Kitchener's Mob: Adventures of an American in the British Army

with certainty. During the long stalemate on the western front, British military organization has been perfected until, in times of quiet,

ere told, the delay was due to mine-sweeping in the Channel.) With every detail of military routine carefully thought out and every pos

had been filled,-an act of courtesy between battalions,-the dugouts thoroughly cleaned, and the refuse buried. The process of "taking over" was a very brief one. The sentries of the incoming battalion

whenever possible, and for several weeks we were within marching distance of one. There we received a fresh change of underclothing, and our uniforms were fumigated while we splashed and scrubbed in great vats of clean warm water. The order, "Everybody out!" was obeyed with gr

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the whitewash

din' us to

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s really glad that he had no choice but to submit. In the trenches there was little opportunity for vigorous exercise, and our arms and legs became stiff with the long inactivity. Throughout the mornings we were busy with a multitude of duties. Arms and equipment were cleaned and inspected, mac

ing was to play in trench warfare. Her experts in explosives were set to work, and by the time we were ready for active service, ten or a dozen varieties of bombs were in use, all of them made in the munition factories in England. The "hairbrush," the "lemon bomb," the "cricket ball," and the "policeman's truncheon" were the most important of these, all of them so-called because of their resemblance to the artic

, jumping in and out of successive lines of trenches, where dummy figures-clad in the uniforms of German

it gave him the wherewithal to satisfy the promptings of his sporting blood. Our fortnightly allowance of from five to ten francs was not a princely sum; but in pennies and halfpennies, it was quite enough to provide many hours of absorbing amusement. Tommy gambled because he could

to go, or because of that indomitable, unconquerable spirit which is characteristic of the French. There are few British soldiers along the western front who do not have memories of

eplenished daily. I think she made long journeys to the other side of the town, bringing back fresh supplies in a pushcart which stood outside her door. Her cottage, which was less than a mile from our first-line trenches, was partly in ruins. I couldn't understand her being there in such danger. Evidently it

towns and villages back of the German lines. My curiosity got the better of my courtesy, and I asked her, in my poor French, why she was

Mes enfan

story, and I would have been a beast to have asked more. In some way she had become separated from them, a

sk her life daily, that she might put by something for the long hard years which would follow the war. To me she is the

ow completely it cut Europe in half, separating friends and relatives as thousands of miles of ocean could not have done. Roads crossed from one side to the other, but they

en the German artillery were shelling the town in the usual hit-or-miss fashion. The enemy knew, of course, that many of our troops in reserve were billeted there, and they searched for them daily. Doubtless they would have destroyed the town long ago had it

ection. The cloud of brick dust shone like gold in the sun. A moment later, a fleshy peasant woman, wearing wooden shoes, turned out of an adjoining street and ran awkwardly toward the scene of the explosion. Her movements were so clumsy and slow, in prop

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and comforting her, and shielding her with her body, instinctively, at the sound of another exp

little trickle of civilian life made scarcely an impression in the broad current of military activity. A solitary postman, with a mere handful of letters, made his morning rounds of echoing streets, and a bent old man with newspapers hobbled slowly along the Rue Sadi-Carnot shouting, "Le Matin! Le Journal!" to boarded windows and bolted doors. Meanwhile, we marched back and fort

ith such preparation we had constantly to revise downward our standards. We lived without comforts which formerly we had regarded as absolutely essential. We lived a life so crude and rough that our army experiences in England seemed Utopian by comparison. But we throve splendidly. A government, paternalistic in its solicitude for

by day, but so gradually that we had been given time to forget that we had ever known the security of civilian life. We were soon to experience the indescribable horrors

tivity along the entire front. The men noted with great satisfaction that the shells from our own batteries were of

say, nodding his head wisely. "'E's a long w'ile gettin' re

oliers of ammunition and their gas helmets; and they were thoughtful about keeping their metal pocket mirrors and their cigarette cases in

impatience, for we knew that this general bombardment was but a preliminary one for the purpose of concealing, until the last moment, the plan of attack, the portion of the front where the great artillery concentration would be made and the infantry assault pushed home. Then came sudden orders