Part 14

How lonely my old house must be when the winter storms surge round it at midnight. How the great flakes must swirl round its ancient chimney, and fall softly down the black throat of the fireplace to the dark, ungarnished hearth. The goblin who polished the pewter plates in the light of the crumbling fire-brands has gone to live with his brother in a hollow tree on the hill. But when you come to Topsfield, the goblin himself, red flannel cap and all, will open the door to you as the house's most honored and welcome guest.

A _fusée éclairante_ has just run over the wood--the _bois de la mort_--the wood of the hundred thousand dead. And side by side with the dead are the living, the soldiers of the army of France, holding, through bitter cold and a ceaseless shower of iron and hell, the far-stretching lines. If there is anything I am proud of, it is of having been with the French army--the most devoted and heroic of the war.

H. SHEAHAN

_A Gallant Blessé_

I was stationed at one of our _postes de secours_ the other night during a terrible rainstorm. The wind does blow on top of these mountains when it begins! About bedtime, which is at 7.30 (we eat our dinner at 4.30--it is pitch dark then), a call came from one of our _postes_ three kilometres nearer the line. There was a captain wounded and they asked me to go for him. I cannot speak French well, but I made them understand. The _poste_ is at the foot of the mountain, hidden from the _Boches_ by the trees in the woods only. At night we cannot use lights, for the Germans would see us easily, and then there would be a dead American in short order. Of course, I told them I would go, but it would be dangerous for the _blessé_. I could jump out in case I should run into a ravine, but I could not save the man on the stretcher if anything happened. They understood, and, after about half an hour, we heard another knock on the cabin door, and they brought the captain in--four men, one on each corner of a stretcher. They put him on the floor, and in the lantern light of the room (made of rough timbers) one could see he was vitally stricken by the death color of his face and lips. He had his full senses. It was my duty then to take him down the opposite slope of the mountain to the hospital. I started my car and tried to find my way through the trees in the dark. The wind was almost strong enough to blow me off the seat, and the rain made my face ache. The only light I had was that of the incendiary bombs of the French and the Germans at the foot of the hill, about one and a half kilometres away. These bombs are so bright they illuminate the whole sky for miles around like a flash of lightning. I must admit my nerves were a little shaken, taking a dying man into my car under such conditions, almost supernatural. It did seem like the lights of the spirits departing mixed with the moaning wind and the blackness of the night, and the pounding of the hand-grenades in the front lines so near. They gave me another _blessé_ with the captain. This man had been shot through the mouth only, and was well enough to sit up in back and watch the captain. I could use my lights after I had passed down the side a short distance out of sight of the lines. We must run our motors in low speed or we use up our brakes in one trip. All the poor _capitaine_ could say during the descent was "_J'ai soif_," except once when he requested me to stop the car, as the road was too rough for him, and we had to rest. When we reached the hospital, I found a bullet had struck one shoulder and passed through his back and out the other shoulder. He also had a piece of shell in his side. A few hours before he had walked back from the trenches into the woods to see a position of the Germans; they saw him--and seldom does a man escape when seen at fairly close range. He was vitally wounded. I climbed up the mountain watching the fire-flashes in the sky, feeling pretty heavy-hearted and homesick, but with strengthened resolve to help these poor chaps all I possibly could.

The next day I had another trip from the same station on the mountain to the same hospital at five o'clock in the afternoon--then dark as midnight. The sisters told me the _capitaine_ was better; the ball had not severed the vertebra and there was hope for him. They told me also that the general had arrived and conferred upon him the Cross of the _Légion d'Honneur_. It was reassuring to hear that he was better and had distinguished himself so well, and I went back up the trail this night with a lighter heart. I had felt really guilty, for I did not have a thing in my car to give him the night before when he asked me to stop the car and said, "_J'ai soif_." Never did I want a spoonful of whiskey more and never have I regretted not having it more. I could not give him water--he had some fever; besides, though there are many streams of it running down the mountain, no one dares to touch it. Water is dangerous in war-time, and we have all been warned against it.

I was called the next morning for the same trip and when I reached the hospital at eight o'clock it was still raining--now for three days! I met Soeur Siegebert in the hall--carrying her beads, her prayer-book and a candle. She is one of the good nuns who always gives me hot soup or tea with rum in it when I come in cold, wet, and hungry--and many times I and the others have blessed her! My first question was: "_Comment ça va avec le capitaine ce matin?_" All she said and could say was "_Fini_." He had passed out a short time before I got there. He was only thirty years old, tall and handsome, and they say he led a whole battalion with the courage of five men.

A little later I stepped into the death chamber in a little house apart from the hospital. It was cold, wet, and smelled strongly of disinfectant, just as such places should, and in a dim, small room lighted by two candles, upon a snowy white altar made by the nuns, there he lay on a bier of the purest linen beautifully embroidered, whiter even than the pallor of his features and hands, and as I came near him the only color in the room was the brilliant touch of red and silver in his _Légion d'Honneur_ medal, which was pinned over his heart. His peaceful expression assured me he was happy at last, and made me realize that this is about the only happiness left for all these poor young chaps I see marching over these roads in companies for the trenches, where their only shelter is the sky and their only rest underground in dug-outs. When they go into the trenches they have a slim chance of coming out whole again, and they pass along the road in companies with jovial spirits, singing songs and laughing as though they were going to a picnic. I see them come back often, too; they are still smiling but nearly always in smaller numbers. What can they have in view when they see their numbers slowly but surely dwindling! I marvel at their superb courage!

LUKE C. DOYLE

_Perils of a Blizzard_

The other night, just as I was going to crawl in, three _blessés_ arrived from the trenches, another was down the road in a farmhouse waiting for the _médecin chef_; he was too badly wounded to go farther. They asked me to take the men to the hospital at Krût, which is back over the mountains twenty miles, and of course I said I would. I dressed again (I hated to because it was warm in the little log shack and it had begun to rain outside); I lit my lantern, and went out to the shelter where the cars were, got my tank filled with gas, and my lights ready to burn when I could use them. It was so black one could see nothing at all. We put two of the _blessés_ on stretchers and pushed them slowly into the back of the car; the other sat in front with me. We did this under the protection of the hill where the _poste de secours_ is located. When one goes fifty yards on the road beyond the station there is a valley, narrow but clear, which is in full view of the trenches, and it is necessary to go over this road going and coming. In the daytime one cannot be seen because the French have put up a row of evergreens along it which hides the road. I started and proceeded very carefully, keeping my lantern under a blanket, and we soon arrived at the house where the other _blessé_ was waiting for the doctor. It was a typical French farmhouse, little, old, and dirty inside, and white outside. I pushed in the door and stepped down into the flagstone kitchen. On the floor lay the _chasseur_ on a stretcher, his face pale under the lamplight from the table. The _médecin chef_ was bending over him injecting tetanus (lockjaw) anti-toxin into his side, and with each punch of the needle the poor fellow, already suffering from terrible wounds, would squirm but not utter a word. The soldiers stood around the tiny room, their heads almost touching the brown rafters above. We took the man out to my car on the stretcher, carrying the light under the coat of one of the stretcher-bearers. If the Germans see a light moving anywhere in the French territory, they will fire on it if they think it near enough. I started up the mountain with my load of wounded. On either side of the road the French guns at certain places pounded out their greetings to the _Boches_, and the concussion would shake the road so that I could feel it in my car. I could light my lights after about a mile, so I proceeded slowly up the mountain in low speed. The heat from my motor kept the _blessés_ and myself warm. About halfway up, we ran into the clouds and it became so foggy one could scarcely see; farther up it became colder and began to snow. I had no chains on my car (none to be had). They need so many things here, if they only had the money to buy them. I thought of the time you and I got stuck at Princeton, and it worried me to be without chains, especially since I had three helpless men inside and one out. I kept climbing up and the higher I went the more it snowed and the harder it blew. Near the top it became veritably blinding--snow, sleet, and wind--a typical northeasterly American blizzard. The little car ploughed on bravely; it stuck only once on a sharp turn, and by backing it I was able to make it by rushing it. I could not see the road, the sleet was blowing into my face so and the snow was so thick. At last I reached the summit and the wind was so strong there it actually lifted my car a little at one time. On one side of the road was a high embankment and on the other a ravine sloping down at least one thousand feet. I was scared to death, for without chains we were liable to skid and plunge down this depth. The snow had been falling all day, and it had drifted in places over a yard deep. Twice I took a level stretch to be the road, but discovered my mistake in time to back up; the third time was more serious; I plunged ahead through a drift which I thought was the road, and finally I stuck and could move neither way. I could not leave these men there all night wounded, and the blizzard did not stop, so my only means was to find help. I walked back to what I thought was the road and kept on toward a slight, glimmering light I could see in the right direction. It was an enclosure for mules which haul ammunition over the mountains, and I felt safe again, for I knew there were a lot of Territorial soldiers with them. I hauled them out of bed; it was then 10.30. They came with me and pushed me back on the road, also pushed me along--ten of them--until they got me on the descent, and from there on the weight of my car carried me down through the drifts. I arrived at the hospital at 12.30 and was the happiest man you have ever seen to get those poor fellows there safely.

I was sent back to Mittlach the next day to get four more wounded. They were what are called _assis_, not _couchés_, fortunately, because the snow on top of Trekopf had been falling and drifting all day and night. When I got to the top of the mountain and started down, the roads had been broken and beaten down by munition wagons and were like a sheet of ice. I started down without chains, and with all my brakes on the car began to slide slowly down the road. It slid toward the edge of the ravine and the two front wheels went over; it stopped, I got it back on the road, and turned the radiator into the bank on the other side and tried tying rags on the rear wheels to keep the car from going down, when a big wagon with four horses came down the hill behind me. It was so slippery that the horses started to slide down on their haunches, and, with brakes on, the driver could not stop them. The horses came on faster and they slid into the rear of my car, pushed it along for about six feet, and then nothing could stop it. It started down the road. I yelled to the wounded, "_Vous, jetez vous._" They understood and piled out just in time. The car ran across the road and plunged down into the ravine. There was a lot of snow on the side of the ravine, and it had piled up so that it stopped the car part way down, and it was not injured very much. It took nine men and as many mules to pull it out. Now that the snow has come, I think our service to Mittlach will have to be abandoned.

L. C. D.

At Tomansplatz the other day an officer and I started for ----, one of our _postes_. We took a short cut over a high hill from which one could look easily down on ----, where all the fighting had been going on. There is a path over this hill which is hidden by trees, and on the top is a long _boyau_ to pass through so as to keep out of sight of the Germans in clear weather. When we reached the top, we stepped out of the path to get a view of the valley, and it was wonderful looking down on the French and German trenches, and to see the hill all shot to pieces and the trees broken to stubs--living scars of the fighting that had gone on. We did not get by unseen, for the Germans are always on the job. They have observation posts in the trees, hard to be seen, but easy to see from. There was a lot of firing going on, and we could see the French shells landing in the German lines. I had a premonition that something was going to happen and stepped behind a tree. I heard particularly one big gun fire, and wondered if by any chance it was meant for us. It took only three or four seconds to confirm my suspicion, for the shriek of a shell came our way. As they often pass high over our heads and we are familiar with the sound, I was still in doubt, when it burst not fifty yards away. We did not wait to investigate further, but jumped for the _boyau_ when another shriek was heard, and we were just in time, for the shell burst not far behind us. We could tell when they were firing at us, for we could hear the gun fire,--it sounded like a 150 mm., which is about 6-inch bore,--then came the shriek, and then the bursting. It certainly is a strange, unwelcome sound when you know you are the target. We ran down the _boyau_ toward the back of the hill for all we were worth, and they followed us, but we did not stop to look or listen, we almost rolled down the other side of the hill, but it was to safety, thank Heaven. The only thing that happened to me was a scratch on the back of my hand. Never again! The sensation of shells coming at one is novel but nauseating, and I keep away from the lines from now on.

I must tell you that we have received a citation, and Colonel Hill's brother the _Croix de Guerre_ for the work we did during the attack of October 15 to 19. Two more citations and we receive, each one, the _Croix de Guerre_.

L. C. D.

_Poignant Impressions_

I had a wild ride last night in the rain. A German shell landed in a town only two kilometres from the front and killed four civilians and wounded one woman. I had to go and get her. For two kilometres the road runs over a slight rise in the plain, in full view of the Germans. It is all screened off with brush cut and stuck up along the side toward the lines, but here and there the brush was blown down by the terrific wind which came with the storm. We could not use lights, but we did not need them, for, though it was raining like fury, the Germans were sending up illuminating bombs which lighted up the country for miles around. They are the most fascinating yet weird things you have ever witnessed. This ball of fire rises from the trenches to a height of one hundred feet, and then floats along slowly through the air for a quarter of a mile, illuminating everything around. At one time one came directly for us, and we stopped the car and watched it. At the roadside stood a huge crucifix, and, as this ball of fire approached, it silhouetted the cross, and all we could see was the beautiful shadow of the figure on the cross rising from the earth against the weird glow of white fire. It seemed like the sacrifice of Calvary and the promise of success for poor France.

We did not dare to use our low speed for fear the _Boches_ would hear us, so we tore over this road on high, rushing past the bare spots, afraid of being seen. The illuminating bombs are used for this purpose only; the one which came toward us went out before it reached us, for which we were grateful. We got the woman. She had to have her arm amputated.

_December 27_

We have had very strenuous times, as a big attack has just taken place and the wounded have come in so fast and so badly cut up they could not give them the care they would like to, as everything is so crowded. The Germans lost a lot of trenches, and almost two thousand of them were taken prisoners. They have been shelling the French lines and towns constantly; since the 22d, our cars have been more or less under fire. We moved our quarters about six kilometres nearer the line and bring the wounded in to the hospital three times a day. The Germans shelled this place,--why we do not know, for there is nothing military here but the hospital, and why should people of any intelligence and feeling wish to shell a hospital?

One of our men was killed on Christmas Day and we are terribly broken up over it. He was going from this hospital to the _poste_ we go to daily over a road up the mountain. At four o'clock Christmas morning one of our boys started up this road, which goes up and up with no level place on it. He passed the middle of the journey when he thought he noticed a wagon turned over about forty feet down in the ravine. He went to a point where he could stop his car, took his lantern, and walked back. He found one of our Fords so demolished it could not be distinguished. The top of the car was up in a tree and so were the extra tires; there was nothing on the ground but a chassis. He saw no one around, but on going down a little farther, he saw a bundle of blankets which we always carry for the wounded, and, on walking up to it, he found one of our fellows, Dick Hall. He was lying on his side with his arms fixed as if driving and in a sitting position, cold and rigid. He had been dead a couple of hours. Walter, who found him, went back up the road for assistance, and, while there, Hall's brother came along in his car and asked what the matter was and offered his assistance. Walter told him his brakes were not working and he was fixing them, so Hall, knowing nothing of his brother, passed on up the mountain, got his load of wounded, and took them to the hospital.

_In the Hospital_

_January 1, 1916_

This brings the war home to us! This and the suffering and torments of the wounded make me sick at heart. I have seen them suffer particularly since this last attack, as I am a _blessé_ myself--and am in a French hospital. It is only a slight arm wound; the bone is cracked a little, but not broken. I am here to have the piece of shell drawn out and am assisting these poor wounded all I can. I was sent to the _poste_ we have nearest the lines, on the other side of the mountain and hidden in the woods. The trenches begin at this _poste_. The _poste_ itself is an _abri_, a bomb-proof dug-out in the ground. The roof and supports are made of timbers a foot or more thick, over these are placed two feet of heavy rock and again two feet of earth. When I got there the Germans began bombarding, and fired shells into these woods and into this _poste_ for almost five hours. I never want to see another such bombardment; it was frightful. I saw shells land among horses, smash big trees in half within ten and twenty yards. I saw three men hit; one had his face shot away. The _poste_ became so full of wounded we had to stand near the doorway, which is partly protected by a bomb-proof door. It was not exactly safe inside, for the shells, if big enough, when they hit such an _abri_ often loosen the supports, and the roof, weighing tons, falls in and buries people alive. A man in the same room with me in the hospital here was in an _abri_ not far from where we were when it was struck; the roof fell and killed three men who were with him and he was buried for an hour. A shell struck a tree not eight feet off from where we were standing and smashed it in half; it fell and almost killed one of two _brancardiers_ (stretcher-bearers) who were carrying a dead man past the door. A piece of the _éclat_ hit the other _brancardier_ in the head and killed him. The man standing beside me had his hand shot off, and I got hit in the elbow. Three pieces went through my coat, but only one went into the arm. If I had not been standing against the door I might have fared worse. I was carried with two other wounded by one of our fellows up the steep mountain road to our second _poste_. They were bombarding that road as well as the _poste_. We could see the sky redden from the flash of the guns below and we could hear the shells shriek as they came toward us, and the _éclat_ not too far away. Twice we started the Ford on the way up; it stalled and took five precious minutes to get it going again. The force of one explosion knocked the fellow with me over when he walked ahead to try and make out the road. We stuck in the road twice, not daring to pass a wagon conveying munitions. We could not make the hill, it was so steep, and we had to seek men to push us. It was pitch-black and we could not use our lights. This with two gravely wounded men on our hands rather took the nerve out of us. We finally got back to headquarters and found them bombarding there, one shell having struck not far from the hospital.

_January 20_

I am still in the hospital, but am glad to say my arm is almost quite well again. It does take time. The bombardment by the Germans of all our former _postes_ has become pretty nerve-racking. The house we took for the attack has been hit twice. We had moved out only the day before. They struck a schoolhouse close by and killed a nun and wounded three harmless children. Our cars have been hit by scraps of shell, but fortunately when none of the men were in them.

The suffering of the men in this hospital and the cries in the night make it an inferno. Though I am glad I can help a little, I must say it is on my nerves.