CHAPTER VI

French Official Photograph.

French Infantry Advancing.

From "Illustrirte Zeitung."

German Infantry Advancing.

Horace watched the deft movements of the artillerists, as they made sure that the sighting-gear was in place and that the training and elevating levers were working smoothly.

"You wanted to see fighting, Horace," said Croquier, pointing with his finger, "well, look!"

In the dull, hot afternoon haze, the boy saw black figures which seemed no larger than ants run up the hillside, far, far ahead and then suddenly disappear as they threw themselves down. Jets of up-thrown earth showed where the shells were striking, and a rising cloud of dust, like to that raised by a tooth-harrow being dragged over plowed land on a dry day, told, to accustomed eyes, the terrible tragedy of the curtain of leaden hail.

The guns were laid, the breeches returning smoothly to rest with their burden of death.

Fear lay heavy on Horace, but an overmastering desire to watch the modern gladiatorial arena, drove him to look.

His experience at Beaufays had taught the boy to put his fingers to his ears, but it was the first time he had heard a .75, the famous "Soixante-Quinze" which the French believed—and rightly—to be the best field-gun in the world. It cracked deafeningly, stridently. The flame which darted out of the muzzle was long and thin and seemed to lick the air as though envious of the shell's flight. The smell of the powder was acrid and bitter, somewhat like the taste of an unripe persimmon, Horace thought.

The shells, twelve to a minute, poured out of the flame-belching muzzle of the gun.

The gun-crew fell back to mechanical automatic speed, muscle and sinew moving with the precision of things of steel. Cartridge-cases littered the ground in irregular piles, smoking for a minute where they fell.

On the hillside, far away, the little dots who were men jumped up to run ahead and then fell to earth once more. Some never rose again.

"Why, then, do our fellows go ahead in short bursts? If they're not in sight of the Germans, what difference does it make if they stand up or lie down?"

"The difference between being shot and not being shot," replied the hunchback. "A modern rifle, using smokeless powder, will send a bullet 700 yards with an almost flat trajectory, that is to say, the bullet does not have to curve upwards much in order to reach its mark. Therefore every man standing up, within the distance of 700 yards, who is in line with that bullet, can be hit by it. A man, lying down, can only be hit by a bullet which is dropping to earth, so that the zone of danger is low. For example, a man standing at 1000 yards range is in a danger zone 65 yards wide, within which he will be shot; if lying down, the danger zone is reduced to 13 yards, or, in other words, he is five times as likely to be shot when standing up, irrespective of the fact whether the enemy can see him or not."

The sonorous tumult of the battle increased steadily. The dome of the sky beat like the parchment of an angry drum. High-explosive shell and shrapnel was bursting overhead, filling the air with splinters of shell and bullets. Now and again a clang on the gun-shield of the "Soixante-Quinze" told of some fragment that would have brought death to the gun-crew in default of such protection.

Horace, crouched down behind the gun-shield, watched a tall thistle, swaying in the breeze a couple of arm's-lengths away, and found himself wondering what would happen to him if he were lying there.

He never saw the answer to his question. Suddenly, the thistle was no more to be seen, probably cut athwart by a splinter of shell.

In the heat of that August afternoon, Horace shivered. He was not precisely afraid, his experience in the woods near Embourg had freed him of fear, but death seemed very near. If this were battle, he had seen enough.

The wooded hill became alive with columns of infantry. They broke out of the woods, some still holding their formations under the orders of their officers, others scattered and disorganized. The roar of the artillery took on a wilder howl, as the high-explosive shells gave place to a larger proportion of the shriller-voiced shrapnel.

The infantry drew nearer, passing on the road just below the gun position, stricken, beaten, war-dulled—and dismayed. It does not take many minutes of fighting in the open against machine-guns to break the spirit and numb the hope of victory. A machine-gun spitting 600 bullets to the minute, swaying its muzzle from side to side like a jet of murder, is the material embodiment of the very spirit of slaughter. These men had seen it and terror had taken up its dwelling in their eyes. Panic and discipline struggled for the mastery.

But, as always, blood tells. The guns belched death behind them and carnage rode, shrieking, on the blast, but their officers were there, cool and masterful. On the very verge of disgraceful rout, the French steadied to the words of command from leaders whom they not only admired and respected, but loved.

Tattered remnants of troops, wounded, half-delirious, many without rifle or pack, surged back. The torrent of smitten humanity filled the road. The weaker were pushed into the ditch. Not a man but had bleared eyes looking wildly out of sweat-rimmed sockets. The way was littered with mess-tins, cartridge belts, kepis and broken rifles. But training, only a little less strong than the instinct of life itself, came to their aid. The sight of an officer brought the hand to the forehead in salute, and the gesture brought back the sense of control. Even as the regiments fled, they reformed.

The hunchback, his iron will unmoved by the imminent peril, answered in a perfectly even tone,

Harsh and wild, the air overhead screamed like a living thing. Men dropped on every side. The road of flight was a shambles.

"Second round!" remarked the battery commander, as calmly as though on maneuvers.

The battery had scarcely fired, the first shell was but half-way on its mission of revenge, when, as though at a signal, a dozen other batteries replied.

A cloud of men in iron-gray uniforms topped the hill, met the concentrated fire of those batteries of seventy-fives and melted into a gray carpet on the earth which would never stir again.

Sweeping up through the scattered and broken troops, as jaunty and full of fight as though they had not been marching for hours and had not encountered the débris of a defeat, came the French reserves. They cheered as they passed the battery.

The guns roared again, and under their fire, the Germans broke and fled, deserting some of their guns. As they wavered and gave way, the French cavalry, who had been waiting their chance, charged down and cleared the hillside of the last invader.

Then, from the rear, came a new sound, a whip-like crackle, of little sharp explosions, rapidly coming nearer.

"It's not a gun," put in Horace, whose composure had begun to return when the cavalry made their triumphant dash, "it's a motor-cycle. I used to ride one in Beaufays."

The dispatch-rider whizzed by on the road below. The men watched him, and, ignoring their own dangers, one of the gunners remarked,

Instantly all was excitement. The gun was to take up a new position. The German infantry rush had failed, but the artillery halted not its tempest of shell.

Three of the horses had been killed. This left only five for the gun. They strained at their collars, but the wheels had sunk in the soft soil.

He thrust the cage into Horace's hands, ran up to the wheels of the gun, where two gunners were lifting, shouldered the men aside, stooped and put his tremendous strength into the heave and the gun jerked forward.

Horace and the hunchback jumped on the rear of the ammunition wagon. They had not gone a hundred yards when a shrapnel bullet struck one of the gun-drivers in the head and he fell.

There was a moment's confusion, and, before any one could say a word, Horace had dropped from the wagon, run forward to the gun and leapt on the plunging horse. Old memories of the ranch came back to him and the rearing animal quieted at once.

Courtesy of "L'Illustration."

"They Do Not Pass!"

"The Veteran's Advice."

Two famous pictures by Georges which awoke red-hot interest in France at the beginning of the war.

"But you may be shot, there!" the major remarked, in a conversational tone of voice, as he cantered beside the gun-team.

"If you'll excuse me, sir," said the boy, "but I'm in no more danger than the rest of us."

The road was cut into deep ruts and great care was needed in driving, for the ditches were filled with wounded. To lighten the loads, the gunners ran alongside the guns and ammunition wagons. Darkness fell over the scene. The battle came to a lull. Night covered the slaughter. Never in his life before had Horace been so glad to see the dark.

None of the gun crew, now, rode on the limbers. Every available point on which a man could lie or sit was crowded with wounded. Many of the wounds were terrible, but few of the sufferers complained.

"My mother wished to give a son to France. Tell her she is victorious!" and he died.

Said another, when the surgeon told him that one leg would have to be amputated,

"Only one, my doctor? Then France has made me a gift of a leg. I was willing to give her both."

The battery passed on through the village. There were no cries of welcome. The women gave food to the soldiers, all silently. With a noble restraint, moreover, none of the women raised a word of blame. The men drove through with hanging heads, downcast, humiliated by the mute reproach in the eyes of the villagers, who knew they were being abandoned to their fate by their own army, which was powerless to aid them. The morrow would bring ruin, brutality, and massacre.

It was late in the evening before the battery halted and Horace took his turn in watering the horses and doing the chores of a driver attached to a gun. Croquier, in a manner attached to the battery, felt he could be of principal service in trying to secure information. When he returned, his expression was full of concern.

Horace pondered for a minute to think what this might mean, then raised himself on his elbow, suddenly wide-awake.

"That smashes the corner!" he cried. "They've pierced our line! The whole strategy is gone!"

"Not quite," said the hunchback grimly, "but unless something happens to-morrow, it will be smashed."

Therein, Croquier was right. The next day, Saturday, August 22, Von Buelow attacked Charleroi in full strength. The two main bridges east and west of the city, at Chatelet and Thuin, fell under the impact of the combined light and heavy field howitzers, and, before noon, Charleroi was in German hands. Von Buelow thrust swiftly round the eastern end of the Fifth French Army, in order to roll up its flank and force it into the arms of Von Kluck for annihilation.

The Chasseurs d'Afrique, Turco and Zouave troops which had been detached from the Fourth Army to help the Belgians at Namur, arrived unexpectedly in Charleroi during the middle of the engagement. They were too late to keep the Germans from entering the city, but not too late to drive them out again, not too late to put a spike in Von Buelow's plan to flank the Fifth Army.

In all the history of modern war, there has never been more savage street-fighting, hand to hand, tooth and claw, sword and bayonet, than in Charleroi. The Germans were more than five to one, but they could not stand cold steel. The onslaught of the French colonials was a spume of wrath that the invaders dared not face. They fled like gray rats.

Then, upon doomed Charleroi, crashed the full force of the German field artillery. Church steeples and foundry chimneys fell like dry sticks before a whirlwind's blast, factories crumbled into ruin under the disintegrating effects of high explosive shells, burying French and Belgian defenders in the ruins. The blue sky overhead was gray with the web of flying steel, the gutters of the streets ran red.

Trebly reënforced, the Germans charged Charleroi again. Here were no modern tactics, here was no battle born in the military schoolroom, but a savage, primitive combat, where each man fired, stabbed, thrust and clubbed to save himself and to fell his foe. Though outnumbered ten to one, the French drove the sharp-biting rats, back, back, and back beyond the outskirts of the town.

Again the German infantry charged forward, now twenty to one, all fresh troops, against the wearied but still defiant Turco and Zouave regiments. The torrent was irresistible and Charleroi was again in German hands.

This was the moment for which the French artillery had been waiting. No sooner was Charleroi filled with German troops than the French guns hammered at the shattered town. The French Army, however, had almost ignored the development of howitzers, which proved so valuable to the Germans. They had but few of their 3.9-inch (105 mm.) and 5.7-inch (155 mm. Rimailho) guns available for a reply to the German batteries and they could not retake the town. About midnight, the city burst into flames.

That same Saturday had been one of disaster, also, for the Fourth Army, though in a lesser degree. Horace had partaken in the retreat from Givet, though, naturally, he did not know the character of the engagement, the night before. All next morning he stayed by the battery, acting as a driver, but the battery was not in action more than an hour. The army suffered heavily, but retreated in good order, the line stiffening, and holding the Germans in check. The battery slept that night on heaps of straw in a little chapel.

A dispatch-rider on a motor-cycle whizzed by. He was traveling thirty or forty miles an hour on a road which was nothing more than a series of holes and ruts. A few guns fired from time to time, but the air reverberated with the grumbling breathing of that master of modern war—petrol.

The little red lamp over the altar in the chapel burned steadily and comfortingly; the red camp fires in the village streets wavered in the chill air of the early morning. A heavy dew had fallen. The German guns were beginning to speak in the distance, but, as it seemed, sleepily and sulkily.

"Those are the ten- and thirteen-centimeter pop-guns," said a gunner, listening.

"And they've all the seventy-sevens in the world, there," added another, "hear those bunches of sixes coming over!"

The sky was still dark enough to show the distant flashes of the heavier guns, like the glare from the eyes of a herd of giant beasts of prey.

As the day lightened, in the half-dawn, the columns of earth upthrown by the shells seemed like gray specters that appeared for a moment and then vanished. An 8.2-inch (220 mm.) shell buried itself in the ground behind the battery, drawn up at the edge of the village, waiting for orders to take up position, and then, thirty seconds after, exploded like a miniature volcano.

"That's the dispatch-rider again," muttered Horace, turning to watch the flying rider, though his ears warned him of a heavy shell humming on its way, and a few seconds later, the wind of its passage blew cold upon his cheek.

The next second, the earth heaved itself up as though a subterraneous monster were emerging from its lair, and the 10.1-inch (270 mm.) shell [14] burst with a slow majestic grandeur. A tree near by, at whose roots the shell had fallen and burrowed, was tossed into the air like a twig. In the pattering silence as the fragments of the shell and earth hurled outward, a shrill human scream penetrated.

Through the cloud of salmon-colored dust, with its gagging acrid fumes, could be seen the motor-cycle. It had plunged off sharply from the road, jumped a low ditch and was stuck fast in a thick, dense hedge. The motors were running still. The rider—

Horace jumped from the back of the wheel-horse, followed by a couple of the gunners, and ran across the road. The lad stopped the motor while the gunners lifted the cyclist from the saddle. He was terribly mangled. Horace turned his eyes away, in spite of himself.

"Let me go on!" cried the rider, in a voice so full of agony that it was almost a screech. "I have dispatches."

They laid him down on the grass by the edge of the road, grass scorched and crispened by the explosion.

The major stooped down and the wounded man guttered out a few sentences, while feebly trying to reach the paper he bore.

Life was ebbing fast, but though the man's sufferings must have been intense, he said no word of himself. Only he cried out again.

Then the major, in order that the gallant soldier should not die in the despair of an unaccomplished trust, answered, in a firm tone,

With those words in his ears, the dispatch-rider joined the immortal host of the dead heroes of France.

FOOTNOTES:

[14] In strict accuracy, this particular type of gun was not in use until the following spring.

CHAPTER VI

There were tears in the major's eyes as he rose, and he unaffectedly wiped them away.

"Major Fouraud, sir," said Horace eagerly, "let me take the dispatches. The machine isn't injured a bit."

"My battery may go into action at any minute," he said, "and there's been no chance to send you to the rear. I certainly have not the right to keep you with the battery. The dispatches are important. Minutes are precious and I do not know where to find a messenger. Well, then, you shall go."

"I will tell you the message," he said, "that, if anything happens, you can pass on the word and the dispatch. Charleroi is in German hands."

"Pay attention," said the Major, curtly. "This dispatch is in reply to a message from the Fourth Army, asking for support. The reply is that this army will move its left wing north to join the Fifth Army, falling back on Philippeville and presenting a united front to the armies of Von Buelow and Würtemberg. You understand?"

"Perfectly, sir," the boy answered, biting his tongue to keep from repeating his information concerning the German army which lay in between.

Horace clambered into the saddle of the motor-cycle, snatching a look at the road map which had been found in the dispatch-rider's pocket and started off at full speed. The cheers of his former companions of the battery, led by the loud bellow of Croquier, reached his ears as he rounded a turn of the road. All this had happened before the rising sun had cleared the horizon. He waved his hand in reply.

His motor-cycle ate up the miles to Anthée and Rosée and he tore up to Florennes with a fine burst of speed. Just before reaching the village, the boy thought he caught a glimpse of spiked helmets at a farmhouse window and he slackened speed for caution.

Trotting rapidly, straight for him, was a squadron of cavalry, and, on the slope of a hill beyond the town, Horace saw column after column of the iron-gray infantry.

He stopped, jumped from the saddle before the wheels had ceased to turn, and whirled the heavy machine around as though it were a racing bicycle. Well he knew that on a narrow road, such a maneuver was far quicker than trying to make a turn. In a second he was in the saddle and had started off again, leaning low over the handle bars as he put on full speed.

A volley of bullets followed him, but scattering and most of them wild, for the cavalry had been utterly unprepared for this sudden vision of a motor-cycle twisting around a bend of the road. No sooner, however, did it become clear that the boy was in full flight than the Uhlans realized he must be an enemy and started in pursuit.

Courtesy of "The Graphic."

"We've Got Them Licked, Boys!"

Wounded sergeant-major being borne off the field by German prisoners, cheering the reservists going to the front.

If all went well, on his fast machine the boy could afford to laugh at the speed of a galloping horse, but he had a lurking fear of the spiked helmets he thought he had seen in the farmhouse.

At the sound of the volley, two soldiers had run out of the farmhouse. Seeing the motor-cycle driving straight at them and the Uhlans galloping behind, the riflemen prepared to fire.

Lacking an officer's direction and unaccustomed to judging the speed of an oncoming motor-cycle—that particular form of target not having been included in the German drill-book—the soldiers waited a second too long. Horace swerved to one side of the road as their rifles came up and, with the speed of the wind, he was between them.

Horace was conscious of a sudden desire to drive straight into his foe and scatter his brains on the road, but prudence reminded him that, in such case, he might not be able to control his machine. Ignoring vengeance, he shot between the soldiers like a thunderbolt and was half a mile or more ahead when the Uhlans reached the farmhouse.

He turned off a side-road not marked on his map, and, seeing an old peasant working in his fields, halted to secure information as to a possible route.

"Just before daybreak, they did," the old man answered. "Saxons, they were. They didn't do me any harm, though. They went over the fields that way," and he pointed to the left.

"Is there any road from here to Walcourt?" the boy asked, studying his map, fearing that his road was cut off entirely.

"There's a foot-path," said the peasant, "but it's too narrow for that machine of yours."

"I'll tackle it," said Horace, remembering the way in which Croquier and he had slipped through all the German armies by keeping away from the roads. Any foot-path, however narrow and stony, was better than encountering the Saxon advance-guard.

It was not long before he overtook the children of whom the peasant had spoken. There were three of them, a girl about fourteen years old and two boys of seven and five years old. They shrank into the bushes when they heard the motor-cycle behind.

The girl was terror-stricken, but on finding out that Horace was not a German, told him all she knew.

"You've been hurt!" the boy said, sympathetically, noticing the boys' arms were bandaged.

"But they're going to grow again, Marie!" exclaimed the youngest boy, whose face was streaked with tear-stains. "You said so!"

The girl looked pleadingly at the young dispatch-rider. He read the look aright, realizing that the girl had tried to soften the blow to the children. So, to help lift the terrible burden of the girl and to ease the pain of the little ones, he answered cheerfully,

But Horace, as he rode on slowly over the faint footpath, which was shaking his machine to pieces, laid up this cruelty as another item in the long black count against Germany. Thousands of boys in Belgium and in northern France have been deliberately crippled for life, so that, when they grow old enough, they will not be able to carry arms to aid in the revenge which the world will inflict on Germany.[15]

Walcourt, as Horace approached it, was evidently the scene of fighting, but an orderly from a Chasseur regiment told him where to find headquarters, and the boy whirled past, south of the village, on another road. In spite of all his adventures, he had been only two hours in the cycle-saddle when he reached his goal. There he had a great deal of difficulty passing the sentries, owing to the lack of a uniform. He was still wearing the woolen shirt that Aunt Abigail had thrown out of the window and the bloodstained clothes in which he had picked up little Jacques Oopsdiel, a week before. Finally he was passed through, though on foot and under guard.

"I have other information, sir," said Horace. "It's not official, sir, but it may possibly be of value."

"I'm pretty sure, sir, that there is a whole German Army operating between Von Buelow's force and the Duke of Würtemberg."

The officer strode forward a step, looking critically at this lad in civilian clothes who seemed to have so clear a knowledge of the opposing armies.

"Last week, passing through Belgium, I saw a big army. A little later on I found out they were Saxons. This morning I learned from a little girl that the general in command is General Von Hausen."

"Your information," said the officer, "tallies with news brought in by our scouts this morning. It may explain the pressure on the Charleroi corner, which is out of all proportion to the forces we were supposed to have against us. You have not breakfasted?"

"I have sent an official message to the Fourth Army," the officer said, "but there's always a chance that the messenger may not get through. Our lines of communication past Charleroi are demoralized. Apparently all the wires behind us have been cut. This dispatch is important. I should like to forward it in duplicate. Will you take it?"

"Willingly, sir," said Horace, delighted to find that he had discovered a way to be of service.

"I have no desire to expose you to danger," he was told, "especially as you are volunteering as a civilian, so you had better go by Beaumont and Chimay. It is a long way round, but I think you will find the roads clear."

"You may state that an army estimated by our airmen as being four corps strong is being forced in between the Fourth and Fifth Armies. Here is the dispatch."

"Have some one find a uniform for this boy," he said. Then, turning to Horace, he added, "I'll write you an order authorizing its use, as you are on special service."

Half an hour later a uniform was brought to Horace where he was busy oiling his machine and filling the petrol tank.

Horace shivered with repugnance. He did not like putting on a dead man's clothes. However, there was no help for it, and, in uniform—which was a little big for him—he started back for the Fourth Army.

The ride was without special incident and the boy delivered his message. He was expected, for the official dispatch-rider had succeeded in getting through, though a bullet had clipped his ear. Langle de Cary, however, had anticipated the news, and, drawing back from Dinant, had joined with the Fifth Army, thus renewing the operative corner, to which the reserves were being hurried.

In and around staff headquarters, the boy picked up information which enabled him to piece together the happenings from the time he had escaped from Liége, to this crucial Sunday morning of August 23.

Soon, quite soon, Horace was once more to come in touch with the troops he had encountered at Beaufays, who had attacked the forts of Embourg and Boncelles, whose shells had blinded Deschamps and whose companions had murdered the curé and little Jacques. This was Von Kluck's army which had marched westward, undelayed by the detachment of 40,000 picked troops to make a triumphal parade through Brussels, undelayed by the detachment of several "frightfulness companies" deliberately chosen and ordered to terrorize that section of Belgium between Aerschot and Louvain.

Von Kluck, indeed, had not halted a moment. He had farther to march than any other of the German armies, although it is true he had the magnificent railroads and highways of Belgium to aid him in his transport. By August 18, Von Kluck was at Tirlemont; by August 19, he was at Wavre; by August 20, he was at Nivelles; by August 21, his left or southern wing had halted a little northeast of Namur, his center advancing slowly over the famous field of Quatre Bras, while his right wing made a forced march at top speed through Enghien to Mons, the cavalry sweeping out in the direction of Tournay. By August 22, the straightened line, now facing south, advanced slowly in a heavy massed formation to take up positions facing the British line and the left of the Fifth French Army. Thus, if Von Buelow and Von Hausen should curl up the eastern flank of the Fifth Army, Von Kluck was in position to crush it in his iron teeth.

On this Sunday morning, August 23, the British force was still ignorant of the fall of Namur. Sir John French had heard nothing but the distant cannonading of the Battle of the Sambre, and when, at midnight, Charleroi broke into flames, the British, though holding the left wing of the whole Allied movement, were unaware of the disaster. The disorganization caused by the sudden fall of Namur and the still more sudden appearance of Von Hausen's mysterious army had demoralized all communication. Spies behind the lines had cut all the telegraph and telephone wires, and the only messenger sent to the British never reached them, either having been killed or taken prisoner.

Although the attack on Givet, on Dinant, on Namur, on Charleroi and on Mons are all a part of the same simultaneous battle-plan, which might perhaps be called the Battle of Namur, history has definitely divided it into four parts: the battle of Givet-Dinant, between the French Fourth Army and the Duke of Würtemberg, of which Horace had seen the first day's fighting; the defense of Namur, between the Belgians and Von Buelow, which was merely a holocaust produced by the 42-centimeter howitzers; the battle of Charleroi, between the French Fourth Army and Von Buelow and Von Hausen combined, at which the one day's grace necessary to save the whole campaign from destruction was secured by the glorious and desperate courage of the Chasseurs d'Afrique, the Turcos and the Zouaves; and the battle of Mons, between the British and Von Kluck, which became a week-long retreating engagement.

The British had not reached their appointed positions on the barge-canal until Friday, and had spent Saturday, entrenching. Sir John French had only an army corps and a half in his command, with an extra cavalry division covering the west wing. There was not the slightest indication of immediate danger. Sir John French himself stated that he was informed by his patrols, that "little more than one, or at the most, two of the enemy's army corps, with perhaps one cavalry division, was in front, and I was aware of no outflanking movement." As a matter of fact, Von Kluck had five army corps opposed to the British one and a half, and three cavalry divisions besides. The odds, therefore, were over three to one.