Men, horses and mules were killed or wounded. A poilu spontaneously took command of the column, his immediate superiors having been killed. The beasts reared and plunged, frightened by the flashes and explosions which succeeded each other rapidly. The men clinging to the bridles were killed on the spot before they could make a move!
A little soldier is lifted high by his frantic mule, which stands, straight up on its hind feet. He curses, he yells, while the timed shell churn the air with wailings like a dying child——
"I say you will not go back—at a time like this, you mules must not go back!"
A few seconds later he and his mule are on the ground, fastened, one to the other, by the bridle: the shell which killed him has almost stripped his body of clothes. I also was thrown to the ground, but I am not hit——
Bending over the man, I attempt to find, but vainly, his identification tag, so that some day the name of this obscure hero may be known——
The mule, stretched out at full length, essays to raise its head, still grasped by the hands of the corpse, and gives a couple of useless kicks——
It commences to snow——
THE DAY OF FEBRUARY 23, ELEVEN O'CLOCK AT NIGHT.