[MARCH, 1917]
Never has there been a March so compounded of squalls and snows and unseasonable inclemencies. Verily I believe that my Lobgesang of that spring day in February was maliciously transmitted to the powers of the air, and, so far from being pleased with my distinguished approval, they merely said: "Very well; we will see what else we can do, if you like our arrangements so much." Indeed, it looks like that, for we all know how the powers of Nature (the unpleasant variety of them) seem to concentrate themselves on the fact of some harmless individual giving a picnic, or other outdoor festivity, for which sun and fine weather is the indispensable basis. But now in a few days I shall defy them, for I do not believe that their jurisdiction extends to Italy.
Italy: yes, I said Italy, for at last an opportunity and a cause have presented themselves, and I am going out there "at the end of this month, D.V." (as the clergyman said), "or early in April, anyhow." Rome is the first objective, and then (or I am much mistaken) there will be an interval of Alatri, and then Rome again and Alatri again: a sumptuous sandwich. How I have longed for something of the sort in these two years and a half of insular northern existence I cannot hope to convey. Perhaps at last I have reached that point of wanting which ensures fulfilment, but though I am interested in fantastic psychology, I don't really care how the fulfilment came now that it has come.
I have had no word from Francis since his letter last month from the Italian front, announcing his departure for Rome. He mentioned that he hoped to go to Alatri, and since he did not give me his address in Rome, I telegraphed to the island, announcing my advent at the end of March or early in April. Rather to my surprise I got the following answer from Alatri:
"Was meaning to write. Come out end of March if possible. Shall be here."
For no very clear reason this somewhat perturbed me. There was no cause for perturbation, if one examined the grounds of disquietude, for if he was ill he would surely have told me so before. Far the more probable interpretation was that he had already forgotten about his discomforts and his very depressed letter, and was snatching a few rapturous days now and then from Rome, and spending them on the island. He might foresee that he could do this again at the end of the month, and wanted me to come then, because he would be back at the front in April. That all held water, whereas the conjecture that he was ill did not. But though I told myself this a good many times, I did not completely trust my rendering, and his silence both before and after this telegram was rather inexplicable. My reasonable self told me that there was no shadow of cause for anxiety, but something inside me that observed from a more intimate spy-hole than that of reason was not quite satisfied. However, as the days of March went by and the time for my departure got really within focus, this instinctive and unreasonable questioning grew less insistent, and finally, as if it had been a canary that annoyed me by its chatter, I put, so to speak, the green baize of reason quite over it and silenced it. Soon I shall be sitting on the pergola, where the shadows of the vine-leaves dance on the paving-stones, telling Francis how yet another of my famous presentiments had been added the list of failures.
And, indeed, there were plenty of other things to think about. Bellona, goddess of war, has come out of her winter reverie, where, with her mantle round her mouth, she has lain with steadfast eyes unclosed, waiting her time. All these last months she has but moved a drowsy hand, just sparring, but now she has sprung up and cast her mantle from her mouth, and yelled to her attendant spirits "Wake! for winter is gone and spring is here!" And, day by day, fresh news has come of larger movements and the stir of greater forces. In Mesopotamia an advance began late in February, and gathering volume, like an avalanche rushing down a snow-clad cliff, it thundered on with ever-increasing velocity till one morning we heard that the Baghdad city was reached and fell into the hands of the British expedition. And still it rolls on with its broad path swept clean behind it....
Simultaneously the advance on the French front has continued, though without anything approaching a battle, as battles are reckoned nowadays. The Germans have been unable to hold their line, and retreating (I am sorry to say) in a masterly manner, have given us hundreds of square miles of territory. The ridge of Bapaume, which held out against the Somme offensive of last summer, has fallen into our hands; so, too, has Peronne. True to the highest and noblest precepts of Kultur, the enemy in their retreat have poisoned wells, have smashed up all houses and cottages with their contents, down to mirrors and chairs; have slashed to pieces the plants and trees in gardens, in vineyards and orchards; have destroyed by fire and bomb all that was destructible, and have, of course, taken with them women and girls. The movement has been on a very large scale, and the strategists who stay at home have been very busy over telling us what it all means, and the "best authority" has been very plentifully invoked. The optimist has been informed that the enemy have literally been blown out of their trenches, and tells us that a headlong retreat that will not stop till it reaches the Rhine has begun, while the pessimist sees in the movement only a strategical retreat which will shorten the German line, and enable the enemy both to send reinforcements to other fronts, and establish himself with ever greater security on what is known as the "Hindenburg Line." The retreat, in fact, according to the pessimist (and in this the published German accounts agree with him) is a great German success, which has rendered ineffective all the Allies' preparations for a spring offensive. According to the optimist, we have taken, the French and we, some three hundred square miles of territory, some strongly fortified German positions, at a minimum of cost. Out of all this welter of conflicting opinion two incontestable facts emerge, the one that the enemy was unable to hold their line, the other that their retreat has cost them very little in men, and nothing at all in guns.