With Kreisler
Four weeks in the Trenches, by Fritz Kreisler. [Houghton Mifflin Company, Boston.]
I had a big day with Ruby Davis, our Chicago little violinist, out in the country, roaming, climbing, racing, conversing, but not talking. Talk we left behind us, in the city drawing-rooms. Between pranks and escapades we found rest in sitting side by side and reading Kreisler’s war impressions. I knew that Ruby worshipped Fritz, but his reflections on the book of the violinist have shown me that in addition to admiration he possesses critical perception. We delighted in the pages written with spontaneous beauty, without pose, without the banal superstructure of sentimental colors, but revealing a tense, vibrating, virile artistic heart, reservedly sensitive to bloody horrors as well as to imperceptible impressions of human emotions concealed beneath the dehumanizing military uniform. Ruby called my attention to the fact that only such an artist as Kreisler could have had a broad non-professional outlook on men and things, an artist of unusual versatility, of a wide education, of rich experiences in various fields of life. Yet, he added, only the keen, delicate ear of a musician could have perceived the symphonic sounds on the battle-field and in the trenches, as, for instance, in this passage:
My ear, accustomed to differentiate sounds of all kinds, had some time ago, while we were still advancing, noted a remarkable discrepancy in the peculiar whine produced by the different shells in their rapid flight through the air as they passed over our heads, some sounding shrill, with a rising tendency, and the other rather dull, with a falling cadence. A short observation revealed the fact that the passing of a dull sounding shell was invariably preceded by a flash from one of our own cannon in the rear on the hill, which conclusively proved it to be an Austrian shell. It must be understood that as we were advancing between the positions of the Austrian and Russian artillery, both kinds of shells were passing over our heads. As we advanced the difference between shrill and dull shell grew less and less perceptible, until I could hardly tell them apart. Upon nearing the hill the difference increased again more and more until on the hill itself it was very marked. After our trench was finished I crawled to the top of the hill until I could make out the flash of the Russian guns on the opposite heights and by timing flash and actual passing of the shell, found to my astonishment that now the Russian missiles had become dull, while on the other hand, the shrill sound was invariably heralded by a flash from one of our guns, now far in the rear. What had happened was this: Every shell describes in its course a parabolic line, with the first half of the curve being ascending and the second one descending. Apparently in the first half of its curve, that is, its course while ascending, the shell produced a dull whine accompanied by a falling cadence, which changes to a rising shrill as soon as the acme has been reached and the curve points downward again. The acme for both kinds of shells naturally was exactly the half distance between the Austrian and Russian artillery and this was the point where I had noticed that the difference was the least marked. A few days later, in talking over my observation with an artillery officer, I was told the fact was known that the shells sounded different going up than when going down, but this knowledge was not used for practical purposes. When I told him that I could actually determine by the sound the exact place where a shell coming from the opposing batteries was reaching its acme, he thought that this would be of great value in a case where the position of the opposing batteries was hidden and thus could be located. He apparently spoke to his commander about me, for a few days later I was sent on a reconnoitering tour, with the object of marking on the map the exact spot where I thought the hostile shells were reaching their acme, and it was later on reported to me that I had succeeded in giving to our batteries the almost exact range of the Russian guns. I have gone into the matter at some length, because it is the only instance where my musical ear was of value during my service.
Ruby kept on explaining Kreisler while we were making our way through picturesque ravines. Then we stormed a steep bluff that made a difficult climb, and I had to pull and push my gentle co-adventurer. “Be brave, little Kreisler!” He turned to me with serious eyes, and proceeded to point out the greatness of his god, who throughout the book does not even once show any national narrowness or hatred for the enemy, who speaks with equal sympathy of the Russians and of the Austrians, who relates his terrible experiences in the swampy trenches in such a calm, modest tone, making your heart bleed with sorrow for the hardships and suffering of the belligerents. What a terrible calamity it would have been had the Cossack slashed Kreisler’s hand instead of his leg! Ruby smiled with joy reading the last page in which the violinist regrets that he had been pronounced “invalid and physically unfit for armed duty” and had “to discard his well-beloved uniform for the nondescript garb of the civilian.” Ruby does not share his big brother’s regret.
K.
Book Discussion
Quasi-Rationalistic Moralizing
Criticisms of Life, by Horace Bridges. [Houghton Mifflin Company, Boston.]
Some time ago, at a meeting of the Book and Play Club, Mr. Bridges complained against The Little Review wherein a certain book was criticised and labeled “naive and dull as the sermon of an Ethical Society preacher.” “Ladies and gentlemen, I am naive and dull!” protested Mr. Bridges. The reviewer of that unfortunate book, who happened to be present, expressed his surprise at the complainer’s unmodest assumption that those epithets were meant for him, as if he had monopolized the characteristic features of all ethical preachers. Now that Mr. Bridges’ book is out, the reviewer wishes to make amends and apologize; verily, the distinguished preacher was justified in claiming the honorary titles.