A YEAR had passed. The Marne and the Yser had gone into history. We knew that enormous preparations were in progress behind our lines. They are always known. The symptoms are perfectly visible. The artillery is massed, the various operations are pushed more vigorously, new precautions are taken.
Vague rumors are afloat. Every one wishes to appear informed, and the strangest forecasts, the most absurd reports are passed from mouth to mouth, originating no one knows where.
“We are going clear to the Rhine, this time!”
“What! do you think? As far as the Meuse, and already——”
“The cavalry is massed at the rear; and if the cavalry passes, the line is already smashed. Then, mon vieux, how far do you think we’ll go?”
The war was changing its aspect. Germany, checked at the Marne, seemed to have an unsuspected force. Her regiments were renewed continuously. They seemed to spring from the ground, an uncounted host, capable of breaking over any barrier. Unprepared France, in accepting the combat, profited by the period of “digging in,” to cast big guns and manufacture shells. A colossal effort galvanized her hope. People repeated the famous words of Joffre: “Je les grignote.”[F]
We were confident: Germany could not win. She would be beaten as soon as we could collect guns and ammunition in sufficient quantities. Some words of the generals came down to the ranks. Gallieni had said: “They are in the trenches—they are lost!”
We believed it, we were sure of it. The humblest cook, in his smoky abri, spattered with his sauces, his blackened face beaming with smiles, had no more doubt of it than the major-general in his automobile.
Many furloughs had been granted. Each man had been allowed to visit his family, and had spread assurance of success in return for the festivities his friends had prepared for him. No doubts found lodgment in the minds of the people. On tenter-hooks the country awaited victory. Trembling old mothers believed it, tearful wives put faith in it, fathers felt convinced of it. At last we would be avenged, we would punish the enemy’s infamous arrogance, we would chastise him, we would crush him. We were going to crunch him by an enormous pressure, overthrow his system of trenches, advance, break his line; and then, with one burst of valor, we would hurl him back whence he came—into his deep forests, as far as the Rhine; perhaps still farther, to his lair. Every one knew the good news, counted on it, awaited it with impatience.
People liked the bearing of the soldiers. All were delighted to see them so robust, so hardened; more alert than at the beginning, more viril, more manly. The warrior’s helmet graced his forehead like an aureole. The men were fêted and showered with tokens of affection. Long trains brought them home—so ardent, and young, and splendid; shouting their joy in the stations, passing through towns with the air of a victor. How the women admired them! They were treated (in advance) as liberators. Those sober people who still were apprehensive of the outcome, who reckoned up the future and calculated the chances, were looked upon with a reproachful eye. This time it was certain: we would pass!
The opening came the 20th of September. A furious storm of artillery saluted the dawn, and set the thunder rolling. It was a prodigious simoon. The sky cracked with the terrible, hot breath; the earth itself bubbled. A deluge of red-hot iron fell. It was more than a noise: it was a tempest, a gigantic roaring, the forge of Vulcan in full action; an entire sector of the front bursting into flame. What a fantastic tornado! All calibers of shells shrieked together. No single voice of cannon could be distinguished in the concert. They were blended in one roll, as if a god had sounded the charge on a gigantic drum. The avalanche of steel fell on the enemy’s breastworks, spattered over the intervening space, let loose billows of smoke, dust, and flames. The very earth seemed to cry out to heaven, as it was pounded to powder and scorched by the fire. Entire sections of trench walls leaped into the air; a giant plough turned over the tunnels. A heavy cloud formed, grew thicker, rolled over the battle-field. The passing hours augmented the uproar. No sooner did the climax appear to be reached than the tumult increased afresh.
Massed near the field of carnage, the bivouacked troops were in readiness. Each company had its rôle, and each was ready. Each knew at what hour to join the dance. They were going to pierce through, they would pass! Comrades exchanged encouragement and last promises. All hoped to survive, and pursue the routed foe in a sweeping victory.
Our regiment, like others, awaited the call. It had no active part in the festivity, but was present. This was for us a poignant grief. In our sector, not a sound. The cannon were as silent as if every living thing had become a mere spectator of the drama. As the roaring increased in volume from minute to minute, we listened. We divined the scene. We could follow it in the clouds, and in the sounds carried by the breeze. We were like curious, listening neighbors who hear the people next door quarrel and fight. The Germans opposite us remained silent also, and listened, like ourselves.
Battle of Champagne! It had not yet a name. It held all the hope of France, a single, united, colossal WILL. For five days France could only listen to the panting of an army in travail, and held her breath.
The 25th of September, at 9.15 in the morning, the first line left the trenches; bounded forward, hurled themselves on the enemy. Another line followed, and another, and another. Less than an hour later, everywhere, even well back at the rear, messages of victory came. The telephone passed on the joyful news, distributed it to the end of its lines. In our ranks, where we awaited our turn with arms at rest, we breathed with high-swelling hope. We defied the enemy, that day. We looked at his lines, marked his location. To-morrow, perhaps, we would be where he was to-day. We would command his crushed-in shelter, his hiding-places opened by the shells; we would be the victors, and he would be driven before us. Oh, yes, we were quite sure. Already, with pricked-up ears, we could perceive the advance. Our cannon pierced his lines. It roared elsewhere than was usual; already, opposite us, the German had turned.
And yet—no! The accursed race has the tricks of a cowardly beast. To the chivalrous courage which offers itself for an open test of prowess, the Boche opposes stealthy ambush, burrowing in the ground. For the noble élan of our men, for their impetuous passion, for their valor, the Teutonic sneak sets a snare: close to the ground, about a foot high or less, a fine copper-wire was concealed in the grass, and electrified. Our heroes were ensnared in that web. In vain their assaults were renewed. In vain they accomplished a hundred exploits. Close to the earth the traitorous wire caught their ankles, sent the electric shock through their legs, threw them down and burned them.
But we—we were still ignorant of all this, and we awaited our turn. In the falling night we saw the neighboring sky light up. The enemy’s fear was read in the number of his rockets. He was afraid of our sortie, of our onslaught and the outcome.
Ah! Those hours! Those days, those four days of superhuman effort! In what a fever we passed them! At any moment we could become participants, and yet we remained there, inert, champing our bits. We talked, that we might shake off our impatience; that we might hear words, though their import went unnoticed. We talked without knowing what we said, merely to hear ourselves say something. We waited for our cue: nothing came! Near us our comrades were fighting in a veritable furnace; they were living the apotheosis of supreme minutes, living the glory of combat, amidst an uproar of shells: in suffering of the flesh and in the beauty of sublime Adventure. We envied them. We mounted to the extreme edge of the embankments, to the parapets of the trenches, that we might see farther and follow more closely the movement of the drama; that we might breathe the odor of battle and grasp its splendor. We looked at the fire-reddened sky, where a hundred lightnings flashed and a hundred thunders rolled. We desired, with all our souls, to enter the strife, and at last force back the intrenched enemy—intrenched in our land, in our soil.
Since then many a battle has been fought. We have had Verdun, we have had the Somme, we have had the Aisne, we have had almost each day a unique page of history. Most certainly; but it was at this time that we learned our lesson. We learned that patience is the weapon par excellence in a war such as this; whereas, at that time we still conserved intact the old faith in French ardor. It was the first shock following the Marne, after the defense of the Yser. It was the first hope of breaking through. We were near it, so near we could almost touch it, but we did not attain it. We were ready for death itself, but the sacrifice was unavailing. The sacks loaded for the forward march, the filled cartridge-cases, weighed heavily and more heavily when we knew that the line remained where it had been, that the breach was not sufficient, that an insignificant wire had stopped our onslaught and protected the German.
Nevertheless, the results were worth the effort. We counted our prisoners by hundreds, we gathered from them much information. Yes; but the gain was as nothing, so great had been our hopes. We were bound to accept another hibernation, dig in the earth again, dig oftener and longer; look forward to a war of greater duration, more murderous; recommence the effort, accept not months, but years.
The war ceased to be a human struggle. The mass of material became appalling. It was no longer a shock of arms, but an industrial clash: the machine substituted for the valor of a man, the contrivance become demoniac. Cannon were made in enormous calibers. Old pieces were replaced by huge-throated monsters, and one guessed that the wily German, girt for supreme effort, was preparing something more, which would make the early part of the war seem like child’s play.
This is why the present war is impossible of narration. It is no longer a battle of a certain date. It is not, as in former times, a moment in history, the clash of two wills, the shock of two armed bodies of men. It is a period in a century. It involves, not two peoples, but the world. It is not a turning-point, but a transformation. It is almost a state of society: “C’est la guerre.”
Later, in an unforeseen epoch, in the year ——, it will be taught the children as two dates: the war began August 2, 1914; it ended ——. All the tragedy, all our cries, our furies, our agonies, our suffering and death—all this, without name, blurred and indistinct, will be contained between two numbers, and will mark two eons: that before the War, that after the War. We will have fought and we will have wept; our bodies will have been broken and our hearts will have bled, without our being able to say, “It happened as I have told it,” for we will not know just how it happened. We will be obliged to call to mind the first day when grenades were used; the day torpedoes came to light; the advent of the four-hundreds. Facts will be mixed in our troubled memories. We will no longer recall all that happened to us. To be more explicit, to create a truer picture, we will say:
“At the Marne, we used rifles.”
“In Champagne, we threw bombs.”
“At Verdun—such cannon!”
“On the Somme the shells flew so thick they met in mid-air.”
“And then—and then, America came!”