Outside, the cannon roar and the shells fall like hail around the cantonment. Great shells tear up the ground with their gigantic blows.
War, horrors, blood, ruins, fear, the attack which is near at hand, death perhaps, all that exists no longer for them. It is all of no consequence to them; the air of their natal song transports them.
These men shut up in dark cellars, in dugouts, shaken by the terrific hammering of shells, are transported by their dream to the bright sunshine, the bright and cheerful atmosphere of their southern plains. They sing, and at once they are living again the life of their homeland.
Their “little” country dominates them and makes them valiant and strong in the midst of the sorrows all about to attack and stand up in defense of the Great!...
I go out with my nerves on edge and my eyes full of tears before the unearthly beauty of the scene.
Streaks of light from the stuffed air-holes alone let me realize that men in large numbers wait there underground for a signal to dash into the fiery furnace....
I walk to the end of the village to the officers’ quarters to calm my nerves.
Voices still rise in song on both sides of the road. There, under my feet in a ruin—so martyred that one might think it was an acropolis raising prayers of stone to heaven—a chorus of warm voices scans the joyous song,
Qué cantès, qué recantès