We were put on active duty at the front about the first of the year; in fact, I spent New Year's night in a dugout within pistol-shot of the Germans. It was quite a celebration, as the French Government had provided champagne, cakes, and oranges for all, and every one was feeling in a cheery mood. When dinner was over, each of us chipped in his day's ration of army wine (about a pint), and with a little brandy, some oranges, sugar, and a packet of spices I had been commissioned to get, we brewed a magnificent bowl of hot punch, or mulled wine. First "The Day of Victory" was toasted, then, "France"; then, with typical French consideration, "The United States." After that, each man's family at home received a health; so you may be interested to know that your health and happiness for 1917 were drunk in a first-class abri by a crowd of first-class fellows, as all French soldiers are.

The next day was a typical one, so I will sketch it for you, to give an idea of how we live and what we do. When the party broke up it was late, so we turned in at once, in a deep strong dugout, which is safe against anything short of a direct hit by a very heavy shell. Once or twice, as I dropped off to sleep, I thought I heard furtive scamperings and gnawings, but all was quiet until just before daybreak, when we were awakened by a terrifying scream from a small and inoffensive soldier who does clerical work in the office of the mÉdecin chef. The poor fellow has a horror of rats, and usually sleeps with head and toes tightly bundled up. I flashed on my electric torch at the first scream and caught a glimpse of an enormous rat—fully the size of a small fox terrier, I assure you!—streaking it for his hole. The next minute I made out the unfortunate little soldier holding with both hands one ear, from which the nocturnal visitor had bitten a large mouthful, while he did a frantic dance around the floor. First came a titter, then a choked laugh, and finally the whole dugout howled with uncontrollable mirth, until the victim wound on his puttees and stalked out, much offended, to get some iodine for his ear.

As we had laughed ourselves wide awake, I passed around some cigarettes, while another fellow went down for a pot of coffee. Dressing consists of putting on one's shoes, puttees, and tunic—when I feel particularly sybaritic I take off my necktie at night.

For once the sun came up in a clear blue sky and shone down frostily on a clean white world—a metre of snow on the ground, and pines like Christmas trees. It was wonderfully still: far away on a hillside some one was chopping wood, and beyond the German lines I could hear a cock crow. After stopping to ask the telephonist if there were any calls, I took towel and soap and tooth-brush and walked to the watering trough, where a stream of icy water runs constantly. As I strolled back, a thumping explosion came from the trenches—some enthusiast had tossed a grenade across as a New Year's greeting to the Boche. Retaliatory thumps followed, and suddenly a machine-gun burst out with its abrupt stutter. Louder and louder grew the racket as gusts of firing swept up and down the lines, until a battery of 75's took a hand from the hills half a mile behind us. Crack-whang-crack, they went, like the snapping of some enormous whip, and I could hear their shells whine viciously overhead.

An orderly appeared shortly, to inform me that I must make ready to take out a few wounded. My load consisted of one poor fellow on a stretcher, still and invisible under his swathing of blankets, and two very lively chaps,—each with a leg smashed, but able to sit up and talk at a great rate. We offered them stretchers, but they were refused with gay contempt. They hopped forward to their seats, smiling and nodding good-bye to the stretcher-bearers. Despite my efforts one of them bumped his wounded leg and a little involuntary gasp escaped him. "Ça pique, mon vieux," he explained apologetically; "mais Ça ne fait rien—allez!"

At the hospital, several miles back, there was the usual wait for papers, and as I handed cigarettes to my two plucky passengers, I explained that hospital book-keeping was tiresome but necessary. Suddenly the blood-stained blankets on the stretcher moved and a pale, but calm and quizzical face looked up into mine: "Oh, lÀ lÀ! C'est une guerre de papier; donnez-moi une cigarette!" You can't down men of this caliber.

Just before bedtime another call came from a dressing-station at the extreme front. It was a thick night, snowing heavily, and black as ink, and I had to drive three kilometres, without light of any kind, over a narrow winding road crowded with traffic of every description. How one does it I can scarcely say. War seems to consist in doing the impossible by a series of apparent miracles. Ears and eyes must be connected in some way. Driving in pitchy blackness, straining every sense and calling every nerve to aid one's eyes, it seems that vision is impaired if ears are covered.

At the posts, just behind the lines, where one waits for wounded to come in from the trenches, I spend idle hours, chatting or playing dominoes. Our little circle comprises a remarkable variety of types: one hears French of every patois, from the half-Spanish drawl of the Mediterranean to the clipped negatives and throaty r of Paris.

As inventors of racy slang we Americans are miles behind the French. Your pipe is "MÉlanie" (also your sweetheart, for some unknown reason). One's mess is "la popote," a shrapnel helmet is a "casserole," a machine-gun is a "moulin À cafÉ." Bed is ironically called "plumard"; and when a bursting shell sends out its spray of buzzing steel, the cry is "Attention aux mouches!" [Look out for the flies!] Government tobacco is known, aptly, as "foin" [hay]. If one wants a cigarette, and has a paper but no tobacco, one extends the paper toward a better-provided friend saying, "Kindly sign this." And so on.

February 18

I had an interesting day yesterday. The commandant asked for a car—he is the head medical officer—to visit some posts, and I was lucky enough to land the job. He is a charming, cultivated man, and made it very pleasant for his chauffeur. We visited a number of posts, inspecting new dugout emergency hospitals, and vaccinating the stretcher-bearers against typhoid—a most amusing process, as these middle-aged fellows have the same horror of a doctor that a child has of a dentist. Reluctant was scarcely the word.

Finally we left the car (at the invitation of the artillery officer) and walked a couple of miles through the woods to see a new observation post. The last few hundred yards we made at a sneaking walk, talking only in whispers, till we came to a ladder that led up into the thick green of a pine tree. One after another the officers went up, and at length the gunner beckoned me to climb. Hidden away like a bird's nest among the fragrant pine-needles, I found a tiny platform, where the officer handed me his binoculars and pointed to a four-inch hole in the leafy screen. There right below us were two inconspicuous lines of trenches, zigzagging across a quiet field, bounded by leafless pollard willows. It was incredible to think that hundreds of men stood in those ditches, ever on the alert. At a first glance the countryside looked strangely peaceful and unhampered—farm-houses here and there, neatly hedged fields, and, farther back, a village with a white church. Look closer, though, and you see that the houses are mere shells, with crumbling walls and shattered windows; the fields are scarred and pitted with shell-holes, the village is ruined and lifeless, and the belfry of the church has collapsed. Above all, there is not an animal, not a sign of life in the fields or on the roads. Not a sound, except the distant hornet buzzing of an aeroplane.

On clear days there is a good deal of aeroplane activity in our section, and one never tires of watching the planes. The German machines do not bomb us in this district, for some reason unknown to me, but they try to reconnoiter and observe for artillery fire. It is perfectly obvious, however, that the French have the mastery of the air, by virtue of their skillful and courageous pilots and superb fighting machines, and their superior skill in anti-aircraft fire. To watch a plane at an altitude of, say, nine thousand feet under shrapnel fire, one would think the pilot was playing with death; but in reality his occupation is not so tremendously risky.

Consider these factors: he is a mile and a half to two miles from the battery shooting at him, he presents a tiny mark, and his speed is from eighty to one hundred and twenty-five miles per hour. Above all, he can twist and turn or change his altitude at will. The gunner must calculate his altitude and rate of speed, and after the lanyard is pulled, considerable time elapses before the shell reaches its mark. Meanwhile, the aviator has probably come down or risen or changed his course. It is like trying to shoot a twisting snipe with very slow-burning powder—the odds are all in favor of the snipe.

All the same, the spectacle never quite loses its thrill. High and remote against the sky you see the big reconnaissance machine going steadily on its way, its motor sending a faint drone to your ears. Keeping it company, darting around it like a pilot-fish around a shark, is the tiny, formidable appareil de chasse, a mere dot against the blue.

Crack! Whang! Boom! goes a battery near by, and three white puffs spring out suddenly around the distant machines, above, behind, below. Another battery speaks out, another and another, till the sky is filled with downy balls of smoke. Suddenly the firing ceases, and the big German aero slants down swiftly toward its base. A sharper droning hits your ears. There, directly above us, a French fighting machine is rushing at two hundred kilometres an hour to give battle to the little Fokker. Close together, wheeling and looping the loop to the rattle of their mitrailleuses, they disappear into a cloud, and we can only guess the result.

One day later

I finished the paragraph above just as a wave of rifle and machine-gun fire rolled along the lines. Running out of the abri to see what the excitement was about, I saw two French aeros skimming low over the German trenches—where every one with any kind of a fire-arm was blazing away at them. Fortunately, neither one was hit, and after a couple of retaliatory belts, they rose and flew off to the south. The Germans began to waste shrapnel on the air, and indiscreetly revealed the location of a battery, which the French promptly bombarded with heavy guns. Pretty soon all hands were at it—a two-hour Fourth of July.

I was on the road all day yesterday, afternoon and evening, getting back to the post at 10 P.M. One of the darkest nights I remember—absolutely impossible to move without an occasional clandestine flash of my torch. Far off to the right (twenty or thirty miles) a heavy bombardment was in progress, the guns making a steady rumble and mutter. I could see a continuous flicker on the horizon. The French batteries are so craftily hidden that I pass within a few yards of them without a suspicion. The other day I was rounding a familiar turn when suddenly, with a tremendous roar and concussion, a "380" went off close by. The little ambulance shied across the road and I nearly fell off the seat. Talk about "death pops"—these big guns give forth a sound that must be heard to be appreciated.

Another break here, as since writing the above we have had a bit of excitement, in the shape of a raid, or coup de main. In sectors like ours, during the periods of tranquillity between more important attacks, an occasional coup de main is necessary in order to get a few prisoners for information about the enemy. We are warned beforehand to be ready for it, but do not know exactly when or where. I will tell you the story of the last one, as related by a slightly wounded but very happy poilu I brought in beside me.

"After coffee in the morning," he said, "our battalion commander called for one platoon of volunteers to make the attack—each volunteer to have eight days' special leave afterwards. It was hard to choose, as every one wanted to go—for the 'permission,' and to have a little fun with the Boches. At noon we were ordered to the first line. Our rifles and equipment were left behind, each man carrying only a little food, a canteen of wine, a long knife, and a sack of grenades. Our orders were to advance the moment the bombardment ceased, take as many prisoners as possible, and return before the enemy had recovered from his surprise. At the point of attack the German trench is only twenty yards from ours—several nights before, they had rolled out a line of portable wire-entanglements. At 4.30 in the afternoon our 75's began to plough up the Boche trench and rip their wire to shreds. It was wonderful—along the line in front of us hundreds of our shells, bursting only twenty metres off, sent earth and wire and timbers high into the air—while not one of us, watching so close by, was hurt.

"At 5.15 the guns ceased firing and the next instant we were over the parapet, armed with knives, grenades, and a few automatic pistols. After the racking noise of the bombardment, a strange quiet, a breathless tranquillity, seemed to oppress us as we ran through the torn wire and jumped into the smoking ruins of the enemy trench. In front of me there was no one,—only a couple of bodies,—but to the right and left I could hear grenades going, so it was evident that a few Germans had not retreated to the dugouts. Straight ahead I saw a boyau leading to their second lines, and as I ran into this with my squad, we came on a German at the turn. His hands were up and he was yelling, 'Kamerad, Kamerad!' as fast as he knew how. Next minute, down went his hand and he tossed a grenade into our midst. By luck it struck mud, and the time-fuse gave us a moment's start. The corporal was killed and my pal, FrÉtard, who lies on the stretcher behind, got an Éclat through the leg. We did not make a prisoner of the Boche.

"The abris of the second line were full of Germans, but all but one were barricaded. A few grenades persuaded the survivors to come out of this, with no fight left in them; but how to get into the others? In vain we invited them to come out for a little visit—till some one shouted, 'The stove-pipes!' Our barrage fire was now making such a fuss that the Boches farther back could not use their machine-guns, so we jumped on top of the dugouts and popped a half-dozen citrons into each chimney. That made them squeal, mon vieux—oh, lÀ lÀ! But it was time to go back—our sergeant was shouting to us; so, herding our prisoners ahead, we made a sprint back to our friends."

One of the prisoners was wounded, and he was hauled to the hospital by the chap with whom I share my quarters. I went to have a look at the German—always an object of curiosity out here. Had to shoulder my way through a crowd to get there. He lay on a stretcher, poor devil, hollow-eyed, thin, with a ragged beard—an object of pity, suffering and afraid for his life. His gray overcoat lay beside him and near it stood his clumsy hobnailed boots. German or no German, he was a human being in a bad situation—a peasant obviously, and deadly afraid.

Suddenly, a half-baked civilian—always the most belligerent class—reached up and plucked contemptuously at his leg, with an unpleasant epithet. Then a fine thing happened. A French soldier, lying near by on a stretcher, severely wounded, raised up his head and looked sternly at the crowd. "Enough," he said, "he is a Boche, I grant you; but first of all remember that he is a soldier, wounded and in your power!"

We were at lunch yesterday when a friend rushed in to say that an aeroplane fight was starting, almost directly overhead. A big French reconnaissance plane was diving for safety, with a Fokker close behind and German shrapnel bursting all around, when a tiny French fighting machine appeared far above, plunging down like a falcon on its quarry. The Fokker turned too late: the Nieuport, rushing downward at one hundred and fifty miles an hour, looped the loop around the German. Two bursts of machine-gun fire came down faintly to our ears, and the next moment it was evident that the German was hit. Slowly at first, the Fokker began to fall—this way and that, like a leaf falling in still air, growing larger each moment before our eyes, until it disappeared behind a hill. High over the lines, scorning burst after burst of German shrapnel, the tiny Nieuport sailed proudly back and forth, as if daring any Boche pilot to rise and try his luck. In the thrill of the superb spectacle, one forgot that the poor chap (a good sportsman, if he was a German!) had lost his life.

April, 1917

I have met some interesting types lately. One is Jean B——, a sergeant of infantry. Jean has been about the world a good bit, and when the war broke out was just finishing a contract in Spain. He promptly came to France and volunteered, and had only fifteen days of training before being sent to the front for a big attack. Knowing nothing of military matters and having distinguished himself in the first day's fighting, he was made a corporal at once; and next day, when the attack began again, he and his squad were the first to jump into a section of German trench. There, abandoned in the hasty retreat, was a brand-new German machine-gun and forty sacks of ammunition. Jean is a canny boy, and before the officers had got to where he was, he had his men hide gun and cartridges in a clump of bushes.

The French made a gain of about two miles at this point, and owing to the nature of the ground,—artillery emplacements, and so forth,—the new lines were nearly a mile apart. Under these conditions, both sides were constantly making daylight patrols in the broken country between the trenches; and as Jean's captain was a good judge of men, he let him take his squad out daily, to do pretty much as he pleased. Pledging his men to absolute secrecy, Jean had them hide machine-gun and ammunition a little way in front of the new French lines, and then gave them a brief drill, in mounting and dismounting the gun, tripod, and so forth. (He had worked in an ordnance factory, by the way.) Each man carried either a part of the gun or a few belts of cartridges.

One morning, just before dawn, they crawled up close to the Germans and hid themselves in a brushy watercourse—mitrailleuse set up and ready for action. Presently there were sounds of activity in front, and as day broke, they made out thirty or forty Germans, who, so far away and out of sight of the French, were out in the open, working on a new trench. Jean's men began to get excited and wanted action, but he calmed them, whispering to be patient. He himself is the most excitable man in the world—except in emergencies; a jovial type, with black hair and a pair of merry gray eyes set in a red, weather-beaten face.

Hour after hour they bided their time, until the Germans, only seventy-five yards away, assembled in a group for a rest. Lying on his belly behind the gun, Jean sighted and pulled the lever, spraying lead into the unfortunate Boches until the last belt of two hundred cartridges had raced through. Then it was all hands dismount the gun and retreat at top speed. Sneaking "home" by devious ways, they smiled to see shells begin to smash into the position they had so lately left.

At supper that evening (the meal known universally as "la soupe"), the colonel came strolling down the trench with Jean's subaltern. The lieutenant nodded and pointed, then called Jean over.

"Ah," said the colonel, smiling, "so this is the type who was on patrol this morning—hum. I was in an advanced observation post on the hill above you and saw the whole affair with my glasses. And how many of those poor Germans did you kill?"

"I did not wait to count, my colonel."

"I will tell you, then; six escaped, out of thirty-eight—most remarkable rifle-fire I remember seeing. It sounded almost like a mitrailleuse at work. How many in your patrol? Five? Remarkable! Remarkable! Eh bien, good day, sergeant."

"He was a type not too severe," remarked the ex-corporal, in telling the tale; "in short, un bon garÇon."

This is the highest compliment a poilu can pay his officer; in fact, I once heard an ancient Territorial say it irreverently of Marshal Joffre, whom he had known in younger days, somewhere in the Orient.

Jean is at home in several languages, speaking perfectly French, German, Italian, and Spanish. I usually chat with him in the last, as in it I get the fine points of his narrative better than in French. His German was the means of getting him into an adventure such as very few men in the war have experienced. I cannot, of course, vouch for the truth of what follows, but I have no reason to doubt his word, and know him to be capable of any foolhardy rashness. Such a thing would be impossible at the present time.

One dark night, shortly after midnight Jean—on a solitary patrol—was lying just outside the wire, about ten metres from the German trench, listening to locate the sentries. There was a faint starlight. Suddenly a whisper came from beyond the wire, a low voice speaking in broken French.

"Why do you lie so quiet, my friend? I saw you crawl up and have watched you ever since. I don't want to shoot you; I am a Bavarian."

"Good-evening, then," Jean whispered back in his perfect German.

"So," said the sentry, "you speak our language. Wait a moment, till I warn the rest of my squad, and I will show you the way through the wire; there are no officers about at this hour."

Probably not one man in a thousand would have taken such a chance, but he did, and ten minutes later was standing in the trench in a German cloak and fatigue cap (in case of passing officers), chatting amiably with a much interested group of Bavarian soldiers. They gave him beer, showed him their dugouts, and arranged a whistle signal for future visits, before bidding him a regretful good-night. "We are Bavarians," they said; "we like and admire the French, and fight only because we must."

With characteristic good sense, Jean went at once to his captain the following morning and told him the whole story. The officer knew and trusted him and said without hesitation, "Go as often as you want, and keep your ears open."

So he made many a midnight crawl through the wires, after whistling the soft signal. He carried with him each time a few litres of wine (a great luxury to the German soldiers), and in return they took him on long excursions through their trenches. Once he was in the German third line, more than a mile back. The sector was a very quiet one, though the trenches were close together, and one morning a crude arrow dropped into the French trench, bearing a note to Jean.

"Get into your dugouts at five this afternoon," it read; "there will be a bombardment, but no attack, we hope."

Another time, after a French bombardment, a similar note dropped in: "Don't send so many torpedoes—shells are all right, but your torpedoes have ruined some of our best sleeping-places. Remember we are not Prussians, but Bavarians."

Jean is just now back from a permission. He went away a reckless, jolly sort of an adventurer, and has come back sober, serious, and tremendously in love. He told me a little about it, as we sat together in my dugout (I have a private one now, with a stove, a tiny window sticking up discreetly six inches above ground, and pictures on the walls), and the tale is so typical of war-time France that I can't resist telling it to you.

They had carried on quite a correspondence, as godmother and godson, before the longed-for permission came; and when A——, with her parents, of course, met him at the train, she seemed like an old friend. She is charming, as I know from her photograph, and sturdy brown Jean, togged out in his special permission uniform, with his neat shoes, bright leather puttees and belt, kÉpi de fantaisie, and gold sergeant's wound- and service-stripes, looks every inch a soldier of France. At the end of the second day, he was walking with A—— and could contain himself no longer.

"Mademoiselle," he said, "I cannot, as a man of honor, stay here longer. I love you,—there, I have said it,—but I am penniless, and after the war shall have only what I can earn. Your father, on the other hand, is the most important merchant in this district—so you see it would (even if you were willing) be quite impossible for me to ask for your hand. I can never thank you enough for your kindness to a poor soldier; it has given me a glimpse of Paradise."

That evening, as he sat in his room, trying to make up an excuse to give the old people for leaving, the girl's mother came in, saying that she understood he was going, and was much hurt to think that her house had not pleased him. Then the old gentleman rushed in, radiant with smiling good humor.

"But hush, maman," he cried, "I know all. Also I know a man when I see one. You love our little A——, eh, sergeant? Well, what of it? And you are poor—well, what of that? When we old ones are gone, she will have everything—she is all we have, since Louis was killed at the Marne. You are a type that I love, my boy—out there at the front, helping to push the Boche out of France; do you suppose I would not rather have you for a son-in-law than some sacrÉ espÈce of a rich embusquÉ, riding by in his limousine?"

Rather superb, I think.

So, as an engaged man, he is making a poor attempt to be cautious. Also, he has a frightful case of cafard, that mysterious malady of the trenches, which is nothing but concentrated homesickness and longing for the sight of one's women folk, sweethearts, sisters, mothers. A couple of days ago, he came to me with a brilliant idea.

"See, Charlot," he said, "I have a scheme. You know Lieutenant P——, chief of the corps franc—tell him of me, that I can speak German and can take prisoners, and tell him to ask my captain to detach me for the next coup de main."

To understand this, you must know that a coup de main is a raid, made after a brief artillery preparation, on the enemy trenches, not with the idea of gaining ground, but simply to get a few prisoners for information regarding regiments, and so forth. In the French army such raids are made by special selected companies of each regiment, who have no routine duty and get eight days' special leave after each raid that results in prisoners. These men are termed "corps franc." As you can see, Jean thought this a quick way to get back to his fiancÉe.

While we talked, by a freak of luck, who should knock at my door but Lieutenant P——, chief of our local corps franc, a very good friend and one I am proud to have. He is the perfect quintessence of a French subaltern,—twenty-six years old, slight, wiry, and handsome; an Anglophile in everything relating to sport, as exquisite in dress and person as Beau Brummell, and as recklessly brave as Morgan's buccaneers. He has risen from the ranks, wears a gold bracelet, and has every decoration that a French soldier or officer can get, including the red ribbon. His Croix de Guerre has seven citations, and he has been five times wounded. He took to Jean at once, saying that he needed an interpreter for a raid which was coming in two or three days, and promised to see the captain about it at once.

"Better come with us," he said to me, whimsically. "I want to run down to Paris next week, and if the sergeant here and I don't get a prisoner or two, it will be because there are none left in the first line. Come on—you'll see some fun!"

"But," I said, "what is there in it for me? I'm ruined if I'm caught in any such escapade, and in any case I get no permission."

"Oh, we'll fix that. Maybe you'd get a nice little wound like my last one; and if not, I'm an expert with grenades; I think I could toss one so you would just get an Éclat or two in the legs—good for a week in Paris."

I thanked him without enthusiasm and declined.

The sequel to this came last night as I lay reading in my bunk. The evening had been absolutely quiet, not a rifle-shot along the trenches, until suddenly, about 10.30, the batteries set up their sullen thumping, mingled with the thud of exploding aerial torpedoes.

To my ears, concentrated artillery fire—not too far off—has a strangely mournful sound—heavy, dull, and fitful, like a dark thunderstorm in Dante's hell. The bombardment lasted exactly forty minutes, then absolute silence except for an occasional pistol-shot (no one uses rifles in raids), and once more the sudden stammer of a mitrailleuse. As I lay there, safe in my warm bunk, I thought of gallant little P—— and jolly old lovelorn Jean, perhaps at that moment stealing through torn German wire with a brace of prisoners ahead of them, crouching low each time a star-shell sent up its warning trail of sparks,—or perhaps—

To-morrow, when I go back to the village for two days' rest, I shall look for them.

April 10, 1917

I am writing this in a new post of ours—a village several kilometres from the lines, where there are still civilians. As the hospital is very noisy at night, and one would have to sleep in a barrack, packed in among the wounded, I have arranged with a motherly old woman (patronne of the local cafÉ) to let me have her spare room. I found an old cowbell and by an arrangement of strings and hooks have rigged it so that it can be rung at night from the street below. Talk about luxury! I have a real bed (about five feet long) with sheets, pillows, and a featherbed that reaches from feet to waist. When a night call comes, the bell tinkles, I leap out of bed, pull on breeches and coat and high felt "arctics," and in three minutes am off.

As there are no men about, I have been (in odd moments) splitting wood and moving the heavy beer and wine casks as required—work really far too heavy for women. The old lady, in return, often invites me in for a cup of steaming coffee with a dash of schnapps, and to-day she asked me to a family dinner—a superb civilian meal of ham and boiled potatoes and home-made choucroute. The latter must be tasted to be appreciated. She is quite bitter about a branch of the Y.M.C.A.—called Foyer du Soldat—just opened here, which, with its free movies, papers, and so forth, has lured away much of her trade. "I pay a heavy license tax," she says, "and they pay nothing—nothing."

Useless to try to explain to the good old soul that the innocent must suffer in order that virtue shall triumph—or in other words, that the fantassin shall have amusement without beer. I comforted her with the regrettable truth that her boys will all be back when the novelty is worn off.

A great many of the men here are muleteers from the Spanish and Italian borders. Where the country is hilly and trails constitute the shortest route to the trenches, the French use a great many pack-mules to carry up provisions, ammunition, and supplies. A Western packer would be interested in their methods. Each mule has its master, who packs it, washes it, feeds it, and on the march walks ahead, leading it by a rope. The pack-saddles and rigging are wonderful—they must be when one considers that the mules often carry three hundred pounds twenty miles a day, and sore backs are unknown.

A mule's a mule, however, wherever you meet him—these are just the same "ornery" brutes we have at home. Their effect on the explosive southern French temperament is sometimes ludicrous. I stopped the other day to ask the way of a mule-skinner who was limping dejectedly ahead of his charge—the rest of the train was far ahead. After putting me on the road, he leaned wearily against a tree and explained that in all the world there was probably not another mule like his. It had kicked him yesterday, it had bitten him severely this morning, and just now, while he adjusted the pack, it had kicked him on the hip, so that in all likelihood he would limp for life. While he talked, the mule sidled over, with drooping eyelids and sagging ears, and planted one foot firmly on the unfortunate Frenchman's toes. The whole thing seemed to have been done by accident—I could almost see the dotted line of innocence running from the mule's sleepy eye off into space. Without a word, the man set his shoulder against the mule, forced its weight off his foot, and tenderly inspected the injured part. Then, hands on hips, he regarded the mule with a long stare of dramatic contempt.

"Wouldst thou kill me, sacrÉ espÈce of a camel?" he said at last; "well, death would be better than this. Come, here I am!"

The day before yesterday, when I was out at one of our posts on the front, an Austrian 88 mm. shell fell in a crowd of mules and their drivers. Fortunately no one was hurt (by one of the freaks of shells), but three mules were killed by the splinters. That night, with some misgivings, I tried a steak from the hind-quarter of a five-year-old mule. It was bully. When you come to think of it, a mule is just as good food as a steer.

A week ago I was waiting at a front post for some wounded, when a mule train came by, packed with the huge winged aerial torpedoes so much in vogue just now. Each mule carried four of these truly formidable things. As the last mule passed, he slipped on the muddy slope, his feet flew out, and down he came with a whack, torpedoes and all. You ought to have seen us scatter,—officers, men, and mule-drivers,—like fragments of a bursting shell. As the mule showed signs of struggling, we had to rush back and gingerly remove the load before helping him up.

These torpedoes play a great part in war nowadays. They are cheap to manufacture, carry an enormous bursting charge, and—shot out of small mortar-like guns, into which the steel or wooden "stem" of the torpedo is inserted—have a range of six or seven hundred yards. On days of attack you can see them, like huge black birds, soar slowly up from behind the trenches, hang poised for an instant, and dart down to make their formidable explosion, which sends clouds of dÉbris, timber, and dirt, high into the air. Their fragments are very bad—long, thin, jagged things that come whizzing by and inflict terrible wounds. Many of them are equipped with "trailers," which outline their course in a shower of crimson sparks; and on nights of attack the sky is scored with their fiery trails.

A night attack is a wonderful thing to see: the steady solemn thunder of the guns, the sky glaring with star-shells and trails, the trenches flaming and roaring with bursting shell. It is like a vast natural phenomenon,—Krakatoa or Mont PelÉe,—too vast and cataclysmic to be man's handiwork; and yet, into the maelstrom of spouting flames, hissing steel, shattering explosions, insignificant little creatures like you and me will presently run—offering, with sublime courage, their tender bodies to be burned and pierced and mangled. To me that is war's one redeeming feature—it brings out in men a courage that is of the spirit alone—above all earthly things.

April 23, 1917

I am sitting again in the little post I told you about in my last letter. The old lady is tidying up the cafÉ, the early morning sun is shining in gayly through the many-paned windows, and outside, along the picket-line, the mules are squealing and kicking while they have their morning bath. Pretty soon I shall go out foraging for a brace of eggs, and with these, a piece of cheese, and some coffee shall make my dÉjeuner.

The local barrack is the only one I have found where one simply cannot eat, as the cook and his kitchen are unspeakable. Unless he has been caught out in a shower, he has certainly gone without a bath since the war started. After a glance at him and at his kitchen even the most callous poilu rebels.

We have now, attached to our section as mechanic, a French private who is rather an unusual type—a rich manufacturer in civil life, who, through some kink of character, has not risen in the army. He put in a year in the trenches and then, being middle-aged, was put behind the lines. He speaks English, is splendidly educated, and has traveled everywhere, but is too indifferent to public opinion ever to make an officer, or even a non-com. In his factory he had a packer, earning seven francs a day, who was also mobilized, and who has now risen to the rank of lieutenant. Think of the gulf between a poilu and a French officer, with his authority, his galons and superb red-and-gold hat, and then consider that this lieutenant's idea of a permission is to go home, put on his oldest clothes, and spend the seven days working at his old job of packing and heading barrels. It takes France to produce this sort of thing.

The siege warfare to which, owing to strategic reasons, we are reduced in our part of the lines, with both sides playing the part of besieged and besiegers, gives rise to a curious unwritten understanding between ourselves and the enemy. Take the hospital corps, their first-aid posts and ambulances. The Germans must know perfectly well where the posts are, but they scarcely ever shell them—not from any humanitarian reason, but because if they did, the French would promptly blow theirs to pieces. It is a curious sensation to live in such a place, with the knowledge that this is the only reason you enjoy your comparative safety. Likewise our ambulances. I often go over a road in perfectly plain view of the Boche, only a few hundred yards distant, and though shells and shrapnel often come my way, I am confident none of them are aimed at me. The proof of it is that no one has ever taken a pot-shot at me with rifle or machine-gun, either one of which would be a sure thing at the range. The other day an officer invited me down to see his newly completed observatory—a cunningly built, almost invisible stronghold on the crest of a hill, which commanded a superb view of the trenches and German territory behind them. It chanced to be an afternoon of unusual interest. The trenches, about eight hundred yards distant, were spread like a map beneath us,—a labyrinth of zigzag ditches and boyaux,—all cunningly laid out on principles which I have been studying. With the powerful glasses lent me, I could make out the thickets of wire before the first lines. A heavy bombardment was in progress, and all along the lines, as far as the eye could see, clouds of smoke and earth were springing up and settling slowly down. Not a living being was in sight. Far off to the south, a flock of observation balloons floated motionless, high in air, like fat, hovering birds. Suddenly the man beside me, who had been staring through his glasses at a twenty-acre patch of woods a couple of miles away, gave an excited exclamation. "I have spotted it—the new battery of heavy guns that has been annoying us; they were too bold, for once."

Sure enough, I thought I made out a thin wisp of smoke trailing among the tree-tops at the south end of the wood.

The officer muttered a string of cabalistic instructions into his telephone receiver and motioned me to watch. A minute later, a battery of French heavy guns behind us began their deep, coughing thumps, sending enormous shells hurtling overhead with the pulsing rush of an express train, crescendo and diminuendo. The first shell fell short, showering the trees with earth and dÉbris—the salvos that followed obscured the whole wood in clouds of smoke, broken branches, and dust. Twenty minutes of this before the battery went silent again. A final tremendous explosion, eclipsing all that had gone before, seemed to shake the trees to their roots.

"That will hold them for a while," said my friend exultantly, as he telephoned the news back to his battery; "we must have hit their magazine of propelling charges."

Next day I was sitting at lunch in our mess, distant about three hundred yards from the observatory, when a series of heavy, racking explosions made the windows rattle. There is a distinct difference between the sound of a gun and that of a bursting shell. The first is a cracking bang, or boum, as the French say. The latter is a racking, dwelling roar—drawn out, if such a thing can be said of an explosion. Shells were bursting somewhere close to us—many of them. When I went outside I could hear, clear and waspish above the din, the pinging of splinters whizzing overhead, and the occasional crackle of a lopped-off branch. After half an hour of this, a man came panting up with the bad news that the new observatory was completely demolished. There you have the inner workings of siege-war; the Boches, with uncanny craft, knew of the observatory, let the French complete it, and might have let it alone, had it not been instrumental in destroying their battery. That led them into their indiscreet action, for the French, in retaliation, promptly wiped off the map the most important German observatory—an elaborate affair whose exact location they had long known. This time the Boche did not dare retaliate. And so it goes.

There is a crack French gun-pointer near here who has brought down seven enemy planes in the past two months—a remarkable record in this quiet district. The last one fell close to one of our posts—its two passengers, German lieutenants, were dead, but scarcely marked by their drop into a snow-drift. One of them, a handsome young chap, with a little blond mustache, wore a gold bracelet, and in his pocket was a letter from his mother, accusing him of being an ungrateful son, who had only written twice in six months. Rather pathetic. There is a sort of chivalry in the air service which is a relief in the sordid monotony of this war. A German plane was crippled a while ago, and had to volplane down smack into a parade-ground where a French regiment was at drill. The soldiers rushed out to make prisoners of the two German officers, who were not a hundred yards up; but the latter, with indomitable courage, loosed their Spandaus on the crowd, and were promptly riddled with bullets by the reluctant French. They received a funeral in accordance with their splendid death.

The code of the Prussian officer is never to surrender; but of course all cannot live up to this. In a recent raid, a sergeant I know made a prisoner of a German captain, who, as they walked to the rear, cursed his luck in fluent French, saying that he was caught unaware—that an officer never surrendered, but fought to the end.

"Stop here, my captain, and let us consider this," said the sergeant seriously; "there are several articles of your equipment to which my fancy runs—that watch, for example, those leather puttees, and that fat purse I saw you change to your hip-pocket. Perhaps I can at once oblige you and gratify my whim. Suppose you were suddenly to run—a quick shot would save your honor, and me the trouble of escorting you back to the rear. And I am an excellent shot, je vous assure." But the German was not interested.

April 26, 1917

This afternoon the general of the division ordered us to present ourselves at headquarters at four o'clock. From lunch on there was a great shaving and haircutting, brushing and pressing of uniforms, and overhauling of shoes and puttees. Four o'clock found us lined up at the door of the wonderful old chÂteau, and next moment a superb officer, who spoke English,—of the Oxford variety,—stepped out, introduced himself all around with charming courtesy, took our names, and ushered us in.

The general, a hawk-faced man of sixty, straight and slender as an arrow, with sparkling dark eyes, stood surrounded by his resplendent staff. As each name was announced, we walked forward to him, saluted and bowed, and shook hands. This over, we stepped back and mingled with the staff officers, who displayed a wonderful trick of making us feel at home in the first stiffness. Presently orderlies brought in champagne and glasses, and when every one had his glass in hand the buzz stopped while the general spoke.

"Your country, gentlemen," he said, "has done France the honor of setting aside this day for her. It is fitting that I should ask you here, in order to tell you how much we appreciate America's friendship, which you and your comrades have been demonstrating by actions rather than words. I am an old man, but I tell you my heart beat like a boy's when the news came that the great Sister Republic—united of old by ideals of human liberty—had thrown in her lot with ours. I ask you to drink with me to the future of France and America—the sure future. You have seen France: our brave women, ready to make any sacrifices for the motherland; our little soldiers, invincible in their determination. Let us drink then to France, to America, and to the day of ultimate victory, which is coming as surely as the sun will rise to-morrow."

As he ceased, he stepped forward to touch glasses with each of us,—the invariable French custom,—and next moment a magnificent Chasseur band, outside on the terrace, crashed into the "Star-Spangled Banner." Quite thrilling, I assure you. Later, we strolled through the fine old gardens, chatting with the officers while the band played. The general, while the most military man imaginable, has a very attractive brusque affability. We are a good-sized crowd as Americans run, and the French, who average shorter and stockier, never cease to wonder at our height. The old chap grabbed three or four of us by the shoulders and lined us up.

"Mais vous Êtes des gaillards," he said, smiling; "see, I am five or six centimetres shorter than any of you. But wait, we have a giant or two."

With that he called over a grinning captain and pulled him back to back with our biggest man, whom he topped by a full inch.

"But, my general," laughed the officer, "it is not good to be so tall—too much of one sticks out of a trench."

The owner of the chÂteau—a stately woman of fifty, proud of her name, her race, and her country, and an angel from heaven to the sick and poor for miles around—is an example of the kind of patriotism of which, I fear, we are in need. Her husband is dead; when the war broke out she had a daughter and two sons—gallant young officers whose brief lives had been a constant source of satisfaction and pride to their mother. The elder was killed at the Marne, and a while ago, the younger, her special pet, was killed here in an attack. A woman of her kind, to whom the continuance of an old name was almost a religion, could undergo no harder experience. At the grave-side she stood erect and dry-eyed, with a little proud smile on her lips, as her last boy was buried. "Why should I weep?" she asked some one who would have comforted her; "there is nothing finer my boys could have done if they had lived out their lives." Her heart must be very nearly broken in two, but never a sign does she give; going about among her hospitals and peasant families as cheerful, interested, even gay, as if her only cares were for others. There is true courage for you!

To-day I went to a new post for some sick men, and who should be waiting for me but my friend Jean, of whom I wrote you before! His company has been transferred to this place. It was great to see his grinning face and to chatter Spanish with him. As the sick men had not finished lunch, Jean asked me to his mess, and we had a jolly meal with his pals. I have had to give up wine, as it seems to blacken our teeth horribly (all of us have noticed it, and we can trace it to no other source), and the Frenchmen can't get over the joke of seeing one drink water—extraordinary stuff to drink! All right to run under bridges or for washing purposes, but as a beverage—a quaint American conceit, handed down no doubt from the red aborigines—les peaux rouges indigÈnes—of our continent. Jean admitted that since December, 1914, he had not tasted water, and no one else could remember the last occasion when he had tried it.

As word had just come from the trenches that a wounded man was on the way in, I got my helmet and we strolled down the boyau to meet the stretcher-bearers. It was, to me, a new section of the front and very interesting. The country is broken and hilly, and the lines zigzag about from crest to valley in the most haphazard way, which really has been painfully worked out to prevent enfilading fire. There is scarcely any fighting here, as neither side has anything to gain by an advance, which would mean giving up their present artillery positions.

In one place the boyau ran down a steep slope, badly exposed, and Jean said, "Follow me on the run!" We sprinted for twenty yards, and next moment, tat-tat-tat-tat came from the Boches, and little spurts of dust shot up behind us. They can never shoot quickly enough to hurt any one at this point, Jean said, but after all, "You can't blame a fellow for trying."

At the next turn we came on a train of the little grenade donkeys—so small that they make the tiniest Mexican burro seem a huge clumsy brute. They do not show above the shallowest trench, and each one carries two panniers full of grenades. These last are vicious little things of cast iron, checkered so as to burst into uniform square fragments, and about the size and shape of lemons. They make an astonishingly loud bang when they go off, and if close enough, as in a narrow trench, are pretty bad. At a little distance, of course, they are not very dangerous. In the trench warfare—raids, infantry attacks, and so forth—they seem to have supplanted rifles, just as the knife has supplanted the bayonet.

May 11, 1917

Sunday, another lovely day. It is 7 A.M., and already the indefinable Sunday atmosphere has come over the camp. The shower-baths are open and strings of men are coming and going with towels on their arms. Under the trees little groups are shaving and cutting one another's hair, amid much practical joking and raillery.

One becomes very fond of the French soldier. Large floods of rhetoric have been poured out in describing him, and yet nearly every day one discovers in him new and interesting traits. Let me try to sketch for you a composite picture of the French infantryman—the fantassin who is winning the war for France. On the whole, I do not see him as a boy, but as a sturdy middle-aged man—the father of a family. He is short and solidly built, with thick calves and heavy shoulders. His round head, on which the hair is short, crisp, and black, is surmounted by a battered blue helmet. He wears a long overcoat, looped up and buttoned at the sides, showing evidence, in several places, of home-made patching. It was once horizon blue, but has now faded to an ideally protective shade of blue-green-gray. About his middle is a worn cartridge-belt, and from either shoulder, their straps crossing on breast and back, hang his musettes—bags of brown canvas for carrying extra odds and ends, including everything from a bottle of wine to a dictionary. On his back is his square pack, an affair of formidable weight, to which he has lashed his rolled blanket in the form of a horseshoe, points down. Perched on top of this, he carries his gamelle and quart—the saucepan and cup which serve for both cooking and eating; and beside them you perceive with astonishment that he has strapped a large German trench torpedo—a souvenir for the home folks. From his belt hangs the tin box, painted horizon-blue, which contains his gasmask, and on the other side his long slender bayonet rattles against his thigh.

A large calloused hand, not too clean, holds his shouldered rifle at a most unmilitary angle. The gun has seen hard service, the wood is battered, and in places bright steel shows through the bluing; but look closely and you will see that it is carefully greased, and in the muzzle a little plug of cloth keeps out dust and moisture. In spite of a load which would make a burro groan, he walks sturdily, whistling a march between puffs of a cigarette. Glance at his face. The eyes are dark gray, deep-set, and twinkling with good humor; they are the clear decisive eyes of a man who knows what he wants and has set about getting it. The nose is aquiline, the mouth strong and ironically humorous, the unshaven chin positive and shapely. It is the face of a breed that has been settling to type for many centuries, a race old in cultivation and philosophy.

What is he in civil life? That is hard to say. A lawyer, a farmer, a customhouse clerk, a cook—probably a cook; most of them seem to be cooks, and mighty good ones. Ours at the mess was assistant chef at the Savoy, in London, and when he has the material (for example a hind-quarter of mule, a few potatoes, some dandelions, a tin of lobster, and an egg) he can turn out a dinner hard to equal anywhere—delicious hors d'oeuvres, superb soup, roast, sautÉ potatoes, salad, and so on.

The French soldier's one great joy and privilege is to grumble. Back in billets where he goes to rest, he spends the whole day at it—hour after hour, over a bock or a litre of wine, he complains of everything: the food, the uniforms, the trenches, the artillery, the war itself. To hear him, one would suppose that France was on the verge of ruin and disintegration. Let some unwise stranger make the slightest criticism of France, and watch the change. The poilu takes the floor with a bound. There is no country like France—no better citizens or braver soldiers than the French.

"Dis donc, mon vieux," he ends triumphantly, "where would Europe be now if it were not for us?"

To be a French general is a terrible responsibility. Their ears must burn continually, for every act is criticized, picked to pieces, and proved a fatal mistake, daily, in a thousand roadside wine-shops. Some celebrity once remarked, that every French soldier was a potential general. He knew them; he was right. They are no carping destructive critics who tear things down but suggest no method of building up. On the contrary, any chance-met poilu will tell you exactly how any maneuver or bit of strategy should be carried out—from a trench-raid to an enveloping movement, which will—he is sure of it!—net fifty thousand prisoners. In last night's coup de main they caught only three Germans. "Do you know why, my friend? I will tell you. Our artillery cut the wires all right, and tapped on the front trench. Good. After that they raised their guns for the barrage, but pouf! the Boches had already run back to their dugouts in the second or third lines. Had the gunners made a barrage on the second line from the beginning, the Germans would have been forced to remain in the first line, and instead of three, we would have bagged thirty. Oh, well, we get our extra leave anyhow, and you should have heard them squeal when we dropped grenades down their stove-pipes!"

The French infantryman would drive a foreign officer mad until he began to understand him and appreciate his splendid hidden qualities. The only thing he does without grumbling is fight; and, after all, when you come to think of it, that is a rather important part of a soldier's duty.

An officer wants a new boyau dug—you never heard such grumbling and groaning and kicking. Finally, a bit put out, he says,—

"All right, don't dig it, if you are all sick and tired, and think I make you work simply to keep you busy. It was only a whim of mine anyhow—the Boches put up a new machine-gun last night, which enfilades the old boyau, and when day breaks and you go back to the third lines, they will doubtless put a dozen of us out of our misery."

As if by magic the new zigzag trench is dug, and the chances are that the officer finds a supply of extra-good firewood in his abri next day.

In an army like France's, one finds many odd birds among the simple soldiers. I was playing "shinny" (we introduced it and it has become very popular in our section) the other evening, and, when a soldier took off his coat, four thousand francs in bills dropped out of the breast pocket. Another evening, in a cafÉ, a roughly dressed soldier stood up to give us a bit of music—and for an hour the world seemed to stand still while one of the greatest violinists of France (two years at the front, twice wounded, Croix de Guerre, with several citations) made us forget that anything existed except a flood of clear throbbing sound. It was a rough, drinking crowd—a moment before there had been a pandemonium of loud voices and clattering plates; but for an hour the listeners were still as death—not a whisper, not even a hand-clap of applause. It was, I think, the finest tribute I ever saw paid a musician. And so it goes: one never knows what variety of man is hidden beneath the uniform of faded horizon-blue.

June 17, 1917

At last I am free to sit down quietly for a letter to you. It has been a week of rather frenzied running about—passing examinations, and the like. I arrived here in the expectation of taking the first boat, crossing the continent, and seeing you.

A talk with some American officers changed the whole aspect of affairs and showed me that, if I was to be of any use, my job was to remain here. At home, it seems, men are a drug on the market—the rub is to train them and fit them in. Here, on the other hand, they fairly welcome healthy young men—and will train us and put us where we will do the most good, with the least possible delay. Don't let yourself think that flying over here is unduly hazardous—a skillful pilot (as I hope to be) has as good a chance of living to a ripe old age as his comrades in the infantry. Numbers of them have been at it since 1914. The school where I hope to be is the finest in the world, and the machines are beyond praise.

Since writing the above, I have received my papers of acceptance in the Foreign Legion, conditional on passing the French physical tests. I have already passed the tests of the Franco-American Committee. Before cabling I took all the tests.

Later

I have passed the French examination and am to leave for the school in a day or two. I have been lucky!

It was interesting at the Paris recruiting office. I stood in line with dozens of other recruits for the Foreign Legion—all of us naked as so many fish, in the dirty corridor, waiting our turns. Each man had a number: mine was seven—lucky, I think! Finally the orderly shouted, "NumÉro sept," and I separated myself from my jolly polyglot neighbors, marched to the door, did a demi-tour À gauche, and came to attention before a colonel, two captains, and a sergeant.

"Name, Nordhoff, Charles Bernard—born at London, 1887—American citizen—unmarried—no children—desires to enlist in Foreign Legion for duration of war—to be detached to the navigating personnel of the Aviation," read the sergeant, monotonously. In two minutes I had been weighed, measured, stethoscoped, ears and eyes tested, and passed.

The colonel looked at me coldly and turned to the captain.

"Not so bad, this one, hein? He has not the head of a beast."

I bowed with all the dignity a naked man can muster, and said respectfully, "Merci, mon colonel."

"Ah, you speak French," he rejoined with a smile; "good luck, then, my American."