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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..d7b82bc --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,4 @@ +*.txt text eol=lf +*.htm text eol=lf +*.html text eol=lf +*.md text eol=lf diff --git a/LICENSE.txt b/LICENSE.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6312041 --- /dev/null +++ b/LICENSE.txt @@ -0,0 +1,11 @@ +This eBook, including all associated images, markup, improvements, +metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be +in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES. + +Procedures for determining public domain status are described in +the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org. + +No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in +jurisdictions other than the United States. Anyone seeking to utilize +this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright +status under the laws that apply to them. diff --git a/README.md b/README.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..f646d07 --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #63637 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/63637) diff --git a/old/63637-0.txt b/old/63637-0.txt deleted file mode 100644 index 93b4efb..0000000 --- a/old/63637-0.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,3533 +0,0 @@ -The Project Gutenberg EBook of A Village in Picardy, by Ruth Gaines - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and -most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions -whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms -of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at -www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you -will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before -using this ebook. - -Title: A Village in Picardy - -Author: Ruth Gaines - -Illustrator: Francisque Poulbot - -Contributor: William Allan Neilson - -Release Date: November 04, 2020 [EBook #63637] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: UTF-8 - -Produced by: ellinora and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at - https://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images - generously made available by The Internet Archive/Canadian - Libraries) - -*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A VILLAGE IN PICARDY *** - - - - - -A VILLAGE IN PICARDY - -[Illustration: A WELL-KNOWN TUNE] - - - - - A VILLAGE IN - PICARDY - - BY - RUTH GAINES - AUTHOR OF “THE VILLAGE SHIELD,” ETC. - - WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY - WILLIAM ALLAN NEILSON - _President of Smith College_ - - [Illustration] - - NEW YORK - E. P. DUTTON & COMPANY - 681 FIFTH AVENUE - - COPYRIGHT, 1918, - BY E. P. DUTTON & COMPANY - - _All Rights Reserved_ - - Printed in the United States of America - - - - -PREFACE. - - -The history and the work of the Smith College Relief Unit in the Somme -is known wherever reconstruction work in France is spoken of. This brief -account does not purport to give anything but a small cross-section, the -picture of but one of the villages in our care. It is told in the first -person to make the telling easier. As I have said, of all our villages, -Canizy was the most beloved. All the Unit had a share in it. - -The picture is given as it was seen day by day. What was true in this -section, may not be true in another. Here the German retreat was so -rapid that the devastation, though appalling, was not complete; whole -avenues of trees were left standing in places, and only two churches were -dynamited, by contrast with the two hundred and twenty-five destroyed -throughout the _région dévastée_. It was perhaps in more calculated ways -that the Prussians here vented their spite; in the burning of family -pictures, the wrecking of machinery, the cutting of the trees about the -Calvaries, and the taking away of the bells from the church towers. They -left behind them here, as everywhere, ruin and silence; a silence of -industry, of agriculture, of all the normal ways of life; a silence which -has given the plain of Picardy the name of “The Land of Death.” - - RUTH GAINES. - - - - -CONTENTS - - - CHAPTER PAGE - - I UN VILLAGE TOUT OUBLIÉ 3 - - II LE CHÂTEAU DE BON-SÉJOUR 16 - - III M. LE MAIRE 35 - - IV O CRUX, AVE! 48 - - V MME. GABRIELLE 61 - - VI VOILÀ LA MISÈRE 74 - - VII NOUS SOMMES DIX 88 - - VIII UNE DISTRIBUTION DE DONS 100 - - IX EN PERMISSION 113 - - X A LA FERME DU CALVAIRE 129 - - XI LES PETITS SOLDATS 139 - - XII M. L’AUMÔNIER 151 - - XIII HEUREUX NOËL 162 - - XIV FIDELISSIMA, PICARDIE 176 - - - - -ILLUSTRATIONS[1] - - - A Well-Known Tune _Frontispiece_ - - Map of the German Retreat[2] 2 - - “They are over there” 12 - - “What, another little Brother!” 17 - - “Only that much Bread!” 44 - - “Is that wounded Man a Boche?” 51 - - “He is big already” 58 - - “I didn’t do that!” 63 - - “Once, before the War, the _Pralines_ were two for a Sou” 80 - - “A Cut of a Sword-scabbard!” 114 - - “If I were grown up!” 124 - - “Our House used to be there!” 132 - - “And do the little Boche children hug their Father?” 143 - - “Company, halt!” 148 - - “If it hadn’t been for the Officer....” 157 - - “He has not come. He has been mobilized....” 165 - - “Well, if we don’t see Santa Claus, we may see a Zeppelin” 171 - - “And if it freezes to-night?” 174 - - “Oh yes, Papa is strong!” 182 - - Plan of the Village 188 - - - - -INTRODUCTORY NOTE - - -No one, it may safely be said, can see this war as a whole. The nations -taking part in it girdle the world, and no people is unaffected by it. -Real knowledge can be gained of only comparatively small sections of the -conflict, and we are grateful to those who, knowing a small section, -give us a faithful account of their own observation and experience, and -refrain from speculation and generalisation. - -Among the infinitude of tragedies few have appealed more poignantly to -our imaginations than those involved in the devastation of Picardy; and -among the attempts at salvage few details have attracted the sympathetic -attention of America more powerfully than the efforts of the Smith -College Relief Unit. Their heroic persistence in the work of evacuation -under the very guns of the great offensive of March, 1918, made the -members of the Unit suddenly conspicuous; but the more picturesque feats -of that terrible emergency had been preceded by a long winter of quiet -work. The material results were largely wiped out; the spiritual results -will remain. It is the method of that work as carried on in a single -village that is described in this little book. When we have read it we -know what kind of people these were who clung to the remnants of their -homes in the midst of desolation. Their character and temper are depicted -with kindly candour; they were very human and very much worth saving. -When the time comes for reconstruction on a large scale, such an account -as this will be of value in enabling us to realise the nature of the task -and in teaching us how to set about it. - -Smith College is proud of what these graduates have done and are doing; -and this note is written to assure the Unit rather than the outside world -that those who have to stay at home see and understand. - - WILLIAM ALLAN NEILSON. - -_Smith College, Northampton, Mass._ - - - - -A VILLAGE IN PICARDY - -[Illustration: THE GERMAN RETREAT] - - - - -CHAPTER I - -UN VILLAGE TOUT OUBLIÉ - - -As a relief visitor, in a Unit authorized by the French Government _au -secours dans la région dévastée_, I have lived recently in the Department -of the Somme. There I had in my care a village with a personality which -I venture to think is typical of Picardy. As such, I would present it to -you. - -It was on a winter’s morning, by snow and lantern light, that I traversed -for the last time a road grown familiar to me through months of use, -the road which led from our encampment, known as that of the “Dames -Américaines” at Grécourt, past the railroad station of Hombleux to -the hamlet of Canizy. It leads elsewhere, of course, this road; to -the military highway for instance, which has already seen in the last -three years three momentous troop movements: the advance and retreat -of the French, the advance and retreat of the Germans, and, again, the -victorious sweep of the French and British armies which reclaimed, -just a year ago, the valleys of the Somme. It leads to the front, that -fluctuating line, some twelve miles distant, in the shelter of which we -have lived and worked for the ruined countryside. It is an important -route, on some occasions choked with artillery, on others with blue -columned infantry swinging down its vista arched with elms. Officers’ -cars flash by there, and deafening _camions_. But for me, until this the -morning of my departure, it has led to Canizy. - -There is no longer a station at Hombleux, because the Germans destroyed -it. One therefore paces the platform and stamps one’s feet with the -cold. Down the track, from the direction of Canizy, the headlight of -the engine will presently emerge. All about, the plain lies white and -level; the break in the hedge where a footpath crosses the tracks to the -village is almost visible. In fancy, I take it, past a fire-gutted farm -house and eastward on a long curve across fields where the snow hides -an untilled growth of weeds. The highway which parallels the railroad, -recedes in a perspective of marching trees, till, topping a little -rise, a wooden scaffold stands clear against the sky. It was formerly a -German observation post. To the left, equally gaunt, rises the Calvary -which marks the entrance to the village. And beyond, cupped in a gentle -declivity, lie the ruins of Canizy, framed in snow. So I saw it last; so -all the way to Amiens, and from Amiens to Paris, as the train bore me -away, I saw it; so in its misery and its beauty, I would picture it to -you. - -You will not find my hamlet on any map of the _région dévastée_ with -which I am familiar; it is not listed among the destroyed villages of -the Department, although it was looted, dynamited and defaced, even -to the cutting of the oak trees about its Calvary. You would have to -search minutely in history for any mention of it among the King’s -towns of Picardy which became famous in guarding his frontier of the -Somme. Comparatively modern and quite insignificant, it lies beside a -tree-bordered, dyked canal, one of many which tapped the rich plain and -bore the produce of farm and garden to the market centres, of Péronne, -Ham and St. Quentin. To this canal sloped its fields of chicory, leeks, -pumpkins, potatoes, turnips, carrots and other garden truck. Crooked -lanes, brick-walled or faced with trim brick cottages, led from it back -through the village to higher ground. There, before the war, the _grands -cultivateurs_, such as M. le Maire, and M. Lanne, who rents the old -Château, would have ploughed and sown their winter wheat. - -In those days, Canizy had a railroad also, and I have heard how for -three sous one could travel by it to Nesle. It took only eight minutes -then,—but now! By it as well, one went more quickly than by canal to St. -Quentin or Péronne with perhaps a hundred huge baskets of vegetables -on market day. But the Germans tore up the bed of the railroad and -destroyed the locks of the canal. They blew up, too, the bridge on the -main highway which used to pass the Calvary at the foot of the village -street. Cut off, reached only by a circuitous and deep-rutted road which -is impassable at certain hours every day owing to _mitrailleuse_ practice -across it, Canizy lapsed into oblivion. As its mayor said on our first -visit, “Look you, it has been quite forgotten,—_c’est un village tout -oublié_.” - -In 1914, Canizy had 445 inhabitants. Of these, there were perhaps half -a dozen substantially well off, such as M. le Maire, possessing ten -hectares of wheat land, a herd of seven cows, four horses, thirty rabbits -and fifty hens. Besides, M. le Maire, or his wife, was proprietor of one -of the three village _épiceries_. Joined with him in respectful mention -by the townspeople are the lessee of the Château, and various owners -of property not only in Canizy but in the surrounding country. Of these -gentry, not one apparently had been made prisoner by the Germans. They -were to be found on their other estates, at Compiègne, at Ham, or in -Paris. Even the real mayor was an absentee, so that the acting mayor, -lame, red-faced and heady-eyed, was the only representative of landed -interests left in the little town. He had had, however, a dozen or more -neighbours scarcely less comfortably provided with worldly goods than -himself: M. Picard, for instance, who owned extensive market gardens -and employed six workers in the fields. He it was who did not suffer -even during the German occupation, for was he not placed in charge of -the _ravitaillement_? And though his friends the Germans took him away -with them, a prisoner, did not his wife and children live well on his -buried money, eh? _O, Mme. Picard, elle était riche._ There were the -Tourets, two brothers, who held connecting high-walled gardens in the -centre of the village, and their next door neighbour, the comely widow, -Mme. Gabrielle. Directly opposite ranged the Cordier farm, comprising an -orchard of 360 trees, ten cows, two bulls, one ox, eighty-seven pigs, -three horses, one hundred and fifty chickens, and one hundred and fifty -rabbits. Smaller cottages there were, some rented, but most of them -owned, where the families raised just enough for their own necessities, -or worked for their more prosperous townsfolk. There were the village -cobbler, the two store keepers who competed with the mayor, a sprinkling -of factory hands who walked along the dyke a mile and a half to work in -the brush factory at Offoy, and last on the street, but not least in -social importance, the domestics of the Château. There were, too, the -poor whom one has always; but in Canizy, so far as I could learn, they -consisted of but two shiftless families. - -The civic life of the village centred about its public school and its -teacher, and, of course, its curé and its church. The monotony of toil -was relieved by market days and fête days and first communions and -neighbourhood gatherings. Of these last I have seen a few pictures, -groups of wrinkled grandparents and sturdy sons and grandchildren stiffly -posed in Sunday best, yet happy in spite of it. Behind them pleached -pear trees or grape vines make an appliqué against a patterned brick -wall. But there are not many of the pictures even left, for you will -understand, the Germans systematically searched them out and burned them -in great piles. The one that I remember best, a poor mother had torn out -of its frame the night of her flight. “I could not think well,” she said. -“The Boches had wrenched my Coralie away—so lovely a child that every -one on the streets of Ham turned to look at her curls as she walked—but -I did save this. See, there she is,—how pretty and good, and that is -my eldest, a soldier. He is dead. And that, with the accordion, is my -seventeen-year-old Raoul, like his sister, a _prisonnier civil_. What do -the Boches do, think you,” she continued, “with such? One hears nothing, -nothing. Never a letter, never a message. Even when Mme. Lefèvre and Mme. -Ponchon returned, they brought no word. The prisoners, evidently they are -separated. One is told that they work and starve,—that is all.” - -A community so homogeneous in its interests, was bound to link itself -intimately by marriage as well. The intricacies of the family trees of -Canizy were a source of constant mental effort, as one discovered that -Mme. Gense was really Mme. Butin, that is, she had at least married M. -Butin, and that Germaine Tabary was so called because she was living with -her maternal grandparents, whereas her father’s name again was Gense, and -her mother was known by the sounding title of Mme. Gense-Tabary. “But -why these distinctions?” one continually demanded upon unravelling the -puzzles for purposes of record. “Because, otherwise, one would become -confused,” was the reply. - -[Illustration: —_Ils sont là!!!_ - -[They are over there!!!]] - -Such, peaceful, prosperous, yet stirred by family bickerings enough to -spice its days, was Canizy before the war. - -Canizy to-day numbers just one hundred souls, fifty being children and -fifty adults. It was in March, 1917, that the village was blotted out. -Two years and a half of German occupation preceded that event. In every -house German soldiers had been billeted; one sees now on the door posts -the number of officers and men allotted, or the last warning, perhaps, in -regard to concealed fire-arms. For two years and a half the inhabitants -had been prisoners, for the same length of time there had been no school -and no mass. Yet the villagers do not speak unkindly of their conquerors. -They fared better than many, for they fell to the lot of the Bavarians, -who are reputed to be more humane than the Prussians. Besides, Picardy is -inured to invasions, which for centuries have swept across her plains. -By them, fortitude has been inbred. - -But one day last spring, the Bavarians filed away northward. Prussians -succeeded them. Quickly came the order for the villagers to evacuate -their homes. At the same time, the able-bodied, men and women, youths and -maidens, were seized and held. Weeping mothers, tottering grandfathers, -and helpless children,—the remnant,—were driven forth with what scant -possessions they could snatch, to the town of Voyennes, four kilometres -away. There, huddled with the like refugees of other villages, they -remained ten days. From it they could see the ascending smoke, black -by day and red by night, and hear the detonations which marked the -destruction of their homes. They returned to the blackened ruins,—as, -in the words of a historian of the Thirty Years’ War, their ancestors -had done. “Les paysans,” he says, “qui avaient survécu à tant de -désastres étaient accourus dans leurs villages aussitôt que les ennemis -s’éloignèrent de ce champ de carnage. Mais, sans ressources d’aucune -sorte, sans habitations, sans chevaux, sans bestiaux, sans instruments -de culture, sans grains pour la semence, que pouvaient-ils faire? -Mourir——”[3] - -But our villagers, though equally pillaged in the year 1917, were not -doomed to death. The Germans had retreated before the advancing French -and British armies, and the ruins of Canizy ere long were held by -Scottish troops. - - - - -CHAPTER II - -LE CHÂTEAU DE BON-SÉJOUR - - -In Canizy, after the Germans were through with it, not one of its -forty-seven houses stood intact. Most were roofless shells, or fallen -heaps of brick. An occasional ell, a barn, a rabbit hutch, or a chicken -house,—such were the shelters into which the returning villagers crept. -Nor was there furniture. Pillage had preceded destruction and loaded -wagons had borne away the plunder of household linen, feather mattresses, -clothes presses, chairs or anything practicable, into Germany. Scattered -through the ruins to this day lie iron bedsteads twisted by fire, the -metal stands of the housewives’ sewing machines, broken farm tools and -fire-cracked stoves. One day, beside a half-demolished wall, I came upon -a group of little girls playing house. They had marked off their rooms -with broken bricks, set up for a stove a rusty brazier, and stocked their -imaginary cupboards with fragments of gay china. A grey, drizzling day -it was, and their toy _ménage_ had no roof. But was it more cheerless -than the hovels they called their homes, where their mothers, like them, -had gathered in the wreckage left by the Germans,—a stove here, a kettle -there, and a “Boche” bed of unplaned planks, perhaps, with an improvised -mattress of grass? I paused to regard the play house. “What is this -room,” I inquired. “_La cuisine_,” was the quick reply. “And this?” “_La -salle à manger._” “But this next?” “_Une salle à manger_,” came the -chorus. “Then all the rest are _salles à manger_?” “_Assurément_,” with -merry laughter. “O, I see. Are you then so hungry at your house?” And I -turned away with an uncomfortable conviction that they were. - -[Illustration: —_Encore un autre petit frère?_ - -—_Oui, un petit belge._ - -[What, another little brother? - -Yes, a little Belgian.]] - -One after another, if you listen, the Village mothers will tell of their -return; with what hope against hope they looked for some trace of -vanished husbands, sons and daughters; with what despair they realised -the utter ruin. “My cat,” said one, “was the only living thing I found. -She was waiting for me on the doorstep.” But those were fortunate who -found even the door sills remaining to their homes. Those who were -shelterless took possession of some semi-habitable corner of their -neighbour’s outbuildings, or even of cellars, and furnished them with -what they could find. As I went about among them, in an effort to supply -immediate needs, I was continually told: “That cupboard, you understand, -is not mine. I am taking care of it for Mme. Huillard, who is with -the Boches. When she returns, I must give it up.” “This bed,”—a very -comfortable one, by the way—“belongs to M. de Curé, whom the Germans made -prisoner.” “Those blankets an English soldier gave me.” “This stove”—in -answer to a query as to whether a new one would not be appreciated—“well, -to be sure, it has no legs, but one props it with bricks, _et ça marche, -tout de même_!” The boast of the Prussians in regard to their handiwork -was true: “Tout le pays n’est qu’un immense et triste désert, sans arbre, -ni buisson, ni maison. Nos pionniers ont scié ou haché les arbres qui, -pendant des journées entières, se sont abattus jusqu’à ce que le sol fût -rasé. Les puits sont comblés, les villages anéantis. Des cartouches de -dynamite éclatent partout. L’atmosphère est obscurcie de poussière et de -fumée.”[4] - -By the time of the arrival of our Unit, six months after the Great -Retreat, our villagers had recovered from the shock of their sorrow. They -had managed to save enough bedding and clothing for actual warmth; they -had planted and worked their gardens; they were used to the simplest -terms of life. This courage rather than the too-evident squalor, was what -impressed one on a first visit to Canizy. Dumb endurance drew one’s heart -as no protestations could have done. It made me long to make my home -among my villagers, so that I might the more quickly meet their needs. - -But this could not be, because every habitable cranny was crowded to -capacity. Hence it was that I lodged with the rest of the Unit, four -miles away, at the _Château de Bon-Séjour_. Again, you will not find my -château so called upon the map. It is merely a name that represents to me -six months of hardship, of comradeship and of some small achievement that -made the whole worth while. - -At the Château, then, but not in it, lived the Unit. For the Château, -a German Headquarters, and a most comfortable one, in its day, had -been wrecked in the best German style. There were seventeen of us, -American college women, to whom the Government had entrusted the task -of reconstructing thirty-six of the 25,000 square miles of devastated -France. Two were doctors, three nurses, four chauffeurs, and the rest -social workers. Among them were a cobbler, a carpenter, a farmer, a -domestic science expert; and of other manual labor there was nothing -to which they did not turn their hands. It was in the golden days of -early September that my companions reached the Château allotted them in -that indefinite area known as the War Zone, and became from that moment -a part of the Third Army of France. But I, for reasons best known to -the passport bureau of that army, did not arrive until October. The -seventy-mile run from Paris was made in our own truck, driven by two of -our chauffeurs. As we cleared the dusty suburbs and took the highway -northward, war seemed very far away. To be sure, we often passed grey -_camions_ rumbling to or from the front, or saw fleeting automobiles -containing officer’s whiz by. But the country, the fields of stacked -grain or of freshly seeded wheat; the apple orchards,—sometimes miles -of trees along the roadside festooned with red fruit,—poplared vistas -of smoke-blue hill and valley, with church spires and red roofs in the -distance,—all these spoke of peace. Even the air lay in a motionless -amber haze, spiced with apples and wood smoke and ferns touched by -frost. But suddenly war was upon us. As we topped a sharp rise we came -upon an empty dugout, about which stood a shell-shattered grove. Lopped -orchards followed, zig-zag trenches, a bombarded village set in fields -bearing no crop but barbed-wire entanglements and tall weeds turned -brown. The country became flatter as we hurried along, intent on reaching -the Château before dark. At intervals we made detours around crumpled -bridges. Occasionally a sentry halted us, to be shown our permits known -as _feuilles bleues_. By this time the sun was setting and caught and -turned to gold a squadron of aeroplanes. Like great dragon-flies they -coursed and wheeled and presently alighted, to run along the fields -to their canvas-domed hangars. In the after-glow, we could still see -occasional peasants or soldiers working late at ploughing with oxen or -tractors. But otherwise, mile on mile, the brown plain, dotted here and -there with scraggly thickets, lay deserted. - -It was dusk when we turned off the main road between the half dozen -dynamited farm-houses that once formed a tiny village, past the little -church, and into the gate of the Château. To the rear of this ruined -mass, set in a row as soldiers would set them, were the three _baraques_, -or temporary shacks, which the Army had made ready for us. Very cheerful -they looked that night with the lamplight streaming from open doors and -windows, and the smell of savoury stew upon the air. - -But morning revealed what darkness had hidden: the destruction which -this estate shared with the entire countryside. Of the noble spruces -and poplars, which had formed the two main avenues leading the one to -the church and the other to the highway, only a ragged line remained; -the rest lay as they had been felled, in tangles of crossed trunks. The -Château itself, an imposing building as one viewed it through the frame -of a scrolled wrought-iron gate, proved to be a rectangle of roofless -walls. The water-tower, draped in flaming ampelopsis, no longer held the -reservoir which had supplied in former days the mansion, the greenhouses, -the servants’ quarters and the stables. The greenhouses themselves, the -_jardin d’hiver_, and the _orangerie_, where were grown hot-house fruits, -retained scarcely one unbroken pane of glass. Dynamite had been employed -freely; but—an instance of German economy—the main roof of the greenhouse -had been demolished by the well-calculated fall of a heavy spruce. In -this same greenhouse were the remains of a white tiled tank, and a -heating plant which had involved the construction of three new buildings. -“_Voilà_,” said Marcel, the sixteen-year-old son of the gardener, as he -pointed it out, “the officers’ bath.” - -Marcel and his mother (whom, we think, the Germans left behind because -of her too shrewd tongue) still take unbounded pride in the place. Even -before repairs were made on her own cottage, Marie routed Marcel out of -a morning to weed the flower beds and to fence off what, by courtesy, -she calls the lawn. By this last manœuvre she renders difficult both the -entrance and exit of our cars. She also refuses to open for us the wicket -for foot passengers, probably because in the days of Mme. la Baronne’s -hospitality there were none. Here entertaining was done on a patrician -scale. A French officer who stopped in passing, told us how he was in -the habit of coming each year to hunt in season. There was a gallery of -famous pictures. In short, the Château of his friend, Mme. la Baronne, -was the show place of the countryside. “To think,” said he, as he pointed -to a sign still standing beside the gate, “to think that dogs were -forbidden,—and yet the Germans came here!” Marie, having been left by -her mistress in charge of the property, carries the responsibility with -seriousness. A letter arrives: Mme. la Baronne desires that the vegetable -garden be always locked, and that no trees be cut. It is she, doubtless, -who directs that the lawn be preserved. “Poor Madame,” sighs Marie, “she -little knows. Pray heaven she may never return to see what the Boches -have done!” - -With Marie’s and Marcel’s help, one can reconstruct from the ruins the -gracious comfort of the old estate, the hospitable kitchen, the chambers -warm in winter and tree-shaded in summer, the wide balustrades where -the guests sat in long summer gloamings, courting the breeze. It was -Marcel who pointed out the view one gains from the steps of the Château, -straight through gaping doors and windows, to the sundial from which -radiated the alleys of the grove: bronze oaks and beeches, golden plane -trees, spruces and tasselled pines. - -How is the beauty of that day departed! Half of the grove lies now a -waste of scrubby second growth and fallen timber, for here the Germans -employed Russian prisoners as lumbermen. No longer the huntsmen and their -ladies pace the alleys. Now, on almost any day you may see old women -dragging branches from the woods to the _basse-cour_, to be cut up for -fuel. Twenty-six of them, no men, and only two children, the wretched -villagers had found in the Baronne’s stables their only shelter after the -razing of their homes. - -Yet we entered the winter far less warmly housed than they. Our two-room -_baraques_ were supplemented in time by six portable houses which we had -brought from America; two we used as dormitories and the other four as a -dispensary, a store, a kitchen, and a dining room. Our furnishings were -of the simplest; camp beds, a stove for each building, a table, camp -stools, and shelves. Our wood—when we had any—was chopped by a vigorous -old lady who walked a mile and a half from the nearest village to do it. -Our laundry was done upon a stove a foot square in a small building known -as the Morgue: such having been its use during the German occupation. -Marie made our cuisine on her range in a hut which she had built into -the ruins of her cottage. Zélie carried food and dishes in baskets to -and fro from kitchen to dining room, a quarter of a mile apart. The one -luxury of our existence was hot water, prepared by Marcel in a huge -cauldron, and brought in covered metal pitchers to our doors. - -Only once did Marcel fail us, and that was because the rightful owner of -the cauldron left the _basse-cour_ for her newly erected _baraque_. She -requested our kind permission to transport thither her property. “There -is another cauldron at Buverchy, which I think you could rent in place of -mine,” she suggested. “It belonged to my cousin, Mme. Bouvet, and is now -in Mme. Josse’s yard. No one is using it.” Marcel was dispatched to make -inquiries, and later, with horse and wagon, to fetch the cauldron home. -But meantime there had dawned a morning when we were not wakened by the -clump-clump of Marcel’s sabots, and the setting down of the water jug -with a thud upon the frozen ground. - -For wood, we depended largely on the chivalry of nearby encampments of -troops, French, English, Canadian or American, to whom our need became -apparent. For food, we were supplied by the Army with our quota of -bread and a soldier, M. Jean, to fetch it. Vegetables and some fruit -we obtained from our villages, of which we had sixteen in our charge. -Often these were presents, thrust upon us through gratitude; nor could -we pay for them. Meat was plentiful in all the towns of the Zone, where -the Army was charged with supplying the civilian population with food. -Anyone, going on any errand, marketed; and the dispensary jitney, which -might have started in the morning with doctors, nurses, kits, and relief -supplies, often returned at night overflowing with cabbages, potatoes, -pounds of roast, bags of coal, and _bidons_ of oil. - -Our relief supplies came through more regular channels, largely from -Paris, where one member of the Unit devoted all her time to buying. -These were either shipped to the nearest railroad station, or sent by -the French Army, free of charge, in a thundering _camion_. We never -knew when to expect this last, nor what it would contain. Sunday seemed -a favourite day for its arrival. On one occasion, there were three pigs, -loose and hungry, and no pen to put them in; seventy-five crated chickens -followed, with the request that the number be verified, and the crates -returned. Such were the colonel’s orders. But, seeing that the Unit -carpenter had to construct a chicken yard, this command was modified by a -judicious distribution of cigarettes. Mixed cargoes of Red Cross boxes, -stoves, bundles of wool from the Bon Marché which had burst _en route_, -and sundries, were even harder to deal with. - -We had no store room. The _cave_ of the Château, seeping with tons of -débris which in places bent with its weight the steel ceiling, and open -along one whole side to the elements,—this contained our dairy, our -lumber, our fuel, our vegetables, our groceries, and our relief supplies. -It abounded in rats, cats, and bats. But such as it was, it was the -centre of our activities. By night often weirdly lighted with candles, -by day never empty, laughter rather than complaints floated from its dim -interior. Here we held our first store; here the children who had trudged -over from Canizy, Hombleux or Esmery-Hallon waited in line for their -milk; here were assembled and tied up the thousands of packages for our -_fêtes de Noël_. As winter advanced, we prepared for a day in the _cave_ -by encasing our feet in peasants’ socks and sabots, and our hands in -worsted mittens. The soldiers in the trenches had nothing on us. - -Whether at home or on the road, our days were long and arduous, and -seldom what we had planned. Even Sunday became part of the working -week, for then we attempted to entertain our official supervisors and -co-laborers, and all chance acquaintances. M. le Commandant of the Third -Army has dined with us; the ladies of the American Fund for French -Wounded, under whom we held our section, have come to call; the Friends -walk over from Esmery-Hallon where they are building _baraques_ for the -commune; a lonesome Ambulance boy who has tramped ten miles and must -retrace his steps before dark, drops in; a squad of Canadian Foresters -rides through the gate; reporters, accompanied by a French officer, -harry us with questions. But most frequent, and most welcome of all our -visitors, are our countrymen, the—th New York Engineers. They came from -home, those men, to be the first of our army under fire. But during the -early days of the autumn, their talk was not of their work, but of ours. -They brought us slat walks, called duck walks, to keep us out of the mud, -and wood, and benches, and stoves. They came with mandolins and guitars -and violins to give an entertainment to our villagers, and stayed for a -buffet dinner and dance. They sent their trucks to take us in turn to a -party at their encampment. But all that was before the Cambrai drive. -As we, in our _baraques_, listened night and day to that bombardment, -we little knew the heroic part taken in it by our Engineers. Surprised, -unarmed, with pick and shovel they stood and fought; and later, hastily -equipped with rifles, helped save the day for England on the bitterly -contested front. But you have doubtless read of them in the papers, for -they were the first of our soldiers to die in battle and to be mentioned -in the orders of the day. - - - - -CHAPTER III - -M. LE MAIRE - - -By rights, Canizy belongs with three other hamlets, to the commune of -Hombleux. The mayor of Hombleux is therefore in reality also the mayor -of Canizy. But each of the hamlets has an acting mayor besides. And, -to complicate this matter of mayors still further, the real mayor of -the commune has left his post to reside in his mansion in the Boulevard -Haussmann in Paris. Inquiring into the reason of his non-residence, I -was told that he was broken in health, and belonged to a political party -which, at the moment, was no longer in power. Hence the so-called mayors, -with whom rests the welfare of our villages. - -Before the war, the present mayor of Hombleux was one of the _grands -cultivateurs_. With Mme. la Baronne, Mme. Desmarchez and M. Gomart, -he owned most of the rich acres encircling the town. Hombleux itself -contained then about 1200 inhabitants, and was an industrial as well -as an agricultural centre, having a distillery and two refineries for -sugar-beets. Of the factories, practically nothing now remains, and of -the inhabitants, 250 have survived the German deportations. Zélie, the -kitchen maid, has told me of these last. “The first deportation,” she -said, “was one of five hundred. The officers came to the doors at seven -o’clock with the names, and told us to be ready to start at dawn. O -Mademoiselle, the night! All the neighbours ran to and fro; all night -we washed and sewed and ironed, and in the morning, each with a sack -of fresh linen, my father, my sister, M. le Curé,—the flower of our -village,—were marched away. And after, what weeping!” Zélie put down her -broom to wring her hands, as if still dry-eyed from too much suffering. -“The next time,” she continued, “the Boches gave us no warning. They -came at midnight, and dragged us from our beds.” “Did you then go?” I -inquired. “But yes,” she replied, and her eyes flashed. “They tried to -make us work; there were five of us, friends, from our village. But work -for the enemies of France? We would not! They put us in prison; they fed -us almost nothing, but we would not work. One day they summoned us. ‘Go,’ -they said, ‘go where you like, beasts of the Somme!’ Hungry, foot-sore, -travelling mostly by night from the frontier, we came home. It was -midnight when we reached Hombleux. In my own house, my mother had barred -the door. I tapped on the window to wake her. At first, she would not -believe that it was I. Even now, she looks at me with a question in her -eyes as if asking continually, ‘Zélie, is it thou?’” - -Our mayors have no such heroic past! They not only saved their own skins, -but reside to this day with their wives and daughters; comely daughters -of an age for the German draft. Of one it is more than whispered that he -is a spy. Many carrier pigeons he had in his dovecote, and whether there -were any connection or not, _he knew of the impending German invasion_, -and left his comfortable house and growing crops, to spend the summer of -1914 in Normandy. Nor did he return till the summer of 1917. Meantime, -his little hamlet had held a town meeting of its refugees, and elected -a lady as mayor. In fact, M. Renet, on his return, found himself the -only man in the village. He found also—a suspicious circumstance in -the eyes of his neighbours—his house the only one undestroyed. I have -talked with him there, looking out of his casement windows into a walled -garden, where the fruit trees are uncut, and the walks are still bordered -with close-trimmed box. He assumes an injured air, recounting his -unpopularity. It is unfortunate, but since M. the Deputy has again asked -him to act as mayor, _que voulez-vous_? He is compelled. - -His superior, the mayor of the entire commune, did not fare so well. On -our first visit, we found him inhabiting a loft in his partially ruined -barn. But despite his chubby person, this mayor is a man of action. -Week after week, Hombleux receives shifting regiments of troops back -from the trenches _en repos_. These are detailed for construction work. -Carpenters set up the _baraques_, which the Government furnishes to -homeless families; masons and bricklayers are slowly raising the walls -of the village bakery. The mayor has taken his share of the materials -and workmen, and is now housed in a two-room lean-to, with a new slate -roof, and lace-curtained windows. Here, beside an open fire, he transacts -business. - -He it is to whom returning refugees come to report and register; through -him claims of damage (based on pre-war valuation of property) are filed, -which the Government has promised to honor after the war. To him, -requests for _baraques_ are made, and sent by him to the _Sous-Préfet_ -of the Department, to be forwarded in turn to the Minister of the -Interior, with whom such matters rest. The mayor calculates the amount -of _allocation_ or pension to which each family in the devastated area -is entitled, varying according as they are _réfugiés_ or _rapatriés_, -according to the number of bread-winners imprisoned or serving with the -colors, according to the number of children, or, in some cases, to the -decorations won by their soldiers, for decorations carry pensions.[5] -This entire matter of income is adjusted finally for our district by the -_Préfet_ at Péronne. Besides housing and pensioning, the Government -has undertaken to supply a certain amount of cereals, coffee, sago and -the like. These the mayor distributes. Furniture as well is provided -by the Government: bedsteads, mattresses (not forgetting bolsters), -stoves, cupboards, chairs, tables and _batteries de cuisine_. Before our -coming to take charge of the district, the mayor signed the furniture -requisitions which were understood by the fortunate recipients to -represent a part of their “_indemnité de guerre_.” He also had the even -more delicate task of distributing relief supplies left in bulk by the -Red Cross or other agencies on their hurried passage through the ruined -villages. Naturally, the supply fell short of the demand; and it was with -unconcealed pleasure that the Mayor at the instance of the _Sous-Préfet_ -turned over these two thankless tasks to us. Yet we found him—or rather -his wife and daughter—always ready to advise and coöperate. On demand, -they furnished immaculately penned lists of all inhabitants, whether -grouped by sex and by age, by family, or by the main division of adults -and juveniles. They know the number of families in each hamlet, the -number of persons in each family, the name and the age of each. Much more -they know, of gossip, and of human nature, and laughed, I fear a trifle -derisively, at our manifest difficulties. - -All these activities, centring in the Mayor, belong to the civil -administration of the Department. The Ministry of Agriculture has -its share in reconstruction also, but is more independent of local -officials, having an office of its own in the commune. To it belong the -ploughing and seeding, the replacing of orchards, and to a certain extent -of livestock. But on all these matters, as to whose fields shall be -ploughed, or who shall plant two apple trees or own a goat, the verdict -of the Mayor is sought. He himself, you may be sure, is dependent on no -such circuitous methods. Together with two other _grands cultivateurs_, -he has bought an American tractor, a harrow, and a mowing machine. These -can even be hired for the same price as the government-owned tractors, -which is forty francs an hectare. Over all reconstruction, considered as -a part of the civil administration, preside the _Sous-Préfet_ and the -_Préfet_ of the Somme. - -On the other hand, food supplies in general, such as bread, are -controlled by the army. In fact, every detail of life in the War Zone is -their care if they choose to assume it. Troop movements delay shipments; -therefore there may be no bread. Cavalry needs fodder; the sergeant at -Hombleux goes out to forage with rick and trio of white horses and buys -it at a fixed price. Mme. N—— is ill; the army doctor visits her, and if -she seems to him a menace to the health of the soldiers, he removes her -to a hospital. In view of the military importance attached to the Zone, -the confidence of the French Government in giving over a section of it to -the care of a group of American women, wholly unacquainted with the task -before them, seems truly touching. - -[Illustration: —_Rien que ça de pain! Vous mangez bien chez vous!_ - -—_Ben ... on n’est pas des boches!_ - -[Only that much bread! You eat well at your house! - -Well ... we are not Boches!]] - -In fact, it seemed appalling, as I learned from day to day the problems -for which I was myself responsible in Canizy. Not the least of these was -its mayor. Unlike his _confrère_ at B——, M. Thuillard had not fled his -property until forced to do so with the rest of the villagers immediately -prior to the Retreat of 1917. During the occupation, he kept his store as -usual. And even though his horses and cattle, his fat rabbits and plump -chickens, were requisitioned by the Germans, they say that he was paid -for them. To see him, however, housed in a miserable hut, with a dirt -floor so uneven that the very chairs looked tipsy; to hear the complaints -of his querulous wife, and the references of his daughter to their former -comfort, was calculated to enlist one’s sympathy. Mme. Thuillard was ill, -and he was lame, and the daughter’s husband was a prisoner, and they had -lost heavily, because they had the most to lose. All this they told me -over the saucerless cups of black coffee which they offered me “out of a -good heart.” - -But when I considered the Mayor’s duty to his village, my own heart -hardened. Here is the entry I find in my notebook on my first survey of -Canizy. “Canizy, dependence of Hombleux, Thuillard, Oscar, in charge. -Curé of Voyennes has charge of the children; 4 k. away. No church, no -school, no bread, no water fit to drink.” There was something, of course, -in the Mayor’s own contention that the village had been forgotten; and -one could understand why the Curé came only to burials when one saw -him,—so ill he looked. But in M. Thuillard’s barn were two stout horses, -and two carts stood before his door. On his own business, he could -travel. “Why, then,” I inquired, “has he not fetched the bread supply -from Hombleux to which the village is entitled?” “Because he has nothing -to gain,” and the good wife I interrogated shrugged her shoulders and -laughed. “Look you,” she continued, “M. Thuillard is rich; 26 kilos of -money he buried, and it is not in sous.” This rumour, which gave the -one-legged Mayor something of the air of a land pirate, I heard on all -sides. Even the school teacher of Hombleux repeated it; and her husband, -an officer, nodded his head to emphasize his “_Oui, c’est vrai_.” - -Of one of our mayors, however, I would like to record nothing but praise. -Widow of a soldier, left with two little girls, and absolutely no other -possession in the world, she ruled our home village at the Château with -justice and dignity. She never complained. When at last the _baraque_ on -the ruins of her farm was completed, all except the fitting of the glass -in the windows, she insisted on moving in so that we could make use of -the space she vacated in our _basse-cour_. I met her one bitter evening -shortly afterward, as I was returning from Canizy. “Is it not cold in the -_baraque_, Madame?” I asked. “Oh, yes,” she replied, “but what would you? -It is so good to be at home!” - - - - -CHAPTER IV - -O CRUX, AVE - - -As the aeroplanes fly, Canizy is perhaps three miles from the Château, -or reckoned in time, half an hour by motor and an hour on foot. But by -either route, one turns into the village at the stark Calvary I have -already mentioned, with its half obliterated inscription: _Ave, O Crux_. - -At our first visit, despite our novelty, Canizy regarded us with -indifference. We seemed to them doubtless one more of those strange -manifestations of the war which had stranded them among their ruins. -Incurious, apathetic, they passed us with sidelong glances, and went -their ways. But this did not last long. The “Dames Américaines” did such -extraordinary things! They gathered and bought up rags; they played with -the children; they walked fearlessly, even at night, across the fields -to tend a sick baby; they slept—so the village children who had seen -their encampment reported—on _lits-soldats_. The village waked to a new -interest, and it came about that one expected to be waited for by the -gaunt old cross. - -Before my arrival, the routeing of our three cars had already been -decided. Three times a week the Dispensary was held at Canizy, and once -a week, on Monday, our largest truck, turned into a peddler’s cart with -shining tinware, sabots, soap, fascinators, stockings and other articles -of clothing, made there its first stop. On the seat back of the driver -and the storekeeper, or if there were not room for a seat, on top of the -hampers, went also the children’s department, consisting of two members. -While the mothers, grandmothers and elder sisters gathered at the honk -of the horn about the truck, the children, equally eager, followed the -teachers to an open field for games. Or, did it rain, I have seen them -of all ages from fourteen years to fourteen months, huddled in a shed, -listening open-mouthed to the same tales our children love, which begin, -in French as in English, with “Once upon a time.” - -But when, after a three-days’ inspection of our outlying domain, I -asked our Director for the village of Canizy, I was given charge of -all branches of our work there. This meant not interference but close -coöperation with the other members of the Unit already occupied with -its problems. Of all our villages, Canizy was the most beloved, not, -perhaps, because its need was greatest, but because its isolation was -most complete. No one could do enough for it. Were a sewing-machine to -be repaired, the head of our automobile department, a mechanical genius, -spent hours making it “marcher.” The doctors, with their own hands, took -time to scrub the children’s heads. They came to me with every need that -they found on their rounds, with the neighbourhood gossip, and with -kindly advice. The teachers gave me the names of children requiring -shoes; and, as the work developed, asked in turn for recommendations -in regard to opening a children’s library. To the farm department, I -made requests that we buy largely of fodder and vegetables, until we had -literally hundreds of kilos of pumpkins, turnips and carrots bedded for -us in the cellars, on call. To this department went also requisitions -that Mme. Cordier be supplied with a pig, or M. Noulin with five hens, -or Mme. Gense with a goat. Or, were there shipments of furniture to be -delivered, one called again on the automobile department, which even -through the drifts and cold of winter, kept at least one of its engines -thawed and running every day. - -[Illustration: —_C’est un boche ce blessé là?_ - -—_Non, M’sieu le Major, c’est le cheval du capitaine._ - -[Is that wounded man a Boche? - -No, Major, he’s the captain’s horse.]] - -It will be seen that our scheme of material relief followed closely that -laid down by the Government. Our method was simple: where the Government -supplies were on hand, or adequate, we used them; whatever was lacking, -even up to kitchen ranges costing three hundred francs, we attempted to -supply. In this we had not only our own resources to draw on, but to -a limited extent, those of the American Fund for French Wounded, and -to a much larger extent, those of the Red Cross. In a huge truck came -the goods from the Red Cross, driven by a would-be aviator who, when -asked his name, replied bashfully, “Call me Dave.” “Dave” was frequently -accompanied by another youth of like ambition, named Bill. And I will say -that they handled their truck as if it were already a flying-machine. -The first consignment of hundreds of sheets and blankets, the truck and -the driver, all were overturned in our moat. It took a day to get them -out. The next mishap was a head-on collision with our front gate. But -the last, which I learned of just before I left, will best illustrate -their imaginative turn of mind. Bill, the intrepid, having attempted to -traverse a ploughed field, left his machine there mired to the body, and -spent the night with us. He seemed a trifle apprehensive as to how his -“boss” would take this exploit. Willing workers, however, were Dave and -Bill. Unannounced, they came exploding up the driveway under orders to -work for us all day. And many a time have we risked our necks with them, -perched on the high front seat, careering along at what seemed like sixty -miles an hour. - -But for my part, my usual mode of travel was on foot, and my orbit -bounded by the Château, Hombleux and Canizy. In any case, even though I -went over by motor, I was dropped at my village and walked back across -the fields. As I grew better acquainted with the villagers, I came and -went at will, spending almost all the daylight hours—few enough in -winter—with them. Every one has heard of the mud in the trenches. The -clayey soil of our district, admirably adapted to the making of bricks, -lends itself equally well to the making of mud. Continually churned -by _camions_ and marching troops, it becomes on the highways of the -consistency of a purée, through which, high-booted and short-skirted, -one wades. It is therefore a relief to turn off by the footpath beyond -Hombleux, though it plunges for the first quarter of a mile through a -bog. Of a sunny day, birds sing in the hollow, wee _pinsons_ perched -on ragged hedges answering one another with fairy flutes. Farther on, -yellow-breasted finches dart over patches of mustard as yellow, and -sing as they fly. Raucous crows, whose gray-barred wings make them far -more decorative than ours, and the even more strikingly marked magpies, -darken in great flocks the newly ploughed and seeded wheatfields which in -increasing areas border the path. A sudden movement sends them whirring -like a black and white cloud against the sky. Often above them courses a -flier of another sort, a scout aeroplane probably, holding its way from -the aviation fields in our rear, to the front. It rasps the heavens like -a taut bow; by listening to the beat of its engines one can determine -whether it be French or Boche. For Boche planes come over us frequently, -on bombing raids; and sometimes one does not have to look or listen long -to know that an air battle is taking place overhead. The sharp reports; -the white puffs of our guns, the black plumes of the enemy’s; the glint -of the sunlight on careening sails high up in the blue,—it all passes -like a panorama, of which we do not know the end. Other sounds also are -familiar to us on our plain, when from the Chemin des Dames, or St. -Quentin, or Cambrai, the great guns boom. Like surges they shake and -reverberate; and when, as often happens, the sea-fog rolls in from the -Channel, one can well fancy them the breakers of a mighty storm. So they -are, out there, on our front, where the living dyke of the _poilus_ holds -back the German flood. - -The highway and the railway, these are the two most coveted goals of -the German bombs. For over them go up the trains of ammunition and of -soldiers and supplies. Both we cross on the way to Canizy. The railroad, -running between well defined hedges, would seem almost as conspicuous -an object as the tree-sentinelled road. But, so far, both have escaped -harm. Trains whistle and puff as usual up and down from Amiens to Ham. -Often I halt at the crossing, to wave to soldiers, who fill the cars; -sometimes I pass through companies of red-turbaned, brown Moroccans, -who are brought here by the Government to rebuild bridges and keep the -roadbed in repair. Over the track the footpath carries one, on over brown -stubble, to the Calvary and Canizy. - -As I have said, at the Cross one is awaited. Sometimes it is only one -little figure in black apron and blue soldier’s cap that stands beside -it to give the signal; sometimes from the wall on the other side of -the road, a half dozen girls start up, like a covey of quail. The boys -usually ran away, but the girls advanced to surround one, and dance hand -in hand down the street. But always before the Calvary there was a pause. -Brown hands, none too clean, were raised to forehead and breast with the -quick sign of the cross. One caught a whispered invocation. “But you do -not do it,” five-year-old Flore protested to me one day, with troubled -eyes. “Why do you not salute the Calvary?” “Teach me,” I replied; and in -chorus I learned the words which on the lips of the war-orphaned children -are infinitely pathetic: “Glory to the Father and to the Son and to the -Holy Ghost.” - -[Illustration: —_Il est déjà grand!..._ - -—_Ben ... il a l’âge de la guerre._ - -[He is big already! - -Well ... he is as old as the war.]] - -It is not alone at Canizy that one finds the Cross, though by its -aloofness above the plain this one became impressive. By every roadside -stands a Calvary, sometimes embowered in trees, but more often stark -and naked, with the wantonly felled trunks about its base bearing -mute Witness to a desecration which respected the form, but not the -spirit, of the Christ. At Hombleux, three such crucifixes marked the -intersections of the village lanes, flanked by stenciled guide-posts: _A -Nesle_, _A Athies_, or _A Roye_. They cluster in the cemeteries, above -well-remembered graves; Where even the dead no longer rest inviolate, -since the Germans, to their unspeakable shame, have blasted open many a -tomb. Day by day, the obsession grows on one that these uplifted symbols -of suffering, stripped and mocked and defiled by the invader, typify the -crucifixion of Picardy. - - - - -CHAPTER V - -MME. GABRIELLE - - -Every village, everywhere, has its stronger characters, to whom the -community looks up, perhaps unconsciously. Canizy, having been deprived -of its normal leaders in the Curé, a prisoner, and the teacher, -transferred to the school at Hombleux, looked up in this way to Mme. -Lefèvre and Mme. Gabrielle. The former was the especial friend of our -medical department. In fact, she rented one of her two rooms for our -use as a dispensary, and her flagged kitchen was always open to her -neighbours and to us. Here I measured out milk to half the village, or -distributed the loaves of bread which we ourselves purveyed from the -crabbed Garde Champêtre at Hombleux. Or, had I neither the time nor the -patience, Mme. Lefèvre herself made the distribution, and gave me a -list of the recipients, and always the correct amount of neatly stacked -coppers in change. A shrewd face had Mme. Lefèvre, wrinkled by humour -as well as by sorrow. She had been taken away by the Boches in their -retreat, but later, for some reason unknown, was allowed to return. Her -three daughters, however, and her husband, all were in the hands of the -enemy. She lived alone, therefore, and busied herself in her late-planted -garden, and in her neighbours’ affairs. - -[Illustration: —_C’est pas moi!... c’est lui._ - -[I didn’t do it ... _he_ did!]] - -Most of them, it seemed, were related to her in one way or another, all -the Genses being of her kin. Of these there were Mme. Gense-Tabary, -already mentioned, and her swarming family of eight, bright and pretty -as pictures, and dirty as little pigs. She, lodged near the bank of -the canal, really had no excuse for this chronic condition, and was -encouraged to scrub by object lessons, clean clothing, and gifts even -of long bars of _savon marseilles_. I remember her yet, two or three -children tagging at her skirts, knocking at the door of my _baraque_ of -a Sunday morning, to tell me that she must have more soap. All the way -from Canizy she had walked to get it; and she did not go back without. -Mme. Gense-Tabary’s eldest daughter, known as Germaine Tabary, was the -sorrow of the village, even more than its daughters who had gone into -captivity; for she had become an earlier victim of the invaders, and with -her unborn baby was left behind. Mme. Marie Gense, another unfortunate, -was a niece by marriage of Mme. Lefèvre’s. Her husband was a soldier. -She had lived in a little cottage whose blue and white tiled floor I -often had occasion to admire, next the church. But being left with two -growing boys, and no resources, what was she to do? What she did was to -add to her family a Paul, and one bitter winter night which our doctors -and nurses well remember, a Paulette. “What would you?” she expostulated. -“I had no bread for the children; in this way they were fed.” That two -more months were added, and that her lean-to of ten feet by twelve could -not accommodate them, were facts which did not seem to concern her. And -of all good children, her two boys, Désiré and Robert, were certainly -the best. But Aunt Lefèvre looked upon her niece’s conduct as a scandal. -She was forbidden the kitchen, and it was even known that the quarrel -had come to the point of knives. With the children, that was different. -“Yes,” said Mme. Lefèvre on the arrival of the new baby, “Désiré may -sleep in the Dispensary if you so wish. It is your room; you pay for -it.” That Désiré did, though I had a bed put up for him, I misdoubt. But -Robert, happy-go-lucky Robert, with his head cocked on one side and a -smile rippling his brown eyes, even Aunt Lefèvre could not help loving -him. There was no question of his sleeping out, however, he being nurse -to the babies and to his mother as well. Another wayward connection of -Mme. Lefèvre’s was a sister of Mme. Marie Gense’s, known as Mme. Payelle. -She had three children as cunning as you could wish to see, clean—as -were Marie’s—and sunny-tempered. Their parentage also was a mystery. -But this blot did not rest by rights on the village escutcheon. Mme. -Payelle had been installed there by one of her admirers, a soldier _en -permission_; she really did not belong to Canizy. - -To keep her social position in the midst of these misfortunes was a -tribute to Mme. Lefèvre’s worth. She was always doing kindnesses, and -speaking to us on her neighbours’ behalf. Beneath her shed stood one of -the four _chaudières_, or washing cauldrons, which survived the general -destruction. These, varying in capacity from 50 to 250 litres, are an -indispensable utensil of housekeeping in Picardy. In them, week by week, -the soiled clothes are boiled. Not even the lack of a pump—and there was -only one left in the village—was so much deplored as the loss of the -cauldrons. In view of these two handicaps and the dearth of soap, the -squalor of the village on our arrival seems excusable. Mme. Lefèvre, at -least, did her share toward remedying it. Without charge, her _chaudière_ -was in constant use, and her shed became a neighbourhood rendezvous. - -It will be seen that all the Genses were by no means a bad lot, Mme. -Lefèvre being one herself. Of an older generation, and I know not of -what degree of kinship to her, is Mme. Hélène Gense, grandmother to Mme. -Gabrielle, that energetic, substantial young Widow, not Mme. Thuillard -nor yet Veuve Thuillard, but Mme. Gabrielle to all Canizy. In pre-war -times, she owned, through her parents and not by marriage, the most -central homestead in the village. There remain now only the arched gate -into the courtyard, the brick rabbit hutches, a heap of débris, and a -tottering wall. She and ten-year-old Adrien lodge, therefore, in the -first house on the left as you come past the Calvary, with Grand’mère -Gense. This ell, flanked though it is by the ruin of the main building, -is the most cheerful spot in the village. The narrow yard before the -door is swept; a row of geraniums blossoms beneath the windows. Above -all, there _are_ windows, two of them, and curtains at each. Outside the -door, if you are fortunate in the hour of your call, will stand two pairs -of worn sabots. Or perhaps the door may be open, framing Grand’mère, -bent almost at right angles, Mme. Gabrielle, and Bobbinot. Bobbinot is -a dog, iron-grey, smooth-coated, with a white band on his breast and a -white vest. He has no pedigree, his mistress assures me, but his brown -eyes and his square, intelligent head bear out her statement that he is -“_très loyal_.” All three welcome me; a chair is proffered near the fire. -Grand’mère sinks carefully into her low seat, Mme. Gabrielle sets on a -saucepan of coffee, and we sit down to chat. - -It is a pleasure to look about as we talk. On the mantel, to give a note -of colour, are laid a row of tiny yellow pumpkins; the floor is red, and -through the window peer red geraniums. In a cupboard beyond the stove is -a modest array of pans and dishes. Two panes of glass, like portholes, -pierce the wall to the rear. Beneath stands a sideboard, and a little to -one side, a round table. Not until the coffee was heated did I notice -that cups were set for four. - -“But have you another guest?” I inquired, as Mme. Gabrielle poured first -some syrup from a bottle, and then the steaming drink. “But no, only -Adrien. _Adrien, come!_” She raised her voice. Then for the first time -I saw the boy, head propped on elbows, poring over a book. The mother -regarded him indulgently. “It is a pity for the children that we have -no school. Adrien is apt; when the Germans were here, he understood -everything, everything. And when the Scotch came, he learned, too. I -myself try to learn English.” She brought forth from the sideboard an -English-French phrase book. “This I found in a house after the English -soldiers went away. It would be easy, but there is the pronunciation.” “I -will teach you,” I said, and we took up the words one by one, Grand’mère -laughing the while, pleasant laughter, like a cracked, old bell. But -the boy kept on reading and hummed a tune. “The children,” broke in the -mother, “they sing; it is well.” But presently the boy shuts his book -with a sigh and draws a chair to the table. “Did you like it, the story?” -I inquire. “Yes, it tells of America.” On the table, clear now save for -Adrien’s belated cup, is revealed an oilcloth map in lieu of a linen -cover. “Where, then, is America?” His finger traces the colored squares. -“Here is France, here England, here Italy, here Russia,—but America, it -is so far one cannot see it.” “But yes,” rejoins his mother, “so far that -never in my life did I expect to see an American. Once in my childhood I -remember looking at a picture of M. Pierpont’s bank in New York—a great -bank. But now I have seen Germans, Russians, English, Moroccans,—and you. -The war teaches many things.” - -“You have seen Russians?” - -“Very many; the Germans worked our fields with Russian prisoners. A -strange people! You and I converse; we come from different countries, -but we have ideas in common. The Russians were like dumb beasts; they had -no _esprit de corps_.” - -“It is the fault of their government,” I venture. - -“Yes,” she replied, “France and America are republics. It is not that our -government is perfect. There are many beautiful things in France, but -there is much injustice also, much.” - -I knew of what Mme. Gabrielle was thinking, then; of the wheatlands of -Canizy, where not one furrow had been turned for the next year’s harvest, -while the _grands cultivateurs_ and the petty politicians looked out for -themselves; and of the school building, long promised and still delayed. - -But Mme. Gabrielle looked beyond the confines of her small village -and its grievances. Love for _la belle plaine_ and _la belle France_, -unreasoning, passionate, pulsed in her. Hatred of the Germans was its -corollary. “Mademoiselle, during the occupation, we were prisoners,” she -said. “We had to have passes to go one fourth of a kilometre from our -village. My mother was sick at Voyennes,—and I could not go to see her.” -It came out that Bobbinot had been her constant companion. “But I should -think,” I said, “that the Germans would have taken him away.” “They dared -not; he would have bitten them!” was the spirited response. - -At Mme. Gabrielle’s table, with the map upon it, I was destined to sit -often, sometimes for luncheon and sometimes for dinner, while we took -counsel over village affairs. For Mme. Gabrielle, together with Mme. -Lefèvre, and the former school teacher, became an informal advisory -committee to me. Through punctiliously served courses of soup, stew, -salad, wine, cheese and coffee, Mme. Gabrielle offered her information, -or, when asked, her opinion. It was she who reassured me on the point of -selling rather than of giving the smaller articles we distributed. “I -understand completely; it is better for us. The American Red Cross did -the same when the Germans were here. They sold the food, but very cheap. -Without their help, we should have starved. We are grateful to America, -which saved our lives.” It was she who advised in regard to a baby whom -its half-witted mother had placed in a crèche: “For the mother,” she -said, “it would doubtless be better that the child returned. But for the -child—and I am a mother myself who speak—let it remain.” On the good -sense and the good heart of Mme. Gabrielle one came to rely. Even as far -as Hombleux she was known and respected. “O yes,” the women there told -me, “Mme. Gabrielle, we know her. She is _une femme très forte_.” - - - - -CHAPTER VI - -VOILÀ LA MISÈRE - - -Directly opposite Mme. Gabrielle lives Mme. Odille Delorme. One lifts the -latch of a heavy wooden gate to enter her courtyard. On left and right -are the remains of barn and stable, from the rafters of which depend -bundles of _haricots_ hung to dry. A half dozen chickens scurry from -under foot, and at the commotion Mme. Delorme steps out. “I have come -to make a little visit,” I begin. “Enter then, and see misery,” is her -reply. It is a startling reply from this woman, strong, intelligent, and -direct. The room of which she throws open the door is tiny; the floor is -of earth; there is no window, only a hole covered with oiled linen, which -lets in a ray of light but never any sun. A stove, a table, two stools, -a shelf or two and a few dishes hung on nails are her furnishings. In -her arms she holds her sixteen-months’ baby; a little girl of three comes -running in from an adjoining alcove, and is followed presently by her -seven-year-old sister, Charmette. The three children look like plants -blanched in a cellar. As gently as possible, I proceed with necessary -questions: for in social parlance, I am making a preliminary survey of -the family needs. “Your husband?” I inquire. She turns to her little -girl, “Marie, tell the lady, then, where is Papa.” And Marie, smiling up -into her mother’s face, repeats her lesson proudly, “_Avec—les—Boches_.” -“_Avec les Boches_,” reiterates the mother, and catches the child to her -in a passionate embrace. There is a pause before I can continue. “Have -you beds and covers?” “See for yourself, Mademoiselle,” and she leads the -way through her _ménage_; three passage-ways opening the one into the -other, like the compartments of a train. The first contains a child’s bed -of white enamel, and beneath an aperture like that in the outer room, -a crib. Both are canopied and ruffled in spotless white. “Yes,” Mme. -Delorme says in answer to my unspoken surprise, “I bought these beds. -The ruffles are made of sheets, one can but do one’s best. As you see, -it is only a chicken-house after all.” Beyond, quite without light, is a -space occupied by her own bed, a springless frame of planks. From nails -in the walls clothes of all sizes and descriptions hang. In fact, one -wonders at the amount of clothing saved by the panic-stricken peasants in -their flight. They not only took away with them heavy sacks made out of -sheets, but buried what they had time to. Of course, some of their hiding -places were rifled; but most of the villagers have a real embarrassment -of riches in their old clothes. Their first request is usually for a -wardrobe, so that the mice will not nest in them. - -But Mme. Delorme asked for nothing. She rested her case in the simple -statement, “Voilà la misère.” At a later date, when I returned with a -camera, she repeated, “What would you? Take a picture of our misery?” -“Yes, Madame, to carry with me to America, that they may see it there and -fight the harder for knowing what the Boches have done.” “_Eh, bien!_” -she replied, and the picture was taken. Framed in the deep gateway, from -which the clusters of dried beans depend like a stage curtain, her baby -in her arms, her two little girls clinging beside her, and neighbourly -Adrien, broom in hand, sweeping the light snow from the path,—I see her -yet amid the ruins, brave, broken-hearted Odille Delorme. - -Before the war, Mme. Delorme had not the social position of her -neighbour, Mme. Gabrielle. She lived on her smaller property, and -attended to her truck garden and her poultry yard and her children, while -her husband served the Government as bargeman on the canal. Yet the -two were close friends. Mme. Gabrielle having bought a cow, shared the -milk with Mme. Delorme. Mme. Gabrielle told me that Mme. Delorme needed -blankets. “She would never admit it,” she explained. “We are not used to -accepting gifts, you see.” Or were it necessary for Mme. Delorme to go to -Ham perhaps for her _allocation_, Mme. Gabrielle transferred the baby and -Marie to her kitchen until their mother’s return. - -From this extreme end of the village, by the Calvary, the street -continues across the railroad track. Here, on almost any day, children -may be seen digging miniature coal mines. They do it not in play, but in -earnest. The ties which the Germans left have long since been used as -fuel, but in the roadbed the villager still finds a scant supply of coal. -Beyond the track, the first habitable building is a barn. Its interior -consists of one room, earthen-floored where two makeshift beds allow it -to be seen. In one corner stands a small stove. No light enters except -from the open door. Here lodge the old mother, the married daughter, two -children, a girl of seventeen and a boy of eleven, and their orphaned -cousin, four-year-old Noël. Lydie, capable, red-cheeked, crisp-haired, -welcomes us and pulls forward a bench. “Be seated, please.” Her voice has -a ring of youth, her mouth a ready smile. One wonders how it can be, yet -it is so. The grandmother complains querulously from the untidy bed where -she is lying to keep warm. Lydie tells us with perfect equanimity that -she herself has no bed. Where does she sleep? On the bench. Beds would be -welcome, yes, and sheets and blankets. The grandmother adds a request for -warm slippers; her feet are so often cold. A pane of glass for the door -I set down also in the list in my notebook, and as assets—the furniture -being negligible—300 kilos of cabbages, 100 kilos of potatoes, leeks and -chicory in smaller quantities. - -[Illustration: —_Avant ... quand c’était pas la guerre ... on en avait -deux pour un sou, des pralinés!_ ... - -[Once, before the war, the pralines were two for a sou.]] - -My next call I have been urged to make by our doctors. Here in a -ramshackle ell, facing a court deep in mire, live the poorest family -in the village, comprising Mme. Laure Tabary, her six children, and a -black and bearded goat. The goat inhabits a rabbit hutch from which -her tether allows her the freedom of the narrow brick path. From the -sidelong gleam in her eyes, one always expects an attack in the flank or -rear. But Madame, her mistress, regards her as a pet; perhaps because she -cannot regard her in any other favourable light,—since _la petite_ gives -no milk. Once past the goat, the door is quickly gained. Two rooms has -Mme. Tabary, and a loft and a shed. She needs them! From forlorn Olga to -forlorn Andréa, the girls of the family descend in graduated wrappings -of rags. “O, Mme. Tabary,” exclaimed the school teacher, with whom I -discussed the all too evident need of soap, and of clothing, “she is a -very worthy woman, but she is always poor.” Always poor, always ailing, -yet always humorous, were the Laure Tabarys. Did the unfortunate woman -try to boil her washing, the stove must needs break, and the cauldron -full of scalding water descend upon Madeleine. No sooner were her wounds -dressed than Andréa developed a fever. It would be interesting to know -how many litres of gasoline were consumed by us in the carrying of Mme. -Tabary’s children to and from hospitals located ten and twenty miles -away. One would have thought the distracted mother might welcome these -deportations. But, naturally enough, she distrusted them, and having -faithfully promised to give up the baby to our care on a certain day, -left instead for Ham. Of how she was won over,—that is a tale which -belongs to the annals of the medical department rather than to me. But I -have heard rumours of hair ribbons and dolls and candy and fairy stories -and I know not what of similar remedies which Hippocrates and Galen never -mentioned. Judge, then, whether our doctors were bugbears or no among the -children of our villages! - -But the ell housed another family besides the Tabarys. Across the hall -lodged the Moroys; M. Edouard, an old man of eighty-four, his niece and -nephew and his granddaughter, Mlle. Suzanne. All lived in the one room. -It was a room with only three corners as well, because in the fourth the -floor rose in an arch which indicated the cellar-way. In this room were -three beds, a table, a stove, three chairs and a broken sewing machine. -Yet I never saw the room in disorder, nor heard any requests from the -family beyond that of a little sugar for Grandpère, and, if possible, -another bed, so that Charles might have a place to sleep. Meantime, -Charles slept upon the floor. In this room were two windows. The one to -the south interested me by chance, because the panes looked so clear. I -stepped over and put out my hand. It went straight through the framework; -there was no glass. “But you must be cold!” I exclaimed, knowing well the -common fear of _courants d’air_. Besides, it was late October, and the -nights were already frosty. “Yes, a little,” Mlle. Suzanne admitted in a -matter of fact way. “Yes,” agreed her aunt, in a more positive tone. “And -besides, Mademoiselle, our stove is too small, as you see. In fact, it -is not ours, but belongs to Mme. Tabary. But she has so large a family, -we made an exchange. Perhaps when you distribute stoves——” I promise to -remember, wondering the while if we in like circumstances would share our -last crusts with like generosity. For the window, so scarce was glass, -oiled linen was the best that could be done, a pity considering that it -excluded the sun with the cold. - -Mlle. Suzanne, with the exception of Germaine Tabary and Lydie Cerf, -is the only young woman in Canizy. She had been taken captive by the -Germans, but was allowed to return. Her family, however, met an unknown -fate; father and brother, they were _avec les Boches_. A curious -circumstance in this connection was that Suzanne, having been an -independent worker, received no pension for her loss. She, too, seemed a -Good Samaritan to her neighbours—lame Mme. Juliette depends on Suzanne -to bring her her pitcher of milk; Mme. Musqua, sick and irresponsible, -has only to send over her children to Mlle. Suzanne to be cared for,—what -matter two more or less in the crowded room? I added my quota to her -labours by asking her to take charge of washing rags, and started her in -with those of her next-door neighbour, Mme. Tabary. For the purpose, I -have given her a cylindrical boiler, standing three feet high. This, when -not in use, is placed over by the cellar-way. On washing days, it is set -on an open fire in the court, where Grandpère feeds it with laboriously -chopped twigs. Meantime, back of the house, patches of colour and of -flapping white begin to adorn the wire fence. Suzanne also sews, by hand -and, now that its frame is mended by I know not how many screws in the -warped wood, by machine. We give out the sewing, and she earns by it -perhaps three francs a week. - -Beyond the Moroys, lives Mme. Thuillard, Charles, as the neighbours call -her to distinguish her from the Thuillards, O. I have seldom found this -energetic lady at home, but I often see her, and sometimes hear her, -as she passes with firm step down the street to work in her garden. -When not playing, her ten-year-old granddaughter Orélie follows in her -wake. This leaves in the unlighted recesses of the barn, her husband, -M. Charles. He seems an apologetic and conciliatory soul, with whom I -discuss domestic needs, such as a window, a lamp, and sheets for the -beds. He will tell his wife what I say and report to-morrow when he -comes for the milk. It is in his entrance-way, so to speak, that I first -noticed a pile of willow-withed market baskets. “O, yes,” he said, “I -had hundreds of such, but the Boches took them.” “Are they then made -hereabouts?” “Before the war; but now no one is left who understands the -trade.” The next day I am likely to get a report, and a sharp one, from -Madame, his wife. “Sheets,” she queries, “what sort of sheets? Are they -linen sheets? Blankets. Are they wool? Are they white? Look you, before -the war, I had five dozen linen sheets and plenty of blankets and down -quilts of the finest quality. Keep your gifts about which you make so -much talk! I will have none of them, none of them at all!” - -I have sometimes wondered if Madame were related to the contrary-minded -but equally independent wife of the _garde champêtre_ who distributes—or -not—at her pleasure, the communal supply of bread. “I hear,” she began -one day, as I waited for change for a hundred franc note—change which -came in gold, by the way, as well as in silver—“I hear that you are to -make a distribution of gifts. Do not forget me! I will receive anything, -but you understand, not for payment; only as a present. Behold,” this -with a playful slap on the shoulder, “any one will tell you that I have a -tongue. _O, là, là, là!_” - - - - -CHAPTER VII - -NOUS SOMMES DIX - - -It was at Christmas time that we came most to realise the broken family -circles in all our villages. There was not one household which did not -have some hostage _avec les Boches_. Of the pitiful remnant, the old -men—there were no young ones—were to me the most appealing. I shall never -forget the fête in the hill village of Douilly, well up to the front, a -village completely destroyed, whose inhabitants were living in cellars. -On the brow of the hill, facing the sunset, stood the white stone -church. It had been used by the Germans as a barracks, and had not been -reconsecrated, so that we were given permission to hold our party there. -Cold, bare, yet beautiful with the sunlight falling in rainbow colours on -the groined arches, was the old church. At the bases of the pillars, we -deposited our sacks of presents; most of them for the children, but one -each for the women and the men. The latter were in my charge. Only three -came hobbling up from the outskirts of the crowd. “But is this all?” -I asked, as they chose the size of package which seemed to each most -desirable. “Are there no other men in the village?” The old men consulted -together. “There is Grandpère Cordon,” suggested one, “and Jean, who has -rheumatism,” “and blind Pierre——” “_Nous sommes dix_,” came the answer, -finally. “Shall we take the presents to the rest?” - -“_Nous sommes dix!_” It was the answer which might have been made in -Canizy. According to the number of inhabitants, it might represent the -proportion of the male population left anywhere in the _région dévastée_. -Not one was able-bodied. In Canizy there were, for example, the lame -mayor of whom I have spoken; his four contemporaries, verging on sixty, -one a heavy drinker, another one-armed, a third in need of an operation, -a fourth suffering from heart disease. Even the latter had been taken -away, but as he said, when the German doctor put down his ear to listen, -he threw up his hands, and gave the officers a good piece of his mind for -having imported a useless consumer of food. So he was encouraged to make -his way back. - -Of an older generation are two of the servitors of the Château, the -one the feeble gardener, the other the bedridden husband of the -laundress, who has not worked for many years. There is M. Tabary also, -the grandfather of Germaine, who has his own peculiar sorrow in his -granddaughter’s visible disgrace. A Boche baby will never outlive its -stigma while the memory of the Great War remains. M. Tabary is sick and -frail. It was he who, persuaded at last to come to the Dispensary, paused -in going out to doff his old cap with a courtly bow and to address the -doctors with a “_Merci, mes demoiselles, merci; je suis content_.” - -It was a fortunate circumstance, however,—for I cannot think it -intentional on the part of the Germans—that all of these old men, more -or less in need of care, had either wives or other feminine relatives to -give it to them. Not so circumstanced was M. Augustin. Smooth-shaven save -for a white fringe of beard, his fresh-coloured but anxious face appeared -one day at the Château. Thither he had gone to deliver a load of hay. -But the particular lady who had contracted to buy it being unexpectedly -absent, M. Augustin was disturbed. His language gave one an impression -of vigour which was borne out by subsequent acquaintance. On the saint’s -day of the village, he shared honours with young Lydie in being the life -of the party, by contributing a song and a quaint peasants’ dance. He -was to be met with frequently along the roads, with blue-visored cap, -brown corduroys and stout cane. As his neighbours said: “_M. Augustin, -il voyage toujours partout_.” Still, he took time to do chores, like -chopping wood for Mme. Juliette, to hoe in his garden, and to keep his -house. The latter was, strictly speaking, a shed. It had two windows, -however, through which, in the absence of the owner, I made inventory. A -broken stove was propped against a home-made chimney; a plank table stood -beneath the window; a chair, and a rough chest completed the furniture. -On the table, instead of a lamp, was a bottle containing a candle; beside -it were a bowl and a frying pan. - -Chiefly from the neighbours, I learned that M. Augustin was a widower, -that he had been the village cobbler, and that he preferred to live -alone. Now, we had shoe-making tools among our stores, so one day I -asked him if he would not like some. “No, Mademoiselle, I thank you,” -he replied. “My eyes are no longer clear; I cannot see well.” I was -more successful with other suggestions, however. A little nest of -dishes pleased him greatly; a new stove was installed, and a bed, and -what was perhaps even more greatly appreciated, a lamp. The evidence of -his appreciation took the form of whitewash on walls and ceiling; the -cobwebs vanished from the windows; and a shelf appeared for the dishes -behind the stove. It may be that M. Augustin will now be more content -with his own fireside, and less drawn to visit the wineshops of Ham and -Nesle. - -I never saw M. Augustin at mass, where the village transformed itself on -occasion from weekday caps and kerchiefs and sabots to its conventional -and unbecoming best. Therefore I must needs infer that his face was -shaven daily, and his suit always clean, for his own satisfaction. The -moral stamina shown by this is noteworthy, and characteristic of the -peasantry of our district. We ourselves in our living conditions found -cleanliness next to godliness in this respect at least, in that it was -hard to attain. But _cui bono_ seemed never to have disturbed the habits -of M. Augustin. - -Another sprightly old gentleman was M. Touret. His quarters were more -spacious than those of his neighbour, for he lived in a barn. Overhead, -hay piled from eaves to roof-tree helped to keep out the cold, and there -was one window. As he himself said when asked if he wanted anything: -“What would you? I am warm; I have a chair, a stove and a bed. If -the young people were here—perhaps. But we who are old, we shall not -live long, we have enough.” M. Touret, however, did not live alone. -The mother of his son’s wife had taken pity on him after the Germans -deported his two sons and their families, and had invited him to share -her barn. There were three housed there altogether, for with them lived -her son. M. Touret was oftenest found on a bench between the window and -the stove, poring through his spectacles over the daily paper. Mme. -Clara was usually busy with some savoury cooking, and M. Albert on the -occasion of my first visit held the centre of the floor with saw-horse -and axe. A chair was offered at once, and we all sat down to talk. M. -Touret, however, kept glancing at his paper, or regarded us over the rims -of his spectacles. Presently he broke in: “As for you, I do not know -what you may be, but as for me, I am a Christian.” In the midst of a -conversation about fodder and furniture, the effect was arresting, until -one realised from his point of view the strangeness of our position. -What, he must have queried, are these young American women doing here? We -were certainly different from the French ladies of family who nursed the -soldiers, or took over whole communities to house and feed. French women -would never have walked as we did, muddy-shoed and knapsacked, alone over -the fields. They might have been more understanding, at least their ways -would have been more conventional and better understood. - -In fact, on another occasion M. Touret asked me why I had come to France. -“Monsieur, my father was a soldier; I cannot fight, but in this war I, -too, want to help.” “Your father was a soldier? Ah yes, that would be -in the Civil War, in ’64—I remember it well. And what rank did he hold? -Was he a general?” “But no, Monsieur; only a common soldier.” “A common -soldier?” He thought a moment. “But not like ours, because in America you -are not a military nation, and depend on volunteers.” My face must have -expressed astonishment. “Look you, Mademoiselle; before the war it was my -habit to read. I read every year as many as two hundred volumes. I had a -large library in a cabinet. The Germans burned my books.” He rose, picked -up something from a bench behind the stove and handed it to me. It proved -to be a charred and mildewed copy of a history; the history of England -in the time of Henry the Eighth. Mutilated as it was, the pages showed a -beautiful clear type and exquisite engravings. It was a good example of -the printing of Abbeville, famous for its engravers and binders since the -days of its first printing press in 1484. - -“Would you not like some books, then?” I ventured. - -“What sort of books? Not magazines.” He looked contemptuously at one that -I had in my hand. “Me, I like stories. See what I bought yesterday.” He -brought from a chest of drawers a gaudy paper volume entitled “La Morte -d’Amour.” - -Knowing that our library contained no such light literature, I continued, -“Would you perhaps like Dumas?” - -“Dumas? ‘The Three Musketeers’?” His wrinkled face lighted. “I know them. -Another book I liked the Germans loaned me when they were here. It was by -an Englishman—B-u-l-w-e-a-r—‘The Last Days of Pompeii’—a very interesting -book.” - -“Tell me,” he went on a little later, “some one has said that you have no -twilight in North America. Is it true?” - -It seeming in his mind to be a reflection upon our country, I tried my -best to dissipate this impression by citing the great size of the United -States, and its varying climatic conditions. But I could not truthfully -say that we had the lingering orange sunsets and afterglows of pink and -mauve and applegreen which I knew were in his mind, and with which I too -became familiar on the plain of Picardy. - -The last time I saw M. Touret was on a white and wintry morning when I -had risen even earlier than the Villagers or M. the chaplain, to attend -the Village mass. In a golden-brown corduroy which might have been -the twin of M. Augustin’s, I spied M. Touret on the path ahead of me, -homeward bound after the service. I ran to catch up. - -“Good morning, Monsieur, and how are you?” - -“_O, doucement, doucement_,” he answered. “And you?” - -“The books, did you like them?” I inquired, for his Christmas present had -consisted of three. - -“O, well enough; but one was not true. It was called ‘Contes de la Lune.’ -I did not read it. Another (this in reference to Tourguenieff) was by -a Russian; and you know well, in France we do not love Russia, now. A -Russian indeed! The third,—well Jules Verne is always interesting. _Ça -ira._” - -Somewhat discouraged, I recalled what Mme. Clara had told me once in -an effort to soften the old man’s brusqueness. “He is old; he is full -of crotchets, you understand.” But Madame herself appeared to me to be -quite as old, though I had the wit not to compliment her politeness -thus maladroitly. Perhaps it was because of this honesty, entirely -unaffected, that of all the households in my village, I enjoyed most -hers and M. Touret’s. There one found a freeborn fellowship, which, -like the mellow twilight, belongs to Picardy. It is a _timbre_ resonant -in the older generation; that generation which endured the invasion of -1870, as well as the invasion of 1914. It is a survival of many wars, of -many hardships, a spirit akin to that fortitude which has made our own -country,—a common language that we, who came from the ends of the earth, -could understand. - - - - -CHAPTER VIII - -UNE DISTRIBUTION DE DONS - - -At length, the survey of Canizy was completed: its crooked streets traced -on a map, its houses numbered, and the pre-war and the post-war status -of each of its families noted thereon. But long before these facts had -been collected, the articles found to be most necessary had been bought -for the homes. It only remained to wait their arrival. Even the number -of sheets and blankets in each household was listed, and against them, -the number to be given out. The honesty and unselfishness of most of the -villagers in setting down their needs, was a constant joy. There was -Mme. Regina, for instance, who had five pairs of stout linen sheets and -four soldiers’ blankets on two Boche beds. I proposed a new bed for the -baby, and covers to go with it. Mme. Regina acquiesced at first, but -later drew me aside: “I can get along,” she said, “I know you have not -enough to go around,—and when one is so poorly lodged anyway, it does not -matter. When I get my _baraque_, then I will come to you.” - -There was good sense in Mme. Regina’s decision. The housing rested not -with us, but with the Government, through the mayor of the commune. Long -delay ensued in Canizy, when ten families had applied, and only three -_baraques_ had been set up. Of these, two were for the domestics of M. -Lanne. Mme. Picard and the Mayor himself were among the waiting; nor -could one decide which was the more miserably off. Even Mme. Picard’s -vegetables were comfortably bedded compared with her children, in her -dark and windy barn, and as for M. le Maire, a water-spout built within -his hut carried the rain from his bed. But at last one day, loads of -_baraques_ began to arrive, and red-fezzed Moroccans, to erect them. -There were five shacks in all, and four, it transpired, were for Mme. -Picard and M. Thuillard. I could understand that Mme. Picard had need of -her two apartments, but the Mayor,—well, he wished to reopen his store. -And his wife, all smiles at their prospective installation, offered me -myself a guest room so that I could live in my village at last. But this -offer was tendered before the distribution of gifts. - -It was Dave, or strictly speaking, the Red Cross, which made possible -an early allotment of blankets and sheets in Canizy. Though they had -been overturned in the mud, even Mme. la Maire did not complain of their -condition. “It matters nothing; they can be washed,” she said. On the -day we had chosen, word was passed to each family that a distribution -would be made at Mme. Lefèvre’s at four that afternoon. There was no -need of a _garde champêtre_ such as they had in Esmery-Hallon to cry -the news. The children flew with it; the mothers halted at the corners -to talk about it; and at four o’clock, when the jitney drove in with -its wonderful cargo, a line like a bread-line had formed in front of -the door. Mme. Lefèvre herself came out to help us; the older boys lent -a hand, and within five minutes, piles of single blankets and double -blankets, and single sheets and double sheets, were ready to be given -out. Then a window was opened and the names were called. “Mme. Carlier: -6 blankets; 3 single sheets; 3 double sheets.” “Mme. Lecart: 3 double -sheets, 2 blankets.” So ran the list. One after another the mothers -stepped forward, received their quota and went away. There were order, -good nature, and no unkind comment. Even afterwards, there seemed to be -little dissatisfaction. The distribution had been made, as every one -knew, on the basis of actual need, and the result was accepted as just. -If Mme. Lefèvre had only one blanket, that was because she had plenty -of linen sheets, much better than the cotton ones we gave, a woollen -blanket, and a warm red eiderdown quilt. Only the mayor’s wife and that -very human lady, Mme. Charles Thuillard, of whom I have before spoken, -raised protesting voices,—but such was their bent. - -Our first distribution having gone so well, and we being still received -as friends, we proceeded to the second, which consisted of cast-iron -beds and stoves. The single beds we had been fortunate enough to buy -ourselves; but the double beds and the stoves came from M. le Sous-Préfet -and were signed for by the recipients as a part of their _indemnité de -guerre_. Heavy loads these articles made, and Dave and his truck were -requisitioned for the day. We first had to secure the double beds, which -were stored, together with other civilian supplies, at the Moroccan camp -at Nesle. To Nesle, then, we tore, coasting the long hills, and chugging -up the inclines as if the Germans themselves were in pursuit. Arrived -at the camp, we found that we had not made the proper entry, and must -reverse, disentangle ourselves from the railroad embankment, plough -through mud to the axles, and back up to the warehouse at the other end -of the yard. All this Dave did. Bedsteads, mattresses and bolsters were -then piled aboard. Dave and one of my comrades precariously balanced -on the front seat, and I high on the load, expecting a landslide every -minute, we steamed away for Canizy. A house to house visitation with a -truck down its narrow and uneven streets was also an adventure, and we -were thankful enough when the day ended with only minor injuries, and -every family that needed them supplied with beds. Stoves were simpler, -for the reason that they were smaller. Wardrobes, buffets, chairs and -tables would have followed, could we have secured them. But these, even -when I left, had not yet been crossed off the village lists. - -Failing to obtain furniture, we distributed clothing, for by this time -the winter was well upon us. Individual families had been taken care -of before as the need arose. In order not to pauperize, or hurt the -genuine self-respect of the people, I tried a plan known by them as -“an arrangement,” whereby I took vegetables, or rags, in exchange. This -system of barter was also one of coöperation with our travelling store, -which supplied the wants of families able—and glad—to buy. The coming of -the store made a red-letter day, like a market-day, in the village. Even -the soldiers gathered around, commenting humorously on the bargains, and -urging the ladies to buy. They asked on their own part for mufflers or -sabots or cigarettes. Once a small tradesman, transformed by his uniform -in appearance but not in nature, wondered audibly how long we thought -we could remain in business and lose in each purchase from a third to a -half of its value. Our storekeeper laughed. “_Toujours_, M. Soldat,” she -answered, and forthwith beguiled a hesitant grandmother into buying an -entire bar of laundry soap at four francs instead of twelve. - -But our “arrangements” did not lack humour or interest. There was Mme. -Laure, for example, who was purposely absent when we brought the new -clothing for her family, and undressed and bathed it and filled the -boiler in turn with what we had taken off; and Mme. Gense-Tabary who -conspired with her husband to get vegetables in Ham and resell to us at a -higher price in payment for her dozens of new garments, and Mme. Payell -who, hearing a rumour that We were about to outfit her babies, bought -extra buttons to have them ready to sew on. There was also conscientious -Mme. Regina, with her box of clean rags all ready for the new suit We -gave fifteen-year-old Raymond. - -The purpose of the rag industry was twofold: to clear the cluttered -interiors, and with the rags themselves to make rag rugs. After Mlle. -Suzanne’s washing, the clean pieces went to a class of three young -girls, who met once a week, divided the stock, and sewed and braided the -strands. To them went also the snippings of the hundreds of garments we -cut and let out through the district to be sewed. A pretty picture my -girls made of a Tuesday afternoon around the big table in Mme. Noulin’s -store; Elmire fair and delicate as a lily, Albertine black-haired and -black-eyed, and quick, graceful, thirteen-year-old Cécile. Fingers and -tongues were busy. Mme. Noulin herself bustled in and out, and finally -served us with the inevitable coffee. This ceremony concluded the lesson. -But the yards of braiding grew week by week,—though not without some -small heart-burning and rivalry. “Cécile,” Elmire complained, “takes all -the longer pieces and gives me only the scraps. Perhaps Mademoiselle -would speak to her.” But it was the Government which unintentionally -interfered most with my rags. I had bespoken the mayor’s hut for our -headquarters as soon as he was ready to move out. Only a few feet from -the best well, where we planned to install our new pump and our Village -_chaudière_, it was to be a centre of neighbourhood industry. But the -mayor still waits on opportunity and the rags still wait in sacks. - -As winter advanced, it became obvious, even at mass, that Canizy went -cold. The children’s noses and mittenless hands were red. True, there -was Mme. Gabrielle, who came in furs and smart black hats; and several -other ladies sufficiently warm if rather rusty and old-fashioned. But -one noted among the children an absolute lack of the capes which are -the characteristic dress of French school children. Throats wrapped in -mufflers, hands thrust into pockets or skirts,—this was their method -of keeping warm. The older boys especially looked pinched in trousers -which had become too short, and tightly buttoned, threadbare coats. One -day, when a biting wind and a powdery snow impressed their discomfort -upon me, I made a raid on our store-room, with the entire permission of -my colleague in charge. Woollen shirts, stockings, caps, overcoats and -suits, whatever article of warmth I could find, I gathered up. The roads -were too drifted for the truck, or for walking, but I had asked for the -horse and wagon. Carlos, our soldier, helped me pack my plunder, and -conveyed me on my way. But a difficult way it proved to be, and it was -not until nearly twilight that we drew up at Mme. Lefèvre’s door, too -late to distribute that night. I left the warm clothing in her care, -asking her at the same time to make me a list of those to whom she -thought it ought to go, and promising to return the following day. But -Mme. Lefèvre’s enthusiasm exceeded her instructions. When I came, she -met me with a triumphant smile. “I knew, Mademoiselle, that it would -please you were the clothes on the backs of the poor children. Voilà, I -have given the clothing according to the list.” A cramped and illiterate -list it was she handed me, devoid of capitals, but it accounted for -every article, even to a boy’s coat given to Lydie Cerf. “Lydie?” I -queried mentally, yet not for the world would I have questioned or -criticised good Mme. Lefèvre. Lydie herself I did question. “But, yes, -Mademoiselle,” she replied, “I am keeping the coat for Papa. He is with -the Boches. It will be ready for him when he returns.” - -When they return! It was a phrase on every lip. “If the children were -here, it would be different.” “No, I do not wish to touch my indemnity. -I and my wife, we are saving it for the boys when they come home.” -“Mademoiselle, I need another bed.” “But you have two.” “Yes, but there -is my mother, who may return any day.” So ran the undercurrent of longing -in every family, mutilated as were the apple trees girdled in the -orchards, uprooted, like them, and left for dead. - -For my next distribution, which was to be a more important one, I went -to Mme. Gabrielle. “Madame,” said I, “it is true, is it not, that the -parents of most of the children have enough money to buy capes?” “Yes,” -she admitted. “But it is not true that they will not do so?” “Yes; there -are so many things to buy when one has lost so much. We fear to spend -the money.” “Very well. Will you make me out a list for all the world?” -The list was made; a list so orderly that it could be used as a shopping -guide. Coats for the women and capes for the children were bought, -including a coat for Lydie Cerf. They were brought down by our own truck, -which had made a special trip to Amiens in the bitterest weather, and -deposited with Mme. Gabrielle. “Madame,” I said again as we brought the -heaped armfuls in, “will you not make this distribution yourself?” “But -it is very difficult,” she remonstrated, “and all the world will say -that I am partial.” “I will tell all the world that the distribution is -mine,” I urged. “You can see yourself that we are very busy,—and you know -the size for each child.” Reluctant though she was, Mme. Gabrielle’s -kind heart could not refuse. On a Sunday not long after, a strange yet -strangely familiar audience sat in the little church, the women in coats -all of one pattern, “but of different colours, the children in smart -blue hooded capes. No one looked self-conscious, or thanked us. The -distribution, like the snow, had fallen on the just and on the unjust; it -was a providence for which one thanked God. - - - - -CHAPTER IX - -EN PERMISSION - - -At noon time, on dispensary days, I sometimes lunched with the doctors in -Mme. Lefèvre’s kitchen. It was a heterogeneous spot, with two beds (one -being stored for a niece), two cats, and a few neighbours always sitting -near the fire. Usually the neighbours were waiting for _la factrice_. A -tap at the window, and Madame ran to open it, and received a handful of -letters which the postmistress brought each day by bicycle from Nesle. -Were it cold, she herself, a capable, pleasant-faced woman, came in -to join the group for a moment, threw back her long cape, and warmed -her numb hands. Meantime spectacles were brought out and the envelopes -scanned. It was not alone of the return of the refugees that the village -lived in hope. They might come unannounced, but the soldiers, _en -permission_,—that was different. Any day Albert or Henri might write that -he was coming home! - -[Illustration: _C’est un coup de fourreau de sabre._ - -[A cut of a sword-scabbard.]] - -And when they came! It was in Mme. Lefèvre’s kitchen again that I had -the pleasure of seeing the greeting given to a soldier in faded blue. A -bronzed and bearded man he was, the father of a family. But the family -alas! the wife and the children, were _avec les Boches_. M. Huillard -seemed to have returned therefore, unheralded. As he opened the door, the -neighbours rose with exclamations; the men grasping his hands, the women -presenting one cheek and then the other for a kiss. Questions followed: -Where had he been stationed? At Verdun, and, more lately, at St. Quentin. -“At St. Quentin? Have you seen Narcisse, then?” Mme. Carpentier inquired -eagerly. “Yes, your husband was well. I have a letter.” And M. Huillard -fumbled in his pockets and brought out a thumbed envelope with the -cramped address: Mme. Regina Carpentier, Canizy, Somme. - -An account of the recent bombardment is curtailed by M. Huillard’s own -desire for information. This is his first visit to the village since his -leave-taking during the tragic mobilisation of 1914. He has known, of -course, of the German occupation; he has heard the terrible news of the -deportation of wife and children. He has seen other devastated villages. -But to-day, for the first time, he looks upon the ruins of his own home. -I saw him standing alone that afternoon before the sagging door, which -bore the staring military number 25, and beside it, chalked inscriptions -in German and in English jostling each other: _Gott mit uns._ _Hot ᛭ -buns._ Within, thistles grew about the hearth. M. Huillard uttered no -sound, and shed no tears, but his face, as he turned away, was set in a -white hatred, and his right hand rose to heaven in an unspoken vow. - -No soldier on his ten days’ leave remained idle. Mme. Cordier’s handsome -son, looking even more handsome in the uniform of an Alpine _chasseur_, -was no exception. In fact, when I first saw him, the uniform, including -his decoration, was covered by a mason’s white blouse. Up on a ladder, he -was white-washing the walls of the stable in which his family then lived. -A huge brick manger in a dark corner was startingly brought out by his -brush. It served as a kitchen table, and was laughingly referred to as -one of the conveniences of the _ménage_. In another home, I found one day -a soldier-brother knocking up a cupboard out of rough planks. Cheerful -was the sound of his vigorous hammer strokes, and cheerful the sight of -a young and merry face among the ruins. It mattered not whether he had a -bed to sleep in—one of the most difficult requests we had to refuse was -that of a bed to a soldier—the younger _poilu en permission_ was always -gay. If his mother worked, he helped her; and day after day through the -Christmas holidays one of these boys walked to the Château each morning -to help Mme. Topin chop our wood. I happened in upon her on the eve of -his departure. Her tiny cabin was full of an odour most appetising after -my long day’s walk. Over a glowing fire, she was turning waffles, “to put -in his knapsack,” she explained. But he had one the less for my having -called; and over it his mother sprinkled half of the last teacupful of -sugar she possessed. - -Mme. Topin had another son also serving with the colours, who came home -quite often to see his wife, because he was making a slow recovery from -gas-injured lungs. She, during his absence, taught in the village school, -while her old mother kept house and took care of three-year-old Guy. M. -Topin it was who showed me around his ruined yard one day, pointing out -the place of the five-room cottage, and telling me the colours of the -roses whose blackened stalks still remained against the walls. “This was -white and very fragrant; that yellow. I planted it on Guy’s birthday. -Here we had a bed of mignonette. Take care, Guy—pardon, Mademoiselle.” -And he stooped to wrench away from the child’s fingers a long cartridge -picked up in the débris. “A German bullet,” he explained, handing it to -me. “There are hundreds of them about.” - -As I have said, the soldier _en permission_ expected to work. Yet I know -of one who was assigned to more of a-task than he relished. Him, hapless -being, I first encountered down by the old Château at Canizy, hunting -rabbits for a stew. But as I remembered the dimensions of his mother’s -_baraque_, it seemed to me that self-interest might prompt him to leave -his hunting to assist me for a time. Besides his grandmother, his mother, -a brother and a sister, there was an aunt who had arrived to lodge with -the family,—a _réfugiée_ from near Péronne. Utterly destitute and unhappy -was the aunt. The fact that her husband and her daughter were still in -the slavery from which she had escaped, would be enough to sadden any -one, but she whispered to me that her sister did not make her welcome. -At the time, we were much in need of a domestic at our camp. “Would you -like to come and work for us, perhaps,” I suggested. “We have no lodging, -but I will find you a shelter in Hombleux from which you can walk over -with Madame our cook.” Rash promise, to which I added a complete outfit -of furniture and two francs a day. The offer was accepted. - -From pillar to post, I then went to Hombleux. A regiment _en repos_ had -been quartered there since I had made arrangements with the baker’s wife -for a room in her tidy loft. Regiments succeeded one another rapidly, -and during their sojourns there was literally no lodging to be had. I -was finally directed to a corner in the outbuilding of a former convent -school which was considered habitable. My soldier I pressed into service -to assist its quondam tenant, who had moved out because it was so cold, -in removing the vegetables, wood and furniture she still had stored -there. He looked on while a resourceful young girl pasted oiled paper on -the iron window frame; he went to the woods and chopped and hauled a tree -for fuel; he brought over at the same time a plank with which to mend the -door. This took a day, which I, meantime, spent in Ham. There I bought -a bed, mattress and bedding, a stove, a pipe, an elbow for the same, a -chair, a table, a metal wash basin and a pitcher, a saucepan, a little -set of dishes, a lamp, a brush and a broom. It is surprising how many -things are necessary for even a primitive existence. Two days more were -consumed in setting these few articles in place, and all the neighbours -helped. - -The snow had come, meantime, and the soldier returned to rabbit hunting. -As he remarked on pointing out the little roads beaten by them through -the weeds, “They look much better _en casserole_.” It remained for our -own soldier at the château to bring our domestic to her new home. One -frosty morning, Tambour and the cart awaited me after breakfast, and I -set forth. Old Tambour appeared none too steady on the trot to which I -urged him. “_Ça glisse_,” explained Carlos, and we relapsed into a walk. -In fact, all the way to Canizy we walked, the shrewd wind biting nose -and ears and coursing under the blankets on the high seat. Carlos got -out, winding the lines about the whipstock. The horse floundered through -drifts, and he, adjusting his cap to the veering gusts, trudged at his -head. At length, we debouched upon the direct road to the village. But, -barring our way was a machine-gun squad. Already the red signals had been -posted and the route was _défendu_. Even as we halted, came volleys like -staccato hail. On other occasions, with honking horn, we have run this -gauntlet, the sentries halting the fire for us to pass. But to-day, I -judged it safer to turn down into a hollow, and skirt the action. Thus -delayed, it was near noon when we turned into the gate of the Château at -Canizy. - -We were expected, however; coffee was hot upon the stove, and the soldier -_en permission_ served it, stirring the cups in rotation with the one -family spoon. Madame, our new domestic, was ready also, with quite a -store of bedding and clothing done up in a sack. Two kisses apiece, -a last admonition, a promise to come to see her on Sunday, and she -climbed up over the wheel. To her, I imagine, the journey to Hombleux -seemed, like a voyage to a foreign country. Nor was she welcomed, as I -afterwards learned, by her new neighbours in the commune. It seems, one -should have gone to the mayor first for permission to install her; and -certainly one should have paid more money to that inconvenienced lady, -the former tenant. As Madame said, “She talks most unkindly.” To add to -the newcomer’s hardships, the winter wind ripped the oiled linen from the -window, and her nephew, the soldier, never returned to mend the door. -“_Bien mal logée_,” having to walk a mile and a half through the snow at -dawn and after dark, it is not to be wondered at that she made a final -choice of her sister’s sharp tongue and warm fire, and left our employ. - -[Illustration: —_Si j’étais grand...._ - -[If I were grown up!]] - -Akin to the soldier _en permission_ is the soldier _en repos_. Of the -latter class was our Carlos, who was given us by M. le Sous-Préfet, -together with a horse and two carts. He was to report during his stay -to no one but Mlle. la Directrice, nor would the authorities take any -direct cognisance of him save in case of her complaint. A southerner was -Carlos, a dapper man from the Basque provinces. There he had a wife and -two children whom he had not seen for three years. But he expected a -_permission_ shortly, he said; and that may have reconciled him to the -uncongenial hewing of wood and drawing of water to which he was detailed. -Day long he drove, or chopped trees, or cleaned the stable, as advised. -His only diversion appeared to be our milk maid,—a harmless enough one, -I presume; for she told us proudly and often how she received a letter -from her soldier-husband every day. Nevertheless, there was visible -sadness when one morning Carlos announced that he had been transferred. -And was he then going home? No, his _permission_ had been taken away; he -was returning to the front. He and Tambour were to join the artillery. -Poor old Tambour, faithful, plodding; one knew not for which to feel more -compassion, the horse or the master, as one pictured them dragging into -position the grey seventy-fives! “Good-bye, then,” I said, “I am sorry.” -“O, what would you,” he replied. “So it goes. But you, you are leaving -also. Some one has told me, for America—_La bonne chance, Mademoiselle_.” - -Unlike Carlos only in that they came by regiments, were the shifting -troops taken at intervals from the trenches for a brief rest in our more -habitable villages. One saw them, a weary line of blue, marching down -the roads, flanked by stretcher bearers, and followed by a provision -train. Once settled, they stood about the corners of the streets or in -the gaping doorways; a disconsolate enough addition to the ruins. Or at -the camp kitchens, drawn up to one side, they grouped themselves around -huge cauldrons of soup. Sometimes a more ambitious company set to work -to clean up the village and built an outdoor bathing tank which was much -in use. On one occasion, a dashing troop of blue devils gave military -concerts each evening. An incongruous sight was the band, drawn sprucely -up in a desolate courtyard, and a strangely stirring sound, the music -floating through the empty streets, of _Ce que c’est qu’ un drapeau_. -Often soldiers and even officers came over to see us at the Château and -to ask for cigarettes or shoes. If one had time to listen, they talked -for hours on the war. They were never boastful, these soldiers; they -had a just estimate of the German strength of organisation; they had no -illusions as to their own personal fate. Each one expected to die at -his post. Patient, sturdy, intelligent, they gave one confidence that, -however heavy the dawn bombardments, our lines would hold. And if our -lines, then all the lines manned by them with such spiritual as well as -physical courage. The morale of the _poilu_, unflinching, will yet win -the war. - - - - -CHAPTER X - -A LA FERME DU CALVAIRE - - -Midway between Hombleux and Canizy, at the crossing of the highway, stood -on one side a Calvary, and on the other a demolished farm house. The -lane here emerged from a hollow, so that both objects rose distinctly -against the sky. About the Calvary, the poplars were shattered by -shell-fire; back of the farm sloped an orchard, whose every tree had -been lopped. Across the road and into the fields ran a zig-zag trench, -where could be found even yet blue coats and rusted helmets; the line of -defence evidently for the highway, against the German advance. A square -declivity, formerly a clay pit, perhaps an hectare in area, bordered road -and trench. Its banks were green with grass, and in the bottom land was -a little orchard. At one side, half-hidden, was a hut. - -A solitary farm is rare in these rural communities, where the houses as -a rule cluster in villages. I was undecided at first as to whether the -Farm of the Calvary belonged to Hombleux or Canizy. But in the yard were -two obvious reasons for calling and inquiring. Higher than the hut rose -a heaped hay stack; at its base the apples from the orchard had been -gathered in a mound of red and white. I ran down the path, too steep for -walking, and knocked at the door. It was opened by a gaunt, dark man -of perhaps forty-five. At a table sat his wife paring apples; and in a -corner, quite unabashed, his daughter, pretty Colombe, finished lacing -her bodice before she stepped forward to greet me. So small a room, in -any of our villages, I had never been in. A double bed took up all the -space except for a border of about two feet. The roof was so low that the -man seemed to have acquired a perpetual stoop. - -“_Entrez! entrez!_” was the hospitable entreaty; but not seeing how this -might be possible, I remained on the threshold. - -“I come from the Château,” I began. - -“But yes, you are one of the _Dames Américaines_, eh! We have often seen -you cross the fields. Colombe, here, goes to the sewing class with you.” -Colombe smiled a recognition. - -“I should have called before, perhaps; but I was not aware that a family -lived in so small a place, until I saw the smoke from the chimney to-day.” - -“Yes, it is small,” admitted the wife. - -“A Boche hut, eh!” agreed her husband. “Yonder, across the road is my -farm. Not one stone left; all destroyed. I have asked for a _baraque_.” - -I measured the interior with my eyes. “You would not have room for -another bed——” - -“If it folded, yes, and we would thank you. Colombe, she sleeps now on -the ground.” - -[Illustration: —_C’était là, notre maison._ - -[Our house used to be there!]] - -The bed being promised, I inquired as to fodder. Could I see if it were -suitable to feed our cows? Assuredly; and the brown sides of the stack -were rudely pulled apart that I might see and smell the sweet hay within. -How much would it weigh and how much would it cost? A bargain was finally -concluded for eight hundred francs. - -This was the first of many visits to the hut beside the road. Going or -coming, sharp eyes spied me, and friendly voices called me in. Once it -was for a bumper of sparkling cider. - -“I make it myself, from the apples. But I have to take them to Mme. -Marié’s in Hombleux because my press the Germans broke. Ah, the Germans!” -he continued. “It is only a month and a half since I returned, eh!” - -“Were you then taken to Germany?” - -“To Belgium; and I worked, always. And hungry, always hungry; one has -nothing, eh! to eat.” - -On another occasion I was offered apples; not the small, sour ones from -which cider was made, but luscious golden globes that adorned the narrow -beams of the hut like a frieze. - -“See,” said Monsieur. “I will put them in this sack, so that you can -carry them the more easily.” - -But I, thinking of the long miles yet ahead of me, ventured to suggest -that I call on my return. - -“Very well, only, look you, I shall not be here. But wait, I will hide -them. Behold, in the _chaudière_,” and suiting the action to the word he -lifted the cover of the cauldron and placed them within. “No one will -think to look for them there. Au revoir, until you return.” - -But a rain set in that afternoon; a slant mist which made Corot-like -effects of brown autumn copses and shut one in from the sometimes too -lonely sweep of the plain. At the same time, it beat persistently on my -face, and made heavier at every step my woollen uniform. I did not stop -therefore for my apples, and wondered for a few days what had been their -fate. But not for long. - -One morning at breakfast I was told that I had a caller. Now callers -about this time of a morning had become frequent, ever since Monsieur -le Maire of the commune told his villagers that they must apply to us -rather than to him for beds and stoves and cupboards. I visualised the -waiting crones of Hombleux whom in America we should have thrust into an -Old Ladies’ Home. Not so the French Government, which respected their -sentiment and built for each on her own plot her own _baraque_. Knowing -well that we had no cupboards, and no prospect of getting any, I rose -with a sigh. But my face brightened at the sight of M. Guilleux. - -Over his back hung a sack, nor was it empty. - -“You did not come for your apples,” he began. “I hope that you wish them, -however.” He unslung the sack, opened it, and disclosed the golden fruit. - -I thanked him. “But the sack, you wish it back?” - -“Yes, for look you; it is a little souvenir.” And at that he showed -me certain crosses and darts and letterings in German script which -indicated by number and description the prisoner, Guillaume Guilleux of -the commune of Hombleux and the farm _du Calvaire_. “I took this with me, -eh! I would not part with it.” - -“Not to me, Monsieur? To me also it would be a souvenir, to take to -America.” - -“O no, Mademoiselle, never,” and his hands clutched it involuntarily. -“The souvenir and the memory, they are mine. Both my grandchildren shall -remember also in the years to come.” - -But the sack was not the only souvenir contained in the little hut. I -spied one day three tiny teacups depending from nails upon the wall. They -were even smaller than coffee cups, and delicately flowered. - -“Oh, how pretty,” I exclaimed. “May I look?” - -Mme. Guilleux took them down with fumbling fingers and a suddenly altered -face. For the first time, I noticed the sharp indrawn wrinkles about -mouth and eyes which tell of suffering. - -“They belonged to Solange, Colombe’s sister,” and not able to continue, -she hid her face in her apron. “They were her tea-set,” she went on in -broken sentences. “Her father and I bought them for her on her thirteenth -birthday, and she always kept them. _Mon Dieu_, how lovely she was! -Curls, and long lashes, and skin like apple blossoms, and eyes blue like -those flowers! She was my oldest, and good as she was pretty. But on the -night when the Germans came, they tore her from my arms. Why do I live?” -she broke into sobs. “Solange, Solange!” - -She wiped her eyes at length, and regarded the little cups. “When we -returned, I searched the ruins. I was fortunate, for I found these. They -were all that I did find. Everything else had been destroyed. Nor did I -save anything, for look you, after the soldiers seized Solange, I ran -hither and thither distracted, and knew not what to save.” - -She rose, took the cups from my hands, and rehung them on the wall. - -How do they live, I wondered, as I passed out and over the fields? How -do these mothers keep their reason, who have seen their daughters taken -into a captivity upon which shuts down a silence deep as death? One -understands the comment of Mme. Charles Thuillard, who in spite of her -sharp tongue has a most human heart. She was showing me the picture of -her daughter one day; an enlargement such as all the world makes of its -dead. “Thank God,” she said, “she was happy; she died before the war.” - - - - -CHAPTER XI - -LES PETITS SOLDATS - - - Ou t’en vas-tu, soldat de France, - Tout equipé, prêt au combat, - Ou t’en vas-tu, petit soldat? - _C’est comme il plaît à la Patrie,_ - _Je n’ai qu’ à suivre les tambours._ - _Gloire au drapeau,_ - _Gloire au drapeau._ - _J’aimerais bien revoir la France,_ - _Mais bravement mourir est beau._ - -So, in chorus, sang the children of my village, day after day, as they -marched and circled about us up and down the streets. A catching tune; a -laughing eye; did they realise that only twelve miles away on the firing -line their soldiers were dying for the glory of the flag? No, it was not -possible for them, fugitives though they themselves had been, to live the -horrors of war. As Mme. Gabrielle said: “The children laugh; they do not -know that our world is destroyed, and it is well.” - -Yet it would be hard to find a more manly group of boys in any land than -those of Canizy. They were soldiers, even in their dress; blue caps, -and blue or khaki blouses and trousers which their mothers had cut and -made from the cast-off coats of passing troops, English or French as -the case might be. Stockings also were of a military colour; for as -Mme. Marie Gense explained: “One can find stockings in the trenches -sometimes,—dirty, of course, and ragged; but they can be washed and -raveled, and the yarn is excellent.” So it came about that little Robert -had one pair of stockings with blue tops and khaki feet, because, you -understand, there was not enough wool of one colour to complete them. -Above his wooden sabots, the straight splicing was plainly visible, if he -were ever _en repos_. But my memory of Robert is of tireless feet that -twinkled almost as merrily as his eyes. It was no hardship for him to -walk the eight miles back and forth to the Château of a morning for his -quart can of milk. Mud, rain, snow, it was all one to him. By the hand, -he often brought a younger cousin, Albert, aged six. Chubby-faced and -sturdy of leg was Albert, clad in a diminutive khaki suit, and a brown -visored cap which failed to blight his red cheeks. Robert, being brave -and unconscious, whistled the merry call he had been taught, “Bob White, -Bob White!” and smiled at all the world. But Albert, being shy, buried -his small nose between cap and muffler, hung his head, and if pressed too -far by unsought civilities, presented his back. - -It would be small wonder if all the children of Canizy had been shy. With -their elders they were virtual prisoners during the German occupation. -They had no incentive to gather in groups, no church and no school. -Rather, they were taught to slip in and out in silence lest they attract -sinister attention. One of our little soldiers to the end of his life -will carry a mark of German brutality in a hand maimed by a too well -aimed grenade. Even since the Retreat, their life has consisted of -skulking more or less among the ruins. Raiding aeroplanes, by night or -day, drop bombs in their vicinity; for Canizy lies near to Ham, the -munition centre of the St. Quentin front. They hear the bombardments; -and the rumours fly that the Boches are advancing. Will the lines hold? -Their mothers keep eyes and ears open to the eastward. One refuses to buy -a stove, because she thinks it is too risky an investment; her husband -is sure the Germans will return, and a stove, it cannot be carried away. -“What will you do then, if the Germans come?” I ask. “_Fly_,” is the -universal reply. “_We know the Boches; better to die than remain._” - -[Illustration: —_Et les momes Boches ils embrassent leur père?_ ... - -[And do the little Boche children hug their father?]] - -Even in the fields, a child cannot play. One day I was taken by a -bevy of laughing little girls to see an _obus_ which had fallen in -the graveyard near the entrance to the church. It had lain there some -months unexploded, hidden by grass and weeds. But the preparations for -All Saints’ Day, as punctiliously made last autumn as in times of -peace, revealed it. The girls danced about it like sprites, touching it -spitefully with their toes. “Take care,” I cried. “Come away.” Merry -laughter greeted my alarm. “There are many of them,” said dare-devil -Thérèse; “they do no harm.” Nevertheless, knowing that a farmer had been -killed while ploughing, not far away, by just such a shell, I sent word -to the military authorities who removed this particular _obus_, before -the next Sunday’s mass. The Government recognises the danger, and prints -large placards of warning, which are hung up in the schoolrooms. - -The schools themselves are depressing enough, for against no class of -buildings did the Germans vent more hatred. Throughout the devastated -area, they were completely destroyed. _Ecole des Filles_, or _Ecole des -Garçons_ may still be seen in white capitals adorning a gaping arch or a -jagged wall. But the schools, such as they are, are held in half-ruined -dwellings, or in _baraques_. One such dilapidated interior bore, beside -the warning against spent shells, the following “Fable for the day,” -written in the teacher’s slant hand upon the blackboard: “At our last -breath, we shall have nothing. Since we have neither father nor mother, -we are now orphans. Nevertheless, we must do right. We must do right -because it is right.” - -In Canizy, as I have said, there was no school. The walls even of the -former school building were razed to the ground. But the children were -supposed to attend the school of another commune, that of Offoy, a mile -and a half distant along the canal. This seemingly simple provision for -education was made impossible by the fact that regiments continuously -_en repos_ at Offoy used the sandy buttes formed by the Somme at this -point for _mitrailleuse_ practice. One saw them every afternoon at half -past two, bringing out their gruesome targets, in the shape of a human -head and shoulders, and sentineling the crossroads with notices and red -flags. Then woe to the urchin lingering perhaps in Offoy on some belated -errand. Like the rabbits he must stay under cover until the fusillades -should cease. Yet the children of the village were not wholly neglected. -It was their former teacher, now resident in Hombleux, who taught them -the stirring _Petit Soldat_. And from Offoy came M. l’Aumônier, of whom -you shall hear later, to teach them the catechism and to receive them -into the church. “They are very _gentils_, the children of Canizy,” -he assured me one day. “They are not like the children of the other -villages. They have brave parents; they are well brought up.” - -Well brought up, yes, in all the usages of docility and endurance. -Shifting of troops, obedience to military masters, slavery and pillage, -such are the facts which these children have learned for three years. But -grafted as the lesson has been upon a spirit gentle by nature, the result -is terrible in its sombreness. Robert Gense, uncannily helpful; Raymond -Carpentier, threadbare and bowed at fourteen,—a look like that of a -faithful, whipped dog in his eyes,—Elmire Carlier, whose lovely mouth is -carved in patience, the Tabarys, ragged and elfin—these are the children -of Picardy. But where is the spontaneity of childhood? Where may one find -it in the track of war? - -[Illustration: _Garde à vous!_ - -—_Compagnie!... halte!_ - -[Company ... halt!]] - -On our own playground, perhaps, sometimes. Yet the children had to -be encouraged to play. They might remember the words of the _rondes_ -which have lately become familiar to American children also through the -illustrations of Boutet de Monville, but they no longer curtseyed as -the beautiful gentlemen and the beautiful ladies should _sur le pont -d’Avignon_. They no longer had books to read. A prayer book, a hymnal, -sometimes the family records; these were all the literature saved in -their mothers’ sacks of flight. But the play teacher draws our waifs of -the war as if with a magic flute; even M. Lanne’s cows come trooping -with the children, because the boy who herds them cannot come without. -The babies come, with older sister nurses; and on the outskirts may be -seen bent grandfather or grandmother, forgetting sorrow for the moment, -in watching the romping groups. And even after the store automobile, -stripped of its merchandise, honks persistently its desire to be off, -the joy of that brief hour is perpetuated in the books that the teacher -leaves behind. Who so proud then as the boy or girl singled out to be the -owner of a book for a whole week? _Contes des Fées_, _petites histoires_, -the _rondes_ themselves; they are treasures comparable to fairy gold. -Yet reading never seems to interfere with duty; Raymond, or Désiré, or -Adrien, you are likely to meet them as usual _en route_ to Voyennes for -apples, or returning from Ham with loaves of bread hanging, like life -preservers, about their necks; they pasture the few cows; they feed the -rabbits; they bring wood and dig coal,—they are the men of Canizy. - -Such grow to be the soldiers of whom France is proud; those older -children, the _poilus_, whom all the world has come to know. Long ago -Julius Cæsar knew them also, and Hirtius Pansa wrote of them: “They make -war with honour, without deceit and without artifice.” Brought up to -adore _la Patrie_, singing of death, as of glory, the little soldier of -France marches to-day as did the child in the Children’s Crusade. Across -three thousand miles I hear his refrain: - - _Point de chagrin,_ - _Point de chagrin,_ - _Il a sa gourde, il a sa pipe,_ - _C’est un gaillard toujours en train._ - - - - -CHAPTER XII - -M. L’AUMÔNIER - - -In Canizy, one found always something new. It might be an _obus_, or -a soldier _en permission_, or a family _réfugiée_, or a _baraque_. I -learned to expect the unexpected. Having carefully negotiated with M. -Lanne for certain timbers and chicken wiring which formed the basis for -a roof of which I had need, I was prepared to see that they had vanished -overnight, and to express neither surprise nor indignation when I was -told that they were transformed into the foundation for Mme. Picard’s -_baraques_. Having left glass, diamond cutter, putty, brads, and a list -of those who needed the panes, I was not discouraged when week after week -went by without M. Augustin’s cutting them. The fact that M. Noulin had -brought the materials over in his cart, and held them on his premises, -was doubtless reason enough why M. Augustin stayed his hand. At all -events, it seemed wiser to leave the solution of this problem to the -village; and the last I knew, it hinged on the return of a soldier _en -permission_, a glazier by trade. He, all the world assured me, would -actually out the glass! - -The Noulins themselves were among my earliest surprises. How they came -I know not, but one day I found the trio, father, mother and daughter, -tidying up the premises they had rented from M. Huillard. The outermost -room, from the walls of which still depended half-charred pictures, gaped -to the sky. But this was used as a store-room for neatly stacked wood -and fodder; within, the main room served as both kitchen and _épicerie_; -off it opened two bedrooms, and in the rear was a yard. The rooms were -completely furnished and the yard stocked with hens and about thirty -rabbits. In the stable stood a pony and a high-wheeled cart. All these -goods had M. Noulin bought and brought back from Compiègne, whither he -had fled at the outbreak of the war. - -It was in the _épicerie_, which we provisioned, that I came to look for -most of the news of Canizy. Here, about the table, might sit drinking the -Moroccans who were repairing the canal. Here Mme. Moulin thrust into my -hand an account of our own Unit in her fashion journal of the month; an -account glowing with undeserved praise of America and concluding with the -words: “Heureux pays, où sur les mairies des villages on pourrait écrire: -‘Aide-toi, l’Amérique t’aidera.’ Plus heureuses Américaines, qui peuvent -et qui savent donner!” - -Here she showed me a postal marked _Deutschland_, and bearing on its back -the picture of a jovial-looking man in civilian dress. “It is my son,” -explained Mme. Noulin. “He is a _prisonnier militaire_, and sends me this -to show me how well he is. He writes, too, that he has plenty to eat, of -sugar, of chocolate, and is always warm,—there is so much of coal! Think -you it is true?” - -On the table was lying a package, done up with many directions, all -pointing to Germany. “What is this?” I asked. “That is for him; but the -_factrice_ could not take it to-day; such are her orders. No packages -will be transported by Germany this week, or next, or who knows for how -long? It is on account of a troop movement, she says.” - -“But why then do you send, if he has no need?” - -“There, what did I tell you?” broke in her husband. “Oh, these women; -they have no minds! It is the enemy who sends the letters, that we may -feel more bitterly the cold, the hunger, the misery, that we endure!” - -It was at Mme. Noulin’s, in fine, that I first met M. l’Aumônier. - -A snowy, windy morning it was, and the glare and the smart in my eyes -blinded me so that I did not at first note anything unusual about the -blue-clad soldier sitting by the fire. Declining Madame’s invitation -to share the open bottle of wine on the table, I was proceeding with my -errand when she’ interrupted, “Mademoiselle, I want you to know that this -is M. l’Aumônier from Offoy, who takes an interest, like you, in Canizy.” - -The chaplain arose at the informal introduction. A deprecatory smile -became well his sensitive yet Roman features, and a quick flush -heightened his colour. “But no,” he said, his enunciation betraying him a -gentleman in spite of the plain uniform, “it is I who have been hearing -of your goodness and that of your co-benefactresses, Mademoiselle.” - -“Mademoiselle,” protested Mme. Noulin, “you should know that Monsieur -walks from Offoy every morning before eight o’clock to conduct a class in -the catechism in the church.” - -“That matters nothing; it is my pleasure, I would say, duty. But you—you -who have come from America to help my poor France, you who walk so much -farther. I, I have legs trained for walking by long marches, by a -soldier’s life——” - -But I knew something of the duties of a military chaplain. Had I not seen -the bare, dark infirmary where he comforted his invalided companions? Had -I not visited the _baraque_ called the Soldiers’ Library which was more -or less in his charge; that cheerless hut with the books locked out of -sight in one corner, and the directions for rifle practice confronting -one on the wall? Could not one divine the battle charges when M. -l’Aumônier went forward in the ranks with his comrades, or stopped only -to give them the sacrament as they fell? Did I not know the calls made -upon him by the civilians also, now that he was _en repos_? A soldier’s -life, indeed, has inured the military chaplains of the French army to -hardships by contrast greater perhaps than any endured by the other -soldiers of France. - -[Illustration: _Sans l’officier, les soldats nous auraient peut-être rien -fait?_ - -[If it hadn’t been for the officer, I don’t think the soldiers would have -done anything to us.]] - -I strove to stop him, to express to him something of my deep appreciation -of this added burden he had taken on his shoulders in the spiritual care -of the children of Canizy. - -But he waved away all implied sacrifice. “It is a pleasure,” he repeated, -“and the children are so good.” - -Thereafter, M. l’Aumônier became my most disinterested ally in our -village. Did a mass seem desirable, the time was set late enough for me -to reach it from the Château. What mattered it that thereby Monsieur did -not breakfast till noon? When Mme. Gabrielle was still undecided over -her distribution, he consented to lend his presence to the function, and -thereby insured its success. He even undertook the responsibility of such -a mundane matter as the cutting of the glass. Day after day, I met him -in one family circle or another, making pastoral calls. Very different -were those happy weeks to the villagers from the months preceding, when -spiritual consolation came only with death. He seemed to find entrance -into the hearts of the people, and they responded to his care as flowers -to the sun. - -Wherever M. l’Aumônier went, went also a clean, blond soldier boy of -twenty, who was studying to be a priest like his friend. He spoke -English, which he had learned as a shipping clerk in an exporting house -at Havre. “Our Colonel,” he explained, “is very much interested in the -civilians, particularly in the children. He even sent one of his captains -to Paris to buy warm clothing for every one of them in Offoy. He is a -very rich man and very kind. He has detailed me to help M. l’Aumônier all -that I can.” - -We were walking along the canal as we spoke, and the wind blew straight -from the north. M. l’Aumônier said something in a low voice, and the boy -whipped off his scarf. “Yes, _please_, you are cold; you must take it,” -and perforce the scarf was wound about my neck. - -“How long are you to be here?” I asked, dreading to see this regiment -pass back to the front. - -“Me, I do not know. I have been wounded, you know; twice with the -bayonet, and ten days ago I was gassed. The lungs pain me yet,—I cannot -do much work.” - -“You,” broke in his superior, “you, Mademoiselle, will go before we -do—for you have told me that you leave soon for America. At least, you -will have seen something, and can tell them there of the misery which -France suffers.” - -“But one sees so little,—the trenches, the battles, the hardships of the -soldiers, I know nothing of these.” - -“The trenches? There is little to see; is it not so, comrade? But this,” -he swept his arm to indicate the circle of destruction all about us, -“this you know. Tell them of the agony and of the fortitude of Picardy.” - -We had come to the parting of our ways. Turning west, I was confronted -by a winter sunset; bare branches, crimson streamers, cold lakes of -turquoise; and bleak against this background, the ruins of Canizy. M. -l’Aumônier was right; of this one who has seen it cannot help to speak; -of the terrible devastation, of the silent courage of those who live in -it and fight, unheralded, their fight for France. - - - - -CHAPTER XIII - -HEUREUX NOËL - - -Christmas weather, sunlight, moonlight and snow; our grove a white -stencil; our _baraques_ with their red shutters by day and their lighted -windows by night, like painted Christmas cards; our defaced and ruined -villages new-clothed with beauty,—such was our Christmas week. But -the snow, so beautiful to the eye, accentuated the bitter cold of our -ill-lodged and under-nourished neighbours, and the moon pointed out to -hostile aeroplanes desired points of attack. It was on account of the -dangerous moonlight that the Bishop of Amiens forbade midnight masses in -the churches. We, and our villagers, were the more disappointed because -even during the German occupation these masses had been sung. We heard -of loaded Christmas trees, and of parties where cakes and chocolate -were served by German officers. “Not for all the world, you understand,” -Colombe, our informant, explained, “just for themselves.” Yet all the -world had had some share in the German Christmas, and we felt eager to -make up a little for the added hardships caused since that time by German -cruelty, for all the ruined homesteads which are but the outward sign of -families scattered, missing and dead. - -Yet at first, so prevalent was the feeling of sadness, we thought it -might not be desirable to have a fête. Did the villagers want one? Had -the Christmas tree too many German associations? We made inquiry of M. -le Sous-Préfet, and of the Commandant of the Third Army. From the latter -came the following reply: - - 27.11.17. Guiscard - - Dear Miss ——, - - I am glad to tell you that you got a stupid gossiping about the - Christmas tree. - - There is nothing at all in this country against the charming - practice to delight the children with a spruce of which some - toys are hanging all round among as many candles as possible. - - Therefore you are free to be nice for the poor people once more - and God bless you for your splendid charity. - - With my kindest regards for you, for your chief, and your - sisters, - - Yours respectfully, - - —— - -So it came about that in each of the villages there was a spruce, with -toys and candles and goodies, and carols and Christmas cheer. In Canizy, -thanks to good fortune and to M. l’Aumônier, the fête was especially -pretty. I had not yet met the chaplain or planned my Christmas, when, on -a late December afternoon, I happened to pass the little chapel, on my -way to Visit a group of families lodged within the grounds of the old -Château. Several times before I had been inside, once for a mass on All -Saints’ Day, and more than once to look at the faded painting behind the -altar, and at the quaintly quilted banners of the saints along the wall. -These, strange to say, had been left in place by the German invaders; -save for a soiled altar cloth and two or three broken windows, the -church, indeed, appeared as if it might still be in constant use. - -[Illustration: —_Il n’est pas venu?... Il est mobilisé!_ - -— ... _Et il a pas eu de permission._ - -[He has not come? He has been mobilised.... - -And he has not had any leave.]] - -To-day, in spite of the early gathering dusk, and the long walk home, an -impulse beckoned me in,—a very definite impulse, however, for I had in -mind to decipher a moulded coat of arms upon the walls, and to search the -sacristy. In other village churches, alas! dismantled, were to be found -carved chests of drawers, black letter Bibles, brasses, and glorious -books of chants. Perhaps my little chapel might contain treasures also. -Past Our Lady of Lourdes and St. Anthony of Padua, past the Sacred Heart, -and that humble saint of gardens, St. Fiacre, to whom had nevertheless -been given the place of honour on the Virgin’s right, and up through the -chancel I went. The door of the sacristy creaked at my sacrilege. - -The alcove on which it opened was hung with cobwebs. The floor was -littered; drawers gaping awry disclosed a medley of candle ends, tinsel -flowers, vases and books. But on shelves across the end, my eye caught -glowing colours of vestments, green and gold and purple, lying in the -same folds, apparently, in which M. le Curé had left them when he went -forth into captivity three years ago. In a corner cabinet were sundry -images, broken for the most part, and among them that of a wax doll, -broken-armed and blackened with age, but encased in a bell of glass. -In an opposite corner, behind a scaffolding, I found another treasure; -a tiny thatched hut upon a standard, evidently designed to be borne in -processions. Ivy, turned crisp and brown, entwined its four pillars, and -chestnut leaves, silvered with dust, made an appliqué upon the thatch. -The God of Gardens, the Festival of the First Fruits, perhaps,—had I not -come here upon a Roman survival in old Picardy? But, suddenly, I saw with -other eyes; here were the cross and the Christ-child; I had stumbled on -the Christmas _crèche_. - -Time pressed; I noted again the faded blazons which flanked the saints on -either wall—a closed crown, a shield embossed with seven _fleurs-de-lis_, -and upheld by two leopards—shut the outer door, and took my way to the -Château. One can see that the Château of Canizy is ancient, by its two -stone turrets and its Gothic arch. At least, it is so ancient that no one -in the village remembers the family whose royal escutcheon adorns its -chapel walls. It is but lately a ruin, however, at the wanton hands of -the Germans. In a stable in the farmyard, I found the family I had come -to visit, formerly domestics of the estate. - -The old, bent grandmother, vacant-eyed and silent, sat in a corner -nearest the fire. The mother, whom I never saw without her black cap, -shook hands and dusted off a chair. The daughter, lovely as a beam of -sunshine in that dark interior, offered me wine. - -“But no,” I protested, “it is late,” and having paid for the knitting of -a pair of stockings, which was my errand, I continued, “Tell me, please. -I have just come from the sacristy. There is a little house there.” - -“The _crèche_!” - -“There is also a doll.” - -“Yes, the little Jesus!” - -“Have you then all you need for the _crèche_, and would you like a mass -for Noël?” - -At that even the grandmother’s eyes lighted. - -“A mass! We have not had one for three years!” - -Who, then, would clean the church, who trim the _crèche_, who tell me -what to get for it? The answers came as rapidly as the questions. Elmire -had always had charge of the _crèche_; she would return with me at once -to see what was lacking. - -Together we made our way back and inventoried (1) the _crèche_ itself; -(2) a white lace-bordered square, (3) the little Jesus, and (4) some -tinsel, or angel’s hair. - -“There is lacking,” Elmire thought quickly, “a Saint Joseph, a Blessed -Virgin, six tapers, cotton wool, and perhaps a star.” - -Twice on my homeward journey I was stopped by Elmire’s younger brother, -running after me with breathless messages: “Elmire says, would you please -get a shepherd,” and, “Elmire asks for three little sheep.” - -Where one was to get these was as much a mystery as the priest for the -mass. But I promised that all should be done. - -The figures for the _crèche_ were actually found in Amiens. To them was -added a new little Jesus in a cradle; and the whole was brought by hand -to Elmire. The delight of the entire family in unwrapping the various -bundles was equalled only by my own in watching them. Afterwards, in the -stable, the _crèche_ was trimmed. Artificial flowers, blue and pink and -tinsel, bloomed under Elmire’s deft fingers; the pillars were fluted with -coloured paper, the roof plaited with holly leaves. A lamp was necessary -in the dark place, and its light fell on the eager faces of the family, -grouped about that fairy hut. “In a stable,” I thought as I looked at -them, “in a stable, the Christ is born again.” - -[Illustration: —_Si on voit pas l’Noël, on verra peut-être un Zeppelin._ - -[Well, if we don’t see Santa Claus, we may see a Zeppelin, anyhow!]] - -But it was M. l’Aumônier who voiced my thought at mass on Christmas Day. -He had made a children’s service of this, centred about the _crèche_. -After the _cantiques_, led by the soldier-boy, after the triumphal -_Adeste, Fideles_, the children knelt in a circle about the cradle of the -Christ. - -“My children,” began the chaplain, “this year, you yourselves live in -huts, in barns, and in stables; so in a stable lives the little Jesus, as -you see. You know what it is to be cold, beneath the snow upon the roof; -so does the little Jesus. You have been hungry; so is he. - -“My children, it behooves you, therefore, to make for the little Jesus -a cradle in your hearts; cleanse them, each of you, and ask the little -Jesus in. - -“What next should you do, my children? Should you not pray first of all -for yourselves, that you may be kept from sin? Next, forget not to pray -for the soldiers of _la Patrie_, who only a few miles away, guard you -from your enemies. Next, think on your fathers, your older brothers and -sisters, who are with the Germans in captivity. Beseech mercy for them, -my children, that the good God may return them to your homes. Next, be -especially thoughtful of your mothers and obedient to them, who stand to -you in the place of both your parents. And last, but also of importance, -my children, remember in your prayers your benefactresses, these ladies -who have given you this year the Christmas _crèche_.” - -[Illustration: —_Et si i gèle cette nuit?_ ... - -—_Ben mon vieux on pourra s’asseoir._ - -[And if it freezes to-night? - -Why, old chap, we can sit down.]] - -M. l’Aumônier said more, but I could not hear it. I was aware that he -himself set the children an example by praying for us, heretics though -we were. It was only when we came out into the open sunlight, and walked -up the street to Mme. Lefèvre’s to strip the tree, that laughter became -possible, and that one could see the accustomed smile in his eyes. Yet -even at the fête, we could not escape from thanks. The presents, selected -to be sure with care, but so inadequate compared with the needs, were -hardly distributed when a hush fell on the packed room. A boy stepped -forward, and began to read from a piece of paper in his hand. A girl -followed. Their elders listened with the greatest satisfaction, nodding -their heads and smiling at our amazement. And this is what they said,—a -measure not of what we did, but of the spirit of stricken Canizy: - - Le cœur des dames Américaines s’est emu, à la pensée des - misères qu’avait entraînées derrière soi, la terrible guerre, - et vous êtes venues parmi nous les mains pleines de bienfaits - et vos cœurs débordant de dévouement. - - Il nous est bien doux de vous dire merci, en cette circonstance - créée encore par votre charité. Notre merci passera, permettez - nous Mesdames et chères Bienfaitrices, par la crèche du petit - enfant Jésus! - - Puisse-t-il vous rendre en consolation, ce que vous lui donnez - en bienfaits! Au début de l’année nouvelle, nos vœux sont pour - vous et pour ceux qui vous sont chers! Que Dieu comble de - gloire, et de prospérité votre noble Amérique! Qu’il féconde sa - générosité inlassable, que Dieu vous accorde une bonne santé, - nos chères Bienfaitrices, et qu’il vous dise toute l’affection - de cette commune, profondément reconnaissante. - - - - -CHAPTER XIV - -FIDELISSIMA, PICARDIE - - -Since the commencement of this short volume, the German flood has rolled -again across the Somme. Péronne, Nesle, Ham, Noyon, those towns mentioned -so often and so gloriously in the annals of France, have fallen once more -into the hands of the enemy. With them go the villages where my Unit -laboured. Canizy, it is no more. The green-bladed wheatfields have become -fields of unspeakable carnage; the poor ruins again smoke to heaven, and -down the shattered highways course endlessly the grey columns of that -Emperor whose empire is pillage and death. - -What, then, remains to us of our labours? At least a memory in the lives -of the peasants, and a present help in this their time of stress. Our -villagers were rescued, and taken by special trains to safety. The Unit -accomplished this work of succour. Their trucks were driven under shell -fire through the villages to collect the inhabitants; sometimes they -were the last over the bridges; they left our headquarters only when the -Uhlans were within charging distance; they have fed and clothed thousands -of refugees and soldiers. Mentioned with them in the newspaper accounts -of their service is our Red Cross truck driver, Dave. The fate that has -overtaken our peasants, what is it but a repetition of the immemorial -blows that have welded and tempered their ancestral spirit? As one of -their historians has limned them: “Les Picards sont francs et unis.... -Ils vivent de peu.... Il arrive rarement que l’activité et le désir de -s’avancer les déterminent à sortir de leur pays.... Ils sont sincères, -fidèles, libres, brusques, attachés à leurs opinions, fermes dans leurs -résolutions.”[6] It was to this spirit that an ancient king of France -paid honour, when he granted his kinsman, who held this province, a coat -of arms bearing the royal lilies, and the motto: _Fidelissima, Picardie_. - -A thousand such Picards we have known, women for the most part; enduring -a bitter winter, a daily hazard, that they might live on their own land -and till their own fields once more. There was Mme. Pottier, sitting in -her wrecked bakery, where the empty bread baskets were arranged like -plaques against the walls. Her husband and her three daughters were -prisoners. Her youngest son had died a soldier. She showed me with -trembling hands the letter she had received from his Colonel, commending -his clean life and his brave death. Her only remaining child was a -_religieuse_,—a Red Cross nurse. I found Mme. Pottier one day reading the -“Lives of the Saints.” “I like to read,” she said, “all books that are -good. I love well the good God.” But she worked also, and knitted many a -pair of stockings for us. First, however, the wool must be weighed. “It -is just,” she reiterated after each protest on my part. “My conscience -will be easy so.” And up a ladder she mounted to the loft, where stood -scales designed to weigh sacks of flour. No weights being small enough, -she took a few coppers from her pocket. “Voilà!” she said, throwing -them into the balance. “Remember, the skeins weigh six sous; when the -stockings are done, you shall see, they will be the same.” - -There was Mme. Gouge, beautiful and tragic, who came and cooked for us, -in order to send her son to school in Amiens; and even more pathetic, her -brother-in-law, formerly the owner of the prettiest house in the village, -who often accompanied her and served our meals. He was the village -barber as well, and on a Saturday was busy all day in his shed, heating -water, shaving M. le Maire and other of his neighbours, and presenting -each, on the completion of the task, with a view of shaven cheeks, or -clipped hair, in the broken bit of mirror which hung beside the door. -Orderliness seemed to be M. Gouge’s ruling passion; the arbours in the -two corners of his garden, the round flower-bed in the centre, the grassy -square, the gravel walks,—all were as well kept as if the shattered house -were still tenanted, and Madame, his wife, were looking out as she used -to do upon the garden she loved. - -Among the Picard soldiers, there was Caporal Levet, the boy-friend of M. -l’Aumônier, who made so light of his wounds. “It is nothing,” he repeated -again and again after sharp fits of coughing brought on by exposure to -the biting wind as he accompanied us during our week of fêtes. “This is -nothing; I am resting now. Soon I shall go back. My Colonel, he told me -only to-day that I must go down to the Midi to train Moroccans. That is -to the bayonet. Me, I do not like the bayonet,—the charges. One goes with -the blacks, you know. I have been wounded twice. But,” a shrug of the -shoulders, “my Colonel says that I am the youngest,—and I should go.” -Some one asked at one of the parties that he lead the Marseillaise. He -protested for the first time. “We French,” he said, “we are droll; we -do not like to sing always of dying for the glory of _la Patrie_.” But -they die, nevertheless; and one is left only to wonder when his time will -come, on what dark night, in the lull of the bombardment, when the blacks -leap out of the trenches and lead the desperate charge. - -In Hombleux, in the church, beside the altar, hangs the Village roll of -honour, bearing the names of six sons of Picardy fallen in its defence. - - Roullard Pottier - Albert Gourbière - Robert Gautier - Pierre Commont - August Deslatte - Amidé Bens - -[Illustration: _Oui, mais, il est fort papa, plus fort que dix boches._ - -[O yes, papa is strong, stronger than ten Boches.]] - -Unknown heroes these, peasant names, roughly printed. Yet Hombleux, in -the midst of its desolation, of its sorrow for those other sons and -daughters forced into ignoble slavery, remembers its soldier dead. It -remembers in prayer that France for which all have suffered. Near the -illuminated scroll, upon its black background, stands a statue of Joan of -Arc, and beneath it is placed this prayer: - - O bienheureuse Jeanne d’Arc! que notre France a besoin, à - l’heure présente, d’âmes vaillantes, animées de cette espérance - que rien ne déconcerte, ni les difficultés, ni les insuccés, ni - les triomphes passagers et apparents de ses ennemis; des âmes - qui, comme vous, mettent toute leur confiance en Dieu seul; des - âmes enfin que les efforts généreux n’effraient pas, et qui, - ainsi que vous soldats, se rallient à votre étendard portant - ces mots gravés: “Jésus! Maria! Vive labeur!” O Jeanne! ranimez - tous les courages, faites germer de nobles héroïsmes et sauvez - encore une fois la France qui vous appelle à son secours! - -_Fidelissima, Picardie!_ It was in Amiens, in the Library there, that -I first saw the emblazoned coat of arms of the province, and those of -her famous cities, Péronne, Nesle, St. Quentin, Amiens, Noyon, Ham with -its castle, and Corbie, with its crows. I had come by slow train from -Paris, and waited perforce for the still slower train which was to drop -me that night at Hombleux, the nearest railroad station to our Château. -Snow was upon the ground; the sunlight sharp and cold. It cleft the airy -spire of the Cathedral out of the blue sky like a diamond-powdered sword. -It frosted the delicate azure of the rose window, and high up among the -clustered pillars, threw prismic whorls that floated like flowers upon -a rippled stream of light. In the Library, it fell upon tooled leather -bindings, upon the gorgeous blazons, upon pages illuminated, like the -white walls of the Cathedral, with ethereal fruits and flowers. But -the day was all too brief. As my train puffed and rumbled away from -the city, dusk enveloped the plain till the evening star—or was it an -_avion_?—burned forth. Passengers entered or descended, the last being -a batch of Tommies bound for the Cambrai front. They were a noisy, -good-natured lot, who slammed their rifles into the racks, trod upon one -another’s toes, and wished heartily that “this bloomin’ war was done.” -At Chaulnes they got out; an American engineer followed, and I was left -alone. In total darkness the train proceeded, the engine as we swung -around the curves looking like a dragon, belching fire. Presently, out of -the vast level, rose the moon; and with it came those detonations which -we, even in our sheltered camp, had learned to associate with its beauty. -The Boches were bombing Ham. - -Like my day in Amiens is my remembrance of Picardy; the dun plain, the -windy sky, the play of light and shadow over both. The blazons given her -by history glow anew in the heroisms of to-day. They form a glorious -volume, illuminated with flowers as gorgeous as those traced by the monks -of Corbie upon the pages of their Books of Chants, bound, as were they, -with massive iron bands,—the iron bands of war. - - - - -APPENDIX - -BEFORE THE WAR - -[Illustration: _CANIZY_ - -_Survey made November, 1917._ - -Plan of the Village.] - - -1914 - - 1. MME. MARIE GENSE—Had a few rabbits; good house. - - 2. M. NOULIN—Was a storekeeper; had rabbits and hens. - - 3. M. POITEAUX (soldat).[7] - - 4. M. LEON TABARY (living near Amiens). - - 5. M. HUILLARD (soldat). - - 6. M. COTTRET (prisonnier civil). - - 7. MME. AUGÉ—Had hens and rabbits; small garden. - - 8. M. HUILLARD (see 5.) - - 9. M. GAMBARD (at Compiègne). - - 10. M. THUILLARD, G. (at Bacquencourt). - - 11. MME. CORDIER—Had 10 cows, 2 bulls, 1 ox, 87 pigs, 3 horses, - 150 chickens, 150 rabbits, market garden, orchard. - - 12. MME. CARPENTIER, J.—Had 3 cows, 2 horses, 30 hens, 50 - rabbits, market garden. - - 13. MME. PICARD—Had 2 cows, 1 horse, hens, rabbits, market - garden. - - 14. M. THUILLARD, O.—Had 7 cows, 4 horses, 50 hens, 30 rabbits, - 10 hectares of land for garden. - - 15. MME. BROHON (at Voyennes). - - 16. MME. MOROY, R. (at Esmery-Hallon). - - 17. MME. CARPENTIER, R.—Had 2 horses, 21 rabbits, 30 hens, - garden. - - 18. MME. LEFÈVRE—Had 2 cows, 2 horses, 50 rabbits, 30 hens, - market garden. - - 19. M. MOROY—Had 1 cow, 1 horse, 1 pig, 30 rabbits, 100 hens. - - 20. M. CHARLET (at Amiens). - - 21. MME. MOROY (dead). - - 22. MME. TABARY, G.—Had only a few rabbits; husband hostler at - 23. - - 23. MME. THUILLARD, G.—Had 2 cows, 3 horses, hens, rabbits, - market garden. - - 24. M. TOURET (prisonnier civil). - - 25. M. LANNE (at Ham). - - 26. M. HENET (prisonnier civil). - - 27. MME. BUTIN—Had a few hens and rabbits; small garden. - - 28. M. TOURET (prisonnier civil). - - 29. MME. ROQUET (dead). - - 30. MME. CORREON—Had rabbits and hens; small garden. - - 31. MME. DESMARCHEZ (at Esmery-Hallon). - - 32. MME. DELORME (at Amiens). - - 33. M. HUYART (at Voyennes). - - 34. M. REUET (in Paris). - - 35. M. REUET (in Paris). - - 36. MME. VILLETTE (at Voyennes). - - 37. MME. CERF (prisonnière civile). - - 38. MME. MOROY (dead). - - 39. M. THUILLARD, C.—Had 2 cows, 2 horses, 25 chickens, 200 - rabbits, large market garden. - - 40. MME. MOROY (dead). - - 41. MME. MOROY (dead). - - 42. MME. MOROY (dead). - - 43. MME. CARPENTIER, R. (see 17). - - 44. MME. BUTIN (see 27). - - 45. M. THUILLIER, A.—Had 10 rabbits, 12 hens; was a cobbler. - - 46. MME. MOROY, CLAIRE—Had 1 horse, 1 cow, rabbits, hens. - - 47. MME. DELORME, O.—Had 100 rabbits, 40 hens, small garden. - -In 1914 Canizy had 445 inhabitants. - - -November, 1917 - - 1. Lives at 37 in a lean-to; small garden. - - 2. Lives at 5 in a partially ruined house; has an _épicerie_, - in which we have stocked him, 1 pony, 30 young rabbits, 4 hens. - - 7. Lives at 7 in a barn; has 10 hens, small garden. - - 8. House occupied by Tabary, M.; has nothing. - - 10. Mme. Payelle lives here in a barn; does not belong in - village; has nothing. - - 11. Lives at 11 in a barn; has bought cow, horse, 24 rabbits, 9 - hens. - - 12. Lives at 12 in a _baraque_; has a small garden. - - 13. Lives at 16 in a barn; has large market garden and employs - one worker (Mme. Correon). - - 14. Lives at 18 in a shed; has 2 horses, 10 hens, 10 rabbits, - large garden. - - 15. Mme. Musqua lives here; formerly factory worker, never - owned land, has nothing. - - 17. Lives at 17 in a shed; has 3 hens, 2 rabbits, small garden. - - 18. Lives at 18 in a partially ruined house; has 3 hens, large - garden. In her stable she houses Mme. Barbier, a worker in the - fields. - - 19. Lives at 42 in one room; has a garden. - - 23. Lives at 44 in an ell; has a cow, 8 hens, large garden. - - 24. (Father of prisoner) lives here, with 46. - - 30. Lives at 34 in a cottage; works for 13, has nothing. - - 32. M. Lecart lives here in a cottage; formerly coachman at - Château; has nothing. - - 39. Lives at 39 in a barn; has a large garden. - - 42. Mme. Tabary, L., lives here in partially ruined house, - never owned land; has a goat. - - 43. Mme. Cerf, who used to rent 46, lives in a barn; has a few - hens and a garden. - - 44. Lives at 44, with her daughter (see 23). - - 45. Lives at 16 in a shed; has a garden. - - 46. Lives at 24 in a barn; has a garden. - - 47. Lives at 47 in a chicken house; has 4 hens, 1 rabbit. - -At the Château live three families, formerly employed on the estate. They -have gardens. - -In all, there are 100 persons in Canizy. - - - - -FOOTNOTES - - -[1] From Poulbot’s _Des Gosses et des Bonhommes_. - -[2] From the Almanach Hachette. - -[3] Deux Années d’Invasion Espagnole en Picardie, 1635-1636. Alcius -Ledieu. - -[4] Almanach Hachette, 1918, quoted from the _Berliner Tageblatt_. - -[5] Incomes as regulated in August, 1917. - -_Allocation militaire_: - - Soldier, 25 c. per day. - Family, 1 fr. 25 c. for mother. - 1 fr. 25 c. for child 16 or over. - 75 c. for child up to 16. - -_Allocation de réfugié or chômage_: - - Adults, 1 fr. 25 c. per day. - Children, 50 c. per day. - -_War Pensions_: - - Widows of soldiers, 580 fr. per year. - Children, each, 600 fr. per year. - -_Réformées_: - - If wounded, a réformé receives a pension. - -_Médaille militaire_: - - This carries a pension. - - -[6] Introduction à la histoire générale de la Province de Picardie. Dom -Grenier. - -[7] Where no information is given as to property, no member of the family -remains in the village. It should be understood that every family had -some member, or members, with the colours, or _avec les Boches_, or both. - -*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A VILLAGE IN PICARDY *** - -***** This file should be named 63637-0.txt or 63637-0.zip ***** -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: - http://www.gutenberg.org/6/3/6/3/63637/ - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will -be renamed. - -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, -so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United -States without permission and without paying copyright -royalties. Special rules, set forth in the General Terms of Use part -of this license, apply to copying and distributing Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic works to protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm -concept and trademark. 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If you are not located in the United States, you -will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before -using this ebook. - -Title: A Village in Picardy - -Author: Ruth Gaines - -Illustrator: Francisque Poulbot - -Contributor: William Allan Neilson - -Release Date: November 04, 2020 [EBook #63637] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: UTF-8 - -Produced by: ellinora and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at - https://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images - generously made available by The Internet Archive/Canadian - Libraries) - -*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A VILLAGE IN PICARDY *** -</pre> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_i"></a>[i]</span></p> - -<p class="center larger">A VILLAGE IN PICARDY</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_ii"></a>[ii]</span></p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_iii"></a>[iii]</span></p> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 450px;" id="illus1"> -<img src="images/illus1.jpg" width="450" height="700" alt="" /> -<p class="caption"><span class="smcap">A Well-Known Tune</span></p> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_iv"></a>[iv]</span></p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_v"></a>[v]</span></p> - -<p class="titlepage larger">A VILLAGE IN<br /> -PICARDY</p> - -<p class="titlepage"><span class="smaller">BY</span><br /> -RUTH GAINES<br /> -<span class="smaller">AUTHOR OF “THE VILLAGE SHIELD,” ETC.</span></p> - -<p class="titlepage"><span class="smaller">WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY</span><br /> -WILLIAM ALLAN NEILSON<br /> -<span class="smaller"><i>President of Smith College</i></span></p> - -<div class="figcenter titlepage" style="width: 150px;"> -<img src="images/epd.jpg" width="150" height="225" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p class="titlepage"><span class="smaller">NEW YORK</span><br /> -E. P. DUTTON & COMPANY<br /> -<span class="smaller">681 FIFTH AVENUE</span></p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_vi"></a>[vi]</span></p> - -<p class="titlepage smaller"><span class="smcap">Copyright, 1918,<br /> -By E. P. DUTTON & COMPANY</span></p> - -<p class="center smaller"><i>All Rights Reserved</i></p> - -<p class="titlepage smaller">Printed in the United States of America</p> - -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_vii"></a>[vii]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak">PREFACE.</h2> - -</div> - -<p>The history and the work of the Smith College -Relief Unit in the Somme is known wherever -reconstruction work in France is spoken -of. This brief account does not purport to -give anything but a small cross-section, the -picture of but one of the villages in our care. -It is told in the first person to make the telling -easier. As I have said, of all our villages, -Canizy was the most beloved. All the Unit -had a share in it.</p> - -<p>The picture is given as it was seen day by -day. What was true in this section, may not -be true in another. Here the German retreat -was so rapid that the devastation, though -appalling, was not complete; whole avenues of -trees were left standing in places, and only two -churches were dynamited, by contrast with -the two hundred and twenty-five destroyed -throughout the <i>région dévastée</i>. It was perhaps<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_viii"></a>[viii]</span> -in more calculated ways that the Prussians -here vented their spite; in the burning of -family pictures, the wrecking of machinery, -the cutting of the trees about the Calvaries, and -the taking away of the bells from the church -towers. They left behind them here, as everywhere, -ruin and silence; a silence of industry, -of agriculture, of all the normal ways of life; -a silence which has given the plain of Picardy -the name of “The Land of Death.”</p> - -<p class="right"><span class="smcap">Ruth Gaines.</span></p> - -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_ix"></a>[ix]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak">CONTENTS</h2> - -</div> - -<table summary="Contents"> - <tr> - <td class="tdr smaller">CHAPTER</td> - <td></td> - <td class="tdpg smaller">PAGE</td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdr">I</td> - <td><span class="smcap">Un Village tout oublié</span></td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#CHAPTER_I">3</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdr">II</td> - <td><span class="smcap">Le Château de Bon-Séjour</span></td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#CHAPTER_II">16</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdr">III</td> - <td><span class="smcap">M. Le Maire</span></td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#CHAPTER_III">35</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdr">IV</td> - <td><span class="smcap">O Crux, ave!</span></td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#CHAPTER_IV">48</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdr">V</td> - <td><span class="smcap">Mme. Gabrielle</span></td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#CHAPTER_V">61</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdr">VI</td> - <td><span class="smcap">Voilà la Misère</span></td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#CHAPTER_VI">74</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdr">VII</td> - <td><span class="smcap">Nous sommes dix</span></td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#CHAPTER_VII">88</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdr">VIII</td> - <td><span class="smcap">Une Distribution de Dons</span></td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#CHAPTER_VIII">100</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdr">IX</td> - <td><span class="smcap">En Permission</span></td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#CHAPTER_IX">113</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdr">X</td> - <td><span class="smcap">A la Ferme du Calvaire</span></td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#CHAPTER_X">129</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdr">XI</td> - <td><span class="smcap">Les Petits Soldats</span></td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#CHAPTER_XI">139</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdr">XII</td> - <td><span class="smcap">M. L’Aumônier</span></td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#CHAPTER_XII">151</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdr">XIII</td> - <td><span class="smcap">Heureux Noël</span></td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#CHAPTER_XIII">162</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdr">XIV</td> - <td><span class="smcap">Fidelissima, Picardie</span></td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#CHAPTER_XIV">176</a></td> - </tr> -</table> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_x"></a>[x]</span></p> - -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_xi"></a>[xi]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak">ILLUSTRATIONS<a id="FNanchor_1" href="#Footnote_1" class="fnanchor">[1]</a></h2> - -</div> - -<table summary="List of illustrations"> - <tr> - <td>A Well-Known Tune</td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#illus1"><i>Frontispiece</i></a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>Map of the German Retreat<a id="FNanchor_2" href="#Footnote_2" class="fnanchor">[2]</a></td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#illus2">2</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>“They are over there”</td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#illus3">12</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>“What, another little Brother!”</td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#illus4">17</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>“Only that much Bread!”</td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#illus5">44</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>“Is that wounded Man a Boche?”</td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#illus6">51</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>“He is big already”</td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#illus7">58</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>“I didn’t do that!”</td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#illus8">63</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>“Once, before the War, the <i>Pralines</i> were two for a Sou”</td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#illus9">80</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>“A Cut of a Sword-scabbard!”</td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#illus10">114</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>“If I were grown up!”</td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#illus11">124</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>“Our House used to be there!”</td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#illus12">132</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>“And do the little Boche children hug their Father?”</td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#illus13">143</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>“Company, halt!”</td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#illus14">148</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>“If it hadn’t been for the Officer....”</td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#illus15">157</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>“He has not come. He has been mobilized....”</td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#illus16">165</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>“Well, if we don’t see Santa Claus, we may see a Zeppelin”</td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#illus17">171</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>“And if it freezes to-night?”</td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#illus18">174</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>“Oh yes, Papa is strong!”</td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#illus19">182</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>Plan of the Village</td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#illus20">188</a></td> - </tr> -</table> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_xii"></a>[xii]</span></p> - -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_xiii"></a>[xiii]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak">INTRODUCTORY NOTE</h2> - -</div> - -<p>No one, it may safely be said, can see this -war as a whole. The nations taking part in it -girdle the world, and no people is unaffected -by it. Real knowledge can be gained of only -comparatively small sections of the conflict, -and we are grateful to those who, knowing a -small section, give us a faithful account of their -own observation and experience, and refrain -from speculation and generalisation.</p> - -<p>Among the infinitude of tragedies few have -appealed more poignantly to our imaginations -than those involved in the devastation of Picardy; -and among the attempts at salvage few -details have attracted the sympathetic attention -of America more powerfully than the efforts -of the Smith College Relief Unit. Their -heroic persistence in the work of evacuation -under the very guns of the great offensive of -March, 1918, made the members of the Unit<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_xiv"></a>[xiv]</span> -suddenly conspicuous; but the more picturesque -feats of that terrible emergency had -been preceded by a long winter of quiet work. -The material results were largely wiped out; -the spiritual results will remain. It is the -method of that work as carried on in a single -village that is described in this little book. -When we have read it we know what kind of -people these were who clung to the remnants -of their homes in the midst of desolation. Their -character and temper are depicted with kindly -candour; they were very human and very much -worth saving. When the time comes for reconstruction -on a large scale, such an account -as this will be of value in enabling us to realise -the nature of the task and in teaching us how -to set about it.</p> - -<p>Smith College is proud of what these graduates -have done and are doing; and this note -is written to assure the Unit rather than the -outside world that those who have to stay at -home see and understand.</p> - -<p class="right"><span class="smcap">William Allan Neilson.</span></p> - -<p><i>Smith College, -Northampton, Mass.</i></p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_1"></a>[1]</span></p> - -<h1>A VILLAGE IN PICARDY</h1> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_2"></a>[2]</span></p> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 300px;" id="illus2"> -<img src="images/illus2.jpg" width="300" height="700" alt="" /> -<p class="caption"><span class="smcap">The German Retreat</span></p> -</div> - -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_3"></a>[3]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_I">CHAPTER I<br /> -<span class="smaller">UN VILLAGE TOUT OUBLIÉ</span></h2> - -</div> - -<p>As a relief visitor, in a Unit authorized by -the French Government <i>au secours dans -la région dévastée</i>, I have lived recently in the -Department of the Somme. There I had in -my care a village with a personality which I -venture to think is typical of Picardy. As -such, I would present it to you.</p> - -<p>It was on a winter’s morning, by snow and -lantern light, that I traversed for the last -time a road grown familiar to me through -months of use, the road which led from our -encampment, known as that of the “Dames -Américaines” at Grécourt, past the railroad -station of Hombleux to the hamlet of Canizy.<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_4"></a>[4]</span> -It leads elsewhere, of course, this road; to the -military highway for instance, which has -already seen in the last three years three -momentous troop movements: the advance and -retreat of the French, the advance and retreat -of the Germans, and, again, the victorious -sweep of the French and British armies which -reclaimed, just a year ago, the valleys of the -Somme. It leads to the front, that fluctuating -line, some twelve miles distant, in the shelter -of which we have lived and worked for the -ruined countryside. It is an important route, -on some occasions choked with artillery, on -others with blue columned infantry swinging -down its vista arched with elms. Officers’ cars -flash by there, and deafening <i>camions</i>. But -for me, until this the morning of my departure, -it has led to Canizy.</p> - -<p>There is no longer a station at Hombleux, -because the Germans destroyed it. One -therefore paces the platform and stamps one’s -feet with the cold. Down the track, from the -direction of Canizy, the headlight of the engine<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_5"></a>[5]</span> -will presently emerge. All about, the plain -lies white and level; the break in the hedge -where a footpath crosses the tracks to the village -is almost visible. In fancy, I take it, -past a fire-gutted farm house and eastward -on a long curve across fields where the snow -hides an untilled growth of weeds. The highway -which parallels the railroad, recedes in a -perspective of marching trees, till, topping a -little rise, a wooden scaffold stands clear -against the sky. It was formerly a German -observation post. To the left, equally gaunt, -rises the Calvary which marks the entrance to -the village. And beyond, cupped in a gentle -declivity, lie the ruins of Canizy, framed in -snow. So I saw it last; so all the way to -Amiens, and from Amiens to Paris, as the -train bore me away, I saw it; so in its misery -and its beauty, I would picture it to you.</p> - -<p>You will not find my hamlet on any map -of the <i>région dévastée</i> with which I am familiar; -it is not listed among the destroyed villages -of the Department, although it was<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_6"></a>[6]</span> -looted, dynamited and defaced, even to the -cutting of the oak trees about its Calvary. -You would have to search minutely in history -for any mention of it among the King’s towns -of Picardy which became famous in guarding -his frontier of the Somme. Comparatively -modern and quite insignificant, it lies beside -a tree-bordered, dyked canal, one of many -which tapped the rich plain and bore the produce -of farm and garden to the market centres, -of Péronne, Ham and St. Quentin. To this -canal sloped its fields of chicory, leeks, pumpkins, -potatoes, turnips, carrots and other garden -truck. Crooked lanes, brick-walled or -faced with trim brick cottages, led from it back -through the village to higher ground. There, -before the war, the <i>grands cultivateurs</i>, such as -M. le Maire, and M. Lanne, who rents the old -Château, would have ploughed and sown their -winter wheat.</p> - -<p>In those days, Canizy had a railroad also, -and I have heard how for three sous one could -travel by it to Nesle. It took only eight minutes<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_7"></a>[7]</span> -then,—but now! By it as well, one went -more quickly than by canal to St. Quentin or -Péronne with perhaps a hundred huge baskets -of vegetables on market day. But the Germans -tore up the bed of the railroad and destroyed -the locks of the canal. They blew up, -too, the bridge on the main highway which used -to pass the Calvary at the foot of the village -street. Cut off, reached only by a circuitous -and deep-rutted road which is impassable at -certain hours every day owing to <i>mitrailleuse</i> -practice across it, Canizy lapsed into oblivion. -As its mayor said on our first visit, “Look -you, it has been quite forgotten,—<i>c’est un village -tout oublié</i>.”</p> - -<p>In 1914, Canizy had 445 inhabitants. Of -these, there were perhaps half a dozen substantially -well off, such as M. le Maire, possessing -ten hectares of wheat land, a herd of -seven cows, four horses, thirty rabbits and fifty -hens. Besides, M. le Maire, or his wife, was -proprietor of one of the three village <i>épiceries</i>. -Joined with him in respectful mention by the<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_8"></a>[8]</span> -townspeople are the lessee of the Château, and -various owners of property not only in Canizy -but in the surrounding country. Of these -gentry, not one apparently had been made -prisoner by the Germans. They were to be -found on their other estates, at Compiègne, at -Ham, or in Paris. Even the real mayor was -an absentee, so that the acting mayor, lame, -red-faced and heady-eyed, was the only representative -of landed interests left in the little -town. He had had, however, a dozen or more -neighbours scarcely less comfortably provided -with worldly goods than himself: M. Picard, -for instance, who owned extensive market gardens -and employed six workers in the fields. -He it was who did not suffer even during the -German occupation, for was he not placed in -charge of the <i>ravitaillement</i>? And though -his friends the Germans took him away with -them, a prisoner, did not his wife and children -live well on his buried money, eh? <i>O, Mme. -Picard, elle était riche.</i> There were the -Tourets, two brothers, who held connecting<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_9"></a>[9]</span> -high-walled gardens in the centre of the village, -and their next door neighbour, the comely -widow, Mme. Gabrielle. Directly opposite -ranged the Cordier farm, comprising an orchard -of 360 trees, ten cows, two bulls, one -ox, eighty-seven pigs, three horses, one hundred -and fifty chickens, and one hundred and -fifty rabbits. Smaller cottages there were, -some rented, but most of them owned, where -the families raised just enough for their own -necessities, or worked for their more prosperous -townsfolk. There were the village cobbler, -the two store keepers who competed with the -mayor, a sprinkling of factory hands who -walked along the dyke a mile and a half to -work in the brush factory at Offoy, and last -on the street, but not least in social importance, -the domestics of the Château. There were, -too, the poor whom one has always; but in -Canizy, so far as I could learn, they consisted -of but two shiftless families.</p> - -<p>The civic life of the village centred about -its public school and its teacher, and, of course,<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_10"></a>[10]</span> -its curé and its church. The monotony of toil -was relieved by market days and fête days and -first communions and neighbourhood gatherings. -Of these last I have seen a few pictures, -groups of wrinkled grandparents and sturdy -sons and grandchildren stiffly posed in Sunday -best, yet happy in spite of it. Behind -them pleached pear trees or grape vines make -an appliqué against a patterned brick wall. -But there are not many of the pictures even -left, for you will understand, the Germans -systematically searched them out and burned -them in great piles. The one that I remember -best, a poor mother had torn out of its -frame the night of her flight. “I could not -think well,” she said. “The Boches had -wrenched my Coralie away—so lovely a child -that every one on the streets of Ham turned -to look at her curls as she walked—but I did -save this. See, there she is,—how pretty and -good, and that is my eldest, a soldier. He is -dead. And that, with the accordion, is my -seventeen-year-old Raoul, like his sister, a<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_11"></a>[11]</span> -<i>prisonnier civil</i>. What do the Boches do, -think you,” she continued, “with such? One -hears nothing, nothing. Never a letter, never -a message. Even when Mme. Lefèvre and -Mme. Ponchon returned, they brought no -word. The prisoners, evidently they are separated. -One is told that they work and starve,—that -is all.”</p> - -<p>A community so homogeneous in its interests, -was bound to link itself intimately by -marriage as well. The intricacies of the family -trees of Canizy were a source of constant -mental effort, as one discovered that Mme. -Gense was really Mme. Butin, that is, she had -at least married M. Butin, and that Germaine -Tabary was so called because she was living -with her maternal grandparents, whereas her -father’s name again was Gense, and her mother -was known by the sounding title of Mme. -Gense-Tabary. “But why these distinctions?” -one continually demanded upon unravelling -the puzzles for purposes of record. -“Because, otherwise, one would become confused,” -was the reply.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_12"></a>[12]</span></p> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 550px;" id="illus3"> -<img src="images/illus3.jpg" width="550" height="700" alt="" /> -<p class="caption">—<i>Ils sont là!!!</i></p> -<p class="caption">[They are over there!!!]</p> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_13"></a>[13]</span></p> - -<p>Such, peaceful, prosperous, yet stirred by -family bickerings enough to spice its days, -was Canizy before the war.</p> - -<p>Canizy to-day numbers just one hundred -souls, fifty being children and fifty adults. It -was in March, 1917, that the village was -blotted out. Two years and a half of German -occupation preceded that event. In every -house German soldiers had been billeted; one -sees now on the door posts the number of -officers and men allotted, or the last warning, -perhaps, in regard to concealed fire-arms. -For two years and a half the inhabitants had -been prisoners, for the same length of time -there had been no school and no mass. Yet -the villagers do not speak unkindly of their -conquerors. They fared better than many, -for they fell to the lot of the Bavarians, who -are reputed to be more humane than the Prussians. -Besides, Picardy is inured to invasions, -which for centuries have swept across her<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_14"></a>[14]</span> -plains. By them, fortitude has been inbred.</p> - -<p>But one day last spring, the Bavarians filed -away northward. Prussians succeeded them. -Quickly came the order for the villagers to -evacuate their homes. At the same time, the -able-bodied, men and women, youths and maidens, -were seized and held. Weeping mothers, -tottering grandfathers, and helpless children,—the -remnant,—were driven forth with what -scant possessions they could snatch, to the -town of Voyennes, four kilometres away. -There, huddled with the like refugees of other -villages, they remained ten days. From it -they could see the ascending smoke, black by -day and red by night, and hear the detonations -which marked the destruction of their homes. -They returned to the blackened ruins,—as, in -the words of a historian of the Thirty Years’ -War, their ancestors had done. “Les paysans,” -he says, “qui avaient survécu à tant de -désastres étaient accourus dans leurs villages -aussitôt que les ennemis s’éloignèrent de ce -champ de carnage. Mais, sans ressources<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_15"></a>[15]</span> -d’aucune sorte, sans habitations, sans chevaux, -sans bestiaux, sans instruments de culture, -sans grains pour la semence, que pouvaient-ils -faire? Mourir——”<a id="FNanchor_3" href="#Footnote_3" class="fnanchor">[3]</a></p> - -<p>But our villagers, though equally pillaged in -the year 1917, were not doomed to death. -The Germans had retreated before the advancing -French and British armies, and the ruins -of Canizy ere long were held by Scottish -troops.</p> - -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_16"></a>[16]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_II">CHAPTER II<br /> -<span class="smaller">LE CHÂTEAU DE BON-SÉJOUR</span></h2> - -</div> - -<p>In Canizy, after the Germans were through -with it, not one of its forty-seven houses -stood intact. Most were roofless shells, or -fallen heaps of brick. An occasional ell, a -barn, a rabbit hutch, or a chicken house,—such -were the shelters into which the returning -villagers crept. Nor was there furniture. -Pillage had preceded destruction and loaded -wagons had borne away the plunder of household -linen, feather mattresses, clothes presses, -chairs or anything practicable, into Germany. -Scattered through the ruins to this day lie iron -bedsteads twisted by fire, the metal stands of -the housewives’ sewing machines, broken farm -tools and fire-cracked stoves. One day, beside -a half-demolished wall, I came upon a -group of little girls playing house. They had<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_17"></a>[17]</span> -marked off their rooms with broken bricks, set -up for a stove a rusty brazier, and stocked -their imaginary cupboards with fragments of -gay china. A grey, drizzling day it was, and -their toy <i>ménage</i> had no roof. But was it -more cheerless than the hovels they called their -homes, where their mothers, like them, had -gathered in the wreckage left by the Germans,—a -stove here, a kettle there, and a “Boche” -bed of unplaned planks, perhaps, with an improvised -mattress of grass? I paused to regard -the play house. “What is this room,” I -inquired. “<i>La cuisine</i>,” was the quick reply. -“And this?” “<i>La salle à manger.</i>” “But this -next?” “<i>Une salle à manger</i>,” came the -chorus. “Then all the rest are <i>salles à manger</i>?” -“<i>Assurément</i>,” with merry laughter. -“O, I see. Are you then so hungry at your -house?” And I turned away with an uncomfortable -conviction that they were.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_18"></a>[18]</span></p> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 500px;" id="illus4"> -<img src="images/illus4.jpg" width="500" height="700" alt="" /> -<p class="caption">—<i>Encore un autre petit frère?</i></p> -<p class="caption">—<i>Oui, un petit belge.</i></p> -<p class="caption">[What, another little brother?</p> -<p class="caption">Yes, a little Belgian.]</p> -</div> - -<p>One after another, if you listen, the Village -mothers will tell of their return; with what -hope against hope they looked for some trace<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_19"></a>[19]</span> -of vanished husbands, sons and daughters; -with what despair they realised the utter ruin. -“My cat,” said one, “was the only living thing -I found. She was waiting for me on the doorstep.” -But those were fortunate who found -even the door sills remaining to their homes. -Those who were shelterless took possession of -some semi-habitable corner of their neighbour’s -outbuildings, or even of cellars, and furnished -them with what they could find. As I went -about among them, in an effort to supply immediate -needs, I was continually told: “That -cupboard, you understand, is not mine. I am -taking care of it for Mme. Huillard, who is -with the Boches. When she returns, I must -give it up.” “This bed,”—a very comfortable -one, by the way—“belongs to M. de Curé, -whom the Germans made prisoner.” “Those -blankets an English soldier gave me.” “This -stove”—in answer to a query as to whether a -new one would not be appreciated—“well, to -be sure, it has no legs, but one props it with -bricks, <i>et ça marche, tout de même</i>!” The<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_20"></a>[20]</span> -boast of the Prussians in regard to their handiwork -was true: “Tout le pays n’est qu’un immense -et triste désert, sans arbre, ni buisson, -ni maison. Nos pionniers ont scié ou haché les -arbres qui, pendant des journées entières, se -sont abattus jusqu’à ce que le sol fût rasé. -Les puits sont comblés, les villages anéantis. -Des cartouches de dynamite éclatent partout. -L’atmosphère est obscurcie de poussière et de -fumée.”<a id="FNanchor_4" href="#Footnote_4" class="fnanchor">[4]</a></p> - -<p>By the time of the arrival of our Unit, six -months after the Great Retreat, our villagers -had recovered from the shock of their sorrow. -They had managed to save enough bedding -and clothing for actual warmth; they had -planted and worked their gardens; they were -used to the simplest terms of life. This courage -rather than the too-evident squalor, was -what impressed one on a first visit to Canizy. -Dumb endurance drew one’s heart as no protestations -could have done. It made me long<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_21"></a>[21]</span> -to make my home among my villagers, so that -I might the more quickly meet their needs.</p> - -<p>But this could not be, because every habitable -cranny was crowded to capacity. Hence -it was that I lodged with the rest of the Unit, -four miles away, at the <i>Château de Bon-Séjour</i>. -Again, you will not find my château -so called upon the map. It is merely a name -that represents to me six months of hardship, -of comradeship and of some small achievement -that made the whole worth while.</p> - -<p>At the Château, then, but not in it, lived the -Unit. For the Château, a German Headquarters, -and a most comfortable one, in its -day, had been wrecked in the best German -style. There were seventeen of us, American -college women, to whom the Government had -entrusted the task of reconstructing thirty-six -of the 25,000 square miles of devastated -France. Two were doctors, three nurses, four -chauffeurs, and the rest social workers. -Among them were a cobbler, a carpenter, a -farmer, a domestic science expert; and of other<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_22"></a>[22]</span> -manual labor there was nothing to which they -did not turn their hands. It was in the golden -days of early September that my companions -reached the Château allotted them in that indefinite -area known as the War Zone, and became -from that moment a part of the Third -Army of France. But I, for reasons best -known to the passport bureau of that army, -did not arrive until October. The seventy-mile -run from Paris was made in our own -truck, driven by two of our chauffeurs. As -we cleared the dusty suburbs and took the -highway northward, war seemed very far -away. To be sure, we often passed grey -<i>camions</i> rumbling to or from the front, or saw -fleeting automobiles containing officer’s whiz -by. But the country, the fields of stacked -grain or of freshly seeded wheat; the apple -orchards,—sometimes miles of trees along the -roadside festooned with red fruit,—poplared -vistas of smoke-blue hill and valley, with -church spires and red roofs in the distance,—all -these spoke of peace. Even the air lay in<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_23"></a>[23]</span> -a motionless amber haze, spiced with apples -and wood smoke and ferns touched by frost. -But suddenly war was upon us. As we topped -a sharp rise we came upon an empty dugout, -about which stood a shell-shattered grove. -Lopped orchards followed, zig-zag trenches, a -bombarded village set in fields bearing no -crop but barbed-wire entanglements and tall -weeds turned brown. The country became -flatter as we hurried along, intent on reaching -the Château before dark. At intervals we -made detours around crumpled bridges. Occasionally -a sentry halted us, to be shown our -permits known as <i>feuilles bleues</i>. By this time -the sun was setting and caught and turned to -gold a squadron of aeroplanes. Like great -dragon-flies they coursed and wheeled and -presently alighted, to run along the fields to -their canvas-domed hangars. In the after-glow, -we could still see occasional peasants or -soldiers working late at ploughing with oxen -or tractors. But otherwise, mile on mile, the<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_24"></a>[24]</span> -brown plain, dotted here and there with scraggly -thickets, lay deserted.</p> - -<p>It was dusk when we turned off the main -road between the half dozen dynamited farm-houses -that once formed a tiny village, past -the little church, and into the gate of the -Château. To the rear of this ruined mass, set -in a row as soldiers would set them, were the -three <i>baraques</i>, or temporary shacks, which the -Army had made ready for us. Very cheerful -they looked that night with the lamplight -streaming from open doors and windows, and -the smell of savoury stew upon the air.</p> - -<p>But morning revealed what darkness had -hidden: the destruction which this estate shared -with the entire countryside. Of the noble -spruces and poplars, which had formed the two -main avenues leading the one to the church and -the other to the highway, only a ragged line -remained; the rest lay as they had been felled, -in tangles of crossed trunks. The Château -itself, an imposing building as one viewed it -through the frame of a scrolled wrought-iron<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_25"></a>[25]</span> -gate, proved to be a rectangle of roofless -walls. The water-tower, draped in flaming -ampelopsis, no longer held the reservoir which -had supplied in former days the mansion, the -greenhouses, the servants’ quarters and the -stables. The greenhouses themselves, the -<i>jardin d’hiver</i>, and the <i>orangerie</i>, where were -grown hot-house fruits, retained scarcely one -unbroken pane of glass. Dynamite had been -employed freely; but—an instance of German -economy—the main roof of the greenhouse had -been demolished by the well-calculated fall of -a heavy spruce. In this same greenhouse were -the remains of a white tiled tank, and a heating -plant which had involved the construction of -three new buildings. “<i>Voilà</i>,” said Marcel, the -sixteen-year-old son of the gardener, as he -pointed it out, “the officers’ bath.”</p> - -<p>Marcel and his mother (whom, we think, the -Germans left behind because of her too shrewd -tongue) still take unbounded pride in the -place. Even before repairs were made on her -own cottage, Marie routed Marcel out of a<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_26"></a>[26]</span> -morning to weed the flower beds and to fence -off what, by courtesy, she calls the lawn. By -this last manœuvre she renders difficult both -the entrance and exit of our cars. She also -refuses to open for us the wicket for foot passengers, -probably because in the days of Mme. -la Baronne’s hospitality there were none. -Here entertaining was done on a patrician -scale. A French officer who stopped in passing, -told us how he was in the habit of coming -each year to hunt in season. There was a -gallery of famous pictures. In short, the -Château of his friend, Mme. la Baronne, was -the show place of the countryside. “To -think,” said he, as he pointed to a sign still -standing beside the gate, “to think that dogs -were forbidden,—and yet the Germans came -here!” Marie, having been left by her mistress -in charge of the property, carries the responsibility -with seriousness. A letter arrives: -Mme. la Baronne desires that the vegetable -garden be always locked, and that no -trees be cut. It is she, doubtless, who directs<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_27"></a>[27]</span> -that the lawn be preserved. “Poor Madame,” -sighs Marie, “she little knows. Pray heaven -she may never return to see what the Boches -have done!”</p> - -<p>With Marie’s and Marcel’s help, one can -reconstruct from the ruins the gracious comfort -of the old estate, the hospitable kitchen, -the chambers warm in winter and tree-shaded -in summer, the wide balustrades where the -guests sat in long summer gloamings, courting -the breeze. It was Marcel who pointed out -the view one gains from the steps of the -Château, straight through gaping doors and -windows, to the sundial from which radiated -the alleys of the grove: bronze oaks and -beeches, golden plane trees, spruces and tasselled -pines.</p> - -<p>How is the beauty of that day departed! -Half of the grove lies now a waste of scrubby -second growth and fallen timber, for here the -Germans employed Russian prisoners as -lumbermen. No longer the huntsmen and -their ladies pace the alleys. Now, on almost<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_28"></a>[28]</span> -any day you may see old women dragging -branches from the woods to the <i>basse-cour</i>, to -be cut up for fuel. Twenty-six of them, no -men, and only two children, the wretched villagers -had found in the Baronne’s stables their -only shelter after the razing of their homes.</p> - -<p>Yet we entered the winter far less warmly -housed than they. Our two-room <i>baraques</i> -were supplemented in time by six portable -houses which we had brought from America; -two we used as dormitories and the other four -as a dispensary, a store, a kitchen, and a dining -room. Our furnishings were of the simplest; -camp beds, a stove for each building, -a table, camp stools, and shelves. Our wood—when -we had any—was chopped by a vigorous -old lady who walked a mile and a half from the -nearest village to do it. Our laundry was done -upon a stove a foot square in a small building -known as the Morgue: such having been its use -during the German occupation. Marie made -our cuisine on her range in a hut which she had -built into the ruins of her cottage. Zélie carried<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_29"></a>[29]</span> -food and dishes in baskets to and fro from -kitchen to dining room, a quarter of a mile -apart. The one luxury of our existence was -hot water, prepared by Marcel in a huge cauldron, -and brought in covered metal pitchers to -our doors.</p> - -<p>Only once did Marcel fail us, and that was -because the rightful owner of the cauldron left -the <i>basse-cour</i> for her newly erected <i>baraque</i>. -She requested our kind permission to transport -thither her property. “There is another -cauldron at Buverchy, which I think you could -rent in place of mine,” she suggested. “It -belonged to my cousin, Mme. Bouvet, and is -now in Mme. Josse’s yard. No one is using -it.” Marcel was dispatched to make inquiries, -and later, with horse and wagon, to fetch the -cauldron home. But meantime there had -dawned a morning when we were not wakened -by the clump-clump of Marcel’s sabots, and -the setting down of the water jug with a thud -upon the frozen ground.</p> - -<p>For wood, we depended largely on the<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_30"></a>[30]</span> -chivalry of nearby encampments of troops, -French, English, Canadian or American, to -whom our need became apparent. For food, -we were supplied by the Army with our quota -of bread and a soldier, M. Jean, to fetch it. -Vegetables and some fruit we obtained from -our villages, of which we had sixteen in our -charge. Often these were presents, thrust -upon us through gratitude; nor could we pay -for them. Meat was plentiful in all the towns -of the Zone, where the Army was charged with -supplying the civilian population with food. -Anyone, going on any errand, marketed; and -the dispensary jitney, which might have -started in the morning with doctors, nurses, -kits, and relief supplies, often returned at -night overflowing with cabbages, potatoes, -pounds of roast, bags of coal, and <i>bidons</i> of oil.</p> - -<p>Our relief supplies came through more regular -channels, largely from Paris, where one -member of the Unit devoted all her time to -buying. These were either shipped to the -nearest railroad station, or sent by the French<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_31"></a>[31]</span> -Army, free of charge, in a thundering <i>camion</i>. -We never knew when to expect this last, nor -what it would contain. Sunday seemed a -favourite day for its arrival. On one occasion, -there were three pigs, loose and hungry, -and no pen to put them in; seventy-five crated -chickens followed, with the request that the -number be verified, and the crates returned. -Such were the colonel’s orders. But, seeing -that the Unit carpenter had to construct a -chicken yard, this command was modified by -a judicious distribution of cigarettes. Mixed -cargoes of Red Cross boxes, stoves, bundles of -wool from the Bon Marché which had burst <i>en -route</i>, and sundries, were even harder to deal -with.</p> - -<p>We had no store room. The <i>cave</i> of the -Château, seeping with tons of débris which in -places bent with its weight the steel ceiling, -and open along one whole side to the elements,—this -contained our dairy, our lumber, our -fuel, our vegetables, our groceries, and our relief -supplies. It abounded in rats, cats, and<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_32"></a>[32]</span> -bats. But such as it was, it was the centre of -our activities. By night often weirdly lighted -with candles, by day never empty, laughter -rather than complaints floated from its dim -interior. Here we held our first store; here -the children who had trudged over from -Canizy, Hombleux or Esmery-Hallon waited -in line for their milk; here were assembled and -tied up the thousands of packages for our -<i>fêtes de Noël</i>. As winter advanced, we prepared -for a day in the <i>cave</i> by encasing our -feet in peasants’ socks and sabots, and our -hands in worsted mittens. The soldiers in -the trenches had nothing on us.</p> - -<p>Whether at home or on the road, our days -were long and arduous, and seldom what we -had planned. Even Sunday became part of -the working week, for then we attempted to -entertain our official supervisors and co-laborers, -and all chance acquaintances. M. le -Commandant of the Third Army has dined -with us; the ladies of the American Fund for -French Wounded, under whom we held our<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_33"></a>[33]</span> -section, have come to call; the Friends walk -over from Esmery-Hallon where they are -building <i>baraques</i> for the commune; a lonesome -Ambulance boy who has tramped ten -miles and must retrace his steps before dark, -drops in; a squad of Canadian Foresters rides -through the gate; reporters, accompanied by -a French officer, harry us with questions. But -most frequent, and most welcome of all our -visitors, are our countrymen, the—th New -York Engineers. They came from home, -those men, to be the first of our army under -fire. But during the early days of the autumn, -their talk was not of their work, but of ours. -They brought us slat walks, called duck walks, -to keep us out of the mud, and wood, and -benches, and stoves. They came with mandolins -and guitars and violins to give an entertainment -to our villagers, and stayed for a -buffet dinner and dance. They sent their -trucks to take us in turn to a party at their -encampment. But all that was before the -Cambrai drive. As we, in our <i>baraques</i>,<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_34"></a>[34]</span> -listened night and day to that bombardment, -we little knew the heroic part taken in it by our -Engineers. Surprised, unarmed, with pick -and shovel they stood and fought; and later, -hastily equipped with rifles, helped save the -day for England on the bitterly contested -front. But you have doubtless read of them -in the papers, for they were the first of our -soldiers to die in battle and to be mentioned in -the orders of the day.</p> - -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_35"></a>[35]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_III">CHAPTER III<br /> -<span class="smaller">M. LE MAIRE</span></h2> - -</div> - -<p>By rights, Canizy belongs with three other -hamlets, to the commune of Hombleux. -The mayor of Hombleux is therefore in reality -also the mayor of Canizy. But each of the -hamlets has an acting mayor besides. And, -to complicate this matter of mayors still further, -the real mayor of the commune has left -his post to reside in his mansion in the Boulevard -Haussmann in Paris. Inquiring into -the reason of his non-residence, I was told that -he was broken in health, and belonged to a -political party which, at the moment, was no -longer in power. Hence the so-called mayors, -with whom rests the welfare of our villages.</p> - -<p>Before the war, the present mayor of Hombleux -was one of the <i>grands cultivateurs</i>. -With Mme. la Baronne, Mme. Desmarchez<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_36"></a>[36]</span> -and M. Gomart, he owned most of the rich -acres encircling the town. Hombleux itself -contained then about 1200 inhabitants, and -was an industrial as well as an agricultural -centre, having a distillery and two refineries -for sugar-beets. Of the factories, practically -nothing now remains, and of the inhabitants, -250 have survived the German deportations. -Zélie, the kitchen maid, has told me of these -last. “The first deportation,” she said, “was -one of five hundred. The officers came to the -doors at seven o’clock with the names, and told -us to be ready to start at dawn. O Mademoiselle, -the night! All the neighbours ran to and -fro; all night we washed and sewed and ironed, -and in the morning, each with a sack of fresh -linen, my father, my sister, M. le Curé,—the -flower of our village,—were marched away. -And after, what weeping!” Zélie put down -her broom to wring her hands, as if still dry-eyed -from too much suffering. “The next -time,” she continued, “the Boches gave us -no warning. They came at midnight, and<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_37"></a>[37]</span> -dragged us from our beds.” “Did you then -go?” I inquired. “But yes,” she replied, and -her eyes flashed. “They tried to make us -work; there were five of us, friends, from our -village. But work for the enemies of France? -We would not! They put us in prison; they -fed us almost nothing, but we would not work. -One day they summoned us. ‘Go,’ they said, -‘go where you like, beasts of the Somme!’ -Hungry, foot-sore, travelling mostly by night -from the frontier, we came home. It was midnight -when we reached Hombleux. In my -own house, my mother had barred the door. -I tapped on the window to wake her. At first, -she would not believe that it was I. Even -now, she looks at me with a question in her -eyes as if asking continually, ‘Zélie, is it -thou?’”</p> - -<p>Our mayors have no such heroic past! -They not only saved their own skins, but reside -to this day with their wives and daughters; -comely daughters of an age for the German -draft. Of one it is more than whispered that<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_38"></a>[38]</span> -he is a spy. Many carrier pigeons he had in -his dovecote, and whether there were any connection -or not, <i>he knew of the impending German -invasion</i>, and left his comfortable house -and growing crops, to spend the summer of -1914 in Normandy. Nor did he return till -the summer of 1917. Meantime, his little -hamlet had held a town meeting of its refugees, -and elected a lady as mayor. In fact, M. -Renet, on his return, found himself the only -man in the village. He found also—a suspicious -circumstance in the eyes of his neighbours—his -house the only one undestroyed. I have -talked with him there, looking out of his casement -windows into a walled garden, where the -fruit trees are uncut, and the walks are still -bordered with close-trimmed box. He assumes -an injured air, recounting his unpopularity. -It is unfortunate, but since M. the -Deputy has again asked him to act as mayor, -<i>que voulez-vous</i>? He is compelled.</p> - -<p>His superior, the mayor of the entire commune, -did not fare so well. On our first visit,<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_39"></a>[39]</span> -we found him inhabiting a loft in his partially -ruined barn. But despite his chubby person, -this mayor is a man of action. Week after -week, Hombleux receives shifting regiments -of troops back from the trenches <i>en repos</i>. -These are detailed for construction work. -Carpenters set up the <i>baraques</i>, which the -Government furnishes to homeless families; -masons and bricklayers are slowly raising the -walls of the village bakery. The mayor has -taken his share of the materials and workmen, -and is now housed in a two-room lean-to, with -a new slate roof, and lace-curtained windows. -Here, beside an open fire, he transacts business.</p> - -<p>He it is to whom returning refugees come -to report and register; through him claims of -damage (based on pre-war valuation of property) -are filed, which the Government has -promised to honor after the war. To him, -requests for <i>baraques</i> are made, and sent by -him to the <i>Sous-Préfet</i> of the Department, to -be forwarded in turn to the Minister of the<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_40"></a>[40]</span> -Interior, with whom such matters rest. The -mayor calculates the amount of <i>allocation</i> or -pension to which each family in the devastated -area is entitled, varying according as they are -<i>réfugiés</i> or <i>rapatriés</i>, according to the number -of bread-winners imprisoned or serving with -the colors, according to the number of children, -or, in some cases, to the decorations won by -their soldiers, for decorations carry pensions.<a id="FNanchor_5" href="#Footnote_5" class="fnanchor">[5]</a> -This entire matter of income is adjusted finally -for our district by the <i>Préfet</i> at Péronne. Besides -housing and pensioning, the Government<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_41"></a>[41]</span> -has undertaken to supply a certain -amount of cereals, coffee, sago and the like. -These the mayor distributes. Furniture as -well is provided by the Government: bedsteads, -mattresses (not forgetting bolsters), -stoves, cupboards, chairs, tables and <i>batteries -de cuisine</i>. Before our coming to take charge -of the district, the mayor signed the furniture -requisitions which were understood by the fortunate -recipients to represent a part of their -“<i>indemnité de guerre</i>.” He also had the even -more delicate task of distributing relief supplies -left in bulk by the Red Cross or other -agencies on their hurried passage through the -ruined villages. Naturally, the supply fell -short of the demand; and it was with unconcealed -pleasure that the Mayor at the instance -of the <i>Sous-Préfet</i> turned over these two -thankless tasks to us. Yet we found him—or -rather his wife and daughter—always ready to -advise and coöperate. On demand, they furnished -immaculately penned lists of all inhabitants, -whether grouped by sex and by age, by<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_42"></a>[42]</span> -family, or by the main division of adults and -juveniles. They know the number of families -in each hamlet, the number of persons in each -family, the name and the age of each. Much -more they know, of gossip, and of human nature, -and laughed, I fear a trifle derisively, at -our manifest difficulties.</p> - -<p>All these activities, centring in the Mayor, -belong to the civil administration of the Department. -The Ministry of Agriculture has -its share in reconstruction also, but is more -independent of local officials, having an office -of its own in the commune. To it belong the -ploughing and seeding, the replacing of orchards, -and to a certain extent of livestock. -But on all these matters, as to whose fields -shall be ploughed, or who shall plant two apple -trees or own a goat, the verdict of the Mayor is -sought. He himself, you may be sure, is dependent -on no such circuitous methods. Together -with two other <i>grands cultivateurs</i>, he -has bought an American tractor, a harrow, -and a mowing machine. These can even be<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_43"></a>[43]</span> -hired for the same price as the government-owned -tractors, which is forty francs an -hectare. Over all reconstruction, considered -as a part of the civil administration, preside -the <i>Sous-Préfet</i> and the <i>Préfet</i> of the Somme.</p> - -<p>On the other hand, food supplies in general, -such as bread, are controlled by the army. In -fact, every detail of life in the War Zone is -their care if they choose to assume it. Troop -movements delay shipments; therefore there -may be no bread. Cavalry needs fodder; the -sergeant at Hombleux goes out to forage with -rick and trio of white horses and buys it at -a fixed price. Mme. N—— is ill; the army -doctor visits her, and if she seems to him a -menace to the health of the soldiers, he removes -her to a hospital. In view of the military importance -attached to the Zone, the confidence -of the French Government in giving over a -section of it to the care of a group of American -women, wholly unacquainted with the -task before them, seems truly touching.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_44"></a>[44]</span></p> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 700px;" id="illus5"> -<img src="images/illus5.jpg" width="700" height="500" alt="" /> -<p class="caption">—<i>Rien que ça de pain! Vous mangez bien chez vous!</i></p> -<p class="caption">—<i>Ben ... on n’est pas des boches!</i></p> -<p class="caption">[Only that much bread! You eat well at your house!</p> -<p class="caption">Well ... we are not Boches!]</p> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_45"></a>[45]</span></p> - -<p>In fact, it seemed appalling, as I learned -from day to day the problems for which I was -myself responsible in Canizy. Not the least -of these was its mayor. Unlike his <i>confrère</i> at -B——, M. Thuillard had not fled his property -until forced to do so with the rest of the villagers -immediately prior to the Retreat of -1917. During the occupation, he kept his -store as usual. And even though his horses -and cattle, his fat rabbits and plump chickens, -were requisitioned by the Germans, they say -that he was paid for them. To see him, however, -housed in a miserable hut, with a dirt floor -so uneven that the very chairs looked tipsy; -to hear the complaints of his querulous wife, -and the references of his daughter to their former -comfort, was calculated to enlist one’s -sympathy. Mme. Thuillard was ill, and he was -lame, and the daughter’s husband was a prisoner, -and they had lost heavily, because they -had the most to lose. All this they told me -over the saucerless cups of black coffee which -they offered me “out of a good heart.”</p> - -<p>But when I considered the Mayor’s duty<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_46"></a>[46]</span> -to his village, my own heart hardened. Here -is the entry I find in my notebook on my first -survey of Canizy. “Canizy, dependence of -Hombleux, Thuillard, Oscar, in charge. Curé -of Voyennes has charge of the children; 4 k. -away. No church, no school, no bread, no -water fit to drink.” There was something, of -course, in the Mayor’s own contention that the -village had been forgotten; and one could -understand why the Curé came only to burials -when one saw him,—so ill he looked. But in -M. Thuillard’s barn were two stout horses, -and two carts stood before his door. On his -own business, he could travel. “Why, then,” -I inquired, “has he not fetched the bread supply -from Hombleux to which the village is -entitled?” “Because he has nothing to gain,” -and the good wife I interrogated shrugged -her shoulders and laughed. “Look you,” she -continued, “M. Thuillard is rich; 26 kilos of -money he buried, and it is not in sous.” This -rumour, which gave the one-legged Mayor -something of the air of a land pirate, I heard<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_47"></a>[47]</span> -on all sides. Even the school teacher of Hombleux -repeated it; and her husband, an officer, -nodded his head to emphasize his “<i>Oui, c’est -vrai</i>.”</p> - -<p>Of one of our mayors, however, I would like -to record nothing but praise. Widow of a -soldier, left with two little girls, and absolutely -no other possession in the world, she ruled -our home village at the Château with justice -and dignity. She never complained. When -at last the <i>baraque</i> on the ruins of her farm -was completed, all except the fitting of the -glass in the windows, she insisted on moving in -so that we could make use of the space she -vacated in our <i>basse-cour</i>. I met her one bitter -evening shortly afterward, as I was returning -from Canizy. “Is it not cold in the -<i>baraque</i>, Madame?” I asked. “Oh, yes,” she -replied, “but what would you? It is so good -to be at home!”</p> - -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_48"></a>[48]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_IV">CHAPTER IV<br /> -<span class="smaller">O CRUX, AVE</span></h2> - -</div> - -<p>As the aeroplanes fly, Canizy is perhaps -three miles from the Château, or reckoned -in time, half an hour by motor and an -hour on foot. But by either route, one turns -into the village at the stark Calvary I have -already mentioned, with its half obliterated -inscription: <i>Ave, O Crux</i>.</p> - -<p>At our first visit, despite our novelty, Canizy -regarded us with indifference. We seemed -to them doubtless one more of those strange -manifestations of the war which had stranded -them among their ruins. Incurious, apathetic, -they passed us with sidelong glances, and went -their ways. But this did not last long. The -“Dames Américaines” did such extraordinary -things! They gathered and bought up rags; -they played with the children; they walked<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_49"></a>[49]</span> -fearlessly, even at night, across the fields to -tend a sick baby; they slept—so the village -children who had seen their encampment reported—on -<i>lits-soldats</i>. The village waked to -a new interest, and it came about that one -expected to be waited for by the gaunt old -cross.</p> - -<p>Before my arrival, the routeing of our three -cars had already been decided. Three times -a week the Dispensary was held at Canizy, -and once a week, on Monday, our largest truck, -turned into a peddler’s cart with shining tinware, -sabots, soap, fascinators, stockings and -other articles of clothing, made there its first -stop. On the seat back of the driver and the -storekeeper, or if there were not room for a -seat, on top of the hampers, went also the children’s -department, consisting of two members. -While the mothers, grandmothers and elder -sisters gathered at the honk of the horn about -the truck, the children, equally eager, followed -the teachers to an open field for games. Or, -did it rain, I have seen them of all ages from<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_50"></a>[50]</span> -fourteen years to fourteen months, huddled in -a shed, listening open-mouthed to the same -tales our children love, which begin, in French -as in English, with “Once upon a time.”</p> - -<p>But when, after a three-days’ inspection of -our outlying domain, I asked our Director for -the village of Canizy, I was given charge of all -branches of our work there. This meant not -interference but close coöperation with the -other members of the Unit already occupied -with its problems. Of all our villages, Canizy -was the most beloved, not, perhaps, because its -need was greatest, but because its isolation was -most complete. No one could do enough for -it. Were a sewing-machine to be repaired, the -head of our automobile department, a mechanical -genius, spent hours making it “marcher.” -The doctors, with their own hands, took time -to scrub the children’s heads. They came to -me with every need that they found on their -rounds, with the neighbourhood gossip, and -with kindly advice. The teachers gave me the -names of children requiring shoes; and, as the<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_51"></a>[51]</span> -work developed, asked in turn for recommendations -in regard to opening a children’s -library. To the farm department, I made requests -that we buy largely of fodder and -vegetables, until we had literally hundreds of -kilos of pumpkins, turnips and carrots bedded -for us in the cellars, on call. To this department -went also requisitions that Mme. Cordier -be supplied with a pig, or M. Noulin with five -hens, or Mme. Gense with a goat. Or, were -there shipments of furniture to be delivered, -one called again on the automobile department, -which even through the drifts and cold -of winter, kept at least one of its engines -thawed and running every day.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_52"></a>[52]</span></p> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 700px;" id="illus6"> -<img src="images/illus6.jpg" width="700" height="500" alt="" /> -<p class="caption">—<i>C’est un boche ce blessé là?</i></p> -<p class="caption">—<i>Non, M’sieu le Major, c’est le cheval du capitaine.</i></p> -<p class="caption">[Is that wounded man a Boche?</p> -<p class="caption">No, Major, he’s the captain’s horse.]</p> -</div> - -<p>It will be seen that our scheme of material -relief followed closely that laid down by the -Government. Our method was simple: where -the Government supplies were on hand, or adequate, -we used them; whatever was lacking, -even up to kitchen ranges costing three hundred -francs, we attempted to supply. In this -we had not only our own resources to draw on,<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_53"></a>[53]</span> -but to a limited extent, those of the American -Fund for French Wounded, and to a much -larger extent, those of the Red Cross. In -a huge truck came the goods from the -Red Cross, driven by a would-be aviator who, -when asked his name, replied bashfully, -“Call me Dave.” “Dave” was frequently -accompanied by another youth of like ambition, -named Bill. And I will say that they -handled their truck as if it were already a -flying-machine. The first consignment of -hundreds of sheets and blankets, the truck and -the driver, all were overturned in our moat. -It took a day to get them out. The next mishap -was a head-on collision with our front gate. -But the last, which I learned of just before -I left, will best illustrate their imaginative turn -of mind. Bill, the intrepid, having attempted -to traverse a ploughed field, left his machine -there mired to the body, and spent the night -with us. He seemed a trifle apprehensive as -to how his “boss” would take this exploit. -Willing workers, however, were Dave and<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_54"></a>[54]</span> -Bill. Unannounced, they came exploding up -the driveway under orders to work for us all -day. And many a time have we risked our -necks with them, perched on the high front -seat, careering along at what seemed like sixty -miles an hour.</p> - -<p>But for my part, my usual mode of travel -was on foot, and my orbit bounded by the -Château, Hombleux and Canizy. In any -case, even though I went over by motor, I was -dropped at my village and walked back across -the fields. As I grew better acquainted with -the villagers, I came and went at will, spending -almost all the daylight hours—few enough -in winter—with them. Every one has heard -of the mud in the trenches. The clayey soil -of our district, admirably adapted to the making -of bricks, lends itself equally well to the -making of mud. Continually churned by -<i>camions</i> and marching troops, it becomes on -the highways of the consistency of a purée, -through which, high-booted and short-skirted, -one wades. It is therefore a relief to turn off<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_55"></a>[55]</span> -by the footpath beyond Hombleux, though it -plunges for the first quarter of a mile through -a bog. Of a sunny day, birds sing in the -hollow, wee <i>pinsons</i> perched on ragged hedges -answering one another with fairy flutes. -Farther on, yellow-breasted finches dart over -patches of mustard as yellow, and sing as they -fly. Raucous crows, whose gray-barred wings -make them far more decorative than ours, and -the even more strikingly marked magpies, -darken in great flocks the newly ploughed and -seeded wheatfields which in increasing areas -border the path. A sudden movement sends -them whirring like a black and white cloud -against the sky. Often above them courses a -flier of another sort, a scout aeroplane probably, -holding its way from the aviation fields -in our rear, to the front. It rasps the heavens -like a taut bow; by listening to the beat of -its engines one can determine whether it be -French or Boche. For Boche planes come -over us frequently, on bombing raids; and -sometimes one does not have to look or listen<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_56"></a>[56]</span> -long to know that an air battle is taking place -overhead. The sharp reports; the white puffs -of our guns, the black plumes of the enemy’s; -the glint of the sunlight on careening sails -high up in the blue,—it all passes like a panorama, -of which we do not know the end. -Other sounds also are familiar to us on our -plain, when from the Chemin des Dames, or -St. Quentin, or Cambrai, the great guns boom. -Like surges they shake and reverberate; and -when, as often happens, the sea-fog rolls in -from the Channel, one can well fancy them the -breakers of a mighty storm. So they are, out -there, on our front, where the living dyke of -the <i>poilus</i> holds back the German flood.</p> - -<p>The highway and the railway, these are the -two most coveted goals of the German bombs. -For over them go up the trains of ammunition -and of soldiers and supplies. Both we cross -on the way to Canizy. The railroad, running -between well defined hedges, would seem -almost as conspicuous an object as the tree-sentinelled -road. But, so far, both have escaped<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_57"></a>[57]</span> -harm. Trains whistle and puff as usual -up and down from Amiens to Ham. Often -I halt at the crossing, to wave to soldiers, who -fill the cars; sometimes I pass through companies -of red-turbaned, brown Moroccans, -who are brought here by the Government to -rebuild bridges and keep the roadbed in repair. -Over the track the footpath carries one, on -over brown stubble, to the Calvary and Canizy.</p> - -<p>As I have said, at the Cross one is awaited. -Sometimes it is only one little figure in black -apron and blue soldier’s cap that stands beside -it to give the signal; sometimes from the wall -on the other side of the road, a half dozen girls -start up, like a covey of quail. The boys -usually ran away, but the girls advanced to -surround one, and dance hand in hand down -the street. But always before the Calvary -there was a pause. Brown hands, none too -clean, were raised to forehead and breast with -the quick sign of the cross. One caught a -whispered invocation. “But you do not do -it,” five-year-old Flore protested to me one<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_58"></a>[58]</span> -day, with troubled eyes. “Why do you not -salute the Calvary?” “Teach me,” I replied; -and in chorus I learned the words which on -the lips of the war-orphaned children are infinitely -pathetic: “Glory to the Father and to -the Son and to the Holy Ghost.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_59"></a>[59]</span></p> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 450px;" id="illus7"> -<img src="images/illus7.jpg" width="450" height="700" alt="" /> -<p class="caption">—<i>Il est déjà grand!...</i></p> -<p class="caption">—<i>Ben ... il a l’âge de la guerre.</i></p> -<p class="caption">[He is big already!</p> -<p class="caption">Well ... he is as old as the war.]</p> -</div> - -<p>It is not alone at Canizy that one finds the -Cross, though by its aloofness above the plain -this one became impressive. By every roadside -stands a Calvary, sometimes embowered -in trees, but more often stark and naked, with -the wantonly felled trunks about its base bearing -mute Witness to a desecration which respected -the form, but not the spirit, of the -Christ. At Hombleux, three such crucifixes -marked the intersections of the village lanes, -flanked by stenciled guide-posts: <i>A Nesle</i>, <i>A -Athies</i>, or <i>A Roye</i>. They cluster in the cemeteries, -above well-remembered graves; Where -even the dead no longer rest inviolate, since -the Germans, to their unspeakable shame, have -blasted open many a tomb. Day by day, the<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_60"></a>[60]</span> -obsession grows on one that these uplifted -symbols of suffering, stripped and mocked and -defiled by the invader, typify the crucifixion of -Picardy.</p> - -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_61"></a>[61]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_V">CHAPTER V<br /> -<span class="smaller">MME. GABRIELLE</span></h2> - -</div> - -<p>Every village, everywhere, has its -stronger characters, to whom the community -looks up, perhaps unconsciously. -Canizy, having been deprived of its normal -leaders in the Curé, a prisoner, and the teacher, -transferred to the school at Hombleux, looked -up in this way to Mme. Lefèvre and Mme. -Gabrielle. The former was the especial friend -of our medical department. In fact, she -rented one of her two rooms for our use as a -dispensary, and her flagged kitchen was -always open to her neighbours and to us. -Here I measured out milk to half the village, -or distributed the loaves of bread which we -ourselves purveyed from the crabbed Garde -Champêtre at Hombleux. Or, had I neither -the time nor the patience, Mme. Lefèvre herself<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_62"></a>[62]</span> -made the distribution, and gave me a list -of the recipients, and always the correct -amount of neatly stacked coppers in change. -A shrewd face had Mme. Lefèvre, wrinkled by -humour as well as by sorrow. She had been -taken away by the Boches in their retreat, but -later, for some reason unknown, was allowed -to return. Her three daughters, however, -and her husband, all were in the hands of the -enemy. She lived alone, therefore, and busied -herself in her late-planted garden, and in her -neighbours’ affairs.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_64"></a>[64]</span></p> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 500px;" id="illus8"> -<img src="images/illus8.jpg" width="500" height="700" alt="" /> -<p class="caption">—<i>C’est pas moi!... c’est lui.</i></p> -<p class="caption">[I didn’t do it ... <i>he</i> did!]</p> -</div> - -<p>Most of them, it seemed, were related to her -in one way or another, all the Genses being of -her kin. Of these there were Mme. Gense-Tabary, -already mentioned, and her swarming -family of eight, bright and pretty as pictures, -and dirty as little pigs. She, lodged near the -bank of the canal, really had no excuse for this -chronic condition, and was encouraged to -scrub by object lessons, clean clothing, and -gifts even of long bars of <i>savon marseilles</i>. I -remember her yet, two or three children tagging<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_63"></a>[63]</span> -at her skirts, knocking at the door of my -<i>baraque</i> of a Sunday morning, to tell me that -she must have more soap. All the way from -Canizy she had walked to get it; and she did -not go back without. Mme. Gense-Tabary’s -eldest daughter, known as Germaine Tabary, -was the sorrow of the village, even more than -its daughters who had gone into captivity; for -she had become an earlier victim of the invaders, -and with her unborn baby was left -behind. Mme. Marie Gense, another unfortunate, -was a niece by marriage of Mme. -Lefèvre’s. Her husband was a soldier. She -had lived in a little cottage whose blue and -white tiled floor I often had occasion to admire, -next the church. But being left with two -growing boys, and no resources, what was she -to do? What she did was to add to her family -a Paul, and one bitter winter night which our -doctors and nurses well remember, a Paulette. -“What would you?” she expostulated. “I -had no bread for the children; in this way they -were fed.” That two more months were<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_65"></a>[65]</span> -added, and that her lean-to of ten feet by -twelve could not accommodate them, were -facts which did not seem to concern her. And -of all good children, her two boys, Désiré and -Robert, were certainly the best. But Aunt -Lefèvre looked upon her niece’s conduct as a -scandal. She was forbidden the kitchen, and -it was even known that the quarrel had come -to the point of knives. With the children, -that was different. “Yes,” said Mme. Lefèvre -on the arrival of the new baby, “Désiré -may sleep in the Dispensary if you so wish. It -is your room; you pay for it.” That Désiré -did, though I had a bed put up for him, I misdoubt. -But Robert, happy-go-lucky Robert, -with his head cocked on one side and a smile -rippling his brown eyes, even Aunt Lefèvre -could not help loving him. There was no -question of his sleeping out, however, he being -nurse to the babies and to his mother as well. -Another wayward connection of Mme. Lefèvre’s -was a sister of Mme. Marie Gense’s, -known as Mme. Payelle. She had three children<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_66"></a>[66]</span> -as cunning as you could wish to see, -clean—as were Marie’s—and sunny-tempered. -Their parentage also was a mystery. But this -blot did not rest by rights on the village escutcheon. -Mme. Payelle had been installed there -by one of her admirers, a soldier <i>en permission</i>; -she really did not belong to Canizy.</p> - -<p>To keep her social position in the midst of -these misfortunes was a tribute to Mme. -Lefèvre’s worth. She was always doing kindnesses, -and speaking to us on her neighbours’ -behalf. Beneath her shed stood one of the -four <i>chaudières</i>, or washing cauldrons, which -survived the general destruction. These, -varying in capacity from 50 to 250 litres, are -an indispensable utensil of housekeeping in -Picardy. In them, week by week, the soiled -clothes are boiled. Not even the lack of a -pump—and there was only one left in the village—was -so much deplored as the loss of the -cauldrons. In view of these two handicaps -and the dearth of soap, the squalor of the village -on our arrival seems excusable. Mme.<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_67"></a>[67]</span> -Lefèvre, at least, did her share toward remedying -it. Without charge, her <i>chaudière</i> was in -constant use, and her shed became a neighbourhood -rendezvous.</p> - -<p>It will be seen that all the Genses were by no -means a bad lot, Mme. Lefèvre being one herself. -Of an older generation, and I know not -of what degree of kinship to her, is Mme. -Hélène Gense, grandmother to Mme. Gabrielle, -that energetic, substantial young Widow, -not Mme. Thuillard nor yet Veuve Thuillard, -but Mme. Gabrielle to all Canizy. In pre-war -times, she owned, through her parents and -not by marriage, the most central homestead -in the village. There remain now only the -arched gate into the courtyard, the brick rabbit -hutches, a heap of débris, and a tottering wall. -She and ten-year-old Adrien lodge, therefore, -in the first house on the left as you come past -the Calvary, with Grand’mère Gense. This -ell, flanked though it is by the ruin of the main -building, is the most cheerful spot in the village. -The narrow yard before the door is<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_68"></a>[68]</span> -swept; a row of geraniums blossoms beneath -the windows. Above all, there <i>are</i> windows, -two of them, and curtains at each. Outside -the door, if you are fortunate in the hour of -your call, will stand two pairs of worn sabots. -Or perhaps the door may be open, framing -Grand’mère, bent almost at right angles, Mme. -Gabrielle, and Bobbinot. Bobbinot is a dog, -iron-grey, smooth-coated, with a white band -on his breast and a white vest. He has no -pedigree, his mistress assures me, but his brown -eyes and his square, intelligent head bear out -her statement that he is “<i>très loyal</i>.” All -three welcome me; a chair is proffered near the -fire. Grand’mère sinks carefully into her low -seat, Mme. Gabrielle sets on a saucepan of -coffee, and we sit down to chat.</p> - -<p>It is a pleasure to look about as we talk. -On the mantel, to give a note of colour, are laid -a row of tiny yellow pumpkins; the floor is -red, and through the window peer red geraniums. -In a cupboard beyond the stove is a -modest array of pans and dishes. Two panes<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_69"></a>[69]</span> -of glass, like portholes, pierce the wall to the -rear. Beneath stands a sideboard, and a little -to one side, a round table. Not until the -coffee was heated did I notice that cups were -set for four.</p> - -<p>“But have you another guest?” I inquired, -as Mme. Gabrielle poured first some syrup -from a bottle, and then the steaming drink. -“But no, only Adrien. <i>Adrien, come!</i>” -She raised her voice. Then for the first time -I saw the boy, head propped on elbows, poring -over a book. The mother regarded him indulgently. -“It is a pity for the children that we -have no school. Adrien is apt; when the Germans -were here, he understood everything, -everything. And when the Scotch came, he -learned, too. I myself try to learn English.” -She brought forth from the sideboard an English-French -phrase book. “This I found in a -house after the English soldiers went away. -It would be easy, but there is the pronunciation.” -“I will teach you,” I said, and we took -up the words one by one, Grand’mère laughing<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_70"></a>[70]</span> -the while, pleasant laughter, like a cracked, old -bell. But the boy kept on reading and -hummed a tune. “The children,” broke in the -mother, “they sing; it is well.” But presently -the boy shuts his book with a sigh and draws -a chair to the table. “Did you like it, the -story?” I inquire. “Yes, it tells of America.” -On the table, clear now save for Adrien’s belated -cup, is revealed an oilcloth map in lieu -of a linen cover. “Where, then, is America?” -His finger traces the colored squares. “Here -is France, here England, here Italy, here Russia,—but -America, it is so far one cannot see -it.” “But yes,” rejoins his mother, “so far -that never in my life did I expect to see an -American. Once in my childhood I remember -looking at a picture of M. Pierpont’s bank in -New York—a great bank. But now I have -seen Germans, Russians, English, Moroccans,—and -you. The war teaches many things.”</p> - -<p>“You have seen Russians?”</p> - -<p>“Very many; the Germans worked our fields -with Russian prisoners. A strange people!<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_71"></a>[71]</span> -You and I converse; we come from different -countries, but we have ideas in common. The -Russians were like dumb beasts; they had no -<i>esprit de corps</i>.”</p> - -<p>“It is the fault of their government,” I -venture.</p> - -<p>“Yes,” she replied, “France and America -are republics. It is not that our government -is perfect. There are many beautiful things -in France, but there is much injustice also, -much.”</p> - -<p>I knew of what Mme. Gabrielle was thinking, -then; of the wheatlands of Canizy, where -not one furrow had been turned for the next -year’s harvest, while the <i>grands cultivateurs</i> -and the petty politicians looked out for themselves; -and of the school building, long promised -and still delayed.</p> - -<p>But Mme. Gabrielle looked beyond the confines -of her small village and its grievances. -Love for <i>la belle plaine</i> and <i>la belle France</i>, -unreasoning, passionate, pulsed in her. Hatred -of the Germans was its corollary.<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_72"></a>[72]</span> -“Mademoiselle, during the occupation, we were -prisoners,” she said. “We had to have passes -to go one fourth of a kilometre from our village. -My mother was sick at Voyennes,—and -I could not go to see her.” It came out that -Bobbinot had been her constant companion. -“But I should think,” I said, “that the Germans -would have taken him away.” “They -dared not; he would have bitten them!” was -the spirited response.</p> - -<p>At Mme. Gabrielle’s table, with the map -upon it, I was destined to sit often, sometimes -for luncheon and sometimes for dinner, while -we took counsel over village affairs. For -Mme. Gabrielle, together with Mme. Lefèvre, -and the former school teacher, became an informal -advisory committee to me. Through -punctiliously served courses of soup, stew, -salad, wine, cheese and coffee, Mme. Gabrielle -offered her information, or, when asked, her -opinion. It was she who reassured me on the -point of selling rather than of giving the -smaller articles we distributed. “I understand<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_73"></a>[73]</span> -completely; it is better for us. The -American Red Cross did the same when -the Germans were here. They sold the food, -but very cheap. Without their help, we -should have starved. We are grateful to -America, which saved our lives.” It was she -who advised in regard to a baby whom its half-witted -mother had placed in a crèche: “For -the mother,” she said, “it would doubtless be -better that the child returned. But for the -child—and I am a mother myself who speak—let -it remain.” On the good sense and the -good heart of Mme. Gabrielle one came to rely. -Even as far as Hombleux she was known and -respected. “O yes,” the women there told me, -“Mme. Gabrielle, we know her. She is <i>une -femme très forte</i>.”</p> - -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_74"></a>[74]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_VI">CHAPTER VI<br /> -<span class="smaller">VOILÀ LA MISÈRE</span></h2> - -</div> - -<p>Directly opposite Mme. Gabrielle -lives Mme. Odille Delorme. One lifts -the latch of a heavy wooden gate to enter her -courtyard. On left and right are the remains -of barn and stable, from the rafters of which -depend bundles of <i>haricots</i> hung to dry. A -half dozen chickens scurry from under foot, -and at the commotion Mme. Delorme steps -out. “I have come to make a little visit,” I -begin. “Enter then, and see misery,” is her -reply. It is a startling reply from this woman, -strong, intelligent, and direct. The room of -which she throws open the door is tiny; the -floor is of earth; there is no window, only a hole -covered with oiled linen, which lets in a ray of -light but never any sun. A stove, a table, two -stools, a shelf or two and a few dishes hung on<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_75"></a>[75]</span> -nails are her furnishings. In her arms she -holds her sixteen-months’ baby; a little girl -of three comes running in from an adjoining -alcove, and is followed presently by her seven-year-old -sister, Charmette. The three children -look like plants blanched in a cellar. As -gently as possible, I proceed with necessary -questions: for in social parlance, I am making -a preliminary survey of the family needs. -“Your husband?” I inquire. She turns to her -little girl, “Marie, tell the lady, then, where -is Papa.” And Marie, smiling up into her -mother’s face, repeats her lesson proudly, -“<i>Avec—les—Boches</i>.” “<i>Avec les Boches</i>,” reiterates -the mother, and catches the child to her -in a passionate embrace. There is a pause before -I can continue. “Have you beds and covers?” -“See for yourself, Mademoiselle,” and -she leads the way through her <i>ménage</i>; three -passage-ways opening the one into the other, -like the compartments of a train. The first -contains a child’s bed of white enamel, and beneath -an aperture like that in the outer room,<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_76"></a>[76]</span> -a crib. Both are canopied and ruffled in spotless -white. “Yes,” Mme. Delorme says in answer -to my unspoken surprise, “I bought these -beds. The ruffles are made of sheets, one can -but do one’s best. As you see, it is only a -chicken-house after all.” Beyond, quite without -light, is a space occupied by her own bed, -a springless frame of planks. From nails in -the walls clothes of all sizes and descriptions -hang. In fact, one wonders at the amount of -clothing saved by the panic-stricken peasants -in their flight. They not only took away with -them heavy sacks made out of sheets, but buried -what they had time to. Of course, some of -their hiding places were rifled; but most of the -villagers have a real embarrassment of riches -in their old clothes. Their first request is -usually for a wardrobe, so that the mice will -not nest in them.</p> - -<p>But Mme. Delorme asked for nothing. She -rested her case in the simple statement, “Voilà -la misère.” At a later date, when I returned -with a camera, she repeated, “What would<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_77"></a>[77]</span> -you? Take a picture of our misery?” “Yes, -Madame, to carry with me to America, that -they may see it there and fight the harder for -knowing what the Boches have done.” “<i>Eh, -bien!</i>” she replied, and the picture was taken. -Framed in the deep gateway, from which the -clusters of dried beans depend like a stage curtain, -her baby in her arms, her two little girls -clinging beside her, and neighbourly Adrien, -broom in hand, sweeping the light snow from -the path,—I see her yet amid the ruins, brave, -broken-hearted Odille Delorme.</p> - -<p>Before the war, Mme. Delorme had not the -social position of her neighbour, Mme. Gabrielle. -She lived on her smaller property, -and attended to her truck garden and her -poultry yard and her children, while her husband -served the Government as bargeman on -the canal. Yet the two were close friends. -Mme. Gabrielle having bought a cow, shared -the milk with Mme. Delorme. Mme. Gabrielle -told me that Mme. Delorme needed blankets. -“She would never admit it,” she explained.<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_78"></a>[78]</span> -“We are not used to accepting -gifts, you see.” Or were it necessary for -Mme. Delorme to go to Ham perhaps for her -<i>allocation</i>, Mme. Gabrielle transferred the -baby and Marie to her kitchen until their mother’s -return.</p> - -<p>From this extreme end of the village, by the -Calvary, the street continues across the railroad -track. Here, on almost any day, children -may be seen digging miniature coal mines. -They do it not in play, but in earnest. The -ties which the Germans left have long since -been used as fuel, but in the roadbed the villager -still finds a scant supply of coal. Beyond -the track, the first habitable building is a -barn. Its interior consists of one room, -earthen-floored where two makeshift beds allow -it to be seen. In one corner stands a small -stove. No light enters except from the open -door. Here lodge the old mother, the married -daughter, two children, a girl of seventeen -and a boy of eleven, and their orphaned -cousin, four-year-old Noël. Lydie, capable,<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_79"></a>[79]</span> -red-cheeked, crisp-haired, welcomes us and -pulls forward a bench. “Be seated, please.” -Her voice has a ring of youth, her mouth a -ready smile. One wonders how it can be, yet -it is so. The grandmother complains querulously -from the untidy bed where she is lying -to keep warm. Lydie tells us with perfect -equanimity that she herself has no bed. Where -does she sleep? On the bench. Beds would -be welcome, yes, and sheets and blankets. The -grandmother adds a request for warm slippers; -her feet are so often cold. A pane of glass -for the door I set down also in the list in my -notebook, and as assets—the furniture being -negligible—300 kilos of cabbages, 100 kilos of -potatoes, leeks and chicory in smaller quantities.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_80"></a>[80]</span></p> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 450px;" id="illus9"> -<img src="images/illus9.jpg" width="450" height="700" alt="" /> -<p class="caption">—<i>Avant ... quand c’était pas la guerre ... -on en avait deux pour un sou, des pralinés!</i> ...</p> -<p class="caption">[Once, before the war, the pralines were two for a sou.]</p> -</div> - -<p>My next call I have been urged to make by -our doctors. Here in a ramshackle ell, facing -a court deep in mire, live the poorest family -in the village, comprising Mme. Laure Tabary, -her six children, and a black and bearded -goat. The goat inhabits a rabbit hutch from<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_81"></a>[81]</span> -which her tether allows her the freedom of the -narrow brick path. From the sidelong gleam -in her eyes, one always expects an attack in the -flank or rear. But Madame, her mistress, regards -her as a pet; perhaps because she cannot -regard her in any other favourable light,—since -<i>la petite</i> gives no milk. Once past the -goat, the door is quickly gained. Two rooms -has Mme. Tabary, and a loft and a shed. She -needs them! From forlorn Olga to forlorn -Andréa, the girls of the family descend in -graduated wrappings of rags. “O, Mme. -Tabary,” exclaimed the school teacher, with -whom I discussed the all too evident need of -soap, and of clothing, “she is a very worthy -woman, but she is always poor.” Always poor, -always ailing, yet always humorous, were the -Laure Tabarys. Did the unfortunate woman -try to boil her washing, the stove must needs -break, and the cauldron full of scalding water -descend upon Madeleine. No sooner were her -wounds dressed than Andréa developed a -fever. It would be interesting to know how<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_82"></a>[82]</span> -many litres of gasoline were consumed by us -in the carrying of Mme. Tabary’s children to -and from hospitals located ten and twenty -miles away. One would have thought the distracted -mother might welcome these deportations. -But, naturally enough, she distrusted -them, and having faithfully promised to give -up the baby to our care on a certain day, left -instead for Ham. Of how she was won over,—that -is a tale which belongs to the annals of -the medical department rather than to me. But -I have heard rumours of hair ribbons and dolls -and candy and fairy stories and I know not -what of similar remedies which Hippocrates -and Galen never mentioned. Judge, then, -whether our doctors were bugbears or no -among the children of our villages!</p> - -<p>But the ell housed another family besides -the Tabarys. Across the hall lodged the -Moroys; M. Edouard, an old man of eighty-four, -his niece and nephew and his granddaughter, -Mlle. Suzanne. All lived in the one -room. It was a room with only three corners<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_83"></a>[83]</span> -as well, because in the fourth the floor rose in -an arch which indicated the cellar-way. In -this room were three beds, a table, a stove, -three chairs and a broken sewing machine. Yet -I never saw the room in disorder, nor heard -any requests from the family beyond that of a -little sugar for Grandpère, and, if possible, another -bed, so that Charles might have a place -to sleep. Meantime, Charles slept upon the -floor. In this room were two windows. The -one to the south interested me by chance, because -the panes looked so clear. I stepped -over and put out my hand. It went straight -through the framework; there was no glass. -“But you must be cold!” I exclaimed, knowing -well the common fear of <i>courants d’air</i>. -Besides, it was late October, and the nights -were already frosty. “Yes, a little,” Mlle. -Suzanne admitted in a matter of fact way. -“Yes,” agreed her aunt, in a more positive tone. -“And besides, Mademoiselle, our stove is too -small, as you see. In fact, it is not ours, but -belongs to Mme. Tabary. But she has so large<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_84"></a>[84]</span> -a family, we made an exchange. Perhaps -when you distribute stoves——” I promise to -remember, wondering the while if we in like -circumstances would share our last crusts with -like generosity. For the window, so scarce was -glass, oiled linen was the best that could be -done, a pity considering that it excluded the -sun with the cold.</p> - -<p>Mlle. Suzanne, with the exception of Germaine -Tabary and Lydie Cerf, is the only -young woman in Canizy. She had been taken -captive by the Germans, but was allowed to -return. Her family, however, met an unknown -fate; father and brother, they were -<i>avec les Boches</i>. A curious circumstance in -this connection was that Suzanne, having been -an independent worker, received no pension -for her loss. She, too, seemed a Good Samaritan -to her neighbours—lame Mme. Juliette -depends on Suzanne to bring her her pitcher -of milk; Mme. Musqua, sick and irresponsible, -has only to send over her children to Mlle. -Suzanne to be cared for,—what matter two<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_85"></a>[85]</span> -more or less in the crowded room? I added -my quota to her labours by asking her to take -charge of washing rags, and started her in with -those of her next-door neighbour, Mme. Tabary. -For the purpose, I have given her a -cylindrical boiler, standing three feet high. -This, when not in use, is placed over by the -cellar-way. On washing days, it is set on an -open fire in the court, where Grandpère feeds -it with laboriously chopped twigs. Meantime, -back of the house, patches of colour and -of flapping white begin to adorn the wire fence. -Suzanne also sews, by hand and, now that its -frame is mended by I know not how many -screws in the warped wood, by machine. We -give out the sewing, and she earns by it perhaps -three francs a week.</p> - -<p>Beyond the Moroys, lives Mme. Thuillard, -Charles, as the neighbours call her to distinguish -her from the Thuillards, O. I have seldom -found this energetic lady at home, but I -often see her, and sometimes hear her, as she -passes with firm step down the street to work<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_86"></a>[86]</span> -in her garden. When not playing, her ten-year-old -granddaughter Orélie follows in her -wake. This leaves in the unlighted recesses -of the barn, her husband, M. Charles. He -seems an apologetic and conciliatory soul, -with whom I discuss domestic needs, such as a -window, a lamp, and sheets for the beds. He -will tell his wife what I say and report to-morrow -when he comes for the milk. It is in his -entrance-way, so to speak, that I first noticed -a pile of willow-withed market baskets. “O, -yes,” he said, “I had hundreds of such, but the -Boches took them.” “Are they then made -hereabouts?” “Before the war; but now no -one is left who understands the trade.” The -next day I am likely to get a report, and a -sharp one, from Madame, his wife. “Sheets,” -she queries, “what sort of sheets? Are they -linen sheets? Blankets. Are they wool? Are -they white? Look you, before the war, I had -five dozen linen sheets and plenty of blankets -and down quilts of the finest quality. Keep -your gifts about which you make so much talk!<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_87"></a>[87]</span> -I will have none of them, none of them at all!”</p> - -<p>I have sometimes wondered if Madame were -related to the contrary-minded but equally independent -wife of the <i>garde champêtre</i> who -distributes—or not—at her pleasure, the communal -supply of bread. “I hear,” she began -one day, as I waited for change for a hundred -franc note—change which came in gold, by the -way, as well as in silver—“I hear that you are -to make a distribution of gifts. Do not forget -me! I will receive anything, but you understand, -not for payment; only as a present. -Behold,” this with a playful slap on the shoulder, -“any one will tell you that I have a tongue. -<i>O, là, là, là!</i>”</p> - -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_88"></a>[88]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_VII">CHAPTER VII<br /> -<span class="smaller">NOUS SOMMES DIX</span></h2> - -</div> - -<p>It was at Christmas time that we came most -to realise the broken family circles in all -our villages. There was not one household -which did not have some hostage <i>avec les -Boches</i>. Of the pitiful remnant, the old men—there -were no young ones—were to me the -most appealing. I shall never forget the fête -in the hill village of Douilly, well up to the -front, a village completely destroyed, whose -inhabitants were living in cellars. On the brow -of the hill, facing the sunset, stood the white -stone church. It had been used by the Germans -as a barracks, and had not been reconsecrated, -so that we were given permission to -hold our party there. Cold, bare, yet beautiful -with the sunlight falling in rainbow colours -on the groined arches, was the old church.<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_89"></a>[89]</span> -At the bases of the pillars, we deposited our -sacks of presents; most of them for the children, -but one each for the women and the men. -The latter were in my charge. Only three -came hobbling up from the outskirts of the -crowd. “But is this all?” I asked, as they chose -the size of package which seemed to each most -desirable. “Are there no other men in the -village?” The old men consulted together. -“There is Grandpère Cordon,” suggested one, -“and Jean, who has rheumatism,” “and blind -Pierre——” “<i>Nous sommes dix</i>,” came the -answer, finally. “Shall we take the presents -to the rest?”</p> - -<p>“<i>Nous sommes dix!</i>” It was the answer -which might have been made in Canizy. According -to the number of inhabitants, it might -represent the proportion of the male population -left anywhere in the <i>région dévastée</i>. Not -one was able-bodied. In Canizy there were, -for example, the lame mayor of whom I have -spoken; his four contemporaries, verging on -sixty, one a heavy drinker, another one-armed,<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_90"></a>[90]</span> -a third in need of an operation, a fourth suffering -from heart disease. Even the latter had -been taken away, but as he said, when the German -doctor put down his ear to listen, he threw -up his hands, and gave the officers a good piece -of his mind for having imported a useless consumer -of food. So he was encouraged to make -his way back.</p> - -<p>Of an older generation are two of the servitors -of the Château, the one the feeble gardener, -the other the bedridden husband of the -laundress, who has not worked for many years. -There is M. Tabary also, the grandfather of -Germaine, who has his own peculiar sorrow in -his granddaughter’s visible disgrace. A Boche -baby will never outlive its stigma while the -memory of the Great War remains. M. Tabary -is sick and frail. It was he who, persuaded -at last to come to the Dispensary, -paused in going out to doff his old cap with a -courtly bow and to address the doctors with a -“<i>Merci, mes demoiselles, merci; je suis content</i>.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_91"></a>[91]</span></p> - -<p>It was a fortunate circumstance, however,—for -I cannot think it intentional on the part -of the Germans—that all of these old men, -more or less in need of care, had either wives -or other feminine relatives to give it to them. -Not so circumstanced was M. Augustin. -Smooth-shaven save for a white fringe of -beard, his fresh-coloured but anxious face -appeared one day at the Château. Thither -he had gone to deliver a load of hay. But the -particular lady who had contracted to buy it -being unexpectedly absent, M. Augustin was -disturbed. His language gave one an impression -of vigour which was borne out by subsequent -acquaintance. On the saint’s day of the -village, he shared honours with young Lydie -in being the life of the party, by contributing a -song and a quaint peasants’ dance. He was -to be met with frequently along the roads, with -blue-visored cap, brown corduroys and stout -cane. As his neighbours said: “<i>M. Augustin, -il voyage toujours partout</i>.” Still, he took -time to do chores, like chopping wood for Mme.<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_92"></a>[92]</span> -Juliette, to hoe in his garden, and to keep his -house. The latter was, strictly speaking, a -shed. It had two windows, however, through -which, in the absence of the owner, I made inventory. -A broken stove was propped against -a home-made chimney; a plank table stood beneath -the window; a chair, and a rough chest -completed the furniture. On the table, instead -of a lamp, was a bottle containing a candle; -beside it were a bowl and a frying pan.</p> - -<p>Chiefly from the neighbours, I learned that -M. Augustin was a widower, that he had been -the village cobbler, and that he preferred to -live alone. Now, we had shoe-making tools -among our stores, so one day I asked him if -he would not like some. “No, Mademoiselle, -I thank you,” he replied. “My eyes are no -longer clear; I cannot see well.” I was more -successful with other suggestions, however. A -little nest of dishes pleased him greatly; a new -stove was installed, and a bed, and what was -perhaps even more greatly appreciated, a -lamp. The evidence of his appreciation took<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_93"></a>[93]</span> -the form of whitewash on walls and ceiling; -the cobwebs vanished from the windows; and -a shelf appeared for the dishes behind the stove. -It may be that M. Augustin will now be more -content with his own fireside, and less drawn -to visit the wineshops of Ham and Nesle.</p> - -<p>I never saw M. Augustin at mass, where the -village transformed itself on occasion from -weekday caps and kerchiefs and sabots to its -conventional and unbecoming best. Therefore -I must needs infer that his face was shaven -daily, and his suit always clean, for his own satisfaction. -The moral stamina shown by this is -noteworthy, and characteristic of the peasantry -of our district. We ourselves in our living -conditions found cleanliness next to godliness -in this respect at least, in that it was hard -to attain. But <i>cui bono</i> seemed never to have -disturbed the habits of M. Augustin.</p> - -<p>Another sprightly old gentleman was M. -Touret. His quarters were more spacious -than those of his neighbour, for he lived in a -barn. Overhead, hay piled from eaves to roof-tree<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_94"></a>[94]</span> -helped to keep out the cold, and there was -one window. As he himself said when asked -if he wanted anything: “What would you? -I am warm; I have a chair, a stove and a bed. -If the young people were here—perhaps. But -we who are old, we shall not live long, we have -enough.” M. Touret, however, did not live -alone. The mother of his son’s wife had taken -pity on him after the Germans deported his two -sons and their families, and had invited him -to share her barn. There were three housed -there altogether, for with them lived her son. -M. Touret was oftenest found on a bench between -the window and the stove, poring -through his spectacles over the daily paper. -Mme. Clara was usually busy with some -savoury cooking, and M. Albert on the occasion -of my first visit held the centre of the -floor with saw-horse and axe. A chair was offered -at once, and we all sat down to talk. M. -Touret, however, kept glancing at his paper, -or regarded us over the rims of his spectacles. -Presently he broke in: “As for you, I do not<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_95"></a>[95]</span> -know what you may be, but as for me, I am a -Christian.” In the midst of a conversation -about fodder and furniture, the effect was arresting, -until one realised from his point of -view the strangeness of our position. What, -he must have queried, are these young American -women doing here? We were certainly -different from the French ladies of family who -nursed the soldiers, or took over whole communities -to house and feed. French women -would never have walked as we did, muddy-shoed -and knapsacked, alone over the fields. -They might have been more understanding, -at least their ways would have been more conventional -and better understood.</p> - -<p>In fact, on another occasion M. Touret -asked me why I had come to France. “Monsieur, -my father was a soldier; I cannot fight, -but in this war I, too, want to help.” “Your -father was a soldier? Ah yes, that would be in -the Civil War, in ’64—I remember it well. -And what rank did he hold? Was he a general?” -“But no, Monsieur; only a common<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_96"></a>[96]</span> -soldier.” “A common soldier?” He thought -a moment. “But not like ours, because in -America you are not a military nation, and depend -on volunteers.” My face must have expressed -astonishment. “Look you, Mademoiselle; -before the war it was my habit to read. -I read every year as many as two hundred -volumes. I had a large library in a cabinet. -The Germans burned my books.” He rose, -picked up something from a bench behind the -stove and handed it to me. It proved to be a -charred and mildewed copy of a history; the -history of England in the time of Henry the -Eighth. Mutilated as it was, the pages -showed a beautiful clear type and exquisite -engravings. It was a good example of the -printing of Abbeville, famous for its engravers -and binders since the days of its first printing -press in 1484.</p> - -<p>“Would you not like some books, then?” I -ventured.</p> - -<p>“What sort of books? Not magazines.” He -looked contemptuously at one that I had in<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_97"></a>[97]</span> -my hand. “Me, I like stories. See what I -bought yesterday.” He brought from a chest -of drawers a gaudy paper volume entitled “La -Morte d’Amour.”</p> - -<p>Knowing that our library contained no such -light literature, I continued, “Would you perhaps -like Dumas?”</p> - -<p>“Dumas? ‘The Three Musketeers’?” His -wrinkled face lighted. “I know them. Another -book I liked the Germans loaned me when -they were here. It was by an Englishman—B-u-l-w-e-a-r—‘The -Last Days of Pompeii’—a -very interesting book.”</p> - -<p>“Tell me,” he went on a little later, “some -one has said that you have no twilight in North -America. Is it true?”</p> - -<p>It seeming in his mind to be a reflection upon -our country, I tried my best to dissipate this -impression by citing the great size of the -United States, and its varying climatic conditions. -But I could not truthfully say that we -had the lingering orange sunsets and afterglows -of pink and mauve and applegreen<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_98"></a>[98]</span> -which I knew were in his mind, and with which -I too became familiar on the plain of Picardy.</p> - -<p>The last time I saw M. Touret was on a -white and wintry morning when I had risen -even earlier than the Villagers or M. the chaplain, -to attend the Village mass. In a golden-brown -corduroy which might have been the -twin of M. Augustin’s, I spied M. Touret on -the path ahead of me, homeward bound after -the service. I ran to catch up.</p> - -<p>“Good morning, Monsieur, and how are -you?”</p> - -<p>“<i>O, doucement, doucement</i>,” he answered. -“And you?”</p> - -<p>“The books, did you like them?” I inquired, -for his Christmas present had consisted of -three.</p> - -<p>“O, well enough; but one was not true. It -was called ‘Contes de la Lune.’ I did not read -it. Another (this in reference to Tourguenieff) -was by a Russian; and you know well, in -France we do not love Russia, now. A Russian<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_99"></a>[99]</span> -indeed! The third,—well Jules Verne is -always interesting. <i>Ça ira.</i>”</p> - -<p>Somewhat discouraged, I recalled what -Mme. Clara had told me once in an effort to -soften the old man’s brusqueness. “He is old; -he is full of crotchets, you understand.” But -Madame herself appeared to me to be quite as -old, though I had the wit not to compliment -her politeness thus maladroitly. Perhaps it -was because of this honesty, entirely unaffected, -that of all the households in my village, -I enjoyed most hers and M. Touret’s. There -one found a freeborn fellowship, which, like -the mellow twilight, belongs to Picardy. It -is a <i>timbre</i> resonant in the older generation; -that generation which endured the invasion of -1870, as well as the invasion of 1914. It is a -survival of many wars, of many hardships, a -spirit akin to that fortitude which has made our -own country,—a common language that we, -who came from the ends of the earth, could -understand.</p> - -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_100"></a>[100]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_VIII">CHAPTER VIII<br /> -<span class="smaller">UNE DISTRIBUTION DE DONS</span></h2> - -</div> - -<p>At length, the survey of Canizy was completed: -its crooked streets traced on a -map, its houses numbered, and the pre-war -and the post-war status of each of its families -noted thereon. But long before these facts -had been collected, the articles found to be -most necessary had been bought for the homes. -It only remained to wait their arrival. Even -the number of sheets and blankets in each -household was listed, and against them, the -number to be given out. The honesty and -unselfishness of most of the villagers in setting -down their needs, was a constant joy. There -was Mme. Regina, for instance, who had five -pairs of stout linen sheets and four soldiers’ -blankets on two Boche beds. I proposed a -new bed for the baby, and covers to go with<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_101"></a>[101]</span> -it. Mme. Regina acquiesced at first, but later -drew me aside: “I can get along,” she said, -“I know you have not enough to go around,—and -when one is so poorly lodged anyway, it -does not matter. When I get my <i>baraque</i>, -then I will come to you.”</p> - -<p>There was good sense in Mme. Regina’s decision. -The housing rested not with us, but -with the Government, through the mayor of -the commune. Long delay ensued in Canizy, -when ten families had applied, and only three -<i>baraques</i> had been set up. Of these, two were -for the domestics of M. Lanne. Mme. -Picard and the Mayor himself were among -the waiting; nor could one decide which was -the more miserably off. Even Mme. Picard’s -vegetables were comfortably bedded compared -with her children, in her dark and windy barn, -and as for M. le Maire, a water-spout built -within his hut carried the rain from his bed. -But at last one day, loads of <i>baraques</i> began -to arrive, and red-fezzed Moroccans, to erect -them. There were five shacks in all, and four,<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_102"></a>[102]</span> -it transpired, were for Mme. Picard and M. -Thuillard. I could understand that Mme. -Picard had need of her two apartments, but -the Mayor,—well, he wished to reopen his -store. And his wife, all smiles at their prospective -installation, offered me myself a guest -room so that I could live in my village at last. -But this offer was tendered before the distribution -of gifts.</p> - -<p>It was Dave, or strictly speaking, the Red -Cross, which made possible an early allotment -of blankets and sheets in Canizy. Though -they had been overturned in the mud, even -Mme. la Maire did not complain of their condition. -“It matters nothing; they can be -washed,” she said. On the day we had chosen, -word was passed to each family that a distribution -would be made at Mme. Lefèvre’s at -four that afternoon. There was no need of a -<i>garde champêtre</i> such as they had in Esmery-Hallon -to cry the news. The children flew -with it; the mothers halted at the corners to -talk about it; and at four o’clock, when the<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_103"></a>[103]</span> -jitney drove in with its wonderful cargo, a -line like a bread-line had formed in front of -the door. Mme. Lefèvre herself came out to -help us; the older boys lent a hand, and within -five minutes, piles of single blankets and -double blankets, and single sheets and double -sheets, were ready to be given out. Then a -window was opened and the names were called. -“Mme. Carlier: 6 blankets; 3 single sheets; 3 -double sheets.” “Mme. Lecart: 3 double -sheets, 2 blankets.” So ran the list. One after -another the mothers stepped forward, received -their quota and went away. There were order, -good nature, and no unkind comment. Even -afterwards, there seemed to be little dissatisfaction. -The distribution had been made, as -every one knew, on the basis of actual need, -and the result was accepted as just. If Mme. -Lefèvre had only one blanket, that was because -she had plenty of linen sheets, much better -than the cotton ones we gave, a woollen -blanket, and a warm red eiderdown quilt. -Only the mayor’s wife and that very human<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_104"></a>[104]</span> -lady, Mme. Charles Thuillard, of whom I have -before spoken, raised protesting voices,—but -such was their bent.</p> - -<p>Our first distribution having gone so well, -and we being still received as friends, we proceeded -to the second, which consisted of cast-iron -beds and stoves. The single beds we had -been fortunate enough to buy ourselves; but -the double beds and the stoves came from M. -le Sous-Préfet and were signed for by the -recipients as a part of their <i>indemnité de -guerre</i>. Heavy loads these articles made, -and Dave and his truck were requisitioned for -the day. We first had to secure the double -beds, which were stored, together with other -civilian supplies, at the Moroccan camp at -Nesle. To Nesle, then, we tore, coasting the -long hills, and chugging up the inclines as if -the Germans themselves were in pursuit. Arrived -at the camp, we found that we had not -made the proper entry, and must reverse, -disentangle ourselves from the railroad embankment, -plough through mud to the axles,<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_105"></a>[105]</span> -and back up to the warehouse at the other end -of the yard. All this Dave did. Bedsteads, -mattresses and bolsters were then piled aboard. -Dave and one of my comrades precariously -balanced on the front seat, and I high on the -load, expecting a landslide every minute, we -steamed away for Canizy. A house to house -visitation with a truck down its narrow and -uneven streets was also an adventure, and we -were thankful enough when the day ended -with only minor injuries, and every family that -needed them supplied with beds. Stoves were -simpler, for the reason that they were smaller. -Wardrobes, buffets, chairs and tables would -have followed, could we have secured them. -But these, even when I left, had not yet been -crossed off the village lists.</p> - -<p>Failing to obtain furniture, we distributed -clothing, for by this time the winter was well -upon us. Individual families had been taken -care of before as the need arose. In order -not to pauperize, or hurt the genuine self-respect -of the people, I tried a plan known by<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_106"></a>[106]</span> -them as “an arrangement,” whereby I took -vegetables, or rags, in exchange. This system -of barter was also one of coöperation with our -travelling store, which supplied the wants of -families able—and glad—to buy. The coming -of the store made a red-letter day, like a market-day, -in the village. Even the soldiers gathered -around, commenting humorously on the -bargains, and urging the ladies to buy. They -asked on their own part for mufflers or sabots -or cigarettes. Once a small tradesman, transformed -by his uniform in appearance but not -in nature, wondered audibly how long we -thought we could remain in business and lose -in each purchase from a third to a half of its -value. Our storekeeper laughed. “<i>Toujours</i>, -M. Soldat,” she answered, and forthwith beguiled -a hesitant grandmother into buying -an entire bar of laundry soap at four francs -instead of twelve.</p> - -<p>But our “arrangements” did not lack humour -or interest. There was Mme. Laure, for -example, who was purposely absent when we<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_107"></a>[107]</span> -brought the new clothing for her family, and -undressed and bathed it and filled the boiler in -turn with what we had taken off; and Mme. -Gense-Tabary who conspired with her husband -to get vegetables in Ham and resell to us at -a higher price in payment for her dozens of -new garments, and Mme. Payell who, hearing -a rumour that We were about to outfit her -babies, bought extra buttons to have them -ready to sew on. There was also conscientious -Mme. Regina, with her box of clean rags all -ready for the new suit We gave fifteen-year-old -Raymond.</p> - -<p>The purpose of the rag industry was twofold: -to clear the cluttered interiors, and with -the rags themselves to make rag rugs. After -Mlle. Suzanne’s washing, the clean pieces went -to a class of three young girls, who met once a -week, divided the stock, and sewed and braided -the strands. To them went also the snippings -of the hundreds of garments we cut and let -out through the district to be sewed. A pretty -picture my girls made of a Tuesday afternoon<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_108"></a>[108]</span> -around the big table in Mme. Noulin’s store; -Elmire fair and delicate as a lily, Albertine -black-haired and black-eyed, and quick, graceful, -thirteen-year-old Cécile. Fingers and -tongues were busy. Mme. Noulin herself -bustled in and out, and finally served us -with the inevitable coffee. This ceremony -concluded the lesson. But the yards of -braiding grew week by week,—though not -without some small heart-burning and rivalry. -“Cécile,” Elmire complained, “takes all the -longer pieces and gives me only the scraps. -Perhaps Mademoiselle would speak to her.” -But it was the Government which unintentionally -interfered most with my rags. I had -bespoken the mayor’s hut for our headquarters -as soon as he was ready to move out. Only a -few feet from the best well, where we planned -to install our new pump and our Village <i>chaudière</i>, -it was to be a centre of neighbourhood -industry. But the mayor still waits on opportunity -and the rags still wait in sacks.</p> - -<p>As winter advanced, it became obvious, even<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_109"></a>[109]</span> -at mass, that Canizy went cold. The children’s -noses and mittenless hands were red. True, -there was Mme. Gabrielle, who came in furs -and smart black hats; and several other ladies -sufficiently warm if rather rusty and old-fashioned. -But one noted among the children -an absolute lack of the capes which are the -characteristic dress of French school children. -Throats wrapped in mufflers, hands thrust -into pockets or skirts,—this was their method -of keeping warm. The older boys especially -looked pinched in trousers which had become -too short, and tightly buttoned, threadbare -coats. One day, when a biting wind and a -powdery snow impressed their discomfort upon -me, I made a raid on our store-room, with the -entire permission of my colleague in charge. -Woollen shirts, stockings, caps, overcoats -and suits, whatever article of warmth I could -find, I gathered up. The roads were too -drifted for the truck, or for walking, but I -had asked for the horse and wagon. Carlos, -our soldier, helped me pack my plunder, and<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_110"></a>[110]</span> -conveyed me on my way. But a difficult way -it proved to be, and it was not until nearly -twilight that we drew up at Mme. Lefèvre’s -door, too late to distribute that night. I left -the warm clothing in her care, asking her at the -same time to make me a list of those to whom -she thought it ought to go, and promising to -return the following day. But Mme. Lefèvre’s -enthusiasm exceeded her instructions. When I -came, she met me with a triumphant smile. “I -knew, Mademoiselle, that it would please you -were the clothes on the backs of the poor children. -Voilà, I have given the clothing according -to the list.” A cramped and illiterate list -it was she handed me, devoid of capitals, but -it accounted for every article, even to a boy’s -coat given to Lydie Cerf. “Lydie?” I queried -mentally, yet not for the world would I have -questioned or criticised good Mme. Lefèvre. -Lydie herself I did question. “But, yes, -Mademoiselle,” she replied, “I am keeping the -coat for Papa. He is with the Boches. It will -be ready for him when he returns.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_111"></a>[111]</span></p> - -<p>When they return! It was a phrase on every -lip. “If the children were here, it would be -different.” “No, I do not wish to touch my -indemnity. I and my wife, we are saving it -for the boys when they come home.” “Mademoiselle, -I need another bed.” “But you have -two.” “Yes, but there is my mother, who may -return any day.” So ran the undercurrent of -longing in every family, mutilated as were the -apple trees girdled in the orchards, uprooted, -like them, and left for dead.</p> - -<p>For my next distribution, which was to be -a more important one, I went to Mme. Gabrielle. -“Madame,” said I, “it is true, is it not, -that the parents of most of the children have -enough money to buy capes?” “Yes,” she admitted. -“But it is not true that they will not -do so?” “Yes; there are so many things to -buy when one has lost so much. We fear to -spend the money.” “Very well. Will you -make me out a list for all the world?” The -list was made; a list so orderly that it could be -used as a shopping guide. Coats for the women<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_112"></a>[112]</span> -and capes for the children were bought, -including a coat for Lydie Cerf. They were -brought down by our own truck, which had -made a special trip to Amiens in the bitterest -weather, and deposited with Mme. Gabrielle. -“Madame,” I said again as we brought the -heaped armfuls in, “will you not make this distribution -yourself?” “But it is very difficult,” -she remonstrated, “and all the world will say -that I am partial.” “I will tell all the world -that the distribution is mine,” I urged. “You -can see yourself that we are very busy,—and -you know the size for each child.” Reluctant -though she was, Mme. Gabrielle’s kind heart -could not refuse. On a Sunday not long after, -a strange yet strangely familiar audience sat -in the little church, the women in coats all of -one pattern, “but of different colours, the children -in smart blue hooded capes. No one -looked self-conscious, or thanked us. The distribution, -like the snow, had fallen on the just -and on the unjust; it was a providence for -which one thanked God.</p> - -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_113"></a>[113]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_IX">CHAPTER IX<br /> -<span class="smaller">EN PERMISSION</span></h2> - -</div> - -<p>At noon time, on dispensary days, I sometimes -lunched with the doctors in Mme. -Lefèvre’s kitchen. It was a heterogeneous -spot, with two beds (one being stored for a -niece), two cats, and a few neighbours always -sitting near the fire. Usually the neighbours -were waiting for <i>la factrice</i>. A tap at the -window, and Madame ran to open it, and received -a handful of letters which the postmistress -brought each day by bicycle from Nesle. -Were it cold, she herself, a capable, pleasant-faced -woman, came in to join the group for a -moment, threw back her long cape, and -warmed her numb hands. Meantime spectacles -were brought out and the envelopes -scanned. It was not alone of the return of the -refugees that the village lived in hope. They -might come unannounced, but the soldiers, <i>en -permission</i>,—that was different. Any day Albert -or Henri might write that he was coming -home!</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_114"></a>[114]</span></p> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 450px;" id="illus10"> -<img src="images/illus10.jpg" width="450" height="700" alt="" /> -<p class="caption"><i>C’est un coup de fourreau de sabre.</i></p> -<p class="caption">[A cut of a sword-scabbard.]</p> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_115"></a>[115]</span></p> - -<p>And when they came! It was in Mme. -Lefèvre’s kitchen again that I had the pleasure -of seeing the greeting given to a soldier in -faded blue. A bronzed and bearded man he -was, the father of a family. But the family -alas! the wife and the children, were <i>avec les -Boches</i>. M. Huillard seemed to have returned -therefore, unheralded. As he opened the door, -the neighbours rose with exclamations; the men -grasping his hands, the women presenting one -cheek and then the other for a kiss. Questions -followed: Where had he been stationed? -At Verdun, and, more lately, at St. Quentin. -“At St. Quentin? Have you seen Narcisse, -then?” Mme. Carpentier inquired eagerly. -“Yes, your husband was well. I have a letter.” -And M. Huillard fumbled in his pockets and -brought out a thumbed envelope with the<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_116"></a>[116]</span> -cramped address: Mme. Regina Carpentier, -Canizy, Somme.</p> - -<p>An account of the recent bombardment is -curtailed by M. Huillard’s own desire for information. -This is his first visit to the village -since his leave-taking during the tragic mobilisation -of 1914. He has known, of course, of -the German occupation; he has heard the terrible -news of the deportation of wife and -children. He has seen other devastated villages. -But to-day, for the first time, he looks -upon the ruins of his own home. I saw him -standing alone that afternoon before the sagging -door, which bore the staring military -number 25, and beside it, chalked inscriptions -in German and in English jostling each -other: <i>Gott mit uns.</i> <i>Hot ᛭ buns.</i> Within, -thistles grew about the hearth. M. Huillard -uttered no sound, and shed no tears, but his -face, as he turned away, was set in a white -hatred, and his right hand rose to heaven in -an unspoken vow.</p> - -<p>No soldier on his ten days’ leave remained<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_117"></a>[117]</span> -idle. Mme. Cordier’s handsome son, looking -even more handsome in the uniform of an Alpine -<i>chasseur</i>, was no exception. In fact, when -I first saw him, the uniform, including his -decoration, was covered by a mason’s white -blouse. Up on a ladder, he was white-washing -the walls of the stable in which his family then -lived. A huge brick manger in a dark corner -was startingly brought out by his brush. It -served as a kitchen table, and was laughingly -referred to as one of the conveniences of the -<i>ménage</i>. In another home, I found one day a -soldier-brother knocking up a cupboard out of -rough planks. Cheerful was the sound of his -vigorous hammer strokes, and cheerful the -sight of a young and merry face among the -ruins. It mattered not whether he had a bed -to sleep in—one of the most difficult requests -we had to refuse was that of a bed to a soldier—the -younger <i>poilu en permission</i> was always -gay. If his mother worked, he helped her; and -day after day through the Christmas holidays -one of these boys walked to the Château each<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_118"></a>[118]</span> -morning to help Mme. Topin chop our wood. -I happened in upon her on the eve of his departure. -Her tiny cabin was full of an odour -most appetising after my long day’s walk. -Over a glowing fire, she was turning waffles, -“to put in his knapsack,” she explained. But -he had one the less for my having called; and -over it his mother sprinkled half of the last -teacupful of sugar she possessed.</p> - -<p>Mme. Topin had another son also serving -with the colours, who came home quite often -to see his wife, because he was making a slow -recovery from gas-injured lungs. She, during -his absence, taught in the village school, while -her old mother kept house and took care of -three-year-old Guy. M. Topin it was who -showed me around his ruined yard one day, -pointing out the place of the five-room cottage, -and telling me the colours of the roses whose -blackened stalks still remained against the -walls. “This was white and very fragrant; -that yellow. I planted it on Guy’s birthday. -Here we had a bed of mignonette. Take care,<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_119"></a>[119]</span> -Guy—pardon, Mademoiselle.” And he -stooped to wrench away from the child’s -fingers a long cartridge picked up in the -débris. “A German bullet,” he explained, -handing it to me. “There are hundreds of -them about.”</p> - -<p>As I have said, the soldier <i>en permission</i> -expected to work. Yet I know of one who was -assigned to more of a-task than he relished. -Him, hapless being, I first encountered down -by the old Château at Canizy, hunting rabbits -for a stew. But as I remembered the dimensions -of his mother’s <i>baraque</i>, it seemed to me -that self-interest might prompt him to leave -his hunting to assist me for a time. Besides -his grandmother, his mother, a brother and a -sister, there was an aunt who had arrived to -lodge with the family,—a <i>réfugiée</i> from near -Péronne. Utterly destitute and unhappy was -the aunt. The fact that her husband and her -daughter were still in the slavery from which -she had escaped, would be enough to sadden -any one, but she whispered to me that her sister<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_120"></a>[120]</span> -did not make her welcome. At the time, we -were much in need of a domestic at our camp. -“Would you like to come and work for us, -perhaps,” I suggested. “We have no lodging, -but I will find you a shelter in Hombleux from -which you can walk over with Madame our -cook.” Rash promise, to which I added a -complete outfit of furniture and two francs a -day. The offer was accepted.</p> - -<p>From pillar to post, I then went to Hombleux. -A regiment <i>en repos</i> had been quartered -there since I had made arrangements -with the baker’s wife for a room in her -tidy loft. Regiments succeeded one another -rapidly, and during their sojourns there was -literally no lodging to be had. I was finally -directed to a corner in the outbuilding of a -former convent school which was considered -habitable. My soldier I pressed into service to -assist its quondam tenant, who had moved out -because it was so cold, in removing the vegetables, -wood and furniture she still had stored -there. He looked on while a resourceful young<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_121"></a>[121]</span> -girl pasted oiled paper on the iron window -frame; he went to the woods and chopped and -hauled a tree for fuel; he brought over at the -same time a plank with which to mend the door. -This took a day, which I, meantime, spent in -Ham. There I bought a bed, mattress and -bedding, a stove, a pipe, an elbow for the same, -a chair, a table, a metal wash basin and a -pitcher, a saucepan, a little set of dishes, a -lamp, a brush and a broom. It is surprising -how many things are necessary for even a -primitive existence. Two days more were -consumed in setting these few articles in place, -and all the neighbours helped.</p> - -<p>The snow had come, meantime, and the -soldier returned to rabbit hunting. As he remarked -on pointing out the little roads beaten -by them through the weeds, “They look much -better <i>en casserole</i>.” It remained for our own -soldier at the château to bring our domestic to -her new home. One frosty morning, Tambour -and the cart awaited me after breakfast, and I -set forth. Old Tambour appeared none too<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_122"></a>[122]</span> -steady on the trot to which I urged him. “<i>Ça -glisse</i>,” explained Carlos, and we relapsed into -a walk. In fact, all the way to Canizy we -walked, the shrewd wind biting nose and ears -and coursing under the blankets on the high -seat. Carlos got out, winding the lines about -the whipstock. The horse floundered through -drifts, and he, adjusting his cap to the veering -gusts, trudged at his head. At length, we -debouched upon the direct road to the village. -But, barring our way was a machine-gun -squad. Already the red signals had been -posted and the route was <i>défendu</i>. Even as we -halted, came volleys like staccato hail. On -other occasions, with honking horn, we have -run this gauntlet, the sentries halting the fire -for us to pass. But to-day, I judged it safer -to turn down into a hollow, and skirt the action. -Thus delayed, it was near noon when -we turned into the gate of the Château at -Canizy.</p> - -<p>We were expected, however; coffee was hot -upon the stove, and the soldier <i>en permission</i><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_123"></a>[123]</span> -served it, stirring the cups in rotation with the -one family spoon. Madame, our new domestic, -was ready also, with quite a store of bedding -and clothing done up in a sack. Two kisses -apiece, a last admonition, a promise to come -to see her on Sunday, and she climbed up over -the wheel. To her, I imagine, the journey to -Hombleux seemed, like a voyage to a foreign -country. Nor was she welcomed, as I afterwards -learned, by her new neighbours in the -commune. It seems, one should have gone to -the mayor first for permission to install her; -and certainly one should have paid more money -to that inconvenienced lady, the former tenant. -As Madame said, “She talks most unkindly.” -To add to the newcomer’s hardships, the winter -wind ripped the oiled linen from the window, -and her nephew, the soldier, never returned -to mend the door. “<i>Bien mal logée</i>,” having -to walk a mile and a half through the snow at -dawn and after dark, it is not to be wondered -at that she made a final choice of her sister’s -sharp tongue and warm fire, and left our employ.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_124"></a>[124]</span></p> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 450px;" id="illus11"> -<img src="images/illus11.jpg" width="450" height="700" alt="" /> -<p class="caption">—<i>Si j’étais grand....</i></p> -<p class="caption">[If I were grown up!]</p> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_125"></a>[125]</span></p> - -<p>Akin to the soldier <i>en permission</i> is the soldier -<i>en repos</i>. Of the latter class was our Carlos, -who was given us by M. le Sous-Préfet, -together with a horse and two carts. He was -to report during his stay to no one but Mlle. -la Directrice, nor would the authorities take -any direct cognisance of him save in case of her -complaint. A southerner was Carlos, a dapper -man from the Basque provinces. There he -had a wife and two children whom he had not -seen for three years. But he expected a <i>permission</i> -shortly, he said; and that may have -reconciled him to the uncongenial hewing of -wood and drawing of water to which he was -detailed. Day long he drove, or chopped trees, -or cleaned the stable, as advised. His only -diversion appeared to be our milk maid,—a -harmless enough one, I presume; for she told -us proudly and often how she received a letter -from her soldier-husband every day. Nevertheless, -there was visible sadness when one<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_126"></a>[126]</span> -morning Carlos announced that he had been -transferred. And was he then going home? -No, his <i>permission</i> had been taken away; he -was returning to the front. He and Tambour -were to join the artillery. Poor old Tambour, -faithful, plodding; one knew not for which -to feel more compassion, the horse or the -master, as one pictured them dragging into -position the grey seventy-fives! “Good-bye, -then,” I said, “I am sorry.” “O, what would -you,” he replied. “So it goes. But you, you -are leaving also. Some one has told me, for -America—<i>La bonne chance, Mademoiselle</i>.”</p> - -<p>Unlike Carlos only in that they came by -regiments, were the shifting troops taken at -intervals from the trenches for a brief rest in -our more habitable villages. One saw them, a -weary line of blue, marching down the roads, -flanked by stretcher bearers, and followed by a -provision train. Once settled, they stood about -the corners of the streets or in the gaping doorways; -a disconsolate enough addition to the<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_127"></a>[127]</span> -ruins. Or at the camp kitchens, drawn up to -one side, they grouped themselves around huge -cauldrons of soup. Sometimes a more ambitious -company set to work to clean up the -village and built an outdoor bathing tank -which was much in use. On one occasion, a -dashing troop of blue devils gave military concerts -each evening. An incongruous sight was -the band, drawn sprucely up in a desolate -courtyard, and a strangely stirring sound, the -music floating through the empty streets, of -<i>Ce que c’est qu’ un drapeau</i>. Often soldiers -and even officers came over to see us at the -Château and to ask for cigarettes or shoes. If -one had time to listen, they talked for hours -on the war. They were never boastful, these -soldiers; they had a just estimate of the German -strength of organisation; they had no illusions -as to their own personal fate. Each -one expected to die at his post. Patient, -sturdy, intelligent, they gave one confidence -that, however heavy the dawn bombardments,<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_128"></a>[128]</span> -our lines would hold. And if our lines, then -all the lines manned by them with such spiritual -as well as physical courage. The morale of -the <i>poilu</i>, unflinching, will yet win the war.</p> - -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_129"></a>[129]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_X">CHAPTER X<br /> -<span class="smaller">A LA FERME DU CALVAIRE</span></h2> - -</div> - -<p>Midway between Hombleux and Canizy, -at the crossing of the highway, -stood on one side a Calvary, and on the -other a demolished farm house. The lane here -emerged from a hollow, so that both objects -rose distinctly against the sky. About the -Calvary, the poplars were shattered by shell-fire; -back of the farm sloped an orchard, whose -every tree had been lopped. Across the road -and into the fields ran a zig-zag trench, where -could be found even yet blue coats and rusted -helmets; the line of defence evidently for the -highway, against the German advance. A -square declivity, formerly a clay pit, perhaps -an hectare in area, bordered road and trench. -Its banks were green with grass, and in the<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_130"></a>[130]</span> -bottom land was a little orchard. At one side, -half-hidden, was a hut.</p> - -<p>A solitary farm is rare in these rural communities, -where the houses as a rule cluster in -villages. I was undecided at first as to whether -the Farm of the Calvary belonged to Hombleux -or Canizy. But in the yard were two -obvious reasons for calling and inquiring. -Higher than the hut rose a heaped hay stack; -at its base the apples from the orchard had been -gathered in a mound of red and white. I ran -down the path, too steep for walking, and -knocked at the door. It was opened by a -gaunt, dark man of perhaps forty-five. At a -table sat his wife paring apples; and in a -corner, quite unabashed, his daughter, pretty -Colombe, finished lacing her bodice before she -stepped forward to greet me. So small a room, -in any of our villages, I had never been in. -A double bed took up all the space except for -a border of about two feet. The roof was so -low that the man seemed to have acquired a -perpetual stoop.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_131"></a>[131]</span></p> - -<p>“<i>Entrez! entrez!</i>” was the hospitable entreaty; -but not seeing how this might be possible, -I remained on the threshold.</p> - -<p>“I come from the Château,” I began.</p> - -<p>“But yes, you are one of the <i>Dames Américaines</i>, -eh! We have often seen you cross the -fields. Colombe, here, goes to the sewing class -with you.” Colombe smiled a recognition.</p> - -<p>“I should have called before, perhaps; but I -was not aware that a family lived in so small a -place, until I saw the smoke from the chimney -to-day.”</p> - -<p>“Yes, it is small,” admitted the wife.</p> - -<p>“A Boche hut, eh!” agreed her husband. -“Yonder, across the road is my farm. Not -one stone left; all destroyed. I have asked for -a <i>baraque</i>.”</p> - -<p>I measured the interior with my eyes. “You -would not have room for another bed——”</p> - -<p>“If it folded, yes, and we would thank you. -Colombe, she sleeps now on the ground.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_132"></a>[132]</span></p> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 700px;" id="illus12"> -<img src="images/illus12.jpg" width="700" height="450" alt="" /> -<p class="caption">—<i>C’était là, notre maison.</i></p> -<p class="caption">[Our house used to be there!]</p> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_133"></a>[133]</span></p> - -<p>The bed being promised, I inquired as to -fodder. Could I see if it were suitable to feed -our cows? Assuredly; and the brown sides -of the stack were rudely pulled apart that I -might see and smell the sweet hay within. How -much would it weigh and how much would it -cost? A bargain was finally concluded for -eight hundred francs.</p> - -<p>This was the first of many visits to the hut -beside the road. Going or coming, sharp eyes -spied me, and friendly voices called me in. -Once it was for a bumper of sparkling cider.</p> - -<p>“I make it myself, from the apples. But I -have to take them to Mme. Marié’s in Hombleux -because my press the Germans broke. -Ah, the Germans!” he continued. “It is only -a month and a half since I returned, eh!”</p> - -<p>“Were you then taken to Germany?”</p> - -<p>“To Belgium; and I worked, always. And -hungry, always hungry; one has nothing, eh! -to eat.”</p> - -<p>On another occasion I was offered apples; -not the small, sour ones from which cider was -made, but luscious golden globes that adorned -the narrow beams of the hut like a frieze.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_134"></a>[134]</span></p> - -<p>“See,” said Monsieur. “I will put them in -this sack, so that you can carry them the more -easily.”</p> - -<p>But I, thinking of the long miles yet ahead -of me, ventured to suggest that I call on my -return.</p> - -<p>“Very well, only, look you, I shall not be -here. But wait, I will hide them. Behold, in -the <i>chaudière</i>,” and suiting the action to the -word he lifted the cover of the cauldron and -placed them within. “No one will think to -look for them there. Au revoir, until you return.”</p> - -<p>But a rain set in that afternoon; a slant -mist which made Corot-like effects of brown -autumn copses and shut one in from the sometimes -too lonely sweep of the plain. At the -same time, it beat persistently on my face, and -made heavier at every step my woollen uniform. -I did not stop therefore for my apples, -and wondered for a few days what had been -their fate. But not for long.</p> - -<p>One morning at breakfast I was told that<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_135"></a>[135]</span> -I had a caller. Now callers about this time -of a morning had become frequent, ever since -Monsieur le Maire of the commune told his -villagers that they must apply to us rather -than to him for beds and stoves and cupboards. -I visualised the waiting crones of Hombleux -whom in America we should have thrust into -an Old Ladies’ Home. Not so the French -Government, which respected their sentiment -and built for each on her own plot her own -<i>baraque</i>. Knowing well that we had no cupboards, -and no prospect of getting any, I -rose with a sigh. But my face brightened at -the sight of M. Guilleux.</p> - -<p>Over his back hung a sack, nor was it empty.</p> - -<p>“You did not come for your apples,” he -began. “I hope that you wish them, however.” -He unslung the sack, opened it, and disclosed -the golden fruit.</p> - -<p>I thanked him. “But the sack, you wish it -back?”</p> - -<p>“Yes, for look you; it is a little souvenir.” -And at that he showed me certain crosses and<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_136"></a>[136]</span> -darts and letterings in German script which -indicated by number and description the prisoner, -Guillaume Guilleux of the commune of -Hombleux and the farm <i>du Calvaire</i>. “I took -this with me, eh! I would not part with it.”</p> - -<p>“Not to me, Monsieur? To me also it would -be a souvenir, to take to America.”</p> - -<p>“O no, Mademoiselle, never,” and his hands -clutched it involuntarily. “The souvenir and -the memory, they are mine. Both my grandchildren -shall remember also in the years to -come.”</p> - -<p>But the sack was not the only souvenir contained -in the little hut. I spied one day three -tiny teacups depending from nails upon the -wall. They were even smaller than coffee -cups, and delicately flowered.</p> - -<p>“Oh, how pretty,” I exclaimed. “May I -look?”</p> - -<p>Mme. Guilleux took them down with fumbling -fingers and a suddenly altered face. For -the first time, I noticed the sharp indrawn<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_137"></a>[137]</span> -wrinkles about mouth and eyes which tell of -suffering.</p> - -<p>“They belonged to Solange, Colombe’s sister,” -and not able to continue, she hid her face -in her apron. “They were her tea-set,” she -went on in broken sentences. “Her father and -I bought them for her on her thirteenth birthday, -and she always kept them. <i>Mon Dieu</i>, -how lovely she was! Curls, and long lashes, -and skin like apple blossoms, and eyes blue -like those flowers! She was my oldest, and -good as she was pretty. But on the night when -the Germans came, they tore her from my -arms. Why do I live?” she broke into sobs. -“Solange, Solange!”</p> - -<p>She wiped her eyes at length, and regarded -the little cups. “When we returned, I -searched the ruins. I was fortunate, for I -found these. They were all that I did find. -Everything else had been destroyed. Nor did -I save anything, for look you, after the soldiers -seized Solange, I ran hither and thither -distracted, and knew not what to save.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_138"></a>[138]</span></p> - -<p>She rose, took the cups from my hands, and -rehung them on the wall.</p> - -<p>How do they live, I wondered, as I passed -out and over the fields? How do these mothers -keep their reason, who have seen their daughters -taken into a captivity upon which shuts -down a silence deep as death? One understands -the comment of Mme. Charles Thuillard, -who in spite of her sharp tongue has a -most human heart. She was showing me the -picture of her daughter one day; an enlargement -such as all the world makes of its dead. -“Thank God,” she said, “she was happy; she -died before the war.”</p> - -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_139"></a>[139]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_XI">CHAPTER XI<br /> -<span class="smaller">LES PETITS SOLDATS</span></h2> - -</div> - -<div class="poetry-container"> -<div class="poetry"> - <div class="stanza"> - <div class="verse indent0">Ou t’en vas-tu, soldat de France,</div> - <div class="verse indent0">Tout equipé, prêt au combat,</div> - <div class="verse indent0">Ou t’en vas-tu, petit soldat?</div> - <div class="verse indent0"><i>C’est comme il plaît à la Patrie,</i></div> - <div class="verse indent0"><i>Je n’ai qu’ à suivre les tambours.</i></div> - <div class="verse indent0"><i>Gloire au drapeau,</i></div> - <div class="verse indent0"><i>Gloire au drapeau.</i></div> - <div class="verse indent0"><i>J’aimerais bien revoir la France,</i></div> - <div class="verse indent0"><i>Mais bravement mourir est beau.</i></div> - </div> -</div> -</div> - -<p>So, in chorus, sang the children of my village, -day after day, as they marched and -circled about us up and down the streets. A -catching tune; a laughing eye; did they realise -that only twelve miles away on the firing line -their soldiers were dying for the glory of the -flag? No, it was not possible for them, fugitives -though they themselves had been, to live -the horrors of war. As Mme. Gabrielle said:<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_140"></a>[140]</span> -“The children laugh; they do not know that -our world is destroyed, and it is well.”</p> - -<p>Yet it would be hard to find a more manly -group of boys in any land than those of Canizy. -They were soldiers, even in their dress; blue -caps, and blue or khaki blouses and trousers -which their mothers had cut and made from the -cast-off coats of passing troops, English or -French as the case might be. Stockings also -were of a military colour; for as Mme. Marie -Gense explained: “One can find stockings in -the trenches sometimes,—dirty, of course, and -ragged; but they can be washed and raveled, -and the yarn is excellent.” So it came about -that little Robert had one pair of stockings -with blue tops and khaki feet, because, you -understand, there was not enough wool of one -colour to complete them. Above his wooden -sabots, the straight splicing was plainly visible, -if he were ever <i>en repos</i>. But my memory of -Robert is of tireless feet that twinkled almost -as merrily as his eyes. It was no hardship for -him to walk the eight miles back and forth to<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_141"></a>[141]</span> -the Château of a morning for his quart can of -milk. Mud, rain, snow, it was all one to him. -By the hand, he often brought a younger -cousin, Albert, aged six. Chubby-faced and -sturdy of leg was Albert, clad in a diminutive -khaki suit, and a brown visored cap which -failed to blight his red cheeks. Robert, being -brave and unconscious, whistled the merry call -he had been taught, “Bob White, Bob White!” -and smiled at all the world. But Albert, -being shy, buried his small nose between cap -and muffler, hung his head, and if pressed too -far by unsought civilities, presented his back.</p> - -<p>It would be small wonder if all the children -of Canizy had been shy. With their elders -they were virtual prisoners during the German -occupation. They had no incentive to -gather in groups, no church and no school. -Rather, they were taught to slip in and out in -silence lest they attract sinister attention. -One of our little soldiers to the end of his life -will carry a mark of German brutality in a -hand maimed by a too well aimed grenade.<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_142"></a>[142]</span> -Even since the Retreat, their life has consisted -of skulking more or less among the ruins. -Raiding aeroplanes, by night or day, drop -bombs in their vicinity; for Canizy lies near -to Ham, the munition centre of the St. Quentin -front. They hear the bombardments; and the -rumours fly that the Boches are advancing. -Will the lines hold? Their mothers keep eyes -and ears open to the eastward. One refuses -to buy a stove, because she thinks it is too -risky an investment; her husband is sure the -Germans will return, and a stove, it cannot be -carried away. “What will you do then, if the -Germans come?” I ask. “<i>Fly</i>,” is the universal -reply. “<i>We know the Boches; better to -die than remain.</i>”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_143"></a>[143]</span></p> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 450px;" id="illus13"> -<img src="images/illus13.jpg" width="450" height="700" alt="" /> -<p class="caption">—<i>Et les momes Boches ils -embrassent leur père?</i> ...</p> -<p class="caption">[And do the little Boche children hug their father?]</p> -</div> - -<p>Even in the fields, a child cannot play. One -day I was taken by a bevy of laughing little -girls to see an <i>obus</i> which had fallen in the -graveyard near the entrance to the church. It -had lain there some months unexploded, hidden -by grass and weeds. But the preparations -for All Saints’ Day, as punctiliously<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_144"></a>[144]</span> -made last autumn as in times of peace, revealed -it. The girls danced about it like -sprites, touching it spitefully with their toes. -“Take care,” I cried. “Come away.” Merry -laughter greeted my alarm. “There are many -of them,” said dare-devil Thérèse; “they do no -harm.” Nevertheless, knowing that a farmer -had been killed while ploughing, not far away, -by just such a shell, I sent word to the military -authorities who removed this particular <i>obus</i>, -before the next Sunday’s mass. The Government -recognises the danger, and prints large -placards of warning, which are hung up in the -schoolrooms.</p> - -<p>The schools themselves are depressing -enough, for against no class of buildings did -the Germans vent more hatred. Throughout -the devastated area, they were completely destroyed. -<i>Ecole des Filles</i>, or <i>Ecole des -Garçons</i> may still be seen in white capitals -adorning a gaping arch or a jagged wall. -But the schools, such as they are, are held in -half-ruined dwellings, or in <i>baraques</i>. One<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_145"></a>[145]</span> -such dilapidated interior bore, beside the warning -against spent shells, the following “Fable -for the day,” written in the teacher’s slant hand -upon the blackboard: “At our last breath, we -shall have nothing. Since we have neither -father nor mother, we are now orphans. -Nevertheless, we must do right. We must do -right because it is right.”</p> - -<p>In Canizy, as I have said, there was no -school. The walls even of the former school -building were razed to the ground. But the -children were supposed to attend the school of -another commune, that of Offoy, a mile and a -half distant along the canal. This seemingly -simple provision for education was made impossible -by the fact that regiments continuously -<i>en repos</i> at Offoy used the sandy buttes -formed by the Somme at this point for <i>mitrailleuse</i> -practice. One saw them every afternoon -at half past two, bringing out their gruesome -targets, in the shape of a human head and -shoulders, and sentineling the crossroads with -notices and red flags. Then woe to the urchin<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_146"></a>[146]</span> -lingering perhaps in Offoy on some belated -errand. Like the rabbits he must stay under -cover until the fusillades should cease. Yet -the children of the village were not wholly -neglected. It was their former teacher, now -resident in Hombleux, who taught them the -stirring <i>Petit Soldat</i>. And from Offoy came -M. l’Aumônier, of whom you shall hear later, -to teach them the catechism and to receive them -into the church. “They are very <i>gentils</i>, the -children of Canizy,” he assured me one day. -“They are not like the children of the other -villages. They have brave parents; they are -well brought up.”</p> - -<p>Well brought up, yes, in all the usages of -docility and endurance. Shifting of troops, -obedience to military masters, slavery and pillage, -such are the facts which these children -have learned for three years. But grafted as -the lesson has been upon a spirit gentle by -nature, the result is terrible in its sombreness. -Robert Gense, uncannily helpful; Raymond -Carpentier, threadbare and bowed at fourteen,—a<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_147"></a>[147]</span> -look like that of a faithful, whipped dog -in his eyes,—Elmire Carlier, whose lovely -mouth is carved in patience, the Tabarys, ragged -and elfin—these are the children of -Picardy. But where is the spontaneity of -childhood? Where may one find it in the -track of war?</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_148"></a>[148]</span></p> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 700px;" id="illus14"> -<img src="images/illus14.jpg" width="700" height="450" alt="" /> -<p class="caption"><i>Garde à vous!</i></p> -<p class="caption">—<i>Compagnie!... halte!</i></p> -<p class="caption">[Company ... halt!]</p> -</div> - -<p>On our own playground, perhaps, sometimes. -Yet the children had to be encouraged -to play. They might remember the words of -the <i>rondes</i> which have lately become familiar -to American children also through the illustrations -of Boutet de Monville, but they no -longer curtseyed as the beautiful gentlemen -and the beautiful ladies should <i>sur le pont -d’Avignon</i>. They no longer had books to -read. A prayer book, a hymnal, sometimes -the family records; these were all the literature -saved in their mothers’ sacks of flight. But -the play teacher draws our waifs of the war -as if with a magic flute; even M. Lanne’s cows -come trooping with the children, because the -boy who herds them cannot come without.<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_149"></a>[149]</span> -The babies come, with older sister nurses; and -on the outskirts may be seen bent grandfather -or grandmother, forgetting sorrow for the -moment, in watching the romping groups. -And even after the store automobile, stripped -of its merchandise, honks persistently its desire -to be off, the joy of that brief hour is perpetuated -in the books that the teacher leaves behind. -Who so proud then as the boy or girl -singled out to be the owner of a book for a -whole week? <i>Contes des Fées</i>, <i>petites histoires</i>, -the <i>rondes</i> themselves; they are treasures -comparable to fairy gold. Yet reading -never seems to interfere with duty; Raymond, -or Désiré, or Adrien, you are likely to meet -them as usual <i>en route</i> to Voyennes for apples, -or returning from Ham with loaves of bread -hanging, like life preservers, about their necks; -they pasture the few cows; they feed the rabbits; -they bring wood and dig coal,—they are -the men of Canizy.</p> - -<p>Such grow to be the soldiers of whom France -is proud; those older children, the <i>poilus</i>, whom<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_150"></a>[150]</span> -all the world has come to know. Long ago -Julius Cæsar knew them also, and Hirtius -Pansa wrote of them: “They make war with -honour, without deceit and without artifice.” -Brought up to adore <i>la Patrie</i>, singing of -death, as of glory, the little soldier of France -marches to-day as did the child in the Children’s -Crusade. Across three thousand miles -I hear his refrain:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"> -<div class="poetry"> - <div class="stanza"> - <div class="verse indent0"><i>Point de chagrin,</i></div> - <div class="verse indent0"><i>Point de chagrin,</i></div> - <div class="verse indent0"><i>Il a sa gourde, il a sa pipe,</i></div> - <div class="verse indent0"><i>C’est un gaillard toujours en train.</i></div> - </div> -</div> -</div> - -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_151"></a>[151]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_XII">CHAPTER XII<br /> -<span class="smaller">M. L’AUMÔNIER</span></h2> - -</div> - -<p>In Canizy, one found always something -new. It might be an <i>obus</i>, or a soldier <i>en -permission</i>, or a family <i>réfugiée</i>, or a <i>baraque</i>. -I learned to expect the unexpected. Having -carefully negotiated with M. Lanne for certain -timbers and chicken wiring which formed -the basis for a roof of which I had need, I was -prepared to see that they had vanished overnight, -and to express neither surprise nor indignation -when I was told that they were -transformed into the foundation for Mme. -Picard’s <i>baraques</i>. Having left glass, diamond -cutter, putty, brads, and a list of those -who needed the panes, I was not discouraged -when week after week went by without M. -Augustin’s cutting them. The fact that M. -Noulin had brought the materials over in his<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_152"></a>[152]</span> -cart, and held them on his premises, was doubtless -reason enough why M. Augustin stayed -his hand. At all events, it seemed wiser to -leave the solution of this problem to the village; -and the last I knew, it hinged on the return of -a soldier <i>en permission</i>, a glazier by trade. -He, all the world assured me, would actually -out the glass!</p> - -<p>The Noulins themselves were among my -earliest surprises. How they came I know -not, but one day I found the trio, father, -mother and daughter, tidying up the premises -they had rented from M. Huillard. The outermost -room, from the walls of which still depended -half-charred pictures, gaped to the -sky. But this was used as a store-room for -neatly stacked wood and fodder; within, the -main room served as both kitchen and <i>épicerie</i>; -off it opened two bedrooms, and in the rear -was a yard. The rooms were completely furnished -and the yard stocked with hens and -about thirty rabbits. In the stable stood a -pony and a high-wheeled cart. All these<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_153"></a>[153]</span> -goods had M. Noulin bought and brought back -from Compiègne, whither he had fled at the -outbreak of the war.</p> - -<p>It was in the <i>épicerie</i>, which we provisioned, -that I came to look for most of the news of -Canizy. Here, about the table, might sit -drinking the Moroccans who were repairing -the canal. Here Mme. Moulin thrust into my -hand an account of our own Unit in her fashion -journal of the month; an account glowing with -undeserved praise of America and concluding -with the words: “Heureux pays, où sur les -mairies des villages on pourrait écrire: ‘Aide-toi, -l’Amérique t’aidera.’ Plus heureuses -Américaines, qui peuvent et qui savent donner!”</p> - -<p>Here she showed me a postal marked -<i>Deutschland</i>, and bearing on its back the picture -of a jovial-looking man in civilian dress. -“It is my son,” explained Mme. Noulin. “He -is a <i>prisonnier militaire</i>, and sends me this to -show me how well he is. He writes, too, that -he has plenty to eat, of sugar, of chocolate,<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_154"></a>[154]</span> -and is always warm,—there is so much of -coal! Think you it is true?”</p> - -<p>On the table was lying a package, done up -with many directions, all pointing to Germany. -“What is this?” I asked. “That is for him; -but the <i>factrice</i> could not take it to-day; such -are her orders. No packages will be transported -by Germany this week, or next, or who -knows for how long? It is on account of a -troop movement, she says.”</p> - -<p>“But why then do you send, if he has no -need?”</p> - -<p>“There, what did I tell you?” broke in her -husband. “Oh, these women; they have no -minds! It is the enemy who sends the letters, -that we may feel more bitterly the cold, the -hunger, the misery, that we endure!”</p> - -<p>It was at Mme. Noulin’s, in fine, that I first -met M. l’Aumônier.</p> - -<p>A snowy, windy morning it was, and the -glare and the smart in my eyes blinded me so -that I did not at first note anything unusual -about the blue-clad soldier sitting by the fire.<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_155"></a>[155]</span> -Declining Madame’s invitation to share the -open bottle of wine on the table, I was proceeding -with my errand when she’ interrupted, -“Mademoiselle, I want you to know that this -is M. l’Aumônier from Offoy, who takes an -interest, like you, in Canizy.”</p> - -<p>The chaplain arose at the informal introduction. -A deprecatory smile became well his -sensitive yet Roman features, and a quick flush -heightened his colour. “But no,” he said, his -enunciation betraying him a gentleman in spite -of the plain uniform, “it is I who have been -hearing of your goodness and that of your co-benefactresses, -Mademoiselle.”</p> - -<p>“Mademoiselle,” protested Mme. Noulin, -“you should know that Monsieur walks from -Offoy every morning before eight o’clock to -conduct a class in the catechism in the church.”</p> - -<p>“That matters nothing; it is my pleasure, I -would say, duty. But you—you who have -come from America to help my poor France, -you who walk so much farther. I, I have legs<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_156"></a>[156]</span> -trained for walking by long marches, by a soldier’s -life——”</p> - -<p>But I knew something of the duties of a -military chaplain. Had I not seen the bare, -dark infirmary where he comforted his invalided -companions? Had I not visited the -<i>baraque</i> called the Soldiers’ Library which -was more or less in his charge; that cheerless -hut with the books locked out of sight in one -corner, and the directions for rifle practice -confronting one on the wall? Could not one -divine the battle charges when M. l’Aumônier -went forward in the ranks with his comrades, -or stopped only to give them the sacrament -as they fell? Did I not know the calls made -upon him by the civilians also, now that he was -<i>en repos</i>? A soldier’s life, indeed, has inured -the military chaplains of the French army to -hardships by contrast greater perhaps than -any endured by the other soldiers of France.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_157"></a>[157]</span></p> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 450px;" id="illus15"> -<img src="images/illus15.jpg" width="450" height="700" alt="" /> -<p class="caption"><i>Sans l’officier, les soldats nous -auraient peut-être rien fait?</i></p> -<p class="caption">[If it hadn’t been for the officer, I don’t think the -soldiers would have done anything to us.]</p> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_158"></a>[158]</span></p> - -<p>I strove to stop him, to express to him something -of my deep appreciation of this added -burden he had taken on his shoulders in the -spiritual care of the children of Canizy.</p> - -<p>But he waved away all implied sacrifice. -“It is a pleasure,” he repeated, “and the children -are so good.”</p> - -<p>Thereafter, M. l’Aumônier became my most -disinterested ally in our village. Did a mass -seem desirable, the time was set late enough -for me to reach it from the Château. What -mattered it that thereby Monsieur did not -breakfast till noon? When Mme. Gabrielle -was still undecided over her distribution, he -consented to lend his presence to the function, -and thereby insured its success. He even -undertook the responsibility of such a mundane -matter as the cutting of the glass. Day -after day, I met him in one family circle or -another, making pastoral calls. Very different -were those happy weeks to the villagers -from the months preceding, when spiritual -consolation came only with death. He seemed -to find entrance into the hearts of the people,<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_159"></a>[159]</span> -and they responded to his care as flowers to -the sun.</p> - -<p>Wherever M. l’Aumônier went, went also -a clean, blond soldier boy of twenty, who was -studying to be a priest like his friend. He -spoke English, which he had learned as a shipping -clerk in an exporting house at Havre. -“Our Colonel,” he explained, “is very much interested -in the civilians, particularly in the -children. He even sent one of his captains to -Paris to buy warm clothing for every one of -them in Offoy. He is a very rich man and -very kind. He has detailed me to help M. -l’Aumônier all that I can.”</p> - -<p>We were walking along the canal as we -spoke, and the wind blew straight from the -north. M. l’Aumônier said something in a -low voice, and the boy whipped off his scarf. -“Yes, <i>please</i>, you are cold; you must take it,” -and perforce the scarf was wound about my -neck.</p> - -<p>“How long are you to be here?” I asked,<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_160"></a>[160]</span> -dreading to see this regiment pass back to the -front.</p> - -<p>“Me, I do not know. I have been wounded, -you know; twice with the bayonet, and ten -days ago I was gassed. The lungs pain me -yet,—I cannot do much work.”</p> - -<p>“You,” broke in his superior, “you, Mademoiselle, -will go before we do—for you have -told me that you leave soon for America. At -least, you will have seen something, and can -tell them there of the misery which France -suffers.”</p> - -<p>“But one sees so little,—the trenches, the -battles, the hardships of the soldiers, I know -nothing of these.”</p> - -<p>“The trenches? There is little to see; is it -not so, comrade? But this,” he swept his arm -to indicate the circle of destruction all about -us, “this you know. Tell them of the agony -and of the fortitude of Picardy.”</p> - -<p>We had come to the parting of our ways. -Turning west, I was confronted by a winter -sunset; bare branches, crimson streamers, cold<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_161"></a>[161]</span> -lakes of turquoise; and bleak against this background, -the ruins of Canizy. M. l’Aumônier -was right; of this one who has seen it cannot -help to speak; of the terrible devastation, of -the silent courage of those who live in it and -fight, unheralded, their fight for France.</p> - -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_162"></a>[162]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_XIII">CHAPTER XIII<br /> -<span class="smaller">HEUREUX NOËL</span></h2> - -</div> - -<p>Christmas weather, sunlight, moonlight -and snow; our grove a white stencil; -our <i>baraques</i> with their red shutters by day -and their lighted windows by night, like -painted Christmas cards; our defaced and -ruined villages new-clothed with beauty,—such -was our Christmas week. But the snow, -so beautiful to the eye, accentuated the bitter -cold of our ill-lodged and under-nourished -neighbours, and the moon pointed out to hostile -aeroplanes desired points of attack. It -was on account of the dangerous moonlight -that the Bishop of Amiens forbade midnight -masses in the churches. We, and our villagers, -were the more disappointed because -even during the German occupation these -masses had been sung. We heard of loaded<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_163"></a>[163]</span> -Christmas trees, and of parties where cakes -and chocolate were served by German officers. -“Not for all the world, you understand,” -Colombe, our informant, explained, “just for -themselves.” Yet all the world had had some -share in the German Christmas, and we felt -eager to make up a little for the added hardships -caused since that time by German -cruelty, for all the ruined homesteads which -are but the outward sign of families scattered, -missing and dead.</p> - -<p>Yet at first, so prevalent was the feeling -of sadness, we thought it might not be desirable -to have a fête. Did the villagers want -one? Had the Christmas tree too many German -associations? We made inquiry of M. -le Sous-Préfet, and of the Commandant of the -Third Army. From the latter came the following -reply:</p> - -<div class="blockquote"> - -<p class="right">27.11.17. Guiscard</p> - -<p class="noindent">Dear Miss ——,</p> - -<p>I am glad to tell you that you got a stupid gossiping -about the Christmas tree.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_164"></a>[164]</span></p> - -<p>There is nothing at all in this country against the -charming practice to delight the children with a spruce -of which some toys are hanging all round among as -many candles as possible.</p> - -<p>Therefore you are free to be nice for the poor people -once more and God bless you for your splendid charity.</p> - -<p>With my kindest regards for you, for your chief, and -your sisters,</p> - -<p class="center">Yours respectfully,</p> - -<p class="right">——</p> - -</div> - -<p>So it came about that in each of the villages -there was a spruce, with toys and candles and -goodies, and carols and Christmas cheer. In -Canizy, thanks to good fortune and to M. -l’Aumônier, the fête was especially pretty. I -had not yet met the chaplain or planned my -Christmas, when, on a late December afternoon, -I happened to pass the little chapel, on -my way to Visit a group of families lodged -within the grounds of the old Château. Several -times before I had been inside, once for a -mass on All Saints’ Day, and more than once -to look at the faded painting behind the altar, -and at the quaintly quilted banners of the<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_165"></a>[165]</span> -saints along the wall. These, strange to say, -had been left in place by the German invaders; -save for a soiled altar cloth and two or three -broken windows, the church, indeed, appeared -as if it might still be in constant use.</p> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 500px;" id="illus16"> -<img src="images/illus16.jpg" width="500" height="700" alt="" /> -<p class="caption">—<i>Il n’est pas venu?... Il est mobilisé!</i></p> -<p class="caption">— ... <i>Et il a pas eu de permission.</i></p> -<p class="caption">[He has not come? He has been mobilised....</p> -<p class="caption">And he has not had any leave.]</p> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_166"></a>[166]</span></p> - -<p>To-day, in spite of the early gathering dusk, -and the long walk home, an impulse beckoned -me in,—a very definite impulse, however, for -I had in mind to decipher a moulded coat of -arms upon the walls, and to search the sacristy. -In other village churches, alas! dismantled, -were to be found carved chests of drawers, -black letter Bibles, brasses, and glorious books -of chants. Perhaps my little chapel might -contain treasures also. Past Our Lady of -Lourdes and St. Anthony of Padua, past the -Sacred Heart, and that humble saint of gardens, -St. Fiacre, to whom had nevertheless -been given the place of honour on the Virgin’s -right, and up through the chancel I went. -The door of the sacristy creaked at my sacrilege.</p> - -<p>The alcove on which it opened was hung<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_167"></a>[167]</span> -with cobwebs. The floor was littered; drawers -gaping awry disclosed a medley of candle ends, -tinsel flowers, vases and books. But on -shelves across the end, my eye caught glowing -colours of vestments, green and gold and purple, -lying in the same folds, apparently, in -which M. le Curé had left them when he went -forth into captivity three years ago. In a -corner cabinet were sundry images, broken -for the most part, and among them that of a -wax doll, broken-armed and blackened with -age, but encased in a bell of glass. In an -opposite corner, behind a scaffolding, I found -another treasure; a tiny thatched hut upon a -standard, evidently designed to be borne in -processions. Ivy, turned crisp and brown, entwined -its four pillars, and chestnut leaves, -silvered with dust, made an appliqué upon the -thatch. The God of Gardens, the Festival of -the First Fruits, perhaps,—had I not come -here upon a Roman survival in old Picardy? -But, suddenly, I saw with other eyes; here<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_168"></a>[168]</span> -were the cross and the Christ-child; I had -stumbled on the Christmas <i>crèche</i>.</p> - -<p>Time pressed; I noted again the faded -blazons which flanked the saints on either wall—a -closed crown, a shield embossed with seven -<i>fleurs-de-lis</i>, and upheld by two leopards—shut -the outer door, and took my way to the -Château. One can see that the Château of -Canizy is ancient, by its two stone turrets and -its Gothic arch. At least, it is so ancient that -no one in the village remembers the family -whose royal escutcheon adorns its chapel walls. -It is but lately a ruin, however, at the wanton -hands of the Germans. In a stable in the -farmyard, I found the family I had come to -visit, formerly domestics of the estate.</p> - -<p>The old, bent grandmother, vacant-eyed -and silent, sat in a corner nearest the fire. -The mother, whom I never saw without her -black cap, shook hands and dusted off a chair. -The daughter, lovely as a beam of sunshine in -that dark interior, offered me wine.</p> - -<p>“But no,” I protested, “it is late,” and having<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_169"></a>[169]</span> -paid for the knitting of a pair of stockings, -which was my errand, I continued, “Tell me, -please. I have just come from the sacristy. -There is a little house there.”</p> - -<p>“The <i>crèche</i>!”</p> - -<p>“There is also a doll.”</p> - -<p>“Yes, the little Jesus!”</p> - -<p>“Have you then all you need for the <i>crèche</i>, -and would you like a mass for Noël?”</p> - -<p>At that even the grandmother’s eyes lighted.</p> - -<p>“A mass! We have not had one for three -years!”</p> - -<p>Who, then, would clean the church, who -trim the <i>crèche</i>, who tell me what to get for -it? The answers came as rapidly as the questions. -Elmire had always had charge of the -<i>crèche</i>; she would return with me at once to -see what was lacking.</p> - -<p>Together we made our way back and inventoried -(1) the <i>crèche</i> itself; (2) a white lace-bordered -square, (3) the little Jesus, and (4) -some tinsel, or angel’s hair.</p> - -<p>“There is lacking,” Elmire thought quickly,<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_170"></a>[170]</span> -“a Saint Joseph, a Blessed Virgin, six tapers, -cotton wool, and perhaps a star.”</p> - -<p>Twice on my homeward journey I was -stopped by Elmire’s younger brother, running -after me with breathless messages: “Elmire -says, would you please get a shepherd,” and, -“Elmire asks for three little sheep.”</p> - -<p>Where one was to get these was as much a -mystery as the priest for the mass. But I -promised that all should be done.</p> - -<p>The figures for the <i>crèche</i> were actually -found in Amiens. To them was added a new -little Jesus in a cradle; and the whole was -brought by hand to Elmire. The delight of -the entire family in unwrapping the various -bundles was equalled only by my own in -watching them. Afterwards, in the stable, -the <i>crèche</i> was trimmed. Artificial flowers, -blue and pink and tinsel, bloomed under -Elmire’s deft fingers; the pillars were fluted -with coloured paper, the roof plaited with holly -leaves. A lamp was necessary in the dark -place, and its light fell on the eager faces of<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_171"></a>[171]</span> -the family, grouped about that fairy hut. “In -a stable,” I thought as I looked at them, “in -a stable, the Christ is born again.”</p> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 500px;" id="illus17"> -<img src="images/illus17.jpg" width="500" height="700" alt="" /> -<p class="caption">—<i>Si on voit pas l’Noël, on verra -peut-être un Zeppelin.</i></p> -<p class="caption">[Well, if we don’t see Santa Claus, we may see a Zeppelin, -anyhow!]</p> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_172"></a>[172]</span></p> - -<p>But it was M. l’Aumônier who voiced my -thought at mass on Christmas Day. He had -made a children’s service of this, centred about -the <i>crèche</i>. After the <i>cantiques</i>, led by the -soldier-boy, after the triumphal <i>Adeste, -Fideles</i>, the children knelt in a circle about the -cradle of the Christ.</p> - -<p>“My children,” began the chaplain, “this -year, you yourselves live in huts, in barns, and -in stables; so in a stable lives the little Jesus, -as you see. You know what it is to be cold, -beneath the snow upon the roof; so does the -little Jesus. You have been hungry; so is he.</p> - -<p>“My children, it behooves you, therefore, to -make for the little Jesus a cradle in your -hearts; cleanse them, each of you, and ask the -little Jesus in.</p> - -<p>“What next should you do, my children? -Should you not pray first of all for yourselves, -that you may be kept from sin? Next, forget<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_173"></a>[173]</span> -not to pray for the soldiers of <i>la Patrie</i>, who -only a few miles away, guard you from your -enemies. Next, think on your fathers, your -older brothers and sisters, who are with the -Germans in captivity. Beseech mercy for -them, my children, that the good God may -return them to your homes. Next, be especially -thoughtful of your mothers and obedient -to them, who stand to you in the place of both -your parents. And last, but also of importance, -my children, remember in your prayers -your benefactresses, these ladies who have given -you this year the Christmas <i>crèche</i>.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_174"></a>[174]</span></p> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 450px;" id="illus18"> -<img src="images/illus18.jpg" width="450" height="700" alt="" /> -<p class="caption">—<i>Et si i gèle cette nuit?</i> ...</p> -<p class="caption">—<i>Ben mon vieux on pourra s’asseoir.</i></p> -<p class="caption">[And if it freezes to-night?</p> -<p class="caption">Why, old chap, we can sit down.]</p> -</div> - -<p>M. l’Aumônier said more, but I could not -hear it. I was aware that he himself set the -children an example by praying for us, heretics -though we were. It was only when we came -out into the open sunlight, and walked up the -street to Mme. Lefèvre’s to strip the tree, that -laughter became possible, and that one could -see the accustomed smile in his eyes. Yet -even at the fête, we could not escape from -thanks. The presents, selected to be sure with<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_175"></a>[175]</span> -care, but so inadequate compared with the -needs, were hardly distributed when a hush -fell on the packed room. A boy stepped forward, -and began to read from a piece of paper -in his hand. A girl followed. Their elders -listened with the greatest satisfaction, nodding -their heads and smiling at our amazement. -And this is what they said,—a measure not of -what we did, but of the spirit of stricken -Canizy:</p> - -<div class="blockquote"> - -<p>Le cœur des dames Américaines s’est emu, à la pensée -des misères qu’avait entraînées derrière soi, la terrible -guerre, et vous êtes venues parmi nous les mains pleines -de bienfaits et vos cœurs débordant de dévouement.</p> - -<p>Il nous est bien doux de vous dire merci, en cette -circonstance créée encore par votre charité. Notre merci -passera, permettez nous Mesdames et chères Bienfaitrices, -par la crèche du petit enfant Jésus!</p> - -<p>Puisse-t-il vous rendre en consolation, ce que vous lui -donnez en bienfaits! Au début de l’année nouvelle, nos -vœux sont pour vous et pour ceux qui vous sont chers! -Que Dieu comble de gloire, et de prospérité votre noble -Amérique! Qu’il féconde sa générosité inlassable, que -Dieu vous accorde une bonne santé, nos chères Bienfaitrices, -et qu’il vous dise toute l’affection de cette -commune, profondément reconnaissante.</p> - -</div> - -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_176"></a>[176]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_XIV">CHAPTER XIV<br /> -<span class="smaller">FIDELISSIMA, PICARDIE</span></h2> - -</div> - -<p>Since the commencement of this short -volume, the German flood has rolled again -across the Somme. Péronne, Nesle, Ham, -Noyon, those towns mentioned so often and -so gloriously in the annals of France, have -fallen once more into the hands of the enemy. -With them go the villages where my Unit -laboured. Canizy, it is no more. The green-bladed -wheatfields have become fields of unspeakable -carnage; the poor ruins again smoke -to heaven, and down the shattered highways -course endlessly the grey columns of that -Emperor whose empire is pillage and death.</p> - -<p>What, then, remains to us of our labours? -At least a memory in the lives of the peasants, -and a present help in this their time of stress. -Our villagers were rescued, and taken by special<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_177"></a>[177]</span> -trains to safety. The Unit accomplished -this work of succour. Their trucks were -driven under shell fire through the villages to -collect the inhabitants; sometimes they were -the last over the bridges; they left our headquarters -only when the Uhlans were within -charging distance; they have fed and clothed -thousands of refugees and soldiers. Mentioned -with them in the newspaper accounts of -their service is our Red Cross truck driver, -Dave. The fate that has overtaken our peasants, -what is it but a repetition of the immemorial -blows that have welded and tempered -their ancestral spirit? As one of their historians -has limned them: “Les Picards sont -francs et unis.... Ils vivent de peu.... Il -arrive rarement que l’activité et le désir de -s’avancer les déterminent à sortir de leur pays.... -Ils sont sincères, fidèles, libres, brusques, -attachés à leurs opinions, fermes dans -leurs résolutions.”<a id="FNanchor_6" href="#Footnote_6" class="fnanchor">[6]</a> It was to this spirit that<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_178"></a>[178]</span> -an ancient king of France paid honour, when -he granted his kinsman, who held this province, -a coat of arms bearing the royal lilies, and the -motto: <i>Fidelissima, Picardie</i>.</p> - -<p>A thousand such Picards we have known, -women for the most part; enduring a bitter -winter, a daily hazard, that they might live on -their own land and till their own fields once -more. There was Mme. Pottier, sitting in her -wrecked bakery, where the empty bread -baskets were arranged like plaques against the -walls. Her husband and her three daughters -were prisoners. Her youngest son had died -a soldier. She showed me with trembling -hands the letter she had received from his -Colonel, commending his clean life and his -brave death. Her only remaining child was -a <i>religieuse</i>,—a Red Cross nurse. I found -Mme. Pottier one day reading the “Lives of -the Saints.” “I like to read,” she said, “all -books that are good. I love well the good -God.” But she worked also, and knitted -many a pair of stockings for us. First, however,<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_179"></a>[179]</span> -the wool must be weighed. “It is just,” -she reiterated after each protest on my part. -“My conscience will be easy so.” And up a -ladder she mounted to the loft, where stood -scales designed to weigh sacks of flour. No -weights being small enough, she took a few -coppers from her pocket. “Voilà!” she said, -throwing them into the balance. “Remember, -the skeins weigh six sous; when the stockings -are done, you shall see, they will be the same.”</p> - -<p>There was Mme. Gouge, beautiful and -tragic, who came and cooked for us, in order -to send her son to school in Amiens; and even -more pathetic, her brother-in-law, formerly -the owner of the prettiest house in the village, -who often accompanied her and served our -meals. He was the village barber as well, -and on a Saturday was busy all day in his -shed, heating water, shaving M. le Maire and -other of his neighbours, and presenting each, -on the completion of the task, with a view of -shaven cheeks, or clipped hair, in the broken -bit of mirror which hung beside the door.<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_180"></a>[180]</span> -Orderliness seemed to be M. Gouge’s ruling -passion; the arbours in the two corners of his -garden, the round flower-bed in the centre, the -grassy square, the gravel walks,—all were -as well kept as if the shattered house were still -tenanted, and Madame, his wife, were looking -out as she used to do upon the garden she -loved.</p> - -<p>Among the Picard soldiers, there was -Caporal Levet, the boy-friend of M. l’Aumônier, -who made so light of his wounds. -“It is nothing,” he repeated again and again -after sharp fits of coughing brought on by -exposure to the biting wind as he accompanied -us during our week of fêtes. “This is -nothing; I am resting now. Soon I shall go -back. My Colonel, he told me only to-day -that I must go down to the Midi to train -Moroccans. That is to the bayonet. Me, I -do not like the bayonet,—the charges. One -goes with the blacks, you know. I have been -wounded twice. But,” a shrug of the shoulders, -“my Colonel says that I am the youngest,—and<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_181"></a>[181]</span> -I should go.” Some one asked at one -of the parties that he lead the Marseillaise. -He protested for the first time. “We -French,” he said, “we are droll; we do not like -to sing always of dying for the glory of <i>la -Patrie</i>.” But they die, nevertheless; and one -is left only to wonder when his time will come, -on what dark night, in the lull of the bombardment, -when the blacks leap out of the trenches -and lead the desperate charge.</p> - -<p>In Hombleux, in the church, beside the -altar, hangs the Village roll of honour, bearing -the names of six sons of Picardy fallen in its -defence.</p> - -<ul> -<li>Roullard Pottier</li> -<li>Albert Gourbière</li> -<li>Robert Gautier</li> -<li>Pierre Commont</li> -<li>August Deslatte</li> -<li>Amidé Bens</li> -</ul> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_182"></a>[182]</span></p> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 450px;" id="illus19"> -<img src="images/illus19.jpg" width="450" height="700" alt="" /> -<p class="caption"><i>Oui, mais, il est fort papa, plus -fort que dix boches.</i></p> -<p class="caption">[O yes, papa is strong, stronger than ten Boches.]</p> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_183"></a>[183]</span></p> - -<p>Unknown heroes these, peasant names, roughly -printed. Yet Hombleux, in the midst of -its desolation, of its sorrow for those other sons -and daughters forced into ignoble slavery, remembers -its soldier dead. It remembers in -prayer that France for which all have suffered. -Near the illuminated scroll, upon its black -background, stands a statue of Joan of Arc, -and beneath it is placed this prayer:</p> - -<div class="blockquote"> - -<p>O bienheureuse Jeanne d’Arc! que notre France a -besoin, à l’heure présente, d’âmes vaillantes, animées de -cette espérance que rien ne déconcerte, ni les difficultés, -ni les insuccés, ni les triomphes passagers et apparents -de ses ennemis; des âmes qui, comme vous, mettent -toute leur confiance en Dieu seul; des âmes enfin que -les efforts généreux n’effraient pas, et qui, ainsi que -vous soldats, se rallient à votre étendard portant ces -mots gravés: “Jésus! Maria! Vive labeur!” O Jeanne! -ranimez tous les courages, faites germer de nobles -héroïsmes et sauvez encore une fois la France qui vous -appelle à son secours!</p> - -</div> - -<p><i>Fidelissima, Picardie!</i> It was in Amiens, -in the Library there, that I first saw the emblazoned -coat of arms of the province, and -those of her famous cities, Péronne, Nesle, St. -Quentin, Amiens, Noyon, Ham with its castle, -and Corbie, with its crows. I had come by -slow train from Paris, and waited perforce for<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_184"></a>[184]</span> -the still slower train which was to drop me that -night at Hombleux, the nearest railroad station -to our Château. Snow was upon the -ground; the sunlight sharp and cold. It cleft -the airy spire of the Cathedral out of the blue -sky like a diamond-powdered sword. It -frosted the delicate azure of the rose window, -and high up among the clustered pillars, threw -prismic whorls that floated like flowers upon -a rippled stream of light. In the Library, it -fell upon tooled leather bindings, upon the -gorgeous blazons, upon pages illuminated, like -the white walls of the Cathedral, with ethereal -fruits and flowers. But the day was all too -brief. As my train puffed and rumbled away -from the city, dusk enveloped the plain till -the evening star—or was it an <i>avion</i>?—burned -forth. Passengers entered or descended, the -last being a batch of Tommies bound for the -Cambrai front. They were a noisy, good-natured -lot, who slammed their rifles into the -racks, trod upon one another’s toes, and wished -heartily that “this bloomin’ war was done.”<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_185"></a>[185]</span> -At Chaulnes they got out; an American engineer -followed, and I was left alone. In total -darkness the train proceeded, the engine as we -swung around the curves looking like a dragon, -belching fire. Presently, out of the vast level, -rose the moon; and with it came those detonations -which we, even in our sheltered camp, had -learned to associate with its beauty. The -Boches were bombing Ham.</p> - -<p>Like my day in Amiens is my remembrance -of Picardy; the dun plain, the windy sky, the -play of light and shadow over both. The -blazons given her by history glow anew in -the heroisms of to-day. They form a glorious -volume, illuminated with flowers as gorgeous -as those traced by the monks of Corbie upon -the pages of their Books of Chants, bound, as -were they, with massive iron bands,—the iron -bands of war.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_186"></a>[186]</span></p> - -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_187"></a>[187]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak">APPENDIX<br /> -<span class="smcap">Before the War</span></h2> - -</div> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_188"></a>[188]</span></p> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 500px;" id="illus20"> -<img src="images/illus20.jpg" width="500" height="700" alt="" /> -<p class="caption"><i>CANIZY</i></p> -<p class="caption"><i>Survey made November, 1917.</i></p> -<p class="caption">Plan of the Village.</p> -</div> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_189"></a>[189]</span></p> - -<h3>1914</h3> - -<div class="blockquote hanging"> - -<p>1. <span class="smcap">Mme. Marie Gense</span>—Had a few rabbits; good -house.</p> - -<p>2. <span class="smcap">M. Noulin</span>—Was a storekeeper; had rabbits and -hens.</p> - -<p>3. <span class="smcap">M. Poiteaux</span> (soldat).<a id="FNanchor_7" href="#Footnote_7" class="fnanchor">[7]</a></p> - -<p>4. <span class="smcap">M. Leon Tabary</span> (living near Amiens).</p> - -<p>5. <span class="smcap">M. Huillard</span> (soldat).</p> - -<p>6. <span class="smcap">M. Cottret</span> (prisonnier civil).</p> - -<p>7. <span class="smcap">Mme. Augé</span>—Had hens and rabbits; small garden.</p> - -<p>8. <span class="smcap">M. Huillard</span> (see 5.)</p> - -<p>9. <span class="smcap">M. Gambard</span> (at Compiègne).</p> - -<p>10. <span class="smcap">M. Thuillard, G.</span> (at Bacquencourt).</p> - -<p>11. <span class="smcap">Mme. Cordier</span>—Had 10 cows, 2 bulls, 1 ox, 87 -pigs, 3 horses, 150 chickens, 150 rabbits, market -garden, orchard.</p> - -<p>12. <span class="smcap">Mme. Carpentier, J.</span>—Had 3 cows, 2 horses, 30 -hens, 50 rabbits, market garden.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_190"></a>[190]</span></p> - -<p>13. <span class="smcap">Mme. Picard</span>—Had 2 cows, 1 horse, hens, rabbits, -market garden.</p> - -<p>14. <span class="smcap">M. Thuillard, O.</span>—Had 7 cows, 4 horses, 50 -hens, 30 rabbits, 10 hectares of land for garden.</p> - -<p>15. <span class="smcap">Mme. Brohon</span> (at Voyennes).</p> - -<p>16. <span class="smcap">Mme. Moroy, R.</span> (at Esmery-Hallon).</p> - -<p>17. <span class="smcap">Mme. Carpentier, R.</span>—Had 2 horses, 21 rabbits, -30 hens, garden.</p> - -<p>18. <span class="smcap">Mme. Lefèvre</span>—Had 2 cows, 2 horses, 50 rabbits, -30 hens, market garden.</p> - -<p>19. <span class="smcap">M. Moroy</span>—Had 1 cow, 1 horse, 1 pig, 30 rabbits, -100 hens.</p> - -<p>20. <span class="smcap">M. Charlet</span> (at Amiens).</p> - -<p>21. <span class="smcap">Mme. Moroy</span> (dead).</p> - -<p>22. <span class="smcap">Mme. Tabary, G.</span>—Had only a few rabbits; husband -hostler at 23.</p> - -<p>23. <span class="smcap">Mme. Thuillard, G.</span>—Had 2 cows, 3 horses, hens, -rabbits, market garden.</p> - -<p>24. <span class="smcap">M. Touret</span> (prisonnier civil).</p> - -<p>25. <span class="smcap">M. Lanne</span> (at Ham).</p> - -<p>26. <span class="smcap">M. Henet</span> (prisonnier civil).</p> - -<p>27. <span class="smcap">Mme. Butin</span>—Had a few hens and rabbits; small -garden.</p> - -<p>28. <span class="smcap">M. Touret</span> (prisonnier civil).</p> - -<p>29. <span class="smcap">Mme. Roquet</span> (dead).</p> - -<p>30. <span class="smcap">Mme. Correon</span>—Had rabbits and hens; small -garden.</p> - -<p>31. <span class="smcap">Mme. Desmarchez</span> (at Esmery-Hallon).</p> - -<p>32. <span class="smcap">Mme. Delorme</span> (at Amiens).</p> - -<p>33. <span class="smcap">M. Huyart</span> (at Voyennes).</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_191"></a>[191]</span></p> - -<p>34. <span class="smcap">M. Reuet</span> (in Paris).</p> - -<p>35. <span class="smcap">M. Reuet</span> (in Paris).</p> - -<p>36. <span class="smcap">Mme. Villette</span> (at Voyennes).</p> - -<p>37. <span class="smcap">Mme. Cerf</span> (prisonnière civile).</p> - -<p>38. <span class="smcap">Mme. Moroy</span> (dead).</p> - -<p>39. <span class="smcap">M. Thuillard, C.</span>—Had 2 cows, 2 horses, 25 -chickens, 200 rabbits, large market garden.</p> - -<p>40. <span class="smcap">Mme. Moroy</span> (dead).</p> - -<p>41. <span class="smcap">Mme. Moroy</span> (dead).</p> - -<p>42. <span class="smcap">Mme. Moroy</span> (dead).</p> - -<p>43. <span class="smcap">Mme. Carpentier, R.</span> (see 17).</p> - -<p>44. <span class="smcap">Mme. Butin</span> (see 27).</p> - -<p>45. <span class="smcap">M. Thuillier, A.</span>—Had 10 rabbits, 12 hens; was -a cobbler.</p> - -<p>46. <span class="smcap">Mme. Moroy, Claire</span>—Had 1 horse, 1 cow, rabbits, -hens.</p> - -<p>47. <span class="smcap">Mme. Delorme, O.</span>—Had 100 rabbits, 40 hens, -small garden.</p> - -</div> - -<p>In 1914 Canizy had 445 inhabitants.</p> - -<h3>November, 1917</h3> - -<div class="blockquote hanging"> - -<p>1. Lives at 37 in a lean-to; small garden.</p> - -<p>2. Lives at 5 in a partially ruined house; has an -<i>épicerie</i>, in which we have stocked him, 1 pony, -30 young rabbits, 4 hens.</p> - -<p>7. Lives at 7 in a barn; has 10 hens, small garden.</p> - -<p>8. House occupied by Tabary, M.; has nothing.</p> - -<p>10. Mme. Payelle lives here in a barn; does not belong -in village; has nothing.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_192"></a>[192]</span></p> - -<p>11. Lives at 11 in a barn; has bought cow, horse, 24 -rabbits, 9 hens.</p> - -<p>12. Lives at 12 in a <i>baraque</i>; has a small garden.</p> - -<p>13. Lives at 16 in a barn; has large market garden -and employs one worker (Mme. Correon).</p> - -<p>14. Lives at 18 in a shed; has 2 horses, 10 hens, 10 -rabbits, large garden.</p> - -<p>15. Mme. Musqua lives here; formerly factory worker, -never owned land, has nothing.</p> - -<p>17. Lives at 17 in a shed; has 3 hens, 2 rabbits, small -garden.</p> - -<p>18. Lives at 18 in a partially ruined house; has 3 hens, -large garden. In her stable she houses Mme. -Barbier, a worker in the fields.</p> - -<p>19. Lives at 42 in one room; has a garden.</p> - -<p>23. Lives at 44 in an ell; has a cow, 8 hens, large garden.</p> - -<p>24. (Father of prisoner) lives here, with 46.</p> - -<p>30. Lives at 34 in a cottage; works for 13, has nothing.</p> - -<p>32. M. Lecart lives here in a cottage; formerly coachman -at Château; has nothing.</p> - -<p>39. Lives at 39 in a barn; has a large garden.</p> - -<p>42. Mme. Tabary, L., lives here in partially ruined -house, never owned land; has a goat.</p> - -<p>43. Mme. Cerf, who used to rent 46, lives in a barn; -has a few hens and a garden.</p> - -<p>44. Lives at 44, with her daughter (see 23).</p> - -<p>45. Lives at 16 in a shed; has a garden.</p> - -<p>46. Lives at 24 in a barn; has a garden.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_193"></a>[193]</span></p> - -<p>47. Lives at 47 in a chicken house; has 4 hens, 1 rabbit.</p> - -</div> - -<p>At the Château live three families, formerly employed -on the estate. They have gardens.</p> - -<p>In all, there are 100 persons in Canizy.</p> - -<hr /> - -<div class="footnotes"> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<h2 class="nobreak">FOOTNOTES</h2> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a id="Footnote_1" href="#FNanchor_1" class="label">[1]</a> From Poulbot’s <i>Des Gosses et des Bonhommes</i>.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a id="Footnote_2" href="#FNanchor_2" class="label">[2]</a> From the Almanach Hachette.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a id="Footnote_3" href="#FNanchor_3" class="label">[3]</a> Deux Années d’Invasion Espagnole en Picardie, 1635-1636. -Alcius Ledieu.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a id="Footnote_4" href="#FNanchor_4" class="label">[4]</a> Almanach Hachette, 1918, quoted from the <i>Berliner -Tageblatt</i>.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a id="Footnote_5" href="#FNanchor_5" class="label">[5]</a> Incomes as regulated in August, 1917.</p> - -<p><i>Allocation militaire</i>:</p> - -<ul> -<li>Soldier, 25 c. per day.</li> -<li>Family, 1 fr. 25 c. for mother.</li> -<li class="pad6">1 fr. 25 c. for child 16 or over.</li> -<li class="pad8">75 c. for child up to 16.</li> -</ul> - -<p><i>Allocation de réfugié or chômage</i>:</p> - -<ul> -<li>Adults, 1 fr. 25 c. per day.</li> -<li>Children, 50 c. per day.</li> -</ul> - -<p><i>War Pensions</i>:</p> - -<ul> -<li>Widows of soldiers, 580 fr. per year.</li> -<li>Children, each, 600 fr. per year.</li> -</ul> - -<p><i>Réformées</i>:</p> - -<ul> -<li>If wounded, a réformé receives a pension.</li> -</ul> - -<p><i>Médaille militaire</i>:</p> - -<ul> -<li>This carries a pension.</li> -</ul> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a id="Footnote_6" href="#FNanchor_6" class="label">[6]</a> Introduction à la histoire générale de la Province de -Picardie. Dom Grenier.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a id="Footnote_7" href="#FNanchor_7" class="label">[7]</a> Where no information is given as to property, no member -of the family remains in the village. It should be understood -that every family had some member, or members, with the -colours, or <i>avec les Boches</i>, or both.</p> - -</div> - -</div> - -<pre style='margin-top:6em'> -*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A VILLAGE IN PICARDY *** - -This file should be named 63637-h.htm or 63637-h.zip - -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: -http://www.gutenberg.org/6/3/6/3/63637/ - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will -be renamed. - -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, -so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United -States without permission and without paying copyright -royalties. 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