As we marched forward toward our goal, huge geysers of dust spouted into the air, rising behind our backs from the rows of "75's" supporting us. In front the fire-curtain outlined the whole length of the enemy's line with a neatness and accuracy that struck me with wonder, as the flames burst through the pall of smoke and dust around us. Above, all was blackness, but at its lower edge the curtain was fringed with red and green flames, marking the explosion of the shells directly over the ditch and parapet in front of us. The low-flying clouds mingled with the smoke-curtain, so that the whole brightness of the day was obscured. Out of the blackness fell a trickling rain of pieces of metal, lumps of earth, knapsacks, rifles, cartridges, and fragments of human flesh. We went on steadily, nearer and nearer. Now we seemed very close to the wall of shells streaming from our own guns, curving just above us, and dropping into the trenches in front. The effect was terrific. I almost braced myself against the rocking of the earth, like a sailor's instinctive gait in stormy weather.

In a single spot immediately in front of us, not over ten metres in length, I counted twelve shells bursting so fast that I could not count them without missing other explosions. The scene was horrible and terrifying. Across the wall of our own fire poured shell after shell from the enemy, tearing through our ranks. From overhead the shrapnel seemed to come down in sheets, and from behind the stinking, blinding curtain came volleys of steel-jacketed bullets, their whine unheard and their effect almost unnoticed.

I think we moved forward simply from habit. With me it was like a dream as we went on, ever on. Here and there men dropped, the ranks closing automatically. Of a sudden our own fire-curtain lifted. In a moment it had ceased to bar our way and jumped like a living thing to the next line of the enemy. We could see the trenches in front of us now, quite clear of fire, but flattened almost beyond recognition. The defenders were either killed or demoralized. Calmly, almost stupidly, we parried or thrust with the bayonet at those who barred our way. Without a backward glance we leaped the ditch and went on straight forward toward the next trench, marked in glowing outline by our fire. I remember now how the men looked. Their eyes had a wild, unseeing look in them. Everybody was gazing ahead, trying to pierce the awful curtain which cut us off from all sight of the enemy. Always the black pall smoking and burning appeared ahead—just ahead of us—hiding everything we wanted to see.

The drama was played again and again. Each time, as we approached so close that fragments of our own shells occasionally struck a leading file, the curtain lifted as by magic, jumped the intervening metres, and descended upon the enemy's trench farther on. The ranges were perfect. We followed blindly—sometimes at a walk, sometimes at a dog-trot, and, when close to our goal, on the dead run. You could not hear a word in that pandemonium. All commands were given by example or by gesture. When our captain lay down, we knew our orders were to be down too. When he waved to the right, to the right we swerved; if to the left, we turned to the left. A sweeping gesture, with an arm extended, first up, then down meant, "Halt! Lie down!" From down up, it meant, "Rise!" When his hand was thrust swiftly forward, we knew he was shouting, "En avant!" and when he waved his hand in a circle above his head, we broke into the double-quick.

Three times on our way to the second trench, the captain dropped and we after him. Then three short, quick rushes by the companies and a final dash as the curtain of shells lifted and dropped farther away. Then a hand-to-hand struggle, short and very bloody, some using their bayonets, others clubbing their rifles and grenades. A minute or two, and the trench was ours. The earthen fortress, so strong that the Germans had boasted that it could be held by a janitor and two washerwomen, was in the hands of the Legion.

As we swept on, the trench-cleaners entered the trench behind and began setting things to rights. Far down, six to eight metres below the surface, they found an underground city. Long tunnels, with chambers opening to right and left; bedrooms, furnished with bedsteads, washstands, tables, and chairs; elaborate mess-rooms, some fitted with pianos and phonographs. There were kitchens, too, and even bathrooms. So complex was the labyrinth that three days after the attack Germans were found stowed away in the lateral galleries. The passages were choked with dead. Hundreds of Germans who had survived the bombardment were torn to pieces deep beneath the ground by French hand-grenades, and buried where they lay. In rifles, munitions, and equipment the booty was immense.

We left the subterranean combat raging underneath us and continued on. As we passed over the main trench, we were enfiladed by cannon placed in armored turrets at the end of each section of trench. The danger was formidable, but it, too, had been foreseen. In a few moments these guns were silenced by hand-grenades shoved point-blank through the gun-ports. Just then, I remember, I looked back and saw Pala down on his hands and knees. I turned and ran over to help him up. He was quite dead, killed in the act of rising from the ground. His grotesque posture struck me at the time as funny, and I could not help smiling. I suppose I was nervous.

Our line was wearing thin. Halfway to the third trench we were reinforced by Battalion E coming from behind. The ground in our rear was covered with our men.

All at once came a change. The German artillery in front ceased firing, and the next second we saw the reason why. In the trench ahead, the German troops in black masses were pouring out and advancing toward us at a trot. Was it a counter-attack? "Tant mieux," said a man near me; another, of a different race, said, "We'll show them!" Then as suddenly our own artillery ceased firing, and the mystery became plain. The Germans were approaching in columns of fours, officers to the front, hands held in the air, and, as they came closer, we could distinguish the steady cry, "Kameraden! Kameraden!"

They were surrendering. How we went at our work! Out flew our knives, and, in less time than it takes to tell it, we had mingled among the prisoners, slicing off their trousers buttons, cutting off suspenders, and hacking through belts. All the war shoes had their laces cut, according to the regulations laid down in the last French "Manual," and thus, slopping along, hands helplessly in their breeches pockets to keep their trousers from falling round their ankles, shuffling their feet to keep their boots on, the huge column of prisoners was sent to the rear with a few soldiers to direct rather than to guard them. There was no fight left in them now. A terror-stricken group; some of them, temporarily at least, half insane.

As the Germans left the trenches, their artillery had paused, thinking it a counter-attack. Now, as file after file was escorted to the rear and it became apparent to their rear lines that the men had surrendered, the German artillery saw its mistake and opened up again furiously at the dark masses of defenseless prisoners. We, too, were subjected to a terrific fire. Six shells landed at the same instant in almost the same place, and within a few minutes Section III of our company had almost disappeared. I lost two of my own section, Casey and Leguen, both severely wounded in the leg. I counted fourteen men of my command still on their feet. The company seemed to have shrunk two thirds. A few minutes later, we entered the trench lately evacuated by the Prussians and left it by a very deep communication trench which we knew led to our destination, Ferme Navarin. Just at the entrance we passed signboards, marked in big letters with black paint, SchÜtzengraben Spandau.

This trench ran zigzag, in the general direction north and south. In many places it was filled level with dirt and rocks kicked in by our big shells. From the mass of dÉbris hands and legs were sticking stiffly out at grotesque angles. In one place, the heads of two men showed above the loose brown earth. Here and there, men were sitting, their backs against the wall of the trench, quite dead, with not a wound showing. In one deep crater, excavated by our 320-millimetres, lay five Saxons, side by side, in the pit where they had sought refuge, killed by the bursting of a single shell. One, a man of about twenty-three years of age, lay on his back, his legs tensely doubled, elbows thrust back into the ground, and fingers dug into the palms; eyes staring in terror and mouth wide open. I could not help carrying the picture of fear away with me, and I thought to myself, That man died a coward. Just alongside of him, resting on his left side, lay a blond giant stretched out easily, almost graceful in death. His two hands were laid together, palm to palm, in prayer. Between them was a photograph. The look upon his face was calm and peaceful. The contrast of his figure with his neighbor's struck me. I noticed that a paper protruded from his partly opened blouse, and, picking it up, I read the heading, "Ein' Feste Burg ist Unser Gott." It was a two-leaved tract. I drew a blanket over him and followed my section.

The trench we marched in wound along in the shelter of a little ridge crowned with scrubby pines. Here the German shells bothered us but little. We were out of sight of their observation posts, and, consequently, their fire was uncontrolled and no longer effective. On we went. At every other step our feet pressed down upon soldiers' corpses, lying indiscriminately one on top of the other, sometimes almost filling the trench. I brushed against one who sat braced against the side of the trench, the chin resting upon folded arms naturally—yet quite dead. It was through this trench that the Germans had tried to rush reinforcements into the threatened position, and here the men were slaughtered, without a chance to go back or forward. Hemmed in by shells in both front and rear, many hundreds had climbed into the open and tried to escape over the fields toward the pine forest, only to be mown down as they ran. For hundreds of metres continuously my feet, as I trudged along, did not touch the ground. In many of the bodies life was not yet extinct, but we had to leave them for the Red Cross men. We had our orders. No delay was possible, and, at any rate, our minds were clogged with our own work ahead.

Making such time as we could, we finally arrived at the summit of the little ridge. Then we left the cover of the trench, formed in Indian file, fifty metres between sections, and, at the signal, moved forward swiftly and in order.

It was a pretty bit of tactics and executed with a dispatch and neatness hardly equalled on the drill-ground. The first files of the sections were abreast, while the men fell in, one close behind the other; and so we crossed the ridge, offering the smallest possible target to the enemy's guns. Before us and a little to our left was the Ferme Navarin, our goal. As we descended the slope, we were greeted by a new hail of iron. Shells upon shells, fired singly, by pairs, by salvos, from six-gun batteries, crashed and exploded around us.

We increased the pace to a run and arrived out of breath abreast of immense pits dynamited out of the ground by prodigious explosions. Embedded in them we could see three enemy howitzers, but not a living German was left. All had disappeared.

We entered the pits and rested for a space. After a moment we crawled up the side of the pit and peeked over the edge. There I could see Doumergue stretched on the ground. He was lying on his back, his shoulders and head supported by his knapsack. His right leg was doubled under him, and I could see that he had been struck down in the act of running. As I watched, he strained weakly to roll himself sideways and free his leg. Slowly, spasmodically, his leg moved. Very, very slowly the foot dragged itself along the ground, and finally the limb was stretched alongside the other. Then I saw his rough, wan face assume a look of satisfaction. His eyes closed. A sigh passed between his lips, and Doumergue had gone with the rest.

As we waited there, the mood of the men seemed to change. Their spirits began to rise. One jest started another, and soon we were all laughing at the memory of the German prisoners marching to the rear, holding up their trousers with both hands. Some of the men had taken the welcome opportunity of searching the prisoners while cutting their suspenders, and most of them were now puffing German cigarettes. One of them, Haeffle, offered me a piece of K.K. bread,1 black as ink. I declined with thanks, for I didn't like the looks of it. In the relaxation of the moment, nobody paid any attention to the shells falling outside the little open shelter, until Capdeveille proposed to crawl inside one of the German howitzers for security. Alas, he was too fat, and stuck! I myself hoped rather strongly that no shell would enter one of these pits in which the company had found shelter, because I knew there were several thousand rounds of ammunition piled near each piece hidden under the dirt, and an explosion might make it hot for us.

As we sat there, smoking and chatting, Delpeuch, the homme des liaisons, as he is called, of the company, slid over the edge of the hollow and brought with him the order to leave the pit in single file and to descend to the bottom of the incline, in line with some trees which he pointed out to us. There we were to deploy in open order and dig shelter-trenches for ourselves—though I can tell the reader that "shelter" is a poor word to use in such a connection. It seems we had to wait for artillery before making the attack on Navarin itself. The trench "Spandau," so Delpeuch told me, was being put into shape by the engineers and was already partially filled with troops who were coming up to our support. The same message had been carried to the other section. As we filed out of our pit, we saw them leaving theirs. In somewhat loose formation, we ran full-tilt down the hill, and, at the assigned position, flung ourselves on the ground and began digging like mad. We had made the last stretch without losing a man.

The Ferme Navarin was two hundred metres from where we lay. From it came a heavy rifle and mitrailleuse fire, but we did not respond. We had something else to do. Every man had his shovel, and every man made the dirt fly. In what seemed half a minute we had formed a continuous parapet, twelve to fourteen inches in height, and with our knapsacks placed to keep the dirt in position, we felt quite safe against infantry and machine-gun fire. Next, each man proceeded to dig his little individual niche in the ground, about a yard deep, twenty inches wide, and long enough to lie down in with comfort. Between each two men there remained a partition wall of dirt, from ten to fifteen inches thick, the usefulness of which was immediately demonstrated by a shell which fell into Blondino's niche, blowing him to pieces without injuring either of his companions to the right or the left.

We were comfortable and able to take pot shots at the Germans and to indulge again in the old trench game of sticking a helmet on a bayonet, pushing it a little above the dirt, and thus coaxing the Germans into a shot and immediately responding with four or five rifles. I looked at my watch. It said 10.45—just an hour and a half since we had left our trenches and started on our charge; an hour and a half in which I had lived days and years.

I was pretty well tired out and would have given the world for a few hours' sleep. I called to Merrick to toss me Blondino's canteen. Mine was empty, and Blondino had left his behind when he departed with the 105-millimetre. Haeffle remarked that Blondino was always making a noise anyway.

The artillery fire died down gradually and only one German battery was still sweeping us now. Our long-range pieces thundered behind us, and we could hear shells "swooshing" overhead in a constant stream on their way to the German target. Our fire was evidently beating down the German artillery fire excepting the single battery which devoted its attention to us. The guns were hidden, and our artillery did not seem able to locate them. Our aeroplanes, long hovering overhead, began to swoop dangerously low. A swift Morane plane swept by at a height of two hundred metres over the pine forest where the German guns were hidden. We watched him as he returned safe to our lines.

Soon the order came down the line to deepen the trenches. It seemed we were to stay there until night.

The charge was over.

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1

Kriegs Kartoffel Brot.