a magnificently monotonous memory, our march that day. it lasted from nine o'clock in the morning until six o'clock at night. its scene was a vast tableland, completely exposed, fields of beetroot alternating with fields of corn and oats. the harvest had been got in nearly everywhere. there were groups of stacks by the roadside.
directly we came out of the woods, we were marked by the hostile artillery. their object was to stop us at any price by their tirs de barrage. the rumbling went on all day without a pause. it is impossible to give any idea of the horror of it. by midday, everyone of us was deaf.
the diabolical jaws of the horizon! big and little german guns were talking. our 75's retorted—rather feebly, it is true. the distance must have been too great, and apparently did not silence a single one of the enemy's batteries.
this plain was a hell, a hell: iron and fire, every imaginable peril, a conspiracy of the elements. to begin with, there was a continuous flight of teuton aeroplanes above our heads, dropping bombs of different kinds, which fell with a muffled sound. the din of the big "coal-boxes," the shriek of the 77's, the[pg 442] thunder-clap of explosions, and the columns of tainted smoke staking out the ground.
our regiment went on advancing; so did one on our right and one on our left, and others farther away. our soldiers were swarming as far as eye could see, a calm and regular deployment. we marched for a long time by platoons, in columns of four; then by platoons two deep; and at last in skirmishing order; each officer, each n.c.o., each connecting file in his place. the silence and impeccable order were in striking contrast with the blind fury of the projectiles. mind against matter.
all our men had realised the solemnity of the task. three quarters of them were experienced heroes, who had already fought ten times; the rest were raised to the same moral level by virtue of their surroundings. there could be nothing more impressive than this sustained and irresistible advance, under shell fire, of thousands and thousands of men who never fired a single shot.
by a miracle, our casualties, on the whole, were not very severe. what unflagging inspiration was shown by our leaders of all ranks! imperceptible, serpentine movements protected each unit in turn from the mortal line of fire. how many times did we see a broadside of four "coal-boxes" fall just where we had been hardly thirty seconds before, or else where we would have been but for a fortunate zigzag! what hazard protected us? i protest that one was tempted to bow before a providence, like de valpic. the men betrayed this feeling, murmuring:
"we are blessed!"
we advanced at the double, lay down and got up again, just as at man?uvres. what am i saying?[pg 443] better than that. we kept our intervals and direction with incredible exactitude. there was not a straggler or funk among us. all honour to these proud troops, these splendid soldiers! they are dead—dead, nearly all of them. they appeared to feel, in the vague intuition of their flesh, in the vibration of the nourishing air, that their end, even if they survived to-morrow's sanguinary triumph, was inscribed on the pages of the disastrous winter or the fatal spring to come. there was no sadness or despair, but something indescribably resigned and shy crept into their gait. joking was out of date. judsi himself had put a damper on his animation. we kept on and gained ground. at one point—the wonders could not be repeated indefinitely—a single rafale on our left mowed down about forty men. we did not slacken our pace—hardly turned our heads.
we went on in a rising tide, and i thought how the sight of this inexorable multitude rolling towards them, like god's judgment, must strike terror into the hearts of the enemy's gunners.
at the end of the day we neared a wood. i was very much afraid lest the hostile infantry might be hidden there, watching for us. those barricades of trees looked most suspicious. our reconnoitring patrol went on ahead of us. i trembled for their safety. the rest of us lay down and waited in an agony of fear. not a shot was fired. what a relief it was when the wood turned out to be unoccupied—by living men, at all events.
when we, in our turn, penetrated into it, we found it strewn with dead bodies. what a struggle must have raged there during the last few days! there[pg 444] was not much undergrowth, which made it propitious for hand-to-hand fighting. the scene was re-enacted in my mind. the bosches about to continue their defensive organisation, surprised by the attack of the rifle brigade—our dead bore this uniform. the furious onslaught with the sword. we had driven them back at the point of the bayonet and massacred them wholesale. in advancing, we came upon heaps of germans. we had lost a great many men, too, but they had cleared the way for us. we were duly grateful to them and the men stepped carefully and reverently over their remains as they advanced in single file.
"pore old chaps!" sighed icard. "you're havin' a rest now and it's our turn to do the swottin'."
evening was falling. we had not gone more than three hundred yards after leaving the wood, when we halted. we were warned to make the best of the position. a certain sector was allotted to us, and we were told that we must hold it all the next day. hold it only? guillaumin looked at me and pulled a face. what we wanted to do was to get on. the big push was what we were out for. he urged me to question the captain on the situation, as i was on such good terms with him. i refused. a little occurrence which had taken place that morning was still rankling in my mind. i had thought i might be permitted to ask our company commander whether the enemy was far off. ribet had heard me all right, but had not deigned to answer. he had looked through me as if i did not exist, and then called his orderly. that meant—what? simply that the captain intended to be familiar only when it suited him. i had been annoyed[pg 445] and offended. i should let him make the advances, next time!
the lieutenant seemed embarrassed by the task entrusted to him. as we were occupying the edge of a wood the temptation was great to make use of the resources at hand—the trees for instance. henriot bustled about and had the saws got out; then asked me whether there was not some way of getting hold of some petard of melinite to put round the big trunks. he spoke too loudly. the poilus snorted when they heard him. nobody felt inclined to undertake such a piece of work which would have lasted all night. and then, we were so certain to leave it all behind when we charged to-morrow.
some time was lost in bandying words. we had been there for half an hour when the captain came up.
"not begun yet?"
henriot began to unfold his plan. ribet cut him short, after the first words.
"you're quite off the mark! the edge of a wood! do you imagine we're going to settle down at the edge of a wood—a line which is sure to be especially marked? you wouldn't have a man left. take two or three hundred yards in front there. exactly! and now dig me some good trenches!"
"deep ones, sir?"
"that's your lookout. you must arrange that. let your men do the best they can—and remember that you may be attacked any minute."
he went on. his tall silhouette disappeared behind the bushes.
covered by a new patrol party, we chose a piece of ground of the length indicated. night had come. the stars shone out one by one. the cannonade was[pg 446] diminishing in intensity. the long beams of the searchlight were probing the dark sky in all directions.
and now to our task. guillaumin and i wielded spades ourselves, but the work did not get on fast, in spite of our efforts to hasten it. the men were lazy. they had made so many of these trenches in the meuse and in argonne which were never used at all.
at the end of an hour we had a ditch only a yard wide at the most, and not deep, allowing just enough room to fire kneeling down. we had to be content with it.
