And in his honour, poor little blue hussar, the people of Thann, who since yesterday were German no longer, desired of their own accord to make some special demonstration, because he was the son of the Three Years' Service Bill. These Alsatians, released from bondage, had the fancy to adorn his coffin with gilding, simple but charming, as if for a little prince in a fairy-tale, and they carried him in their arms, him alone, while his companions were borne along behind him on a cart.
After the service in the old church the whole assembly, at least three thousand in number, were warned that it would be exceedingly dangerous to go any farther. As the cemetery was in an exposed position, spied upon by German binoculars, the long procession ran a great risk of attracting the barbarians' shrapnel fire, for it was unlikely that they would miss such an excellent opportunity of taking life. But no one was afraid, no one stayed behind, and the little hussar was escorted by them all to the very end.
And there are thousands and thousands of our sons mown down in this manner—sons from villages or castles, who were all the hope of, all that made life worth living for, mothers, fathers, grandfathers, and grandmothers. Night and day for eighteen years, twenty years, they had been surrounded with every care, brooded over with all tenderness. Anxious eyes had watched unremittingly their physical and moral growth. For some of them, of humbler families, heavy sacrifices had necessarily to be made and privations endured so that their health might be assured and their minds have scope to expand, to gain knowledge of the world, to be enriched with beautiful impressions. And then, suddenly, there they are, these dear boys, prepared for life with such painstaking love; there they are, beloved young heroes, with shattered breast or brains blown out—by order of that damnable Jack-pudding who rules in Berlin.
Oh, execrations and curses upon the monster of ferocity and trickery who has unchained all this woe! May his life be greatly prolonged so that he may at least have time to suffer greatly; and afterwards may he still live on and remain fully conscious and lucid of intellect in the hour when he shall cross the threshold of eternity, where upon that door, which will never again be opened, may be read, flaming in the darkness, that sentence of utmost horror, "All hope abandon, ye who enter here."
X
AN EVENING AT YPRES
"In anticipation of death I make this confession, that I despise the German nation on account of its infinite stupidity, and that I blush to belong to it."
Schopenhauer.