ON THE BATTLE FRONT IN FRANCE

Dominion, Volume 9, Issue 2624, 20 November 1915, Page 7

ON THE BATTLE FRONT IN FRANCE

MR. ARNOLD BENNETT IN THE TRENCHES LIVELY SKETCH OP HIS IMPRiiSSIONS (From tlio "Saturday. Post.")

We were met at a poste de commandement by the officers in charge, .who'were waiting for us. And later we found that we were always thus Wet. < Tlie highest offioer presentgeneral, colonel, or oomoiandant—was at every placo at our disposition to. explain things, and to explain them with that clarity of whidh the French alone have the secret, and of which a superlative example exists in the official report of . the earlier phases of the war, offered to the Anglo-Saxoti public through Renter. Automobiles and chauffeurs abounded for our small party of • four. Never once at any moment of lie day,, whether driving furiously along somewhat deteriorated roads in the oar or walking about the laiid, did I lack, a staff officer who produced in me the illusion that he was living solely in. order to. be of use to , me. All details of .the excursions were elaborately organised; never once did tie organisation break down. No pre-Lusi-t&nia AmericnSi correspondent could 'have, been more spoiled by Germans desperately anxious for his goodwill thai. 1 was spoiled by these IVench, who could not gain my goodwill because they had the whole, of it already. After .the rites of greeting walked lip to- tlhe high terrace of a considerable oha/teau olose byj and Franco lay -before us in a shimmering vast semicircle. . In the distance ,a' low range of hills, irregularly wooded; then a river ; then woods and - spinneys; then vineyards—boundless vineyards which climbed in varying slopes out of the . valloy aJlmost to our feet. Far to the left was a town with lofty factory chimneys, smokeless. Peasant women were • stooping in tho vineyards; the whole of ■the earth seemed to be cultivated and to be yielding bounteously. It was a 'magnificent summer aftermoon. The sun was and a few huge purple shadows moved with august deliberation across the brilliant greens.' An impression of peace, majesty, grandeur, mid of the mild, splendid richness of the soil of Franco. . '

"You see that white line on the hills, opposite," said an officer, opening a large scale map. I guessed it was a level road. "That is the German trenches," said he. - "They axe. five miles away. Their gun. positions are in the woods. Our own trenches are invisible from here."

It constituted a great' moment, this first vision of the German trenches. With the thrill caitne the lancinating thought: "All of France that lies, beyond that line, land just like the-land on which I am standing, inhabited by people just like ■ the • - people who are talking' to me, is under the insulting tyranny of the invader." - And I also thought, as the_ sense of distance quickened- my imagination to realise that these trenches stretched from Ostend to Switzerland, and that the creators of them were prosecuting - similar enterprises as far north-east as Libau, and as far south-east as the confines of Rumania: "The brigands are mad, but they are mad in the grand manner." We were at ,the front.

We Lad driven for twenty miles along fc very busy road, which was closed to civilians, and along which' oven staff offioere could not travel without murmurthe password,to the. hostile vigilance of sentries. The civil life 7 of the district was- in abeyanco, proceeding precariously from meal to meal. Aeroplanes woke the sleep. No letter could ' leave v a post office-without a ary delay of three. days. Telegrams ; Were snspeot. To get into a railway ! station was almost as difficult as to get into Paradise. A passport or a safe conduct was the sine qua non of even 1 the restricted liberty which had survived. And, yet nowhere did X see a frown nor hear a complaint. Every- • body comprehended that the exigencies of the terrific military machine were necessary exigencies. Everybody waited, waited, in confidence and with tranquil smiles. Farming Under Shell Fire. _ Also it is misleading to say that civil life was in abeyance. For the elemental basis of its prosperity , and its amenities continued' just as though the luna-tio-bullies of Potsdam , had never - dictated to Vienna the ultimatum for Serbia. The earth, was yielding fabulously. It was yielding up" to within a mile and a half of the German wire cntanglen. ments. The peasants would not neglect the earth. Officers remonstrated with them upon their perilous rashness. They replied: "The land must be tilled." •Must! When the .German artillery begins to fire the blue-clad women sink out of sight amid the foliage. Half an 2iour after it has ceased they cautiously emerge and resume. One peasant put Up an umbrella—but he was a man. We were yeritably at the front. There was, not a whisper of war, nor anything visible except the thin, pale line like a striation on the distant hills. Then a far-off sound of thunder is heard. It is a gun. A faint puff of smoke is pointed out' to ul Neither the rumble nor the transient cloudlet makes any apparent impression on the placid and wide dignity of the scene. Nevertheless, this is war.. And ' war seems a very vague, casual'and negligible thing. We are led about fifty feet to the left, where in a previous phase a shell has indented a hqge hole in the • earth. The sight of this hole renders war rather less vague ard rather less negligible. "There are eighty thousand men in front of .us," says an officer,'indicating the shimmering, empty landscape. "But- where?" "Interred—in the trenches." It is incredible. "And the other interred—the dead?" I ask. * "We never speak of them. But we think of them a good deal." Still a little closer 1 to war. The pare du genie—engineers' park. Wo inspected hills of coils of the most formidable barbed wire, far surpassing that of farmers, well contrived to tear to pieces any human being who, having got into its. entanglement, should try to get out again. One thought that nothing but steam chisels wcitld he capable of cutting it. Also stacks of timber for shoring up mines which sapners would dig beneath the enemy's trenches. Also sacks to be filled with earth for improvised entrenching. Also the fourpointed contraptions called chevaux-de-frise,- which', however you throw them, ' will always' stick a fatal point upward, to impale tho horse or man who cannot or will not look where lie is going. Even tarred paper for the weather out of trenches or arything else. And all these things in unimagined quantities. Closo by a few German prisoners performing sanitary duties under a guard. "They wcro men in God's image, and they went about on the assumption that all the rest of tho war lay heforo them, and that there was a lot of it. A genorald told us-that ho had mentioned to them the possibility of an exchange of prisoners, whereupon they had gloomily and pathetically protested. They very sincerely did not want to go back whence they had como, preferring captivity, humiliation, and the basest tasks to a share in the great glory of German arms. To me they had a brutalised a j r — no doubt ono minor consequence of military ambition in high places. ; Not many minute© away was a hospital—what the French call an ambulance.

de premiere 'ligne—contrived out of a factory. This was tho hospital ncarost to the trenches in that region, and the wounded camo to it direct from the dressing stations which lie immediately behind tho trenches. "When a man falls or men fail the automobile is telephoned for, and it arrives at tho appointed rendezvous generally before tho strctelier-boarers, who may havo to walk for 20 or 30 minutes over rough ground. A wounded' man may be, and lias been, operated upon in this hospital within an hour of 'his wounding;. - It is organised on a permanent basis, for cases too serious for romoval liavo, of course, to l-omain there. Nevertheless, these, establishments are, as _ regards their staff, pationts, and material, highly mobile. One hospital of 200 beds was onco entirely evacuated within 60 minutes upon a sudden order. We walked through small ward after small ward, storeroom after storeroom, aseptic operating room and septic tporating room, all odorous with ether, and saw little but resignation—and not much of that, for patients happened to bo few. Yet tho worn face of p tho doctor in charge showed that vast labours must havo been accomplished in thoso sombre chambers. \ .*

In the very large courtyard a tent operating hospital was established. The white attendants were waiting within tho pallid obscurity among tables, glass jars, and instruments. The surgeon's wagon, with hot water and sterilising apparatus, was waiting without. The canvas organism was a real hospital, and the point about it was that it could move, off complete at 25 minutes' notice, and set itself up again in any other ordained location in another 25 minutes. Ingeniousi Lethal Apparatus. Another short ride, and we were in an aviation park, likewise tented, in tho midst of an immense wheat field, on the lofty side of a hill. There were f.ix hangars of canvas, each containing an aeroplane and serving as a dormitory; and for each aeroplane a carriage and a motor — for sometimes aeroplanes are wounded, and have to travel by road. It takes 90 minutes.to dismount an aeroplaiio. Bach corps of an army has one of the'escadrilles, or teams" of aeroplanes, and the amy as a whole has an extra one, bo that, if an army consists of eight corps it possesses 54 aeroplanes. I am speaking now of the particular typo of aeroplane employed for regulating artillery fire. It was a young non-commissioned officer, with a marked Southern accent, who explained to us the secret nature of tilings. He was wearing both the military medal and the Legion of Honour, for lie had done wondrous feats in the way of shooting occupants of Taubes in mid-air. He got out one of the machines and exhibited its tricks and its_ wireless apparatus, and invited us to sit in tho seat of the flyer. The weather was quite unsuitable for flying, but, setting four men to hold the machine m place, he started tho motor and Tan it up to 2000' revolutions a minute, creating a draught which bowed the fluttered wheat for many yards behind and blew hats off. And in tho middle of this pother lie continued to offer lucid and surprising explanations to deafened ears, until his, superior officer, excessively smart, and looking like a cross between a cavalryman and a yachtsman, arrived on the scene, swinging a cane. Auto-Cannon. It was natural that after this we should visit some auto-cannon-s expressly constructed' for. bringing down aeroplanes. In front of these marvels it was suggested to us that we_ should neither take photographs nor write down exact descriptions; As regards tho latter, tho staff officers had reason to be reassured. No living journalist could have reproduced the scientific account of the sighting arrangements-given to us in an esoteric yot quite comprehensive language by the high priest of these guns, who was . a middle-aged artillery captain. It lasted about twenty minutes. It was .complete, final, and unchallengeable. At intervals tho artillery captain himself admitted that such and-such a part of the device was tres beau. _ It was. There was only one word of which I could not grasp the significance in that connection. It was,the word sinus. It recurred. Several times I determined to ask the captain what he meant us to understand by sinus, but I lacked moral courage. I doubt whether in all the lethal apparatus that I saw 111 France I saw anything quite equal to the demoniac ingenuity of "these massive guns. The proof of guns i t s in the shooting. These guns do not merely aim at Taubes; they hit them. .

: I will not, however, derogate from the ■ importance of the illustrious sev-enty-five. We saw one of these on an afternoon of much marching up and down, hills and among woods, gazing at horses and hot water , douches, baths, and barbers' shops, deep dug-outs called Tipperary, and guns of various calibre, including the seventy-live.- Tlie 6eventy-iive is a very sympathetic creature, in blue-grey, with metallic glints.' He is perfectly easy to see when you approach him from behind, but get twenty yards in front of him and he is absolutely indiscoverable. Viewed from the sky he is part of the forest. Viewed from behind he is perceived to be in a wooden hut, with rafters, in which you" can just stand upright.

We bolield the working of the gun by two men, aud we beheld the different sorts of shell in their delved compartments. But this was not enough for us. iWo ventured to suggest that it would bo proper to fire a sevonty-five for out - amusement. The request was instantly granted. "Time Tor forty-three hundred metres," said the lieutenant quickly and sternly, and a soldier manipulated tho obus. It was done. It was done with disconcerting rapidity. The shell was put into its place. A soldier pulled a string. Bang! A neat, clean, not too .loud bang! The messenger had gone invisibly forth. The prottiest part of the affair was tho recoil and automatic swinging back of tho gun. Lc6t the first ,shell should have failed in its mission, the commandant ordered a second one to be sent, and this time tho two artillerymen sat in seats attached on eithor side to the gun itself. The seventy-five was enthusiastioally praised by every officer present. He is beloved like a favourite sporting dog, and with cause. At tho side of the village street there was a bit of sharply* sloping ground, with a ladder thrown on it to make descent easier. "This way," said ono of the officers. Wo followed him, and in an instant were.'in tho communication trench. Tho change was magical in its quickness. At ono moment we were on the earth; at the next we wore in it. The trench was so narrow that I had to hold my stick in front of mo, as there was no room to swing the arm 6; tho chalky sides left traces on the oll>ows. The floor was for tho most part quite dry, but at intervals there were muddy poolsnearly ankle deep. The top of tho trench was about level with tho top of my head, and long grasses or chance cereals, bending down, continually brushed tho face. An officer was uplifted for the rest of the day bv finding a four-leaved clover at tho edgo of the trench. The day was warm, and the _ trench was still warmer. Its direction never ccased to change, gonerally in curves, but now and then liv n sharp course. We walked what seemed to be an immense distance, and then came out on to a road which we wcro instructed to cross two by two, as, like the whole of tho region, it was subject to German artillery. Far down this road wri could see the outlying village for which wo were bound. A Tour of the Outer Trcnches. A new descent into the earth. Wo proceed a. fow yards, nnd the trench jniddenty divides iat-o U»ea. We do jwji.

know which to take. An officer following us does not know which to take. The guiding officer is perhaps thirty yards in front. AVo call. No answer. We climb out of the trench on to the surfaco dosolation. Wo can see nothing, nothing whatever but land that is running horribly to waste. Our friends are as invisiblo as moles. There is not a trace even of their tracks. This is a fine objcct lessbn in tho efficacy of trenches. At longth an officer returns and saves us. We have to take tho tronch on tho extreme right. Much more hot walking, and a complete loss of tho notion of direction. Then we come out on to another portion of the same road, at tho point where a main lino of railway crosses it. We are told to run to shelter. In the noar distance a German captive balloon sticks motionless against the sky. Tho main .'line of railway is a sorrowful sight. Its signal wires hang in festoons. Its rails are _ rusting. The abandonment of a main line in a civilised country is a tiling unknown, 11 thing contrary to sense, an impossible thing; so that one wonders whether 0110 is not visiting • the remains of a civilisation dead and definitely closed. Very strange thoughts pass through tho mind. That .portion of main lino cannot be urjtl by the Germans because it is within i&e Freitfh positions, and it cannot be used by the French because it is utterly oxposed to Gorman artillerv. Thus perhaps ten kilometres of it are left forlorn, to illustrate tho imbecile brutality of an invasion. ■There is a good deal moro trench before wo reach tho village which forms file Tiead of a salient French line. This village is knocked all to pieces. It is a fearful spectacle. We see a teddy bear left on what remains of a flight oT stairs, a bedstead buried to tlie knobs in debris, skeletons of birds in a cage hanging under an eave. The entire placo is in the zone of fire, and it has -been tremendously bombarded throughout the war. Nevertheless some houses still stand, and seventeen civilians —seven men and ten women —insist on remaining thoi't>, J tafked to one Tat old woman who contended that tliero was 110 danger. A few minutes later a shell fell within a hundred yards of her, and it might just as well have fallen on the top of her coif, to prove finally- to her tho noble reasonableness of war and the reality of tho German necessity for expansion. The village church was laid low. In the roof two thin arches of the groining remain, marvellously. One remembers this freak of balance, and _ a few poor flowers on the altar. ! Mass is celebrated in that church every Suftfey morning. We 6poke with tho cure, an' extremely emaciated priest of middle age; 110 wore the Legion of Honour. W° took to the trenches again, having in the interval be.en protected by several acres of ruined masonry. About thlk. point geography seemed to end for me. I was ill a maze of burrowing, from whicli tho hot sun could be felt but not seen. I saw stencilled signs, such as "Tranche© de fopli," ana 6igns containing numbers. I saw a sign ovrrr o, door, "Guetteur de jour et do nuit'' — watcher by day and by night. "Anybody in there?" ~ "Certainly." . The door was opened. In the gloom a pale man stood, rather like a ghost, almost as disconcerting as a ghost, watohing. He ignored' us and kept on watching. • Then through a hole I had a glimpse of an abandoned road, where no man might live, and beyond it a vast wire entanglement. Then we curved, and I was in an open place, a sort of redoubt contrived oiit of little homes and cattle stables. I heard irregular rifle fire olose b'y, but I could not see who was firing. I was bliowti tho maohinegun dhamber, and 1)110 blind Which hides the aperture for the muzzle was lifted, but: only, momentarily. I was shown, too^' tho deep underground refuges to which everybody takes in case of a heavy bombardment. Then wo wore in tho men's in houses very well -proteoted by advance walls to tilio north, and at length we saw some groups of men. "Bonjour, les poilusl" This from the commandant nimself, with jollity. The commandant had a wonderful smile, which were showed bright teeth, and liis gestures were almost as' quiok as those of his lieutenant, -Whom tho regiment had christened "The Electric Man."

The soldiers saluted. This_ salute was so proud, so eager, that it might have brought tears to the eyes. The soldiers stood up very straight, but not at all stiffly. I noticed one man because I could not notice them all. He throw his head back and slightly to one side, and his brown beard stuck out. His eyes sparkled. Every muscle was taut. He semed to bo saying: "My commandant, I know my, worth; I am utterly yours; you won't-get anything better." '

A young officer said to me that these men had in thorn a wild boast and an angel. It was a good saying, and. I wished I'had thought of it myself. This regiment, had Been in this village since the autumn. It had declined to be relieved. It seemed absolutely fresh. One hears that'individual valour is ■ about the same in all armies— everywhere very high. Events appealto have justified tho assertion. German valour is astounding. I have not seen any German regiment, but I do not bolievo that there are in any German regiment any-;men equal to these men. After all, ideas must count, and these men know that they are defending ail outraged country. Tho regiment was relatively very comfortable. It had plenty of room. It 1 had made a little garden, with little' terra cotta statues. It possessed also a gymnasium ground, where we witnessed some excellent high jumping, and—moro surprising—a theatre, witli stage, dressing-room, and women's costumes. Tho summit' of our excitement was attained when wo- were led into tho first-line trendh. "Is this Teally the first-line trcnch?" "It is." Well, the first-line French, very remarkably swept and dusted and spotless, as. wore all the trenchos beyond tho communication trench, was not much like a trench'. It was like a long wooden gallery. Its sides were of wood; its ceiling was of wood; its floor was of wood. Tho carpentry, though not expert, was quite neat; and wo wore told that not a single engineer had over been in tho position, which, nevertheless, is reckoned to bo ono of tho most ingenious on the whole front.. Tho gallery ; is rather dark, because it is lighted ordy by the loopholes. Those loopholes are about eight inches squaro and moro than eight inches deep, bccaimo they must, of course, penetrate tho onlor earthwork. A couple of inches from the, bottom a stronir wiro is fixed iicroßs them. At night tho soldier puts his gun under this wiro, so that he may not liro too high. The Outlook from the Loopholes. Tho loopholes arc probably less than a yard apart, allowing enough spaco in front of each for a man to inovo comfortably. Boneath tho loopholeG riins a woodon platform for the men to stand on. Behind tho loopholes, in tho ceiling, aro largo hooks to hang guns on. Many of the loopholes aro labelled \rtth men's names, written ill a good engrossing hand, and between tna loopholes, and lovel with them, aro pinned coloured jxistcards and photographs of women, Eir)6, and children. Tucked conveniently away in nine cases underground aro found nine receptaclcd- for stores of cartridges, powders to bo used against gas, grenades and matches. Ono gazes through a loopholo. Occasional firing can bo hoard, but it is not in the immediate vicinity. Indeed, all tho men wo can soe liivo stepped down from the platform in ordor to allow us to pass freely along it and inspect. Through the loophole can bo distinguished ft batbi'l wirn <Mt&tisl«tninti then . jl- little wjuta Jwn tfe».

barbed wiro entanglement and then tho' Gorman trenches, which' are less than half a milo away and stretoh rbund bohind us in a semicircle.

"Do not look too long. They havo very good glasses." Tho hint is taken. T t is singular to rc-Kect that just as we are gazing privily at tho Germans, so the Germans are gazing privily at us. A mere strip of level earth separates them from us, but that strip is impassable, save at night, when the Frenchmen often creep lip to the German wire. There Is a terrible air of permanency about tho wholo affair. Not only the passage of time produces this effect; the telephons wiro running along miles of communication • tronch, the elaborateness of tho fighting trenches, the established routine and regularity of existence —all contribute to it.

But the air of permanency is fallacious. Tho Germans are In ' Franco. Every day of slow preparation brings nearer tho day when tho Germans will not be in France. That is certain. All immense expectancy hangs over the land, enchanting it. We leave the first line trench with regret. But we have been in it! I was informed that only one solitary English journalist had previously been in a French first-line trench. . 1 should have preferred none, but I was content. In the quarters of the oommandant, a farm house at the back end of the village, champagne was served—admirable champagne.' We stood round a- long table, waiting till the dilatory should have arrived. The party had somehow grown. For example, the cure came, timid acclamations. He related how a lieutenant had accosted him in front of some altar and asked whether 110 might be allowed to celebrate the Mass. "That depends," said the cure. "You cannot celebrate if you are not a priest. If you are you can." "I am a priest," said the lieutenant. And he celebrated the Mass.

We are all equal. The French army is by far the most democratic institution I have over seen. On our journeys the staff captains and ourselves habitually ate with a sorgeant and a corporal. The corporal was tho son of 11 general. Tho sergeant was a man of business and a writer. His first words when he met me were in English: "Monsieur Bennett, I liavo read your books." 0110 of our chauffeurs was a well-known printer who employs three hundred and fifty men — when there is peace. The relations between officers and mon are simply unique. I never saw a greeting that was hot exquisite. The officers were full of knowledge, decision, and appreciative kindliness. The men -were burst-ing-with eager devotion. This must count, perhaps, even more' than big guus. Tho Commandant's Beautiful Pages. The commandant', of course, presided at tho vin d'honnour. His glaneo and his smile, his latent energy, would have inspired devotion in a wooden block. Every glass touched every glass, an operation that entailed' eomo three scoro clmkings. And while we were drinking one of tho staff captains—the one whose English was tho less perfect of the two —began to tell mo of the careor of tho commandant in Algeria and elsewhere. Among other things,_ he had carried his wounded men 011 his own shoulders under firo from tho field of battle to a place of safety. Ho was certainTy under forty; he might have been under thirtyfive. . Said the staff captain, ingeniously translating in his mind from French to English, and speaking with slow cautioiij as though picking his way among the ehevaux-de-frise of the English language: "There are—very beautiful pages —in his—military life." He meant: "II y ado tres belles pagos dans sa carriore militairo."

Which is subtly not quite tho same thing.. . As wo left the farm house to regain the communication trench there was a fierce, loud noise like this: ZZZZZ ssss ZZZZ sss ZZZZ. And then an explosion. Tho observer in tho captive balloon had noticed unaccustomed ac-

tivity in our village, and then consequencos were ooming. We saw yellow smoke rising just beyond the wall of lllio farmyard, about 200 yards away. Wo received instructions to hnn-y to the trench. Wo had not gone 50 yards in the trench when there was anoiJher celestia.) confusion of S's and 7's.. Imitating tJho officers, we benit low in Wio trench. The explosion followed. "One, two, three, four, five," said a captain. "One should not rise till one lias counted five, because all the bits have not fallen. If it is a big shell count ten." We tiptoed and glanced over tlio edge of the trenoh. Yellow smoke was rising at a distance of about) three lawn tennis courts. "With some of their big shells," said the oaptain, "you can hear nothing until it is too late, for the reason that the s/hell travels more qnicldy than t'he sound of it. Tbo sound reaches your ears in inverse order —if you are alive." ' _ A moment later a third shell dropped in the same plot of ground. And even a- mile a.nd a half off, at the other end of the communication trench,- when the automobiles emerged from their shelter into the view of the captive baJloon, the officers feared for the automobiles, and wo fled very swiftly. We had been to the very front of the front, and it was the most cheerful, confident, high-spirited place I had seen in France, or in England either.