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True Stories of the Great War, Volume 1 (of 6)

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Title: True Stories of the Great War, Volume 1 (of 6)

Editor: Francis Trevelyan Miller


        
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*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK TRUE STORIES OF THE GREAT WAR, VOLUME 1 (OF 6) ***

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TRUE STORIES OF THE GREAT WAR




  TRUE STORIES
  OF THE
  GREAT WAR

  TALES OF ADVENTURE--HEROIC DEEDS--EXPLOITS
  TOLD BY THE SOLDIERS, OFFICERS, NURSES,
  DIPLOMATS, EYE WITNESSES

  _Collected in Six Volumes
  From Official and Authoritative Sources_
  (_See Introductory to Volume I_)

  VOLUME I

  Editor-in-Chief
  FRANCIS TREVELYAN MILLER (Litt. D., LL.D.)
  Editor of The Search-Light Library

  1917
  REVIEW OF REVIEWS COMPANY
  NEW YORK




  Copyright, 1917, by
  REVIEW OF REVIEWS COMPANY




TRUE STORIES OF THE GREAT WAR


INTRODUCTORY


Thirty million soldiers, each living a great human story--this is the
real drama of the Great War as it is being written into the hearts and
memories of the men at the front. If these soldiers could be gathered
around one camp-fire, and each soldier could relate the most thrilling
moment of his experience--what stories we would hear! "Don Quixote,"
the "Arabian Nights," Dante's "Inferno," Milton's "Paradise Lost, and
Regained"--all the legends and tales of the world's literature out-told
by the soldiers themselves.

It is from the lips of these soldiers, and those who have passed
through the tragedy of the war--the women and children whose eyes have
beheld the inferno and whose souls have been uplifted by suffering
and self-sacrifice--the generations will hear the epic of the days
when millions of men gave their lives to "make the world safe for
Democracy." The magnitude of this gigantic struggle against autocracy
is such that human imagination cannot visualize it--it requires one to
stand face to face with death itself.

A member of the British War Staff estimates that more than a million
letters a day are passing from the trenches and bases of the various
armies "to the folk back home." Another observer at the General
Headquarters of one of the armies estimates that more than a million
and a half diaries are being kept by the soldiers. It is in these
words, inscribed by bleeding bodies and suffering hearts, that
posterity is to hear _True Stories of the Great War_.

It is the purpose of these volumes, therefore, to begin the
preservation of these soldiers' stories. This is the first collection
that has been made; it is in itself an historic event. The manner in
which this service has been performed may be of interest to the reader.
It was my privilege to appoint a committee, or board of editors, to
collect stories from soldiers in the various armies--personal letters,
records of personal experiences, reminiscences, and all other available
material. An exhaustive investigation has been made into the files of
European and American periodicals to find the various narratives that
have "crept into print."

More than eight thousand stories were considered. The vast amount of
human material would require innumerable volumes to preserve it. It
was the judgment of the committee that this documentary evidence could
be brought into practical limitations by selecting a sufficient number
of narratives to cover every human phase of the Great War and preserve
them in six volumes.

This first collection of "True Stories" forms what might be termed a
"story-history" of the Great War, although all chronological plan is
purposely avoided in order to preserve the story-teller's "reality"
rather than the historian's record.

These volumes are in the nature of a "Round Table" in which soldiers,
refugees, nurses, eye-witnesses--all gather about the pages and relate
the most thrilling episodes of their war experiences. We hear the tales
of the soldiers who invaded Belgium, through the campaigns and battles
on all the fronts, to the landing of the American troops in France.
Diplomats tell of the scenes at the outbreak of the war; despatch
bearers relate their missions of danger from Paris to Berlin, London,
Vienna, Petrograd; refugees describe the flight of the Belgians, the
exodus of the Serbians, the invasion of Poland. Emissaries at General
Headquarters tell of their dinners with the Kaiser and the Crown
Prince, with Hindenburg and Zimmerman, and describe the scenes inside
the German empire. Soldiers from the Marne, the Aisne, Verdun--relate
their experiences. We listen to passengers tossed into the sea from
the _Lusitania_; revolutionists who overthrew the Czar in Russia;
exiles returning from Siberia. We hear the tales of the fighters from
South Africa, Egypt, Turkey; stories from the Far East along the seas
of China. The lieutenant of the _Emden_ relates his adventures. There
are stories told by Kitchener's "mob"; the "fighting Irish," Scottish
Highlanders, the Canadians, the Australians, the Hindus. The French
hussars and poilus tell of their experiences; the Italians in the Alps,
the Austrians in the Carpathians--the stories cover the whole world and
every race and nation.

These personal narratives reveal the psychology of war in all its
horrible reality--modern warfare on its gigantic scale--the genius
of invention and organization applied to destruction. They reveal,
moreover, the psychology of human nature and human emotions in all
their moods and passions. The first impression is of the physical
horror of the war, but this is soon overcome by the higher spirituality
that impels men to sacrifice their lives for civilization and humanity.
The stories sink at times into grossest brutality only to rise to the
heights of nobility on the part of the sufferers. Officers tell of
the charges of their battalions; the men in the trenches tell of the
"nights of terror"; spies tell of their secret missions; nurses deliver
the death-messages of the dying; priests tell how they carry the Cross
of Christ to the bloody fields; the prisoners tell the "inside story of
the prisons"; aviators relate their death-duels in the air; submarine
officers tell how they torpedo and capture the enemies' ships. There is
testimony from the lips of women who were ravaged; children who were
brutally mutilated; witnesses who saw soldiers crucified; soldiers
lashed to their guns; babies torn from their mothers' arms; homes in
flames and ruins, cathedrals desecrated.

And yet there is an undercurrent of humanity in these human documents.
In their physical aspect they are almost beyond human belief--but there
is a certain spiritual force running through them. There is a nobility
in them that rises above all the physical anguish.

These stories (and this war) reveal the souls of men as has nothing
before in modern times. The war has taught men "how to die." These
men have lost all fear of death. They have traveled the road of the
crucifixion and stood before Calvary; they have caught a glimpse of
something finer, nobler, truer than their own individual existence.
Through suffering and self-sacrifice they have risen to the noblest
heights. They have found something that we who have not faced death in
the trenches may never find--they have felt an exaltation in mind and
body that we may never know. There is the fire of the Old Crusaders
about them; they have caught the realization of the glory of humanity
as they march into the face of death. It is interesting to observe
that wherever the story-teller is fighting for a principle, he sees no
horror in war or death. It is only where he thinks of his individual
suffering, where his thoughts are of his own physical self, that he
complains.

And there is even humor in these stories; we see men laughing at
death; we see the wounded smiling and telling humorous tales of their
suffering; there is irony, cajolery, good-natured satire, and loud
outbursts of laughter. And there is tenderness in them--kindness,
gentleness, devotion, affection, and love. We find in them every
human passion--and every divine emotion. They form a new insight into
character and manhood--they inspire us with a new and deeper faith in
humanity.

The committee in making these selections found that many of the human
documents of the Great War are being preserved by the British, French,
and German publishing houses, but it is the American publishers who are
performing the greatest service in the preservation of war literature.
We have given consideration wherever possible to the notable work that
is being done by our American colleagues. While we have selected from
all sources what we consider to be _the best stories of the war_,
giving full recognition in every instance to the original sources, it
is a pleasure to state that our American periodicals have been given
the preference. They cordially co-operated with us in this undertaking
and we trust the public will show their due appreciation. We would
especially call attention to the list of books and publishers recorded
in the contents pages of the several volumes; also to the periodicals
which are preserving many of the human stories of the war. These will
form the basis for much of the literature of the future.

As editor-in-chief of these volumes, I desire further to give full
recognition to my associates: Mr. M. M. Lourens, of the University of
Leyden; Mr. Egbert Gilliss Handy, founder of The Search-Light Library;
Mr. Walter R. Bickford, former managing editor of The Journal of
American History; and the staff of investigators at The Search-Light
Library who made the extensive researches and comprehensive
bibliographies--covering the whole range of literature on The Great
War--required as a basis for the production of these books.

  FRANCIS TREVELYAN MILLER.




CONTENTS


  The Board of Editors in accordance with the plan outlined in
  "Introductory" for collecting the "Best Stories of the War," has
  selected this group of stories for VOLUME I from the most authentic
  sources in Europe and America. This volume includes 170 episodes and
  tales of adventure told by twenty-six story-tellers--Soldiers, Staff
  Observers, Officers, Despatch Riders, Cavalrymen, Aviators, Nurses,
  Prisoners, Raiders, Secret Service Men and American soldiers. Full
  credit is given in every instance to the original sources.


  VOLUME I--TWENTY-SIX STORY-TELLERS--170 EPISODES

  =STORIES OF THE THREE MEN WHO CAUSED THE WORLD WAR=           1
  "HOW I MET THE KAISER, CROWN PRINCE AND ARCHDUKE"
  Told by Hall Caine
  (Permission of J. B. Lippincott Company)

  =MY VISIT TO KING ALBERT--THE KING WHOSE THRONE IS
    THE HEARTS OF HIS PEOPLE=                                   8
  "I AM BOUND ON A MISSION FROM THE PRESIDENT OF
  FRANCE"
  Told by Pierre Loti
  (Permission of J. B. Lippincott Company)

  ="VIVE LA FRANCE"--HOW THEY DIE FOR THEIR COUNTRY=           23
  LAST MESSAGES OF FRENCH SOLDIERS
  Told by Rene Bazin
  (Permission of Current History)

  =FOR GOD AND ITALY--BREATHING DEATH WITH THE ITALIANS=       29
  "WHERE MINUTES ARE ETERNAL"
  Told by Gabriele D'Annunzio
  (Permission of London Telegraph)

  =THE BLOOD OF THE RUSSIANS IN FIGHT FOR LIBERTY=             36
  "THE DESERTED BATTLEFIELDS I HAVE SEEN"
  Told by Count Ilya Tolstoy
  (Permission of Current History)

  =MY EXPERIENCES IN THE WAR HOSPITALS OF RUMANIA=             44
  THE HORRORS OF THE LITTLE BALKAN KINGDOM
  Told by Queen Marie of Rumania
  (Permission of Philadelphia Public Ledger)

  ="WITH THE GERMAN ARMIES IN THE WEST"--VISITS TO
    THE GENERAL STAFF=                                         49
  Told by Sven Hedin
  (Permission of John Lane Company)

  ="THE FIRST HUNDRED THOUSAND"--WITH KITCHENER'S
    ARMY IN FRANCE=                                            73
  STORIES STRAIGHT FROM THE TRENCHES
  Told by Captain Ian Hay Beith
  (Permission of Houghton, Mifflin and Company)

  =SOME EXPERIENCES IN HUNGARY=                                97
  IN THE PALACE OF PRINCE AND PRINCESS K----
  Told by Mina Macdonald
  (Permission of Longmans, Green and Company)

  ="FORCED TO FIGHT"--THE TALE OF A SCHLESWIG DANE=           117
  "WHAT MY EYES WITNESSED IN EAST PRUSSIA"
  Told by Eric Erichsen
  (Permission of Robert M. McBride and Company)

  ="ADVENTURES OF A DESPATCH RIDER"=                          133
  AN OXFORD MAN WITH THE MOTORCYCLISTS
  Told by Capt. W. H. L. Watson
  (Permission of Dodd, Mead and Company)

  =WITH A B.-P. SCOUT IN GALLIPOLI--ON THE TURKISH FRONTIER=  155
  A RECORD OF THE BELTON BULLDOGS
  Told by Edmund Yerbury Priestman
  (Permission of E. P. Dutton and Company)

  ="IN THE FIELD"--THE STORIES OF THE FRENCH CHASSEURS=       165
  IMPRESSIONS OF AN OFFICER OF LIGHT CAVALRY
  Told by Lieut. Marcel Dupont
  (Permission of J. B. Lippincott Company)

  ="FIELD HOSPITAL AND FLYING COLUMN"--IN RUSSIA=             181
  JOURNAL OF AN ENGLISH NURSING SISTER
  Told by Violetta Thurston
  (Permission of G. P. Putnam's Sons)

  =AN UNCENSORED DIARY--FROM THE CENTRAL EMPIRES=             192
  AT THE AMERICAN EMBASSY IN COPENHAGEN
  Told by Ernesta Drinker Bullitt
  (Permission of Doubleday, Page and Company)

  ="A STUDENT IN ARMS"--IN THE RANKS WITH KITCHENER'S ARMY=   209
  RESURRECTION OF THE SOUL ON THE BATTLEFIELD
  Told by Donald Hankey
  (Permission of E. P. Dutton and Company)

  ="THE RED HORIZON"--STORIES OF THE LONDON IRISH=            217
  THE MAN WITH THE ROSARY
  Told by Patrick MacGill
  (Permission of George H. Doran Company)

  =MY TRIP TO VERDUN--GENERAL PETAIN FACE TO FACE=            225
  FROM GRAVES OF THE MARNE TO HILLS OF THE MEUSE
  Told by Frank H. Simonds
  (Permission of American Review of Reviews)

  =UNDER THE STARS AND STRIPES--WITH AMERICAN ARMY IN FRANCE= 246
  STORIES OF AMERICAN TROOPS ON ROAD TO FRONT
  Told by Lincoln Eyre, with Pershing's Army
  (Permission of New York World)

  =WITH THE SERBIAN STOICS IN EXILE--UNDER THE GERMAN YOKE=   257
  EXPERIENCES IN THE FLIGHT TO ALBANIA
  Told by Gordon Gordon-Smith
  (Permission of New York Tribune)

  =TALES OF THE TANKS--WITH THE ARMORED MONSTERS IN
  BATTLE=                                                     274
  ADVENTURES AS ROMANTIC AS MEDIAEVAL LEGENDS
  Told by the Men in the Tanks

  ="MY ESCAPE FROM THE TURKS DISGUISED AS A WOMAN"=           288
  THE STORY OF A WONDERFUL FEAT
  Told by Private Miron D. Arber
  (Permission of Wide World Magazine)

  =TALES OF GERMAN AIR RAIDERS OVER LONDON AND PARIS=         306
  "HOW WE DROP BOMBS ON THE ENEMIES' CITIES"
  Told by the Air Raiders Themselves
  (Permission of New York American)

  =TALES FROM SIBERIA--WHEN THE PRISON DOORS OPENED=          316
  JOURNEY HOME OF A HUNDRED THOUSAND EXILES
  Told by (name withheld), an Eye-Witness
  (Permission of New York Evening World, Los Angeles Times,
  and Literary Digest)

  =SURVIVORS' STORIES OF SINKING OF THE "LUSITANIA"=          325
  "HOW WE SAW OUR SHIP GO DOWN--TORPEDOED BY A
  GERMAN SUBMARINE"
  Told by Passengers of the Ill-Fated "Lusitania"

  =WITH THE AMERICAN SOLDIERS ON THE FIELDS OF FRANCE=        340
  PERSONAL EXPERIENCES DIRECT FROM THE FRONT
  (Permission of New York Sun)




[Illustration: Photo by International News Service.
ON OBSERVATION DUTY
_A Better Defense Against Enemy Eyes Than Against Bullets or Shells!_]

[Illustration: "Canadian War Records, Copyright Reserved."
A NERVE-RACKING JOB
_Watching Artillery Fire From an Advance Pit in No-Man's-Land_]

[Illustration: POUNDING AT LONG RANGE
_A Battery of Heavy Howitzers Doing its Part in Hammering the Enemy
into Proper Condition for a Charge_]

[Illustration: © International News Service.
FORWARD!
_A Few Minutes Later These Britishers Were in the German Trenches_]




STORIES OF THE THREE MEN WHO CAUSED THE WORLD WAR

"_How I Met the Kaiser, Crown Prince and Archduke_"

_Told by Hall Caine, Famous British Novelist, Who Offered All to His
Country_

  This celebrated novelist, since the outbreak of the War, has fought
  a noble battle for the Anglo-Saxon race with the "pen that is
  mightier than the sword." His appeals to America have been the voice
  of a world patriot calling in the name of humanity. He presents the
  great actors in vivid pen pictures, the Kaiser, the Crown Prince,
  the Archduke. The following pen sketches are from "The Drama of 365
  Days," by permission of the publishers _J. B. Lippincott Company_:
  Copyright, 1915.

[1] I--PEN PORTRAITS OF THE KAISER

Other whisperings there were of the storm that was so soon to burst
on the world. In the ominous silence there were rumours of a certain
change that was coming over the spirit of the Kaiser. For long years he
had been credited with a sincere love of peace, and a ceaseless desire
to restrain the forces about him that were making for war. Although
constantly occupied with the making of a big army, and inspiring
it with great ideals, he was thought to have as little desire for
actual warfare as his ancestor, Frederick William, had shown, while
gathering up his giant guardsmen and refusing to allow them to fight.
Particularly it was believed in Berlin (not altogether graciously) that
his affection for, and even fear of his grandmother, Queen Victoria,
would compel him to exhaust all efforts to preserve peace in the
event of trouble with Great Britain. But Victoria was dead, and King
Edward might perhaps be smiled at--behind his back--and then a younger
generation was knocking at the Kaiser's door in the person of his
eldest son, who represented forces which he might not long be able to
hold in check. How would he act now?

Thousands of persons in this country had countless opportunities
before the war of forming an estimate of the Kaiser's character. I had
only one, and it was not of the best. For years the English traveller
abroad felt as if he were always following in the track of a grandiose
personality who was playing on the scene of the world as on a stage,
fond as an actor of dressing up in fine uniforms, of making pictures,
scenes, and impressions, and leaving his visible mark behind him--as in
the case of the huge gap in the thick walls of Jerusalem, torn down (it
was said with his consent) to let his equipage pass through.

In Rome I saw a man who was a true son of his ancestors. Never had
the laws of heredity better justified themselves. Frederick William,
Frederick the Great, William the First--the Hohenzollerns were all
there. The glittering eyes, the withered arm, the features that gave
signs of frightful periodical pain, the immense energy, the gigantic
egotism, the ravenous vanity, the fanaticism amounting to frenzy, the
dominating power, the dictatorial temper, the indifference to suffering
(whether his own or other people's), the overbearing suppression of
opposing opinions, the determination to control everybody's interest,
everybody's work--I thought all this was written in the Kaiser's
masterful face.

Then came stories. One of my friends in Rome was an American doctor who
had been called to attend a lady of the Emperor's household. "Well,
doctor, what's she suffering from?" said the Kaiser. The doctor told
him. "Nothing of the kind--you're entirely wrong. She's suffering from
so and so," said the Majesty of Germany, stamping up and down the room.
At length the American doctor lost control. "Sir," he said, "in my
country we have a saying that one bad practitioner is worth twenty good
amateurs--you're the amateur." The doctor lived through it. Frederick
William would have dragged him to the window and tried to fling him out
of it. William II put his arm round the doctor's shoulder and said, "I
didn't mean to hurt you, old fellow. Let us sit down and talk."

A soldier came with another story. After a sham fight conducted by the
Kaiser the generals of the German army had been summoned to say what
they thought of the Royal manoeuvers. All had formed an unfavourable
opinion, yet one after another, with some insincere compliment, had
wriggled out of the difficulty of candid criticism. But at length came
an officer, who said:

"Sir, if it had been real warfare to-day there wouldn't be enough wood
in Germany to make coffins for the men who would be dead."

The general lived through it, too--at first in a certain disfavour, but
afterwards in recovered honour.

Such was the Kaiser, who a year ago had to meet the mighty wind of
War. He was in Norway for his usual summer holiday in July, 1914, when
affairs were reaching their crisis. Rumour has it that he was not
satisfied with the measure of the information that was reaching him,
therefore he returned to Berlin, somewhat to the discomfiture of his
ministers, intending, it is said, for various reasons (not necessarily
humanitarian) to stop or at least postpone the war. If so, he arrived
too late. He was told that matters had gone too far. They must go on
now. "Very well, if they must, they must," he is reported to have said.
And there is the familiar story that after he had signed his name
on the first of August to the document that plunged Europe into the
conflict that has since shaken it to its foundations, he flung down his
pen and cried, "You'll live to regret this, gentlemen."


II--PEN-PORTRAIT OF THE CROWN PRINCE

And then the Crown Prince. In August of last year nine out of every ten
of us would have said that not the father, but the son, of the Royal
family of Germany had been the chief provocative cause of the war.
Subsequent events have lessened the weight of that opinion. But the
young man's known popularity among an active section of the officers of
the army; their subterranean schemes to set him off against his father;
a vague suspicion of the Kaiser's jealousy of his eldest son--all these
facts and shadows of facts give colour to the impression that not least
among the forces which led the Emperor on that fateful first of August
to declare war against Russia was the presence and the importunity of
the Crown Prince. What kind of man was it, then, whom the invisible
powers of evil were employing to precipitate this insensate struggle?

Hundreds of persons in England, France, Russia and Italy must have
met the Crown Prince of Germany at more or less close quarters, and
formed their own estimates of his character. The barbed-wire fence
of protective ceremony which usually surrounds Royal personages,
concealing their little human foibles, was periodically broken down in
the case of the Heir-Apparent to the German Throne by his incursion
every winter into a small cosmopolitan community which repaired to the
snows of the Engadine for health or pleasure. In that stark environment
I myself, in common with many others, saw the descendant of the
Fredericks every day, for several weeks of several years, at a distance
that called for no intellectual field-glasses. And now I venture to
say, for whatever it may be worth, that the result was an entirely
unfavourable impression.

I saw a young man without a particle of natural distinction, whether
physical, moral, or mental. The figure, long rather than tall; the
hatchet face, the selfish eyes, the meaningless mouth, the retreating
forehead, the vanishing chin, the energy that expressed itself merely
in restless movement, achieving little, and often aiming at nothing
at all; the uncultivated intellect, the narrow views of life and the
world; the morbid craving for change, for excitement of any sort; the
indifference to other people's feelings, the shockingly bad manners,
the assumption of a right to disregard and even to outrage the common
conventions on which social intercourse depends--all this was, so far
as my observation enabled me to judge, only too plainly apparent in the
person of the Crown Prince.

Outside the narrow group that gathered about him (a group hailing,
ironically enough, from the land of a great Republic) I cannot remember
to have heard in any winter one really warm word about him, one story
of an act of kindness, or even generous condescension, such as it
is easy for a royal personage to perform. On the contrary, I was
constantly hearing tales of silly fooleries, of overbearing behaviour,
of deliberate rudeness, such as irresistibly recalled, in spirit if not
in form, the conduct of the common barrator in the guise of a king,
who, if Macaulay's stories are to be credited, used to kick a lady in
the open streets and tell her to go home and mind her brats.


III--PEN-PORTRAIT OF THE ARCHDUKE FERDINAND

Then the Archduke Ferdinand of Austro-Hungary, whose assassination was
the ostensible cause of this devastating war--what kind of man was he?
Quite a different person from the Crown Prince, and yet, so far as I
could judge, just as little worthy of the appalling sacrifice of human
life which his death has occasioned.

Not long before his tragic end I spent a month under the same roof
with him, and though the house was only an hotel, it was situated in
a remote place, and though I was not in any sense of the Archduke's
party, I walked and talked frequently with most of the members of it,
and so, with the added help of daily observation, came to certain
conclusions about the character of the principal personage.

A middle-aged man, stiff-set, heavy-jawed, with a strong step, and a
short manner; obviously proud, reserved, silent, slightly imperious,
self-centred, self-opinionated, well-educated in the kind of knowledge
all such men must possess, but narrow in intellect, retrograde in
sympathy, a stickler for social conventions, an almost unyielding
upholder of royal rights, prerogatives, customs, and usages (although
by his own marriage he had violated one of the first of the laws of his
class, and by his unfailing fidelity to his wife continued to resist
it), superstitious rather than religious, an immense admirer of the
Kaiser, and a decidedly hostile critic of our own country--such was
the general impression made on one British observer by the Archduke
Ferdinand.

The man is dead; he took no part in the war, except unwittingly by the
act of dying, and therefore one could wish to speak of him with respect
and restraint. Otherwise it might be possible to justify this estimate
of his character by the narration of little incidents, and one such,
though trivial in itself, may perhaps bear description. The younger
guests of the hotel in the mountains had got up a fancy dress ball,
and among persons clad in all conceivable costumes, including those of
monks, cardinals, and even popes, a lady of demure manners, who did
not dance, had come downstairs in the habit of a nun. This aroused the
superstitious indignation of the Archduke, who demanded that the lady
should retire from the room instantly, or he would order his carriage
and leave the hotel at once.

Of course, the inevitable happened--the Archduke's will became law,
and the lady went upstairs in tears, while I and two or three others
(Catholics among us) thought and said, "Heaven help Europe when the
time comes for its destinies to depend largely on the judgment of a man
whose bemuddled intellect cannot distinguish between morality of the
real world and of an entirely fantastic and fictitious one."

       *       *       *       *       *

(Hall Caine in his pen portraits from the War describes "A Conversation
with Lord Roberts"; "The Motherhood of France"; "The Russian Soul";
"The Soul of Poland"; "The Part Played by Italy," and sixty-two
dramatic sketches.)

FOOTNOTES:

[1] All numerals throughout these volumes are for the purpose of
enumerating the various stories and episodes herein told--they have no
relation to the chapters in the original sources.




MY VISIT TO KING ALBERT--THE KING WHOSE THRONE IS THE HEARTS OF HIS
PEOPLE

"_I Am Bound on a Mission from the President of France_"

_Told by Pierre Loti, of the French Academy, and Captain in the French
Navy_

  This master of the modern school of French letters offered his
  services to his Country at the outbreak of the War. As Captain
  Julien Viaud, of the Naval Reserve, this famous author was assigned
  to the dockyards. He longed for more active service and appealed to
  the Minister of Marine: "I should accept with joy, with pride, any
  position whatsoever that would bring me nearer to the fighting line,
  even if it were a very subordinate post, one much below the dignity
  of my five rows of gold braid." With his masterful touch Pierre
  Loti is immortalizing the War in literature. The story here told
  of his visit to King Albert, of Belgium, is from his notable story
  entitled "War" in which he describes with simple but touching words
  his encounters with wounded soldiers, sisters of mercy and homeless
  little Belgian orphans. This one story from his book of twenty-five
  inspiring chapters is reproduced by permission of his publishers, _J.
  B. Lippincott Company_: Copyright 1917.


I--"ON MY WAY TO GENERAL HEADQUARTERS OF THE BELGIAN ARMY"

To-day on my way to the General Headquarters of the Belgian Army,
whither I am bound on a mission from the President of the French
Republic to His Majesty King Albert, I pass through Furnes, another
town wantonly and savagely bombarded, where at this hour of the day
there is a raging storm of icy wind, snow, rain, and hail, under a
black sky.

Here as at Ypres the barbarians bent their whole soul on the
destruction of the historical part, the charming old town hall and
its surroundings. It is here that King Albert, driven forth from his
palace, established himself at first. Thereupon the Germans, with that
delicacy of feeling to which at present no one in the world disputes
their claim, immediately made this place their objective, in order to
bombard it with their brutal, heavy shells. I need hardly say that
there was scarcely anyone in the streets, where I slowed down my motor
so that I might have leisure for a better appreciation of the effects
of the Kaiser's "work of civilisation"; there were only some groups
of soldiers, fully armed, some with their coat-collars turned up,
others with the back curtains of their service-caps turned down. They
hastened along in the squalls, running like children, and laughing
good-humouredly, as if it were very amusing, this downpour, which for
once was not of fire.

How is it that there is no atmosphere of sadness about this half-empty
town? It is as if the gaiety of these soldiers, in spite of the
gloomy weather, had communicated itself to the ruined surroundings.
And how full of splendid health and spirits they seem! I see no more
on any faces that somewhat startled, haggard expression, common at
the beginning of the war. The outdoor life, combined with good food,
has bronzed the cheeks of these men whom the shrapnel has spared,
but their principal support and stay is their complete confidence,
their conviction that they have already gained the upper hand and are
marching to victory. The invasion of the Boches will pass away like
this horrible weather, which after all is only a last shower of March;
it will all come to an end.


II--"I CAME UPON A LITTLE KNOT OF FRENCH SAILORS IN THE STORM"

At a turning, during a lull in the storm, I come very unexpectedly
upon a little knot of French sailors. I cannot refrain from beckoning
to them, as one would beckon to children whom one had suddenly found
again in some distant jungle, and they come running to the door of my
car equally delighted to see someone in naval uniform. They seem to
be picked men; they have such gallant, comely faces and such frank,
spirited eyes. Other sailors, too, who were passing by at a little
distance and whom I had not called, come likewise and surround me as
if it were the natural thing to do, but with respectful familiarity,
for are we not in a strange country, and at war? Only yesterday, they
tell me, they arrived a whole battalion strong, with their officers,
and they are camping in a neighbouring village while waiting to "down"
the Boches. And I should like so much to make a _détour_ and pay them
a visit in their own camp if I were not pressed for time, tied down to
the hour of my audience with His Majesty. Indeed it gives me pleasure
to associate with our soldiers, but it is a still greater delight to
associate with our sailors, among whom I passed forty years of my
life. Even before I caught sight of them, just from hearing them talk,
I could recognise them for what they were. More than once, on our
military thoroughfares in the north, on a pitch-dark night, when it was
one of their detachments who stopped me to demand the password, I have
recognised them simply by the sound of their voices.

One of our generals, army commander on the Northern Front, was speaking
to me yesterday of that pleasant, kindly familiarity which prevails
from the highest to the lowest grade of the military ladder, and which
is a new tone characteristic of this essentially national war in which
we all march hand in hand.

"In the trenches," he said to me, "if I stop to talk to a soldier,
other soldiers gather round me so that I may talk to them too. And they
are becoming more and more admirable for their high spirits and their
brotherliness. If only our thousands of dead could be restored to us
what a benefit this war would have bestowed upon us, drawing us near
together, until we all possess but one heart."

It is a long way to the General Headquarters. Out in the open country
the weather is appalling beyond description. The roads are broken
up, fields flooded until they resemble marshes, and sometimes there
are trenches, _chevaux de frise_, reminding the traveller that
the barbarians are still very near. And yet all this, which ought
to be depressing, no longer succeeds in being so. Every meeting
with soldiers--and the car passes them every minute--is sufficient
to restore your serenity. They have all the same cheerful faces,
expressive of courage and gaiety. Even the poor sappers, up to their
knees in water, working hard to repair the shelter pits and defences,
have an expression of gaiety under their dripping service-caps. What
numbers of soldiers there are in the smallest villages, Belgian and
French, very fraternally intermingling. By what wonderful organisation
of the commissariat are these men housed and fed?

But who asserted that there were no Belgian soldiers left? On the
contrary, I pass imposing detachments on their way to the front, in
good order, admirably equipped, and of fine bearing, with a convoy of
excellent artillery of the very latest pattern. Never can enough be
said in praise of the heroism of a people who had every reason for not
preparing themselves for war, since they were under the protection
of solemn treaties that should have preserved them forever from any
such necessity, yet who, nevertheless, sustained and checked the brunt
of the attack of the great barbarism. Disabled at first and almost
annihilated, yet they are recovering themselves and gathering around
their sublimely heroic king.


III--"WE ARRIVE AT LAST--I SEE THE KING"

It is raining, raining, and we are numb with cold, but we have arrived
at last, and in another moment I shall see him, the King, without
reproach and without fear. Were it not for these troops and all these
service motor cars, it would be impossible to believe that this remote
village was the General Headquarters. I have to leave the car, for
the road which leads to the royal residence is nothing more than a
footpath. Among the rough motor cars standing there, all stained with
mud from the roads, there is one car of superior design, having no
armorial bearings of any kind, nothing but two letters traced in chalk
on the black door, S.M. (_Sa Majesté_), for this is _his_ car. In this
charming corner of ancient Flanders, in an old abbey, surrounded by
trees and tombs, here is his dwelling. Out in the rain, on the path
which borders on the little sacred cemetery, an aide-de-camp comes to
meet me, a man with the charm and simplicity that no doubt likewise
characterise his sovereign. There are no guards at the entrance to the
dwelling, and no ceremony is observed. At the end of an unimposing
corridor where I have just time to remove my overcoat, in the embrasure
of an opening door, the King appears, erect, tall, slender, with
regular features and a surprising air of youth, with frank eyes, gentle
and noble in expression, stretching out his hand in kindly welcome.

In the course of my life other kings and emperors have been gracious
enough to receive me, but in spite of pomp, in spite of the splendour
of some of their palaces, I have never yet felt such reverence for
sovereign majesty as here, on the threshold of this little house,
where it is infinitely exalted by calamity and self-sacrifice; and
when I express this sentiment to King Albert he replies with a smile,
"Oh, as for my palace," and he completes his phrase with a negligent
wave of the hand, indicating his humble surroundings. It is indeed a
simple room that I have just entered, yet by the mere absence of all
vulgarity, still possessing distinction. A bookcase crowded with books
occupies the whole of one wall; in the background there is an open
piano with a music-book on the stand; in the middle a large table,
covered with maps and strategic plans; and the window, open in spite
of the cold, looks out on to a little old-world garden, like that of
a parish priest, almost completely enclosed, stripped of its leaves,
melancholy, weeping, as it were, the rains of winter.

After I have executed the simple mission entrusted to me by the
President of the Republic, the King graciously detains me a long time
in conversation. But if I felt reluctant to write even the beginning
of these notes, still more do I hesitate to touch upon this interview,
even with the utmost discretion, and then how colourless will it seem,
all that I shall venture to say! It is because in truth I know that
he never ceases to enjoin upon those around him, "Above all, see that
people do not talk about me," because I know and understand so well
the horror he professes for anything resembling an "interview." So
then at first I made up my mind to be silent, and yet when there is
an opportunity of making himself heard, who would not long to help to
spread abroad, to the utmost of his small ability, the renown of such a
name?

Very striking in the first place is the sincere and exquisite modesty
of his heroic nature; it is almost as if he were unaware that he
is worthy of admiration. In his opinion he has less deserved the
veneration which France has devoted to him, and his popularity among
us, than the least of his soldiers, slain for our common defence.
When I tell him that I have seen even in the depths of the country,
in peasants' cottages, the portraits of the King and Queen of the
Belgians in the place of honour, with little flags, black, yellow and
red, piously pinned around them, he appears scarcely to believe me; his
smile and his silence seem to answer:

"Yet all that I did was so natural. Could a king worthy of the name
have acted in any other way?"

Now we talk about the Dardanelles, where in this hour serious issues
hang in the balance; he is pleased to question me about ambushes in
those parts, which I frequented for so long a time, and which have
not ceased to be very dear to me. But suddenly a colder gust blows in
through the window, still opening on to the forlorn little garden. With
what kindly thoughtfulness, then, he rises, as any ordinary officer
might have done, and himself closes the window near which I am seated.

And then we talk of war, of rifles, of artillery. His Majesty is well
posted in everything, like a general already broken in to his craft.


IV--"A GREAT WARRIOR IN THE MIDST OF AN ARMY OF HEROES"

Strange destiny for a prince, who, in the beginning, did not seem
designated for the throne, and who, perhaps, would have preferred
to go on living his former somewhat retired life by the side of his
beloved princess. Then, when the unlooked-for crown was placed upon
his youthful brow, he might well have believed that he could hope for
an era of profound peace, in the midst of the most peaceful of all
nations, but, contrary to every expectation, he has known the most
appallingly tragic reign of all. Between one day and the next, without
a moment's weakness, without even a moment's hesitation, disdainful of
compromises, which for a time, at least, though to the detriment of the
civilisation of the world, might have preserved for a little space his
towns and palaces, he stood erect in the way of the Monster's onrush, a
great warrior king in the midst of an army of heroes.

To-day it is clear that he has no longer a doubt of victory, and
his own loyalty gives him complete confidence in the loyalty of the
Allies, who truly desire to restore life to his country of Belgium;
nevertheless, he insists that his soldiers shall co-operate with all
their remaining strength in the work of deliverance, and that they
shall remain to the end at the post of danger and honour. Let us salute
him with the profoundest reverence.

Another less noble, might have said to himself:

"I have amply paid my debt to the common cause; it was my troops who
built the first rampart against barbarism. My country, the first to be
trampled under the feet of these German brutes, is no more than a heap
of ruins. That suffices."

But no, he will have the name of Belgium inscribed upon a yet prouder
page, by the side of Serbia, in the golden book of history.

And that is the reason why I met on my way those inestimable troops,
alert and fresh, miraculously revived, who were on their way to the
front to continue the holy struggle.

Before him let us bow down to the very ground.

Night is falling when the audience comes to an end and I find myself
again on the footpath that leads to the abbey. On my return journey,
along those roads broken up by rain and by military transport wagons,
I remain under the charm of his welcome. And I compare these two
monarchs, situated, as it were, at opposite poles of humanity, the
one at the pole of light, the other at the pole of darkness; the one
yonder, swollen with hypocrisy and arrogance, a monster among monsters,
his hands full of blood, his nails full of torn flesh, who still dares
to surround himself with insolent pomp; the other here, banished
without a murmur to a little house in a village, standing on a last
strip of his martyred kingdom, but in whose honour rises from the
whole civilised earth a concert of sympathy, enthusiasm, magnificent
appreciation, and for whom are stored up crowns of most pure and
immortal glory.


V--A LITTLE JOURNEY TO THE BATTLEGROUNDS OF FRANCE

(Another Story Told by Pierre Loti)

  The blood of the masters is drenching the soil of France. The great
  academicians are willing to die that their beloved France may live.
  Here we stand on the battleground with this great French novelist,
  whose impressions are told in _Current History_.

This is the first time that I have found myself so absolutely and
infinitely alone, in the midst of this stage setting of immense
desolation, which to-day, as it chances, is sparkling with light, and
is only the more mournful for that. Until I reach the little wood to
which an errand of duty calls me I need think of nothing; I need not
occupy myself with anything; I need not avoid the shells, which would
not give me time to avoid them, nor even choose the spot to set my foot
down, since it sinks in everywhere equally. And so it comes that I
drift back again to the mood of former days, to my mood of mind before
the war, and all these things to which I have grown used I see and
judge as though they were new.

Only a score of months ago who would have imagined such a face of
things? Thus, these countless excavations--white, because the soil of
this region is white--excavations that stretch on all sides and which
mark across the wilderness multitudes of zebra-tracings--is it possible
that they mark out the only paths along which our soldiers of France
can move to-day with a sort of half security?... Little sunken ways,
some of them full of curves, some of them straight, which have been
named "guts," and which we have had to multiply, to multiply to such a
point that the earth is furrowed by them to infinity! What an enormous
sum of toil they represent, these mole paths, lying in a network over
hundreds of leagues! If we add the trenches, the shelter caves, all
these catacombs that plunge down into the hearts of the hills, one's
mind stops dead before such a total of excavation, that might seem the
work of centuries.

And these things that look like fishing nets stretched on all sides.
If one were not informed in advance and accustomed to them, could one
divine what they can possibly be? You might think that gigantic spiders
had been spinning their webs among these myriads of posts, sometimes
planted in straight lines, sometimes forming circles or half moons,
tracing across the wide expanse designs that must be cabalistic in
order better to ensnare and envelop the Barbarians. And besides they
have terribly reinforced them, multiplying them twice, nay, ten times,
since my last passage, these stake nets, and our web-spinning soldiers
have had to make among them turnings and passages, with the enormous
reels of barbed wire which they carry under their arms.

But there is one thing that you can understand at the first glance,
and which adds to the grim horror of the whole scene, and that is the
inclosures sprinkled here and there, the wooden fences that shut in
closely packed groups of poor little burial crosses, made of two pieces
of wood. That you can tell at once, alas! and see exactly what it is!
Here they lie, therefore, under the thunder of the big guns, as though
the battle was not yet finished for them, our dear departed ones, our
unknown, magnificent heroes--whom even those who weep for them cannot
now come nigh, because death is passing ceaselessly in the air above
their silent little gatherings.

Ah! To complete the unreality of it all, here comes a black bird of
gigantic wing-stretch, a monster of the apocalypse, that flits past
noisily high above me. He flies on toward France, seeking doubtless the
more sheltered region where women and children begin to be found, with
the hope of slaughtering some of them.


VI--"I LOOK DOWN ON THE TERRIBLE LANDSCAPE"

I walk on, if one call it walking, this wearisome and inexorable
process of plunging through the mud. And finally I arrive at the little
grove of trees where we are to meet. I am glad of it, for my helmet
and cloak had become a heavy burden under this unexpectedly burning
sun. It happens that I am the first to arrive; the officer whom I have
summoned--to discuss new defense works, new lines of stake nets, new
burrows--is without doubt that blue outline making its way hither, but
he is still distant, and I have still a few moments to continue my
meditation of the way hither before it is time to become once more
concentrated and exact. It is clear that the place is not left entirely
alone, for these poor, half-stripped branches offer no more resistance
than mere sheets of paper to the huge humming beetles that pass through
them from time to time; but all the same a little wood like this keeps
you company, shuts you in, spreads something of illusion about you.

I am on a bit of rising ground, from which I look down on all
the terrible landscape, the succession of monotonous hillocks
zebra-streaked by whitish "guts," and the few trees disheveled by
shrapnel bullets. In the further distances these intertwined wires,
stretched in all directions, sparkle in the sun, somewhat like "the
Virgin's threads," which spread over the meadows in Spring. And on all
sides the detonations of artillery keep up their accustomed rumble,
which goes on unceasingly here, night and day, like the roar of the
ocean against the cliffs.

Ah! the huge bird has found some one to speak to in the air! I see
it all at once assailed by a host of those little tufts of white
cotton--bursting shrapnel--which look so innocent, but which are so
perilous for birds of its breed. It turns about hastily; its crimes are
put off for another time.

From behind a nearby rising ground come forth a group of men in blue,
who will reach me before the officer who is coming over there. It is
the chance one, the one among thousands of these little processions
which one meets incessantly, alas! along the battle front, and which
form, so to speak, part of the stage setting. At its head four soldiers
are carrying a stretcher, and others are following, to relieve them.
Attracted also by the illusory protection of the branches, they stop
instinctively at the entrance of the little wood to take breath and
change shoulders. They come from the first-line trenches, which are
three or four kilometers away, and are carrying a "gravely wounded"
man to an underground hospital, which is some quarter of an hour away.
They also had not foreseen this vicious sun that scorches one's head;
they are wearing their helmets and cloaks, and they feel the weight of
them as much as that of the precious load which they take such pains to
carry steadily; more, they drag along, on each foot, a thick shell of
sticky mud which gives them feet like elephants, and the sweat runs in
big drops over their fine, tired faces.

"What is the matter with your wounded man?" I ask in a low voice.

In still lower voices they answer me: "He is ripped up the belly--oh!
the trench surgeon told us that...." They finish the sentence only
with a shake of the head, but I understand. For the rest, he has not
stirred. His poor hand remains pressed to his brow and his eyes,
doubtless to protect them against the baking sun, and I ask: "Why did
you not cover his face?" "We did put a handkerchief over it, Colonel,
but he took it away; he said he would rather have it like that, so that
he can still see something between his fingers."


VII--HOW GLORIOUS IS THE SPIRIT OF FRANCE

Ah! but the two last men, besides sweat, have broad smears of blood
across their faces and running down their necks. "Oh, nothing much the
matter with us, Colonel!" they tell me; "we got that as we came along.
We started to carry him along the 'guts,' but it shook him too much;
so we came on outside in the open." Poor, admirable dreamer! To save
their wounded man from jolting they have risked all their lives! Two
or three of these huge death beetles which ceaselessly hum past have
smashed themselves near them against the stones and have sprinkled them
with their fragments; the Germans do not take the trouble to shoot at
a single passerby like myself, but a group, and especially a litter,
is irresistible for them. Of the two who are streaming with blood, one
is, perhaps, not much the worse, but the other has an ear torn off, and
hanging only by a shred of skin.

"You must get your wound dressed by the surgeon immediately, my
friend," I say to him.

"Yes, Colonel, we are on our way there to the hospital. It suits
exactly."

That is the only thing that has occurred to him to say in complaint:
"It suits exactly." And he says it with such a fine, quiet smile, while
thanking me for taking an interest in him.

I hesitate to go closer to look at their gravely wounded man, who has
remained without stirring, for fear I might disturb his last thoughts.
I do go close to him, however, very gently, because they are going to
carry him away.

Ah! He is a mere lad! A village boy; one can guess that at once by his
bronzed cheeks, which have just begun to grow pale. The sun, as he
wishes, floods his handsome 20-year-old face, which is at the same time
vigorous and candid, and his hand is still held like a guard before his
eyes, which are set and seem no longer to perceive anything. They must
have given him morphine to keep him from suffering too much. Humble
child of our countryside, brief little life, what is he dreaming of, if
he is still dreaming? Perhaps of his kerchiefed mamma, who wept happy
tears every time she recognized his childish writing on an envelope
from the front? Or is he dreaming of the farm garden that held his
earliest years?

I see on his breast the handkerchief with which they tried to cover his
face; it is of fine linen, embroidered with a Marquis's coronet--the
coronet of one of his bearers. He had wanted "to go on seeing things,"
doubtless in his terror of the great night. But even this sun, which
must dazzle him, will soon cease suddenly to be recognizable for him;
to begin with, it will be the half-darkness of the hospital, and,
immediately afterward, will begin for him the long inexorable night, in
which no sun will ever dawn again.




"VIVE LA FRANCE"--HOW MEN DIE FOR THEIR COUNTRY

_Last Messages of French Soldiers_

_Told by Rene Bazin, Member of the French Academy_

  Behind the dry official reports of military events is a vast fund
  of emotional human stories. Glimpses of this side of the Great War
  are found in private letters, personal experiences, and thrilling
  episodes of courage, humor, or pathos which are being preserved in
  the New York Times _Current History_.


I have heard magnificent sayings of our soldiers; others have been
written to me by those who heard them. I would not have them perish.
It seems to me that they naturally form a part of the epoch we are
living through; that they are good to read and meditate on, unconscious
testimonies of that which historians will call the new life of France,
of that which has ever been her deeper life, widened and developed in
this hour of trial.

Therefore I shall record here not all these sayings and traits, but
some of them.

At B., in the hospital of the Grand Hotel, a wounded soldier was to
have a limb amputated. But he was so weak that the surgeon hesitated.

"If we could only give him some blood!"

"If that is all that is needed I am ready to give it!" answers another
wounded soldier, a Breton.

The transfusion is made. The staff of the hospital, touched by the
devotion of this wounded soldier, who was known to be very poor, made
a little collection here and there, very quietly, and gathered five
hundred francs, which they took great satisfaction in offering to him.
One day one of them came close to his bed, spoke of the service he had
rendered, thanked him and offered him the money. Mark his answer:

"Oh, no! I give my blood; I do not sell it!"

A very young soldier from the North, with a beardless and rather
childish face, is stretched at the back of a trench, dying from a
terrible shell wound in the stomach. In spite of the frightful wound he
does not complain, he does not repine, and in his wide, upward-gazing
eyes one could just perceive the expression of sadness which he often
had. For since mobilizing he had received no news from his home in
the occupied territory. His comrades are doing what they can for him,
offering him water to drink, unbuttoning his tunic, trying to stanch
the blood. Opening his eyes, which he had kept for a long moment
closed, and no longer with an expression of suffering, he said to one
of his comrades, a big, hairy fellow who was bending over him:

"Friend, you must not tell mother what a frightful wound I had! A
bullet is better than what I have!" Then he distributed a few little
things he had in his pocket--his knife, his purse, a corkscrew, a
tinder-box--a last testament soon ended. Finally, with difficulty, he
opened his notebook and, setting himself to write, though he could no
longer see very clearly, he traced a few lines. When he had finished
his soul departed.... Three minutes later, as the word of his end
spread along the trench, at this time not under heavy bombardment by
the enemy, a Captain arrived, smeared with mud up to the shoulders. He
saw the soldier. "Oh, poor boy! One of my bravest!" Respectfully he
took the notebook, which had fallen on the ground, opened it and read:
"Au revoir, father; au revoir, mother; au revoir, little sisters; I am
dying for my country. Vive la France!"

Sergeant Raissac of Beziers was mortally wounded in an assault on
a German trench. When they lifted his body his hand still held a
photograph representing his mother, his sisters and himself, and on
the back of the picture he had managed to write, with his last effort,
"Adieu! No tears, but a Christian acceptance. I am at peace with God."

Yesterday, during his two days' leave, I met the son of a poor
countrywoman, a workman whom I have loved for a long time. When I took
leave of him, saying, "Good luck to you, Marcel!" he looked up with
unreproaching eyes and answered me: "On the one side, and on the other,
I fear nothing!" And this meant: "Life? Death? What does it matter? I
am ready!"

What does all this signify? It is the poetry of chivalry that
continues; it is the unfinished Crusade; it is God making Himself
manifest through purified France.

Those who seek the sublime will find nothing grander.


II--THE YOUNG HEROES OF FRANCE

_Told by Maurice Barrès, in memory of Max Barthou, who volunteered at
eighteen_

I believe that young heroes abound at this moment when every family is
cruelly involved in the war. The son dreams of helping his father, his
elder brothers, of joining them, of avenging them. Are his city and
his home invaded? With his whole heart he tries and examines himself
as to what his duty and his honour demand. I remember how the minds of
my companions, some 10 years old, and our slightly older brothers were
fired in 1870....

Do you wish me to bring you my contribution to the monument of our
young patriots?

First, a little story. On Nov. 24, 1914, on a cold day, about 3 in
the afternoon, the Prussians, whom they call "Boches," are once again
trying to cross the frontier, to enter France. It is very cold, there
is a high wind, and snow covers the ground. Who tells the story? A
workman at the front, who, from the neighbourhood of Pont-à-Mousson,
writes to his two little children at his home at Neuillez sur Marne.
They gave me his letter. I should spoil it if I retouched it. I
transcribe it just as it is:

"My dear little Marcella, this story, which happened to some French
soldiers, you are to tell to your little Charlie and your companions,
and you are to show them how two little children saved the lives of
twenty-eight papas.

"In a lonely farmhouse a detachment of reservists, composed of thirty
men, are resting from the labours of the night in an underground
cellar, waiting for the next night to begin their work again and
accomplish their mission.

In a room about them, two children, Liza and John, are sitting beside
their mamma near the fire. All three talk the old country dialect.
All at once the mother rises, runs to the door and sees some horsemen
coming from a distance.

"'My children,' she says, pressing them to her heart, 'I think the
Prussians are coming. They will see that we have lodged and fed French
soldiers, and they will surely want to make us tell where they are.
They will take them and shoot them.'

"'We must say they have gone away there, just in the opposite
direction!' said little John.

"'Oh, no!' said their mamma; 'if we deceive them with a lie they will
come back and take vengeance. Listen rather! I shall speak to the
Prussians only in dialect, and they won't understand a word. Do you
also do as I do, and, to everything they say, answer always in the
same phrase, in dialect.'

"The clatter of hoofs was heard, and the rattle of weapons.

"'Courage, my children!' said their mamma. The door opens. The Boches
enter. They ask questions, but the mother's answers are unintelligible
to them.

"'Look at these two children! They must learn French at school,' said
the officer, who spoke a little French.

"One of the Germans seized little Lisa, while another caught little
John.

"'Where is your father?' he asked in a harsh voice. 'Where are the
French that passed here?'

"Lisa raised her blue eyes to this foreign soldier and, all trembling,
replied in dialect. John did the same. The soldiers, irritated,
suspecting a trick, searched the house, but did not find the trap-door
which had been previously covered with dirty straw. They threatened
to cut the children's throats. They told them they would kill their
mother, too, if they did not answer. The poor children began to cry,
but, faithful to their mother's directions, they repeated, through
their tears, the same phrase.

"The French soldiers who were in the cellar and who heard everything
through a ventilator felt their blood boil, and, but for their officer,
would have come forth to protect the poor children, and, without doubt,
would have been killed, for they were outnumbered.

"The Prussians did not think that such young children, threatened
with death, would be capable of such heroic discretion; they ended by
believing that they could not make themselves understood and rode away.

"And that is how two little children, Lisa, aged 8, and John, aged
10, by their obedience to their mother and by courage kept thirty men
from being killed, twenty-eight wives still have their husbands, and
forty-seven little children have their papas. Among these forty-seven
little children my little Marcella and my little Charlie will perhaps
see their papa again."

I leave this story in its fine simplicity. A workman who had become a
soldier chats with his children far away. But the chief attraction in
it for me is that the fact reported is quite authentic. I know the farm
in the district of Meurthe et Moselle, and later on I shall tell its
name, as well as those of the farmer's wife and the two children, who
have received a well-earned reward.




FOR GOD AND ITALY--BREATHING DEATH WITH THE ITALIANS

"_Where Minutes Are Eternal_"

_Told by Gabriele D'Annunzio, Italy's Most Famous Living Poet and a
Lieutenant in the Italian Navy_

  The great D'Annunzio, like most of the famous poets, painters, and
  composers of Europe, is offering his life to his country. He is a
  Lieutenant in the Italian Navy. Occasionally some word is heard from
  him in which we see war through the eyes of the poet. He sent this
  graphic description of his experiences as a mine-layer to the _London
  Telegraph_ of December 29, 1915.


I--A POET AT SEA WITH THE ITALIAN NAVY

It can be said of the Italian war what Percy Bysshe Shelley said of
the Medusa's head which he saw in Florence, and which he attributed to
Leonardo da Vinci: "Its beauty and its horror are divine."

This night of danger and death is one of the sweetest that ever spread
its blue veil over the face of the heavens. The sea darkens, and in
its innumerable pulsations the nocturnal phosphoresence is already
discernible. Here and there the rippled surface of the sea glitters
with an internal light as a quivering eyelid, disclosing mysterious
glances. The new moon is like a burning handful of sulphur. Ever and
anon the black cloud of smoke rising from the funnels hides it or
appears to drag it in its spirals like a moving flame.

Life is not an abstraction of aspects and events, but a sort of
diffused sensuousness, a knowledge offered to all the senses, a
substance good to touch, smell, taste, feel. In fact, I feel all the
things near to my senses, like the fisherman walking barefooted on
the beach covered with the incoming tide, and who now and then bends
to identify and pick up what moves under the soles of his feet. The
aspects of this maritime city are like my passions and like the
monuments of Nineveh and Knossus, places of my ardor and creations of
my fancy, real and unreal, products of my desire and products of time.
This city is one of those tumultuous harmonies whence often the most
beautiful elements of my art are born. Nothing escapes the eyes Nature
gave me, and everything is food for my soul. Such a craving for life is
not unlike the desire to die in order to achieve immortality.

In fact, to-night death is present like life, beautiful as life,
intoxicating, full of promises, transfiguring. I stand on my feet,
wearing shoes that can easily be unlaced, on the deck of a small
ironclad on which there is only space enough for the weapons and the
crew. Steam is up. The black smoke of the three funnels rises toward
the new moon, shining yellow in the cloud, burning like a handful of
sulphur. The sailors have already donned life-saving belts and inflated
the collars which must support the head in the agony of drowning. I
hear the voice of the second officer giving the order to place in the
only two boats the biscuits and the canned meat.

A young officer, muscular, but agile as a leopard, who has Boldness'
very eyes, and has to his credit already an admirable manoeuvre in
conducting the destroyer from the arsenal to the anchorage, pays
for the champagne. We drink a cup sitting around the table on which
the navigation chart is spread, while the commander of the flotilla
dictates, standing, to the typist the order of the nocturnal operation,
which is to be issued to the commanders of the other ships. A
suppressed joy shines in the eyes of all. The operation is fraught with
danger, is most difficult, and the cup we drink may be our last.

An ensign, who is little more than a boy, and a Sicilian, who resembles
an adolescent Arabian brought up in the court of Frederick of Serbia,
rubs in his hands a perfumed leaf, one of those leaves which are grown
in a terra cotta vase on the parapets of the windows looking into the
silent lanes of the city. The perfume is so strong that every one of us
smells it with quivering nostrils. That single leaf on that terrible
warship, where everything is iron and fire, that leaf of love, seems to
us infinitely precious, and reminds us of the gardens of Giudecca and
Fondamenta Nuove left behind.

The commander continues to dictate the order of the operation with
his soft Tuscan accent, with some same telling words that Ramondo
d'Amoretto Manelli used in the epistle he sent to Leonard Strozzi
when the Genoese were vanquished by the navy of the Venetians and
Florentines.


II--"WE ARE GOING TO PLANT MINES ON A HOSTILE COAST"

Ours is a marvelous exploit. We are going to plant mines near the
enemy's coast, only a bare kilometer from its formidable batteries. The
ensign fastens the black collar around his neck, and will presently
inflate it with his breath.

We are ready. We sail. The firmament over our heads is covered with
smoke and sparks. Along the gunwale, on each side of the ship, the
enormous mines in their iron cages rest on the supports projecting over
the water. The long torpedoes are ready for the attack, protected by
their iron tubes, with their bronze heads charged with trytol, beasts
in ambuscade. The sailors, their heads covered, are grouped around the
guns, whose breeches are open. All the available space is strewn with
weapons and contrivances, and full of alert men. In order to go from
stern to prow it is necessary to crouch, bend, pass under a greasy
torpedo, leap over outstretched sailors, strike the leg against the
fastening of a torpedo, squeeze against a hot funnel, entangle one's
self in a rope, receive squarely in the face a dash of foam while
grasping the railing.

I ascend the bridge. We are already clear of the anchorage. It is dark.
The moon is dipping in the sea. In an hour it will have disappeared.
The ship quivers at the vibration of the machinery. The funnels still
emit too much smoke and too many sparks. On board all the lights are
out, even the cigarettes. Darkness enshrouds alike both prow and stern.
The last order megaphoned resounds in an azure dotted with sparks and
stars--which are only inextinguishable sparks. A light mist rises from
the water. The wake foams, and the sea ahead parts in two broad furrows
along the sides of the ship, giving forth, now and then, strange
reflections.

Following in our wake the second destroyer looms up darkly, and after
her all the others in line. When the route is changed to reconnoitre
the coast, from the great central wake many oblique ones part,
designing an immense silver rake.

The commander is against the railing, leaning out toward darkness,
with his whole soul in his scrutinizing eyes. Now and then he turns
his ruddy face and transmits an order with exact and sharp words. The
helmsman at the wheel never once removes his eyes from the compass,
lighted by a small lamp in a screened niche. Clearly he is a man of
the purest Tyrrenean race, a true comrade of Ulysses, with a face
which seems to have been modeled by the trade wind. Near by is the
signal box. "Half Speed," "Full Speed," "Slow," "Stop." Through
the speaking tube the orders are transmitted to the engine room.
"Four--Three--Zero."

We are making twenty-three knots an hour. The foam of the great wake
glitters under the stern lights. "A little to the right."

The navigating officer is bending over the chart, held down by lead
weights covered with cloth, measuring, figuring with the compass and
the square, under the blue light of a shaded lamp. A great shooting
star crosses the August sky, disappearing toward the Cappella.


III--A DRAMATIC MOMENT IN THE NIGHT

Impatience gnaws my heart. I strain my sight to discern in the darkness
the signal which has been prearranged. Nothing is to be seen yet. I
descend from the ladder and move toward the stern, skirting the row of
torpedoes, leaping over the outstretched sailors. From the stern the
dark silhouettes of the other destroyers in line are visible. All of
a sudden the signal is flashed in the direction of the prow. We are
nearing the spot of our operation. Every will is strained.

"One--Two--Zero."

The speed is reduced to six knots. The funnels still emit too much
smoke and too many sparks. The commander is furious. Orders are
megaphoned and every word seems to crowd the adventurous air with
danger. The manoeuvre is executed with sort of rhythmic precision.
Maintaining their distance, and one by one, every ship files to the
starboard of us, standing black over the foaming wake, lighted every
now and then by a strange phosphorescence.

"On reaching the eastern route for the planting of the mines,
extinguish the stern lights," cries the megaphone. Under the playing
searchlights the enemy's coast is clearly visible. We are in low water,
and the speed is further diminished.

"One--Zero--Zero."

We almost touch bottom, and proceed by feeling our course ahead. We
also take soundings continuously to avoid running aground. The ships
seem to pant and puff grievedly, as great mammals in danger of running
ashore.

"Reverse engines. Full speed!"

One of the ships feels she cannot manoeuvre any longer, having actually
struck bottom, and endeavors to free herself. She lies ahead of us,
and within speaking distance. We see the water glitter under the blue
light of her stern lanterns. It seems to us now that every other ship
is in danger. The sky is veiled. Long Medusan tresses of clouds drag
the constellation as the net drags silvery fishes. The engines throb
painfully.

The commander is there, all soul, defying the darkness with his eyes.
What if at that moment the enemy should sight us?

"The _Invitto_ leads."

His clear orders through a series of manoeuvres draw away the flotilla
from the shallow waters and on to the safe course. Beyond, on the
shore, the enemy's searchlights are seen crossing each other like white
blades. Under the light the shore seems so near as to give one the
illusion of being about to drop anchor. We are all tensely waiting. In
a few seconds we shall be in the prearranged spot. Minutes seem hours.
The rubber stoppers have been removed from the tubes. The mines are
ready, on their supports, to be lowered into the sea. The sailors await
the order standing.


IV--"WE BREATHE DANGER AND DEATH"

The minutes are eternal. We may be detected every second. The shore is
only a mile from us. The funnels are our despair. They still emit too
much smoke and sparks. At last a warning is heard from the bridge.

"Ready."

The Lieutenant looks at his watch, lighting the dial with the lamp
hidden in his hand. The enormous mines, whose heads are charged with
destruction, are there silent, like gigantic, gray, petrified sea
Medusas, fixed on their support, whose double tooth projects over the
waters.

"Ready! Let go!"

The first mine rolls over with the sound of a shattering barrel, falls
in the foaming sea, disappears.

"Ready! Let go!"

Eighteen seconds elapse. The second falls, followed by the third,
fourth, and all the others, on every ship which maintains a diagonal
course nearing the coast. In three minutes the operation is over; the
mines are planted in the exact spot. The teeth of the crew gleam in a
wild smile. Each sailor sees in his heart the enemy's battleships rent
and sinking.

"Four--Three--Three--Zero."

We assume our position at the head of the line, returning on our course
with the initial speed. The ships seem now to me to be quivering with
warlike joy. In the distance over the mainland the white beams of the
searchlights still cross each other. Ever and anon a rocket explodes.
Our wake now is so beautiful as to resemble a whirling milky way. A
sailor mounts the bridge and gives us a cup of steaming coffee, whose
aroma titillates our nostrils and our heart. We light our cigarette.

But here is a Marconigram.

"Look out, two submarines are lying in wait for you on the safe route."

And in the first quiver of dawn, with expanded lungs, we again breathe
danger and death.




THE BLOOD OF THE RUSSIANS IN FIGHT FOR LIBERTY

"_The Deserted Battlefields I Have Seen_"

_Told by Count Ilya Tolstoy, Son of the late Count Leo Tolstoy, Famous
Russian Novelist_

  Count Tolstoy has been serving with the Red Cross branch of the
  Russian Army. During these tragic experiences, he kept a war diary on
  the battlefields. This is the first English translation of excerpts
  from this diary, translated from the Russian by Miss I. Rojansky for
  _Current History_--Copyright 1916 by Otis F. Wood.


I--"I CAN SEE THE SCENE UNFOLDING BEFORE MY EYES"

The war relics of devastated structures leave a sad and painful
impression. Of the many deserted battlefields which I have seen during
the two years past, the nameless little graves faintly marked with
little wooden crosses, of the deserted trenches, nothing gave me so
much food for deep and sad reflection as the bare and lonely chimneys
projecting from amid piles of rubbish, melancholy blackened pots, the
scattered remnants of domesticity; a smashed pail, a broken wheel, a
binding of a torn book, the splinters of what was once a crib.

To think that hereabout dwelt a family; that they were contented and
possibly happy! Those walls, stripped and crumbled, what have they not
seen!

It always seems to me that an event having occurred at a given place,
the memory of the occurrence attaches permanently to it. Whenever I
happened to find myself in a locality in which some memorable events
had taken place I could not think of those events without at the
same time visualizing the surroundings amid which they occurred; and
the more recent the occurrence, the more vividly I can see the scene
unfolding itself before my eyes.

The vast number of such impressions which the present war has produced
make a film, vivid and endless.


II--"I REMEMBER ... A HORRIBLE TALE"

I remember one such pile of ruins, which I saw not far from the road
leading to Jaroslav. This ruin remained permanently fixed in my memory
by reason of a horrible tale connected with it.

Some time ago there lived on a farm a well-to-do Galician gardener.
When the war broke out he was drafted into the army. He went
forth, leaving behind him a wife and three small children. Shortly
following his departure, troops commenced appearing in the immediate
neighborhood. At first came small detachments, but these were quickly
followed by more formidable bodies. In a short time lines of trenches
were dug on both sides of the farm and real warfare began.

The firing was continuous. The family sought safety in the corners
of their hut. They hid in the cellar under the heaps of beets and
potatoes, but the children soon became accustomed to the hissing of
bullets and lost all fear of them.

The wounded soldiers, for the most part Austrians, began crawling
toward the farm. There they bound up their wounds. The children
looked on and sometimes gave aid, holding with their tiny fingers the
blood-soaked cotton, or winding long and transparent bandages around
the wounded limbs. They became accustomed to pain and to the groans of
the dying, and in their naive and simple way rendered all the help of
which they were capable.

At night, when darkness fell and when firing from both sides would
cease, the Austrian relief workers would come, place the wounded on
long and unsteady stretchers, and carry them to the rear. On one
occasion the wounded sent the eldest girl to the pond to fetch some
water. She stayed away for a long, long time. Later she was found lying
on the grass with a bullet in her slender little shoulder. The pails
lay near her empty.

During the night she, too, was placed on a stretcher and was carried
away. With her went the mother and the rest of the children. From that
night on the farm remained forsaken.

The wounded, however, continued crawling to the hut, their numbers
increasing from day to day. At times the litter bearers could not
manage to look into the farm, and the wounded lay for days at a stretch
without aid.


III--"THERE WAS NO ONE TO BURY THE BODIES"

At the end of October a serious cholera epidemic broke out among the
Austrian troops. From that time on there appeared among those creeping
toward the lonely farm large numbers of emaciated and pale-blue
forms--shadows of men. On reaching the farm they fell on to the straw,
coiled and groaned in agony, and for the most part remained lying
there, silenced by everlasting sleep.

There was no one to bury the bodies, and they gradually began
decomposing. On top of those bodies fell more and more. It became
impossible to live amid these hellish surroundings, and if by chance
some unfortunate wounded happened to come along most of them would
leave the little hut and limp ahead, preferring to dare the firing
line rather than be stifled in this horrible atmosphere of death and
stench.

The engagements, having lasted several weeks, became more and more
stubborn. The trenches crept nearer and nearer, until they resembled
two live, gigantic horns about to embrace each other. Presently one of
the Austrian trenches came so near the farm that the house became an
obstacle to firing, and an order was issued to apply the torch to the
incumbrance.

It was a dangerous task; all knew through experience that the Russians
keep a sharp lookout on all that transpires in the enemy line and do
not allow to pass with impunity the most insignificant move on the part
of the enemy. At night the men, while smoking, would lie low at the
very base of the trench, as the mere striking of a match sufficed to
draw fire from the opposite lines.

As a result of some faint noise or a slight movement, vigorous firing
would not infrequently burst out all along the line, and instead of
getting the much-needed rest, the soldiers would pass nights on their
feet and remain fatigued from sleeplessness and nervous exertion.

A young Second Lieutenant, recently promoted, and clean-shaven,
volunteered to apply the torch. Though an ambitious man, he was at
the same time limited and cowardly. He always tried to conceal his
cowardice under a mask of arrogance, pushing his way forward whenever
there was an opportunity to get into the spotlight and have his name
mentioned. To brace himself, the officer emptied a large glass of
spirits, and, taking along one of the men, left a cozy, sheltered
trench and began feeling his way across the fields.


IV--THE TORCH AT THE HOUSE OF DEATH

The night was dark as a grave, and over the lowland of the garden
hung a thick, milky fog. The feet sank deep into the sticky, soaking
mud. The Lieutenant's assistant went slowly, bent to the ground and
breathing heavily.

They continued on their way without seeing anything ahead. Though the
distance between them and their object was only 200 yards, it seemed
to them from time to time as if they had lost their bearings and were
going in the wrong direction.

Soon they were aware of a heavy, suffocating smell; the next moment
there loomed up before their eyes a sombre silhouette of a building. It
stood there enveloped in fog.

Reaching a corner of the house, the Lieutenant stopped short, drew from
his ulster a big field revolver and whispered to the man to come near.

It seemed that his main care was not to carry out the task he had
undertaken, but to hide conveniently from the Russian fire, and then
slip off to the rear as soon as the house caught fire. He figured that
while the flames were spreading over the structure, and before they had
reached the last wall, he could quietly and without the least danger
remain under shelter. As soon as the fire enveloped the structure, and
before the walls began crumbling, he would run back in time to avoid
exposure by the conflagration.

With this in view, he gave orders to his subordinate to pile up straw
on the side of the building directly facing the trenches. In the
meantime the officer, having taken shelter behind the opposite wall,
lit a cigar and remained waiting for developments.

A few moments of long and painful suspense followed. The poor
Lieutenant was in a state of frenzy. It was not the personal danger
alone that now excited his imagination. He was tormented by the mystic
fear of that which he was about to carry out. In the darkness he drew
a sombre sketch of all that was hidden behind the wall, the inevitable
which he was to face within a few moments.

How many of them are there? In what stage of decomposition? How do they
lie?

The officer suddenly recalled a conversation in which some one had told
him that when the flames touched the dead in the crematory they coiled
and twisted as if alive. In his excited imagination he quickly pictured
a wild dance of the dead which was about to begin.

"When they calm down," he thought, "after they are burned, as soon as
roast meat is scented I will run, and then let the Russians shoot at
them. All I have to do is to get away in time. If we were only done
with this! Quick! Quick!"

At this moment he became aware of a pleasant smell of straw smoke, and
immediately afterward the opposite corner of the structure burst into
a bright flame. Almost simultaneously with the flash firing began from
the Russian trenches, and it seemed to the officer that a few bullets
hissed near him.

The soldier succeeded in pouring a great quantity of kerosene into the
interior of the house. The fire spread with unusual swiftness. In two
minutes the structure was all ablaze.


V--"THESE WERE THE HORRIBLE VISIONS"

The officer stood at the open door, watching curiously the interior of
the main room. Scattered all over the floor there lay contorted and
twisted forms. They lay in irregular heaps. It was an appalling and
gruesome sight. From somewhere protruded some one's long, bare legs;
near the wall lingered a lonely arm, curled, swollen, and slightly
lifted, it hung in a threatening posture; from under a tattered old
military coat projected a thick brush of black-blue hair; and at some
distance, leaning on the furnace, there half sat the mighty figure of a
stately corpse. The majestic body was bent in gloom, two huge, rough,
and calloused hands supporting a big head.

Suddenly it seemed to the Lieutenant as if he heard some one groan.
The sound became more and more audible, coming nearer and nearer;
one voice, a second, somebody called, a cry rang out, and suddenly
pandemonium broke loose. Air-rending cries came from all sides, and men
began to drop, one by one, falling about the officer and stretching at
his feet. Some fell straight from the ceiling to the earthen floor,
others came creeping down the ladder; they dropped into the flames,
choking and writhing in deadly agony.

The officer, half dead from fright, drew his revolver and opened fire.
He ceased firing when his supply of bullets gave out. His ammunition
gone, the Lieutenant threw down the weapon and ran. No one will ever
know the number of unfortunates he thus killed. All I know is that
of all the men hiding in the garret of that farm only one was saved.
It was he who told me this terrible tale. He did this while lying in
one of our hospitals. According to his version, there were at the
time in the building a great number of wounded soldiers, who had come
there during the last engagement. When fire was set to the house,
they endeavored to get down. All perished. Some were burned alive,
while others were shot to death by their own officer. Among those
who perished was also the soldier who had served as the Lieutenant's
assistant.

These were the horrible visions. I saw them every time I chanced to
pass the ruined and devastated spot.

The fate of the vain and unhappy officer does not in the least concern
me. I am not even disposed to blame him for his weakness. For this we
can only pity a man. One is bound to pity also those who met death at
his hands.

But for some reason or other I cannot help remembering the wounded
little girl. There she lay, dying from loss of blood; there at the
turning of the footpath, near the two little birch trees.




MY EXPERIENCES IN THE WAR HOSPITALS OF RUMANIA

_The Horrors of the Little Balkan Kingdom_

_Told by Queen Marie of Rumania_

  Driven into exile with her many subjects, who had to retreat before
  the Hun just as the Belgians and Serbians were forced out of their
  peaceful homes in the debacle of war, Queen Marie of Rumania turned
  to the pen, and with it pictured the horrors that have engulfed
  the pretty little Balkan kingdom. Queen Marie was married to King
  Ferdinand in 1893, and was then the Princess Marie of Edinburgh,
  the daughter of Alfred I, Duke of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha, Prince of
  Great Britain and Ireland. Noted for her beauty, idolized by her
  people, she has devoted herself to Red Cross work and the care of
  her stricken people ever since the entry of Rumania into the war. In
  devoting her pen to the cause of her adopted country, Queen Marie has
  followed the example of her husband's aunt, the late Queen Elizabeth
  (Carmen Sylva), whose charming books of poetry and prose deal almost
  entirely with the customs and folklore of Rumania. In this article in
  the _Philadelphia Public Ledger_ Queen Marie gives a graphic picture
  of war-torn Rumania.


I--"I WATCH MY RUMANIANS GO TO WAR"

The trains are passing ... passing ... and the cargo they are hurrying
thither is the youth of our country and the hope of our homes....

By thousands they are massed together; they sit on the roofs of the
wagons, they hang on to their sides, they balance themselves in
perilous positions, but all of them are gay, ... they shout, they sing,
they laugh....

And the trains pass, pass ... all day the trains pass.... With hands
full of flowers we hurry to the stations; our hearts are heavy; we long
to say words they will remember, to tell them what we feel, but their
voices raised in chorus drown all we would say.

One cry is on every lip when they see me, "We are going! Going gladly,
going to victory, so that you may become Empress--Empress of all the
Rumanians!" There is hardly a voice that does not say it; it is the cry
of every heart; they hope it, they believe it, they mean it to me, and
I smile back at them offering them my flowers, which they clutch at
with eager hands.

And thus the trains pass ... pass....


II--"THE SOLDIERS SHOWERED ME WITH FLOWERS"

One evening the sun was going down in glowing glory, turning all it
shone over into glittering gold. I was late, other duties having kept
me back; the train I had come to greet was already moving away.

In joyous crowds the young soldiers thronged the carriages; others had
been before me to deck their caps, their tunics, even their horses
and cannons, with bright violet asters of every shade. The prodigious
radiance of sunset fell over all those flowers, enhancing their beauty,
as though even the heavens were doing their utmost to render more
blessed the departure of those eager boys, who so gayly were going to
death.

Hurriedly I ran toward the moving carriages, distressed at being late.
A great shout mounted from a thousand throats as they recognized me and
a shower of flowers fell at my feet.

From their caps, their tunics, their cannons they tore away the flowers
that had been given them to shower them over their Queen, while the
usual chorus mounted to the skies: "May you become Empress--Empress of
all the Rumanians."...

And always more flowers fell over me; my arms were full; my hands could
hardly hold them; the ground was purple where I stood....

Long did I remain there after the train had disappeared. A trail of
smoke against the orange sky alone marked its passage, and all those
fading flowers at my feet.

As one looks at the incomprehensible, I gazed at those two long rails
running into the infinite, there seeming to join their separate ways,
and wondered toward what fate those youths were hurrying; wondered if
their dream would be realized; especially I wondered how many would
come back....

The sun had set, the smoke had dissolved into nothing; the voices of
my soldiers were but a remembrance ... slowly I turned my foot toward
home....


III--"I BEND OVER THE SUFFERING FACES"

All day long I have been moving among the wounded, wandering from ward
to ward--they all want me to come among them, each soldier desirous to
see his Queen....

Never do I leave a call unanswered; everywhere do I go; no sight is too
sad, no fatigue is too great, no way too long, but sometimes it is to
me as though I were wandering through some never-ending dream.

Bed beside bed they lie there, and all eyes meet me, follow me, consume
me; never before have I known what it means to be the prey of so many
eyes.... They seem to be drawing my heart from my bosom, to be a weight
I can hardly bear!

I bend over suffering faces, clasp outstretched hands, lay my fingers
upon heated brows, gaze into dying eyes, listen to whispered
words--and everywhere the same wish follows me: "May you become
Empress--Empress of all the Rumanians!" Stiffening lips murmur it to
me, hopeful voices cry it out to me; it goes with me wherever I move:
"What matters our suffering as long as you become Empress--Empress
of all the Rumanians!" Infinitely touching are the words when they
mount toward me from the beds of so many wounded, who see in me the
realization, the incarnation of the dream for which they are giving
their lives.

It makes me feel so small, so humble before their stoic endurance;
tears come to my eyes and yet, because of the beauty of it, I have a
great wish to thank God.

Why should I be chosen to represent an ideal? Why should just I be the
symbol? What right have I to stand above them, to buy glory with the
shedding of their blood?...

And always more tenderly do I pass from bed to bed....

That was at a time when hope still sang in every soul, when in the
first enthusiasm all hearts beat in unison, when belief in glorious
victory gladdened the day....

But much later, under widely different circumstances in quite another
place, the same words were said to me by one who could not see my face,
for that morning he had been trepanned; his bandaged head was lying in
a pool of blood....

Some one told him that his Queen was beside him, that she had come to
see him, to inquire about his sufferings; to help him if he needed help.

A groping hand was stretched out toward me; I took it in mine,
whispering words of comfort; bending low toward the parched lips that
were murmuring something that at first I could not understand. The man
had no face, no eyes; all was swathed in blood-stained cloths. Then,
as though from very far, came the words, the same brave words: "May the
great God protect you. May He let you live to become Empress--Empress
of all the Rumanians!"


IV--"I PRAYED TO GOD TO LISTEN"

It was to me as though something very wonderful had quite suddenly
descended upon the distress of my soul, something very holy, very
beautiful; but that was almost more than I could bear.... Touching had
been that wish when hope shone before us like a star, but now it was
more than touching, it was grand and sacred, for it was pronounced at
an hour when darkest disaster had overthrown our land, when inch by
inch our armies were retreating before the all-invading foe. There in
that chamber of suffering those dying lips still spoke of the hope they
clung to, of the dream that, in spite of sacrifice, death and misery,
one day must surely come true....

That dying man was but one of many, a voice out of the unknown, a
martyr without a name; but his words had gone home to my heart.

As I bent over him, laying my hand gently upon his crimson-stained
rags, I prayed to God to listen to his wish; prayed that the blood of
so many humble heroes should not be given in vain; prayed that when
that great hour of liberation should sound at last an echo of the shout
of victory that that day would sound over all our land should reach the
heart of this nameless one beyond the shadow into which he was sinking,
so that even beyond the grave he should still have a share in the glory
his living eyes were not destined to see....




"WITH THE GERMAN ARMIES IN THE WEST"--VISITS TO THE GENERAL STAFF

_Told by Sven Hedin, Noted Swedish Explorer--Authorized Translation
from, the Swedish by H. G. Dewalterstorff_

  This is one of the most remarkable narratives of the War. It is a
  great historical record, as well as a fascinating story of personal
  experiences. Dr. Sven Hedin is one of the great Swedish explorers
  and historians. His record as a man of intrepid daring is known
  throughout Europe. By special permission of the Kaiser, Dr. Hedin
  was commissioned to visit and observe the German Armies in Belgium
  and France. He is the friend of Kings and was received with open
  arms at the headquarters of the general staff of the German Army.
  These experiences he describes in a volume entitled "With the German
  Armies in the West," which is one of the few War books which has been
  accepted by the German government as a true record. Dr. Hedin's talks
  with the Kaiser, the Crown Prince, and the Army Officers, with his
  journeys along the battle grounds of the Western front, allow us to
  look behind the scenes for the first time. A few selections from his
  remarkable tales are here given by permission of his publishers _John
  Lane Company_.

[2] I--"ON MY WAY TO WILHELMSTRASSE, BERLIN"

The rain falls thick and heavy and patters down on the dripping lines
outside my balcony. Berlin is dull and miserable in the autumn when the
rain sweeps its long, monotonously straight streets with their heavy,
dark houses. Not even the trooping of the colors and the march past
at midday raise the drooping spirits, and only a few pedestrians with
open umbrellas join the band and march in step with the soldiers. No
calls are made, no visits paid, for the whole of the aristocracy is in
mourning for lost relatives and everybody's thoughts are centered on
the war. Nobody feels inclined for the futile pleasures of ordinary
times when the newspapers speak of a father who has lost four sons at
the front, or of a mother whose three sons have each died a hero's
death for Emperor and country. But no complaints are heard, no tears
seen. In the streets one seldom sees signs of mourning. There is
perhaps a tacit convention not to express in black and white the
sorrow which is felt at the bottom of the heart, but to make the grief
subservient to the proud consciousness that the beloved one has fallen
for his country, never to return!...

But the rain keeps on falling and beats against the window-panes.
I hurry downstairs, jump into a taxi and in a few minutes I am
sitting in an elegant drawing-room at the dainty new residence of
the Swedish Minister, at the corner of Friedrich Wilhelmstrasse and
Tiergartenstrasse, chatting with old friends--needless to say, about
the war. When I last met Count Taube in Berlin, I had just returned
from a long journey in the Far East. Now I stood on the threshold of a
new journey, which might be infinitely longer than the last! Later in
the day I visited another nobleman, Prince von Wedel, whom I had met
in Vienna when he was ambassador there, and in Strassburg when he was
Governor. We had much to talk about, but what is there to discuss in
these days but the great and bloody drama which occupies everyone's
thoughts--the War!

My most important visit in Berlin was to the Foreign Office. But before
narrating what took place there I must say a few words about the
reasons which led up to my journey. It was desirable that no one in
a responsible position in Sweden should have an inkling of my journey
to the front. Our country belonged to the neutral states, and thus no
authority must entertain the slightest shadow of suspicion that I was
traveling on any sort of secret mission. No,--the reason was a very
simple one. Only a few days' journey away the greatest war of all time
was being waged. It was clear that the outcome of this struggle would
decide the political development for the next fifty or hundred years,
or perhaps longer. In any case its shadows must envelop the remainder
of the lives of the present generation....

Once this war is over, whole libraries of books will be written about
it. I do not think it an exaggeration to say that on the western front
alone upwards of a million and a half diaries are being kept at the
present moment. In all directions, in all fighting units down to the
company, the platoon and the battery, official war journals are being
kept and accounts of the fighting are being prepared from the bedrock
furnished on the one hand by the draft of outgoing reports and on the
other by incoming papers, orders, reports and communications. The
soldiers record their own personal experiences, the officers their
military observations. Many a notebook has no doubt protected a heart
or checked the death-dealing bullet. Thus the sections of the German
General Staff, whose task it will be in due course to prepare the
materials, will be occupied for many years to come with this monumental
labor.

When I went out to the front, it was clearly established in my mind
that my narrative would be quite different from the military accounts.
I was not going to devote any attention to matters of purely military
science, which could only be dealt with by experts.


II--"I MEET HERR VON ZIMMERMANN"

I am standing on the doorstep and ringing the bell at the Foreign
Office at 76 Wilhelmstrasse, Berlin.

The Under Secretary of State, Herr von Zimmermann, who is acting
Foreign Minister in Berlin whilst His Excellency von Jagow is at the
Main Headquarters, received me with open arms and said that all he knew
was that I was to proceed straightway to the said Headquarters.

"But where are the Main Headquarters?" I asked.

"That is a secret," Herr von Zimmermann answered, with a smile.

"Good, but how am I to get there?"

"Oh, the Chief of the Great General Staff, Colonel-General von Moltke,
has given instructions that a car is to be kept at your disposal. You
may decide yourself when you would like to start. An officer and an
orderly will accompany you, and if you like you can travel to the Main
Headquarters day and night without stopping, or you can choose your own
road and time. In fact, you are at liberty to do as you like."

"And afterwards?"

"After that your fate will rest in the hands of His Excellency von
Moltke. No doubt he will map out a plan for your journey. The only
thing you have to think about now is to get to him."

"And where shall I find the car?"

"This paper will tell you."

Herr von Zimmermann handed me a permit from the Great General Staff
which read as follows: "The bearer of this permit is entitled to use
the relays of the Imperial Volunteer Automobile Corps to the Main
Headquarters. Everything that can in any way expedite his journey is to
be placed at his disposal."


III--"MY ARRIVAL AT THE GREAT GENERAL STAFF IN LUXEMBURG"

Still as ignorant regarding the whereabouts of the Main Headquarters
as when we left Berlin, we set out from Treves in the morning of the
18th of September, recrossed the Moselle, and cast a glance up at the
heights from which on August 4th Frenchmen in mufti were heliographing
to the airships, who wanted to know how the German mobilization was
getting on. At the flying station we stopped a moment to have a look at
the _Taubes_ in their canvas sheds....

Now we begin to look about. Yes, it is obvious that the Main
Headquarters are still at Luxemburg. Sentries at the entrances to all
hotels, soldiers everywhere, officers rushing past in motor-cars. In a
market-place large tents have been put up for horses, and round them
walk the sentries smoking their pipes; in another open space there are
rows of motor-cars laden with petrol and oil in cylinders.

We must observe becoming military precision in our search and
consequently make at once for the house where the Great General Staff
has taken up its quarters, and which in ordinary times is a Luxemburg
school. Von Krum gets down and soon returns with the intimation that
we must report ourselves to a Lieutenant-Colonel Hahnke. He sent us
off to the Chief of the General Staff, His Excellency von Moltke, who
with his charming Swedish Countess has just sat down to dinner at the
_Kölnischer Hof_, where they reside. The Countess was on a short visit
to Luxemburg in the service of the Red Cross. Here I felt almost as if
I were at home, for I had many times been a guest in their hospitable
home in Berlin. As calm as if he had been on manoeuvers, the Chief lit
his cigar and made detailed enquiries about my plans and wishes. I
said I wanted to go to the front and see as much as I might be allowed
to, mentioning that it was my intention subsequently to describe what
I had seen of the war with my own eyes. If possible I wanted to get an
impression of a modern battle, and hoped also to get an opportunity of
visiting the occupied parts of Belgium.

The Chief thought for a moment. Permission to visit the front had
already been granted to me by the Emperor, and it only remained to
decide which would be the best place for me to begin my observations.
The army of the German Crown Prince was the nearest, only a couple of
hours away. The Chief would arrange everything for my journey, and I
was shortly to receive details of the programme. "Of course, there can
be no question of safety in the fighting zone," he said, "it is not far
away. If you listen you can hear the thunder of guns from Verdun."...

It would take too long to describe all the interesting acquaintances I
made in Luxemburg and to introduce to the reader all the eminent men
with whom I spoke during the two days I spent in this little town.
Suffice it to mention the Imperial Chancellor von Bethmann Holweg, the
Foreign Minister von Jagow, the War Minister Lieutenant-General von
Falkenhayn, and the Chief of the Imperial Volunteer Automobile Corps
the young Prince Waldemar, son of Prince Henry.

The Main Headquarters are the head or rather the brain of the army
in the field, where all plans are made and from which all orders are
issued. It is an incredibly complicated apparatus with an organization
of which every detail has been prepared in advance. When an apparatus
of this kind is installed in a small town like Luxemburg, all hotels,
schools, barracks, Government offices, as well as a number of private
houses, have to be requisitioned for billets. The invaded country
has no alternative but to resign itself to its fate. But nothing is
taken promiscuously, everything will be made good after the war. The
War Ministry is housed in an hotel, the General Staff--as already
mentioned--in a school, the officers of the automobile corps, in a
private house, and so on. The Commander-in-Chief, von Moltke, resided
at the _Kölnischer Hof_, the Imperial Chancellor and the Foreign
Minister in an exceptionally elegant private house, whilst the
Emperor's personal staff and suite were stopping at the _Hotel Staar_,
where a room was also placed at my disposal....


IV--"AN INVITATION TO DINE WITH THE EMPEROR"

Directly I arrived in Luxemburg, I was honored with an invitation
to dine with the Emperor William the following day at one o'clock.
Most of the guests were stopping at the _Hotel Staar_, and the cars
were to leave there in good time. I went with Adjutant-General,
Lieutenant-General von Gontard, Acting General à la suite. The street
close to the Imperial residence was railed off, the barriers being
withdrawn by the soldiers to let our car pass. The Emperor lived in
the house of the German Minister and had his private apartments on the
first floor. On the ground floor was the chancellerie, where enormous
maps of the theaters of war were mounted on easels, and next to it was
the dining-room, quite a small apartment.

The guests, all in field uniform, without any display, for-gathered in
the chancellerie. I myself was dressed in the most flagrant, everyday
clothes--in the field nothing is carried for show. Among the Emperor's
suite I recognized a couple of old acquaintances, the Headquarters
Commandant, Adjutant-General, Colonel-General von Plessen, and
the President of the Navy Council, Admiral von Müller, of Swedish
descent, who spoke Swedish as fluently as German. The others were his
Excellency von Treutler and Lieutenant-General Baron Marschall, Colonel
von Mutius, acting aide-de-camp, the Princes Pless and Arnim and the
Emperor's body-physician, Dr. Ilberg. We were thus ten all told.


V--"THE DOOR OPENED ... EMPEROR WILLIAM ENTERED"

At the stroke of one the door from the vestibule was opened and Emperor
William entered with a firm, quiet step. All glances were fixed on
the strongly built, well-knit figure. The room became as quiet as
the grave. One realized that one was in the presence of a great
personality. The little room, otherwise so humble, now had a deeper
significance. Here was the axis, the pivot round which the world's
happenings turned. Here was the center from which the war was directed.
Germany is to be crushed, so say its enemies. "_Magst ruhig sein_,"[3]
says the German army to its Fatherland. And here in our midst stands
its supreme war-lord, a picture of manliness, resolution and honorable
frankness. Around him flit the thoughts and passions of the whole
world. He is the object of love, blind confidence and admiration, but
also of fear, hate and calumny. Round him, who loves peace, rages the
greatest war of all times, and his name is ringed with strife....

Any feeling of timidity one may have had whilst waiting for the most
powerful and most remarkable man in the world vanished completely
once the Emperor, after a more than hearty handshake and a cheery
welcome, began to speak. His voice is manly and military, he speaks
extraordinarily plainly without slurring over a single syllable, he
is never at a loss for a word, but always strikes the nail on the
head--often in exceedingly forceful terms. He punctuates his sentences
with quick and expressive gestures. His speech flows smoothly, is
always terse and interesting and is often suddenly interrupted by
questions delivered with lightning precision, which one must endeavor
to answer equally quickly and clearly. A good answer never fails to
elicit the Emperor's approval. He is exceedingly impulsive and his
conversation is a mixture of earnest and jest. A ready repartee or an
amusing tale causes him to laugh so heartily that his shoulders shake
with it.

At the Emperor's bidding we passed into the dining-room. Admiral von
Müller sat on the left, I on the right of our august host, and opposite
him was Adjutant-General von Gontard. The table was simply laid. The
only luxury that could be discovered was a bell of gold placed in front
of the Emperor's cover, and which he rang when a new course was to be
brought in. The dinner was equally plain, consisting of soup, meat with
vegetables, a sweet dish and fruit with claret. I have seldom been as
hungry as when I rose from this table: not on account of the dishes,
but because there had not been a moment's silence up to the time
when the bell rang for the last time and bade the uniformed servants
withdraw our chairs as we rose. The Emperor talked to me all the time.
He began by reminding me of my last lecture in Berlin, at which he was
present, and he conjectured that Tibet, where I had passed through such
stirring times, would probably soon be the only country in the world
where peace reigned. Then we spoke of the political position and of the
storms that are sweeping over Europe....

On a table in the chancellerie were cigars and cigarettes round a
lighted candle. Here the conversation was continued with zest and
vigor, and jest and earnest, horrors of war and funny stories were all
jumbled together; finally the Emperor took his leave, wishing me a
successful and instructive trip, and went up to his apartments, where
no doubt piles of papers and letters, reports and telegrams awaited him.

The talk of the Emperor having aged during the war, and of the war with
all its labors and anxieties having sapped his strength and health, is
all nonsense. His hair is no more pronouncedly iron gray than before
the war, his face has color, and far from being worn and thin, he
is plump and strong, bursting with energy and rude health. A man of
Emperor William's stamp is in his element when, through the force of
circumstances, he is compelled to stake all he possesses and above all
himself for the good and glory of his country.


VI--"I GO TO SEE THE CROWN PRINCE"

I returned to the _Hotel Staar_ just in time to meet the young
lieutenant who had been instructed by General Moltke to take me to the
Headquarters of the Crown Prince's Army. His name was Hans von Gwinner
and he is the son of the great banker and Bagdad Railway magnate in
Berlin. He was a wide-awake and capable young fellow and drove his car
himself. I sat down beside him, whilst the orderly accompanying us took
his seat inside.

It poured with rain as we left the town. The road was slippery, but
we had studded tires and the lieutenant drove at terrific speed. We
had started off rather late and we wanted to get in before dark. It is
better thus, otherwise one is not entirely safe from the attentions of
_franctireurs_. A whole lot of them had recently been caught by the
Fifth Army and shot without hesitation....

We stop outside the house in which the General in Command of the 5th
Army has taken up his quarters. I was able to speak there without
difficulty to one of my friends from the Main Headquarters, Landrat
Baron von Maltzahn, Member of the Reichstag and a personal friend of
the Crown Prince. He was able to give me the welcome news that I was
expected and that I must hurry in order to be in time for supper, which
was served at eight o'clock. So we drove at once up to the little
French château, where His I. & R. Highness had elected to stay. Here I
said good-bye to my excellent friend Lieutenant von Gwinner and thanked
him for his companionship. Thus he, too, disappears from my horizon,
and I stand before a new association of acquaintances and friendships.

Footmen in military uniforms at once took charge of my baggage and
conducted me to my room on the first floor, next door to the Crown
Prince's private apartments. A few minutes before eight the acting
Lord-in-Waiting, Court-Marshal von Behr, knocked at my door. He was
a pleasant young man of distinguished and attractive appearance, and
he had come to bring me in to supper. We went out through the upper
vestibule and down the stairs, from the landing of which we were
fortunate enough to witness a pleasing ceremony. In the lower hall
stood a number of officers in line, and opposite them some twenty
soldiers formed up in the same way. Then came the Crown Prince William,
tall, slim and royally straight, dressed in a dazzling white tunic and
wearing the Iron Cross of the first and second class; he walked with
a firm step between the lines of soldiers. An adjutant followed him,
carrying in a casket a number of Iron Crosses. The Crown Prince took
one and handed it to the nearest officer, whom he thanked for the
services which he had rendered to his Emperor and country, and then
with a hearty handshake he congratulated the hero whom he had thus
honored.

When all the officers had received their decorations, the reward for
their bravery, the turn came of the soldiers, the ceremony being
precisely the same as with the officers; but I found it hard to
distinguish what the soldiers said in their loud, rough and nervous
voices. At last I distinguished the words: _Danke untertänigst
Kaiserliche Hoheit_ (I humbly thank your Imperial Highness).


VII--"AT SUPPER WITH THE CROWN PRINCE"

When the knights of the Iron Cross had taken their departure, we went
down into the hall, where the Crown Prince stepped up to me and bade me
heartily welcome to his Headquarters and to the seat of war. The meal,
which might as well have been called dinner as supper, was attended by
the following gentlemen: Lieutenant-General Schmidt von Knobelsdorff,
Chief of Staff of the 5th Army, Court-Marshal von Behr, Chief of the
Medical Corps, Body-Physician Professor Widenmann, Majors von der
Planitz, von Müller, personal Adjutant to H.I. & R.H., and Heymann,
Lieutenant von Zobeltitz and a few members of the Staff, who arrived
later after the day's work in the field and took their seats at the
lower end of the table.

Would you like to know what the German Crown Prince, the Crown Prince
of Prussia, eats for supper? Here is the menu: cabbage soup, boiled
beef with horseradish and potatoes, wild duck with salad, fruit,
wine, and coffee with cigars. And what would you say the conversation
was about? It is hard to say exactly, but we traveled over almost
the whole world with the ease bred by familiarity. The Crown Prince,
like the Emperor, began with Tibet, and from there it was but a step
across the Himalayas to the palms of the Hugli Delta, the pagodas
of Benares, the silver moonlight over Taj Mahal, the tigers of the
jungle and the music of the crystal waves of India beating against the
rocks of Malabar point. We also spoke of old unforgettable memories
and of common friends who now love us no longer--of the brave and
famous Kitchener, the conqueror of Omdurman and South Africa, of the
Maharajahs and their fairy-like splendor at Bikanir, Kutch Behar,
Gwalior, Kashmir and Idar.

We also talked about the war and its horrors, and the terrible
sacrifices it demands. "But it cannot be helped," said the Crown
Prince, "our Fatherland asks us to give all we have, and _we will, we
must_ win, even if the whole world takes up arms against us."

"Is not the calm here wonderful! We seem to be living to-night in the
most absolute peace, and yet it is but a couple of hours' drive to the
firing line," observes my Imperial host after listening to a short,
concise and satisfactory report made in a ringing voice by an officer
who has just entered. "Yes, your Imperial Highness, I had imagined
the Staff Headquarters of an army to resemble a buzzing beehive, but
now that I have the reality before me, I find no trace of anxiety or
nervousness, nothing but calm and assurance everywhere. But what I
should like to see most of all would be a battle, for I suspect that in
common with most other civilians I have formed an erroneous opinion on
this subject."

The Crown Prince smiles and answers: "Yes, battle painters like
Neuville and Détaille would have little use for their art in these
days. Of the fighting men one sees practically nothing, for they
are concealed by the ground and in the trenches, and it is rather
dangerous to get too close to a bayonet charge--unless one's duty takes
one there."

What life and spirit at the Crown Prince's Headquarters! Everything was
gay with the freshness of youth, and devoid of restraint. No trace of
the stiffness of court ceremonial. Even General Schmidt, who usually
maintained the strictest discipline, was infected by the prevailing
spirit of camaradie. But owing to the terrible burden of work which
rested on the shoulders of the Chief of Staff, it was not unusual for
him to come in for his meals after the others. The supper, or rather
the talk after it, went on till about eleven--these were the only hours
when one could meet in quiet, for during the day everyone was busy with
his duties, and the Crown Prince then occupied his post as commanding
officer at suitable points at the front.

The château where we were staying belonged to an aristocratic French
lady--if I remember rightly her name was du Vernier. When the war
broke out she moved to Bordeaux. On her return after the contest she
will find her château, her estates and the beautiful park in the same
condition as when she went away. There was a certain aristocratic
grandeur about the château, though signs of decay were already making
themselves apparent. On the mantelpiece in my room stood a pendulum
clock of gilt bronze of an antique mythological design, and on each
side stood a couple of gorgeous candelabra. The walls were decorated
with a few unassuming pictures, amongst them a portrait of an old
French warrior.

I open my window, it is pitch-dark outside, and the rain falls close
and heavy upon the trees and lawns outside. Tired after a somewhat
ambitious day's work, I hurry to bed, the more so as I suspect the next
day's programme to be no less exacting....


VIII--WITH THE GERMAN SOLDIERS--"TO VICTORY OR DEATH"

But events move all too fast. Observations and impressions follow so
quickly upon one another that it is difficult to assimilate them all.
The whole road is full of supply columns moving southward, and we meet
innumerable empty transport lorries on the way north, to be reloaded
at some railway station. Here we also see fresh young troops, all
strapping fellows, who have come direct from Germany to go straight
to victory or death. All are jolly and eager; truly, they look as if
the whole affair were to them but an autumn manoeuver, and as if they
felt no trace of excitement. They march along with easy bearing and
sing merry soldiers' ditties under the leaden skies now darkening this
unhappy, bleeding France. They light their pipes and their eternal
cigarettes, laugh and chat--as if they were going to a picnic in the
country. In reality they are going out to fill the gaps made by the
French fire in the ranks of their comrades. They are _Ersatstruppen_,
i.e., reinforcements, but I do not see a single face which betrays the
slightest feeling that death is near. They hear the thunder of the guns
better than we do, for the humming of the car drowns all other sounds.
But they seem to delight in the dull music, and yet their place is far
in advance of the artillery positions. _Ersatstruppen!_ it means that
their duty is to _replace_ the fallen, and that the same fate awaits
themselves. Yet they are gay and happy. "_Dulce et decorum est pro
patria mori._"...

We now begin to notice that we are approaching the firing line. The
whole road is encumbered with troops. Here comes a detachment of
wounded on foot, with bandages round heads and hands, or with the arm
in a sling. We meet an empty ammunition column, an endless string of
rattling wagons.

The artillery ammunition column which we are just now passing is an
impressive sight. The noise of these vehicles, dull and heavy, is
quite different from that of the empty wagons on our left, but then
they are loaded to the top with heavy ammunition, shells for 21-cm.
mortars at Septsarges and neighbouring villages. Every ammunition
wagon--consisting of limber and wagon body--with its team of six horses
requires the services of six men. Three of them--drivers--ride on the
off-side horses, two are seated on the limber, and one facing the rear
on the wagon body. They are armed with Mauser pistols fastened on the
left side of the belt, but the swords of the drivers are securely
strapped on to the left side of the saddle.

The horses are fat and sleek, and pull without exerting themselves
unduly. They move at a walking pace--anything else would be impossible
on this road. It is a far finer sight to see one of these columns
trundling along at full speed with the horses moving at a sharp trot
or gallop. Even at the pace at which they are now travelling these
endless columns are an impressive and attractive sight. What does it
matter if the helmets, in order not to glitter and attract attention,
are concealed by a cover which even hides the spike surmounting them;
what does it matter if the men's uniforms are of the same dirty grey as
the clay and mud of the soil? The whole team looks picturesque enough
with its massive, solid wagon, its pole, its leather fittings and its
harness.

Tramp, tramp go the horses' hoofs, and behind them comes the rattling
of the heavy wagons. One rider sings, another whistles and a third is
shouting at a refractory horse. Behind sit a couple of men rolling
cigarettes, which by the way is more difficult than it sounds when a
wagon is jolting up and down. This column also has a mounted escort.
The train is wound up by a field kitchen with a couple of store wagons
on which a few bundles of firewood are also lying. Without ceasing,
this eternal tramp, tramp, keeps dinning into our ears as the columns
slowly travel southward, a never-ending stream of warriors, horses,
ammunition and provisions.


IX--"WE DROVE THROUGH A ROARING SEA OF LOUD HURRAHS"

It was still daylight when we returned to our domicile, where the Crown
Prince, just back from his day's work, was resting in the doorway. A
moment later I went out for a walk in the town. At the bridges over
the Meuse I was stopped by the sentries, who in authoritative but
invariably polite tones asked to see my _Ausweis_. That they found me
suspicious-looking, ambling along as I did with a sketch-book under my
arm, was not to be wondered at. Only one of them, an honest Landwehr
man, declared categorically that my pass was not sufficient. "Oh," I
said. "The name of the Chief of the General Staff of the Field Army,
General Moltke, does not impress you?" "No, the permit must be viséd by
the 5th Army," he replied. A couple of his comrades saved the situation
after reading the permit, and declared that General Moltke was good
enough for them....

It had been arranged that at about half-past six I should look out for
the Crown Prince and his staff as they passed through Dun on their
way back from Romagne. The time was approaching, and we were on the
watch. The traffic had not decreased at all, rather the reverse. For
a moment it looked like a block, and it would have been a nice thing
if the Crown Prince had arrived just then. We crossed the bridge and
were outside the town, when the aristocratic-looking cars, bearing
the mark, _General Ober Kommando V. Armee_, came tearing along at full
speed. Beside the chauffeur of the first one sat the Crown Prince
himself in a cloak with a high collar. He made a sign to me to get
in and I took my seat behind him. Then he talked for a while to the
officers of the lines of communications, and after that we started. But
now the pace was slow, as we happened to meet an infantry regiment.
The men took hold of their helmets by the spike, raised them aloft and
gave a rousing cheer, as if they were charging a French position. But
this time the cheer was meant for the Commander of the 5th Army and the
heir to the throne, and we drove through a roaring sea of loud hurrahs.
Gradually the ranks thinned out and finally came the stragglers--for
there are footsore men even in the best marching army of all--in small
groups of two or three, but they cheered as wildly as the rest. Last of
all a solitary man stood by the side of the road. He, too, joined in
with all the strength of his lungs. When the Crown Prince had reassumed
his motor goggles and turned up the collar of his cloak he was not
easily recognised, especially by the men of the transport columns we
met, who had their horses to look after. But his Imperial and Royal
Highness turned half round to me and said unassumingly that nothing
pleased him more than to find that he was supported and understood
by the soldiers. He considered it the first duty of a prince to show
himself worthy of the confidence of his whole people, and for his own
part he could not imagine a greater happiness than to occupy such a
position in the minds of the German people.


X--"AT DINNER WITH THE CROWN PRINCE"

We reached home in due course and sat down to table. The spirits of
the company were as cheerful and unconstrained as usual, though one
would have expected high-sounding speeches, toasts and cheering.

Dinner had been going on for some time when Professor Widenmann, the
body-physician, came in and took his place. He had been at a hospital,
looking after our friend, Baron von Maltzahn, who had been the victim
of a motor accident in the course of the day. The car, while going at a
terrific pace, had skidded at a corner of the wet road and turned over.
Von Maltzahn lay underneath and had the whole weight of the car on his
chest. He had a couple of ribs broken, a broken leg, concussion of the
brain and general shock. His condition was rather alarming, but the
professor had good hopes of his recovery.

That professor is a man one would never forget. We took to each other,
more especially as he had travelled all over the world. He had seen a
great deal of Africa, and had been very near the summit of Kilima Njaro
when he was forced to turn back by wind and weather. We had mutual
friends far and near, and long after the others had gone to their rooms
we sat up chatting--on that evening, which was my last with the German
Crown Prince, the Crown Prince of Prussia.

On the following day, September 24, we made a very early breakfast,
after which the cars of the Chief Command of the Army again drove up to
the château. I thanked his Imperial and Royal Highness the Crown Prince
with all my heart for the great hospitality which had been shown me and
for all the memorable things I had had the opportunity of seeing while
with his proud army. After a vigourous shake of the hand and a friendly
_Auf Wiedersehen!_ the energetic young Imperial Prince got into his car
and went off to his duty.


XI--"I WAS ONCE MORE AT THE EMPEROR'S TABLE"

I was once more honoured with an invitation to dine at the Emperor's
table at one o'clock. Those present, apart from the Chamberlain,
included Herren von Plessen, von Gontard and von Busch, the latter
being the German Minister at Luxemburg, also the Emperor's Field
Chaplain and a couple of adjutants. In the forenoon news had been
received of the illness of Prince Oskar. He had contracted some sort
of heart complaint through over-exertion. I expected therefore to find
the Emperor a bit depressed, but there was no sign of it. He walked in
with youthful and military bearing, honoured me once more with a hearty
handshake and bade me welcome back from the 5th Army. Thereupon he took
a letter out of his pocket and asked me to read it through carefully.
Whilst His Majesty was talking to his suite, I read the letter. It was
addressed to the Emperor personally and was written by a sergeant who
had been at Prince Joachim's side when he was wounded. Now the sergeant
wanted to tell his august master how gallantly the Prince had borne
himself and what an example he had been to the soldiers. The letter was
simply and ingenuously written and showed how deep and strong is the
loyalty which binds the German Army to its supreme Chief and Emperor.
The loyalty and unity between Emperor and people, between Commander
and Army, form the firm and immovable rock on which the German Empire
has been built up. When the Emperor turned to me again and asked what
I thought of the letter, I merely answered: "It must be a pleasure to
your Majesty to receive such messages from the rank and file."

"Yes," he replied. "There is nothing that gives me so much pleasure
as these proofs of the faithful loyalty of my people and the close
bonds which bind me to my entire army. Such a letter as this I treasure
amongst my most valued possessions."

Then we talked about Prince Oskar's illness, and whilst on this topic,
the Emperor said: "So you see, now Hohenzollern blood, too, has flowed.
I have six sons and a nephew with me in the war and among the many
German Princes who are fighting at the front several have already given
their lives for Germany's sake."


XII--"SUPPER WITH CROWN PRINCE OF BAVARIA"

We were to drive to Douai, where we were invited to take supper at
8 P.M. with the ... Crown Prince of Bavaria. The distance
is nearly thirty-four kilometres and can easily be covered in
three-quarters of an hour, but the numerous posts stationed on the road
took up much of our time. It was five minutes to eight when we arrived.
An adjutant conducted us to a drawing-room, and we had not waited half
a minute when the Crown Prince entered.

He is one of those rare men whom all love and admire--all except the
English, for I think that even the French cannot help paying him a meed
of respect. In the German army he is looked upon as a very eminent
general--a born strategist and a thoroughly schooled soldier. As
regards appearance, manner and speech, he is fascinating and congenial
in the highest degree, neither regal nor humble, but without artifice
and modest like an ordinary mortal. When one _knows_ that he has
recently experienced the greatest private sorrow which could befall
him, one fancies, perhaps, that one detects a trace thereof in his
features--an air of sadness--but otherwise he does not betray, by a
look or a sigh, how deeply he grieves over the death of the little
prince of thirteen, the darling of all Bavaria. When the country and
the empire are in danger, all private sorrows must be put aside!
The Crown Prince has no time to grieve or to think of the void and
bereavement which he will feel on his victorious return to Munich.
He lives for and with his army, and is like a father to each and all
of his soldiers. He devotes all his power of mind, all his physical
strength, all his time, to the one great object which dominates all
else in the minds of the whole German army.

Crown Prince Rupprecht walks in with brisk and easy stride, stretches
out his hands towards us and gives us a truly cordial welcome. And then
he adds half-humourously: "I expect some other distinguished guests at
my table to-night."

"Who can that be?" asks the Duke.

"The Emperor!" replies the Crown Prince, and clasps his hands together.

"The Emperor?" we cry, for we had no idea that His Majesty was in this
part of the country.

"Yes, the Emperor has visited several units in this neighbourhood
to-day, and has promised ... Hush, I hear his car!" and with that the
Crown Prince hurried out.

Meanwhile the Officers of the General Staff of the Army came to greet
us, and presently the Emperor's suite, among whom I knew several, also
entered. Before I had time to wonder where the supreme War-Lord himself
had gone, we were asked to step into the dining-room. The Emperor was
already seated at the table. We all stepped up to our chairs, but no
one seated himself. The Emperor sat with bowed head, looking very
grave. But suddenly his blue eyes flashed up, and he nodded kindly
in all directions. When he caught sight of me, he extended his hand
across the table and cried gaily: "_Guten Tag, mein lieber Sven Hedin;
es scheint Ihnen gut zu gefallen in meiner Armee_," a sentiment which I
confirmed with the greatest alacrity.

Perhaps it might amuse the reader to hear who were the ten people
seated round Crown Prince Rupprecht's table. Duke Adolf Friedrich of
Mecklenburg sat at the Emperor's right, and Prince Löwenstein at his
left. Right opposite the Emperor sat the Crown Prince--the host--with
Colonel-General von Plessen, Adjutant-General, at his right and myself
at his left. Next to me on the other side was Lieut.-General von
Marschall, with Colonel Tappen, of the Crown Prince's staff, on his
left. To the left of Prince Löwenstein sat General Falkenhayn, Minister
of War, and between him and General von Plessen the chief of the Crown
Prince's staff, General Krafft von Dellmensingen. At another table of
about the same size, covers had been laid for the other gentlemen of
the Emperor's and Crown Prince's staff and suite.


XIII--"THE WAR LORD IN JOLLY SPIRITS"

The Emperor was in brilliant spirits. I really do not know whether he
_can_ be otherwise, for whenever I have had the honour to meet him, he
has always been merry, amiable and witty. He can certainly express at
times in words of thunder his displeasure at some contemptible act on
the part of the enemy, but he is soon sunshine again and bursts into
irresistible laughter at some whimsical idea. He has a wonderful gift
of instilling life into a party and keeping the conversation at high
pitch--as he did here for over two and a half hours. He told us a great
deal of most interesting news, things which had happened in different
parts of the field during the last few days and which, at least to me
and to the Duke, were news indeed. If one asks the Emperor any question
about the conditions in more or less remote countries, as to which
sparse or contradictory information has come to one's ears, he will,
off-hand, and with a masterly marshalling of facts, deliver a veritable
lecture on its internal and external policy, its public sentiments, its
resources, and its military strength. I think I have never met a man
who can rival Emperor William in this respect.

He also possesses the faculty of grasping with lightning quickness
and judging the opinions expressed by others. He listened with the
liveliest interest to Crown Prince Rupprecht as the latter gave
him various details about his army, and to me when I described the
bombardment of Ostend.

It was past half-past ten when the Emperor laid down his cigar and
rose to say good-bye with that vigorous handshake which leaves its
mark on one's knuckles. The Crown Prince alone accompanied him out
into the hall, which immediately adjoined the dining-room and from
which a few steps led out into the road. A soldier stood ready holding
the Emperor's light greyish-blue cloak, with dark fur collar; another
handed him the plain Prussian officer's field-cap. After the host and
his guest had exchanged a few more words they went out to the car,
which drove off rapidly into the night.

FOOTNOTES:

[2] All numerals relate to stories herein told--not to chapters in
original sources.

[3] From the line "_Lieb Vaterland magst ruhig sein_" ("Be undismayed,
dear Fatherland"), in _Die Wacht am Rhein_.




"THE FIRST HUNDRED THOUSAND"--WITH KITCHENER'S ARMY IN FRANCE

_Stories Straight from the Trenches_

_Told by Captain Ian Hay Beith, Famous Scotch Novelist with the Argyil
and Sutherland Highlanders_

  Ian Hay's collection of War stories is pronounced in England "the
  greatest book of the War." This Scotch novelist went to the trenches
  to fight with the Highlanders. He sends "back home" graphic and
  absorbing stories of a thousand heroes. They are full of humor, with
  bits of superb character drawing that make the men at the front seem
  like old friends. His division has been badly cut up and seriously
  reduced in numbers during the War; he has risen from a sub-lieutenant
  to the rank of Captain, finally to be transferred to the machine
  gun division and recommended for a military cross. The story of the
  first hundred thousand was originally contributed in the form of an
  anonymous narrative to _Blackwood's Magazine_. In a letter to his
  publishers, Capt. Beith describes the circumstances under which he
  is writing: "I write this from the stone floor of an outhouse, where
  the pigmeal is first accumulated and then boiled up at a particularly
  smelly French farm, which is saying a good deal. It is a most
  interesting life and if I come through the present unpleasantness
  I shall have enough copy to last me twenty years." His pictures of
  the Great Struggle, uniquely rich in graphic human detail, have been
  collected into a volume, "The First Hundred Thousand," by _Houghton,
  Mifflin and Company_, of Boston and New York, which is creating wide
  attention. One of the stories entitled, "The Front of the Front," is
  here retold by permission of his publishers.

[4] I--THE FRONT OF THE FRONT

We took over these trenches a few days ago; and as the Germans are
barely two hundred yards away, this chapter seems to justify its
title.... We find that we are committed to an indefinite period of
trench life, like every one else.

Certainly we are starting at the bottom of the ladder. These trenches
are badly sited, badly constructed, difficult of access from the rear,
and swarming with large, fat, unpleasant flies, of the bluebottle
variety. They go to sleep, chiefly upon the ceiling of one's dugout,
during the short hours of darkness, but for twenty hours out of
twenty-four they are very busy indeed. They divide their attentions
between stray carrion--there is a good deal hereabout--and our rations.
If you sit still for five minutes they also settle upon _you_, like
pins in a pincushion. Then, when face, hands, and knees can endure
no more, and the inevitable convulsive wriggle occurs, they rise in
a vociferous swarm, only to settle again when the victim becomes
quiescent. To these, high-explosives are a welcome relief.

The trenches themselves are no garden city, like those at Armentières.
They were sited and dug in the dark, not many weeks ago, to secure two
hundred yards of French territory recovered from the Boche by bomb and
bayonet. (The captured trench lies behind us now, and serves as our
second line.) They are muddy--you come to water at three feet--and at
one end, owing to their concave formation, are open to enfilade. The
parapet in many places is too low. If you make it higher with sandbags
you offer the enemy a comfortable target: if you deepen the trench you
turn it into a running stream. Therefore long-legged subalterns crawl
painfully past these danger-spots on all-fours, envying Little Tich.


II--STORY OF ZACCHAEUS: "HE LIVES UP A TREE"

Then there is Zacchæus. We call him by this name because he lives up
a tree. There is a row of pollarded willows standing parallel to our
front, a hundred and fifty yards away. Up, or in, one of these lives
Zacchæus. We have never seen him, but we know he is there; because
if you look over the top of the parapet he shoots you through the
head. We do not even know which of the trees he lives in. There are
nine of them, and every morning we comb them out, one by one, with a
machine-gun. But all in vain. Zacchæus merely crawls away into the
standing corn behind his trees, and waits till we have finished. Then
he comes back and tries to shoot the machine-gun officer. He has not
succeeded yet, but he sticks to his task with gentle persistence. He is
evidently of a persevering rather than vindictive disposition.

Then there is Unter den Linden. This celebrated thoroughfare is an old
communication-trench. It runs, half-ruined, from the old German trench
in our rear, right through our own front line, to the present German
trenches. It constitutes such a bogey as the Channel Tunnel scheme once
was: each side sits jealously at its own end, anticipating hostile
enterprises from the other. It is also the residence of "Minnie." But
we will return to Minnie later.

The artillery of both sides, too, contributes its mite. There is a dull
roar far in the rear of the German trenches, followed by a whirring
squeak overhead. Then comes an earth-shaking crash a mile behind us.
We whip round, and there, in the failing evening light, against the
sunset, there springs up the silhouette of a mighty tree in full
foliage. Presently the silhouette disperses, drifts away, and----

"The coals is hame, right enough!" comments Private Tosh.

Instantly our guns reply, and we become the humble spectators of an
artillery duel. Of course, if the enemy gets tired of "searching" the
countryside for our guns and takes to "searching" our trenches instead,
we lose all interest in the proceedings, and retire to our dugouts,
hoping that no direct hits will come our way.

But guns are notoriously erratic in their time-tables, and fickle in
their attentions. It is upon Zacchæus and Unter den Linden--including
Minnie--that we mainly rely for excitement.


III--STORY OF AYLING OF THE MACHINE GUNNERS

As already recorded, we took over these trenches a few days ago, in the
small hours of the morning. In the ordinary course of events, relieving
parties are usually able to march up under cover of darkness to the
reserve trench, half a mile in rear of the firing line, and so proceed
to their appointed place. But on this occasion the German artillery
happened to be "distributing coal" among the billets behind. This made
it necessary to approach our new home by tortuous ways, and to take to
subterranean courses at a very early stage of the journey. For more
than two hours we toiled along a trench just wide enough to permit a
man to wear his equipment, sometimes bent double to avoid the bullets
of snipers, sometimes knee-deep in glutinous mud.

Ayling, leading a machine-gun section who were burdened with their
weapons and seven thousand rounds of ammunition, mopped his steaming
brow and inquired of his guide how much farther there was to go.

"Abart two miles, sir," replied the youth with gloomy satisfaction. He
was a private of the Cockney regiment whom we were relieving; and after
the manner of his kind, would infinitely have preferred to conduct us
down half a mile of a shell-swept road, leading straight to the heart
of things, than waste time upon an uninteresting but safe _détour_.

At this Ayling's Number One, who was carrying a machine-gun tripod
weighing forty-eight pounds, said something--something distressingly
audible--and groaned deeply.

"If we'd come the way I wanted," continued the guide, much pleased with
the effect of his words upon his audience, "we'd a' been there by now.
But the Adjutant, 'e says to me----"

"If we had come the way you wanted," interrupted Ayling brutally, "we
should probably have been in Kingdom Come by now. Hurry up!" Ayling, in
common with the rest of those present, was not in the best of tempers,
and the loquacity of the guide had been jarring upon him for some time.

The Cockney private, with the air of a deeply-wronged man, sulkily led
on, followed by the dolorous procession. Another ten minutes' labored
progress brought them to a place where several ways met.

"This is the beginning of the reserve trenches, sir," announced the
guide. "If we'd come the way I----"

"Lead on!" said Ayling, and his perspiring followers murmured
threatening applause.

The guide, now in his own territory, selected the muddiest opening and
plunged down it. For two hundred yards or so he continued serenely upon
his way, with the air of one exhibiting the metropolis to a party of
country cousins. He passed numerous turnings. Then, once or twice, he
paused irresolutely; then moved on. Finally he halted, and proceeded to
climb out of the trench.

"What are you doing?" demanded Ayling suspiciously.

"We got to cut across the open 'ere, sir," said the youth glibly.
"Trench don't go no farther. Keep as low as you can."

With resigned grunts the weary pilgrims hoisted themselves and their
numerous burdens out of their slimy thoroughfare, and followed their
conductor through the long grass in single file, feeling painfully
conspicuous against the whitening sky. Presently they discovered, and
descended into, another trench--all but the man with the tripod, who
descended into it before he discovered it--and proceeded upon their
dolorous way. Once more the guide, who had been refreshingly but
ominously silent for some time, paused irresolutely.

"Look here, my man," said Ayling, "do you, or do you not, know where
you are?"

The paragon replied hesitatingly:--

"Well, sir, if we'd come by the way I----"

Ayling took a deep breath, and though conscious of the presence of
formidable competitors, was about to make the best of an officer's
vocabulary, when a kilted figure loomed out of the darkness.

"Hallo! Who are you?" inquired Ayling.

"This iss the Camerons' trenches, sirr," replied a polite West Highland
voice. "What trenches wass you seeking?"

Ayeling told him.

"They are behind you, sirr."

"I was just goin' to say, sir," chanted the guide, making one last
effort to redeem his prestige, "as 'ow----"

"Party," commanded Ayling, "about turn!"

Having received details of the route from the friendly Cameron, he
scrambled out of the trench and crawled along to what was now the head
of the procession. A plaintive voice followed him.

"Beg pardon, sir, where shall _I_ go now?"

Ayling answered the question explicitly, and moved off, feeling much
better. The late conductor of the party trailed disconsolately in the
rear.

"I should like to know wot I'm 'ere for," he murmured indignantly.

He got his answer, like a lightning-flash.

"For tae carry _this_," said the man with the tripod, turning round.
"Here, caatch!"


IV--A DAY'S WORK IN THE TRENCHES

The day's work in trenches begins about nine o'clock the night
before. Darkness having fallen, various parties steal out into the
No-Man's-Land beyond the parapet. There are numerous things to be done.
The barbed wire has been broken up by shrapnel, and must be repaired.
The whole position in front of the wire must be patrolled, to prevent
the enemy from creeping forward in the dark. The corn has grown to
an uncomfortable height in places, so a fatigue party is told off to
cut it--surely the strangest species of harvesting that the annals of
agriculture can record. On the left front the muffled clinking of picks
and shovels announces that a "sap" is in course of construction: those
incorrigible night-birds, the Royal Engineers, are making it for the
machine-gunners, who in the fullness of time will convey their voluble
weapon to its forward extremity, and "loose off a belt or two" in the
direction of a rather dangerous hollow midway between the trenches,
from which of late mysterious sounds of digging and guttural talking
have been detected by the officer who lies in the listening-post, in
front of our barbed-wire entanglement, drawing secrets from the bowels
of the earth by means of a microphone.

Behind the firing trench even greater activity prevails. Damage done to
the parapet by shell fire is being repaired. Positions and emplacements
are being constantly improved, communication trenches widened or made
more secure. Down these trenches fatigue parties are filing, to draw
rations and water and ammunition from the limbered wagons which are
waiting in the shadow of a wood, perhaps a mile back. It is at this
hour, too, that the wounded, who have been lying pathetically cheerful
and patient in the dressing-station in the reserve trench, are smuggled
to the Field Ambulance--probably to find themselves safe in a London
hospital within twenty-four hours. Lastly, under the kindly cloak of
night, we bury our dead.

Meanwhile, within various stifling dugouts, in the firing trench or
support trench, overheated company commanders are dictating reports
or filling in returns. (Even now the Round Game Department is not
entirely shaken off.) There is the casualty return, and a report on
the doings of the enemy, and another report of one's own doings, and a
report on the direction of the wind, and so on. Then there are various
indents to fill up--scrawled on a wobbly writing-block with a blunt
indelible pencil by the light of a guttering candle--for ammunition,
and sandbags, and revetting material.

All this literature has to be sent to Battalion Headquarters by one
A.M., either by orderly or telephone. There it is collated
and condensed, and forwarded to the Brigade, which submits it to the
same process and sends it on, to be served up piping hot and easily
digestible at the breakfast-table of the Division, five miles away, at
eight o'clock.


V--SOLDIERS' NIGHT AT THE FRONT

You must not imagine, however, that all this nightwork is performed in
gross darkness. On the contrary. There is abundance of illumination;
and by a pretty thought, each side illuminates the other. We perform
our nocturnal tasks, in front of and behind the firing trench, amid a
perfect hail of star-shells and magnesium lights, topped up at times by
a searchlight--all supplied by our obliging friend the Hun. We, on our
part, do our best to return these graceful compliments.

The curious and uncanny part of it all is that there is no firing.
During these brief hours there exists an informal truce, founded on
the principle of live and let live. It would be an easy business to
wipe out that working-party, over there by the barbed wire, with
a machine-gun. It would be child's play to shell the road behind
the enemy's trenches, crowded as it must be with ration-wagons and
water-carts, into a blood-stained wilderness. But so long as each
side confines itself to purely defensive and recuperative work, there
is little or no interference. That slave of duty, Zacchæus, keeps on
pegging away; and occasionally, if a hostile patrol shows itself too
boldly, there is a little exuberance from a machine-gun; but on the
whole there is silence. After all, if you prevent your enemy from
drawing his rations, his remedy is simple: he will prevent you from
drawing yours. Then both parties will have to fight on empty stomachs,
and neither of them, tacitally, will be a penny the better. So, unless
some elaborate scheme of attack is brewing, the early hours of the
night are comparatively peaceful. But what is that sudden disturbance
in the front-line trench? A British rifle rings out, then another,
and another, until there is an agitated fusilade from end to end of
the section. Instantly the sleepless host across the way replies, and
for three minutes or so a hurricane rages. The working parties out in
front lie flat on their faces, cursing patiently. Suddenly the storm
dies away, and perfect silence reigns once more. It was a false alarm.
Some watchman, deceived by the whispers of the night breeze, or merely
a prey to nerves, has discerned a phantom army approaching through the
gloom, and has opened fire thereon. This often occurs when troops are
new to trench-work.

It is during these hours, too, that regiments relieve one another
in the trenches. The outgoing regiment cannot leave its post until
the incoming regiment has "taken over." Consequently you have, for
a brief space, two thousand troops packed into a trench calculated
to hold one thousand. Then it is that strong men swear themselves
faint, and the Rugby football player has reason to be thankful for his
previous training in the art of "getting through the scrum." However
perfect your organization may be, congestion is bound to occur here
and there; and it is no little consolation to us to feel, as we surge
and sway in the darkness, that over there in the German lines a Saxon
and a Prussian private, irretrievably jammed together in a narrow
communication trench, are consigning one another to perdition in just
the same husky whisper as that employed by Private Mucklewame and his
"opposite number" in the regiment which has come to relieve him.

These "reliefs" take place every four or five nights. There was a time,
not so long ago, when a regiment was relieved, not when it was weary,
but when another regiment could be found to replace it. Our own first
battalion once remained in the trenches, unrelieved and only securing
its supplies with difficulty, for five weeks and three days. During all
that time they were subject to most pressing attentions on the part of
the Boches, but they never lost a yard of trench. They received word
from Headquarters that to detach another regiment for their relief
would seriously weaken other and most important dispositions. The
Commander-in-Chief would therefore be greatly obliged if they could
hold on. So they held on.

At last they came out, and staggered back to billets. Their old
quarters, naturally, had long been appropriated by other troops, and
the officers had some difficulty in recovering their kits.

"I don't mind being kept in trenches for several weeks," remarked their
commander to the staff officer who received him when he reported, "and
I can put up with losing my sleeping-bag; but I do object to having my
last box of cigars looted by the blackguards who took over our billets!"

The staff officer expressed sympathy, and the subject dropped. But not
many days later, when the battalion were still resting, their commander
was roused in the middle of the night from the profound slumber which
only the experience of many nights of anxious vigil can induce, by the
ominous message:--

"An orderly to see you, from General Headquarters, sir!"

The colonel rolled stoically out of bed, and commanded that the orderly
should be brought before him.

The man entered, carrying, not a despatch, but a package, which he
proffered with a salute.

"With the Commander-in-Chief's compliments, sir!" he announced.

The package was a box of cigars!

But that was before the days of "K(1)."

But the night is wearing on. It is half-past one--time to knock off
work. Tired men, returning from ration-drawing or sap-digging, throw
themselves down and fall dead asleep in a moment. Only the sentries,
with their elbows on the parapet, maintain their sleepless watch. From
behind the enemy's lines comes a deep boom--then another. The big guns
are waking up again, and have decided to commence their day's work by
speeding our empty ration-wagons upon their homeward way. Let them!
So long as they refrain from practising direct hits on our front-line
parapet, and disturbing our brief and hardly-earned repose, they may
fire where they please. The ration train is well able to look after
itself.

"A whiff o' shrapnel will dae nae harrm to thae strawberry-jam
pinchers!" observes Private Tosh bitterly, rolling into his dugout. By
this opprobrious term he designates that distinguished body of men,
the Army Service Corps. A prolonged diet of plum-and-apple jam has
implanted in the breasts of the men in the trenches certain dark and
unworthy suspicions concerning the entire altruism of those responsible
for the distribution of the Army's rations.


VI--DAYBREAK--"STAND TO ARMS!"

It is close on daybreak, and the customary whispered order runs down
the stertorous trench:--

"Stand to arms!"

Straightway the parapets are lined with armed men; the waterproof
sheets which have been protecting the machine-guns from the dews of
night are cast off; and we stand straining our eyes into the whitening
darkness.

This is the favorite hour for attack. At any moment the guns may open
fire upon our parapet, or a solid wall of gray-clad figures rise from
that strip of corn-land less than a hundred yards away, and descend
upon us. Well, we are ready for them. Just by way of signalizing the
fact, there goes out a ragged volley of rifle fire, and a machine-gun
rips off half a dozen bursts into the standing corn. But apparently
there is nothing doing this morning. The day grows brighter, but there
is no movement upon the part of Brother Boche.

But--what is that light haze hanging over the enemy's trenches? It is
slight, almost impalpable, but it appears to be drifting towards us.
Can it be----?

Next moment every man is hurriedly pulling his gas helmet over his
head, while Lieutenant Waddell beats a frenzied tocsin upon the
instrument provided for the purpose--to wit, an empty eighteen-pounder
shell, which, suspended from a bayonet stuck into the parados (or back
wall) of the trench, makes a most efficient alarm-gong. The sound is
repeated all along the trench, and in two minutes every man is in his
place, cowled like a member of the Holy Inquisition, glaring through an
eye-piece of mica, and firing madly into the approaching wall of vapour.

But the wall approaches very slowly--in fact, it almost stands
still--and finally, as the rising sun disentangles itself from a pink
horizon and climbs into the sky, it begins to disappear. In half
an hour nothing is left, and we take off our helmets, sniffing the
morning air dubiously. But all we smell is the old mixture--corpses and
chloride of lime.

The incident, however, was duly recorded by Major Kemp in his report of
the day's events, as follows:--

4.7 A.M.--_Gas alarm, false. Due either to morning mist, or
the fact that enemy found breeze insufficient, and discontinued their
attempt._

"Still, I'm not sure," he continued, slapping his bald head with a
bandanna handkerchief, "that a whiff of chlorine or bromine wouldn't do
these trenches a considerable amount of good. It would tone down some
of the deceased a bit, and wipe out these infernal flies. Waddell, if I
give you a shilling, will you take it over to the German trenches and
ask them to drop it into the meter?"

"I do not think, sir," replied the literal Waddell, "that an English
shilling would fit a German meter. Probably a mark would be required,
and I have only a franc. Besides, sir, do you think that----"

"Surgical operation at seven-thirty, sharp!" intimated the major to the
medical officer, who entered the dugout at that moment. "For our friend
here"--indicating the bewildered Waddell. "Sydney Smith's prescription!
Now, what about breakfast?"


VII--NINE O'CLOCK--"A LITTLE MORNING HATE"

About nine o'clock the enemy indulges in what is usually described,
most disrespectfully, as "a little morning hate"--in other words, a
bombardment. Beginning with a _hors d'oeuvre_ of shrapnel along
the reserve trench--much to the discomfort of Headquarters, who are
shaving--he proceeds to "search" a tract of woodland in our immediate
rear, his quarry being a battery of motor machine-guns, which has
wisely decamped some hours previously. Then, after scientifically
"traversing" our second line, which has rashly advertised its position
and range by cooking its breakfast over a smoky fire, he brings the
display to a superfluous conclusion by dropping six "Black Marias" into
the deserted ruins of a village not far behind us. After that comes
silence; and we are able, in our hot, baking trenches, assisted by
clouds of bluebottles, to get on with the day's work.

This consists almost entirely in digging. As already stated, these
are bad trenches. The parapet is none too strong--at one point it has
been knocked down for three days running--the communication trenches
are few and narrow, and there are not nearly enough dugouts. Yesterday
three men were wounded; and owing to the impossibility of carrying a
stretcher along certain parts of the trench, they had to be conveyed
to the rear in their ground-sheets--bumped against projections, bent
round sharp corners, and sometimes lifted, perforce, bodily into view
of the enemy. So every man toils with a will, knowing full well that in
a few hours' time he may prove to have been his own benefactor. Only
the sentries remain at the parapets. They no longer expose themselves,
as at night, but take advantage of the laws of optical reflection,
as exemplified by the trench periscope. (This, in spite of its grand
title, is nothing but a tiny mirror clipped on to a bayonet.)

At half-past twelve comes dinner--bully-beef, with biscuit and
jam--after which each tired man, coiling himself up in the trench, or
crawling underground, according to the accommodation at his disposal,
drops off into instant and heavy slumber. The hours from two till five
in the afternoon are usually the most uneventful of the twenty-four,
and are therefore devoted to hardly-earned repose.


VIII--STORY OF AN AFTERNOON WITH CAPTAIN BLAIKIE

But there is to be little peace this afternoon. About half-past three,
Bobby Little, immersed in pleasant dreams--dreams of cool shades and
dainty companionship--is brought suddenly to the surface of things by--

"Whoo-oo-_oo_-oo-UMP!"--followed by a heavy thud upon the roof of his
dugout. Earth and small stones descend in a shower upon him.

"Dirty dogs!" he comments, looking at his watch. Then he puts his head
out of the dugout.

"Lie close, you men!" he cries. "There's more of this coming. Any
casualties?"

The answer to the question is obscured by another burst of shrapnel,
which explodes a few yards short of a parapet, and showers bullets and
fragments of shell into the trench. A third and a fourth follow. Then
comes a pause. A message is passed down for the stretcher-bearers.
Things are growing serious. Five minutes later Bobby, having despatched
his wounded to the dressing-station, proceeds with all haste to Captain
Blaikie's dugout.

"How many, Bobby?"

"Six wounded. Two of them won't last as far as the rear, I'm afraid,
sir."

Captain Blaikie looks grave.

"Better ring up the Gunners, I think. Where are the shells coming from?"

"That wood on our left front, I think."

"That's P 27. Telephone orderly, there?"

A figure appears in the doorway.

"Yes, sirr."

"Ring up Major Cavanagh, and say that H 21 is being shelled from P 27.
Retaliate!"

"Verra good, sirr."

The telephone orderly disappears, to return in five minutes.

"Major Cavanagh's compliments, sirr, and he is coming up himself for
tae observe from the firing trench."

"Good egg!" observes Captain Blaikie. "Now we shall see some shooting,
Bobby!"

Presently the Gunner major arrives, accompanied by an orderly, who
pays out wire as he goes. The major adjusts his periscope, while the
orderly thrusts a metal peg into the ground and fits a telephone
receiver to his head.

"Number one gun!" chants the major, peering into his periscope;
"three-five-one-nothing--lyddite--fourth charge!"

These mystic observations are repeated into the telephone by the
Cockney orderly, in a confidential undertone.

"Report when ready!" continues the major.

"Report when ready!" echoes the orderly. Then--"Number one gun ready,
sir!"

"Fire!"

"Fire!" Then, politely--"Number one has fired, sir."

The major stiffens to his periscope, and Bobby Little, deeply
interested, wonders what has become of the report of the gun. He
forgets that sound does not travel much faster than a thousand feet
a second, and that the guns are a mile and a half back. Presently,
however, there is a distant boom. Almost simultaneously the lyddite
shell passes overhead with a scream. Bobby, having no periscope, cannot
see the actual result of the shot, though he tempts Providence (and
Zacchæus) by peering over the top of the parapet.

"Number one, two-nothing minutes more right," commands the major. "Same
range and charge."

Once more the orderly goes through his ritual, and presently another
shell screams overhead.

Again the major observes the result.

"Repeat!" he says. "Nothing-five seconds more right."

This time he is satisfied.

"Parallel lines on number one," he commands crisply. "One round battery
fire--twenty seconds!"

For the last time the order is passed down the wire, and the major
hands his periscope to the ever-grateful Bobby, who has hardly got
his eyes to the glass when the round of battery fire commences.
One--two--three--four--the avenging shells go shrieking on their way,
at intervals of twenty seconds. There are four muffled thuds, and four
great columns of earth and _débris_ spring up before the wood. Answer
comes there none. The offending battery has prudently effaced itself.

"Cease fire!" says the major, "and register!" Then he turns to Captain
Blaikie.

"That'll settle them for a bit," he observes. "By the way, had any more
trouble with Minnie?"

"We had Hades from her yesterday," replies Blaikie, in answer to this
extremely personal question. "She started at a quarter-past five in the
morning, and went on till about ten."


IX--STORY OF "MINNIE--THE MOST UNPLEASANT OF HER SEX"

(Perhaps, at this point, it would be as well to introduce Minnie a
little more formally. She is the most unpleasant of her sex, and her
full name is _Minenwerfer_, or German trench-mortar. She resides,
spasmodically, in Unter den Linden. Her extreme range is about two
hundred yards, so she confines her attentions to front-line trenches.
Her _modus operandi_ is to discharge a large cylindrical bomb into the
air. The bomb, which is about fifteen inches long and some eight inches
in diameter, describes a leisurely parabola, performing grotesque
somersaults on the way, and finally falls with a soft thud into the
trench or against the parapet. There, after an interval of ten seconds,
Minnie's offspring explodes; and as she contains about thirty pounds of
dynamite, no dugout or parapet can stand against her.)

"Did she do much damage?" inquires the Gunner.

"Killed two men and buried another. They were in a dugout."

The Gunner shakes his head.

"No good taking cover against Minnie," he says. "The only way is to
come out into the open trench, and dodge her."

"So we found," replies Blaikie. "But they pulled our legs badly the
first time. They started off with three 'whizz-bangs'"--a whizz-bang is
a particularly offensive form of shell which bursts two or three times
over, like a Chinese cracker--"so we all took cover and lay low. The
consequence was that Minnie was able to send her little contribution
along unobserved. The filthy thing fell short of the trench, and
exploded just as we were all getting up again. It smashed up three or
four yards of parapet, and scuppered the three poor chaps I mentioned."

"Have you located her?"

"Yes. Just behind that stunted willow, on our left front. I fancy they
bring her along there to do her bit, and then trot her back to billets,
out of harm's way. She is their two o'clock turn--two A.M.
_and two_ P.M."

"Two o'clock turn--h'm!" says the Gunner major meditatively. "What
about our chipping in with a one-fifty-five turn--half a dozen H E
shells into Minnie's dressing-room--eh? I must think this over."

"Do!" said Blaikie cordially. "Minnie is Willie's Worst Werfer, and the
sooner she is put out of action the better for all of us. To-day, for
some reason, she failed to appear, but previous to that she has not
failed for five mornings in succession to batter down the same bit of
our parapet."

"Where's that?" asks the major, getting out a trench-map.

"P 7--a most unhealthy spot. Minnie pushes it over about two every
morning. The result is that we have to mount guard over the breach
all day. We build everything up again at night, and Minnie sits there
as good as gold, and never dreams of interfering. You can almost
hear her cooing over us. Then, as I say, at two o'clock, just as the
working party comes in and gets under cover, she lets slip one of her
disgusting bombs, and undoes the work of about four hours. It was a
joke at first, but we are getting fed up now. That's the worst of the
Boche. He starts by being playful; but if not suppressed at once,
he gets rough; and that, of course, spoils all the harmony of the
proceedings. So I cordially commend your idea of the one-fifty-five
turn, sir."

"I'll see what can be done," says the major. "I think the best plan
would be a couple of hours' solid frightfulness, from every battery we
can switch on. To-morrow afternoon, perhaps, but I'll let you know.
You'll have to clear out of this bit of trench altogether, as we shall
shoot pretty low. So long!"


X--HOW HOURS PASS IN THE DUGOUT

It is six o'clock next evening, and peace reigns over our trench. This
is the hour at which one usually shells aeroplanes--or rather, at which
the Germans shell ours, for their own seldom venture out in broad
daylight. But this evening, although two or three are up in the blue,
buzzing inquisitively over the enemy's lines, their attendant escort of
white shrapnel puffs is entirely lacking. Far away behind the German
lines a house is burning fiercely.

"The Hun is a bit _piano_ to-night," observes Captain Blaikie,
attacking his tea.

"The Hun has been rather firmly handled this afternoon," replies
Captain Wagstaffe. "I think he has had an eye-opener. There are no
flies on our Divisional Artillery."

Bobby Little heaved a contented sigh. For two hours that afternoon
he had sat, half-deafened, while six-inch shells skimmed the parapet
in both directions, a few feet above his head. The Gunner major had
been as good as his word. Punctually at one-fifty-five "Minnie's" two
o'clock turn had been anticipated by a round of high-explosive shells
directed into her suspected place of residence. What the actual result
had been nobody knew, but Minnie had made no attempt to raise her voice
since. Thereafter the German front-line trenches had been "plastered"
from end to end, while the trenches farther back were attended to
with methodical thoroughness. The German guns had replied vigorously,
but directing only a passing fire at the trenches, had devoted their
efforts chiefly to the silencing of the British artillery. In this
enterprise they had been remarkably unsuccessful.

"Any casualties?" asked Blaikie.

"None here," replied Wagstaffe. "There may be some back in the support
trenches."

"We might telephone and inquire."

"No good at present. The wires are all cut to pieces. The signallers
are repairing them now."

"_I_ was nearly a casualty," confessed Bobby modestly.

"How?"

"That first shell of ours nearly knocked my head off! I was standing
up at the time, and it rather took me by surprise. It just cleared the
parados. In fact, it kicked a lot of gravel into the back of my neck."

"Most people get it in the neck here, sooner or later," remarked
Captain Blaikie sententiously. "Personally, I don't much mind being
killed, but I do bar being buried alive. That is why I dislike Minnie
so." He rose, and stretched himself. "Heigho! I suppose it's about
time we detailed patrols and working parties for to-night. What a
lovely sky! A truly peaceful atmosphere--what? It gives one a sort of
Sunday-evening feeling, somehow."

"May I suggest an explanation?" said Wagstaffe.

"By all means."

"It _is_ Sunday evening!"

Captain Blaikie whistled gently, and said--

"By Jove, so it is." Then, after a pause: "This time last Sunday--"


XI--A SOLDIER'S SUNDAY AT THE FRONT

Last Sunday had been an off-day--a day of cloudless summer beauty.
Tired men had slept; tidy men had washed their clothes; restless men
had wandered at ease about the countryside, careless of the guns which
grumbled everlastingly a few miles away. There had been impromptu
Church Parades for each denomination, in the corner of a wood which was
part of the demesne of a shell-torn château.

It is a sadly transformed wood. The open space before the château,
once a smooth expanse of tennis-lawn, is now a dusty picketing-ground
for transport mules, destitute of a single blade of grass. The
ornamental lake is full of broken bottles and empty jam-tins. The
pagoda-like summer house, so inevitable to French château gardens, is
a quartermaster's store. Half the trees have been cut down for fuel.
Still, the July sun streams very pleasantly through the remainder, and
the Psalms of David float up from beneath their shade quite as sweetly
as they usually do from the neighborhood of the precentor's desk in the
kirk at home--perhaps sweeter.

The wood itself is a _point d'appui_, or fortified post. One has to
take precautions, even two or three miles behind the main firing line.
A series of trenches zigzags in and out among the trees, and barbed
wire is interlaced with the undergrowth. In the farthermost corner
lies an improvised cemetery. Some of the inscriptions on the little
wooden crosses are only three days old. Merely to read a few of these
touches the imagination and stirs the blood. Here you may see the names
of English Tommies and Highland Jocks, side by side with their Canadian
kith and kin. A little apart lie more graves, surmounted by epitaphs
written in strange characters, such as few white men can read. These
are the Indian troops. There they lie, side by side--the mute wastage
of war, but a living testimony, even in their last sleep, to the
breadth and unity of the British Empire. The great, machine-made Empire
of Germany can show no such graves: when her soldiers die, they sleep
alone.

The Church of England service had come last of all. Late in the
afternoon a youthful and red-faced chaplain had arrived on a bicycle,
to find a party of officers and men lying in the shade of a broad
oak waiting for him. (They were a small party: naturally, the great
majority of the regiment are what the identity-discs call "Pres" or
"R.C.")

"Sorry to be late, sir," he said to the senior officer, saluting. "This
is my sixth sh--service to-day, and I have come seven miles for it."

He mopped his brow cheerfully; and having produced innumerable
hymn-books from a saddle-bag and set his congregation in array, read
them the service, in a particularly pleasing and well-modulated voice.
After that he preached a modest and manly little sermon, containing
references which carried Bobby Little, for one, back across the Channel
to other scenes and other company. After the sermon came a hymn, sung
with great vigor. Tommy loves singing hymns--when he happens to know
and like the tune.

"I know you chaps like hymns," said the padre, when they had finished.
"Let's have another before you go. What do you want?"

A most unlikely-looking person suggested "Abide with Me." When it
was over, and the party, standing as rigid as their own rifles, had
sung "God Save the King," the preacher announced awkwardly--almost
apologetically--

"If any of you would like to--er--communicate, I shall be very glad.
May not have another opportunity for some time, you know. I think over
there"--he indicated a quiet corner of the wood, not far from the
little cemetery--"would be a good place."

He pronounced the benediction, and then, after further recurrence to
his saddle-bag, retired to his improvised sanctuary. Here, with a
ration-box for altar, and strands of barbed wire for choir-stalls, he
made his simple preparations.

Half a dozen of the men, and all the officers, followed him. That was
just a week ago.

       *       *       *       *       *

Captain Wagstaffe broke the silence at last.

"It's a rotten business, war," he said pensively--"when you come to
think of it. Hallo, there goes the first star-shell! Come along, Bobby!"

Dusk had fallen. From the German trenches a thin luminous thread
stole up into the darkening sky, leaned over, drooped, and burst
into dazzling brilliance over the British parapet. Simultaneously a
desultory rifle fire crackled down the lines. The night's work had
begun.

(Ian Hay relates innumerable stories, each filled with absorbing human
emotions. Among them are: "The Conversion of Private M'Slattery;"
"Shooting Straight;" "Deeds of Darkness;" "The Gathering of the
Eagles;" "The Battle of the Slag-Heaps," all of which are the
narratives of a trained novelist direct from the battlefield.)

FOOTNOTES:

[4] All numerals relate to stories herein told--not to chapters in
original sources.




SOME EXPERIENCES IN HUNGARY

_In the Palace of Prince and Princess K----_

_By Mina MacDonald, English Companion to the Two Daughters of a
Hungarian Magnate_

  These experiences of an English girl throw a new light on the
  character of the Hungarian noble families. At the outbreak of the
  War, she was companion to the two daughters of a Hungarian Prince who
  resided in the vicinity of Pressburg. This gave her an opportunity
  of gauging the sentiments of those connected with the House of
  Hapsburg. They discussed the War with frankness in her presence.
  The family treated her precisely as one of their own and at no time
  considered her as an "enemy alien." In the preface to her narrative,
  Miss MacDonald says: "If other British subjects in Austria proper
  were treated more rigorously, they must lay the blame on instructions
  received from Berlin. My own experiences in the Hungarian family
  during the throes of a World War may, perchance, induce British (and
  American) readers to think more highly of the gallant Magyar race."
  Selections from her narrative are here presented by courtesy of her
  publishers, _Longmans, Green and Company_.

[5] I--THE CASTLE IN THE CARPATHIANS

The village of K---- stands in a pleasant mountain valley among the
White Carpathians on the borders of Moravia.... It cannot even lay
claim to the various dissensions of its neighbouring town S---- where
representatives of every race, religion, and political party to be
found in Austria and Hungary, keep the town like a boiling pot. It is
far otherwise in K---- which is solidly and frankly Clovak, Catholic,
and anti-Austrian. The peasants who, with the exception of the priest,
the schoolmaster and the inn-keeper, constitute the population of
village, are all dirty, drunken, hard-working, and intelligent.

       *       *       *       *       *

The Schloss is an old white building full of beauty and interest, built
on the hill below the village, in the midst of a park where Maria
Therese used to hunt.... The gardens which surround the Schloss are
so beautifully laid out and so ornamented with fountains and statues
that K---- is known to Hungarians as the Miniature Versailles; the head
gardener being a person of such serious importance in K---- that even
the Herrschaft at the Schloss speak of and treat him not as an ordinary
gardener but as a Man of Art. Indoors, too, the house confirms its
reputation of being a small Versailles, for the collection of pictures
and antiquities, begun centuries ago, is pursued by the Prince of
to-day with vigour, and carping guests have been heard to remark that
though there wasn't a chair in the Schloss but had a history and a
value that made ordinary mortals' hair stand on end, there also wasn't
one that offered any ease or comfort except in the Prince's den where
all was modern--but sacred to the Prince.

Life was always merry at the Schloss, and it was a very jolly party
that Excellenz von R---- found gathered there when she arrived hot and
cross from Vienna, on June 28, 1914, bringing her bad news. We were:
the Prince and Princess--the best-natured and most happy-go-lucky of
all hosts and hostesses; their daughters, Claire aged twenty-one,
fair, blue-eyed and very beautiful, and Billy aged eighteen, large
and dark and interested in all things pertaining to sport; General
T----, round, white-haired, and explosive--once Commandant of a very
famous Galician fortress, but now living in irksome retirement in
Vienna; his son Walther, a lieutenant of Uhlans, known to us as "The
Babe"; finally, myself, known to everybody as Jerry--a name which no
circumstances could make beautiful, and which became heart-breaking
when invariably pronounced there as "Sherry."

Everybody knew and liked Excellenz von R----, who was a very gay and
enterprising old lady, and Claire, Billy, and I who had looked forward
in pleasure to her coming, awaited her at the gates and clambered
into the carriage from both sides as it passed--for Jan, the coachman
who had driven Excellencies to and from the Schloss for the past
twenty-five years, found it beneath his dignity to stop at the gates to
take us in, so we tumbled in as best we could on and around Excellenz,
whose face was long and tragic.


II--"THE ARCHDUKE AND SOPHIE WERE SHOT TO-DAY"

"Ach, my dear children, have mercy on old bones! And I bring you bad
news! The Tronfolger and his wife were shot to-day in Sarajevo. Oh,
poor Sophie!" and Excellenz, who was an intimate friend of the Duchess,
burst into tears. "It's quite true too--official before I left Vienna
this afternoon."

But Jan was before her at the house and called as he drove up, to the
footman on the steps--

"Tronfolger mit Frau heute geschossen."

German, which he insisted on speaking, was not Jan's strong point.
The footman, a Bohemian and anti-Austrian, sniffed at this lack of
breeding, and answered very casually "So." Excellenz, though she was
still weeping, was very angry and shook her fist at Jan, but she got
her innings in the hall where the Princess was awaiting--in perplexity
as she saw Excellenz's wrath and tears.

"What, Francesca, you arrive in tears at K----?"

"Yes, I should think I do--it's too awful," and Excellenz sobbed out
her news.

"What nonsense!" said the Princess. "How can you believe these wild
stories? Besides, who would shoot that pair?"

"But it's official."

"What is official?" asked the Prince appearing.

"The Archduke and Sophie were shot to-day in Sarajevo."

"Then what the devil made them go there? They might know beforehand
that they wouldn't get out of there with whole skins," he replied,
greeting his guest.

In the drawing-room I found the General, who in the excitement of the
moment had been forgotten. He said as usual, "Pooh! that's not a funny
joke, Sherry."

"That may be; but it's official, and you ought not to receive your
'officials' with 'pooh,' but perhaps it's your way here. Here is
Excellenz von R---- in tears--she has brought the news from Vienna."

"Old wives' tales! I don't believe it."

Excellenz nevertheless persuaded him.

"Donnerwetter! Jesus Maria! And she tried to save him! Plucky
woman--always was plucky. Skinflint though--a skinflint. Too fond
of the Jesuits! This plot was arranged in Serbia, I'll stake my
life--stake my life. Ach, those Serbs! The scum of creation--scum of
creation! We must exterminate them one day. They have always been a
trouble, but this will bring about their end at last. Ach, the poor
Archduke and the poor Duchess! Ach! Pooh!"

"Personally," said the Prince, "I think you needn't be so angry with
the Serbs. They've done us a good turn really. The Archduke--it's
useless to pretend otherwise, General--was the best hated man in
Austria, and the Duchess the best-hated woman. Both cared only for the
Church. They won't really be regretted. The young Karl Franz Josef may
be the saving of Austria at a critical moment."


III--GLIMPSES OF THE LIFE OF A PRINCESS

Excellenz von R---- during her stay in K---- remained sad over the
murder of her friend, and no one spoke of anything but the political
complications which might ensue. The plot, it seemed, had been known
to the military and civil authorities in Sarajevo, and several arrests
made even before the tragedy. The Archduke was very uneasy, and asked
the Governor, General Potiorek, if it was safe to venture out to the
reception in the town hall. "Absolutely safe," General Potiorek was
unwise enough to reply, "I can stake my own life on your Highnesses'
safety."

After Excellenz von R---- returned to Vienna the Bores arrived _en
masse_ to spend the whole month of July in K----. They were the
Princess's young brother Count R----, his wife, and children, Elizabeth
and Stefan. It is not without reason that they are known as the Bores.
The Count was the most bearable of them--but even he was trying
to one's nerves in hot weather. He was gay and irresponsible--had
squandered his own fortune, and as much of his wife's as she would
allow him, at baccarat. His particular sin was his unfortunate habit
of writing verse to each and all of us and singing it, to his own
melodies, on every embarrassing occasion. His verse was clever--and
usually true, consequently it annoyed. The countess was a politician,
devoting her attentions to the General, who spent his days in trying
to avoid her.

"Jesus Maria!" he would say when, red and panting, he had made good his
escape. "In all my years in Bosnia and Galicia I never had anything
like this--pooh!"

Elizabeth--usually called Bethi--was sixteen, and Stefan was twelve.
Both were small but they overran the whole Schloss; no person or thing
was sacred to them, and no room escaped invasion.... Bethi was being
educated in the Convent of the Sacré Coeur in Budapest, where all
disliking her, the nuns advised her mother to have the girl's education
completed at home--an advice which we in Schloss K---- could so well
understand and sympathise with!...

The children were always first in church, occupying the most
comfortable chairs in the chancel. Once they actually established
themselves in the large velvet chairs placed for the Prince and
Princess. Billy could not succeed in dislodging them, and Claire and
I, on arrival, had to use force--to the amusement of all the peasant
children--which so insulted Stefan that he sulked during Mass till he
conceived the brilliant idea of stretching out his foot far enough
to trip up an altar boy. The priest stumbled in the "Lavabo inter
innocentes manus meas," and the old church servant, who had in earlier
days been the village schoolmaster, shot out of the sacristy, as was
his custom when the attention of the acolytes wandered, and soundly
cuffed the unfortunate altar-boy. Happily the Countess had seen, and
Stefan had a very bad quarter of an hour afterwards in the Schloss.


IV--DARK DAYS AFTER THE TRAGEDY

There were days of tension after the ultimatum went to Serbia. The
press was very restrained but clearly uneasy, and did not attempt to
justify the extravagant tone of the ultimatum. General opinion as to
whether the Serbs would fight or not was not very divided, and there
were few who did not agree that Serbia was never intended to fight. She
was simply to behave herself in future and Austria was to see that she
did it. General T---- was indignant at the ultimatum.

"Berchtold again! Soft-headed fool--pooh! There are so many ways
of getting what one wants--he must just choose this one! This way
may really lead to war, and we are not prepared--no money, no
munitions--nothing, nothing! Ach, it's an awful business! Perhaps
Serbia won't dare to fight ... if the Russians back her she will!"

"You surely can scarcely imagine that any country could take such an
ultimatum lying down?" I suggested.

"Pooh," he replied, "you can't deny that they've always been a thorn
in our flesh. But my country is mad--mad! Nobody seems to realise what
this can lead to. The Serbs are good fighters too. If Russia backs them
we're done for. Na, I must get back to Vienna now, for Walther will
have to go if there's war. Pooh--they're all crazy everywhere."

Even the Man of Art grew mournful among his rosebushes. He was Croatian
and bitterly anti-Austrian.

"Ach, Fräulein! There are sad days coming, for that wasn't an ultimatum
that went to Serbia--it was a declaration of war. The Serbs will fight,
Fräulein. I know the race; they are brave men such as we have in
Croatia. Of course they'll fight. They are real soldiers and have real
officers--old General Putnik--that's a man! They'll beat us, Fräulein,
and I'll have to go and fight against them too--against my own race.
Bah! we're slaves here in Austria."


V--THE PRINCE WAS "IRRITATED BY THE WAR"

Then came the Serbs' reply and the partial mobilisation of the Austrian
army. Everybody looked grave and the Prince became distinctly irritable.

"Just in the middle of the harvest, too! What a time of year to send
an ultimatum! How the devil do they expect me to get my harvest in, if
they take my men away? The lifting of the beets won't even begin for
six weeks yet."

"War will be finished by then," said Billy, "and Serbia will have
ceased to exist."

"And what of little Poli--the beautiful Dragoon with the sky-blue
coat?" asked Claire. "Won't you have to return to Göding and join your
regiment now?"

"This upsets all my plans for the summer," replied the soldier, "and
it's very annoying, and it's too bad of them to spring a war upon
peace-loving soldiers like this. They'll telephone to me if they want
me, and I won't move from here till they do."

"And if the telephone is out of order, as it usually is, you'll be shot
as a deserter," said Billy.

"Nevertheless, I won't go," said Poli, for the Einjährigerfreiwilliger
was a man of peace and did not appreciate a Government which enforced
days of warlike pursuits upon him each year.

But Poli had to go, for one morning about four o'clock, as the church
bells were ringing the Angelus, the order for a general mobilisation
was "drummed out"--in Hungary the town crier always uses a drum. Being
much too sleepy to grasp what he said, I promptly went to sleep again,
and in the morning discovered that I was the one person in the Schloss
who had not been at all upset by the news, and that I was regarded
by all as something approaching a monster of callousness. There was
the wildest confusion inside and outside the Schloss when I came
downstairs; all the outdoor servants had gathered in the courtyard to
say good-bye before leaving to report themselves at their "Kaders";
indoors the housemaids were crying as they went about their work, and
it was with difficulty that the Princess, Claire, and I managed at last
to get some sort of a breakfast served by a scared-looking butler. The
Prince and Billy had been up at the stables for some time, for the
officials had already arrived to claim the horses on the Government
list. "And all our riding-horses will have to go--every one of them,"
sobbed the Princess, "yes, even Hadur--nothing but Claire's little
horses, which are too young, and one other pair will be left."


VI--WEEPING PEASANTS FLOCK TO WAR

The road was simply alive--peasants leading in their horses, recruits
wearing the Hungarian red, white and green in their hats, cartloads of
Jews huddled together weeping and wailing because their Moishes and
Aarons had to go, wild-looking gipsies who had never done military
service, dancing and singing in the gladness of their hearts that when
others were taken they were left to steal and sing.

       *       *       *       *       *

The town of S---- was seething with excited gesticulating crowds of
people--all soldiers and recruits were drunk--the women-folk sobbing
and screaming--the gipsies who lived in the town drunken and singing
and dancing like their brethren in the country--every one was hurried
and anxious, men, women, children and horses were all mixed up and
military automobiles rushing about everywhere.... We reached the
Oberstuhlrichter's door in safety, but so bruised and breathless
that we could hardly move. Our friend, the Oberstuhlrichter was so
harassed and overworked, that he had nothing to say but--"For the love
of Heaven, my dears, go away. I really know nothing myself except that
Germany and Russia are now in the fray and I've got to get all the
recruits away from here at once. Now go away and leave me."


VII--THE WISDOM OF UNCLE PISTA

From him we went to Aunt Sharolta and Uncle Pista--in Hungary all
older people are addressed as uncle or aunt. Aunt Sharolta was nearly
blind, but wonderfully sweet and gentle; and Uncle Pista was small,
round and jovial--red-faced and white-haired. He always wore a piece of
plaster on his nose, and we often speculated as to what might be below
that plaster, for it certainly never was changed, and whether it had
originally been black or pink no one knew, for from time immemorial it
was grey. He was the most intrepid politician I have ever met. He had
learned geography sixty years ago, had forgotten it for fifty, and I
doubt if he rightly knew where Serbia lay from Austria. His daughters'
geographical views were based on their father's.

When, on this particular day, we appeared in their house, hot and
breathless and looking as if we had been picked out of the hay-stack,
we found Uncle Pista bemoaning his horses and saying that if this sort
of thing would continue he would have no nerves left. Aunt Sharolta was
turning out all her drawers for things to manufacture into comforts for
the soldiers, and having unearthed a piece of grey material embroidered
with rose-buds she was making it into a chest-protector.

"Our boys," she explained, "will die of cold in Russia, if we don't
make warm clothes for them."

"What's more to the point, my horses will die of cold in Russia,"
grumbled Uncle Pista.

"You don't think, then, that the Russians may break into Galicia?" I
suggested.

"What an idea! Our army won't let them. Russia will take six weeks
to mobilise--she can't do it in less--and by that time we shall have
finished off Serbia and we can join the Germans in Russia. It's a pity
though that the German Kaiser didn't keep quiet; of course he knows
best, but there's no question but the Tsar was very impertinent to him
lately, and William is hot-tempered. I've no doubt it's for the best,
and it's one of God's mercies that we have the Kaiser behind us to
help us against Russia. Our boys will be in St. Petersburg long before
Christmas."


VIII--THE PRINCE CALLED THEM ALL FOOLS

Partridge shooting opened on August 1st, and the Prince and
Billy--for the keepers were all away at their Kaders--collected some
beaters--among whom the naughty and clever Joszo, resplendent in carpet
slippers, a pair of old gaiters, and an old cartridge belt--and set
out to a melancholy half-hearted shoot, from which Billy returned in
a dismal humour. They had shot little and had thought all the time of
the men--German, Austrian, Russian, and French--who had shot with them
last year and who were now engaged in shooting one another; the Prince
had spoken all the time, too, of his friend the Grand Duke Nicholai
Nicholaievich, who had hitherto been such a charming and clever man,
but who, now that he was to lead the Russians, was nothing but a
mahogany-coloured giant; and it was a disgusting world, and how could
anybody ever be happy again....

The days that followed were very anxious. France, the newspapers said,
declared war on Germany; and Austria felt cross and shocked. How could
France declare war on any country when she was herself, as the whole
world knew, so little prepared? But there would be a revolution in
France, and Poincaré would be guillotined for rushing his country into
war like that. Oh, yes, all were agreed, nothing was surer than that
Poincaré would meet the traitor's death he deserved.... My return to
England had been planned for September, and I began to think that I
ought to try to leave at once, but this was laughed down.

"How do you propose to go, Jerry--by private balloon? For everything on
wheels is in the hands of the army at present. No, whatever happens you
must just stay with us--even if England should join in, you will easily
be home for Christmas--the war will be finished long before then. But
England won't fight, so why should we break our heads about it?"

I pointed out that treaty obligations would hardly allow Great Britain
to stand aside.

"Treaty obligations don't count any more," said the Prince; "the
Germans are in Belgium."

"Great Britain, I imagine, does not accept the German view of treaty
obligations. Can't you really see that Germany is committing a crime in
going through Belgium like that?" I asked the Prince.

"No, absolutely not, when the French were already in Belgium before
France declared war on Germany. And even supposing they were not there,
Germany would still be right in forcing her way through--it's a case
of the survival of the fittest. He's a nice fool that King of the
Belgians! He had simply to allow the Germans through, and he would have
been well paid for it by William. Old Leopold would not have been so
silly."

"There you are right," I said, "he probably would have sold his
country."

"Now, Jerry, don't be impertinent! Anything you say now will be used
against you if England declares war on us. Don't forget you're our
prisoner then."

       *       *       *       *       *

When the declaration of war did come it sobered us somewhat! The
Princess quickly recovered and said----

"Why do you worry about it, Jerry? It's not a matter between you and
me, but between Grey and Berchtold--let them scratch each other's eyes
out if they like. After all, I'm not sure that I'm so angry with them,
for it means that now you've got to remain here indefinitely--nolens
volens. I am very glad, for it will be fearfully dull here without our
usual big shooting parties. And now come and play bridge."

That was the way in which the Princess looked at it all the time. It
was impossible for me to persuade her that to have an enemy alien
in the house might be very unpleasant for her: she could never see
why, though England and Germany hated each other so cordially, she
and I could not remain the good friends we had always been and live
peacefully in the same house.

       *       *       *       *       *

It was very easy for us to disagree, for, after a course of the _Neue
Freie Presse_, the _Neues Wiener Tagblatt_ and the _Berliner Tagblatt_,
with the exception of myself and the servants--the majority of whom
were Slavs--the inmates of Schloss K---- were soon convinced that it
was England that had been behind the whole conflagration: that jealous
of Germany's dangerously increasing foreign trade, she sought to
cripple it by a war, and accordingly it was at England's suggestion
that Russia bribed the Serbs to assassinate the Archduke--an event
which the Entente felt would certainly force Germany's hand....

"We are not strong enough to do anything ourselves, and Germany is the
one hope of our existence. What can one do if one is so poor and so
divided as we are? Oh, but Willy will save us--a plucky dashing fellow
who will teach you all a lesson. You will shed bitter tears in England
yet."

"We shall see, when the war is over, who will laugh and who will cry,"
I would reply.


IX--THE ROMANCE OF MARISCHA

I have said that all the servants were anti-Austrian. I wrong Marischa
and probably also Therese. The latter was the maid who waited on me--a
Vienna girl whose views were probably orthodox enough.... She was a
scullery-maid--round as a barrel, with a large, good-humoured face,
was always in a hurry and always smiling, and dressed always in the
black and red costume of Moravia.... She had had a husband who left her
years ago, going to America, from where he wrote to say that he had had
enough of her and did not intend to return to her. Then Stefka Stefan
came into her life and she found him irresistible.... He was small,
sulky, and delicate looking, not as one pictures a hero of romance; but
he was very devoted to Marischa and, if she could have got a divorce
from her husband, he would have married her; but, as she explained to
me in her inimitable way, this wasn't possible.

"Priest say no divorce, so Marischa yes just live like that with
Stefan. Prince and Princess yes give Marischa and Stefan house.
Marischa's husband no good man, but Stefan yes good man and yes want to
marry Marischa: priest say no possible, so Marischa yes live just like
that with Stefan."

Nevertheless her romance was a very real grief to Marischa, for the
priest at confession would nev

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