CHAPTER IV
THE FOREIGN LEGION'S BARRACKS
In the company's storeroom : Mr. Smith--American, légionnaire, philosopher : The Legion's neatness : The favourite substantive of the Foreign Legion : What the commander of the Old Guard said at Waterloo : Old and young légionnaires : The canteen : Madame la Cantinière : The regimental feast : Strange men and strange things : The skull : The prisoners' march : The wealth of Monsieur Rassedin, légionnaire : "Rehabilitation" : The Koran chapter of the Stallions
The eleventh company's storeroom was in a state of siege. We besieged the place, pushing and being pushed, hunting for standing room, but everywhere standing in somebody's way. The "non-coms" had very soon exhausted their vocabulary of strong language and could only express their feelings in fervent prayers that fifteen thousand devils might fly away with those thrice confounded recruits--ces malheureux bleus. A corporal, two sergeants, a sergeant-major and half a dozen légionnaires detached for storeroom work continually fell over each other in their haste to get done at last with the trying on of uniforms and with the issue of the kit. Countless jackets and pants were tried on; they put numerous "képis" upon our sinful heads, and again and again they anathematised our awkwardness in priceless adjectives. In big heaps the property of our future Legion life was dealt out to us; red pants and fatigue uniforms, blue jackets and overcoats, sashes, knapsacks, field-flasks, leather straps and belts, a soldier's kit in a bewildering jumble.
"Ready!" said the sergeant-major at last with a grin of relief. "And that's something to be thankful for. Here, Corporal Wassermann, take them away. Voilà! Off with your mess of recruits. Try and make légionnaires out of the beggars. Yes, you'll find it a big contract. I wish you joy, Corporal Wassermann."
"En avant, marche!" commanded the corporal. Once more the non-commissioned officers of the storeroom told us exactly what they thought of us and where they wished us to go. Their remarks were extremely pointed and expressive of their disgust.
We mounted three flights of stairs and the passing légionnaires of the company stared at us in curiosity.
Through a long corridor we marched, until the corporal kicked a door open and led us into a big room, our future quarters. We looked about our new home. Twenty beds were in the room, ten on one side, ten on the other, perfectly aligned. In the middle of the room stood two big wooden tables and long benches, scoured gleaming white. Everything in the place was scrupulously neat and clean. A rack in the corner held our rifles. Suspended from the ceiling, over the tables, there was a cupboard--the "pantry" of our quarters. It struck me as very practical. Knives and forks, the men's tin plates and tin cups, our bread rations were kept there. Half a dozen légionnaires were sitting on bunks and benches, cleaning their rifles and polishing their leather belts--our comrades.
Corporal Wassermann, lying in his bunk puffing a cigarette, took a good long look at us. He was little more than a boy.
"Eh bien," he said, "I am your corporal. You will have to learn French as quickly as possible. That's very important. Keep your ears open and listen to everything that's said. That is the right way to go about it. We shall begin drilling to-morrow. To-day you will have to arrange your bunks and things. I shall arrange your bunks in such a fashion that each of you shall be placed between two old légionnaires. You've only got to watch how they fix their things and do the same. It is all very simple. When you have finished arranging your stuff, you can do what you please."
Then he assigned a bunk to each of us and went off whistling. To the canteen, of course.
* * * * *
"Hallo!" said Smith. He had just come in. "That's all right. So you've not only been sent to the eleventh, but to my room as well. And that's all right. That's my bunk over there at the window. Take the one next. It's been given to a recruit already, you say? Oh, kick him out, kick him out. What do you suppose the corporal cares where you bunk. I'll fix it with him. And that's all right. I'm going to call you Dutchy. Now don't object, because I'm going to call you Dutchy anyhow, see?"
He was evidently pleased. So was I. From the start I had taken a liking to this man with the sharply cut features and the curious air of infinite knowledge. The pasteboard card on his bed said:
"Jonathan Smith, No 10247, soldat 1ère[1] classe."
[1] The Foreign Legion and the French army in general make a distinction between first-class privates and second-class privates. The first-class private has the grade of a lance-corporal.
He was the company's bugler, and had nine years' service in the Foreign Legion to his credit. Fever and privation and vice had engraved hard lines in his face, and when he rolled his cigarettes in French fashion, his hands trembled just a little. His hair was quite grey. He had fought against Chinese pirates in French Indo-China, he had campaigned in Madagascar and won the French medal for bravery on colonial service. During this campaign he had been shot in the shoulder and had had a severe attack of jungle fever. There was no garrison in Algeria, be it on the Morocco frontier, be it on the Sahara line, where he had not been stationed once at least. He was a perfect encyclopædia of all things connected with the Legion. He could swear fluently in English, German, French, and Arabian, and had even acquired a pretty fair knowledge of Chinese expressions of disgust. He was friend and brother to several Arabs with doubtful characters, he could recite whole chapters of the Koran by heart, and knew a great deal about Morocco. Which will be seen later on.
He was in fact a man well worth knowing.
From the very beginning there was a perfect understanding between us. He volunteered the information that he was a native of California and had "seen a few things in his life." I answered with the bare statement that I was a German, and had lived in the United States for some years. Both remarks were the basis for a tacit agreement to keep within the limits of strict impersonality.
He lay on his bunk, and I tried to get some order in my newly issued belongings.
"Your shoulders have been drilled into shape somewhere?" said Smith.
"They were."
"States?"
"No, Germany."
"Oh, I see. Thought you might have been in the U.S. army. Wish I had stuck to it."
"Have you tried the Legion's tobacco yet?" he continued.
We rolled ourselves cigarettes from strong, black Algerian tobacco, and Smith stretched himself comfortably on his bunk with his knees drawn up, his cap pulled down over his eyes. Smoking contentedly, the old soldier preached me the Legion's wisdom:
"There's no money here--the pay is not worth speaking of, I mean. There's a lot of work. It's a hard life all round. That's the Foreign Legion. There's no earthly reason why any man should be fool enough to serve in this outfit, unless he's specially fond of being underfed and overworked. When I come to think of it--I don't know what the dickens made me stay nine years! Because there's something doing once in a while, I suppose. Well, I'll stick it out for the pension now. Anyway, you've joined the Legion--more fool you--you're here and you can make up your mind that you are here to stay. And you must look at things in the right way. Legion life can be stood right enough, if you don't let yourself be worried by anything at all, if you're as ice-cold as Chicago in January, and if you're lucky enough to see something doing. Whether we march against the Arabs or Chinese (there's a battalion of us in Indo-China, you know) or to 'Maroc' at last, that's all the same, but it's good to be on the move in the Legion. Then a légionnaire's life ain't half bad. Don't ever forget, though, to have your feelings frozen into an iceblock. Don't let anything bother you. No use getting mad about things here. Just say to yourself: 'C'est la Légion.' When you're dead played out, and you think you can't stand it any longer; when the fever's got you by the neck; when you're sitting and fuming in the 'cellule' (that's the prison, Dutchy), or when some sergeant's giving you hell--grin, sonny, and say to yourself: 'C'est la Légion!' That's the Legion. Do your work and don't worry. If any of the fellows get fresh, hit quick and hit hard--c'est la Légion. And don't forget that the main thing in this Foreign Legion business is neatness and cleanliness. You want to have your things in order, you want to be neat. So!"
He rummaged in the bundle of uniform things on my bed, pulling out one by one jackets, pants, shirts, &c., and folding them with astonishing quickness. I watched him in wonder. This old soldier with his big rough hands had fingers as clever as any chambermaid's. Piece after piece he folded rapidly, smoothing every crease with almost ridiculous care. Each of the folded pieces he measured, giving each the same length, from the tips of his fingers to his elbow. Finally he erected with these bundles, upon the shelf at the wall over my bed, an ingenious structure of uniforms, the "paquetage" of the Legion. The légionnaire has no clothes-chest like the American regular. To get over this difficulty he invented his "paquetage," which is a work of art, solving the military problem of how to stow away several uniforms in a compact space without crumpling them.
With half-shut eyes the bugler stood in front of my bunk and regarded his handiwork.
"And that's all right," he said. "That's a 'paquetage,' how it should be. It's 'fantasie,' pure 'fantasie,' Dutchy dear. Making 'fantasie'[2] it is called in the Legion, if one tries to be always 'très chic' and 'parfaitement propre,' to be a swell. Yes, that's the Legion. We are lazy by preference, but we're always neat. Always!"
[2] This curious expression of the Foreign Legion is, of course, an imitation of the Moorish "fantasia."
The "paquetage" was not the only miracle. I was very much impressed by the way every bit of available space was put to the utmost use. A légionnaire keeps his linen in his haversack. For his letters, his books, for the few other articles of private property he possesses, he finds room in his knapsack; his brushes and his polishing-rags are carefully stored away in a little sack which hangs on the wall. Even the most trivial of his belongings has its appointed place. A légionnaire keeps his kit in such perfect order that he can find everything in the dark.
While I was making my bed, the bugler looked on for a while, grinning all the time. Finally he couldn't stand it any longer. He pulled the blankets and the sheets I had spread out away again and started showing me how to make a bed "à la Légion." Bed-making was another of the Legion's tricks. In a few seconds Smith had arranged the bed-clothes in wonderful accuracy, blankets drawn tight as a drum, pillows placed in mathematical exactness.
"Merde!" he said, "that's how we légionnaires fix our bunks. It's easy enough."
"Merde?" I asked, "what does 'merde' mean, anyway?"
It was a French word unknown to me. Smith used it continually, underlining his remarks with it, so to speak. He seemed to like it. He pronounced it with much care, lovingly. Naturally I thought that it must be some especially forceful invective, the more so as the sergeant-major in the storeroom (who certainly had not been in good humour) had said "merde" about five hundred times in ten minutes. And the other légionnaires in the room liked it apparently no less. The "merdes" were always flying about....
"Well, what is this 'merde'?"
Smith nearly had a fit.
"Merde?" he yelled, laughing as if he had suddenly gone crazy, "what 'merde' means? Why, you owl, 'merde' is ----."
He used a word which certainly does not exist in the vocabulary of polite society, an old Anglo-Saxon substantive, describing a most natural function and expressing huge disgust when used as an invective.
This little word is the favourite substantive of the Foreign Legion. It is _the_ substantive of the Legion! The English Tommy rejoices in his time-honoured adjective "bloody," the American revels in his precious "damned," the Mexican cavalryman enjoys his malignant hissing "caracho," and the légionnaire is distinctly unhappy without his well-beloved "merde." It's the most used word in the Foreign Legion. It has suffered curious derivations: Merdant, merdable.... It has a happy home in all French regiments--it is part and parcel of the French army's soldier-talk. The Legion worships it. Out of it the légionnaire has even fabricated a verb. When an officer gives him a "dressing down," the légionnaire says simply and devoutly:
"Il m'enmerde!"
The French army's primitive substantive of disgust is very ancient. It is time-honoured, it is classical.
At Waterloo the commander of Napoleon's Old Guard is said to have replied to the challenge to surrender, pompously: "The Old Guard dies, but it does not surrender!" In the French army, however, it is an old tradition that he simply yelled:
"Merde!"
* * * * *
Invectives of all descriptions were used with much vigour in our quarters just now. The old légionnaires took a delight in kicking the clumsy recruits about. In drastic terms they told them exactly what they thought of them, of their past, of their families, of their future. They felt very sorry (so they said) for the poor old eleventh company having been buncoed into taking such an awful pack of useless recruits. Many were the fools they had seen in the Legion, but never such idiots as we were. Pretty fellows, those recruits! A nice assortment of pigs! Fine times they (the poor old légionnaires) would have, living in the same quarters with these "bleus."
"Why--there's one of 'em sitting on my bed. What's this bow-legged monkey doing on my bunk? Get off! Get off quick, son of a jackal! Do you suppose that my bunk's a manoeuvring-ground for dirty recruits?"
The old légionnaires knew their business, however. Abuse alone was not good enough. They wanted to see practical results. So they explained to the "bleus" that recruits, and especially such recruits as now present, could never manage to build a "paquetage" without help. That was a foregone conclusion. Said one of them:
"Can't you see that? If such a thing as intelligence had a place in your empty heads, you would have seen long ago that you needed help. Who's going to help you? We are. We old légionnaires will help you--we who know everything and can fix anything. But we're thirsty, you see. Tant de soif! Such a thirst. I put it to you: Is it right that recruits, recruits, mind you, who have just sold their clothes and got a lot of money in their pockets, should look on and say nothing, while their betters are dying of thirst. Is it right, eh?"
There the others joined in: "Allons donc pour un litre--let's drink a litre in the canteen."
The arguments of the old fellows met with enormous success. At frequent intervals old and young légionnaires left the quarters to pay a visit to the canteen and render homage to the immortal "litre" of the Foreign Legion. The whole performance was an old custom. Old légionnaires always rejoice when new recruits arrive--anticipating many pleasant walks to the canteen....
One of the recruits, a Swiss, on returning from the canteen found that the greater part of the kit on his bed had disappeared. Almost everything was gone. A complete uniform, a fatigue suit, an overcoat and several other things were missing. The Swiss, scared to death, asked every man in the room if he had seen his things. But his kit had vanished.
The old légionnaires gathered about his bunk. Very likely he had lost part of his outfit while coming up the stairs, they said. They told him that one must look after one's kit in the Legion. If he could not find the missing uniforms, he would be certain to be sent to prison at the very least. He might even be punished with deportation into the penal battalion. Losing part of the uniform was the very worst crime known in the Legion.
The Swiss ran up and down the stairs hunting for his lost uniforms, but naturally found nothing.
Again the old légionnaires talked to him. They played their part very well.
"You're a poor devil," they said. "We're sorry for you. We'll try and help you. It's a very difficult case, but we might be able to do something. The non-commissioned officer of the third company's storeroom is a pretty decent fellow. He'll do something for an old légionnaire. We'll try him. There's just the chance that he will give us the stuff you have lost from his stock of uniforms--for a little money. He's fond of making something on the quiet. Five francs would do, and what are measly five francs anyway, if they are the means of saving you from prison?"
The poor devil was glad enough to get off with paying five francs. It was just what he had got for his clothes.
... Very soon the old soldiers came back. That good fellow of a sergeant had given them everything needed! Faultless new uniforms! And the Swiss recruit thanked the old thieves profusely.
Personally I was angry at the shabby trick played on the poor devil. I had known from the very outset that it was only a trick. The rascals had stolen the recruit's uniforms, and had then sold him back his own things! It certainly was no business of mine, and I did not interfere. In a way the comic side of the thing appealed to my sense of humour, but it was a nasty trick all the same. While I was wondering whether I should tell that fool of a Swiss how he had been done, one of the old légionnaires happened to sit down on my bunk.
"Get off my bed!" I said.
Blank astonishment was written on the man's face.
"What d----d cheek for a raw recruit. You impertinent ..."
"My bed's my bed. Get off. Sit on your own bed. Just now you raised a row because one of us was sitting on yours. Get away from here and be quick about it."
The old légionnaire rose slowly.
"Viens là bas!" he yelled. "Come down below to the yard with me. I'll teach you that a good-for-nothing recruit should respect an old soldier. Come down!"
Together we descended the stairs, a few other légionnaires following. The bugler was amongst them.
"Give him hell," he said. "Look out for his feet!"
I was very pleased with myself. It was bad enough to be in the Legion, but one could at least play the man....
At the back entrance of the company's quarters, in a small alley-way, we found a quiet spot to settle our little difference. He kicked furiously in French fashion, and I barely managed to escape. Then we closed in and in a second were rolling over and over on the gravel-covered ground. Now one had the upper hand, now the other. My antagonist's strength surpassed mine by far. I could do but very little in his iron grip. I began to wonder how many of my ribs would survive the fray. But all at once I got the upper hand. Again and again he tried to get a grip of my throat, but I caught his hand every time. We rolled over and over. My strength was fast sinking. At the last moment almost, I noticed a big stone on the ground quite near his head. I wrested my hand free. Seizing my antagonist by the hair, I pounded his head against the stone as hard as I could. Once--twice--four times.... His grip relaxed....
"Assez!" he yelled, "enough."
"Très bien," the onlooking old légionnaires said, "very good."
The bugler was disgusted. (So was I.) "Now that's the Legion all over. I wonder why the people here can't box like Christians instead of rolling about like pigs. You've licked him, though. And that's all right."
The man I had "fought" with rose with some difficulty and walked up to me. We shook hands....
"You were in the right when you ordered me off your bed," he said. "Parbleu, that was a good idea with the stone. Eh, you'll be a good légionnaire very soon. We men of the Legion quarrel often, but at heart we're always comrades. C'est la Légion! I propose we return to our quarters again...."
And in the room we brushed the dust from each other's uniforms, like old friends....
* * * * *
"You're tired, I guess," said the bugler with a grin. "Let's go and have a litre."
I had no objection.
"I am paying for this," he declared, as we crossed the drill-ground.
The regimental canteen was in a small building in a corner of the barrack square. We opened the door and--I at least must have looked very much surprised. There was an awful noise in the little room. A great many soldiers were talking and laughing and singing and yelling in many languages; in German, French, English, Italian and Spanish--there was the jingle of many bottles and glasses. As we entered a German was singing:
Trinken wir noch ein Tröpfchen Aus dem kleinen Henkeltöpfchen, Oh, Suss ... a ... na!
In sharp marching rhythm a Frenchman sang the refrain of one of the Legion's songs:
Le sac, ma foi, toujours au dos ...
The canteen was crowded. Hundreds of légionnaires in white fatigue uniforms or in blue jackets sat on the long benches, drinking, laughing. On the wooden tables bottles stood in long rows and deep red wine sparkled in the glasses.
"There's no room here," I said.
Smith grinned in answer: "Room? Nom d'un pétard, what do we want room for? The litre is the main thing, sonny!"
Pushing through the crowd he reached the bar and held up a forefinger with a serious face. This seemed to be a well-known signal to the young woman behind the bar. Without saying a word she took three copper pieces from the bugler, giving him in exchange a full bottle of wine and two glasses. "Madame la Cantinière" could not be over twenty years old. Like a queen seated on her throne she held sway behind her bar and ruled the crowd of noisy, yelling légionnaires in quiet authority, imposing and comical at the same time.
Madame la Cantinière was the sutler of the Foreign Legion. Old tradition demands that a woman should keep the Legion's canteen. "Madame la Cantinière de la Légion" usually is married, but she is the official head of the canteen and not her husband. The business belongs to her. On the march and in the field she wears the blue sutler's uniform and follows the regiment with her little sutler's waggon.
On a bench in the corner Smith found seats for us, and had two big glasses filled (the Legion does not waste time drinking out of small wineglasses!)--had the glasses filled before we sat down.
"Here's luck," he said. "There's no such thing as luck in this place, but one keeps on wishing for it just the same. Here's luck, Dutchy!"
He emptied his glass at a gulp, wiping his soft fair moustache in great satisfaction. _And_ he refilled his glass at once.
"The wine's good. And that's all right. Sonny, there are miles and miles of vineyards round this here Sidi-bel-Abbès. The hilly ground near the Thessala mountains is a single large vineyard. There are times in Algeria when they let the wine run on the street. It's so plentiful and cheap that it isn't worth the casks. There would be no Legion, I tell you, if it wasn't for the cheap wine!"
With wondering eyes I surveyed the men in the canteen and the canteen itself. The smoke of many hundreds of cigarettes filled the place with a heavy bluish vapour. The noise was indescribable. One had to yell to be understood by one's neighbour, a quietly spoken word would have been lost in the turmoil. Everybody was yelling and everybody seemed to be in high glee. The légionnaires were having what they considered a good time. They jumped on the tables, kicking and dancing, jingled their glasses, threw empty bottles about and made fun of everybody and everything. Every minute the uproar increased. These hard-faced, hard-eyed men were like children at some forbidden game, trying to get as much fun as possible while the teacher was away.
Suddenly a man with a wonderfully clear and strong voice began singing a love-song. Noise and tumult ceased at once. I listened in amazement. A légionnaire sang for his comrades, in a beautiful tenor voice, in a voice reminding me of great singers I had heard long ago. A poor devil of a légionnaire possessed a voice many a singer would have envied. He sang a French song, every verse closing pitifully:
L'amour m'a rendu fou....
The song of a lover who had loved and lost, a song of love and ladies, of love's delights and love's misery, sung in the canteen of the Foreign Legion.
With burning eyes I looked at the listening throng of men in red and blue until I saw nothing but their shadowy outlines like a far-away _fata Morgana_--I was lost in a dream of memories.
Absolute quiet reigned. The song held these men of rough life and rougher manners spellbound; the glorious mellow voice, now clear as a trumpet, now low and sweet as a woman's caress, must have appealed to every heart. The song was at an end:
L'amour m'a rendu fou....
For a moment, for a few seconds, all remained hushed. And then one would think that these men were ashamed of having been so soft-hearted. A légionnaire jumped on a table and yelled:
"Silence.... No more fool songs for us! Vive le litre!"
"Le litre!" ... a hundred men roared. The shouting and the uproar and the noise commenced anew. Blacky, the negro, had come in and was soon dancing the dance of his race. He was a master of the turnings and twistings of the cake-walk. There were universal yells of appreciation as he bent backwards, high-stepping grotesquely. Blacky was much applauded and seemed to be a very happy nigger. Madame la Cantinière did a roaring trade. The copper pieces were continually jingling on the tin-covered surface of the bar. La Cantinière was a very busy woman this evening, passing many hundreds of wine bottles to her thirsty clientèle of légionnaires. Glasses were broken, pieces of glass lay everywhere on the tables and on the floor, and here and there little red pools of wine had formed. The fun grew fast and furious and the noise almost unbearable.
My friend the bugler had emptied glass after glass and was in high good humour.
"Why, it is the regiment's holiday!" he laughed.
The "fifth day" it was--pay-day. The Legion's humour called pay-day the regimental holiday. This humour was somewhat grim in view of the fact that pay in the Legion meant but five centimes a day, twenty-five centimes for the pay-roll period of five days. Twenty-five centimes are almost exactly five cents in American, or twopence-halfpenny in English money.
So the Legion's "holiday" was at the bottom of all the noise and fun in the canteen! These men in the Legion measured the passing of time by their miserable pay-days only. Such a fifth day marked the glorious epoch when two comrades could buy exactly five "litres" of wine for their joint pay. Certainly such frivolity punished itself: there was no money left for the next five days' tobacco. So wise men in the Legion buy the customary package of tobacco for three sous, and drink but one bottle of wine every five days. This is what the soldier of the Foreign Legion works for: One bottle of wine and one package of tobacco every five days!
Shrilly a signal sounded through the noise--lights out! Madame la Cantinière held up her hand, made a funny little bow, and said with a smile:
"Bonsoir, messieurs.--Good night, gentlemen."
The Legion teaches obedience.... In a very few seconds the canteen was empty and everybody was hurrying across the drill-ground to quarters.
* * * * *
When roll-call had been finished in our quarters and everybody had gone to bed, I quietly left the room. Sleep did not appeal to me that night. The still of night lay over the barrack-yard. The white moonlight shone on the bare walls of the barracks. The stars of far south glittered in their trembling beauty. I stared up into the splendour of the heavens and brooded over happiness far away--passed--dead....
I heard footsteps and saw a shadow moving somewhere on the other side. And over there a trembling awkward voice sang softly:
L'amour m'a rendu fou....
Far into the night I crouched in a corner of the Legion's barrack-yard.
* * * * *
The first days, the first weeks of life in the Legion were quite sufficient to render me immune against strange things and strange sights. Sometimes it seemed to me as if my nerves were quite dulled. Every day brought monstrous sights and hideous impressions. I shuddered at unheard-of things and wondered at these strange specimens of humanity. But the next moment some new horror made me forget what I had just seen.
In a few minutes' walk with the bugler round the barrack-yard one could meet with a variety of sights like the following:
A légionnaire ran past us, shrieking in extreme pain, splashed with blood. He had cut off the forefinger and middle finger of his right hand so as to be unfit for active service.
A poor crippled Arab, bent with age, stopped when he saw us. He was evidently on his way to the kitchen buildings to beg for food. In his hands he carried a Standard oil-can. A Standard oil-tin as receptacle for food in connection with an Arab, Algeria and the Foreign Legion struck me as something distinctly new. But there was more to follow. In very broken German the Arab addressed us:
"Gut' Tag, légionnaires. Cigarette! Ick sein deutsch--Magdeburg gewesen--1870."
The man had fought in the great Franco-German war and had been in Magdeburg as a prisoner of war!
Hardly had I recovered from my surprise when a passing légionnaire made me stare in horror. The man had the grinning image of a skull tattooed on his forehead! He smiled at my frightened face and was evidently very pleased at the impression he had made. I remember saying to the bugler how horrible it was that a man should disfigure his face for life in such a manner, and I remember that Smith only shrugged his shoulders in reply.
"Why, that's nothing," he said. "Tattooing of that kind is quite customary in the Battalion of the Disciplined."
I could not agree with the bugler, I could not see a mere freak in this horrible tattoo-mark. To me it spoke of hope lost for ever, of a life so dreadful that a man no longer cared whether he was disfigured or not.
Pleased with the notice he attracted, the légionnaire with the skull on his forehead walked up to us and spoke to me:
"Eh, recruit, do you want to see something that very old légionnaires only have got?"
He showed me a tobacco-pouch, apparently made of fine soft leather:
"This is made of the breast of an Arab woman," said the man of the skull. "It is a very good tobacco-pouch. Made it myself. There are only seven in the whole regiment now. Chose--n'est-ce pas? That is something worth seeing!"
With a grin of vanity he walked away.
"Tobacco-pouch--an Arab woman's breast--my God, what is the meaning of this?" I asked of the bugler.
Smith told me all about those horrible pouches. The man of the skull had not lied. During the last insurrection of Arabs in Algeria, in grim warfare far in the South, Arabian women had horribly mutilated the bodies of légionnaires and inflicted horrible tortures on the wounded. The soldiers of the Legion, maddened, thirsting for revenge, gave quarter to no Arab woman during those times. They retaliated in kind.... Of the horrible deeds they committed the dreadful tobacco-pouches gave evidence.
On the same day I witnessed for the first time the prisoners' march of punishment. I stood aghast.
Behind the quarters of the fourth company, in a small square between barrack building and wall, about thirty men were marching in a continuous circle, to the sharp commands of a corporal:
"À droit--droit; à droit--droit; right about, march; right about, march."
The prisoners marched round their narrow circle in fast quick-step, almost at a run, with backs deeply bent. Their knapsacks were filled with sand and stones, every man carrying a burden of from seventy to eighty pounds. All the prisoners had a hard strained look on their faces. Their fatigue uniforms were torn and soiled. Guards with fixed bayonets stood at the corners of the square, guarding the marching prisoners.
The term prisoner must not be misunderstood. These men were not criminals. The légionnaires marching in the "peloton des hommes punis" had been punished with a term of imprisonment for small offences in the matters of discipline. They were not only put into prison, but also had to march on their ridiculous march of punishment for three hours every day, the stones in their knapsacks causing bad sores on their backs. These men, punished for some paltry military offence, were certainly treated as if they were criminals of the worst description.
I tried to imagine what I should feel and what I should do if a sandsack were put on my back and I were driven round in this maddening march.... It was dangerous to think of these things.
"Allez, let's go," said the bugler. "We all go to prison some time or another and it's not right to stare at the prisoners. They feel bad enough as it is."
Stranger than the strange surroundings were many of the men of the Legion themselves.
On the bunk opposite mine, the little pasteboard card customary in the Legion described the owner as follows:
JEAN RASSEDIN 12429 SOLDAT PREMIERE CLASSE.
Rassedin was a Belgian. He worked as clerk in the regimental offices. Shortly before "soup-time" in the afternoon his day's work was finished. Then he would come running into quarters, tearing off his old white barrack uniform as fast as he possibly could, throwing his things pell-mell on the bed. In a very few moments he had put on the uniform prescribed for town. For the "soup" he didn't care. He never had his meals in quarters. He went away at once after he had changed his uniform and never returned before two o'clock in the morning, having a "certificate of permanent permission" to leave the barracks. His manner was haughty. If one of his comrades tried to speak to him about something or other, he usually turned away without answering. Or he said:
"M'en fou--I don't care for anything. Leave me alone."
Monsieur Rassedin, légionnaire, took his meals in the best hotel of the town and spent more money than any other man in Sidi-bel-Abbès. Rassedin was a rich man. From the standpoint of the Foreign Legion, his wealth was the wealth of Croesus. He had been a non-commissioned officer in a Belgian cavalry regiment, had deserted for reasons unknown and joined the Legion. After being a légionnaire for a time, he got the news of the death of a rich relative, who had left him all his wealth.... So Monsieur Rassedin, légionnaire, had become rich. He always carried a few thousands francs about him. Three men of the company were employed by him to keep his things in order and to do all the cleaning and polishing for him. In the regimental office he paid the other clerks to do his work. He naturally preferred reading novels to copying lengthy reports. As he could afford to pay substitutes, the thing could easily be done. His family had succeeded in getting him a pardon granted for deserting. Monsieur Rassedin could have gone back to Belgium long ago, but he did not care to return to his native country. As soon as he had finished his term of five years' Legion service, he signed on again for another five years.
The reason?
"Disease," Smith said, when I asked him. There certainly was no question concerning men or things of the Legion that the man from California could not answer. "The poor devil's suffering from syphilis. Got it in Madagascar. I asked him once why in thunder he did not get out of this confounded Legion.
"'Bugler,' he said in answer. 'You are an old légionnaire and I don't want to have trouble with you. But remember: You go your own way, and I'll go mine. Don't trouble me with your fool's remarks. There is poison in my body and in a few years I shall be very sick. No, I prefer putting a bullet through my brains in the Legion to returning to my country and then having to peg out. You'll die somewhere in the sand, my friend--I shall die strictly in my own fashion. What is the difference? Now come on, bugler. Want a bottle of champagne?'"
Everybody in Sidi-bel-Abbès knew Rassedin, even the little black children in the streets. Many a time he used to throw franc pieces amongst them.
In quarters Rassedin hardly spoke to anybody. His comrades were afraid of him. He was a man of enormous strength and had the reputation of fighting on the least provocation. But he could be very good-natured. Hardly a day passed without some old soldiers of the company coming to our quarters in search of Rassedin. They would simply rub their throats in pantomime:
"Rassedin, tant d' soif.--Heap big thirst."
Then Rassedin grinned and searched his pockets for copper pieces....
Then there was Latour, a Frenchman, serving his second year. Daily he received letters, a very unusual thing in the Foreign Legion; love-letters from a woman who was waiting for him five long years. Latour, who had committed a crime in France, expiated his deed in the Foreign Legion. He served solely for the purpose of "rehabilitation."
Sentences of the Civil Court are in France entered in the personal papers of the criminal. Without his papers he cannot get work. Naturally employers are shy of taking men who have been in conflict with the law and such a man very seldom succeeds in finding work. It is a barbarous system. Ten years must elapse before such a man is considered rehabilitated and "clean papers" are issued to him. If a man is willing to serve in the Foreign Legion, however, the term of rehabilitation is shortened to five years, and after five years' service new papers are given to him. He has then a new start in civil life after five years instead of ten.
Like many other French légionnaires, Latour was serving for rehabilitation.
The strangest man of all, however, seemed to me this man Smith, American, légionnaire, philosopher. I have always believed, and believe yet, that he actually loved the Legion, that he could not part from the strange life there. He could speak Arabic like a native. Many a time when we were lying in our bunks, he would mumble to himself in Arabic for hours. If I, in curiosity, asked him what he was about, he would say:
"Oh nothing, Dutchy. I'm a bit off my base. I very often am, you know."
But occasionally he would straighten up and sit down beside me, talking of strange things, reciting whole chapters of the Koran. Like this:
"Well, sonny, know anything about the Chapter of the Prophet's Stallions?"
"You don't? Listen."
"When of an evening the stallions, standing on three feet and placing the tip of their fourth foot upon the ground, were brought before the Prophet, he said: 'I have loved the love of things of this earth more than I have loved all thoughts of the things of heaven, and I have wasted the time in feasting my eyes on these horses. Bring them to me.' And when the horses were brought to him, he began cutting off their legs, one by one, saying: 'All' il Allah....'"
"Yes, Dutchy, the Koran's something interesting." Many chapters of the Koran I have learned from Smith.
Such things happened every day. But soon the enormities lost their power of fascination. A host of new impressions were forced upon me, until the senses were dulled and one soon got wonderfully indifferent--absolutely indifferent....