freedom from the cares of an artificial existence, there being nothing artificial about war. Our position was amongst ruined corons, not so badly damaged but that they could with very little trouble be made into very comfortable billets, and owing to the fact that it was in French territory, was immune from the visits of predatory "brass hats." Further, in our group commander we had a strong buckler against interference and aggression, and one in whom we all placed implicit confidence. His kindness to us all will be amongst the most precious memories of those happy days.
We found the change of tenants in the villages round us extremely advantageous in many ways, not the least of which was the amount of loot we acquired. It seems curious that the British Army, equipped as it is with a more copious transport than has ever before been imagined, should invariably leave in its wake enormous quantities of perfectly serviceable stores. On this particular occasion we found abandoned more than enough overcoats and waterproof capes to fit out the whole battery, and collected from the billets into which we moved over a hundred thousand rounds of small-arm ammunition alone. Although these matters were reported, no steps were ever taken to remove the stores, and subsequent discoveries of hundreds of boxes of unused bombs met with the same indifference. What wonder that the thrifty French regard it as the best fortune that can befall them to take over any part of our line, or that French officers to whom I have spoken are inclined to base their opinions of our conduct of the war upon such indications of our national habits. "No army before has ever wasted as you waste," said one to me; "the food you reject would feed half the French Forces, the rifles you failed to collect after Loos would equip many battalions of your New Army. What is your proverb—'Straws show which way the wind blows'—is it not?" Nor did the British troops leave only stores behind in their evacuation. Two days after the exchange, an officer arrived in the battery with a strange tale of woe. He was in command of a picquet in a certain village, from where he had watched his own people depart and the French arrive, expecting every moment to be relieved. Since that time he had received neither orders nor rations, and he and his men had lived upon the charity of a French regiment. We fed him and sent him back to his lonely vigil with an armful of provisions and a promise to report his troubles through our headquarters. I heard subsequently that his patrol had been forgotten and never missed, so presumably he might have been there now but for his own action.