Verdun is an old fort and reputed to be one of the most formidable fortifications in the world. Had it not been so it would certainly have been crushed like an eggshell before the German onslaught, for a dozen shells often exploded at the same time, blowing up many buildings, yet the fortress never weakened for an instant. If Verdun had fallen, nothing could have stood. But as Victor Hugo says of Waterloo, "God was passing by and He took charge of things." To our little minds it is all mysterious. Wonderful are the ways of His working, but through one agency or another He always thwarts the designs of evil men and has His way at last.
Verdun was most important. In every war there are certain battles which the historian calls "strategic," certain points which are pivotal, and the outcome of the engagement there is particularly vital. The history and destiny of nations hangs upon them. Such a one was Waterloo a century ago. Gettysburg in the Civil War was another one. In this present struggle the Marne and Verdun have been the outstanding pivotal battles, but they were won! Won by the French, who, as I look at it, were held up and led on by the very hand of God. I am not a military expert, and I have no knowledge or insight that other folk do not possess, but it is my inward judgment that from this time on the battles will be fought east of Verdun. That is to say in the main, I doubt very much if the Germans will push through much farther than they are already and I believe that little by little the Allies will crowd them back along the greater portion of the front until victorious. The world must bear in mind, however, that Germany is by no means weak and that she will not be vanquished without an awful struggle. She may also at places advance her line somewhat, but I think no one need now fear as many did in the beginning that Paris will ever be taken, or that Verdun will fall. It has stood the supreme test!
One must remember, however, that Verdun today is not a beautiful sight. The forts are still intact and from a military point of view that is all that counts. But from an artistic or aesthetic standpoint, the place is sorry indeed. When the Germans sent over their incendiary bombs setting the buildings on fire, and then their hail of shrapnel so the fire could not be put out, they accomplished sad destruction. Broken pieces of glass, bits of shell and upturned cobblestones fill the streets, and battered carts and wagons lie everywhere. Houses are smashed to pieces and smoke-blackened brick and charred timbers, the worthless remains of burned buildings are seen on every hand. From the individual viewpoint Verdun is very sad, extremely so. Thousands of people have been driven from their homes and when they left they had to say good-bye to those homes forever. Multitudes have had loved ones killed while others have lost track of their relatives and probably will never find them. Beautiful edifices, the fulfilment of the artists' dream, have been battered and burned down, and in that city at the present moment Art is not! All this is lamentable.
Yet from the larger point of view, that of France, Verdun is a glorious triumph. From the national and even the world standpoint, Verdun means one more thwarting of the tyrant's design and one more victory for Truth and Right. When we rise above today, and look at things in the light of human progress, our value judgments alter much. The world will not care much whether this or that individual lost his house or farm, for a ruined city will rise again, but the heart of the world leaps with joy when it realizes that the despot has been checked! And even the French individual possesses such an indomitable spirit of patriotism that he will not mourn for his temporal losses just so the future of France is not impaired. The long sacrifice and the enduring suffering are borne by these patient people with remarkable calm. They endure today in silence, their Calvary of war, the bloody Golgotha of France.
Yet I would not have you think that war is all battle. Not all of the hours nor even the days of the men in the war country are taken up with thoughts of horror, or in listening to the explosions of shells, or the carrying of mangled or lacerated men. The war is so gigantic in its operation and it covers so vast an area that millions of the people engaged find themselves many times occupied with the most peaceful thoughts and the most commonplace pursuits. If all of the people engaged were compelled continually to face the cannon and the barbed wire, or to listen to the moans of the dying, and feel that they themselves were apt to be taken off at any minute, they would not be the cool-headed people that they are, but instead would be a crowd of raving maniacs. The person thousands of miles away from the spectacle who only reads about it often gets a wrong impression on this point. Nations are mobilized; multitudes are under arms; thousands are engaged in assisting those who fight intermittently—and no soldier fights except intermittently, a week or so on and several days off—and, consequently, not infrequently there are hours or even days when one takes the even tenor of his way far from the battle front, much the same as he does in times of peace.
On such an evening, I found myself writing a letter, as letters to me of late had been rather scarce. I was sitting in a plain, bare hut with a kerosene lamp, and a peculiar letter it was that I wrote. I had seen some odd writing paper in a little stationery store and had paid a couple of cents for three or four sheets of it. Each sheet was arranged by the manufacturer so as to make a complete letter. If you were to take an ordinary sheet of paper and perforate it on the sewing machine on all four sides about half an inch from the edge, then put some mucilage on that half inch margin and let it dry, folding it across the middle, you would have a piece of this one-letter stationery. As it happened there was a little wording on the outside, and a square for the postage stamp. All you have to do is to write the address on the outside, open it out, pen your missive inside, fold it and wet the edges all the way round, thus sticking it, and you then have your letter so to speak, on the inside of your envelope and the receiver simply tears off the perforated edges, opens it up, and reads.
I was writing on this odd French stationery after a day of idleness. My table consisted of two boards thrown across a couple of sawhorses—a very comfortable table by the way, but the kerosene lamp smelled badly. My thoughts were of America and home. I was in a soliloquizing mood and I also wanted the letter as a souvenir, when I returned. And so I began:
My dear sir, self: U. S. A., When you receive this epistle you will be far away from the scenes which now confront you. You may sometimes think you have it pretty hard staying out here in France away from home and loved ones, having no money, dead broke, and laboring without pay, and often getting little time to rest or sleep. But listen, son, you must realize that you are at this hour in the very midst of the biggest crisis of history. The world has never seen such a moment and if you had missed having a part in it you would have kicked yourself throughout eternity. Your own little life anyway is not an important thing to the world. A few dollars more and a position of ease doesn't make any difference, and if you learn the lesson, my boy, that giving yourself in a noble cause and living for others, is the greatest thing in life you will have found happiness and gained all things. Please take this little suggestion in the proper spirit and set it to work. Also remember that never again in your life will you ever get a reception from anyone which is so beautiful as that which the French people are giving you right at this hour....
At this moment the door opened and a hurry call was brought in for three hundred wounded. A great battle had been fought and our boys were needed at once. I stuck the letter in my pocket and went out. In ten minutes we were on the road. Arriving in the night at the station where the men were to be brought in we were told that the train would not arrive for at least an hour and we knew that that might mean six hours, as it often did. Things were fairly quiet here, but now and then we saw the shell flashes and occasionally heard the booming of the guns. I went into a little structure nearby prepared to wait as long as need be. While sitting there I got out my odd French stationery and began finishing that letter to myself. I wrote: