Slowly the men marched, trying to maintain an even line under the rapid firing. Silently and unexpectedly a whistle blew and the long lines dropped to the ground. For the distance they had advanced their losses were too great.
To lie down in the face of the firing was more unendurable than moving toward it. The bodies of the men felt to them more conspicuous than when they were on their feet. They tried to hug the ground, to expose as little of themselves as they could.
“What the hell are we going to do? Go to sleep here?”
“No, they’re lookin’ for the Angel of Mons to tell us when to advance.”
“This is an awful way to win a war. Are they tryin’ to get us all killed?”
“Oh, one of these German spies is in command, that’s all.”
So ran the comment of the men, interspersed with cries of assistance from the wounded. At last the whistles blew again and the men rose to their feet, chafing, half-frightened, half-angry, under the restraint of the regulated advance. One man started ahead of the line and an officer, raising his voice above the frightful racket, yelled:
“Come back here, you damned fool. Do you want to get killed by your own barrage?”
The barrage was falling short of its mark. Shells struck the fringe of the woods toward which the men already had closely advanced.
An avion sailed over the field, a serene, self-satisfied dove of peace. The pilot fired a rocket when he was directly above the front line, and wheeled back. The barrage lengthened, the shells crashing into the trees. But if the barrage had delayed their progress on the field, it had hastened it in the woods. The coils of barbed wire which had been strung before the German front-line trench were blown to bits. Great gaps in the wire appeared all along the line. The men rushed through, fell into the trench, and scrambled out the other side. The German trench had been abandoned. The main body of their troops was withdrawn and the hill had been protected only by a heavy rear-guard.