Chapter 2

How this grey estuary spread before my eyes illustrates and illuminates the figures I have been quoting! I am on the light cruiser of a famous Commodore, and I have just been creeping and climbing through a submarine. The waters round are crowded with those light craft, destroyers, submarines, mine-sweepers, trawlers, patrol boats, on which for the moment at any rate the fortunes of the naval war turns. And take notice that they are all--or almost all--_new_; the very latest products of British ship-yards. We have plenty of battle-ships, but "we must now build, as quickly as possible, the smaller craft, and the merchant ships we want," says Sir Edward Carson. "Not a slip in the country will be empty during the coming months. Every rivet put into a ship will contribute to the defeat of Germany. And 47 per cent, of the Merchant Service have already been armed." The riveters must indeed have been hard at work! This crowded scene carries me back to the Clyde where I was last year, to the new factories and workshops, with their ever-increasing throng of women, and to the marvellous work of the ship-yards. No talk now of strikes, of a disaffected and revolutionary minority, on the Clyde, at any rate, as there was twelve months ago. Broadly speaking, and allowing for a small, stubborn, but insignificant Pacifist section, the will of the nation, throughout all classes, has become as steel--to win the war.

Throughout England, as in these naval officers beside me, there is the same tense yet disciplined expectancy. As we lunch and talk, on this cruiser at rest, messages come in perpetually; the cruiser itself is ready for the open sea, at an hour and a half's notice; the seaplanes pass out and come in over the mouth of the harbour on their voyages of discovery and report, and these destroyers and mine-sweepers that he so quietly near us will be out again to-night in the North Sea, grappling with every difficulty and facing every danger, in the true spirit of a wonderful service, while we land-folk sleep and eat in peace;--grumbling no doubt, with our morning newspaper and coffee, when any of the German destroyers who come out from Zeebrugge are allowed to get home with a whole skin. "What on earth is the Navy about?" Well, the Navy knows. Germany is doing her very worst, and will go on doing it--for a time. The line of defensive watch in the North Sea is long; the North Sea is a big place; the Germans often have the luck of the street-boy who rings a bell and runs away, before the policeman comes up. But the Navy has no doubts. The situation, says one of my cheerful hosts, is "quite healthy" and we shall see "great things in the coming months." We had better leave it at that!

Now let us look at these destroyers in another scene. It is the last day of February, and I find myself on a military steamer, bound for a French Port, and on my way to the British Headquarters in France. With me is the same dear daughter who accompanied me last year as "dame secrétaire" on my first errand. The boat is crowded with soldiers, and before we reach the French shore we have listened to almost every song--old and new--in Tommy's repertory. There is even "Tipperary," a snatch, a ghost of "Tipperary," intermingled with many others, rising and falling, no one knows why, started now here, now there, and dying away again after a line or two. It is a draft going out to France for the first time, north countrymen, by their accent; and life-belts and submarines seem to amuse them hugely, to judge by the running fire of chaff that goes on. But, after a while, I cease to listen. I am thinking first of what awaits us on the further shore, on which the lights are coming out, and of those interesting passes inviting us to G.H.Q. as "Government Guests," which lie safe in our handbags. And then, my thoughts slip back to a conversation of the day before, with Dr. Addison, the new Minister of Munitions.

A man in the prime of life, with whitening hair--prematurely white, for the face and figure are quite young still--and stamped, so far as expression and aspect are concerned, by those social and humane interests which first carried him into Parliament. I have been long concerned with Evening Play Centres for school-children in Hoxton, one of the most congested quarters of our East End. And seven years ago I began to hear of the young and public-spirited doctor and man of science, who had made himself a name and place in Hoxton, who had won the confidence of the people crowded in its unlovely streets, had worked for the poor, and the sick, and the children, and had now beaten the Tory member, and was Hoxton's Liberal representative in the new Parliament elected in January 1910, to deal with the Lords, after the throwing out of Lloyd George's famous Budget. Once or twice since, I had come across him in matters concerned with education--cripple schools and the like--when he was Parliamentary Secretary to the Board of Education, immediately before the war. And now here was the doctor, the Hunterian Professor, the social worker, the friend of schools and school-children, transformed into the fighting Minister of a great fighting Department, itself the creation of the war, only second--if second--in its importance for the war, to the Admiralty and the War Office.

I was myself, for a fortnight of last year, the guest of the Ministry of Munitions, while Mr. Lloyd George was still its head, in some of the most important Munition areas; and I was then able to feel the current of hot energy, started by the first Minister, running--not of course without local obstacles and animosities--through an electrified England. That was in February 1916. Then, in August, came the astonishing speech of Mr. Montagu, on the development of the Munitions supply in one short year, as illustrated by the happenings of the Somme battlefield. And now, as successor to Mr. Montagu and Mr. Lloyd George, Dr. Addison sat in the Minister's chair, continuing the story.

What a story it is! Starting from the manufacture of guns, ammunition and explosives, and after pushing that to incredible figures, the necessities of its great task has led the Ministry to one forward step after another. Seeing that the supply of munitions depends on the supply of raw material, it is now regulating the whole mineral supply of this country, and much of that of the Allies; it is about to work qualities of iron ore that have never been worked before; it is deciding, over the length and breadth of the country, how much aluminium should be allowed to one firm, how much copper to another; it is producing steel for our Allies as well as for ourselves; it has taken over with time the whole Motor Transport of the war, and is now adding to it the Railway Transport of munitions here and abroad, and is dictating meanwhile to every engineering firm in the country which of its orders should come first, and which last. It is managing a whole gigantic industry with employes running into millions, half a million of them women, and managing it under wholly new conditions of humanity and forethought; it is housing and feeding and caring for innumerable thousands; transforming from day to day, as by a kind of by-work, the industrial mind and training of multitudes, and laying the foundations of a new, and surely happier England, after the War. And, finally, it is adjusting, with, on the whole, great success, the rival claims of the factories and the trenches, sending more and more men from the workshops to the fighting line, in proportion as the unskilled labour of the country--men and women, but especially women--is drawn, more and more widely, into the service of a dwindling amount of skilled labour, more and more "diluted."

* * * * *

But the light is failing and the shore is nearing. Life-belts are taken off, the destroyers have disappeared. We are on the quay, kindly welcomed by an officer from G.H.Q. who passes our bags rapidly through the Custom House, and carries us off to a neighbouring hotel for the night, it being too late for the long drive to G.H.Q. We are in France again!--and the great presence of the army is all about us. The quay crowded with soldiers, the port alive with ships, the grey-blue uniforms mingling with the khaki--after a year I see it again, and one's pulses quicken. The vast "effort of England" which last year had already reached so great a height, and has now, as all accounts testify, been so incredibly developed, is here once more in visible action, before me.

Next day, the motor arrives early, and with our courteous officer who has charge of us, in front, we are off, first, for one of the great camps I saw last year, and then for G.H.Q. itself. On the way, as we speed over the rolling down country beyond the town, my eyes are keen to catch some of the new signs of the time. Here is the first--a railway line in process of doubling--and large numbers of men, some of them German prisoners, working at it; typical both of the immense railway development all over the military zone, since last year, and of the extensive use now being made of prisoners' labour, in regions well behind the firing line. They lift their heads, as we pass, looking with curiosity at the two ladies in the military car. Their flat round caps give them an odd similarity. It is as if one saw scores of the same face, differentiated here and there by a beard. A docile hard-working crew, by all accounts, who give no trouble, and are managed largely by their N.C.O.'s. Are there some among them who saw the massacre at Dinant, the terrible things in Lorraine? Their placid, expressionless faces tell no tale.

But the miles have flown, and here already are the long lines of the camp. How pleasant to be greeted by some of the same officers! We go into the Headquarters Office, for a talk. "Grown? I should think we have!" says Colonel----. And, rapidly, he and one of his colleagues run through some of the additions and expansions. The Training Camp has been practically doubled, or, rather, another training camp has been added to the one that existed last year, and both are equipped with an increased number of special schools--an Artillery Training School, an Engineer Training School, a Lewis Gun School, a Gas School, with an actual gas chamber for the training of men in the use of their gas helmets,--and others, of which it is not possible to speak. "We have put through half a million of reinforcements since you were here last." And close upon two million rations were issued last month! The veterinary accommodation has been much enlarged, and two Convalescent Horse Depots have been added--(it is good indeed to see with what kindness and thought the Army treats its horses!). But the most novel addition to the camp has been a Fat Factory for the production of fat,--from which comes the glycerine used in explosives--out of all the food refuse of the camp. The fat produced by the system, here and in England, has already provided glycerine _far millions of eighteen-pounder shells_; the problem of camp refuse, always a desperate one, has been solved; and as a commercial venture the factory makes 250 per cent. profit.

Undeterred by what we hear of the smells! we go off to see it, and the enthusiastic manager explains the unsavoury processes by which the bones and refuse of all the vast camp are boiled down into a white fat, that looks _almost_ eatable, but is meant, as a matter of fact, to feed not men but shells. Nor is that the only contribution to the fighting line which the factory makes. All the cotton waste of the hospitals, with their twenty thousand beds--the old dressings and bandages--come here, and after sterilisation and disinfection go to England for gun-cotton. Was there ever a grimmer cycle than this, by which that which feeds, and that which heals, becomes in the end that which kills! But let me try to forget that side of it, and remember, rather, as we leave the smells behind, that the calcined bones become artificial manure, and go back again into the tortured fields of France, while other bye-products of the factory help the peasants near to feed their pigs. And anything, however small, that helps the peasants of France in this war, comforts one's heart.

We climb up to the high ground of the camp for a general view before we go on to G.H.Q. and I see it, as I saw it last year, spread under the March sunshine, among the sand and the pines--a wonderful sight. "Everything has grown, you see, except the staff!" says the Colonel, smiling, as we shake hands. "But we rub along!"

Then we are in the motor again, and at last the new G.H.Q.--how different from that I saw last year!--rises before us. We make our way into the town, and presently the car stops for a minute before a building, and while our officer goes within, we retreat into a side street to wait. But my thoughts are busy. For that building, of which the side-front is still visible, is the brain of the British Army in France, and on the men who work there depend the fortunes of that distant line where our brothers and sons are meeting face to face the horrors and foulnesses of war. How many women whose hearts hang on the war, whose all is there, in daily and nightly jeopardy, read the words "British Headquarters" with an involuntary lift of soul, an invocation without words! Yet scarcely half a dozen Englishwomen in this war will ever see the actual spot. And here it is, under my eyes, the cold March sun shining fitfully on it, the sentry at the door, the khaki figures passing in and out. I picture to myself the rooms within, and the news arriving of General Gough's advance on the Ancre, of that German retreat as to which all Europe is speculating.

But we move on--to a quiet country house in a town garden--the Headquarters Mess of the Intelligence Department. Here I find, among our kind hosts, men already known to me from my visit of the year before, men whose primary business it is to watch the enemy, who know where every German regiment and German Commander are, who through the aerial photography of our airmen are now acquainted with every step of the German retreat, and have already the photographs of his second line. All the information gathered from prisoners, and from innumerable other sources, comes here; and the department has its eye besides on everything that happens within the zone of our Armies in France. For a woman to be received here is an exception--perhaps I may say an honour--of which I am rather tremulously aware. Can I make it worth while? But a little conversation with these earnest and able men shows plainly that they have considered the matter like any other incident in the day's work. _England's Effort_ has been useful; therefore I am to be allowed again to see and write for myself; and therefore, what information can be given me as to the growth of our military power in France since last year will be given. It is not, of course, a question of war correspondence, which is not within a woman's powers. But it is a question of as much "seeing" as can be arranged for, combined with as much first-hand information as time and the censor allow. I begin to see my way.

The conversation at luncheon--the simplest of meals--and during a stroll afterwards, is thrilling indeed to us newcomers. "The coming summer's campaign _must_ decide the issue of the war--though it may not see the end of it." "The issue of the war"--and the fate of Europe! "An inconclusive peace would be a victory for Germany." There is no doubt here as to the final issue; but there is a resolute refusal to fix dates, or prophesy details. "Man for man we are now the better army. Our strength is increasing month by month, while that of Germany is failing. Men and officers, who a year ago were still insufficiently trained, are now seasoned troops with nothing to learn from the Germans; and the troops recruited under the Military Service Act, now beginning to come out, are of surprisingly good quality." On such lines the talk runs, and it is over all too soon.

Then we are in the motor again, bound for an aerodrome forty or fifty miles away. We are late, and the last twenty-seven kilometres fly by in thirty-two minutes! It is a rolling country, and there are steep descents and sharp climbs, through the thickly-scattered and characteristic villages and small old towns of the Nord, villages crowded all of them with our men. Presently, with a start, we find ourselves on a road which saw us last spring--a year ago, to the day. The same blue distances, the same glimpses of old towns in the hollows, the same touches of snow on the heights. At last, in the cold sunset light, we draw up at our destination. The wide aerodrome stretches before us--great hangars coloured so as to escape the notice of a Boche overhead--with machines of all sizes, rising and landing--coming out of the hangars, or returning to them for the night. Two of the officers in charge meet us, and I walk round with them, looking at the various types--some for fighting, some for observation; and understanding--what I can! But the spirit of the men--that one can understand. "We are accumulating, concentrating now, for the summer offensive. Of course the Germans have been working hard too. They have lots of new and improved machines. But when the test comes we are confident that we shall down them again, as we did on the Somme. For us, the all-important thing is the fighting behind the enemy lines. Our object is to prevent the German machines from rising at all, to keep them down, while our airmen are reconnoitering along the fighting line. Awfully dangerous work! Lots don't come back. But what then? They will have done their job!"

The words were spoken so carelessly that for a few seconds I did not realise their meaning. But there was that in the expression of the man who spoke them which showed there was no lack of realisation there. How often I have recalled them, with a sore heart, in these recent weeks of heavy losses in the air-service--losses due, I have no doubt, to the special claims upon it of the German retreat.

The conversation dropped a little, till one of my companions, with a smile, pointed overhead. Three splendid biplanes were sailing above us, at a great height, bound south-wards. "Back from the line!" said the officer beside me, and we watched them till they dipped and disappeared in the sunset clouds. Then tea and pleasant talk. The young men insist that D. shall make tea. This visit of two ladies is a unique event. For the moment, as she makes tea in their sitting-room, which is now full of men, there is an illusion of home.

Then we are off, for another fifty miles. Darkness comes on, the roads are unfamiliar. At last an avenue and bright lights. We have reached the Visitors' Château, under the wing of G.H.Q.

No. 2

_March 31st, 1917_.

DEAR MR. ROOSEVELT,--My first letter you will perhaps remember took us to the Visitors' Château of G.H.Q. and left us alighting there, to be greeted by the same courteous host, Captain----, who presided last year over another Guest House far away. But we were not to sleep at the Château, which was already full of guests. Arrangements had been made for us at a cottage in the village near, belonging to the village schoolmistress; the motor took us there immediately, and after changing our travel-stained dresses, we went back to the Château for dinner. Many guests--all of them of course of the male sex, and much talk! Some of the guests--members of Parliament, and foreign correspondents--had been over the Somme battlefield that day, and gave alarmist accounts of the effects of the thaw upon the roads and the ground generally. Banished for a time by the frost, the mud had returned; and mud, on the front, becomes a kind of malignant force which affects the spirits of the soldiers.

The schoolmistress and her little maid sat up for us, and shepherded us kindly to bed. Never was there a more strangely built little house! The ceilings came down on our heads, the stairs were perpendicular. But there was a stove in each room, and the beds though hard, and the floor though bare, were scrupulously clean. In the early morning I woke up and looked out. There had been a white frost, and the sun was just rising in a clear sky. Its yellow light was shining on the whitewashed wall of the next cottage, on which a large pear-tree was trained. All round were frost-whitened plots of garden or meadow--_préaux_--with tall poplars in the hedges cutting the morning sky. Suddenly, I heard a continuous murmur in the room beneath me. It was the schoolmistress and her maid at prayer. And presently the house door opened and shut. It was Mademoiselle who had gone to early Mass. For the school was an _école libre_, and the little lady who taught it was a devout Catholic. The rich yet cold light, the frosty quiet of the village, the thin French trees against the sky, the ritual murmur in the room below--it was like a scene from a novel by René Bazin, and breathed the old, the traditional France.

We were to start early and motor far, but there was time before we started for a little talk with Mademoiselle. She was full of praise for our English soldiers, some of whom were billeted in the village. "They are very kind to our people, they often help the women, and they never complain." (Has the British Tommy in these parts really forgotten how to grouse?) "I had some of your men billeted here. I could only give them a room without beds, just the bare boards. 'You will find it hard,' I said. 'We will get a little straw,' said the sergeant. 'That will be all right.' Our men would have grumbled." (But I think this was Mademoiselle's _politesse_!) "And the children are devoted to your soldiers. I have a dear little girl in the school, nine years old. Sometimes from the window she sees a man in the street, a soldier who lodges with her mother. Then I cannot hold her. She is like a wild thing to be gone. 'Voilà mon camarade!--voilà mon camarade!' Out she goes, and is soon walking gravely beside him, hand in hand, looking up at him." "How do they understand each other?" "I don't know. But they have a language. Your sergeants often know more French than your officers, because they have to do the billeting and the talking to our people."

The morning was still bright when the motor arrived, but the frost had been keen, and the air on the uplands was biting. We speed first across a famous battlefield, where French and English bones lie mingled below the quiet grass, and then turn south-east. Nobody on the roads. The lines of poplar-trees fly past, the magpies flutter from the woods, and one might almost forget the war. Suddenly, a railway line, a steep descent and we are full in its midst again. On our left an encampment of Nissen huts--so called from their inventor, a Canadian officer--those new and ingenious devices for housing troops, or labour battalions, or coloured workers, at an astonishing saving both of time and material. In shape like the old-fashioned beehive, each hut can be put up by four or six men in a few hours. Everything is, of course, standardised, and the wood which lines their corrugated iron is put together in the simplest and quickest ways, ways easily suggested, no doubt, to the Canadian mind, familiar with "shacks" and lumber camps. We shall come across them everywhere along the front. But on this first occasion my attention is soon distracted from them, for as we turn a corner beyond the hut settlement, which I am told is that of a machine-gun detachment, there is an exclamation from D----.