Title: The Silence of Colonel Bramble
Author: Maurois, André
Language: English
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                            *THE SILENCE OF
                            COLONEL BRAMBLE*


                           *BY ANDRÉ MAUROIS*

                       TRANSLATED FROM THE FRENCH



                   LONDON: JOHN LANE, THE BODLEY HEAD
                  NEW YORK : JOHN LANE COMPANY MCMXIX



     WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, LIMITED, LONDON AND BECCLES, ENGLAND.



                                   TO
                                MY WIFE



                    *THE SILENCE OF COLONEL BRAMBLE*


                              *CHAPTER I*


The Highland Brigade was holding its regimental boxing match in a fine
old Flemish barn in the neighbourhood of Poperinghe.  At the end of the
evening the general got on to a chair and, in a clear, audible voice,
said:

"Gentlemen, we have to-day seen some excellent fighting, from which I
think we may learn some useful lessons for the more important contest
that we shall shortly resume; we must keep our heads, we must keep our
eyes open, we must hit seldom but hit hard, and we must fight to a
finish."

Three cheers made the old barn shake. The motors purred at the door.
Colonel Bramble, Major Parker and the French interpreter, Aurelle, went
on foot to their billets among the hops and beetroot fields.

"We are a curious nation," said Major Parker.  "To interest a Frenchman
in a boxing match you must tell him that his national honour is at
stake.  To interest an Englishman in a war you need only suggest that it
is a kind of a boxing match.  Tell us that the Hun is a barbarian, we
agree politely, but tell us that he is a bad sportsman and you rouse the
British Empire."

"It is the Hun’s fault," said the colonel sadly, "that war is no longer
a gentleman’s game."

"We never imagined," continued the major, "that such cads existed.
Bombing open towns is nearly as unpardonable as fishing for trout with a
worm, or shooting a fox."

"You must not exaggerate, Parker," said the colonel calmly.  "They are
not as bad as that yet."

Then he asked Aurelle politely if the boxing had amused him.

"I particularly admired, sir, the sporting discipline of your men.
During the boxing the Highlanders behaved as if they were in church."

"The true sporting spirit has always something religious about it," said
the major.  "A few years ago when the New Zealand football team visited
England, and from the first match beat the English teams, the country
was as upset as if we had lost this war.  Every one in the streets and
trains went about with long faces. Then the New Zealanders beat
Scotland, then Ireland; the end of the world had come!  However, there
remained the Welsh.  On the day of the match there were one hundred
thousand persons on the ground.  You know that the Welsh are deeply
religious and that their national anthem, ’Land of our Fathers,’ is also
a prayer.  When the two teams arrived the whole crowd, men and women,
exalted and confident, sang this hymn to God before the battle, and the
New Zealanders were beaten.  Ah, we are a great nation!"

"Indeed, yes," said Aurelle, quite overcome, "you are a great nation."
He added, after a moment’s silence, "But you were also quite right just
now when you said you were a curious nation in some things, and your
opinion of people astonishes us sometimes.  You say, ’Brown looks an
idiot, but he’s not, he played cricket for Essex.’  Or, ’At Eton we took
him for a fool, but at Oxford he surprised us.  Do you know he is plus
four at golf, and won the high jump?’"

"Well?" said the colonel.

"Don’t you think, sir, that cleverness——"

"I hate clever people——  Oh, I beg your pardon, messiou."

"That’s very kind of you, sir," said Aurelle.

"Glad you take it like that," growled the colonel into his moustache.

He spoke seldom and always in short sentences, but Aurelle had learnt to
appreciate his dry and vigorous humour and the charming smile which
often lit up his rugged countenance.

"But don’t you find yourself, Aurelle," went on Major Parker, "that
intelligence is over-estimated with you?  It is certainly more useful to
know how to box than how to write.  You would like Eton to go in for
nothing but learning?  It is just like asking a trainer of racehorses to
be interested in circus horses.  We don’t go to school to learn, but to
be soaked in the prejudices of our class, without which we should be
useless and unhappy.  We are like the young Persians Herodotus talks
about, who up to the age of twenty only learnt three sciences: to ride,
to shoot and to tell the truth."

"That may be," said Aurelle, "but just see, major, how inconsistent you
are.  You despise learning and you quote Herodotus. Better still, I
caught you the other day in the act of reading a translation of Xenophon
in your dug-out.  Very few Frenchmen, I assure you——"

"That’s quite different," said the major. "The Greeks and Romans
interest us, not as objects of study, but as ancestors and sportsmen.
We are the direct heirs of the mode of life of the Greeks and of the
Roman Empire.  Xenophon amuses me because he is a perfect type of the
English gentleman, with his hunting and fishing stories, and
descriptions of battles.  When I read in Cicero: ’Scandal in the
Colonial Office. Grave accusations against Sir Marcus Varro,
Governor-General of Sicily,’ you can well understand that that sounds to
me like old family history.  And who was your Alcibiades, pray, but a
Winston Churchill, without the hats?"

The scenery round them was very picturesque: the Mont des Cats, the Mont
Rouge, and the Mont Noir made a framework for the heavy, motionless
clouds of an old Dutch painting.  The peasants’ houses with their
weather-beaten, thatched roofs faded into the surrounding fields; their
dull walls had turned the colour of yellow clay. The grey shutters
bordered with green struck the only vivid and human note in this kingdom
of the earth.

The colonel pointed with his cane to a new mine crater; but Major
Parker, sticking to his point, went on with his favourite subject:

"The greatest service which sport has rendered us is that it has saved
us from intellectual culture.  Luckily one hasn’t time for everything,
and golf and tennis cut out reading.  We are stupid——"

"Nonsense, major!" said Aurelle.

"We are stupid," emphatically repeated Major Parker, who hated being
contradicted, "and it is a great asset.  When we are in danger we don’t
notice it, because we don’t reflect; so we keep cool and come out of it
nearly always with honour."

"Always," amended Colonel Bramble with his Scotch curtness.

And Aurelle, hopping agilely over the enormous ruts by the side of these
two Goliaths, realized more clearly than ever that this war would end
well.



                              *CHAPTER II*


"Clear the table," said Colonel Bramble to the orderlies.  "Bring the
rum, a lemon, some sugar and hot water, and keep some more boiling. Then
tell my batman to give me the gramophone and the box of records."

This gramophone, a gift to the Highlanders from a very patriotic old
lady, was the colonel’s pride.  He had it carried about after him
everywhere and treated it with delicate care, feeding it every month
with fresh records.

"Messiou," he said to Aurelle, "what would you like?  ’The Bing Boys,’
’Destiny Waltz,’ or ’Caruso.’"

Major Parker and Dr. O’Grady solemnly consigned Edison and all his works
to a hotter place; the padre raised his eyes to heaven.

"Anything you like, sir," said Aurelle, "except ’Caruso.’"

"Why?" said the colonel.  "It’s a very good record, it cost twenty-two
shillings. But first of all you must hear my dear Mrs. Finzi-Magrini in
’La Tosca.’  Doctor, please regulate it, I can’t see very well—Speed 61.
Don’t scratch the record, for God’s sake!"

He sank down on his biscuit boxes, arranged his back comfortably against
a heap of sacks, and shut his eyes.  His rugged face relaxed.  The padre
and the doctor were playing chess, and Major Parker was filling in long
returns for brigade headquarters.  Over a little wood, torn to bits by
shells, an aeroplane was sailing home among fleecy white clouds in a
lovely pale-green sky.  Aurelle began a letter.

"Padre," said the doctor, "if you are going to the division to-morrow,
ask them to send me some blankets for our dead Boches.  You saw the one
we buried this morning?  The rats had half eaten him. It’s indecent.
Check to the king."

"Yes," said the padre, "and it’s curious how they always begin at the
nose!"

Over their heads a heavy English battery began to bombard the German
line.  The padre smiled broadly.

"There’ll be dirty work at the cross roads to-night," he remarked with
satisfaction.

"Padre," said the doctor, "are you not the minister of a religion of
peace and love?"

"The Master said, my boy, that one must love one’s fellow-man.  He never
said that we must love Germans.  I take your knight."

The Reverend John MacIvor, an old military chaplain, with a face bronzed
by Eastern suns, took to this life of war and horrors with the
enthusiasm of a child. When the men were in the trenches he visited them
every morning with his pockets bulging with hymn-books and packets of
cigarettes.  While resting behind the lines, he tried his hand at
bombing and deplored the fact that his cloth forbade him human targets.

Major Parker suddenly stopped his work to curse Brass Hats and their
absurd questions.

"When I was in the Himalayas at Chitral," he said, "some red-hats sent
us a ridiculous scheme for manoeuvres; among other details the artillery
had to cross a rocky defile hardly wide enough for a very thin man.

"I wired, ’Scheme received; send immediately a hundred barrels of
vinegar.’  ’Report yourself to the P.M.O. for mental examination,’
courteously remarked headquarters. ’Re-read "Hannibal’s Campaign,"’ I
replied."

"You really sent that telegram?" asked Aurelle.  "In the French army you
would have been court-martialled."

"That’s because our two nations have not the same idea of liberty," said
the major. "To us the inalienable rights of man are humour, sport, and
primogeniture."

"At the headquarters of the brigade," said the padre, "there is a
captain who must have had lessons from you in military correspondence.
The other day, as I had no news of one of my young chaplains who had
left us about a month, I sent a note to the brigade: ’The Reverend C.
Carlisle was invalided on September 12th.  I should like to know if he
is better, and if he has been given a new appointment.’  The reply from
the hospital said simply: ’1. Condition unchanged.  2. Ultimate
destination unknown.’  The officer in transmitting it to me had added,
’It is not clear whether the last paragraph refers to the unit to which
the Rev. C. Carlisle will be eventually attached, or to his eternal
welfare.’"

The Italian air came to an end with a triumphant roulade.

"What a voice!" said the colonel, opening his eyes regretfully.

He carefully stopped the record and put it affectionately in its case.

"Now, messiou, I am going to play ’Destiny Waltz.’"

One could just see outside the Verey lights gently rising and falling.
The padre and the doctor went on describing their corpses while
carefully manoeuvring the ivory pieces of the little set of chessmen;
the howitzers and machine-guns broke into the voluptuous rhythm of the
waltz, creating a sort of fantastic symphony highly appreciated by
Aurelle.  He continued to write his letter in easy verses.

    "La Mort passe; le Destin chante;
      Vite, oublie-moi.
    Tes robes noires sont charmantes;
      Mets-les six mois.

    Garde-toi de venir en pleurs
      M’offrir des roses;
    Aux vivants réserve tes fleurs
      Et toutes choses.


Il ne faut pas m’en vouloir, mon amie, si je tourne an plus plat des
romantismes: un clergyman et un médecin, à côte de moi, s’obstinent à
jouer les fossoyeurs d’Hamlet.

    Ne me plains pas, je dormirai
      Sans barcaroles,
    Et de mon corps je nourrirai
      Des herbes folles.

    Mais si, par quelque soir d’automne
      On de brouillard,
    Pour ton visage de madone
      Tu veux le fard.

    De cet air de mélancolie
      Que j’aimais tant,
    Alors oublie que tu m’oublies
      Pour un instant."


"Do you like my waltz, messiou?" said the colonel.

"Very much indeed, sir," said Aurelle sincerely.

The colonel gave him a grateful smile.

"I’ll play it again for you, messiou. Doctor, regulate the gramophone
slower, speed 59.  Don’t scratch the record.  For _you_, this time,
messiou."



                             *CHAPTER III*


BOSWELL.  "Why then, sir, did he talk so?"

JOHNSON.  "Why, sir, to make you answer as you did."


The batteries were asleep; Major Parker was answering questions from the
brigade; the orderlies brought the rum, sugar and boiling water; the
colonel put the gramophone to speed 61, and Dr. O’Grady talked about the
Russian Revolution.

"It is unprecedented," said he, "for the men who made a revolution to
remain in power after it is over.  Yet one still finds revolutionaries:
that proves how badly history is taught."

"Parker," said the colonel, "pass the port."

"Ambition," said Aurelle, "is after all not the only motive that
inspires men to action.  One can be a revolutionary from hatred of a
tyrant, from jealousy, or even from the love of humanity."

Major Parker abandoned his papers.

"I admire France very much, Aurelle, especially since this war; but one
thing shocks me in your country, if you will allow me to speak plainly,
and that is your jealousy of equality.  When I read the history of your
Revolution I am sorry I was not there to kick Robespierre and that
horrible fellow Hébert.  And your _sans-culottes_.  Well, that makes me
long to dress up in purple satin and gold lace and walk about the Place
de la Concorde."

The doctor allowed a particularly acute attack of hysteria on the part
of Madame Finzi-Magrini to pass, and went on:

"The love of humanity is a pathological state of a sexual origin which
often appears at the age of puberty in nervous and clever people.  The
excess of phosphorus in the system must get out somewhere.  As for
hatred of a tyrant, that is a more human sentiment which has full play
in time of war, when force and the mob are one. Emperors must be mad
fools to decide on declaring wars which substitute an armed nation for
their Prætorian Guards.  That idiocy accomplished, despotism of course
produces revolution until terrorism leads to the inevitable reaction."

"You condemn us then, doctor, to oscillate between rebellion and a _coup
d’état_?"

"No," said the doctor, "because the English people, who have already
given the world Stilton cheese and comfortable chairs, have invented for
our benefit the Parliamentary system.  Our M.P.’s arrange rebellions and
_coups d’état_ for us, which leaves the rest of the nation time to play
cricket.  The Press completes the system by enabling us to take our
share in these tumults by proxy.  All these things form a part of modern
comfort and in a hundred years’ time every man, white, yellow, red or
black, will refuse to inhabit a room without hot water laid on, or a
country without a Parliament.

"I hope you are wrong," said Major Parker.  "I hate politicians, and I
want, after the War, to go and live in the East, because nobody out
there pays any attention to a government of babblers."

"My dear major, why the devil do you mix your personal feelings with
these questions?  Politics are controlled by laws as necessary as the
movements of the stars. Are you annoyed that there are dark nights
because you happen to prefer moonlight? Humanity lies on an
uncomfortable bed. When the sleeper aches too much he turns over, that
is a war or an insurrection.  Then he goes to sleep again for a few
centuries. All that is quite natural and happens without much suffering,
if one does not mix up any moral ideas with it.  Attacks of cramp are
not virtues.  But each change finds, alas, its prophets who, from love
of humanity, as Aurelle says, put this miserable globe to fire and
sword."

"That’s very well said, doctor," said Aurelle, "but I return the
compliment; if those are your sentiments, why do you take the trouble to
belong to a party? Because you are a damned socialist."

"Doctor," said the colonel, "pass the port."

"Ah," said the doctor, "that’s because I would rather be persecutor than
persecuted. You must know how to recognize the arrival of these
periodical upheavals and prepare.  This war will bring socialism, that
is to say, the total sacrifice of the aristocrat to the Leviathan.  This
in itself is neither a blessing nor a misfortune: it is cramp.  Let us
then turn over with a good grace, as long as we feel we shall be more
comfortable on the other side."

"That’s a perfectly absurd theory," said Major Parker, angrily sticking
out his square chin, "and if you adopt it, doctor, you must give up
medicine!  Why try and stop the course of diseases?  They are also,
according to you, periodic and necessary upheavals.  But if you pretend
to fight against tuberculosis do not deny me the right to attack
universal suffrage."

At this moment a R.A.M.C. sergeant entered and asked Dr. O’Grady to come
and see a wounded man: Major Parker remained master of the situation.
The colonel, who had a horror of arguments, seized the opportunity to
talk about something else.

"Messiou," he said, "what is the displacement of one of your largest
cruisers?"

"Sixty thousand tons, sir," hazarded Aurelle wildly.

This knock-out blow put the colonel out of action, and Aurelle asked
Major Parker why he objected to universal suffrage.

"But don’t you see, my dear Aurelle, that it is the most extravagant
idea that humanity has ever conceived?  Our political system will be
considered more monstrous than slavery in a thousand years. One man, one
vote, whatever the man is! Do you pay the same price for a good horse as
for a crock?"

"Have you ever heard the immortal reasoning of our Courteline?  ’Why
should I pay twelve francs for an umbrella when I can get a glass of
beer for six sous?’"

"Equal rights for men!" continued the major vehemently.  "Why not equal
courage and equal intelligence while you are about it?"

Aurelle loved the major’s impassioned and pleasant harangues and, to
keep the discussion going, said that he did not see how one could refuse
a people the right to choose their leaders.

"To control them, Aurelle, yes; but to choose them, never!  An
aristocracy cannot be elected.  It is or it isn’t.  Why, if I were to
attempt to choose the Commander-in-Chief or the Superintendent of Guy’s
Hospital I should be shut up; but, if I wish to have a voice in the
election of the Chancellor of the Exchequer or the First Lord of the
Admiralty, I’m a good citizen!"

"That is not quite correct, major.  Ministers are not elected.  Mind, I
agree with you that our political system is imperfect; but so are all
human affairs.  And then, ’_La pire des Chambres vaut mieux que la
meilleure des antichambres_.’"

"I piloted round London lately," replied the major, "an Arab chief who
honoured me with his friendship, and when I had shown him the House of
Commons and explained what went on there, he remarked, ’It must give you
a lot of trouble cutting off those six hundred heads when you are not
pleased with the Government.’"

"Messiou," said the colonel, exasperated. "I am going to play ’Destiny
Waltz’ for you."

                     *      *      *      *      *

Major Parker remained silent while the waltz unrolled its rhythmic
phrases, but he ruminated over his old resentment against that "horrible
fellow Hébert" and, as soon as the record had ground out its final
notes, he started a new attack on Aurelle.

"What advantage," he said, "could the French have found in changing
their government eight times in a century? Revolutions have become a
national institution with you.  In England, it would be impossible.  If
a crowd collected at Westminster and made a disturbance, the policeman
would tell them to go away and they would do so."

"What an idea!" said Aurelle, who did not like Revolutions, but who
thought he ought to defend an old French lady against this hot-headed
Saxon.  "You must not forget, major, that you also cut off your King’s
head.  No policeman intervened to save Charles Stuart, as far as I
know."

"The assassination of Charles I," said the major, "was the sole work of
Oliver Cromwell; now Oliver was a very good cavalry colonel, but he knew
nothing of the real feelings of the English people, which they showed
pretty plainly at the time of the Restoration.

"Cromwell’s head, which had been embalmed, was stuck on a pike on the
top of Westminster Hall.  One stormy night the wind broke the shaft of
the pike and the head rolled to the feet of a sentry.  He took it home
and hid it in the chimney of his house, where it remained until his
death.  It passed through various hands till it came into the possession
of a friend of mine, and I have often sat at tea opposite the head of
the Protector still on its broken pike.  One could easily recognize the
wart which he had on his forehead and there still remains a lock of
chestnut hair."

"Humph," grunted the colonel, at last interested in the conversation.

"Besides," continued the major, "the English Revolution does not compare
in any way with the French one: it did not weaken the ruling classes.
As a matter of fact, all the bad business of 1789 was caused by Louis
XIV.  Instead of leaving your country the strong armour of a landed
gentry he made his nobles into the ridiculous puppets of Versailles,
whose sole business was to hand him his coat and his waistcoat.  In
destroying the prestige of a class which should be the natural
supporters of the monarchy, he ruined it beyond repair, and more’s the
pity."

"It is very easy for you to criticize us," said Aurelle.  "We made our
Revolution for you: the most important event in English history is the
taking of the Bastille, and well you know it."

"Bravo, messiou," said the colonel, "stick up for your country.  One
ought always to stick up for one’s country.  Now please pass the port.
I am going to play you ’The Mikado.’"



                              *CHAPTER IV*


                            AURELLE’S LETTER

Somewhere in France.

    Les soldats passent en chantant:
    "Mets tes soucis dans ta musette."[#]
    Il pleut, il vente, il fait un temps
    A ne pas suivre une grisette.
    Les soldats passent en chantant,
    Moi, je fais des vers pour Josette;
    Les soldats passent en chantant:
    "Mets tes soucis dans ta musette."

    Un planton va dans un instant
    M’apporter de vieilles gazettes:
    Vieux discours de vieux charlatans,
    "Mets tes soucis dans ta musette."
    Nous passons nos plus beaux printemps
    A ces royales amusettes;
    Les soldats passent en chantant:
    "Mets tes soucis dans ta musette."

    La pluie, sur les vitres battant
    Orchestre, comme une mazette,
    Quelque prelude de "Tristan,"
    "Mets tes soucis dans ta musette."
    Demain sans doute un percutant
    M’enverra faire la causette
    Aux petits soupers de Satan.
    "Mets tes soucis dans ta musette."
    Les soldats passent en chantant.

[#] "Pack up your troubles in your old kit bag."


Grey dawn is breaking over the spongy plain.  To-day will be the same as
yesterday, to-morrow like to-day.  The doctor will wave his arms and
say, "Très triste, messiou," and he will not know what is sad, no more
shall I.  Then he will give me a humorous lecture in a style between
Bernard Shaw and the Bible.

The padre will write letters, play patience and go out riding.  The guns
will thunder, Boches will be killed, some of our men too. We shall lunch
off bully beef and boiled potatoes, the beer will be horrible and the
colonel will say to me, "Bière française no bonne, messiou."

In the evening, after a dinner of badly cooked mutton, with mint sauce,
and boiled potatoes, the inevitable gramophone will appear.  We shall
have "The Arcadians," "The Mikado," then "Destiny Waltz"—"pour vous,
messiou"—and "Mrs. Finzi-Magrini" for the colonel, and finally "The
Lancashire Ramble."  Unfortunately for me, the first time that I heard
this circus tune I imitated a juggler catching balls in time to the
music.  This little comedy henceforth took its place in the traditions
of the Mess, and if this evening at the first notes of the "Ramble" I
should forget to play my part the colonel will say, "Allons, messiou,
allons," pretending to juggle, but I know my duty and I shall not
forget; for Colonel Bramble only cares for familiar scenes and fine old
crusted jokes.

His favourite number is a recitation by O’Grady of "Going on leave."
When he is in a bad temper, when one of his old friends has been made a
brigadier-general, or been given a C.B., this recitation is the only
thing that can make him smile.  He knows it by heart and, like the
children, stops the doctor if he misses a sentence or alters a reply.

"No, doctor, no; the Naval officer said to you, ’When you hear four loud
short whistles, it means that the ship has been torpedoed,’ and you
replied, ’And what if the torpedo carries away the whistle?’"

The doctor, having found his place, goes on.

Parker, too, one day found a remark which ever afterwards had a
brilliant success. He got it out of a letter that a chaplain had written
to the _Times_.  "The life of the soldier," wrote this excellent man,
"is one of great hardship; not infrequently mingled with moments of real
danger."

The colonel thoroughly enjoys the unconscious humour of this remark, and
would quote it whenever a shell scattered gravel over him.  But his
great resource, if the conversation bores him, is to attack the padre on
his two weak points: bishops and Scotchmen.

The padre, who comes from the Highlands, is madly patriotic.  He is
convinced that it is only Scotchmen who play the game and who are really
killed.

"If history told the truth," he says, "this war would not be called the
European War, but the war between Scotland and Germany."

The colonel is Scotch himself, but he is fair, and every time he finds
in the papers the casualty lists of the Irish Guards or the Welsh
Fusiliers he reads them out in a loud voice to the padre, who, to keep
his end up, maintains that the Welsh Fusiliers and Irish Guards are
recruited in Aberdeen. This is his invariable retort.

All this may appear rather puerile to you, my friend, but these childish
things are the only bright spots in our boring, bombarded existence.
Yes, these wonderful men have remained children in many ways; they have
the fresh outlook, and the inordinate love of games, and our rustic
shelter often seems to me like a nursery of heroes.

But I have profound faith in them; their profession of empire-builders
has inspired them with high ideals of the duty of the white man.  The
colonel and Parker are "Sahibs" whom nothing on earth would turn from
the path they have chosen.  To despise danger, to stand firm under fire,
is not an act of courage in their eyes—it is simply part of their
education.  If a small dog stands up to a big one they say gravely, "He
is a gentleman."

A true gentleman, you see, is very nearly the most sympathetic type
which evolution has produced among the pitiful group of creatures who
are at this moment making such a noise in the world.  Amid the horrible
wickedness of the species, the English have established an oasis of
courtesy and phlegm. I love them.

I must add that it is a very foolish error to imagine that they are less
intelligent than ourselves, in spite of the delight my friend Major
Parker pretends to take in affirming the contrary.  The truth is that
their intelligence follows a different method from ours.  Far removed
from our standard of rationalism and the pedantic sentiment of the
Germans, they delight in a vigorous common sense and all absence of
system. Hence a natural and simple manner which makes their sense of
humour still more delightful.

But I see, from the window, my horse waiting for me; and I must go round
to the surly farmers and get some straw for the quartermaster, who is
trying to build stables. But _you_ are furnishing boudoirs, and mind you
choose, oh, Amazon, soft, oriental silks.

    Dans votre salon directoire
    (Bleu lavande et jaune citron)
    De vieux fauteuils voisineront
    Dans un style contradictoire
    Avec un divan sans histoire
    (Bleu lavande et jaune citron).

    A des merveilleuses notoires
    (Bleu lavande et jaune citron)
    Des muscadins à cinq chevrons
    Diront la prochaine victoire,
    En des domains ostentatoires
    (Bleu lavande et jaune citron).

    Les murs nus comme un mur d’église
    (Bleu lavande et jaune citron)
    Quelque temps encore attendront
    Qu’un premier consul brutalise
    Leur calme et notre Directoire
    De son visage péremptoire
    (OEil bleu lavande et teint citron).


"Are you a poet?" the colonel asked me doubtfully, when he saw me
writing lines of equal length.

I denied the soft impeachment.



                              *CHAPTER V*


It had been raining for four days.  The heavy raindrops played a
monotonous tattoo on the curved roof of the tent.  Outside in the field
the grass had disappeared under yellow mud, in which the men’s footsteps
sounded like the smacking of a giant’s lips.

"’And God looked upon the earth, and behold, it was corrupt,’" recited
the padre; "’and God said to Noah, Make thee an ark of gopher wood;
rooms shalt thou make in the ark, and shalt pitch it within and without
with pitch.  The same day were all the fountains of the great deep
broken up, and the windows of heaven were opened,’" continued the
doctor.

"The Flood," he added, "was a real event, for its description is common
to all oriental mythology.  No doubt the Euphrates had burst its banks;
that’s why the Ark was driven into the interior and came to rest on a
hill.  Similar catastrophes often occur in Mesopotamia and in India, but
are rare in Belgium."

"The cyclone of 1876 killed 215,000 people in Bengal," said the colonel.
"Messiou, send round the port, please."

The colonel loved statistics, to the great misfortune of Aurelle, who,
quite incapable of remembering figures, was interrogated every day on
the number of inhabitants in a village, the strength of the Serbian
army, or the initial velocity of the French bullet. He foresaw with
terror that the colonel was going to ask him the average depth of rain
in feet and inches in Flanders, and he hastened to create a diversion.

"I found in Poperinghe," he said, showing the book he was reading, "this
very curious old volume.  It is a description of England and Scotland by
the Frenchman, Etienne Perlin, Paris, 1558."

"Humph!  What does this Mr. Perlin say?" asked the colonel, who had the
same respect for ancient things as he had for old soldiers.

Aurelle opened the book at hazard and translated:

"’After dinner, the cloth is withdrawn and the ladies retire.  The table
is of beautiful glossy Indian wood, and stands of the same wood hold the
bottles.  The name of each wine is engraved on a silver plate which
hangs by a little chain round the neck of the bottle.  The guests each
choose the wine they like and drink it as seriously as if they were
doing penance, while proposing the health of eminent personages or the
fashionable beauties; this is what is known as a toast.’"

"I like ’fashionable beauties,’" said the doctor.  "Perhaps Aurelle will
take to drinking port, now he can pour libations to Gaby Deslys or
Gladys Cooper."

"There are toasts for each day in the week," said the colonel, "Monday,
our men; Tuesday, ourselves; Wednesday, our swords; Thursday, sport;
Friday, our religion; Saturday, sweethearts and wives; Sunday, absent
friends and ships at sea."

Aurelle went on reading aloud:

"’These toasts are of barbaric origin, and I have been told that the
Highlanders of Scotland, a semi-savage folk who live in a state of
perpetual feud——’"

"Listen to that, padre," said the colonel. "Read it again, messiou, for
the padre, have been told that the Highlanders of Scotland——’"

"A semi-savage folk who live in a state of perpetual feud, have kept to
the original character of this custom.  To drink the health of anyone is
to ask him to guard you while you drink and cannot defend yourself; and
the person to whom you drink replies, "I pledge you," which means in
their language, "I guarantee your safety."  Then he draws his dagger,
places the point on the table and protects you until your glass is
empty.’"

"That’s why," said Major Parker, "the pewter pots that they give for
golf prizes have always got glass bottoms through which one can see the
dagger of the assassin."

"Send round the port, messiou, I want to drink the padre’s health in a
second glass to hear him reply, ’I pledge you,’ and to see him put the
point of his dagger on the table."

"I’ve only got a Swiss knife," said the padre.

"That’s good enough," said the colonel.

"This theory of the origin of toasts is very probable," said the doctor.
"We are always repeating ancestral signs which are quite useless now.
When a great actress wants to express hate she draws back her charming
lips and shows her canine teeth, an unconscious sign of cannibalism.  We
shake hands with a friend to prevent him using it to strike us, and we
take off our hats because our ancestors used to humbly offer their
heads, to the bigwigs of those days, to be cut off."

At that moment there was a loud crack, and Colonel Bramble fell
backwards with a crash.  One of the legs of his chair had broken.  The
doctor and Parker helped him up, while Aurelle and the padre looked on
in fits of laughter.

"There’s a good example of an ancestral survival," said the major,
kindly intervening to save Aurelle, who was trying in vain to stop
laughing.  "I imagine that one laughs at a fall because the death of a
man was one of the most amusing sights for our ancestors. It delivered
them from an adversary and diminished the number of those who shared the
food and the females."

"Now we know you, messiou," said the colonel.

"A French philosopher," said Aurelle, who had by this time recovered,
"has constructed quite a different theory of laughter: he is called
Bergson and——"

"I have heard of him," said the padre; "he’s a clergyman, isn’t he?"

"I have a theory about laughter," said the doctor, "which is much more
edifying than yours, major.  I think it is simply produced by a feeling
of horror, immediately succeeded by a feeling of relief.  A young monkey
who is devoted to the old father of the tribe sees him slip on a banana
skin, he fears an accident and his chest swells with fright, then he
discovers that it’s nothing and all his muscles pleasantly relax.  That
was the first joke, and it explains the convulsive motions in laughing.
Aurelle is shaken physically because he is shaken morally by two strong
motives: his anxious affection and respect for the colonel——"

"Ugh," grunted the colonel.

"And the consoling certainty that he is not hurt."

"I wish you would talk about something else," said the colonel.  "Read a
little more of the book, messiou."

Aurelle turned over some pages.

"’Other nations,’" he read, "’accuse the English of incivility because
they arrive and depart without touching their hats, and without that
flow of compliments which are common to the French and Italians. But
those who judge thus see things in a false light.  The English idea is
that politeness does not consist in gestures or words which are often
hypocritical and deceptive, but in being courteously disposed to other
people.  They have their faults like every nation, but, considering
everything, I am sure that the more one knows them the more one esteems
and likes them.’"

"I like old Mr. Perlin," said the colonel. "Do you agree with him,
messiou?"

"The whole of France now agrees with him, sir," said Aurelle warmly.

"You are biased, Aurelle," said Major Parker, "because you are getting
quite English yourself.  You whistle in your bath, you drink whisky and
are beginning to like arguments; if you could only manage to eat
tomatoes and underdone cutlets for breakfast you would be perfect."

"If you don’t mind, major, I would rather remain French," said Aurelle.
"Besides, I never knew that whistling in one’s bath was an English
rite."

"So much so," said the doctor, "that I have arranged to have carved on
my tombstone: ’Here lies a British subject who never whistled in his
bath or tried to be an amateur detective.’"



                              *CHAPTER VI*


British conversation is like a game of cricket or a boxing match;
personal allusions are forbidden like hitting below the belt, and anyone
who loses his temper is disqualified.

Aurelle met at the Lennox Mess veterinaries and generals, tradesmen and
dukes. Excellent whisky was provided and the guests entertained in a
friendly way without boring them with too much attention.

"It rains a lot in your country," said a major in the Engineers who sat
next him one evening.

"So it does in England," said Aurelle.

"I intend," said the major, "when this damned war is over, to leave the
army and go and live in New Zealand."

"You have friends there?"

"Oh no, but the salmon fishing is very good."

"Bring your rod over here while we are resting, major, the pond is full
of enormous pike."

"I never fish for pike," said the major, "he is not a gentleman.  When
he sees he is caught he gives up; the salmon fights to the end, even
without hope.  A thirty-pound fellow will sometimes fight two hours;
that’s something like, isn’t it?"

"Admirable!" said Aurelle.  "And what about trout?"

"The trout is a lady," said the major; "you must deceive her; but it is
not easy, because she is a judge of flies.  And you," he added politely,
after a short silence, "what do you do in peace time?"

"I write a little," said Aurelle, "and I am trying for a degree."

"No, no; I mean what is your sport—fishing, hunting, golf, polo?"

"To tell the truth," acknowledged Aurelle, "I am not much good at sport.
I am not very strong and——"

"I’m sorry to hear that," said the major, but he turned to his other
neighbour and bothered no more about the Frenchman.

Aurelle was thrown back on the Veterinary Captain Clarke sitting on his
left, who had up to then been eating and drinking without saying a word.

"It rains a lot in your country," said Captain Clarke.

"So it does in England," said Aurelle.

"I intend," said Clarke, "when this damned war is over to go back to
Santa Lucia."

Aurelle asked if the captain’s family lived in the Antilles.

He was horrified.

"Oh, no!  I belong to a Staffordshire family.  I went out there quite by
chance; I was travelling for pleasure and my boat touched at Santa
Lucia; I found the heat very agreeable and I stayed there.  I bought
some land very cheap and I grow cocoa."

"And it does not bore you?"

"No, the nearest white man is six miles off, and the coast of the island
is excellent for sailing.  What more could I do at home?  When I go to
England for three months’ holiday, I spend a week at my old home, then I
go off in a yacht alone.  I have been all round your Brittany coast; it
is delightful because the currents are so difficult and your charts are
so good; but it is not warm enough.  At Santa Lucia I can smoke
cigarettes in my pyjamas on my veranda."

He slowly swallowed his port and concluded:

"No, I don’t like Europe—too much work.  But, out there, there is enough
food for everybody."

The colonel at the other end of the table was holding forth about India,
the white ponies of his regiment, the native servants with their
complicated names and varied duties, and the lax life in the Hills.
Parker described hunting on an elephant.

"You stand up on your animal firmly tied on by one leg, and when the
elephant gallops you fly into space: it’s really most exciting."

"I’ll take your word for it," said Aurelle.

"Yes, but if you try it," said the colonel solicitously to Aurelle,
"don’t forget to slide off by the tail as quickly as you can if the
elephant comes to marshy ground. His instinct, when the ground gives way
beneath him, is to seize you in his trunk and put you down in front of
him to have something solid to kneel on."

"I’ll remember, sir," said Aurelle.

"In the Malay States," said the major of Engineers, "the wild elephants
wander about the main roads.  I often met them when I was on my
motor-bike; if your face or your clothes annoy them they pick you off
and smash your head by treading on it.  But except for that they are
quite inoffensive."

A long discussion on the most vulnerable part of an elephant followed.
The padre showed his knowledge by explaining how the anatomy of the
Indian elephant differed from that of the African species.

"Padre," said Aurelle, "I always knew you were a sportsman; but have you
ever really done any big game shooting?"

"What! my dear fellow?  Big game? I’ve killed pretty nearly everything a
hunter _can_ kill, from the elephant and rhinoceros to the lion and
tiger.  I’ve never told you the story of my first lion?"

"Never, padre," said the doctor, "but you are going to now."

"Padre," said the colonel, "I should like to hear your stories, but I
make one condition: some one must start the gramophone for me.  I want
my dear ’Mrs. Finzi-Magrini’ to-night."

"Oh no, sir, for pity’s sake!  I’ll let you have a rag-time if you
absolutely must grind that damned machine."

"Not at all, doctor, you aren’t going to get off so easily.  I insist on
’Finzi-Magrini.’  Come, Aurelle, like a good chap, and remember, speed
65, and don’t scratch my record.  Padre, you may now begin the story of
your first lion."

"I was at Johannesburg and very much wanted to join a sporting club, as
a number of the members were friends of mine.  But the rules did not
admit any candidate who had not at least killed a lion.  So I set out
with a nigger loaded with several rifles, and that evening lay in wait
with him near a water-hole where a lion was accustomed to come and
drink.

"Half an hour before midnight I heard the crashing of branches and over
the top of a bush appeared the head of a lion.  He had winded us and
looked our way.  I aimed and fired.  The head disappeared behind the
bush, but appeared again after a minute. A second shot, the same result.
The brute got frightened, hid his head and then put it up again.  I
remained quite cool, I had sixteen shots to fire in my various rifles.
Third shot, same old game; fourth shot, ditto.

"I got unnerved and shot badly, so that after the fifteenth shot the
beast put up his head again.  ’Miss that one, him eat us,’ said the
nigger.  I took a long breath, aimed carefully and fired.  The animal
fell.  One second—two—ten—he did not reappear.  I waited a little
longer, then I rushed out followed by my nigger, and guess, messiou,
what I found behind."

"The lion, padre."

"_Sixteen_ lions, my boy, and every one had a bullet in its eye!  That’s
how I made my debut."

"By Jove, padre!  Who says the Scotch have no imagination?"

"Now listen to a true story.  It was in India that I first killed a
woman.  Yes, yes, a woman!  I had set out tiger-shooting when in passing
through a village, buried in the jungle, an old native stopped me.
’Sahib, sahib, a bear!’  And he pointed out a moving black shape up a
tree.  I took aim quickly and fired.  The mass fell heavily with a
crashing of branches, and I discovered an old woman, whom I had
demolished while she was picking fruit. Another old nigger, the husband,
overwhelmed me with abuse.  They went and fetched the native policeman.
I had to buy off the family; it cost a terrible lot, at least two
pounds.

"The story soon got about for twenty miles round, and for several weeks
I could not go through a village without two or three old men rushing at
me and crying, ’Sahib, sahib, a bear up the tree!’  I need hardly tell
you that they had just made their wives climb up."

Then Parker described a crocodile hunt, and Captain Clarke gave some
details about sharks in Bermuda, which are not dangerous as long as
people take the precaution of jumping into the water in company.  The
colonel, meanwhile, played "The March of the Lost Brigade" in slow time.
The New Zealand major put some eucalyptus leaves in the fire so that the
smell might remind him of the Bush.  Aurelle, rather dazed, fuddled with
the Indian sun and the scent of wild animals, at last realized that this
world is a great park laid out by a gardener god for the gentlemen of
the United Kingdoms.



                             *CHAPTER VII*


    Puisque le mauvais temps vous condamne à la chambre,
    Puisque vous méprisez désormais les romans,
    Puisque pour mon bonheur vous n’avez pas d’amant,
    Et puisque ce mois d’août s’obstine impunément
      A jouer les décembre.

    Je griffonne pour vous ces vers sans queue ni tête,
    Sans rime, ou peu s’en faut, en tout cas sans raison,
    Que j’intitulerai dans mes oeuvres complètes:
    "Discours pour une amie qui garde la maison
      Par un jour de tempête."

    Je ne sais là-dessus si nous sentons de même,
    Mais quand je suis ainsi rêveur et paresseux,
    Quand il pleut dans mon coeur comme il pleut dans——


"Aurelle," said the doctor, "this time you _are_ writing verses; deny it
if you can. You are taken red-handed."

"M-ph!" grunted the colonel scornfully, but with indulgence.

"I own to it, doctor, but what then?  Is it contrary to King’s
Regulations?"

"No," said the doctor, "but I’m surprised. I have always been convinced
that the French cannot be a nation of poets. Poetry is rhymed
foolishness.  Now you are not a fool, and you have no sense of rhythm."

"You do not know our poets," said Aurelle, annoyed.  "Have you read
Musset, Hugo, Baudelaire?"

"I know Hugo," said the colonel.  "When I commanded the troops in
Guernsey I was shown his house.  I also tried to read his book, ’The
Toilers of the Sea,’ but it was too boring."

The arrival of Major Parker, pushing in front of him two boyish-looking
captains, put an end to this conference.

"Here are young Gibbons and Warburton. You must give them a cup of tea
before sending them back to their companies.  I found them sitting on
the side of the Zillebeke Road, no doubt waiting for a taxi.  These
London people will expect anything."

Gibbons was returning from leave, and Warburton, a dark Welshman very
like a Frenchman, who had been wounded two months before in Artois, was
rejoining the Lennox after sick leave.

"Aurelle, give me a cup of tea like a good fellow," said Major Parker.
"Oh, the milk first, I beseech you!  And ask for a whisky and soda to
wake up Captain Gibbons, will you?  He looks as if he had just come out
of his wigwam and had not dug up his war hatchet yet."

"It’s such a horrible change," said Gibbons.  "Yesterday morning I was
still in my garden in a real English valley, with hedges and trees.
Everything was clean and fresh and cared-for and happy.  My pretty
sisters-in-law were playing tennis. We were all dressed in white, and
here I am suddenly transported into this dreadful mangled wood among you
band of assassins. When _do_ you think this damned war will be over?  I
am such a peaceable man!  I prefer church bells to guns and the piano to
a Hotchkiss.  My one ambition is to live in the country with my plump
little wife and a lot of plump little children."  And, raising his
glass, he concluded, "I drink to the end of these follies, and to hell
with the Boches who brought us here!"

But keen Warburton cut in immediately.

"I like the War.  It is only War that gives us a normal existence.  What
do you do in peace-time?  You stay at home; you don’t know what to do
with your time; you argue with your parents, and your wife—if you have
one.  Everyone thinks you are an insufferable egotist—and so you are.
The War comes; you only go home every five or six months.  You are a
hero, and, what women appreciate much more, you are a change.  You know
stories that have never been published.  You’ve seen strange men and
terrible things.  Your father, instead of telling his friends that you
are embittering the end of his life, introduces you to them as an
oracle.  These old men consult you on foreign politics.  If you are
married, your wife is prettier than ever; if you are not, all the girls
lay siege to you.

"You like the country?  Well, you live in a wood here.  You love your
wife?  But who was it said that it is easier to die for the woman one
loves than to live with her? For myself I prefer a Hotchkiss to the
piano, and the chatter of my men to that of the old ladies who come to
tea at my home.  No, Gibbons, War is a wonderful epoch," and, holding up
his glass, he said, "I drink to the gentle Hun who procures these
pleasures for us."

Then he described his time at the Duchess’ hospital.

"I thought I was with the Queen of the Fairies.  We got everything we
wanted without asking for it.  When our fiancées were coming to see us,
we were propped up with cushions to match the colour of our eyes.  A
fortnight before I could get up, they brought twelve brightly coloured
dressing-gowns for me to choose which one I would wear the first time I
was allowed out of bed.  I chose a red and green one, which was hung up
near me, and I was in such a hurry to put it on that I got well three
days quicker.  There was a Scotch captain with such a beautiful wife
that all the patients’ temperatures went up when she came to see him.
They ended by making a special door for her near her husband’s bed, so
that she need not walk down the whole ward.  Oh, I hope I shall be
wounded soon!  Doctor, promise to send me to the Duchess’ hospital!"

But Gibbons, with eyes still full of tender memories of home, would not
be consoled. The padre, who was wise and kind, made him describe the
last revue at the Palace, and complacently discussed the legs and
shoulders of a "sweet little thing."  The colonel got out his best
records and played "Mrs. Finzi-Magrini" and "Destiny Waltz" to his
guests.  Gibbons sat with his head in his hands during the waltz.  The
colonel was going to chaff him mildly about his melancholy thoughts, but
the little captain got up at the end of the tune and said:

"I had better be off before dark."

"Silly ass," said Parker, after a pause.

The colonel and the padre agreed. Aurelle alone protested.

"Aurelle, my friend," said Dr. O’Grady, "if you want to be thought
anything of amongst Englishmen, you must make yourself see their point
of view.  They don’t care for melancholy people, and have a contempt for
sentiment.  This applies to love as well as to patriotism and religion.
If you want the colonel to despise you, stick a flag in your tunic.  If
you want the padre to treat you with contempt, give him a letter to
censor full of pious rubbish; if you want to make Parker sick, weep over
a photograph.  They spend their youth hardening their skins and their
hearts. They fear neither physical blows nor the blows of fate.  They
look upon exaggeration as the worst of vices, and coldness as a sign of
aristocracy.  When they are very miserable, they smile.  When they are
very happy, they say nothing at all.  And _au fond_ John Bull is
terribly sentimental, which explains everything."

"All that is perfectly true, Aurelle," said Parker, "but you must not
say it.  The doctor is a confounded Irishman who cannot hold his
tongue."

Upon which, the doctor and Major Parker began a discussion on the Irish
question in their usual amusingly sarcastic manner. The colonel looked
in his box of records for "When Irish eyes are smiling," then wisely and
courteously interrupted them.

"And so, Aurelle," concluded Major Parker, "you see us poor Englishmen
searching hard for the solution of a problem when there isn’t one.  You
may think that the Irish want certain definite reforms, and that they
will be happy and contented the day they get them; but not at all.  What
amuses them is discussion itself, plotting in theory.  They play with
the idea of Home Rule; if we gave it them, the game would be finished
and they would invent another, probably a more dangerous one."

"Go to Ireland after the War, messiou," said the colonel, "it’s an
extraordinary country.  Every one is mad.  You can commit the worst
crimes—it doesn’t matter. Nothing matters."

"The worst crimes?" said Aurelle, "Oh, I say, sir!"

"Oh yes, anything you like—the most unheard-of things.  You can go out
hunting in brown breeches, fish in your neighbour’s salmon river—nothing
will happen; no one will take the smallest notice of you."

"I do believe," said Aurelle, "that I am beginning to understand the
Irish question."

"I will finish your education," said the doctor.  "A year before the War
a Liberal M.P. who was visiting Ireland said to an old peasant, ’Well,
my friend, we are soon going to give you Home Rule!’  ’God save us, your
honour,’ said the man, ’do not do that.’  ’What?’ said the astonished
Member.  ’You don’t want Home Rule now?’  ’Your honour,’ said the man,
’I’ll tell you.  You are a good Christian, your honour?  It’s to heaven
you want to go? So do I, but we do not want to go there to-night.’"



                             *CHAPTER VIII*


CHORUS: "What, Jupiter not so strong as these goddesses?"

PROMETHEUS: "Yes, even he cannot escape destiny."


When young Lieutenant Warburton, temporarily commanding B Company of the
Lennox Highlanders, took over his trench, the captain he came to relieve
said to him:

"This part is not too unhealthy; they are only thirty yards off, but
they are tame Boches.  All they ask is to be left alone."

"We will wake things up a bit," said Warburton to his men, when the
peaceable warrior had departed.

When wild beasts are too well fed, they become domesticated; but a few
well-directed rockets will make them savage again.  In virtue of this
principle, Warburton, having provided himself with a star shell, instead
of sending it straight up fired it horizontally towards the German
trenches.

A distracted Saxon sentry cried, "Liquid-fire attack!"  The Boche
machine-guns began to bark.  Warburton, delighted, replied with
grenades.  The enemy called the artillery to its assistance.  A
telephone call, a hail of shrapnel, and immediate reprisals by the
British big guns.

The next day the German _communiqué_ said: "An attack by the British
under cover of liquid-fire at H—— was completely checked by the combined
fire of our infantry and artillery."

0275 Private Scott, H.J., who served his King and country under the
strenuous Warburton, disapproved heartily of his officer’s heroic
methods.  Not that he was a coward, but the War had taken him by
surprise when he had just married a charming girl, and, as Captain
Gadsby of the Pink Hussars says, "a married man is only half a man."
Scott counted the days he spent in the trenches, and this one was the
first of ten, and his chief was reckless.

The god who guards lovers intervened the next day by the simple means of
a scrap of paper asking for a man from the regiment, mechanic by trade,
to look after a machine at P—— for disinfecting clothes. P—— was a
pretty little town at least eight miles from the front line, rather
deserted by the inhabitants on account of _marmites_, but all the same a
safe and comfortable retreat for a troglodyte of the trenches.

0275 Private Scott, mechanic by trade, put his name down.  His
lieutenant abused him; his colonel recommended him; and his general
nominated him.  An old London omnibus painted a military grey took him
away to his new life, far from Warburton and his perils.

The machine which Scott had to look after was in the yard of a college,
an old building covered with ivy; and Abbé Hoboken, the principal,
received him, when he arrived, as if he were a general.

"Are you a Catholic, my son?" he asked him in the English of the
college.

Luckily for Scott, he did not understand, and answered vaguely:

"Yes, sir."

This involuntary renunciation of the Scotch Presbyterian Church procured
him a room belonging to a mobilized Belgian professor and a bed with
sheets.

Now, at that very moment, Hauptmann Reineker, who commanded a German
battery of heavy artillery at Paschendaele, was in a very bad temper.

The evening post had brought him an ambiguous letter from his wife in
which she mentioned too often, and with an affectation of indifference,
a wounded officer of the Guards, whom she had been nursing for several
days.

During the night, he surveyed his gun-emplacements on the outskirts of a
wood, then he said suddenly:

"Wolfgang, have you any shells available?"

"Yes, sir."

"How many?"

"Three."

"Good!  Wake up Theresa’s crew."

He then verified his calculations by his map.

The men, half awake, loaded the enormous gun.  Heineker gave the order,
and, shaking up everyone and everything, the shell started forth,
hurtling through the night.

0275 Private Scott, then, who adored his wife and had accepted a post
without honour for her sake, was sleeping peacefully in the bedroom of a
mobilized Belgian professor: and Captain Reineker, whose wife no longer
loved him, and whom he mistrusted, was striding furiously up and down
amongst the frozen woods; and these two circumstances, widely apart from
one another, were developed independently in an indifferent world.

Now the calculations of Reineker, like most calculations, went wrong.
He was 400 yards out.  His landmark was the church.  From the church to
the college was 400 yards.  A light wind increased the deviation by 20
yards, and from that moment the Reineker and the Scott situation began
to have points in common.  At this particular point the chest of 0275
Private Scott received the full force of the .305 shell, and he was
blown into a thousand bits, which, amongst other things, put an end to
the Scott situation.



                              *CHAPTER IX*


"The ideal of the English Church has been to provide a resident
gentleman for every parish in the Kingdom, and there have been worse
ideals."—SHANE LESLIE.


Aurelle, arriving for tea at the Mess, found only the padre repairing a
magic lantern.

"Hullo, messiou," he said, "very glad to see you.  I am getting my
lantern ready for a sporting sermon to the men of B Company when they
come out of the trenches."

"What, padre, you preach sermons now with a magic lantern?’

"My boy, I am trying to make the men come; there are too many who keep
away. I know very well that the regiment has a good many Presbyterians,
but if you could see the Irish regiments—not a man misses going to Mass.
Ah, messiou, the Catholic padres have more influence than we have. I ask
myself, why?  I go every day to the trenches, and even if the men think
me an old fool they might at least recognize that I am a sportsman."

"The regiment is very fond of you, padre. But, if you don’t mind my
saying so, I think that Catholic priests have a special influence.
Confession has something to do with it, but their vow of celibacy more,
because, in a sort of way, it makes them different from other people.
Even the doctor tones down his best stories when Father Murphy dines
with us."

"But, my boy, I love O’Grady’s stories; I am an old soldier and a man of
the world. When I was shooting in Africa a negro queen made me a present
of three young negresses."

"Padre!"

"Oh, I let them go the same day, which annoyed them somewhat.  But I
don’t see why, after that, I need play Mrs. Grundy in the Mess."

One of the orderlies brought some boiling water, and the padre asked
Aurelle to make the tea.

"When I was married—_not_ that way, messiou; it’s curious that no
Frenchman can make tea.  Always warm the teapot first, my boy; you
cannot make good tea with a cold teapot."

"You were talking about your wedding, padre."

"Yes, I wanted to tell you how indignant all these Pharisees were, who
want me to behave like a prude with young people, when I merely wanted
to be reasonable. When I was going to be married, I naturally had to ask
one of my colleagues to perform the ceremony.  After having settled the
important points, I said to him, ’In the Marriage Service of the Church
of England there is one passage which I consider absolutely indecent.
Yes, yes, I know quite well that it is what St. Paul said.  Well,
probably in his time he had a perfect right to say such things, and they
were adapted to the manners and customs of the Corinthians, but they are
not meant for the ears of a young girl from Aberdeen in 1906. My fiancée
is innocent, and I will not have her shocked.’  The young man, a
worldly-minded little curate, went and complained to the bishop, who
sent for me and said haughtily, ’So it is _you_ who are taking upon
yourself to forbid the reading of the Epistle to the Corinthians?  I
would have you know that I am not the man to put up with nonsense of
this sort.’  ’All right,’ I replied, ’I would have you know that I am
not the man to put up with an insult to my wife.  If this fellow insists
on reading the passage I shall say nothing in the church, out of respect
for the sacred edifice, but I promise you that after the ceremony I
shall box his ears.’

"Well, messiou, the bishop looked at me carefully to see if I was in
earnest.  Then he remembered my campaign in the Transvaal, the negro
Queen, and the dangers of a scandal, and he answered me with unction, ’I
do not see after all that the passage that shocks you is absolutely
essential to the marriage ceremony.’"

Dr. O’Grady here came in and asked for a cup of tea.

"Who made this tea?" he demanded. "You, Aurelle?  How much tea did you
put in?"

"One spoonful for each cup."

"Now listen to an axiom—one spoonful for each cup and then one for the
pot.  It is curious that no Frenchman knows how to make tea."

Aurelle changed the subject.

"The padre was telling me about his wedding."

"A padre ought not to be married," said the doctor.  "You know what St.
Paul said, ’A married man seeks to please his wife and not God.’"

"You have put your foot in it now," said Aurelle.  "Don’t talk to him
about St. Paul; he has just been strafing him badly."

"Excuse me," said the padre, "I only strafed a bishop."

"Padre," said the doctor, "judge not——"

"Oh, I know," said the padre, "the Master said that, but He did not know
any bishops."  Then he returned to his old subject.  "Tell me, O’Grady,
you are Irish; why have the Catholic chaplains more influence than we?"

"Padre," said the doctor, "listen to a parable.  It is your turn.  A man
had committed a murder.  He was not suspected, but remorse made him
restless and miserable. One day, as he was passing an Anglican church,
it seemed to him that the secret would be easier to bear if he could
share it with someone else, so he entered and asked the vicar to hear
his confession.

"The vicar was a very well brought up young man, and had been at Eton
and Oxford.  Enchanted with this rare piece of luck, he said eagerly,
’Most certainly, open your heart to me; you can talk to me as if I were
your father!’  The other began: ’I have killed a man.’  The vicar sprang
to his feet.  ’And you come here to tell me that?  Horrible murderer!  I
am not sure that it is not my duty, as a citizen to take you to the
nearest police station.  In any case it is my duty as a gentleman not to
keep you a moment longer under my roof.’

"And the man went away.  A few miles farther on he saw a Roman Catholic
church.  A last hope made him enter, and he knelt down behind some old
women who were waiting by the confessional.  When his turn came he could
just distinguish the priest praying in the shadows, his head in his
hands.  ’Father,’ he said, ’I am not a Catholic, but I should like to
confess to you.’  ’I am listening, my son.’  ’Father, I have committed
murder.’

"He awaited the effect of this terrible revelation.  In the austere
silence of the church the voice of the priest said simply, ’How many
times, my son?’"

"Doctor," said the padre, "you know that I am Scotch.  I can only take
in a story eight days after I hear it."

"That one will take you longer, padre," said the doctor.



                              *CHAPTER X*


S. W. Tarkington, an officer of fifty-three, honorary lieutenant and
quartermaster, was possessed of a vain but keen desire to win one more
ribbon before retiring.  The laws of nature and eighteen years of good
conduct had given him the South African medal and the long service
ribbon.  But with a little luck even an honorary lieutenant may pick up
a Military Cross if the bullets fall in the right place.  That is why
Tarkington was always to be found in dangerous corners where he had no
business, and that is why, on the day Loos was taken, he wandered with
his rheumatic old joints over the soaking battlefield and carried in
eighteen wounded men on his back.  But he met no general and no one knew
anything about it, except the wounded, who have no influence.

From there the regiment was sent to the north and went into the line in
the Ypres salient.  There existed, no doubt, excellent sentimental and
military reasons for defending this piece of ground, but as a winter
residence it left much to be desired. Tarkington did not fear the
danger—shells were part of the day’s work—but his rheumatism feared the
water, and the rain falling incessantly on the greasy clay made a damp
and icy paste which no doctor would recommend for the oiling of old
joints.  Tarkington, whose painfully swollen feet now made the shortest
march a Chinese torture, finally realized that he must apply to be sent
to hospital.

"It’s just my luck," he said to his confidant, the sergeant-major.  "I
have the pain without the wound."

So he went off limping and swearing to find the colonel in his dug-out,
and told him of the state of his legs.

The colonel was in a bad temper that morning.  A communication from the
headquarters of the division had pointed out to him that the proportion
of trench feet in his regiment had reached 3.6 per cent., whereas the
average of the corps was only 2.7.  And would he take the necessary
precautions to reduce his percentage in the future?

The necessary precautions had been taken; he had sent for the doctor and
given him the communication.

"And see here, O’Grady.  You may have bronchitis, sore throats and
gastric enteritis, but I do not want any more trench feet for three
days."

You may imagine how Tarkington was received when he came to exhibit his
paralysed feet.

"Now that’s the limit.  _I_ send down an officer for trench feet?  Read,
Tarkington, read, and do you imagine I am going to transform 3.5 into
3.6 to please _you_?  Look up, my friend, General Routine Orders No.
324—’Trench Feet result from a contraction of the superficial arteries
with the consequence that the skin no longer being nourished dies and
mortifies.’  Therefore, all you have to do is to watch your arteries.
Tarkington, I am extremely sorry, old man, but that is all I can do for
you."

"Just my luck," said the old man to his friend the sergeant-major.  "I
have thirty-seven years’ service; I have never been ill; and when, for
the first time in my life, I ask for sick leave, it happens on the very
same day that headquarters have strafed the colonel over that very
subject."

His feet became red, then blue, and had begun to turn black when the
colonel went away on leave.  The command in his absence was taken over
by Major Parker, who, being the second son of a peer, paid small
attention to remarks from the brigade. He saw the distress of the
unfortunate Tarkington, and sent him to the field hospital, where they
decided to send him to England.  It seemed that Tarkington was not the
kind to be acclimatized in the Flemish marshes.

He was taken to B—— and put on board the hospital ship _Saxonia_, with
the wounded, doctors and nurses.  The port officials had ascertained to
their annoyance the day before that a number of floating mines were in
the Channel.

The authorities argued over the origin of these mines, which the N.T.O.
said were those of the Allies, while the M.L.O. thought they were the
enemy’s.  But there was no argument about one detail: every boat that
had come into contact with one had been cut in two and sunk immediately.

The captain of the _Saxonia_ was convinced that the Channel was free
from mines.  He risked it—and was blown up.

So Tarkington jumped into the sea.  As a good soldier, his instinct was
to devote his last minutes to keeping calm, and he swam about quietly
with the gas mask that he had been advised never to lose hanging round
his neck.

A salvage boat picked him up, unconscious, and he was taken to a
hospital on the English coast.  He recovered consciousness, but felt
very ill from his immersion in the water.

"Just like my cursed luck!" he groaned. "They stop me starting for a
month, and when at last I do get off, it is in the only ship that has
gone down for a year."

"They are all alike," said the colonel, on his return from leave.
"Here’s a blighter who grumbles at having his feet in water, and then
takes advantage of my absence to go and have a salt-water bath!"

Now, a few months before, King George, after his accident in France, had
crossed the Channel on board the _Saxonia_.  The fate of the ship
naturally interested His Majesty, who came to see the survivors, and, as
Tarkington was the only officer, he had the inestimable privilege of
quite a long conversation with the King.  The result of this was that a
few days afterwards a regiment "somewhere in France" received a
memorandum from general headquarters asking for a statement of the
services of Tarkington, S. W.

The memorandum being accompanied by certain verbal comments on the
subject of "a very distinguished personage" by an officer in a
red-banded gold-peaked cap, the colonel wrote nice things—which he had
never said to him—of Tarkington, S. W., and the sergeant-major gave
details of the brilliant conduct of the quartermaster at Loos.

The _London Gazette_ a fortnight later recapitulated these exploits in a
supplement to the list of awards and honours, and Tarkington, honorary
captain, M.C., meditating on his fate, found the world not such a bad
place after all.



                              *CHAPTER XI*


The first encounter that the brigade had with the village was not happy.

The village looked distrustfully on the brigade, with its bare knees and
its language like the rolling of a drum.  The brigade found the village
short of _estaminets_ and pretty girls.  The people of Hondezeele
bewailed the departure of a division of London Territorials, with their
soft voices and full pockets, and wherever Aurelle went they did nothing
but sing the praises of these sons of their adoption.

"Your Scotchmen, we know them.  We cannot understand what they say—and
my little girls can speak English."

"Scotch—Promenade—no bon!" said the little girls.

"I had the general’s chauffeur here," went on the old woman, "a nice
boy, sir.  Billy, they called him.  He washed up for me, and pleasant
spoken, too, and good manners. An officers’ Mess?  Certainly not.  I can
make more selling fried potatoes and beer to the boys, and even eggs,
although they cost me threepence each."

"Fried potatoes, two painnies a plate, aigs and bacon, one franc,"
chorused the little girls.

Aurelle went on to the next house, where other old women mourned other
Billys, Harrys, Gingers, and Darkies.

One stout lady explained that noise gave her palpitations; another,
quite seventy-five, that it was not proper for a girl living alone.

At last he found a corpulent lady whom he overwhelmed with such eloquent
protestations that she could not get in a word. The next morning, he
sent her the orderlies with the plate and crockery, and at lunchtime
brought along Parker and O’Grady. The servants were waiting for them at
the door.

"Madame is a regular witch, sir.  She’s a proper fury, that’s what she
is, sir."

"Madame" welcomed them with confused complaints.

"Ah! bien merci!  Ah! bien merci! How I have regretted having agreed to
have you.  I have not had a wink of sleep with my husband abusing me.
He nearly beat me, monsieur.  Oh, don’t touch that!  I forbid you to
enter my clean kitchen.  Wipe your feet, and take those boxes off
there!"

"Put the boxes in the dining-room," ordered Aurelle, to conciliate her.

"Thank you!  Put your dirty boxes in my dining-room, with my beautiful
table and my fine dresser!  I should think so, indeed!"

"But, in heaven’s name, madame," said Aurelle, quietly, "where shall I
put them?"

He half opened a door at the end of the dining-room.

"Will you kindly leave that door alone! My lovely _salon_, where I do
not even go myself for fear of making it dirty!  And, besides, I have
had enough of your Mess, I’m about tired of it."

A little later, Aurelle went into Madame Lemaire’s, the draper’s, to buy
some chocolate.  She had relegated all her pre-war trade to a corner of
the shop, and now sold, like the rest of the village, Quaker Oats,
Woodbine cigarettes, and post-cards with the words: "From your Soldier
Boy."

While she was serving him, Aurelle espied behind the shop a charming,
bright little apartment, decorated with plates on the wall, and a clean
cloth, with green and white squares, on the table.  He strolled
carelessly towards the door.  Madame Lemaire looked suspiciously at him
and folded her arms across her enormous bust.

"Would you believe, madame, that there are in this village people so
unpatriotic as to refuse to take in officers, who do not know where to
eat their meals?"

"Is it possible?" said Madame Lemaire, blushing.

He told her who they were.

"Ah, the carpenter’s wife!" said Madame Lemaire, turning up her nose in
disgust. "I am not surprised.  They come from Moevekerke, and the people
of Moevekerke are all bad."

"But it seems to me," insinuated Aurelle gently, "that you have a room
here that would just do."

                     *      *      *      *      *

A week later the village and the brigade were tasting the pure joys of
the honeymoon. In each house a Jack, a Ginger or a Darkey helped to wash
up, called the old lady Granny, and joked with the girls.  The London
Territorials were quite forgotten. At night, in the barns, beribboned
bagpipes accompanied the monotonous dances.

Aurelle had lodged the padre at Madame Potiphar’s, a lively young widow
to whom the divisions, billeted in turn in the village, had handed on
this nickname, like a local password.

The virtue of the padre, which had protected him against the solid
charms of three young negresses, feared nothing from the manoeuvres of a
village Potiphar.

Parker and O’Grady shared a large room in the inn.  They called the
publican and his wife Papa and Mamma.  Lucie and Berthe, the daughters
of the house, taught them French.  Lucie was six feet high; she was
pretty, slender, and fair.  Berthe was more substantial and remarkably
good-natured.  These two fine Flemish girls, honest without prudishness,
greedy of gain, lacking in culture but not in shrewdness, were the
admiration of Major Parker.

Although their father was in a fair way to making a fortune by selling
the Tommies English beer made in France, they never thought of asking
him for money for their clothes or of making a servant work in their
stead.

"One ought to be able to fight when one leaves such women at home," said
the major admiringly.

The father was the same sort.  He described to Aurelle the death of his
son, a splendid boy, three times mentioned in despatches.  He talked of
him with a pride and resignation truly admirable.

Aurelle advised the publican, if he had a few hundred francs to spare,
to put them in the War Loan.

"I have already put in fifty thousand francs," said the old man.  "I
shall wait a little now."

The whole village was rich.

Colonel Bramble gave two sous one day to Madame Lemaire’s son, an urchin
of five or six.

"To buy some sweets with," Aurelle told him.

"Oh no, I don’t care for them."

"What will you do with your sous, then?"

"Put them in my money-box till I have got enough to get a deposit book
in the Savings Bank; then, when I am grown up, I shall buy some land."

That evening Aurelle repeated this to Lucie and Berthe, thinking it
would amuse them.  He soon found out that no one was amused: jokes about
money were sacrilege. The publican related a little moral story to make
this clear.

"When I was small," he said, "I often used to go on messages into the
town for Monsieur le curé, and each time he gave me two sous, which I
took to my father.  But after a time, Monsieur le curé made old Sophie,
his servant, send me on his commissions and she never gave me my two
sous.  My father, who asked me for them, was very indignant.  He
consulted my grandfather, and the whole family were called in one
evening to discuss the matter.

"My father said, ’The child cannot go and complain to Monsieur le curé,
because if it is he who has stopped the two sous he might be offended.’
’And if it is old Sophie who has diddled the child out of it she would
box his ears,’ said my mother. My grandfather, who was no fool, hit upon
the best way.  He said to me, ’You will go and make your confession to
Monsieur le curé.  You will tell him that you have sinned by getting
angry with old Sophie because she sent you to the town without giving
you anything.’

"It was a great success.  ’What,’ said the curé.  ’The old wretch!  She
charged me for them every time.  Release me from the secret of the
confessional and I will give her a good talking-to!’  I remembered that
her hand was heavy and I did not release him; but in future he always
sent me himself."

The schoolmistress from Lille, who possessed the only piano in the
village, explained to Aurelle that she had had to cut out of her lesson
the whole chapter on economy and thrift, substituting a lesson on
generosity.  A little girl of eight then said to her, "I can never do
that, mademoiselle. My mother is mean, and I am sure I shall be meaner
than she."

Meanwhile the Highlanders were turning the King’s shillings into glasses
of beer, and were showering on these economical little girls embroidered
aprons, sugar-plums and post-cards, with "From Your Soldier Boy" on
them, price ninepence.

The plump and active mothers of these nice little Flemish girls sold the
aprons and post-cards.

"Ah, messiou," said Colonel Bramble, "before the War we used to talk
about frivolous France; now it is stern and prudent France."

"Yes," added the doctor, "the French are hard and severe on themselves.
I begin to understand the Boche who said, ’Man does not aspire to
happiness, only Englishmen.’  There is, among your peasants of the
north, an admirable voluntary asceticism."

"Did you ever see, messiou," said the padre, "in our country, before the
War, the Frenchman of the music-hall?  The little fellow with the black
beard, who gesticulates and harangues?  I believed it, messiou, and
never pictured these devout and industrious villagers."

"I like to see them on Sunday morning," said the major, "when the bell
for Mass starts ringing, and they all come out of their houses together,
old men, women and children, as if they were going to a theatre. Ah,
messiou, why didn’t you tell us all about this before the War?"

"The reason is," said Aurelle, "that we didn’t know it ourselves."



                             *CHAPTER XII*


Orion’s belt rose higher in the wintry sky; the roads were frozen hard.
The mail vans overflowed more and more every day with enormous
quantities of puddings and Christmas cards, and the festive season
recalled the joys of life to the division and the village.

The preparations for the Christmas dinner occupied Aurelle and the padre
for some time.  The latter found a turkey worthy of the royal table at a
farm; Aurelle hunted from house to house for chestnuts; Parker attended
himself to the cooking, and mixed a salad of which he was very proud,
but the colonel examined it long and doubtfully. As for the doctor, he
was sent off with Aurelle to Bailleul to buy some champagne, and
insisted on sampling several different brands, which inspired him to
give vent to some strange doctrines on things in general on the way
home.

He obtained permission to invite his friends Berthe and Lucie to come in
at the end of dinner to drink a bumper of champagne in the Mess, and
when they entered in their Sunday dresses, the colonel played "Destiny
Waltz," speed 61.  The orderlies had hung a great bunch of mistletoe
over the door, and the girls asked ingenuously if it was not the custom
in England to kiss under the mistletoe.

"Oh, certainly," said the doctor, and with his hands behind his back, he
pecked Berthe on the cheek which she turned towards him. Parker, equally
nervous, did the same to pretty Lucie, and Aurelle gave them both a good
hug in the French way.

"That’s fine, mademoiselle?" said the little doctor.

"Yes," said Lucie with a sigh.  "We wish it was always Christmas."

"Oh, but why?" said the doctor.

"Think how dull it will be for us after the War," replied Berthe, "when
you are all gone!  Before, one did not think of it—one saw no one—one
worked, one knew no better, but now, without the boys, the village will
be empty indeed.  My sister and I will not stay here.  We will go to
Paris or London."

"Oh, but that’s a pity," said the doctor.

"No, no," said Aurelle, "you will just get married.  You will marry rich
farmers, you will be very busy with your beasts and your chickens and
you will forget all about us."

"It’s easy to say ’get married,’" observed Berthe, "but it takes two for
that.  And if there are not enough young men for all the girls we shall
probably get left in the lurch."

"Every man will have several wives," said Aurelle.  "You will be much
happier; with one husband between you two; you will only have half the
housework to do."

"I do not think I should like it," said Lucie, who was very refined.

But the padre, to whom the doctor had just treacherously translated
Aurelle’s cynical proposals, indignantly protested.

"_You_ ought not to criticize polygamy, padre," said the doctor.
"Re-read your Bible.  What have you to say about old Laban, who, having
sold his two daughters to the same man, payable monthly for fourteen
years, gave the purchaser in addition two waiting-maids as a bonus."

"But," said the padre, "I am not responsible for the actions of a
doubtful patriarch.  I have no sympathy with Laban."

"No more have I," said Aurelle.  "This Dufayel of marriage has always
profoundly disgusted me, but more on account of his matrimonial methods
than for having gone in for the polygamy natural to his tribe. Moreover,
is the number of women to be apportioned to one man a question of
morals?  It appears to me to be a question of arithmetic.  If there are
nearly as many women as men, monogamy is the rule; if for some reason
the number of women is increased, polygamy is perhaps better for the
general welfare."

The two girls, who understood this conversation much less than the
"promenade" and the "na poo" of the Tommies, went up to the colonel, who
talked to them paternally in his gruff way and got the "Caruso" record
for them out of its pink cover.

"You have some weird ideas about animal psychology, Aurelle," said the
doctor. "If you have observed nature, you would have proved, on the
contrary, that the question of the numbers of mates is certainly not a
question of arithmetic.  With gnats, ten females are born to one male.
Now gnats are not polygamous.  Nine of those females die spinsters.  It
is only the old maids who bite us, from which one sees that celibacy
engenders ferocity among insects as well as among women."

"I have known some charming old maids," said Aurelle.

"Indeed!" said the doctor.  "But, however that may be, the number of
married pairs varies simply according to the way the species feed.
Rabbits, Turks, sheep, artists, and, generally speaking, all herbivorous
creatures are polygamous; while foxes, Englishmen, wolves, bankers, and,
generally speaking, all carnivorous animals are monogamists.  That is
because of the difficulty which carnivorous animals find in rearing
their young until they are strong enough to kill for themselves.  As for
polyandry, it occurs in wretched countries like Thibet, where several
men must unite forces to keep one wife and her progeny."

The howls of Caruso rendered all conversation impossible for a minute,
then Aurelle said to Lucie:

"The other girls in the village will perhaps find it difficult to get
husbands, it is true, but you and your sister need not worry; you are
the prettiest, and you will soon have the richest father.  You will have
fine marriage portions."

"Yes, that’s true.  Perhaps they will marry us for our money," said
Berthe, who was modest.

"I should not care to be married for my money," said Lucie.

"Oh, strange creature!" said the doctor, "you would like to be loved for
your face alone, that is to say, for the position in space of the
albuminoids and fatty molecules placed there by the working of some
Mendelian heredity, but you would dislike to be loved for your fortune,
to which you have contributed by your labour and your domestic virtues."

Berthe regarded the doctor nervously and reminded her sister that they
had some glasses to wash before going to bed: so they emptied their
bumpers and departed.

After a restful silence, Major Parker asked Aurelle to explain the
institution of the marriage _dot_, and, when he had grasped it,
indignantly replied:

"What?  A man receives this splendid gift, a pretty woman, and he exacts
money before accepting her?  But what you tell me is monstrous, Aurelle,
and dangerous. Instead of marrying beautiful and good women who would
have beautiful and good children, you marry ugly, quarrelsome creatures
provided with a cheque-book."

"’He who has found a good wife has found great happiness,’" quoted the
padre, "’but a quarrelsome woman is like a roof that lets in the rain.’"

"It is wrong to suppose the children of love-matches better made than
others," interrupted the doctor, becoming rather warlike, obviously
owing to champagne. "Oh, I know the old theory: every man chooses his
natural complement, and thus rears children which revert to the average
type of the race.  Big men like little women, large noses like little
snub-noses, and very feminine men fall in love with Amazons.

"As a matter of fact, a nervous, short-sighted, intellectual man marries
a pedantic, nervous, short-sighted woman because their tastes are
similar.  Good riders make acquaintance with girls who hunt, and marry
them for their sporting tastes.

"So, far from reverting to the average type, love-matches tend to
exaggerate the differences.  And then is it desirable for selection to
operate?  There are very few really brilliant men who have not had at
least one madman among their ancestors. The modern world has been
founded by three epileptics—Alexander, Julius Cæsar and Luther, without
mentioning Napoleon, who was not altogether well balanced.

"In a thousand men of genius, how many mad relations?" asked the
colonel.

"I can’t tell you, sir," said the doctor.

"You can talk nonsense to your heart’s content, doctor," said Major
Parker.  "But as far as I am concerned, if I ever marry, I shall only
marry a very pretty woman. What’s the name of that charming cinema
actress we saw together at Hazebrouck, Aurelle?

"Napierkowska, sir."

"Oh yes.  Well, if I knew her I would marry her at once.  And I am sure
that she is if anything better and more intelligent than the average
woman."

"My friend Shaw," said the doctor, "says that to desire to be
perpetually in the society of a pretty woman, until the end of one’s
days, is as if, because one likes good wine, one wished always to have
one’s mouth full of it."

"Rather a flimsy argument," observed the major.  "For surely that is
better than having it always full of bad wine."

"Anyhow," the doctor replied, "women who exhibit more surely than us the
underlying instincts of mankind are far from bearing out your theory; I
know very few who make a point of marrying a good-looking man."

"Well, do you know the story about Frazer?" said the major.

"Which Frazer?" said the colonel. "G.R. of the 60th?"

"No, no.  A.K. of the 5th Gurkhas—the one who played polo for the
regiment in 1900, an awfully good-looking fellow, the finest chin in the
army."

"Oh, I know him," said the colonel, "the son of old Sir Thomas.  His
father sold me a damned good pony, when I was a subaltern, and I only
paid 200 rupees for it.  Well, what is his story?"

"At the beginning of 1915," said the major, "Frazer, who was crossing
London on his way home on leave, went to the theatre one evening alone.
Towards the end of the first act, he felt vaguely that some one was
staring at him.  He looked up and saw a woman in a box looking at him.
But, owing to the darkness of the theatre, he could not distinguish her
features.

"In the interval, he tried to see her, but she had withdrawn to the back
of her box. During the next two acts she looked at him fixedly.  Frazer,
decidedly intrigued, was waiting at the exit of the theatre, when a
magnificent footman approached him, saying, ’A lady wishes to speak to
you, sir,’ and led him to the door of a carriage which had stopped in a
side street.

"’You do not know me, Captain Frazer,’ said a very pretty voice, ’but I
know you; have you anything to do this evening or will you come to
supper with me?’  Frazer did what we should all have done."

"He ran away?" said the padre.

"He got into the carriage," said Parker. "He was asked to allow himself
to be blindfolded. When the bandage was taken off he found himself in a
charming room, alone with the fair unknown, who was _decolletèe_ and
wearing a mask, and who had the most beautiful shoulders in the world?"

"Is this by Dumas _père_ or R. L. Stevenson?" asked Aurelle.

"It is a story of what actually happened in January, 1915, and was told
me by a man who never lies," said Major Parker.  "The house was in
silence.  No servant appeared, but Frazer, delighted, was offered by the
unknown herself what you French call, I believe, _bon souper, bon gîte
et le reste_.

"At break of day, she bandaged his eyes again.  He told her how much he
had enjoyed himself and asked her when he could see her again.  ’Never,’
she replied, ’and I take it that I have your word of honour as a
gentleman and a soldier that you will never try to find me again.  But
in one year from now, to the day, go back to the same theatre where we
met, and there will, perhaps, be a letter for you.’ Then she saw him
into the carriage again, and asked him to keep his eyes blindfolded for
ten minutes: when he took off the bandage, he was in Trafalgar Square.

"Frazer naturally moved heaven and earth to get leave in January, 1916,
and on the evening of the anniversary of his adventure appeared at the
box office of the theatre and asked for a stall.  ’Have you by any
chance a letter for me?’ he said, giving his name.  The clerk handed him
an envelope, and Frazer, eagerly opening it, read this short line: ’It
is a fine boy.  Thank you.’"

"What is still more strange," said the doctor with sarcasm, "is that
another good-looking lad told me the same story some time before the
war, and that that time he was the hero of it."

"Then this lady must have several children," said the colonel.



                             *CHAPTER XIII*


                     EXTRACTS FROM AURELLE’s DIARY

Hondezeele, January 19—.


Madame Lemaire has presented the Mess with a bottle of old brandy, and
the doctor is in very good form this evening.  He is the true Irish
type; a lover of surprising epigrams.

He says, "We owe to the Middle Ages the two worst inventions of
humanity—romantic love and gunpowder."  Again, "The whole reason of this
War is because the Germans have no sense of humour."

But, above all, you must hear his scientific and precise demonstration
of his favourite theory: "Two telegrams contrary in sense, and from
officers equal in rank, cancel one another."


January 4th.

Rode with the colonel and Parker.  How delicate and clear the atmosphere
is in this northern part of France!  The colonel was highly indignant to
hear that I have never been out hunting.

"You _must_, messiou, it is the only sport. You jump banks as high as
your horse. At eighteen I had nearly broken my neck twice.  It is most
exciting."

"Yes," said Parker, "one day I was galloping in a wood and a branch went
into my right eye.  It is a miracle I wasn’t killed.  Another time——"

He described how his horse fell on the top of him and broke two of his
ribs.  Then both of them together, certain of having convinced me:

"You must hunt after the War, messiou."


January 7th.

This morning, I do not know why, some French troops came through
Hondezeele. The village and I were delighted.  We like the shrill
bagpipes, but no music in the world is like "Sidi-Brahim" and
"Sambre-et-Meuse."

I was pleased, too, to be able to show Parker these Chasseurs à pied, as
all he had seen of our army were old Territorials.  He was much
impressed.

"They are as fine as the Highlanders," he told me.

And then he described the Lennox as they were when he joined as second
lieutenant in Egypt.

"I was forbidden to speak at Mess for six months.  An excellent
practice!  It taught us to realize how humble we were, and the respect
due to our elders.

"If some ’swelled head’ did not conform to these rules, he soon found
his things all packed up in his room, labelled for England. If he still
refused to understand, he was called up before a subaltern’s
court-martial, and heard some home truths about himself.

"It was hard, but what _esprit de corps_ and what discipline those rough
ways taught us. We shall never see a regiment again like the Lennox of
1914.  The officer of to-day has seen active service, it’s true, but as
a matter of fact it is quite sufficient in war to have good health and
no more imagination than a fish.  It is in peace-time that one ought to
judge a soldier."

"You remind me," said the doctor, "of the sergeant-major in the Guards
who said: ’How I wish the war would finish so that we could have real
manoeuvres once more!’"

This evening, while the gramophone was raging, I forced myself to
translate into French Rudyard Kipling’s admirable poem, "If."

I showed it in English to Parker whom it describes so well, and we
talked about books.  I made the mistake of mentioning Dickens.

"I detest Dickens," said the major.  "I never could understand how
anyone could find him interesting.  His books are all stories of the
lower classes and Bohemians. I do not want to know how they live.  In
the whole of Dickens’ works there is not one gentleman.  No, if you wish
to know the _chef-d’oeuvre_ of English novels read ’Jorrocks.’"


January 13th.

A little English telephonist who came to mend our apparatus said to me,
"Telephones are like women, sir.  No one really knows anything about
them.  One fine day, something goes wrong; you try to find out why, no
good, you swear, you shake them up a bit and all is well."


January 14th.

At dinner an Irish colonel remarked: "I am very annoyed; during my last
leave I rented a house for my family, and now my wife writes that it is
haunted. The owners really ought to tell one these things."

"Perhaps they did not know it," said our indulgent colonel.

"They knew it very well.  When my wife went to complain, they got very
confused, and ended by owning up.  One of their great-grandmothers has
walked from the drawing-room to her old bedroom for the last hundred and
fifty years. They tried to excuse themselves by saying she was perfectly
harmless.  That is possible and I am quite willing to believe it, but it
is none the less annoying for my wife.  Do you think I can cancel my
lease?"

I here risked a sceptical remark, but the whole Mess jumped on me.
Irish ghosts are scientific facts.

"But why do phantoms love Irish houses more than others?"

"Because," said the Irish colonel, "we are a very sensitive race and we
enter into communication with them more easily."

And he crushed me with technical arguments on wireless telegraphy.


January 15th.

The colonel, having found out this morning that a motor-ambulance was
going into Ypres, took me with him.  In front of the hospital we found
ourselves wedged in by a terrible block of waggons, under a fierce
bombardment.

A horse with its carotid artery cut by a bit of shell, and only held up
by the shafts, was writhing in agony close by us. The drivers were
swearing.  Nothing to do but wait patiently in our car, shaken by
explosions.

"Dr. Johnson was right," said the colonel to me, "Whoever wants to be a
hero ought to drink brandy."

Then, as a fresh explosion made the debris of the ruined town in front
of us tremble, he said:

"Messiou, how many inhabitants were there in Ypres before the War?"


January 20th.

We are going to leave Hondezeele.  The red-hats are getting agitated and
already one sees the cyclists passing, the natural advance-guard of our
migrations.

We were beginning to love this country: the village and the brigade, so
distrustful of one another a month ago, had become really quite
affectionate.  But the gods are jealous.

    ... Demain, départ de la brigade:
    La cornemuse et le tambour
    Douneront la dernière aubade
    A ces fugitives amours.

    Les montagnards aux beaux genoux,
    Qui mimaient la danse du sable
    Avec des chants graves et doux
    Vont danser la ronde du Diable.

    La Victoire, un jour, les cherchant,
    Les trouvera trois pieds sous terre,
    Mais par ces fermes et ces champs
    Flottera leur ombre légère.

    Et dans nos villages des Flandres...


Interrupted by the arrival of our successors, the Canadians, regarded by
Madame Lemaire and her little boy with great suspicion.  _That_ won’t
last long.



                             *CHAPTER XIV*


A great attack was in preparation; it was a terrible secret jealously
guarded by headquarters; but Aurelle was informed of it several days
beforehand by the German _communiqué_ published in the _Times_, and by
Madame Lemaire’s little boy, who advised him not to repeat it.

However, the division was soon ordered to occupy one of the sectors in
the attack. The padre, optimistic as ever, already foresaw triumphant
marches, but the colonel gently reminded him that the objectives were
simply a ridge, which in peace-time would be called "a slight undulation
in the ground," and two villages already destroyed. The real object was
to engage the forces of the enemy, who were at that moment advancing in
Russia.  But this information only redoubled the enthusiasm of the
padre.

"You can say what you like, sir; if we hold this ridge they cannot hold
out in the valley, and we shall break through their line.  As for the
retreat of the Russians, that’s capital.  The Boche gets farther from
his base, lengthens his lines of communications, and he’s done."

"He is not," said the colonel, "but he will be one day, and that’s all
that matters."

The evening of the offensive, Aurelle received orders from the colonel
to go and act as liaison officer between the headquarters of the
division and some French batteries, which were reinforcing the British
artillery in this sector.  He wished the Lennox good luck and left them
for a day.

He spent the night in the garden of the little château where the general
was living. The bombardment thundered on without ceasing.  Aurelle
walked up and down the paths of this garden, which had been pretty, but
was now honeycombed with trenches and dug-outs, while camouflaged huts
covered the lawns.

Towards midnight, the rain, the classic rain of an offensive, began to
fall in large drops.  The interpreter took shelter in a shed with some
chauffeurs and motorcyclists. He always liked to find himself among this
class of Englishmen, with their strong language and simple minds.
These, like the rest, were good fellows, careless, courageous and
light-hearted.  They hummed the latest music-hall airs from London,
showed him photographs of their wives, sweethearts and babies, and asked
him when the damned war would be over.  They shared on this subject the
perfect optimism of the padre.

One of them, a little, quick-witted electrician, asked Aurelle to
explain the Alsatian question.  And so he told them about Saverne, the
march past of the Strasburg students before Kléber’s statue, the
pilgrimages of the Alsatians to Belfort for the 14th of July Review, and
about the young men who at the age of twenty left family and fortune to
go to France and become soldiers.

They told him that they could understand anyone loving France: it was a
fine country.  All the same there were not enough hedges in the
landscape.  But they appreciated the thrifty qualities of the women, the
trees along the road, and the out-of-door cafés.  They talked with
enthusiasm about Verdun, but many of them had only grasped the idea of
the Entente through Carpentier’s victory in London.

The day dawned; the rain was now falling in torrents; on the lawn, the
grass and soil was trodden into a sticky mass.  Aurelle went up to the
château; he met an aide-de-camp whom he knew and explained his orders.

"Oh yes," he was told.  "I arranged that myself with the French liaison
officer. If the telephone from the batteries happens to get cut, we
shall have recourse to you. Go into the signalling room and sit down. In
ten minutes from now," he added, "our men go over the top."

The signalling room was the old winter garden.  On the wall, a
large-scale map of the trenches showed the British lines in black, and
those of the enemy in red.  At two long tables six telephone operators
were installed.  Silent officers with red tabs paced calmly up and down
the room, and Aurelle thought of one of Major Parker’s favourite
remarks: "A gentleman is never in a hurry."

As five o’clock struck, the general came in and the officers stood still
and said all together:

"Good morning, sir."

"Good morning," said the general politely.

He was very tall; his carefully brushed grey hair, neatly parted, framed
his fine features.  Gold lace shone on the red facings of his well-cut
tunic.

Discovering Aurelle in his corner, he very kindly gave him a little
"Good morning" all to himself, and then he walked slowly, with his hands
behind his back, between the two long tables of the telephonists.  The
noise of the guns had suddenly ceased, and nothing was heard in the room
but the authoritative and measured step of the general.

A muffled bell tingled; an operator quietly made a note of the message
on a pink form.

"5.5 a.m.," read the general softly, "10th Brigade.  Attack begun, enemy
barrage not very effective, violent machine-gun fire."

Then he passed the telegram to an officer, who stuck it on a long pin.

"Transmit it to the corps," said the general.

And the officer wrote on a white paper: "5.10 a.m. 10th Brigade reports
as follows: Attack begun.  Enemy barrage not very effective.  Violent
machine-gun fire."

He filed a carbon copy on another pin, and handed the original to an
operator, who, in his turn, read it into the machine.

Inflexibly and monotonously the white and pink messages slowly
accumulated. One brigade was in the enemy’s first line trenches, the
other had stopped before a concreted nest of machine-guns.  The general
reinforced them with details from the 3rd Brigade, then rang up the
artillery several times to tell them to destroy the pill box.  And these
orders were transcribed on to the pink and white forms.  An officer,
standing before the huge map, carefully manoeuvred small coloured flags,
and all this methodical agitation reminded Aurelle of a large banking
house on the Stock Exchange.

Towards six o’clock in the morning, a Staff officer beckoned to him,
and, leading him up to the map, showed him the emplacement of a French
.155 and asked him to go and see the officer, and tell him to destroy at
all costs a certain railway cutting in which one or two enemy machine
guns were still firing.  The telephone was no longer working.

Outside everything was calm; it was raining and the road was a river of
yellow mud.  The noise of the guns seemed farther off, but it was only
an illusion, because one could see the wicked red light of the shells as
they burst over the village in front of the house.

A few wounded, in hasty field-dressings, bleeding and muddy, were coming
slowly up to the ambulance in small groups. Aurelle entered a little fir
wood; the wet pine-needles seemed delightful walking after the mud.  He
heard the guns of the French battery quite close, but could not find it.
He had been told: "North-east corner of the wood."  But where the devil
was the north-east?  All at once a blue uniform moved among the trees.
At the same moment a gun went off quite close to him, and, turning to
the right, he saw the gunners on the edge of the wood well hidden by
some thick bushes.  An adjutant, astride a chair, tunic undone, _képi_
pushed back, was in command.  The men served the gun cleverly and
without hurrying, like skilled workmen.  One might have thought it a
peaceful, open-air factory.

"_Mon adjudant_," said one of the men, "here is an interpreter."

"Ah, now, perhaps, we shall find out why we can’t get an answer from the
English," said the adjutant.

Aurelle gave him the orders, as the captain was at the observation post,
and the lieutenant trying to repair the telephone.

"Right," said the adjutant, a native of Lorraine with a quiet, sing-song
voice. "We will demolish it for you, young man."

He telephoned to the captain; then, having found the cutting on the map,
began his calculations.  Aurelle stayed a few moments, glad to find this
corner of the battlefield with no false romance, and also to hear French
spoken again at last.

Then he took the path back to the château.  Cutting across a meadow to
find the high road, he approached the battle-field. A brigade of
reinforcements was going up in line; he passed it in a contrary
direction, with a few wounded to whom he offered a little brandy.  The
men who were going up to fight looked at the wounded in silence.

A shell whistled above the column; the heads bent like poplars in a
wind.  The shell burst in a deserted field.  Then Aurelle, having passed
the brigade, found himself on the road with the informal procession of
wounded men.  They had fever, they were dirty, they were bloody; but,
thankful to be out of it, they hurried at the best pace they could
muster towards the haven of white beds.

A company of German prisoners passed, guarded by a few Highlanders.
Their terrified eyes, like those of trained animals, seemed to be
looking for officers to salute.

As Aurelle arrived at the house, he saw two men in front of him carrying
an officer on a stretcher.  The officer evidently had some terrible
wound, for his body was covered with dressings through which the blood
had soaked, and was dripping slowly on to the muddy road.

"Yes, Aurelle, it’s I," said the dying man in a strange voice, and
Aurelle recognized Captain Warburton.  His good-looking, merry face had
become grave.  "O’Grady will not send me to the Duchess’ hospital this
time, messiou," he gasped painfully. "Will you say good-bye to the
colonel for me—and let him write home that I did not suffer much.  Hope
that won’t bother you. Thanks very much indeed."

Aurelle, without being able to get out a word, pressed the hand of this
maimed boy who had been so fond of War, and the stretcher-bearers
carried him gently away.

On arriving at the château he found every one as calm as ever, but very
serious.  He gave in a report of his mission to the Staff officer, who
thanked him absently.

"How is it going?" he asked an operator in a low voice.

"All right," growled the man.  "All objectives attained, but the general
killed. Would go himself to see why the Second Brigade did not come up—a
shell buried him with Major Hall."

Aurelle thought of the grey, smooth hair and fine features of the
general, the gold and scarlet of his facings all soiled by the ignoble
mud of battles.  So much easy dignity, he thought, so much courteous
authority, and to-morrow carrion, which the soldiers will trample under
foot without knowing.  But already, all round him, they were anxiously
discussing who would be his successor.

In the evening, he went over to the Lennox with the regiment that was
going to relieve them.  The first person he saw was the doctor, who was
working in a dug-out.

"I don’t think the regiment did badly," he said.  "I have not seen the
colonel yet, but all the men tell me he was a marvel of courage and
presence of mind.  It appears, messiou, that we have the record number
of Germans killed by one man.  Private Kemble bayoneted twenty-four.
Not bad, is it?"

"No," said Aurelle, "but it’s horrible. Have you looked at Warburton,
doctor? I met him on the road and he seemed very bad."

"Done for," said the doctor.  "And his friend Gibbons died here this
afternoon, both legs blown off."

"Oh, Gibbons too.  Poor Gibbons!  Do you remember, doctor, his talking
about his plump little wife?  No doubt at this very moment she is
playing tennis with her sisters in some lovely English garden.  And the
bleeding limbs of her husband are there, in that blanket.  It’s
terrible, doctor, all this."

"Pooh!" answered the doctor, going to wash his hands, which were covered
with blood.  "In three months you will see her portrait in the _Tatler_:
’The beautiful widow of Captain Gibbons, M.C., who is shortly to be
married to——’"



                              *CHAPTER XV*


The Lennox Highlanders, when the brigade was relieved, were sent for six
days to a muddy field near Dickebusch.  Dr. O’Grady and Aurelle shared a
tent, and dined together, the first evening, at the inn of the _Trois
Amis_.

On their return, the stars shone brightly in a dark blue velvet sky.
The soft moonlight lay on the grass of the meadows.  A few tents in
which a light was burning resembled great white lanterns; round the
bivouac fires, blown about by the wind, the men sat swearing and
singing.

"War makes light of time," said the doctor, "it is eternal and
unalterable.  This camp might be Cæsar’s, the Tommies round their fires,
talking of their wives and their dangers, their boots and their horses,
like the legionaries of Fabius or the veterans of the Grand Army.  And,
as in those days, on the other side of the hill, repose the barbarous
Germans by their unyoked chariots."

The burgundy of the _Trois Amis_ inspired the doctor to hold forth like
this.

"This tent is six thousand years old," he said, "it belongs to the
warlike Bedouins who founded the empires of Babylon and Carthage.  The
restlessness of the ancient migrating people inspired them with a
longing for the desert every year, and sent them forth from the city
walls on profitable raids.  It is this same force, Aurelle, which each
summer, before the war, covered the deserted shores of Europe with
nomadic tents, and it is the dim recollection of ancestral raids which,
on August 1, 1914 holiday time, Aurelle, the time of migrations—incited
the youngest of the barbarians to let loose their Emperor on the world.
It is an old comedy which has been played for two thousand years, but
the public still seem to take an interest in it.  It is because there is
always a fresh audience."

"You are pessimistic this evening," said Aurelle.

"What do you call pessimism?" said the doctor, painfully pulling off his
stiff boots. "I think that men will always have passions, and that they
will never cease to go for one another at regular intervals with the
most energetic means which the science of their time can procure for
them, and the best chosen weapons with which to break each other’s
bones.  I think that one sex will always try to please the other, and
that from this elementary desire will eternally be born the need to
vanquish rivals.  With this object, nightingales, grasshoppers, prima
donnas and statesmen will make use of their voices; peacocks, niggers
and soldiers, of bright colours; rats, deer, tortoises and kings will go
on fighting. All that is not pessimism, it is natural history!"

While talking the doctor had got into his sleeping-bag, and had seized a
little book from a shelf made out of a biscuit box.

"Listen to this, Aurelle," said he, "and guess who wrote it.

"’My regrets about the War are unceasing, and I shall consent to admire
your invincible general when I see the fight ended under honourable
conditions.  It is true that the brilliant successes which are your
delight are also mine, because these victories, if we would use fortune
wisely, will procure for us an advantageous peace. But if we let the
moment pass when we might appear to give peace rather than receive it, I
much fear that this splendid achievement will vanish in smoke.  And if
fate sends us reverses I tremble to think of the peace which will be
imposed on the conquered by an enemy who has the courage to refuse it to
the conquerors?’"

"I don’t know," said Aurelle, yawning. "Maximilian Harden?"

"Senator Hanno at the Senate of Carthage."  said the doctor
triumphantly. "And in two thousand three hundred years some negro
doctor, finding after the Great African War a speech by Lloyd George,
will say, ’These old sayings are sometimes very true.’  Your formidable
European War is about as important, Aurelle, as the fights between two
ant-heaps in the corner of my garden in Ireland."

"It is much more than that to us," said Aurelle, "and it appears to me
that the sort of sentiments it gives rise to are not animal.  Do you
think that ants are patriotic?"

"Most certainly," replied the doctor, "the ants must be extremely
patriotic. With them the warriors are highly fed by a race of servitors.
Every season their armies set out to steal the eggs of the weaker
species.  Workers are hatched from them, born slaves in a foreign
country. The military citizens are thus delivered from the slavery of
work and these soldiers cannot even feed themselves.  Shut up with
honey, and without their nurse-slaves, they die of hunger.  That is what
is called civil mobilization.  And if this war lasts long enough, one
day, Aurelle, you will see a new human species appear: soldier-men. They
will be born with helmets and armour, impervious to bullets and provided
with natural weapons; the Suffragettes will be the sexless slaves who
will feed these warriors, while a few queens will, in special
institutions, bring national infants into the world."

Thus discoursed the doctor, in the friendly silence of the camp by the
soft light of the moon; and Aurelle, who had gone to sleep, saw visions
of enormous ants in khaki marching by, commanded by the little doctor.



                             *CHAPTER XVI*


The orderlies brought the rum, sugar, and boiling water.  The padre
began patience, the colonel played "Destiny Waltz," and Dr. O’Grady, who
in times of peace was doctor at an asylum, talked about lunatics.

"I had the care of a rich American who thought he was surrounded by a
belt of poisoned gas," he said.  "In order to save his life, he had a
special bed made for himself surrounded by a cage of white wood.  He
passed his days in this safe shelter, dressed in nothing but a red
bathing suit, writing a book in twenty thousand chapters on the life and
works of Adam. His room had a triple door on which he had carved, ’Gas
carriers are warned that there are wolf-traps inside.’  He sent for me
every day, and when I went in he always said, ’I have never seen any
creatures so stupid,’ so wicked, so rotten, or so dense as English
doctors.’"

"’I have never seen,’" repeated the padre with great satisfaction, "’any
creatures so stupid, so wicked, or so dense as English doctors.’"

"Upon which," continued the doctor, "he turned his back on me, and,
clothed in his red bathing suit, set to work again at the
twenty-thousandth chapter on the works of Adam."

"Here, messiou," interrupted the colonel, who was examining some
official papers, "is some work for you," and he passed over to Aurelle a
thick bundle of papers covered with multi-coloured seals.

It commenced thus:


"From the Stationmaster at B—— to the Military Superintendent of the
Station at B——

"I have the honour to inform you that Mademoiselle Héninghem,
gate-keeper at Hondezeele, complains of the following facts: the English
soldiers camped along the railway line are in the habit of performing
their ablutions in the open air, which is a shocking sight for the lady
in question, who, from the nature of her work, cannot avoid seeing them.
I shall be obliged if you will give orders that this regrettable state
of affairs shall be put a stop to as soon as possible."

(Signature.)
       (Seal.)


"From the Military Superintendent of the Station at B—— to the
Superintendent W——

"Transmitted to the proper quarter."

(Signed.)
       (Seal.)


"The Superintendent W—— to the D.A.D.R.T.

"I shall be obliged if you will give orders that the camp in question be
surrounded with a fence of sufficient thickness to render the visibility
at fifty yards’ distance practically nil."


"That last man," said Aurelle, "is a polytechnician."

The padre asked what that was.

"A polytechnician is a man who believes that all beings, alive or dead,
can be precisely defined and submitted to an algebraic calculation.  A
polytechnician puts, on the same plane, victory, a tempest, and love.  I
knew one who, commanding a fortress and having to draw up some orders in
case of aerial attack, began thus: ’The Fortress of X—— will be attacked
by an aerial engine when a vertical line from the engine to the earth
finds the centre of the fortification,’ and so on."

"Do not abuse the Polytechnic, Aurelle," said the doctor.  "It is the
most original of your institutions and the best.  The personal cult of
Napoleon is so well preserved that each year France presents two hundred
Lieutenant Bonapartes to the astonished Government."

"Go on translating, messiou," said the colonel.


"D.A.D.R.T. to the Superintendent.

"This does not concern me but a division that is resting.  You must
address your claim to the A.G. by the intermediary of the French
Mission."

(Signed.)
       (Seal.)


"Superintendent —— to the Base Commandant G.H.Q.

"I have the honour to forward herewith, for any action you consider
necessary, a Memorandum concerning a complaint from Mademoiselle
Héninghem of Hondezeele."

(Signed.)
       (Seal.)


And so it went on: Base Commandant to the French Mission; French Mission
to the Adjutant-General; A.G. to the Army; Army to the Corps; Division
to the Brigade; Brigade to the Colonel of the Lennox Highlanders.  And
it was signed with illustrious names, Colonel, Chief Staff Officer for
the General, Brigadier, Major-General; thus the modest scruples of
Mademoiselle Héninghem of Hondezeele were clothed, in the course of a
long journey, with purple, gold and glory.

"This is a tiresome business," said Colonel Bramble solemnly.  "Parker,
answer it, will you, like a good chap."

The major wrote for several minutes, then read out:

"This regiment having left the Camp at Hondezeele two months and a half
ago, it is unfortunately impossible to take the measures desired in the
matter.  Moreover, having ascertained the great cost of a fence of
sufficient height, I beg to suggest that it would be more advantageous
to the allied Governments to replace the gate-keeper at Hondezeele by a
person of mature age and proved experience, to whom the spectacle
described herewith would be inoffensive and even agreeable."

"No, Parker, no," said the colonel firmly, "I shall not sign that.  Give
me a piece of paper.  I will answer myself."

He wrote simply:

"Noted and returned.
       "BRAMBLE,
              "Colonel."


"You are a wise man, sir," said Parker.

"I know the game," said the colonel. "I have played it for thirty
years."

"Once upon a time," said the doctor, "there were two officers who, on
the same day, each lost something belonging to His Majesty’s Government.
The first one mislaid a coal-bucket; the second a motor-lorry.  Now you
must know, Aurelle, that in our army an officer has to pay for anything
which he may lose by negligence out of his own pocket.  The two
officers, therefore, received notices from the War Office advising one
that he would have to pay three shillings, and the other that a thousand
pounds would be stopped from his pay. The first one wished to defend
himself; he had never had any coal-buckets, and tried to prove it.  He
stopped his promotion, and in the end had to pay the three bob.  The
second, who knew a thing or two, just wrote at the bottom of the paper,
’Noted and returned,’ and sent it back to the War Office.  There,
following an old and wise rule, a clerk lost the correspondence and the
officer never heard anything more of _that_ little matter."

"That isn’t a bad story, doctor," said Major Parker; "but in the case of
the loss of property belonging to the Government there is a much better
method than yours—Colonel Boulton’s method.

"Colonel Boulton commanded an ammunition depot.  He was responsible,
among other things, for fifty machine-guns.  One day he noticed that
there were only forty-nine in the depot.  All the inquiries, and
punishment of the sentries, failed to restore the missing machine-gun.

"Colonel Boulton was an old fox and had never acknowledged himself in
the wrong. He simply mentioned in his monthly return that the tripod of
a machine-gun had been broken.  They sent him a tripod to replace the
other without any comment.

"A month later, on some pretext or other, he reported the sighting
apparatus of a machine-gun as out of order; the following month he asked
for three screw-nuts; then a recoil plate, and bit by bit in two years
he entirely destroyed his machine-gun. And correspondingly, bit by bit,
the Army Ordnance Department reconstructed it for him without attaching
any importance to the requisitions for the separate pieces.

"Then Colonel Boulton, satisfied at last, inspected his machine-guns,
and found fifty-one.

"While he had been patiently reconstructing the lost gun, some damned
idiot had found it in a corner.  And Boulton had to spend two years of
clever manipulation of his books to account for the new gun which had
been evolved out of nothing."

"Messiou," said the colonel, "do you remember the gate-keeper at
Hondezeele?  I should not have thought it of her."

"No more should I," said Aurelle.  "She was very pretty."

"Messiou!" said the padre.



                             *CHAPTER XVII*


"Doctor," said the padre, "give me a cigar."

"Are you aware, padre, that my cigars were rolled on the bare thighs of
the young girls of Havana?"

"O’Grady," said the colonel severely, "I consider that remark out of
place."

"Give me one all the same," said the padre.  "I must smoke a cigar to
help me find a text for my sermon.  The quartermaster made me promise to
go and see the motor-drivers who are at the back, and I don’t know what
to talk to them about."

"Look here, padre, I will give you an appropriate text; lend me your
Bible a moment.  Ah, here it is.  Listen!  ’But David said, Ye shall not
do so, my brethren, with that which the Lord hath given us ... but as
his part is that goeth down to the battle, so shall his part be that
tarrieth by the stuff; they shall part alike.’"

"Admirable," said the padre, "admirable! But tell me, O’Grady, how is it
that an old sinner like you knows the Holy Scriptures so well?"

"I studied the Book of Samuel a good deal from an asylum doctor’s point
of view," said the doctor.  "Saul’s neurasthenia interested me.  His
attacks are very well described.  I have also diagnosed the madness of
Nebuchadnezzar.  They were two very different types.  Saul was apathetic
and Nebuchadnezzar violent."

"I wish you would leave Nebuchadnezzar alone," said the colonel.

"I am very much afraid of asylum doctors," said Major Parker.  "Violent,
depressed, or apathetic, we are all mad, according to them."

"What do you call mad?" said the doctor.  "I certainly can see in you,
and in the colonel, and Aurelle, all the phenomena which I observed in
the asylum."

"Ugh!" said the colonel, horrified.

"But I do, sir.  Between Aurelle, who forgets the war by reading
Tolstoi, and some of my old friends who thought they were Napoleon or
Mahomet, there is a difference in degree but not in nature. Aurelle
browses on novels from a morbid desire to live the life of someone else;
my patients substitute for their miserable life that of some great
personage whose history they have read and whose lot they envy.

"Oh, I know your objections, Aurelle. You know, all the time you are
dreaming of the loves of Prince Bolkonsky, that you are the Interpreter
Aurelle, attached to the Lennox Highlanders, but when Queen Elizabeth is
scrubbing the floor of my office, she does not know that she is Mrs.
Jones, charwoman, of Hammersmith. But incoherence is not the monopoly of
madness: all the main ideas of a sane man are irrational erections built
up, for better or worse, to express his deepest feelings."

"Parker," said the colonel, "can you think of anything to stop him?"

"A No. 5 grenade, sir," said the major.

But the doctor went on imperturbably:

"One of my patients was a country gentleman, who after being a model of
piety for the first part of his life suddenly became an atheist.  He
gave carefully thought out reasons for it, and discoursed with a good
deal of erudition on questions of doctrine, but the only true cause of
his conversion to the wrong side was because his wife ran away with the
clergyman of his village.  Oh, I beg your pardon, padre, you don’t mind,
do you?"

"I?  I have not been listening to you for ages," said the padre, who was
dealing out patience.

"It is just the same thing," continued the doctor, turning to the docile
Aurelle, "with a man who is too refined for the class in which chance
has placed him.  At first he is simply jealous and unhappy.  Influenced
by these feelings, he becomes violently critical of society in order to
account for his hate and disappointment.

"Nietzsche was a genius because he delighted in persecution.  Karl Marx
was a dangerous maniac.  It is only when the feelings of discontent
which he tries to explain coincide with those of a whole class, or a
whole nation, that the impassioned theorist becomes a prophet, or a
hero; while, if he confines himself to explaining that he would rather
have been born an Emperor, they shut him up."

"Moral," said the major, "shut up all theorists."

"And the doctor," said the colonel.

"No, not all," said the doctor.  "We treat the subject just as the
ancients did. All primitive people thought that a lunatic was possessed
by a spirit.  When his incoherent words more or less accord with the
moral prejudices of the time, the spirit is a good one, and the man is a
saint.  In the opposite case, the spirit is evil and the man must be
suppressed.  It is just according to the time and place and the doctors,
whether a prophetess would be worshipped as a priestess or ducked as a
witch. Innumerable violent lunatics have escaped the cells, thanks to
the War, and their very violence has made heroes of them.  And in every
Parliament there are at least five or six undisputed idiots who got
elected for their madness, through the admiration of their
constituents."

"Say five or six hundred," said Major Parker, "and it will be the first
sensible thing you have said to-night."

"That’s because my madness agrees with yours on that subject," said the
doctor.

"Doctor," said the colonel, "you understand treatment by suggestion,
don’t you? I wish you would calm down your hospital sergeant a bit.  He
is so nervous that he begins to tremble and becomes perfectly speechless
if I speak to him.  I really believe I terrify him.  See what you can
do, like a good fellow."

Next morning, Dr. O’Grady sent for Sergeant Freshwater to his tent and
talked kindly to him.

Freshwater, a lean Albino with heavy stupid eyes, owned that he lost his
head whenever the colonel came near him.

"Well, my friend," said the doctor, "we will cure you of that in five
minutes.  Sit down there."

He made some passes to create an atmosphere favourable to suggestion,
then began:

"You are not afraid of the colonel, you know he is a man just like you
and me—you rather like talking to him.  Look closely at his face when he
speaks to you. His moustache is always cut a little too short on the
left side."

The doctor went on like this for a quarter of an hour describing the
rugged features and funny ways of the colonel, then sent away the
sergeant, telling him that he was cured, and not to forget it the first
time he met his commanding officer.

A few hours later, Colonel Bramble, going out for his lunch, met the
hospital sergeant on one of the duck-boards used for going through the
camp.  Freshwater stepped on one side, saluted, and began to laugh
silently.

"Whatever is the matter, sergeant?" said the astonished colonel.

"Oh, sir," replied Freshwater in fits of laughter, "I cannot help
laughing when I look at you, you have such a funny face!"

The colonel, in a few well-chosen words, destroyed the doctor’s learned
suggestions for ever; then, establishing himself in front of the tinned
lobster, he complimented O’Grady on his miraculous cure.

"I have never seen," said the padre, "any creatures so stupid, so
wicked, so rotten, or so dense as English doctors."

"Medicine is a very old joke," said Major Barker, "but it still goes on.
Now, doctor, tell the truth for once: what do you know more than we do
about illnesses and their remedies?"

"That’s right," said the padre, "attack his religion; he often attacks
mine."

"When I was in India," said the colonel, "an old army doctor gave me for
every malady the remedy which just suited me. For palpitations of the
heart, a large glass of brandy; for insomnia, three or four glasses of
port after dinner; for stomachic disorders, a bottle of dry champagne at
each meal.  And, as long as one was feeling well, whisky and soda."

"Excellent, sir," said Aurelle.  "Before the War I drank nothing but
water and I was always ill; since I have been with you I have adopted
whisky and I feel much better."

"Yes, you look it," said the colonel.  "I had a friend, Major
Fetherstonhaugh, who began to have fits of dizziness when he was about
forty; he went to see a doctor who thought it was the whisky and advised
him to drink milk for a time; well, in ten days he was dead."

"And a good thing too," said the padre.

"But I expect——" began the doctor.

"Happy are those who expect nothing," said the padre, "for they shall
not be disappointed."

"What, you too, padre!" said the doctor. "Take care; if you ruin doctors
by your malevolent remarks, I shall found a society for the exportation
to the Colonies of mechanical idols and ovens for cooking missionaries."

"That is an excellent idea," said the padre.  "I must see about it."



                            *CHAPTER XVIII*


The brigade, kept in reserve for the division, was ordered to go and
camp at H——.  As a dentist measures the extent of a cavity at a glance,
the men of the Lennox, expert in bombardments, cast a professional eye
over the village.  Round the château and the church it was done for:
houses in ruins, pavements torn up, trees smashed.  The weaving factory
had been badly damaged.  The rest was not so unhealthy, a little knocked
about, perhaps, but habitable.

The house where Colonel Bramble had established his Mess had already
been hit by a shell.  It had burst in the garden, breaking the
window-panes and marking the walls.  Madame, a dear little old lady,
made light of these blemishes, which had depreciated her house in value.

"Oh, just a shell, _monsieur l’officier_!" she said.  "Quite a small
shell; I put the base of it there on my mantelpiece.  It’s nothing, as
you can see.  True, they make a mess of everything, but I am not afraid
of them!"

The colonel asked her how many windows had been broken.

"I don’t like this house," said the padre, as they sat down to dinner.

"The life of a soldier," replied the colonel, "is one of great hardship,
not infrequently mingled with moments of real danger."

"Be not dismayed, padre," said the doctor.  "Shells fall like drops of
water: if it rains much the whole pavement gets wet."

"The Lennox Mess has always been lucky," said Major Parker.

"Luck is nothing," said the doctor.

"One can see you are not a gambler," remarked Aurelle.

"One can see that you are not a mathematician," said the doctor.

The padre expostulated:

"What?  Luck nothing?  How about little Taylor, killed by a shell in
Poperinghe Station at the very moment that he was arriving at the front
for the first time! You don’t call that bad luck?"

"Not more than if an old habitué like me was wiped out by a whizz-bang,
padre. You are astonished at Taylor being killed the first minute, just
as you would be surprised if, in a lottery of a million tickets, Number
One should win, although that number had obviously as much chance as,
say, 327,645.  Someone must be the last man killed in this war, but you
will see that his family will not think it ordinary."

"You are a fanatic, O’Grady," said Parker, "you must have an explanation
for everything; there are more things in heaven and earth than are
dreamed of in your philosophy.  I believe, myself, in good luck and bad
luck because I have noticed it: I believe in presentiments because I
have had them, and events have confirmed them.  When I was being sent
home, after the Transvaal War, I got an order to embark on a certain
ship.  Well, two days before it started I suddenly had a presentiment
that I must avoid sailing in that ship at all costs.  I went sick and
waited a fortnight longer.  The transport I missed was completely lost
and no one ever knew how.  Then again, why are you so certain, doctor,
that aspirin will cure your headache?  Because aspirin has cured it
before. Where’s the difference?"

"The major is right," said Aurelle.  "To say that you do not believe in
a man’s bad luck because you cannot find it at his autopsy, is like
saying that the tuner has taken the piano to pieces, and therefore
Mozart had no soul."

The quartermaster, who was dining with them that evening, threw his
weight into discussion:

"There _are_ things that cannot be explained, doctor.  For instance, I
hit you in the face: you shut your eye—why?"

There was an astounded silence.

"Another instance," remarked the padre at last.  "Why is it that if
there is a pause in the conversation, it is always twenty minutes to, or
twenty minutes past, the hour?"

"But that’s not true," said the doctor.

"It was true this time, anyhow," said Aurelle, looking at his watch.

"It may be once or twice," said the doctor irritably, "but it cannot
always happen."

"All right, doctor, all right," said the padre.  "You notice it for
several days and I think you will change your mind."

The colonel said:

"My men tell me that if a shell falls on a dug-out where there are
gunners and infantry, the latter are killed and the gunners are spared.
Why?"

"But it is not true, sir."

"And why must one never light three cigarettes with the same match?"

"But you may, sir, it does not matter a bit."

"Ah, there I disagree with you, doctor," said the colonel.  "I am not
superstitious, but I would not do that for anything in the world."

"Why do people dressed in green always lose at Monte Carlo?" said
Aurelle.

"But it is not true!" roared the doctor, exasperated.

"It is easy to argue like you," said Parker.  "Everything you do not
agree with is not true."

"There are," said the padre, "no creatures so wicked and so dense as
English doctors."

"Messiou," said the colonel, "are the gunners equally lucky in the
French Army?"

"I have often remarked it," said Aurelle, who liked Colonel Bramble very
much.

The colonel therefore triumphed, and tried to put an end to the
discussion, which bored him.

"I am so very sorry," he said, "I cannot give you the gramophone
to-night.  I have no more needles."

"That _is_ a pity," said the padre.

The window-panes shook; a big gun went off close to the house.  Aurelle
went to the window and saw behind a farm, silhouetted in black against
the orange twilight of the sky, a yellowish smoke, slowly dispersing.

"There’s the old man beginning to strafe again," said the padre.  "I
don’t like this house."

"You will have to put up with it, padre; the Staff captain won’t give us
another; he’s a boy who knows his own mind."

"Yes," said the colonel, "he is a very nice boy too; he is one of Lord
Bamford’s sons."

"His father, the old Lord, was a fine rider," said Parker.

"His sister," replied the colonel, "married a cousin of Graham, who was
a major in our first battalion at the beginning of the War, and is now a
brigadier-general."

Aurelle, foreseeing that such an interesting subject, so rich in the
possibility of unexpected developments, would occupy the entire evening,
tried to scribble some verses, still meditating on luck and chance.

    "Tu l’as dit, ô Pascal, le nez de Cléopâtre,
    S’il eût été plus court ... nous n’en serions pas là."


A new and formidable detonation put the subtle metre of rhyme out of his
head; discouraged, he tried another:

    "Croyez pas que je moralise,
    Si je vous envoie ces bobards,
    C’est que notre mess analyse
    Ce soir la question du hasard..."


Another shell fell so close that the colonel got up suddenly.

"They are beginning to bombard the château again," he said.  "I am going
to see where that one fell."

Major Parker and the doctor followed him into the street, but Aurelle,
who was again rhyming, stayed with the padre, who had just begun the
same patience for the fourteenth time that evening.  The three officers
had gone about a hundred yards when another explosion took place behind
them.

"That one was not far from the Mess," said the doctor.  "I am going to
tell Madame to go down into the cellar."

He retraced his steps and found a new shell-hole in front of the house.
The house seemed all right; through the broken window the doctor saw the
padre and called out to him:

"A near thing that time, padre.  Are you all right?  Where is Aurelle?"

But the padre did not move: with his head leaning on his arms crossed
over the scattered cards, he appeared to be gazing vaguely at the
doctor, who entered at a bound and touched the padre on the shoulder.

He was dead.  A piece of shell had entered his temple, which was
bleeding slowly.  Aurelle had fallen on the floor. He was unconscious
and covered with blood, but the doctor, bending over him, found that he
still breathed.  As he was unfastening his tunic and shirt, the colonel
and Parker arrived with their measured tread and stopped abruptly at the
door.

"The padre has been killed, sir," said the doctor simply.  "Aurelle is
hit, too, but I don’t think it is serious.  No, it’s his
shoulder—nothing much."

The colonel groaned sympathetically.

Parker helped O’Grady to lay the Frenchman on a table; a crumpled piece
of paper attracted the colonel’s attention; he picked it up and read
with difficulty:

    "Pourquoi me fermes-tu les yeux
    Lorsque tu me baises la bouche?"


"What is it all about?" he said.

"It belongs to Aurelle," said the doctor.

The colonel carefully folded the little sheet of paper and slid it
respectfully into the young Frenchman’s pocket.  Then, after the doctor
had finished dressing the wound and had sent for an ambulance, they laid
the padre on Madame’s humble bed.  They all took their hats off and
stood silent for some time contemplating the strangely softened features
of the childlike old man.

The doctor looked at his watch; it was twenty minutes past nine.



                             *CHAPTER XIX*


Aurelle, on leaving hospital, was attached, while convalescent, to the
English colonel, Musgrave, who commanded a supply depot at Estrées, a
little village well behind the line.  He missed the evenings with the
Lennox Mess, but buying fodder and wood took him some way out into the
pretty undulating country with its clear streams, and he loved Estrées,
hiding its innumerable belfries among the flowery hills.

It was a very antique city, and in its youth, in the time of the
_seigneurs_ of Estrées, had played an important part in the affairs of
France.  For several hundred years she had defended her ramparts against
the troops of the Kings of England, and from her walls she could see
those same soldiers to-day camped about her, this time as familiar and
courteous guests.  Her tenacious burghers had repulsed both Leaguers and
Spaniards with equal success. She now slept in smiling old age, having
seen too many things to be surprised any more, while still retaining
from the times of her glory her casket of beautiful mansions, built
among courts and gardens with the noble simplicity of line dating from
the best periods.

Colonel Musgrave and his officers inhabited the large and handsome house
of the Dutch merchant, Van Mopez, whom Colbert had established at
Estrées to introduce the art of weaving and dyeing cloth. Aurelle liked
to go and sit in the garden and read a History of Estrées written by
Monsieur Jean Valines, correspondence member of the Amiens Academy, and
author of "Nouvelles observations sur les miracles de la chapelle
d’Estrées."

This excellent work contained accounts of the great rejoicings and high
festivals with which Estrées the Faithful had received the Kings, when
they came to kneel and worship at the feet of the miraculous image in
the Chapel of St. Ferréol.

The municipal worthies, between the royal visits, prudently and
carefully preserved the white and blue draperies embroidered with
fleurs-de-lis, and the decorations of painted scenery.

The Revolution had rather upset these domestic arrangements; the
fleurs-de-lis had to be removed and a red fringe sewn along the blue and
white draperies, so that the square of Saint-Ferréol could be decorated
at a small cost for the fête of the Supreme Being.  Aurelle loved the
description:

"The cortège, preceded by music and drums, consisted first of a
half-company of the National Guard carrying a banner on which was
inscribed: ’Up with the People, down with Tyrants.’

"Then came the mothers of families carrying their infants in their arms;
children of both sexes clothed in the most beautiful ornaments of their
age—innocence and candour; young girls adorned with their charms and
virtues; and the members of that Society so dreaded by traitors, in
which were united the defenders of the truth, the upholders of public
opinion, and the indefatigable guardians of the people.

"The whole cortège gathered at the foot of a mound erected in the square
of Saint-Ferréol. There, the people of Estrées swore fidelity to the
laws of nature and humanity, and subsequently a group of figures
representing Despotism and Imposture were consumed by flames; Wisdom
arose out of the ashes and on his shield was written: ’I guard the
Republic.’"

Aurelle turned over some pages, very few, for, as Monsieur Jean Valines
said, the happy sterility of the archives of Estrées during the
Revolution recorded no other facts worthy of notice than two fêtes, a
fire, and a flood.  Next came the visit of the First Consul.  He came to
Estrées accompanied by his wife and several general officers, and was
received by the authorities under a triumphal arch, erected at the
Saint-Ferréol Gate, adorned with this inscription: "The Grateful
Inhabitants of this City swear Allegiance and Fidelity to the Conqueror
of Marengo."

The Mayor presented the keys of the town on a silver dish covered with
bay leaves.  "I take them, _citoyen maire_, and I return them to you,"
replied Bonaparte.

"The National Guard lined the route and cries of ’Long live Bonaparte!
Long live the First Consul!’ were repeated enthusiastically a thousand
times.  The First Consul visited the Van Mopez factory and distributed a
day’s pay among the workmen. The day ended with illuminations and a
brilliant ball.

"A short time after his marriage with Marie-Louise, Napoleon came back,
accompanied by the Empress.  The square of Saint-Ferréol was a
magnificent spectacle, decorated with red and white draperies and
garlands of green leaves.  A triumphal arch had been erected with the
inscription: ’_Augusto Napoleoni Augustæque Mariæ Ludovicæ Strataville
semper fidelis_.’"

A few more pages further on and it was March, 1814; for six days no
couriers got through to Estrées from Paris, and then she heard of the
fall of the Emperor.

"At three o’clock in the afternoon, the magistrates, assembled in the
Town Hall, summoned the inhabitants with the ringing of bells.  The
Mayor appeared on the balcony of the large hall and proclaimed the
allegiance of the town to the restored Bourbons.  The spectators
received this speech with oft-repeated cries of ’Long live the King!’
’Long live Louis XVIII!’ and all put on the white cockade.

"The news soon came that Louis XVIII had landed at Calais and that he
would pass through Estrées.  A guard of honour was formed and a
triumphal arch was erected at the Saint-Ferréol gate.  It bore this
inscription: ’_Regibus usque suis urbs Stratavilla fidelis_.’

"The clergy from every parish approached to compliment the King, and the
Mayor presented the keys of the town on a silver dish adorned with
fleurs-de-lis.  The King replied, ’Monsieur le maire, I take the
flowers, and give you back the keys.’  Then the sailors and footmen
unharnessed the horses from the carriage, and drew him themselves into
the town.  The excitement of the crowd was impossible to describe; every
house was decorated with blue and white draperies and green garlands,
mottoes and white flags, covered with fleurs-de-lis.

"The King was present at a _Te Deum_ sung in Saint-Ferréol, and
repaired, still drawn by sailors, to the Abbey of Saint-Pierre, where he
was to lodge the night."

The evening drew slowly in; the quaint, thick lettering of the old book
was becoming indistinct, but Aurelle wanted to finish the melancholy
history of these inconstant people.  Skipping the triumphal entry of
Charles X, he came to the July insurrection.

"On the 29th of July, 1830, there were no newspapers; but letters and a
few travellers arriving from Paris announced that the tricolour flag had
been hoisted on the towers of Notre-Dame.  A few days later they learnt
that the fighting had stopped, and that the heroic population of the
capital remained in possession of all their outposts.

"Louis-Philippe, accompanied by the Dukes of Orleans and Nemours, soon
after passed Estrées on his way to Lille.  He was received under a
triumphal arch by the Mayor and Corporation.  Every house was hung with
draperies in the three colours. An immense crowd filled the air with
their acclamations.  The King arrived at the square of Saint-Ferréol,
where the National Guard and several companies of _douaniers_ awaited
him.

"The various corps of the urban guards in their best clothes; the
strangeness of the rural guards, with a large number of Napoleon’s old
soldiers in their ranks with their original uniforms; the intrepid
seamen of Cayeux carrying in triumph their fishing prizes, ten old
tricolour banners; the sailors, with their carbines, bandoliers and
cutlasses in their hands, all made the gayest of spectacles, and the
picturesque fête delighted the King and the officers of his staff."

There Jean Valines’ book concluded, but Aurelle, while watching the
garden fading slowly in the twilight, amused himself by imagining what
followed.  A visit from Lamartine, no doubt; then one from Napoleon III,
the triumphal arches and inscriptions, and quite lately, perhaps, Carnot
or Fallières receiving from the mayor, in the square of Saint-Ferréol,
the assurance of the unalterable devotion of the faithful people of
Estrées to the Republic.  Then in the future: unknown governors, the
decorations, perhaps red, perhaps blue, until the day when some blind
god would come and crush with his heel this venerable human ant-hill.

"And each time," he mused, "the enthusiasm is sincere and the vows
loyal, and these honest tradesmen rejoice to see passing through their
ancient portals the new rulers, in the choice of whom they have had no
part.

"Happy province!  You quietly accept the Empires which Paris brings
forth with pain, and the downfall of a government means no more to you
than changing the words of a speech or the flowers on a silver dish.  If
Dr. O’Grady were here he would quote Ecclesiastes to me."

He tried to remember it:

"What profit hath a man of all his labour which he taketh under the sun?

"One generation passeth away, and another generation cometh; but the
earth abideth for ever.

"The thing that hath been, it is that which shall be; and that which is
done is that which shall be done; and there is no new thing under the
sun."

"Aurelle," said Colonel Musgrave, who had quietly approached, "if you
want to see the bombardment after dinner, go up to the top of the hill.
The sky is all lit up.  We attack to-morrow morning."

And a distant muffled thundering floated on the calm evening air.  A
melancholy and ancient peal of bells rang out from the Spanish belfry in
the market-place.  The first stars twinkled above the two ironical
towers of the church of Saint-Ferréol and the proud old town fell asleep
to the familiar sound of battle.



                              *CHAPTER XX*


Colonel Musgrave was drinking his coffee in the handsome _salon_ of the
merchant, Van Mopez; he opened a pink official telegram and read:

"Director of Commissariat to Colonel Musgrave.  Marseilles Indian Depot
overcrowded meet special train 1000 goats with native goatherds find
suitable quarters and organize temporary farm."

"Damn the goats!" he said.

His job being to feed Australians, he thought it hard that he had to
bear in addition the consequences of the religious laws of the Hindoos.
But nothing troubled Colonel Musgrave long; he sent for his interpreter.

"Aurelle," he said, "I am expecting a thousand goats this evening; you
will take my motor and scour the country.  I must have a suitable piece
of ground in five hours and a small building for the shepherds. If the
owner refuses to let you hire them, you will commandeer them.  Have a
cigar? Good-bye."

Having thus disposed of this first anxiety, he turned to his adjutant.

"We now want an O.C Goats!" he said. "It will be an excellent reason for
getting rid of Captain Cassell, who arrived yesterday.  _Captain_!  I
asked him what he did in peace-time—musical critic of the _Morning
Leader_!"

So that is how Captain Cassell, musical critic, was promoted
goatherd-in-chief. Aurelle found a farmer’s wife whose husband had been
called up, and he persuaded her, at the cost of much eloquence, that the
presence of a thousand goats in her orchards would be the beginning of
all sorts of prosperity.  He went in the evening to the station with
Cassell to fetch the goats, and they both passed through the town at the
head of the picturesque flock, herded by ancient Indians, who looked
exactly like the shepherds in the Bible.

Colonel Musgrave ordered Cassell to send him a hundred goats per day for
the front.  After the fourth day Cassell sent over a short note by one
of the children from the farm, announcing, as if it were quite a natural
thing, that his flock would be exhausted the next day and asking for
another contingent of goats.

On opening this extraordinary missive, the colonel was so choked with
rage that he forgot to proclaim, according to custom, that Cassell was a
damned fool.  The numbers were too simple for an error to be possible.
Cassell had received one thousand goats; he had sent off four hundred,
he ought to have six hundred left.

The colonel ordered his car and commanded Aurelle to take him to the
farm. A pretty, deeply cut road led them there. The buildings were in
the rustic, solid style of the end of the eighteenth century.

"It is a charming spot," said the interpreter, proud of his find.

"Where is that damned fellow Cassell?" said the colonel.

They found him in the kitchen having a French lesson from the farmer’s
daughter. He got up with the easy grace of a rural gentleman whom
friends from town had surprised in his hermitage.

"Hullo, colonel," he said, "I am very glad to see you."

The colonel went straight to the point:

"What’s this damned letter that you sent me this morning?  You received
a thousand goats; you sent me four hundred of them.  Show me the
others."

The ground behind the farm sloped gently down to a wooded valley; it was
planted with apple-trees.  Near a stable, sitting in the mud, the Hindoo
shepherds tasted prematurely the joys of Nirvana.

A horrible smell arose from the valley, and, coming nearer, the colonel
saw about a hundred swollen and rotting carcases of goats scattered
about the enclosure.  A few thin kids dismally gnawed the bark of the
apple-trees.  In the distance, among the copses which covered the other
side of the valley, one could see goats which had escaped browsing on
the young trees.  At this lamentable sight, Aurelle pitied the
unfortunate Cassell.

The colonel maintained a hostile and dangerous silence.

"Isn’t it beautiful, colonel," said the musical critic with soft and
stilted speech, "to see all those little white spots among the green?"

                     *      *      *      *      *

"Could not one," suggested Aurelle on the return journey, "ask the
advice of a competent man?  Perhaps goats cannot stand sleeping out of
doors in this damp climate, and perhaps also they are not being fed
properly."

The colonel frowned.

"In the South African war," he said after a silence, "we used a large
number of oxen for our transport.  One day these damned oxen started
dying by hundreds, and no one knew why.  Great excitement at
headquarters.  Some general found an expert, who, after boring the whole
army with his questions, ended by declaring that the oxen were cold.  He
had noticed the same sickness in the north of India.  There they
protected the beasts by making them wear special clothing. Any normal
individual with common sense could see that the oxen were simply
overworked.  But the report followed its course, and arrived at general
headquarters, and from there they wired to India for a few thousand rugs
for cattle.

"So far all went well, the oxen died as fast as ever, the well-paid
expert had a damned good time—up to the arrival of the rugs.  It is very
easy to put clothing on an Indian cow who waits patiently with lowered
head.  But an African bullock—you try, and see what it’s like.  After
several trials, our drivers refused to do it. They sent for the expert
and said to him, ’You asked for rugs for the beasts: here they are.
Show us how to put them on.’  He was damned lucky to get out of hospital
in six months."

That same evening another pink telegram arrived from the Director of
Commissariat:

"Goats arrive at the front half dead pray take steps that these animals
may have some wish to live."

Colonel Musgrave then decided to telegraph to Marseilles and ask for an
expert on goats.

The expert arrived two days later, a fat farmer from the South, sergeant
of Territorials.  With the help of Aurelle, he had a long conversation
with the colonel.

"There is one thing," he said, "that goats cannot get on without, and
that is heat.  You must make very low wooden sheds for them; without any
openings; let them stew in their own juice, and they will be happy!"

He remarked to the interpreter when the colonel had gone, "Didn’t I tell
them a good tale about their goats, _hé_?  In the South they live out in
the open and are as well as you or I.  But let’s talk seriously.
Couldn’t you get your English to manage an extension of leave for me, to
look after their beasts, _hé_?"

They had begun to build the huts described by the man from the South,
when the Indian Corps wrote to Colonel Musgrave that they had discovered
a British expert whom they were sending him.

The new seer was an artillery officer, but goats filled his life.
Aurelle, who looked after him a good deal, found out that he regarded
everything in nature from the point of view of a goat.  A Gothic
cathedral, according to him, was a poor shelter for goats: not enough
air, but that could be remedied by breaking the windows.

His first advice was to mix molasses with the fodder which was given to
the animals. It was supposed to fatten them and cure them of that
distinguished melancholy which the Indian troops complained of. Large
bowls of molasses were therefore distributed to the Hindoo shepherds.
The goats remained thin and sad, but the shepherds grew fat.  These
results surprised the expert.

Then he was shown the plans of the huts.

He was astounded.

"If there is one thing in the world that goats cannot do without," he
said, "it is air.  They must have very lofty stables with large
windows."

Colonel Musgrave asked him no more. He thanked him with extreme
politeness, then sent for Aurelle.

"Now listen to me," he said: "you know Lieutenant Honeysuckle, the goat
expert? Well, I never wish to see him again.  I order you to go and find
a new farm with him.  I forbid you to find it.  If you can manage to
drown him, to run over him with my car, or to get him eaten by the
goats, I will recommend you for the Military Cross.  If he reappears
here before my huts are finished, I will have you shot. Be off!"

A week later Lieutenant Honeysuckle broke his leg by falling off his
horse in a farmyard.  The Territorial from Marseilles was sent back to
his corps.  As for the goats, one fine day they stopped dying, and no
one ever found out why.



                             *CHAPTER XXI*


One morning, Aurelle, seeing an English Staff officer come into his
office in a gold-peaked hat with a red band, was surprised and delighted
to recognize Major Parker.

"Hullo, sir!  I _am_ glad to see you again! But you never told me about
that"—and he pointed to the signs of authority.

"Well," said the major, "I wrote and told you that Colonel Bramble had
been made a general.  He now commands our old brigade and I am his
brigade major. I have just been down to the Base to inspect our
reinforcements, and the general ordered me to pick you up on the way
back and bring you in to lunch.  He will send you back this evening.
Your colonel is quite agreeable.  We are camped for the moment next to
the village where the padre was killed; the general thought you would
like to see his grave."

Two hours later they drew near the front and Aurelle recognized the
familiar landmarks: the little English military village with a policeman
holding up his hand at every corner; the large market town, scarcely
bombarded, but having here and there a roof with its beams exposed; the
road, where one occasionally met a man in a flat steel helmet loaded
like a mule; the village, the notice boards, "This road is under
observation," and suddenly, a carefully camouflaged battery barking out
of a thicket.

But Major Parker, who had seen these things every day for three years,
discoursed on one of his favourite themes:

"The soldier, Aurelle, is always done in by the tradesman and the
politician. England will pay ten thousand a year to a lawyer or a
banker, but when she has splendid fellows like me who conquer empires
and keep them for her, she only gives them just enough to keep their
polo ponies.  And again——"

"It is just the same in France——" began Aurelle; but the car stopped
suddenly opposite the church of a nightmare village, and he recognized
H——.  "Poor old village, how it has changed!" he said.

The church, ashamed, now showed its profaned nave; the few houses still
standing were merely two triangles of stone sadly facing one another;
and the high building of the weaving factory, hit by a shell in the
third story, was bent over like a poplar in a storm.

"Will you follow me?" said the major. "We have had to put the H.Q. of
the brigade outside the village, which was becoming unhealthy.  Walk
twenty paces behind me; the sausage balloon is up and it’s no good
showing them the road."

Aurelle followed for a quarter of an hour through the bushes, and
suddenly found himself face to face with General Bramble who, standing
at the entrance to a dug-out, was watching a suspicious aeroplane.

"Ah, messiou!" he said.  "That’s good!"  And the whole of his rugged red
face lit up with a kindly smile.

"It will be like a lunch in the old days," he continued, after Aurelle
had congratulated him.  "I sent the Staff captain out with the
interpreter—for we have another interpreter now, messiou—I thought you
would not like to see him in your place. But he has not really replaced
you, messiou; and I telephoned to the Lennox to send the doctor to lunch
with us."

He showed them into the Mess and gave Major Parker a few details of what
had been happening.

"Nothing important; they have spoilt the first line a bit at E 17 A.  We
had a little strafe last night.  The division wanted a prisoner, so as
to identify the Boche reliefs—yes, yes, that was all right—the Lennox
went to fetch him.  I have seen the man, but I haven’t had their written
report yet."

"What, not since last night?" said Parker. "What else have they got to
do?"

"You see, messiou," said the general, "the good old times are over.
Parker no longer abuses red hats.  No doubt they are abusing him in that
little wood you see down there."

"It is true," said Parker, "that one must be on the Staff to realize the
importance of work done there.  The Staff is really a brain without
which no movement of the regiments is possible."

"You hear, messiou?" said the general. "It is no longer the same; it
will never be the same again.  The padre will not be there to talk to us
about Scotland and to abuse bishops.  And I have no longer got my
gramophone, messiou.  I left it to the regiment with all my records.
The life of the soldier is one of great hardship, messiou, but we had a
jolly little Mess with the Lennox, hadn’t we?"

The doctor appeared at the entrance to the tent.

"Come in, O’Grady, come in.  Late as usual; there is no creature so
wicked and so dense as you."

The lunch was very like those of the good old times—for there were
already good old times in this War, which was no longer in the flower of
its youth—the orderlies handed boiled potatoes and mutton with mint
sauce, and Aurelle had a friendly little discussion with the doctor.

"When do you think war will be finished, Aurelle?" said the doctor.

"When we win," cut in the general.

But the doctor meant the League of Nations: he did not believe in a
final war.

"It is a fairly consistent law of humanity," he said, "that men spend
about half their lives at war.  A Frenchman, called Lapouge, calculated
that from the year 1100 to the year 1500, England had been 207 years at
war, and 212 years from 1500 to 1900.  In France the corresponding
figures would be 192 and 181 years."

"That is very interesting," said the general.

"According to that same man Lapouge, nineteen million men are killed in
war every century.  Their blood would fill three million barrels of 180
litres each, and would feed a fountain of blood running 700 litres an
hour from the beginning of history."

"Ugh!" said the general.

"All that does not prove, doctor," said Aurelle, "that your fountain
will go on running.  For many centuries murder has been an institution,
and nevertheless courts of justice have been established."

"Murder," said the doctor, "never appears to have been an honoured
institution among primitive peoples.  Cain had no reason to care for the
justice of his country, if I mistake not.  Besides, law courts have not
suppressed murderers.  They punish them, which is not the same thing.  A
certain number of international conflicts might be settled by civil
tribunals, but there will always be wars of passion."

"Have you read ’The Great Illusion’?" said Aurelle.

"Yes," said the major, "it’s a misleading book.  It pretends to show
that war is useless, because it is not profitable.  We know that very
well, but who fights for profit?  England did not take part in this war
to conquer, but to defend her honour. As for believing that Democracies
would be pacific, that’s nonsense.  A nation worthy of the name is even
more susceptible than a monarch.  The Royal Era was the age of gold,
preceding the Iron Age of the people."

"There’s an argument just like the old days," said the general.  "Both
are right, both are wrong.  That’s capital!  Now, doctor, tell me the
story about your going on leave and I shall be perfectly happy."

After lunch, they all four went to see the padre’s grave.  It was in a
little cemetery surrounded by weeds; the ground broken up here and there
by recent shell-holes. The padre lay between two lieutenants of twenty.
Cornflowers and other wild plants had spread a living mantle over all
three graves.

"After the war," said General Bramble, "if I am still alive, I shall
have a stone carved with ’Here lies a soldier and a sportsman.’  That
will please him."

The other three remained silent, restraining their emotion with
difficulty.  Aurelle seemed to hear, in the murmuring summer air, the
undying strains of "Destiny Waltz" and saw the padre setting out once
more on horseback, his pockets bulging with hymn-books and cigarettes
for the men. The doctor meditated: "’Where two or three are gathered
together, there I will be in the midst of them.’  What a profound and
true saying!  And how the religion of the dead still lives."

"Come," said the general, "we must go, the Boche sausage is up in the
air, and we are four; it is too many.  They tolerate two, but we must
not abuse their courtesy. I am going on up to the trenches.  You,
Parker, will take Aurelle back, and if you want to go with them, doctor,
I will tell your colonel that I have given you leave for the afternoon."

The three friends passed slowly across the silent plains, which only a
few months before had been the formidable battlefield of the Somme.  As
far as the eye could see, there were low, undulating hillocks covered
with thick, coarse grass, groups of mutilated tree-trunks marking the
place of the famous wood, and millions of poppies made these dead fields
glow with a warm and coppery light.  A few tenacious rose-trees, with
lovely fading roses, had remained alive in this wilderness, beneath
which slept the dead.  Here and there posts, bearing painted notices,
like those on a station platform, recalled villages unknown yesterday,
but now ranking with those of Marathon or Kivoli: Contalmaison,
Martinpuich, Thiepval.

"I hope," said Aurelle, looking at the innumerable little crosses, here
grouped together as in cemeteries, there isolated, "that this ground
will be consecrated to the dead who won it, and that this country will
be kept as an immense rustic cemetery, where children may come to learn
the story of heroes."

"What an idea!" said the doctor.  "No doubt the graves will be
respected; but they will have good crops all round them in two years’
time.  The land is too rich to remain widowed; look at that superb lot
of cornflowers on those half-healed scars."

And truly, a little further on, some of the villages seemed, like
convalescents, to be tasting the joy of life once more. Shop windows
crowded with English goods in many-coloured packets brightened up the
ruined houses.  As they passed through a straggling village of Spanish
aspect the doctor resumed:

"Yes, this is a marvellous land.  Every nation in Europe has conquered
it in turn; it has defeated its conqueror every time."

"If we go a little out of the way," said Parker, "we could visit the
battlefield of Crécy; it would interest me.  I hope you are not annoyed
with us, Aurelle, for having beaten Philippe de Valois? Your military
history is too glorious for you to have any resentment for events which
took place so long ago."

"My oldest resentments do not last six hundred years," said Aurelle.
"Crécy was an honourably-contested match; we can shake hands over it."

The chauffeur was told to turn to the west, and they arrived on the site
of Crécy by the same lower road taken by Philippe’s army.

"The English," said Parker, "were drawn up on the hill facing us, their
right towards Crécy, their left at Vadicourt, that little village you
see down there. They were about thirty thousand; there were a hundred
thousand French.  The latter appeared about three o’clock in the
afternoon, and immediately there was a violent thunderstorm."

"I observe," said the doctor, "that the heavens thought it funny to
water an offensive even in those days."

Parker explained the disposition of the two armies, and the varying
fortunes of the battle.  Aurelle, who was not listening, admired the
woods, the quiet villages, the yellowing grass of the fields, and saw in
imagination swarms of men and horses riding up to the assault of this
peaceful hill.

"Finally," concluded the major, "when the King of France and his army
had left the field of battle, Edward invited the principal corps
commanders to dinner, and they all ate and drank with great rejoicings
because of the good luck which had befallen them."

"How very English, that invitation to dine with the King," said Aurelle.

"Then," continued Parker, "he ordered one Renaud de Ghehoben to take all
the knights and clerks who knew heraldry——"

"The units," said the doctor, "ought to send up this evening to His
Majesty’s H.Q. a statement of all barons with armorial bearings."

"And commanded them to count the dead, and to write down the names of
all the knights whom they could recognize."

"The adjutant-general will start a numbered list of lords who have been
killed, including their rank," said the doctor.

"Renaud found eleven princes, thirteen hundred knights and sixteen
thousand foot soldiers."

Heavy black clouds were showing up against the brilliant sunshine: a
storm was coming over the hill.  By the valley of Renaud’s clerks, they
climbed up on to the summit and Parker looked for the tower from which
Edward had watched the battle.

"I thought," he said, "that it had been made into a mill, but I don’t
see one on the horizon."

Aurelle, noticing a few old peasants, helped by children, cutting corn
in the next field, went up to them and asked them where the tower was.

"The tower?  There is no tower in these parts," one of them said, "nor
mill either."

"Perhaps we are wrong," said the major.  "Ask him if this is really
where the battle was."

"The battle?" replied the old man. "What battle?"

And the people of Crécy turned back to their work, binding into neat
sheaves the corn of this invincible land.



                                THE END





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