It was the most lamentable thing I have ever seen.
Everything was hurried through in a few minutes. The coffin was too big. The Captain put into it an envelope containing the name of the soldier who was going to rest there between the lines, and who would be crooned to sleep by the noise of shells.
The wind shook the surplice of the priest who recited the prayers, and I heard only a confused murmur of odd phrases, for the wind carried off the rest. We had to hurry, for the quiet moments were rare, and we returned through the dark deserted streets in impressive silence.
Nieuport, 29th January, 1915.—To form an exact idea of what this very peculiar war is like one must have lived the twenty-four hours that I have just passed through—a bitterly cold winter’s day and night.
We set out to occupy the first line trenches at 4 o’clock. The night was clear and frosty, and the stars glittered like splinters of ice. A clear and cold moon lit up the immensity of the ravaged and desolated plain, making the ice glitter, silhouetting the traitorous and dangerous ruins, betraying our position by the glint from our bayonets, while the frost-bound ground conducted sound to a great distance.
As far as the post from which the second-line trenches were commanded the road was good and the distance easy; but from there onwards the carrying out of reliefs became hazardous. We marched in single file, holding our bayonets in our left hands to prevent them from knocking against our rifles, raising our feet and going on tiptoe, as in a sick-room. The road became atrociously bad, it being impossible to repair it owing to the nearness of the enemy. Nothing was wanting, ruts, holes, fencing wire, overturned fencing posts, etc. The squadron occupied some trenches on the right. These were arrow-shaped, and were the nearest trenches to the enemy.
Seventeen of us held the main trench, and in an adjacent one were two marines with a small pom-pom trench gun. These were called trenches; in reality they consisted of sloping beams laid against an embankment of stones and sand-bags. We had to crawl into them, and, once in, we were condemned to immobility. We could not even sit down without bending our heads. Little by little the cold took hold of us, beginning with our feet, and we felt as if we were transformed into blocks of ice.
The wind brought us a suggestive odour, which mingled with the smell of rotting litter on which we were lying. We felt inclined to vomit. Day came and brought the need for absolute immobility. It was impossible to risk oneself outside the trench, even flat on one’s belly, until night-time. M. Chatelin and I shivered side by side, and inspected the horizon through field-glasses. On the left we saw some suspicious smoke, and the same distance off, on the right, we found the explanation of the stink we had smelt on our arrival. A score of German corpses were there, caught between their barbed-wire entanglement and ours, and destined to rot there for an undetermined period. They were in all sorts of poses and horribly mutilated. Some bodies were without heads, some heads and arms were lying separated and all the bodies were in convulsive postures. A number of crows were disputing their bodies, as were some half-wild cats, which refused the meat we offered them—a pretty sight indeed; happily there were no French bodies amongst them.
The artillery opened the ball about eight o’clock. We were almost in the middle, and well below the trajectory of the shells. We saw some shells strike their target—some farms, that fell to pieces—but many missed. That, however, was of no account.