Part 24 (2/2)

All the batteries of the army corps are--or were--controlled from that little station. The colonel in charge came out to greet us, and to him Captain Boisseau gave General Foch's request to show me batteries in action.

The colonel was very willing. He would go with us himself. I conquered a strong desire to stand with the telephone building between me and the German lines, now so near, and looked about. A French aeroplane was overhead, but there was little bustle and activity along the road.

It is a curious fact in this war that the nearer one is to the front the quieter things become. Three or four miles behind there is bustle and movement. A mile behind, and only an occasional dispatch rider, a few men mending roads, an officer's car, a few horses tethered in a wood, a broken gun carriage, a horse being shod behind a wall, a soldier on a lookout platform in a tree, thickets and hedges that on occasion spout fire and death--that is the country round Ypres and just behind the line, in daylight.

We were between Ypres and the Allied line, in that arc which the Germans are, as I write, trying so hard to break through. The papers say that they are sh.e.l.ling Ypres and that it is burning. They were sh.e.l.ling it that day also. But now, as then, I cannot believe it is burning. There was nothing left to burn.

While arrangements were being made to visit the batteries, Lieutenant Puaux explained to me a method they had established at that point for measuring the alt.i.tude of hostile aeroplanes for the guns.

”At some anti-aircfaft batteries,” he explained, ”they have the telemeter for that purpose. But here there is none. So they use the system of _visee laterale_, or side sight, literally.”

He explained it all carefully to me. I understood it at the time, I think.

I remember saying it was perfectly clear, and a child could do it, and a number of other things. But the system of _visee laterale_ has gone into that part of my mind which contains the Latin irregular verbs, harmonies, the catechism and answers to riddles.

There is a curious feeling that comes with the firing of a large battery at an unseen enemy. One moment the air is still; there is a peaceful plain round. The sun s.h.i.+nes, and heavy cart horses, drawing a wagon filled with stones for repairing a road, are moving forward steadily, their heads down, their feet sinking deep in the mud. The next moment h.e.l.l breaks loose. The great guns stand with smoking jaws.

The message of death has gone forth. Over beyond the field and that narrow line of trees, what has happened? A great noise, the furious recoiling of the guns, an upcurling of smoke--that is the firing of a battery. But over there, perhaps, one man, or twenty, or fifty men, lying still.

So I required a.s.surance that this battery was not being fired for me.

I had no morbid curiosity as to batteries. One of the officers a.s.sured me that I need have no concern. Though they were firing earlier than had been intended, a German battery had been located and it was their instructions to disable it.

The battery had been well concealed.

”No German aeroplane has as yet discovered it,” explained the officer in charge.

To tell the truth, I had not yet discovered it myself. We had alighted from the machine in a sea of mud. There was mud everywhere.

A farmhouse to the left stood inaccessible in it. Down the road a few feet a tree with an observation platform rose out of it. A few chickens waded about in it. A crowd of soldiers stood at a respectful distance and watched us. But I saw no guns.

One of the officers stooped and picked up the cast shoe of a battery horse, and shaking the mud off, presented it to me.

”To bring you luck,” he said, ”and perhaps luck to the battery!”

We left the road, and turning to the right made a floundering progress across a field to a hedge. Only when we were almost there did I realise that the hedge was the battery.

”We built it,” said the officer in charge. ”We brought the trees and saplings and constructed it. Madame did not suspect?”

Madame had not suspected. There were other hedges in the neighbourhood, and the artificial one had been well contrived. Halfway through the field the party paused by a curious elevation, flat, perhaps twenty feet across and circular.

”The cyclone cellar!” some one said. ”We will come here during the return fire.”

But one look down the crude steps decided me to brave the return fire and die in the open. The cave below the flat roof, turf-covered against the keen eyes of aeroplanes, was full of water. The officers watched my expression and smiled.

And now we had reached the battery, and eager gunners were tearing away the trees and shrubbery that covered them. In an incredible s.p.a.ce of time the great grey guns, sinister, potential of death, lay open to the bright sky. The crews gathered round, each man to his place. The sh.e.l.l was pushed home, the gunners held the lanyards.

”Open your mouth wide,” said the officer in charge, and gave the signal.

<script>