'NEATH VERDUN—BEHIND THE CROWN PRINCE'S ARMY
By Lieutenant Maurice Genevoix—Translated by H. Grahame Richards
This extraordinary narrative by a young Lieutenant in the French Army gives the most vivid impression that has been recorded of the Great War. The author was a student at the Ecole Normale, Paris, at the outbreak of the War. He received his baptism of fire in August, 1914—and what a baptism it was! It has been truly said by critics that his narrative is one which will be read and reread and handed on to posterity. He lays bare the soul of the War. Under his magic touch, we stand at Verdun; we see the army at "The Crossing of the Meuse"; we stay with them through "The Days of the Marne"; we march with them "Behind the Crown Prince's Army"; we fight with them "In the Woods." We here reprint portions of his narrative by permission of his American publishers, Frederick A. Stokes Company.
[6] I—STORY OF THE LIEUTENANT AT VERDUN
Half-past one in the morning! Kit bags on the ground, rifles piled, lines in sections of four, at the edge of a little wood of birch trees struggling for life on a stony soil. The night is cold. I place a listening post well forward and return and seat myself near my men. The stillness is palpitating; the passage of time interminably long-drawn. The dawn begins to lighten the sky. I look around me and see the pale and tired faces of my men.
Four o'clock. A dozen rifle shots to the right cause me to leap to my feet just as I am making myself comfortable. Out of a small neighboring wood a dozen Uhlans are flying at a gallop—they must have passed the night in the covert.
The day breaks clear and fresh. My Nubécourt bed-fellow produces his inexhaustible flask, and we sip a drop of brandy which possesses no bouquet at all and seems like raw alcohol. The Captain joins us at last and explains the situation in a few words: