V—THE SECRET NEWSPAPER—LIBRE BELGIQUE
But the most brilliant and daring feat achieved in Brussels is unquestionably the publication of Libre Belgique, a mysterious weekly journal which makes its appearance with unfailing regularity, though how, where, and by whom produced the Germans have never been able to discover. This is the very apotheosis of Boche-baiting, for Libre Belgique is a fiery sheet. It does not mince words, but flagellates the Germans with the most scornful virulence, holding them up to ridicule and contempt. Every week it pours the vials of bitter wrath and hatred upon the Boche's devoted head, and the Boche can do nothing but sit meekly under this scorching cataract. For though a reward, which has already risen from a thousand pounds to three times that figure, is offered for a denunciation of those responsible for this "scurrilous rag," the secret of Libre Belgique remains inviolate. Exhaustive searches have been conducted, many arrests have been made upon suspicion, but except for two minor actors in the great comedy, whose function was merely the distribution of copies, no one has been caught. Yet Libre Belgique has already celebrated one anniversary of its birth, and is well into its second year of existence. And every week, without fail, General von Bissing, the German governor of Brussels, receives a "complimentary" copy, which he doubtless peruses with absorbed interest.
It is characteristic of Brussels wit that in conformity with law the paper announces in each issue the address of its office and printing works. These, it appears, are in "a cellar on wheels," and in view of the peripatetic habits thus suggested, correspondents are desired to address their communications to the Kommandatur, i.e., the headquarters of the German authorities!
But Libre Belgique has another function to discharge beyond that of a courageous jest, well calculated to keep the Bruxellois in good heart. Drastic in its satire upon the enemy, it is equally unsparing in its record of German crimes and its dissection of the often grotesque claims made by the German official communiqués. Von Bissing and his staff may affect to make light of this gadfly among journals, but the rewards offered for its betrayal and the energetic measures taken to bring about its suppression tell another story. Libre Belgique, indeed, aptly illustrates the parable at which Burgomaster Max so subtly hinted when he laid his pen beside his interlocutor's pistol. The pen is far mightier—in the long run—than the sword, and the Germans, though they will not perhaps admit it even to themselves, have an uncomfortable inkling of that fact.
That Libre Belgique, in spite of all proffered bribes, should never yet have been betrayed is a wonderful testimony to the high patriotic spirit of the Bruxellois. For though the operations of the paper's staff are doubtless closely guarded, the number of persons who are in the secret must inevitably be considerable, and leakage is difficult to prevent. But the Belgian spirit is a thing with which we are all familiar now, and when to that is added Brussels wit the whole phenomenon is explained.
One fancies, indeed, that when the Belgian capital is at length evacuated by the Germans the populace will be half sorry to see them go. The Boche is not exactly a lovable fellow, but to people of a satirical turn of mind, naïveté, which he possesses in unparalleled degree, is always engaging. As a butt the Boche is unique, and in that capacity, if in no other, he has positively endeared himself to the witty citizens of Brussels.
He shot eight Germans in eight seconds, captured a machine gun, took two barricades single handed, and saved his whole company from being exterminated. The story is told in the New York American as dispatched from London.
I—WHO IS THE BRAVEST MAN IN THE WAR?
Who is the bravest man that the war has produced?
It would probably be impossible to answer this question with any approach to accuracy and impartiality. But it is interesting to compare some of the incidents reported and see how modern courage compares with that of past history.
It is generally admitted that all the nations engaged have fought with remarkable bravery and steadiness, so that a man must have done some extraordinarily daring action to make himself notable. Thousands and thousands of acts of bravery have been performed by many among the millions of soldiers engaged. Doubtless some of the most heroic have died without having their acts mentioned.
Of the innumerable feats of bravery reported the one that has impressed the British public most is that of Sergeant Michael O'Leary, of the Irish Guards, who is a native of Ireland, as his name suggests.
He has received the coveted Victoria Cross, been promoted Sergeant and a long description of his deeds has been given him on the official records—a very great honor. He has also been offered a commission, but will not take it at present because he does not want to leave the Irish Guards, and there is no place for him there as an officer.
The cold official record says that O'Leary won his Victoria Cross "for conspicuous bravery at Cuinchy. When forming one of the storming party which advanced against the enemy's barricades he rushed to the front and himself killed five Germans who were behind the first barricade, after which he attacked a second barricade, about sixty yards further on, which he captured, after killing three of the enemy and making prisoners of two more. Lance Corporal O'Leary thus practically captured the enemy's position by himself and prevented the rest of the attacking party from being fired on."
Further details of O'Leary's wonderful exploit were given by Company Quartermaster Sergeant J. G. Lowry, of the Irish Guards, who was engaged in the fight.
"Our First Battalion," he said, "had been holding trenches near the La Bassee brickfield, and our losses were heavy. The Germans had excellent cover, both in trenches and behind stacks of bricks.
"We were all delighted when the order came that the brickfield had to be taken by assault next day.
"Lance Corporal O'Leary never looked to see if his mates were coming, and he must have done pretty near even time over that patch of ground. When he got near the end of one of the German trenches he dropped, and so did many others a long way behind him. The enemy had discovered what was up.
"A machine-gun was O'Leary's mark. Before the Germans could manage to slew it around and meet the charging men O'Leary picked off the whole of the five of the machine crew, and leaving some of his mates to come up and capture the gun, he dashed forward to the second barricade, which the Germans were quitting in a hurry and shot three more.
"O'Leary came back from his killing as cool as if he had been for a walk in the park and accompanied by two prisoners he had taken. He probably saved the lives of a whole company.
"Had that machine gun got slewed round, No. 1 Company might have been nearly wiped out."
II—STORY OF THE YOUNG IRISH GUARD
What impresses people in O'Leary's deed is not only his bravery but the triumphant success with which he carried out the whole act. Other soldiers may have displayed more self-sacrifice and endurance, but not one of them appears to have done more for his side by one individual act of bravery than O'Leary.
It is the dashing quality of his deed that wins admiration and this quality, it is to be noted, is peculiarly Irish. He is credited by his admirers with having shot eight men in eight seconds. His quickness must have been phenomenal, and here again he showed a peculiarly Irish trait.
How one man could have shot eight soldiers, when all eight of them were armed and many of their comrades were only a few yards away, must appear a mystery to many. The Germans were perhaps retiring hastily from their positions, but they had magazine rifles in their hands and fired many shots at the British.
Why did they not get O'Leary, who was running out alone ahead of his companions? He must have been amazingly lucky, as well as amazingly quick.
Then it is almost equally astonishing that he could have shot eight men in a few moments while running. The best explanation of this is that the British soldier has a rifle carrying more bullets than that of any other army.
The Lee Enfield rifle now used in the British army carries ten bullets in the magazine and one in the barrel. O'Leary, of course, fired all his eleven bullets, and he is credited with making eight of them kill a man apiece. That is an amazing shooting record, said to be unequalled for a soldier.
Sergeant O'Leary is not a particularly fierce looking soldier, as might be expected, but a tall, slender, fair-haired young fellow. He is only twenty-five years old.
"A quiet, easy-going young fellow O'Leary is," said his friend, Sergeant Daly, of the Second Battalion of the Irish Guards. "But he is remarkably quick on his feet."
O'Leary was born in the little village of Inchigeelach, in the County Cork. His father and mother still live there. He has an older brother and four sisters, who are now in America.
He served for several years in the Canadian Northwest Mounted Police, but went back and joined the British Army in order to be nearer home.
After the fight in which he won his decoration he wrote home:
"Dear Parents: I guess you will be glad to hear that I was promoted full sergeant on the field on account of distinguished conduct on February 1, when we charged the Huns and routed them in disorder.
"You bet the Irish Guards are getting back now."
Mrs. O'Leary, the old mother of the hero, has been interviewed at her home in Ireland. As might be expected her words were very simple.
"It's proud I am of Mike," said Mrs. O'Leary, "but I wish he was home instead of being in that cruel war.
"When that telegram came for me, I thought sure Mike was dead, but when I opened it I found that he had been promoted. Sure I was better pleased to know that he was alive than promoted.
"Mike is a good boy. He never gave me a moment's uneasiness since he was in the cradle, except when he went away on his foreign adventures. I suppose he had to leave me. There's little enough chance for a boy here, with only the pigs to look after and his father and me."
We have been inclined to think that the days were over when a mighty warrior could rush in among the foe and slay many with his own hands but O'Leary and many others in this war have proved that that is not the case.
III—TALE OF A GORDON HIGHLANDER
Many of the famous deeds of antiquity have been curiously paralleled in the war. For instance, one of the ancient feats that everybody mentions occasionally was how the brave Horatius held the bridge across the Tiber with two companions against the whole Etruscan army.
Now we find again and again that a bridge has been the scene of deeds of conspicuous heroism in this war. The British were defending a river bank and bridge against a fierce German attack. The crew of a British Maxim gun had all been killed. Then Angus MacLeod, of the Gordon Highlanders, rose from cover, seized the Maxim gun and all alone carried it, under fire, to the far side of the bridge, where he played it on the advancing Germans.
He is credited with having killed sixty Germans. Finally he fell dead and thirty bullets were counted in his body. The delay enabled the British to rally and repel their opponents.
An extraordinary act of heroism was reported of an unnamed French soldier during the disastrous retreat of the French from the Belgian frontier and the Meuse River early in the war.
This man had been taken prisoner with some companions. The Germans, according to the report, drove their prisoners before them when attempting to cross a strongly defended bridge, to make the French think it was a party of their own men returning. As the French prisoners stepped on the bridge, one of them, a big and strong-voiced man, yelled:
"Fire, nom de Dieu, or you will be wiped out."
His own act made his death certain. He fell riddled with bullets from both sides.
Lieutenant Leach and Sergeant Hogan of the British Army each received the Victoria Cross for an extraordinarily daring and ingenious action. The two men killed two Germans, took sixteen unwounded prisoners and twenty wounded men. Leach and Hogan with ten men crawled unobserved to a section of trench that had been captured by the Germans earlier in the day. Leach and Hogan dropped into the trench unnoticed and the ten men lay in wait to shoot any Germans who showed themselves.
A trench is built in zigzags so that there is only a straight section of about twenty yards along which an enemy could shoot. The Germans in the first section were taken by surprise and all killed or wounded. Then the two men hurried on to the next turning. As they walked Hogan put his cap on his rifle and held it above the trench to show their men outside where they were.
Lieutenant Leach poked his automatic revolver round the corner of the trench and began shooting at the Germans from cover. The German soldiers with their big clumsy rifles could not hit the deadly hand that was the only object to aim at. While the Lieutenant was shooting, Hogan watched over the top of the trench to shoot any German who tried to get out or attack them in the rear. Thus all the men in each section were killed, wounded or captured.
How do these and the many other brave men who have been reported in the present war compare with the heroes of antiquity? Achilles is the foremost of Greek warriors. He personified the Greek ideal of bravery, manly beauty and fiery enthusiasm. The "Iliad" contains pages and pages about his deeds, his speeches, how he sulked in his tent, and his quarrel with Agamemnon, but it does not seem after all that he did a vast amount of harm to the enemy. Of course, he killed Hector, but that was not amazing, and he acted with considerable brutality about it.
Achilles was undoubtedly a fine orator, but in achievement he appeared to compare badly with modest Sergeant O'Leary.
This very unusual narrative, with its light on Austrian prison conditions, appeared in the Russkoe Slovo, Moscow, June 30, 1916. It was written by a petty officer of the Russian Army at the request of the paper's Paris correspondent. The correspondent tells of a party of thirty Russians who had recently arrived in Paris from Italy, all war prisoners from Austria, who had managed at different times to slip through the lines on the Italian front. It was translated for Current History.
I—"I WAS PRISONER OF THE MAGYARS"
I was taken prisoner by the Magyars in the Carpathians. We were driven to the station of Kashitzi, where we found more Russians, I don't know how many, and were placed in dirty cars, from which cattle had just been removed. The stench was terrible, the crowd unthinkable. The doors were locked all the time.... We travelled two days; on the third we arrived in a camp called Lintz. What did I see in this camp? Filthy barracks, naked bunks on which our soldiers were scattered, pale, exhausted, hungry, nearly all barefoot or in wooden clogs. Many were suffering from inflamed feet and exhaustion. I don't know how they call it in medicine, but to my mind it was the fever of starvation. One gets yellow, trembles incessantly, longs for food....
The prisoners were fed very poorly, mainly with turnips, beans, and peas.
Once a soldier decided to complain to Francis Joseph or Wilhelm. He went up to an electric pole, formed his fingers so that it looked as if he were speaking into a telephone horn, and shouted, "Hello, Germans, give us some more bread!" He called and knocked with his fists for some time, but, of course, received no reply. Many soldiers made fun of him at first, but others began to look for a way to complain against such treatment of war prisoners. Meanwhile the bread became poorer and poorer in quality and less in quantity. The meals consisted of beans, and in addition there were bugs in the beans. We got meat three times a week, the other days we got herring.
On the 24th of May, 1915, a company was recruited among us to be sent away to do some "agricultural" work. The soldiers would not believe it, claiming that peace was near. I was in the first contingent. Our train was passing between mountains covered with evergreen. Every now and then it would shoot through tunnels. This surprised me greatly. I understood that we were not going in the direction of Russia. And so it was. We finally arrived in a place, where the thousand of us were quartered in one building. We at once began to be treated differently, much more insolently and severely. On the 27th we were driven to the fields to work. We wondered what the agricultural labour we were to do could be. We were supplied with shovels and pick-axes, led to a wood on a hill some 1,600 metres high, mustered into rows, and ordered to dig a ditch—that is what the Germans called it—but we called it otherwise. It became clear that we were to dig trenches.
The first day passed in idleness and grumbling. All unanimously refused to work, even if we had to pay with our lives for it.
We waited for the following morning. The guards came to take us out to work, but we said that we would not dig trenches. Then the Colonel came and asked in Russian: "Why don't you want to work?" We all answered: "This work is against the law. You are violating the European laws and breaking all agreements by forcing us to construct defensive lines for you." The Colonel said: "Look out, don't resist, or we will shoot every one of you. We don't care now for the laws to which you point us. All Europe is at war now—this is no time for laws. If you don't go to work, I will have you shot."
We all exclaimed: "We won't. Shoot us, but we will not do the work."
II—STANDING BEFORE THE EXECUTIONER
All of the 28th we were in our yard. No food was given us. Thus we were held for three days without food. On the fourth day a company of cadets arrived. Leading them was the executioner, with stripes on his sleeves. They loaded their rifles, holding them ready. Then the Colonel asked: "Who will go to work?" The crowd answered "No!" The Colonel said: "I am sorry for you, boys, you don't understand that you are resisting in vain." Suddenly the crowd was split into two. Those who agreed to work were given dinner and put to work. The other half, in which I was included, was led away to another yard. From among us ten were picked out and taken away—we knew not where. We were ordered to lie on the ground with our faces downward, and not to turn our heads.
On June 2 there remained only fifty men who still refused to work, suffering hunger for the sixth day. The ten soldiers who were daily taken away from us were subjected to, besides hunger, suspense in the air from rings, with their hands tied to their backs. In about thirty minutes one would lose consciousness, and then he would be taken down to the ground. After he recovered his senses he would be asked if he agreed to work. What could one answer? To say "I refuse" meant another ordeal. He would begin to cry and agree to work.
The following day our heroes were led out into the open, ten were selected from our midst, arranged in a line facing the rest of us, and told that they would be shot immediately. Of the remainder half were to be shot in the evening, the other half the following morning. Their graves had been dug by the ten heroes themselves. I have not the slightest hesitancy in calling them so.
Then a space was cleared, and Ivan Tistchenko, Feodor Lupin, Ivan Katayev, and Philip Kulikov were ordered forward. The first was Ivan Tistchenko. An officer and four cadets approached him. The officer asked him if he would agree to work. He answered "No," and crossed himself. His eyes were bound with a white 'kerchief, and these pitiless and unjust cadets fired at the order of the officer. Two bullets pierced his head and two his breast, and the brave fellow fell to the wet ground noiselessly and peacefully.
In the same manner the second, third, and fourth were treated. When the fifth was led forward he also refused to work, and they already had his eyes bound. But some one in the crowd exclaimed: "Halt—don't fire!" And the comrades asked for his life, all agreeing to go to work. And I never learned the identity of the chap who saved that fellow's life and many other lives.
We remained in that camp for two and a half months. Then we were removed closer to the front, to a locality inhabited by Italians. Our soldiers there would inquire from the Italian labourers, to whom the guards paid no attention, where the boundary lay. We learned the direction and the distance to the boundary, which was about thirty miles. It was even nearer to the Italian front. And so on Sept. 29 a comrade and I decided to escape.
(Some particulars of the escape have been deleted by the Russian censor.)
Toward dawn we emerged from the thick of the pine trees and bushes, and descended to the base of the mountain. At our feet was a stream, about fifty feet wide, rapid, and full of rocks. Here we made good use of our training in gymnastics. My comrade, a tall fellow, was light on his feet. He jumped like a squirrel from rock to rock. To me it seemed that I would slip and be swept away by the current. My comrade was already on the opposite shore when I, making my last jump, failed to gain the beach. Fortunately he was quick to stretch out to me his long stick, and drew me out of the water as wet as a lobster.
We walked along the stream all day without encountering anybody. At the end of the day we came in sight of a tiny village, but there were no people nor soldiers to be seen. Only near one house smoke was rising. We decided to approach stealthily and investigate. We saw an old woman at the fire, bending over a kettle of sweet corn. We surmised that the inhabitants of the village must have deserted it because of its proximity to the front, while the old woman refused to abandon her home.
We approached her and confessed that we were Russian soldiers. She thought long. What "Russian" meant she did not know, but she understood the meaning of the word "soldiers." She presented us with some of her sweet corn and pointed out the way to the Italian front.
III—"WE ESCAPED TO ITALIAN FRONTIER"
It was six in the evening when we came upon an advanced Italian post. The sentinel stopped us with a "Halt!" He was pointing his rifle at us, showing that he would shoot if we advanced. He called for his superior. We were searched and taken into their quarters. An officer soon came in. Through an interpreter he asked us for our names, regiments, and army branches. He gave each of us a package of cigarettes.
Only then I understood that we were received as guests. When the officer gave us the cigarettes, saying "Bravo, Russi!" the soldiers began showering us with cigarettes, chocolate, and confetti. One soldier guessed better than the rest; he brought us a dish of soup, meat, and a bottle of wine. After this there was a regular wedding feast. Each of the soldiers brought something to eat, cheese, butter, sardines. We, knowing our condition, abstained from eating too much. Thinking that on the following day we would have to suffer hunger again, we put all the presents into a bag presented us by one of the Italians. Thus we accumulated about fifteen pounds of bread, cheese, butter, chocolate, lard, and boiled beef. Then the Italians noticed that our clothes were wet, and began presenting us with underwear and clothing, so that we soon changed our appearance. We were anxious to converse with them. The interpreter, who spoke Russian imperfectly, had a great deal of work. Just the same, I will never in my life forget his first words in Russian, as he asked us, by order of the officer: "Who are you—brothers?" In tears we answered him that we were Russian officers escaped from captivity; he asked it so kindly, and we were infinitely gladdened by his sweet words.
The following day we were taken to the corps headquarters. Officers would come in, shake hands—some even kissed us, which embarrassed us. Unwittingly tears would come to our eyes when we recalled our life in the prison camp and this sudden change for the better.
The General also visited us. He pressed our hands, gave each of us a package of cigarettes, and presented us with 10 lire in gold. We wanted to decline the money, but the interpreter said, "Take," and we did.
We lived for about a month in Italy. What a noble people!—soldiers, civilians, and officers. It is impossible to describe! At every station (on the way to France) the public would surround us, all anxious to do us some favours, all showing their deep affection for the Russians. Once a Sister of Mercy was distributing coffee to our party as the train began to move. She ran along till the train gained full speed, desiring not to leave some of us without coffee. Our soldiers would wonder at the affection of the entire Italian people for the Russians, and would shout incessantly: "Viva Italia! Viva Italia!"
This article, by a German-American sailor on a Norwegian ship bound for Queenstown with a cargo of wheat, was communicated to L'Illustrazione Italiana, from which it is here translated for Current History.
I—"I WAS ON A NORWEGIAN SHIP"
The Norwegian ship on which I was embarked was nearing the Irish Channel. The afternoon was misty, the sea rough. We were warned by an English steamer of the presence of German submarines in the vicinity. There was a certain depression among those on board.
I asked the Captain if there were anything to do. "No," he answered. Boom! a cannon shot was heard at the very moment. General confusion. All the men ran up on deck and looked about, terrified. Boom! another cannon shot. Then one of the German sailors, pointing to a spot on the horizon, said: "A German submarine."
It was true. The black spot grew rapidly larger, and then one could make out some human figures near the small cannon on the deck. It was the famous U-39. We hoisted our flag and awaited events. The Captain sent the mate with our ship's papers over to the submarine, which was now near. Soon those who were not German received orders to take to the boats. The Germans were taken on board the U-39, I among them. When this was done our ship was sunk.
So there I was on board a submarine. The impression of it was strange enough. The first evening, quite exhausted, I threw myself down in a corner. I heard a few short orders, then the sound of the machinery.... After that everything was in absolute silence. Some said we were navigating at such a depth that big ships could pass overhead of us.... I fell asleep.
Next day on waking I tried to get my bearings. We Germans were treated as friends. We were permitted to go about everywhere.
The boat had the shape of a gigantic cigar, about 200 feet long, divided into numerous compartments. They were full of shining instruments. Now there was a buzzing sound, like the inside of a bee-hive, now absolute silence reigned. Every nerve was tense with the expectation of the orders on which our lives depended. Toward the prow was the room from which the torpedo was launched, a room full of tubes and valves. The officers' lodgings are very restricted, since the space on board a submarine proscribes any comfort. The commander was Lieut. Capt. Foerstner, a tall young man, thin and pale—which is not surprising, since he never had a moment's repose; neither he nor the men of the crew ever got their clothes off during the twelve days I was on board.
The periscope, the eye of the submarine, made known to us everything that took place on the surface of the water, and it did so with such clearness that it was almost like looking through a telescope. There was always a man on watch there.
II—"I WAS ABOARD THE U-39"
Suddenly a ship comes in sight. Its smoke is like a black line drawn on the horizon. A bell rings. It is a signal for each man to be at his post. The U-39 slowly rises to the surface. A last look is given at the mirror of the periscope; no English coast guard is in sight. So everything is ready for action. We hear the command, "Empty the water cistern." Freed from her ballast, the submarine rises to the surface. "Both engines ahead at full speed!" The boat cleaves her way through the water that cascades her sides with foam. In a short time the ship is reached. The submarine hoists her flag and fires a cannon shot. No flag betrays the nationality of the captured ship, but we can read the name, Gadsby, on her side. She is English. We signal that her whole crew is to take to the lifeboats, and quickly! At any moment we may be surprised.
Through the megaphone we indicate to the men the nearest way to land; then a cannon shot, then a second one. The captured ship, after pitching for a while, sinks.
The time necessary for the sinking of a ship differs considerably in different cases. Some disappear in five minutes, others float for several hours. The finest spectacle I witnessed was the sinking of the Fiery Cross. The crew received orders to get off in the boats. Some of our men rowed up close to the abandoned ship and attached hand grenades to her sides. They were fired and the three-master was blown up with all her sails spread and set. The hull and the rigging went down to the depths, but the sails spread out on the surface of the water like so many little fields of polar ice. Eleven ships were destroyed during my stay on board. Quite a number of others were captured, besides these, but they were let go again.
This trip, which I shall never forget, lasted twelve days. It was dangerous, but it was exciting and so fine that I would not have missed it for anything in the world.
This is a tragic story of a night fight in snow-buried barbed wire entanglements where a whole German battalion perished. It comes from Petrograd to Montgomery Schuyler in the form of a letter from a Russian officer.
I—TRAGIC STORY OF A NIGHT FIGHT
"We were creeping across the snow, when we hear a frightened 'Wer kommt da?'
"'Hold on, Germans! Where the devil do they come from?' ask our men in surprise. 'Are they numerous?'
"'Wer ist da?' we hear again.
"Our only reply is to fire by the squad, and then again. The Germans are a little surprised, but pull themselves together and return the fire. It is dark and neither side can see the other. In groping about, we finally meet, and it is give and take with the bayonet. We strike in silence, but bullets are falling about us like rain. Nobody knows who is firing and every one is crying in his own language, 'Don't fire! Stop!' From the side where the firing comes from, beyond and to the right, they are yelling at us, both in German and Russian, 'What's the matter? Where are you?'
"Our men cry to the Germans, 'Surrender!'
"They answer: 'Throw down your arms. We have surrounded you and you are all prisoners.'
"Wild with rage, we throw ourselves forward with the bayonet, pushing the enemy back along the trenches. In their holes the Germans cry, peering into the impenetrable darkness, 'Help! Don't fire! Bayonet them!' Hundreds of shouts answer them, like a wave rolling in on us from every hand.
"'Oh, little brothers, their force is numberless. We are surrounded on three sides. Would it not be better to surrender?' cries some one with a sob.
"'Crack him over the head! Pull out his tongue! Drive him to the Germans with the bayonet!' are the growling comments this evokes.
"A command rings out, vibrating like a cord: 'Rear ranks, wheel, fire, fire!'
"The crowd before us yells, moves, and seems to stop. But behind them new ranks groan and approach. Anew the command is given, 'Fire, fire!'
"Cries and groans answer the fusillade and a hand-to-hand struggle along the trenches ensues.
"German shouts are heard: 'Help! Here, this way! Fall on their backs!'
"But it is we who fall on their backs. We pry them out and clear the trenches.
"In front of us all is quiet. On the right we hear the Germans struggling, growling, repeating the commands of the officers: 'Vorwärts! Vorwärts!' But nobody fires and nobody attacks our trenches. We fire in the general direction of the German voices, infrequent shots far apart answer us. The commands of 'Vorwärts' have stopped. They are at the foot of the trenches, but they do not storm them. 'After them with the bayonet,' our men cry, 'Finish them as we finished the others.'
"'Halt, boys,' calls the sharp, vibrating voice of our commander. 'This may be only another German trick. They don't come on; we are firing and they do not answer. Shoot further and lower. Fire!'"
II—"SO PERISHED A WHOLE BATTALION"
"New cries and groans come from the Germans, followed by some isolated shots, which fly high above us. After five or six rounds silence settles upon the trenches and continues unbroken. 'What can this mean?' wonder our men. 'Have we exterminated them all?'
"'Excellency, permit me to go and feel around,' offers S., chief scout, already decorated with the Cross of St. George.
"'Wait, I am going to look into it myself.'
"The officer lights a little electric lamp, and prudently sticks his arm above the rampart. The light does not draw a single shot. We peer cautiously over and see, almost within reach of our hands, the Germans lying in ranks, piled on top of one another.
"'Excellency,' the soldiers marvel, 'they are all dead. They don't move, or are they pretending?'
"The officer raises himself and directs the rays from his lamp on the heaps. We see that they are buried in the snow up to the waist, or to the neck, but none of them moves. The officer throws the light right and left, and shows us hundreds of Germans extended, their fallen rifles sticking up in the snow like planted things.
"'I don't understand,' he mutters.
"'Excellency, I am going to see,' says the chief scout.
"'Go on,' the officer consents, 'and you, boys, have your rifles ready and fire at anything suspicious without waiting for orders from me.'
"S. gets out of the trench and immediately disappears, swallowed by the soft snow up to the neck. He tries to get one leg out, but without success. He tries to lean on one hand, pushes it down into the snow, then pulls hard and swears. His hands are frightfully scratched; the blood tinges the snow with dark blotches.
"'It's the barbed wire defenses,' he cries. 'Help me, little brothers. Alone I can do nothing.'
"We catch him by the collar of his tunic, and with difficulty pull him out. His coat, trousers, boots are in shreds.
"'Thousand devils,' he swears. 'I have no legs left. They're scratched to pieces.'
"The officer understands: the trenches are defended by intrenchments of barbed wire. The snow had covered and piled high above them. The whole battalion we had seen had rushed forward to the help of those who had called and had got mixed up in the wires. The first over had sunk into the snow and disappeared. Those coming after had stepped on them, passed on, become entangled wires, and had fallen in turn under our hail of lead. Rank on rank, ignorant of what had happened and rushing on like wild animals, had shared the fate of their comrades. So perished a whole battalion."