The Wonder of War on Land

avily over the Aisne Valley and the plain of Champagne,

tched each other across a narrow, noisome waste, now and forever to bec

an's

expose themselves to the unsated appetite of hungry slaughter, tens of thous

a gray sky, a

p holes like the festering sores of a foul disease. Not a blade of grass, not a weed, not a shrub remained; where leafy

r, such as those who had driven forward at La F

o

o save the guns, when men met i

o

squadrons with saber or with lance c

o

he great retreat; that had hurled themselves at each other with equal fury in the attack or the defense of Paris; that had charged up the sl

all

indeed,

g

qualify when his work as a motor cyclist was done, looked at the smitten world. He tried to compare the w

as ever seen could the War

ry evening and morning, yielded up its line of staggering, weary, war-dulled figures, glad to exchange the peril of death for

er, only a war of mur

here wasn't any weather to put it to the proof," the boy had puzzled over this new warfare. At last, one day, the opportunity se

of "Le

ley of

hell, forming a barrage fire through which t

d a range of only a couple of hundred yards, a modern rifle will fire thirty shots a minute and over, and has a good killing range at an almost flat trajectory of a thousand yards. Suppose it takes

under cover to face th

is estimated as being equal to fifty men, but, in reality, its destructiveness in the hands of a good gunner is far higher. It's easy to handle

h is

so hot that it boils the water and the enemy can see the steam. Then he knows where you

y counts," s

e a flat trajectory, when they do strike the ground, they do it at a very slight angle. If your head is ten inches below the level of the ground, a thousand

course, it is far harder to aim exactly and to time to the second. A shrapnel shell holds 300 bullets and a 'Soixante-Quinze' can fire fifteen shells a minute. That means that one gun can send 4500 bullets a minute into an advancing enemy, the bullets scattering in a fan shape from

est thing in the world, no matter if it's wet and slimy, full of smells and black with dried blood. The worst pool of filth would be a haven of refuge if only you coul

look down on our trenches. I was only in the air a few minutes and we didn't go very high, but, although I know this section pretty well,

little like that, with the communication trenches for the cross-threads. But

and enfilade you. Then a trench that wavers in long uneven lines is much safer against shell-fire, for, supposing that the enemy does get the range of

straight line, because there are no straight lines in nature. That's why we've had to s

n thought it silly to make them so that two people can hardly squeez

pthrown earth forming a parapet. It should be recessed here and there, and traversed. To pass a man, you have to slide sidewa

ion trenches from one line to another are always best as tunnels, though sometimes they are open. Our trenches here are open, but," the vetera

so bad," said the lad, "if

in the ground and it rains-as it does nearly all the time in this wretched northern country-the water is going to run into those holes. If you bale it out

oks exactly like another and they're all twisting

my little section, of course, and each officer has learned the tangle of trenches in which his command is likely to operate. But the officers have to know the tangle of the enemy's trenches, too, and, what's more, when we atta

n they find

ghtsmen," came the reply. "You've heard

red Horace,

higher ground than ours at that point, so that nothing could be seen from the fire trench. The young draughtsman went up in a machine several times, but there was a very effici

o Man's Land and wiped them out. As soon as the return fire slackened, the draughtsman, who had been in one of the dug-outs, crawled

ressed himself in the dead man's uniform, read carefully all the papers in the poc

with the relief and return again,' he said, 'as soon as I get to the trench I'll bolt out of it, holding my left arm stretched out straight. You'll know by that, it's me. They'll pot me from behi

t you to ribbons

ged his s

d if I'm not and you kill me, then it's

out and drag me in. I've got an indelible pencil,

he

all that night, all the next day and all the nex

ly, one of ou

e he

out straight and began a bolt across No Man's Land. He was running like a hare, but three or four rifles spoke. He dropped, wounded, and began to cr

t wriggle

o crawl up to him, much less a man. Then, when night came, some of

the

uld be," the veteran answered, "and underneath was

ctor

when it comes to hero

fight differently. They make far fewer night attacks than we do, and far more mines. Ther

patrol,'" put in the lad; "tell me, Serg

swered the vete

se, but

er came,

in

cts of those most terrible of

"Illustrated

rol Trapped b

"Illustrated

Sappers on a Li

nition; when there is a concentration of artillery to support the trenches on both sides, nobody can do much. Of course, they shell us all the time, and we shell them. They send over rifle-bombs and we

a 'Minne

me is the 'Krupp trench howitzer.' It weighs only 120 pounds-at least one of them that we captured, weighed that-and

d the boy. "You can't squeeze a 16-

ursting charge of 86 pounds of tri-nitro-toluol. The shell is bored to the center. You shove one end of the iron rod into the gun so that it sticks out about eight inches beyond the muzzle. Then you put the

it g

e bomb is 1244 feet and it takes eight seconds to come. That's the only good thing about it, sometimes you can hear it coming soon enough to

lery until they come right below an important point, maybe an officers' dug-out or a grenade depot. Then they burrow upwards a bit, and put in a tremendous charge of explosive, melinite or something like that, and fix an electric wire. The earth

om it and we've gained a hundred yards and can pepper the Boche trenches from their rear. A mine's a great thing, although, sometimes, it costs more men to consolidate and hold a place like that than to

and during the night. By approaching near the enemy trenches, listening with their ears to the ground, the men can hear if there is any one at work under them. T

e is driving a mine under you? Do you dese

an almost

t a tunnel from our side, right below the other. Then, when they're working busily, a little explosio

d be so dangerous, then," said the boy, "i

only chance is to lie still, like a dead man. But, lots of times, even if they think you're dead they'll turn a machine-gun on you, just to make sure. You don't have

and stared out i

are a pickax and a spade for digging trenches-and graves. And-I wanted to be an officer!" He stared out

en now!" sa

flashed back into the dull eyes and

ad them till we drive the Germans back f

arious duties with swing an

asing in intensity. The clouds hung low, muffling the resonance and emphasizing the sharp reports of the cannon. The moist, sluggish air, full of unimaginable odors, be

appearance of wagon-loads of wire. One

some dodging of b

the number of deaths which have been caused by that entr

The st

The ma

licious glee and holds him fast to

t, which throws its snaky coils around the

trickery, of malign expectancy

ont, 12,000 standards and 12,000 pickets must be used. Withal, that thousand miles of wire has cost a thousand lives

re than is used by the Allies, with curved barbs, altogether a more efficient thing in itself. But, by reason of that very solidity, it affords greater resistance t

-rests, afterwards staked to the ground. It stretches over a wide space, as a rule, with the result that while shell-f

esistance that shell-fire, however much it may blow the coils into the air, only entangles it the more. The spiral coils retain their form. Moreover, most important of all, it cannot

strengthening of wire under an

were prepari

it in the tramping of feet as re?nforcements ca

re the u

the terror

nger, picked for occasions when savage ferocity is

of "The

ank Cutt

of the French design compared with the

h-green, and their muddy helmets displaying the crescent instead of our grenade. From flat or angular faces, burnished like new coins, one would say that their eyes shine like balls of ivory

and secret, like the threat of a snare suddenly found at your feet. These men are drunk with eagerness for the bayonet and

ce, also, to

assault wa

he sun of North Africa, endure the cold and wet of the muddy trench. They are the troops of the advance. There

hboard, plugged calls to distant quarters for re?nforcements. Everywhere along the line,

rench, communication trench and their living defenders being blown into an unrecognizable, pockma

e and there with frantic cries that the appalling nerve-racking din might cease, even for a s

g aeroplanes overhead like vultures waiting to swoop do

lets, the baby's wail of falling torpedoes, the spattering "whit" "whit" of ricochetting fuses, the six-fold squall of the

-inch gun was bodily tearing holes and men in the enemy's trenches. The long thin Rimailho sent its 5.9-inch shell with the swift flight of a vengeful meteor and th

ere redoubled. Extra supplies of bom

grim, stood the Moroccan brigad

nt to sleep, for sleep was impo

ver commence an assault before midnight. At half-past eleven o'clock, Ho

g flame shut off the German lines

red, green and white, writing

illuminated the gruesome zone of No M

hing moved. Its pallid still

anxiously at the watches

. They even laughed in eagerness. It was a ja

icious crackle of rifles far to the left su

of German wire-cutters, trying to sn

-a-a-

itched headlong. The young officer, wou

ra

rpshooter does not miss. The figure

far to the rear, began to draw forward. It approached the rear o

he officer

oy answered,

d in the roof of the dug-out. A flying piece of c

the boy aske

ng! My

phoned

lter-trench. They dislike the underground, but

ades fall like

een wires running to the switchboard is working. Horace is on

ines, making the whole army tingle like

s in activity o

carrying out the wound

it will never return alive. It is met by a storm of rifle-fire, b

gap, throwing coils here and there and

ts peer over the zone of destr

that-a

nig

s burst from trench mort

of the fingers of a thousand dead, cease their gro

y c

s of that intense lig

ng, falling, crawling men. The gray-white expa

ave plunges. It is the end, su

ot kill them all. With two-thirds dead, ten thousand men break through. They plunge

come nea

holds hi

ir

uous river of lightning, the wave is seen to waver. Some fall flat, others sink down quietly, others, again, drop to hands and knees and crawl

y by scores, by hundreds every m

res in their own nightmares, they leap into the trench

utt and the

the trench but the

ine gun a specia

ough the barrage fire again and dashe

hat i

75

o the second, breaks loose behind the French lines. The second

y are driven on to d

nd to hand struggle in the trench is near

e thir

f bodies are thrown in the air. Dozens are

ment h

cans!

eap over the parapet, but the

wave break

my childre

officers runs

have failed. Now is the counter-assault. N

my childre

shrapnel and their wire entanglements stretch before us. The French fall a

children, they

re against a repetition of the assault. With coun

day break

ead and No Man's Land is a

solate as ever, the long line of trenches str

d endeavor, the agony, the slaughter

th

és can say, whether sent out fr

s attack wa

ing been

d. Aggression, greed, and hate have made another violent effort to win a strip of territory for their be

blesses with the hope of the future the soldier who will recover and eases the pain of him who looks upon his last sun; it shows the African sharpening his steel fo

oes

ommuniqué

violent assault