and it goes on to speak of the new exploits in east and west. There are any number of volunteers in Germany; the women are all joining the Red Cross; and the population is busy with every kind of work for the army; but when I asked whether the people were keen for the war, he answered with astonishment, "The people? The people thought that the war was not to be avoided; but that was at the start; now it is different." He asked if there were many other Englishmen in Russia, and when I answered that there were some, he said, to my surprise, "The English are everywhere, they are a fine people—nobel." He also asked me on the quiet whether, when he was well, he would be sent to Siberia. He had been told that the Russians were terrible, but had written home to say that he had found them nothing of the sort.
Much of our talk turned on the Austrian army. The German said that it didn't stand firm "unless it was properly led, by Germans." In Bohemia and Moravia the regiments were mixed, Slavs and Austrian-Germans, and, according to the Moravian soldiers, were constantly quarrelling; all the officers were Austrian-Germans, and even some of the Hungarian regiments seemed to be commanded by Germans. The young Serbian spoke of frequent quarrels and even brawls between Serbian and Hungarian fellow-soldiers. The great wish of all was that the war should end. When I said that the end was not in sight, the German exclaimed, "More misery, more misery;" a second said, "Oh, Jammer, Jammer" (lamentation), and a third had tears in his eyes.
In another ward I heard more of the Bohemians. There Prussia is the antipathy. There appear to be Czech officers only in the reserve. After the outbreak of war, the Austrians made wholesale arrests among the educated Czechs, quite apart from party politics, and were particularly severe on the gymnastic volunteer organisations (sokols), which are popular among all the Slav nationalities of Austria. The Bohemians had not had time to find their legs under the new possibilities created by the Russian successes, but the Russian troops would be sure of a cordial welcome there. The whole of my informant's regiment had surrendered en masse; and even in the mobilisation of 1909, a Prague regiment had refused to march against Russia and several of the men had been shot. I was told that the Austrian army was much weaker in reserves than the Russian.
I ended the day at the railway station, where the Russian wounded just brought in were being attended to, while the cannon sounded from time to time not far off. Several lay on stretchers in the corridors and others on pallets in the ambulance room, all still in their greatcoats and with their kits lying beneath them. I had no conversations here; there was too much pain, one could only sit by the sufferers or perhaps help them to change their position. First aid had been given elsewhere, but this was the stage when the wounds seem to be felt most. There was wonderfully little complaining. Most were silent, except when a helping hand was needed. One man shot through the chest told me that "By the grace of God, it was nothing to matter." It was always a satisfaction to the men that they had been wounded while attacking. A general walked quickly round, distributing cigarettes, which he put in the men's mouths and himself lighted.
In the night the cannonade sounded close to the town, but seemed farther off again next morning.
To-day I also went round a hospital with the dressers. The work was quickly executed, but much of it was very complicated. One does not describe such scenes, not so much because of the ugly character of many of the wounds, nor because of the end impending over many of the patients. To this last the Russian soldier's attitude is simple—gilt es dir, oder gilt es mir. He will speak of it as "going to America," the undiscovered country. But all these things come to be forgotten in the atmosphere of work. Here all the resources of life are going forward in their own slow way, for they can have no quicker, handicapped and outpaced in their struggle to keep up with the work of death. You work early and late, do what you can, and try to be ready for the fresh work of to-morrow.
December 27.
General Radko Dmitriev is a short and sturdily built man with quick brown eyes and a profile reminiscent of Napoleon. He talks quickly and shortly, sometimes drums on the table with his fingers, and now and then makes a rapid dash for the matches. The daily visit of the Chief of the Staff is short, because, as the General says on his return, simple business is done quickly. Every piece of his incisive conversation holds together as part of a single and clear view of the whole military position, of which the watchword is "Forward."
It is only the heavy rains that have saved the retreating Austrians from further losses. The roads are so broken up and so deep with mud that any quick movement is impossible. This gives the occasion for a useful rest. The cold weather—and it is freezing now—will be welcomed on this side; and the Russian winter kits, which have already been served out, are immeasurably better than the thin blue greatcoats of the draggled and demoralised Austrians.
Numbers of Austrian units are so reduced that they are only shadows of what they were, and some seem to have disappeared altogether. The ordinary drafts came in some time ago and are now exhausted—such is the testimony of Austrian officers. The new Russian recruits, on the contrary, will join the colours shortly.
From the beginning of the war, Bosnians, who are really Serbians, surrendered in large numbers. Then the Poles began to come in, and now the Bohemians. The Hungarians are sure to go on to the end; but the Roumanian and Italian soldiers of Austria have also come over very easily. In front of Cracow a Russian officer under fire came on a whole number of Bohemians, who were singing the "Sokol" songs and shouted a greeting as they came into the Russian lines.
These wholesale surrenders have, I think, an extremely interesting political significance. When governments turned the whole people into an army, it was clear that the army was also being turned into the people; but it was not clear how the people could express itself when under army discipline. These surrenders, in their general character and in their differences of detail, are a picture of the feelings and aspirations of the various nationalities which are bundled together under the name of Austria.
January 1, 1915.
At this Staff, as at the General Staff, life was very simple. We all met twice a day for a plain meal without any alcohol; there was plenty of conversation, but it was that of men engaged in responsible work; any news from outside was welcome, especially from the western allies, and there was full appreciation and sympathy for their hard task.
There was plenty of news from other quarters of the Russian front, and one could have a much juster and fuller perspective of how things were going than anywhere behind the army; the two things which stood out even more here than elsewhere were, on the one hand, the immensity of the sacrifices which have been asked and are being cheerfully made by Russia, and, on the other, the sense of quiet confidence as to the ultimate result.
These things were of course talked of here with greater detail. There is a photograph of a battlefield, not with a few straight lines and some scattered dead, but with zigzag lines all close together and simply heaps of Austrian dead (the Russian dead had already been removed). From the attack of one German division on this side, one thousand corpses were counted. The Germans and also the Austrians advance in close column, which may give moral support to the men, but results in terrible losses, as compared with the more individualistic advance of groups of eight to ten on the Russian side. In bayonet fights practically no quarter can be given, and sometimes the men can only use their rifles as clubs. The Austrian army is already no more than a relic of its former self, though it still makes some vigorous moves and covers every retreat with a tremendous cannonade, often resulting in the capture of the guns and men thus left behind. It must not be forgotten that Russia has had to deal with practically all the forces of two of the three allies (Austria and Turkey), as well as with an ever increasing proportion of the forces of the third (Germany). But she is going steadily through with her work, and already it is possible to see more clearly both what has been achieved and how the remainder of the task can be attempted.
After some days in a cottage with some friends, living largely by candle-light and discussing the great social changes which are to be expected in Europe after the war, we were joined by V. S., who had walked in through the thick mud a distance of some twenty miles. V. S. is a young and clever Conservative, who has sat in several Dumas, always a strong and witty enemy of revolution, but never content to sink his conservatism or patriotism in any commonplace formula. He went to the front at the beginning of the war and was wounded in the trenches simultaneously by shrapnel and by bullet. He is now partially recovered and is working energetically for the Red Cross, superintending the removal of the wounded from the front.
V. S. left the neighbouring town in a motor with some Christmas presents for the General. He had only come halfway when his benzine gave out, and, as none was to be got anywhere near, he left the motor with the chauffeur and made the rest of the journey on foot. He had to plough his way through rivers of mud, and when the early night fell he took shelter in a Polish cottage. When he reached us next day he was dead beat and slept for hours.
As soon as his main business was done, we set out together yesterday morning in a long boat-like cart with three horses and a soldier driver; our plan was to find the motor and return to the town, sending back the General's presents in our cart. For some hours we made a sort of slow progress, rolling about in a way that exceeded the North Sea at its nastiest; however, we had time to talk over many subjects that interested us both. We pulled up at the Polish cottage, where V. S. had a most affectionate welcome from the children, and we lunched on bread and milk. We were not out of sight of the cottage when our axle broke; and after finding that there was no smith, and no other cart to be had, we loaded our benzine and chattels on the horses and left the cart at the cottage with a note explaining what was to be done with it.
For several more hours we tramped on in the mud with our pack horses; it was quite impossible to follow the track of the road closely; it was thick with mud too deep to walk through and often the fields were a sort of swamp. At one point we turned in to a Jewish cottage and ate more bread and milk, while our old host asked ceaselessly when the war would end.
At last we found the motor and the chauffeur, and, after a cottage dinner, started on the short remainder of our journey; but we were by no means at the end of our troubles, and this, I was told, was to be expected, because a hare had run across our track. We were going along, dodging the huge and deep ruts in the chaussée, when, close up to one of the hugest and deepest, a cart coming the other way compelled us to make a sudden turn, and we were landed on a kind of plateau between two deep holes with our wheels almost off the ground in them.
We had tried almost all the ordinary expedients in vain, when a long train of soldiers began to pass us with artillery. Appeals of "Brothers, come and help us," brought about a dozen of them to our aid, and they performed prodigies of strength, pushing forwards or backwards, and at one point even raising the whole motor from the ground. Sometimes they counted "one, two, three," sometimes they sang a bargee's chanty, and each of them put the best of his wits to our service; but at last, just after one of them had said "Let's do something a bit more together," the officer in command felt it his duty to call them back to their work, and our brown-coated brothers left us in the semi-darkness while the guns boomed a few versts away.
The chauffeur meanwhile had set himself like a hero to raise the motor out of the ruts. V. S. and I found a cottage with a pile of bricks outside, which we took with the explanation "Needed." After several journeys to and fro we collected a little brickyard; and V. S., though his back was paining him, came dragging a huge log and a tree stump to use for leverage. He still found a free hand to shake mine with the words: "A Happy New Year; it finds us hard at work but full of spirits in spite of everything." The new year began well: the lever acted, the chauffeur made a sort of macadam of his own, and we sailed over the obstacle and on to our destination, which we reached at 1.30 a.m.
These are the conditions of weather and roads under which Russia has to press back the enemy; but she never lets him alone, for she knows that on persistent pressure depends the issue on the allied front.
January 3.
Yesterday I walked out to the lines, which are about four miles out of Tarnow. The railway runs quite straight to the little river which is the Russian front at this point; so I followed the railway embankment, meeting small bodies of troops on the way and a few sentries guarding the bridge over the Biela. It was a beautiful crisp December day, with a blue sky, distant views and a good foothold. To the left lay a long low plateau abutting on the river and crowned with a wooded village and a little church. In front was flat ground, rather marshy, with scattered villages close up to the broken railway bridge. The smoke from burning houses rose at different points to either side of the foreground, and high rugged hills bounded the view. Making my way to some rising ground, I for a time sat in an arbour beside a dismantled and deserted house, with the panorama of plain and villages stretched in front of me, listening to the swirl of the enemy's shrapnel and to the booming replies of a Russian battery. I made my way round to this battery; the men were engaged in improving their underground shelters, which were lined with straw, well heated, and furnished with shelves for a few belongings, including even books, and, anyhow, provided a refuge against frost and bullets. Water was near, and the soldiers' washing was hanging out to dry outside. We couched in the straw and talked of the western front till the word was given to fire. The officer gave the directions and the guns were discharged smartly. A German shell, which broke near us, was greeted with a cry of "Bravo!"; and when the officer announced that the practice was "excellent" the men all cheered. I had more talk in the telephone pit and in the officers' shelter; there was absolute composure, and the men were anxious to move forward again, having been here for over two weeks; I was asked to share any little delicacies that these hermits possessed.
Exchanging good wishes "for health and success" I made my way on through the villages toward the broken bridge. One of a group of soldiers, when I asked the way to the lines, simply pointed, saying "Here, close by." A long line of high earthworks ran close to the stream, on the other side of which were the Germans, their sentry being about 1000 yards away. I entered a hut and drank tea with the battalion commander, an old gentleman in a jersey, who, with charming apologetic gesture, offered me some white bread and chocolate. The telephone gave word of my coming to the staff of the regiment, to which I was piloted over the marsh by a soldier. The Germans shoot at almost any mark, or, even, at hazard, in the darkness; but very few are wounded in this way—this day none, and the day before only one. Scouts go out from time to time and sometimes find a searchlight turned on them. It is a waiting position.
The colonel, a good-looking young man of great simplicity and vigour, entertained me at supper, and we talked late into the night. Everywhere one feels the winning spirit. After the last great halt, on the San, the men went forward with a tremendous rush, and the enemy's rifle pits were filled with dead. Again the talk turned chiefly on the French and English front, and on the necessity of carrying the war to a real settlement. No one can understand why the Germans challenge such enormous losses by their attacks in close columns. Late at night I made my way back to the town; every now and then a few isolated shots rattled in the darkness.
January 5.
I set out late in the evening for a forward ambulance post attached to a famous fighting division. Our party consisted of two soldiers, a niece of Count Bobrinsky, who took such a notable part in the Duma visit to England, and myself. The young Countess, who was enveloped in tarpaulins, is one of the hardest workers in the ambulance. Our cart was stacked with necessaries for the soldiers; on the wall of the courtyard German soldiers had scribbled in large letters expressions of their self-satisfaction, such as "Austria and Germany fear God, and nothing else in the world," and sundry contemptuous allusions to "der Nikolai, der Georg und der Französe."
From the time when we left the lights of the town we had to go mostly on foot, negotiating difficult bits of road and ploughing our way through fluid mud. We passed over high ground and close to the front; all round us was the glare of camp fires and in the distance the flash of projectors. In the darkness we were constantly meeting trains of carts.
At last, on the slope of a hill, we turned into a Polish hut. It had two fairly large apartments, with a big stove and an earthen floor. In the inner room lived the six sisters of mercy: in the outer we were an interesting and strange collection; along one side lay a big bed, on which, crosswise, sat or slept the Polish peasant, his wife, two daughters and little son; in a corner, on a heap of boxes which he had to arrange each night, slept the young priest, the monk, whom I had met before, and one of the most spiritual men whom I have known; the two sanitars and myself made our beds each night beneath the windows (one of which was smashed), removing them each day to make room for the dinner-table. By the stove, or anywhere else, our soldier servants slept on straw.
Not two hundred yards off, but only to be reached by crossing two deep gullies of mud, lay the lazaret of the division, quartered in a white-walled village school. These quarters, I was told, were luxury compared to most of the ordinary stopping places; but we were in a very different atmosphere from the admirably equipped hospitals further back. The wounded arrive all day in large carts or on foot; they come straight from the First Aid stations, which are close up to the actual fighting line; there are no beds, only pallets of straw, on which the men lie down while waiting their turn. They have not yet lost the sense of the battlefield or reached the stage where they are fully conscious of their wounds. They take their places one after another in the cottage chair—in which one of them died yesterday as soon as he had sat down—and the young divisional doctor, with the help of the sisters, removes their first rough-and-ready bandages, and gives them such quick treatment as may enable them to be sent further. It is, of course, the seriously wounded of whom one sees most here, for many of these get no further, dying here, or on the road. From one of them the doctor removed an enormous splinter of shrapnel completely embedded in the body; the largest bombs of all, which the soldiers call "portmanteaux," make terrible wounds.
Here all day and all night the doctors and sisters work at the wounded as they come in. The senior sister, a lady of the most remarkable capacity, takes about one night's sleep in five, but is always as fresh and bright as can be. Her husband, a member of the Duma, travels over Russia for the better organisation of the Duma field hospitals. The transport is in charge of one of the sanitars, the son of a Moscow business man, who has a particularly clear head for work. The whole party, three of whom talk excellent English, are drawn close together by their work; and there is the atmosphere of complete unselfishness which one feels so strongly in anything connected with the Russian soldier. As to our soldier servants, it is clear that their constant preoccupation is to make themselves useful to anyone.
January 6.
We lie at the head of a little valley, some few miles from the Divisional Staff. As the troops move forward new questions are constantly arising; and our transport sanitar, Nikolay Nikolayevich, discusses the possibilities of getting better access for the wounded to the hospitals. We are pressing back the enemy into the Carpathians, and there are halts in front of difficult hill positions. The advance through swamps of mud makes tremendous demands on the men, who have to lie for days in rifle pits full of water; at times a well-chosen and well-entrenched position holds the Russians at bay at a distance of a few hundred yards or less, in one case fifty, and yet they will not go back. "Und auf den Carpathen sind die wege beschneit," often recur to me, these lines of one of the laziest of German student songs, which is a kind of renunciation of all effort.
Nikolay Nikolayevich and I rode over through the snow to the Staff of the Division. He is a charming and simple man, very like one of our own best-known Generals both in face and manner. He lives in a small hut, which is kept very clean. We lunch and discuss transport, and I am asked to carry certain suggestions to the town. On our way back, accompanied by two Cossacks, we pass through Tuchow, a little township half in ruins, and I notice that, as on our way out, some one is still strumming on a piano in a house of which only the walls are standing. The cannon has carried away a large tree and left deep pits near the road.
Driving in the evening to the town, I find groups of wounded, for whom there is no place on the carts, wandering forward in the darkness. The men choose among themselves which I shall take with me: "Let him with the nose go," for one of them has had his face smashed up; the rest move on contentedly, and my passengers give me a word of thanks, which would make any one feel ashamed of himself. This is their Christmas Eve.
It is very wonderful, this self-denying patience of the Russian soldier, and it is too big a thing that one should get tired of speaking of it. A doctor at work here tells me how constantly it is impressed upon him. A man whose chin he has had to remove simply says: "Thank Heaven, now you've tied me up, and I am all right." Another, after his leg has been taken off, as soon as he is able to speak, says: "Ah, but it was a fine fight at Krasny; they gave it us, but we gave it to them too." Another, when he is brought in for operation, is only taken up with the thought that he meets in the operating room an Austrian officer to whom he has attached himself as guide and friend. Anything else that is human comes before any thought of self. I am quite certain that one of the greatest things that this war is doing is its revelation to Europe of the simple goodness of the Russian peasant in the person of the Russian soldier. He is more than the unconscious hero of the moment. The qualities of the real Russian people are going to take their proper place among the best factors in the future of European civilisation.
January 8.
In our halupa (hut) we had those intimate and speculative conversations which seem so natural to Christmas Eve. Monk and Intelligents were on common ground. Only once Father Tikhon put down his foot when one of the party expressed indifference as to the other life. "No," he said, "joking apart, that's not good, least of all in time of war"; and the rebuke was accepted as gently as it was given.
Our Russian Christmas began with the burial of a wounded soldier who had died in the night. In a little waste patch in the snow, near the lazaret, the priest stood in his gorgeous vestments and bowed deep over the new grave, while two soldier choristers sang the beautiful prayers for the dead.
In the evening there was a Christmas Eve service in a room of the lazaret, which Father Tikhon and the soldiers had spent no end of trouble in turning into a chapel. The room was crowded with soldiers, and there was an improvised choir. The simple directions of the priest and the strangeness of the surroundings only added to the deep atmosphere of reverence.
I completed the night service in our hospital in the town. Here the first-floor landing had been turned into a chapel. A matronly sister from Moscow, one of the simplest souls in this work-a-day gathering, served as clerk. The leader of the choir was a young Social Democrat doctor, who had suffered for his convictions at the time of the second Duma; and among the choir were all who had had a training in church singing, which reaches such a high standard in Russia. The singers included sisters, sanitars, soldiers and several of the convalescent wounded, who were wrapped in their long grey dressing-gowns; and one wounded man had been laid on his stretcher among the choir in order that he might take part in the singing. Afterwards we all had cakes and tea; and a conversation as to what England could do, and what would follow in Europe, lasted well into Christmas Day.
We have here with us Bishop Tryphon, of Moscow, who, like the Bishop of London, asked leave to accompany the army, and is now the Superior, or Rural Dean, of one of our Divisions. The Russian army has a staff of army chaplains with an Arch-Presbyter or Chaplain General, as in England; but many priests have enrolled specially for the war. Some have been killed, others wounded, others taken prisoner; some have been specially honoured for serving the Liturgy to regiments under fire. I am told that Father Tikhon's first sermon under fire was wonderfully simple and impressive. One regimental priest told me how a shell burst in his quarters, blowing a medical attendant to bits and leaving himself with a bad contusion.
Bishop Tryphon took a prominent part in the entertainment of our Bishops in Moscow, and sends them by me a message of greeting and good wishes. He arranged a solemn Christmas Day service, with trained singers who were serving in the army. He later visited the hospitals, giving short and plain addresses, and his blessing to each branch of the Red Cross work in turn. There was a great Christmas tree in the station, where presents were distributed to four hundred wounded. Gifts were also distributed under fire by the hospital workers to the soldiers in the trenches some miles from the town.
In the evening I took part in a Christmas gathering in one of the big hospitals. Everyone's health was drunk in turn by Christian name, the whole being woven into a long song. Afterwards we sang songs of the Volga, and some stayed on talking till five in the morning, resuming their work a few hours later.
January 10.
Returning to our halupa in the little village, I rode over in the night to the General to convey the results of my journey. It was almost pitch dark and the road was in most places a simple swamp of mud, sometimes with gaping holes in the causeway or with beams or trunks of trees lying about; and though I had a soldier and a lantern, the ten miles took over four hours. Next morning we left the halupa: the dismantling process made the hut look more desolate, and while our things were being packed, the peasant family sat on their bed, looking on like moony spectators at some rustic entertainment. They showed more than satisfaction with their payment, which they expressed after the local fashion by kissing every one's hands; but they had now to expect the arrival of a fresh batch of strangers.
Our forward move of a few miles was carried out with great expedition; but our carts made quite a long train, and the movement of even a small ambulance section is in itself, under such conditions, almost an exploit. Just in front of me went our Austrian field kitchen with three separate cauldrons, which is found very useful. In a few hours we were installed in our new quarters, a great improvement on the halupa, within a stone's throw of the divisional lazaret and the now reopened railway station. From beyond a near wooded hill came the sound of almost continuous firing.
We were now close behind the line of the front ambulance points. At the station, which we put in order for their reception, there was a constant dribbling stream of soldiers who had come almost straight from the front. Most of them had walked in with their kits, and many seemed almost unconscious of their wounds. Their conversation was of comrades who stood at other points in the line, of the relative distance of the enemy and of the conditions of work in the rifle pits.
Through the thick mud the Russians are driving the Austrians upward over the deeply indented country of the Carpathian region. The enemy entrenches himself strongly, making much use of complicated wire entanglements which can only be carried with a rush. Thus, the heavily clad Russians, whose efforts have pushed the enemy all this way, have sometimes to dig themselves in as best they can at a few paces from the enemy—1000, 500, 100 or even 50. The rifle pits are full of water, straw makes hardly any difference, and as soon as a head is shown it is shot at; many of the wounded have fallen at the moment of rising from the trenches. The Austrians continue a rumbling fire nearly all night. On the other hand, some of our men have seen the shells from the heavy Russian artillery falling plump in the middle of the enemy and have seen how they scatter under the fire of the Russian machine guns. The Russians use less ammunition with much more effect. I have met several Russians who have had at different points fifteen or seventeen days on end of this soaking trench work. One officer, who had had two long doses of it, had contracted rheumatism in one place and bronchitis in another and was resting in a hospital with the hope of getting back as soon as possible. A wounded soldier asked Father Tikhon to write a request that he should be sent back to his regiment as soon as possible. One man at the station, twice wounded in hand and in chest, asked that this time he should be sent to recover in his native town.
The station was very soon in order. One of the sisters went round distributing clean underwear. "Change while you can, children," she said; "we shall give you some tea and soup, and pack you into the train, and send you straight off to Russia"; and in a few hours the first train had arrived and the station was cleared for further work. In the dusk, the military ambulance men set out again to collect more of the wounded under fire.
What is happening is, shortly, this. The Russians, who had first to deal mainly with the Austrians, leaving the Germans to us, have now got within sight of the end of this part of their task. A first-class military power has been so pounded and smashed and has been repulsed in so many vigorous counterstrokes that it is coming to have only a secondary importance. Meanwhile the bulk of the Russian forces is now devoted to meeting the incessant and desperate initiative of the Germans. Russia's new defensive front on this side runs in a straight line to the point where it covers the Russian conquest in Galicia. It is now being extended further south to the natural barrier of the Carpathians. The interval made necessary by the operations in the north is not being wasted by the victorious troops in the south. When we get to the end of the Austrian efforts and have a mountain barrier to safeguard us on that side, these forces will be able to act with much more effect against the Germans. Russia, by accounting for Austria and concentrating her attack on Germany, will have done more than her full share of the work in the common cause. "Honour is not to be divided," said Ney when he stormed the heights of Elchingen; and it is in this spirit of generous rivalry that the Allies move forward.
By a little arrangement room was made in our small quarters for a New Year's feast, to which the divisional doctors were all invited. Father Tikhon had turned the local hall of the Sokols into a Russian church, and the evening service was crowded with soldiers. There was great delight in unpacking the gifts and delicacies received from Petrograd, and soon the guests began to arrive. It was all the simple talk of men accustomed to great privations: some of it turned on a comparison of unpleasant bivouacs; for instance, one told of a night spent in driving wind and rain on an open slope by the light of a burning village; he hoped the wind would blow over some of the warmth from the flames, till at last shelter and sleep were found in a ditch. Another officer was drowsing in a hovel when the door was opened, there entered a strong smell of coarse tobacco and a heavy weight fell on him; he woke in the morning to find a soldier asleep across his knees. An artillery officer, a fine-looking man, told of the tremendous work of the mobilisation and of the strain which war life puts upon the hardest nerves. Regimental doctors have, of course, had to work under fire for weeks on end. Every one discounts the heavy German mortars which in the field do very little damage in comparison with their expense. As to the Austrian bullets, one doctor says that it takes a man's weight of bullets to wound a man. When the trenches are near they come pouring in a sort of continuous rain. One man who insisted on standing up had thirty-six bullets through him directly. When the distance is a hundred to two hundred yards, especially where there is no natural cover, continuous sniping goes on. The line not being straight, but varied by all sorts of indentations, due to the lie of the ground and to the Russians' desire to get as close as possible to the enemy, the former at many points crouch in the temporary and flooded holes which they have scratched out for themselves, perhaps all the while under a cross fire. Men are killed going out with long scissors to cut the Austrian wire entanglements. Many a man has fallen in a crawling excursion to dig up a potato. The sniping becomes a kind of game, and it was described as such by two Russian soldiers, of whom one had knocked over nine Austrians and the other sixteen. The Austrians fire a lot of random shots in the night which are in most cases a sheer waste of powder; but it was hard on a man who was relieved after a week's rifle pits to be hit by a bullet in the night on his way back, as far as a mile from the front.
The last hours of the Russian Old Year I spent in a goods carriage. My companions kept reckoning whether we should reach the town by midnight. Twelve o'clock was well past when the train drew up heavily a verst from the station and we were told that it would go no further. We scrambled out into the snow, when suddenly from the lighted station there rose in full orchestra, strong and triumphant, the most beautiful and the most religious of national anthems. It was played three times, and the notes may even have been carried to the neighbouring Germans beyond the river. This was our Russian New Year: and in the station a colonel was dismissing his men with the words, "For this year I wish you health and victory."
Next day the stretch of railroad that we had traversed and the carriage in which we had supped was cannonaded by the biggest German shells. The bombardment went on all day and night, the huge "portmanteaux" making tremendous holes and falling for the most part far wide of their only mark, the railway, and carrying ruin and mutilation to many of the inhabitants, who are thus encouraged by the beaten enemy to remain Austrian subjects. There is hardly any object in this bombardment, which is put down to the Germans and has roused great indignation among the many wounded Austrian officers and men who are lying here in hospital. Not a soldier has been touched; but wounded civilians, men, women and children, have been brought in to the different hospitals.
January 16.
The bombardment, which was continued yesterday, has created a certain excitement here, but nothing approaching to panic. The big "portmanteaux" are very ugly things and make an unpleasant noise, but only two shots can be said to have produced any results worth mention. The prevailing mood is one of vigour and interest.
I have had some informing conversations with wounded officers of the enemy. They indicate a definite mental attitude very different from ours. I see no trace of religious enthusiasm and little of nationality in the wider sense. The Germans have the greatest confidence and pride in their army. They tell me that two million volunteers were inscribed at the beginning of the war—an enormous fact, if correct. The attitude of the German women is such that no man who can serve dares to remain at home. My informants fully realise that for Germany the war is a matter of life and death. They have served on the western front and described the French fortresses as extremely strong ("brillant"). The Bavarians are terrible in warfare and spread alarm among the population. The losses of the first move through Belgium were enormous. The Belgians are described as excellent soldiers, and large German losses are put down to them. In the march on Paris the reserves and the commissariat could not keep up. The retreat is accepted as an unpleasant necessity. There was a certain pedantry among my informants in insisting on the need of turning the allied right wing, whatever should happen at other points. They claimed that the Germans were now in Calais.
Large losses against the Russians were admitted, but it was claimed, without any real evidence, that the Russians had lost more. Again, there was a kind of machine-like insistence on the need of attack in columns with reserves close up—as this was "our tactics." The Germans had so far been saved by the default of any real Russian winter, which would have ruined the German transport and artillery and robbed their operations of all effect. What struck me most was the absence of any real intelligence as to the political issues in debate. My informants were, for reasons of humanity, in favour of a status quo peace.
Some Austrians gave an interesting account of the origin of the war. The Austro-Serbian quarrel was not political but personal. The Serbian dynasty, failing to obtain any satisfactory recognition from Austria, was credited with a personal hostility against the late Archduke, who was described as in general a friend of the Slavs. Proof in support of this view of his end had been widely circulated in Austria in December. The personal quarrel between the reigning houses of Austria and Serbia had been turned by the insistence of the Emperor William into an occasion for a European war, specially directed against Russia, into which Austria had been hurried against her will. Her present position now was described as very precarious.
To a Hungarian officer I put the question whether the war had produced any real poetry in Hungary. He answered that there had been some rough-and-ready effusions among the working classes, whom he described as militant in their habits in time of peace and always ready for any war, especially with Russia. But the educated classes were not well disposed either to war or to this war.
It is rarely that one meets among these wounded of the enemy any other disposition than a strong desire for peace. I should add that several of them have asked me to communicate to their relations that they were being treated with the greatest kindness in Russia; "I am lovingly tended," wrote one of them. An Austrian colonel, a fine soldier and gentleman, told me he should never forget the "Anständigkeit" (decency) of all the Russians with whom he had had to do since his capture. Even Germans who at first are challenging and hostile, are softened by the true humanity with which they are surrounded in the Russian hospitals.
January 22.
The town has been bombarded for several days on end, beginning with the Russian New Year, January 14. The Germans had given a foretaste on our own Christmas Eve. They dropped from an aeroplane a paper bearing the words: "We ask you not to shoot on December 25; we will send you presents": the text of the telegram I had from the Commandant of the town, to whom it was taken. For all that, and though the Russian artillery was instructed only to reply, five heavy bombs were fired into the town and some of the inhabitants were wounded.
There were other Christmas "presents" which I have seen, sent by the Austrians with a parleyer and a white flag. With other objects of no importance were six matchboxes full of matches and containing also short manifestoes printed in Russian and addressed to the troops. They were signed "Your unfortunate Tsar, Nicholas"; and they informed the Russian soldiers that the Emperor knew the war would ruin Russia and had sought to avoid it, but had been forced into it by the Grand Duke Nicholas and the "perfidious" Russian generals, against whom the soldiers were invited to turn their arms. I have not often seen a document so conspicuously lacking in humour.
Punctually at midnight of January 13, one Russian regiment received two large shells bearing on their case the words "Congratulations on the New Year." The next day the town, though it had no troops in it, was shelled severely, and this bombardment was kept up for several days. The chief mark, and a very legitimate one, was the railway; here there fell in all six large bombs, making holes some twenty feet in diameter and ten in depth. But the great majority of the bombs fell in other parts of the town; and two of them rattled close over the roof of two different hospitals while I was in them, and the splinters of a third flew into the lodging of the workers of another lazaret.
In one of these hospitals, a local one now served by the Russian Red Cross, a large proportion of the patients are wounded of the enemy, including officers, most of them too badly hit to be removed without danger to their lives; and these were greatly agitated by the shells passing so near to them. Hurried councils were held by the different Red Cross authorities. One hospital, where the shells continued to fall quite near, left the town. The most serious cases were moved to the local hospital, where the Russian Red Cross courageously decided to remain. Here are also to be found many local inhabitants, wounded by bullets and shrapnel in the town or in neighbouring villages under fire; and one room is mostly filled with little Polish boys, all of them wearing a little silver religious medal round their necks. Here, too, are the inmates of a Polish hut who were injured by the explosion of a hand grenade; in a space of about twelve feet square, some sixteen persons were thus wounded; the father is dead and the mother and one of the children are out of their minds.
These are all cases that have come under my notice; and of course there are many others. Yet it is wonderful how the inhabitants remain in their huts under fire in the hope that the worst is over or in despair of finding any other shelter. From one such hut, after the last and finally crushing shot, there issued an old man of nearly seventy with a pipe in his mouth and entirely unharmed. I remember that on my first visit to Lvov, I heard a barrel organ repeating about fifty times the beautiful Polish national hymn: "From the Smoke of Fires"; in the Lublin province, on a line of some seventy miles, I found almost every other village half demolished. It is everywhere Poland that suffers; and it will be hard if some new life for this unhappy people does not rise out of their present ordeal.
There must be endless espionage in this town. An Austrian was found by one of our priests at the top of a tower working a telephone, and to the priest's question he replied that he was "sending word as to fires," which was no doubt strictly true. If so, it is a pity that the shots were not better directed. There is no question that the guns at work were not Austrian but German. General Radko Dmitriev came without delay to the town, and distributed the George medal for bravery among the workers of the Red Cross.
January 23.
I have been visiting some of the Regimental First Aid stations. In principle each regiment of four battalions should have five doctors and a captain of bearers. The bearers are selected from each company and can be supplemented by soldiers who volunteer for this service. They must be sound and strong; in peace time they march with their companies, carrying the rifle, and meet for a course of instruction twice a week. They are expected to gather under their captain before an action and to go out to the field to pick up the wounded only at night time, or after the action is over. In the present war it is seldom possible to maintain the full complement of regimental doctors. As battles have continued for weeks on end, it has been quite impossible to limit the bearers' work to less dangerous times; and it has been found most convenient to send them to the trenches with their respective companies, as they could then get to work as soon as they were wanted, and could also know the least dangerous track from their companies to the first-aid points. Ordinarily four bearers are assigned to one wounded: but as the track under fire is often long and exposed, it is sometimes necessary to send out eight men together, to carry by turns. They are supposed to have a leader, but in practice any one gives a lead, and if good it will be followed. The mortality in this service is considerably higher than in the ranks, as this is largely a war of cover, and these are the men who are most deprived of it.
Every Russian soldier is supplied with a packet containing lint, two compresses and a fastening pin. The object of the first bandaging is simply to stop the flow of blood and keep out dirt; and the wounded man is bandaged on the spot by himself, some comrade, or a feldsher (a trained medical assistant), one of whom is in the trenches with each company.
During the seventeen days of fighting on the San, the wounded had to be carried by relays over a long exposed slope and in many cases over the river. It was found possible to divide the distance into different sections; but the workers in each section were under fire, and so was the regimental point, which might sometimes be in a hut, but was more often a patch of open ground, with a tent stretched over it, or with no covering at all. There were instances where wounded and bearers alike were crushed by a shell on their road; for the Austrians poured endless artillery volleys on to given points. For all that, when the Russian trenches were examined after the battle, it was found that the bearers' work had been carried out completely, and that all the wounded had been removed.
The tremendous mortality of this war has put a specially hard strain on this service. Yet it is one of those which it would be most difficult to supplement with volunteers. Untrained men would be almost certain to be killed off soon; and indeed the appearance of bearers on the field is at once an indication to the enemy of the positions of the troops.
It has been found quite impossible, with the present range of artillery, to keep the regimental points in security. The work has therefore to be dispatched with the greatest expedition. The regiments, for mobility, dispense with any superfluous material and appliances and send their patients as soon as possible to the divisional lazaret, where the first really serious treatment is received.
Lazarets further back have often, as I have previously mentioned, been under fire. Austrian prisoners tell me that they have often seen their artillery fire on field hospitals; and from Russian observation points it has several times been noticed that the Austrian fire has been opened on what could only be a hospital field train. One of the subjects discussed with me by wounded officers of both sides is the possibility of securing further respect for the Geneva Convention and even a further definition of its regulations; but at present the overpowering stress under which we all live seems to be carrying us to the total disregard of any limitations at all.
January 27.
After a talk with the Divisional General, I set out for a visit to the regiments at the front. My orderly told me with pride that this was the best fighting Division in the army; certainly it has that reputation in other quarters and has three times in this campaign done decisive work against superior odds. It has rushed the Austrians from point to point, and would do so still unless they had taken refuge in the hill country before the Carpathians, where every hill has to be won in turn. Its General, an old man full of fire and energy, has received three wounds, which, as he says, make for him a calendar of the war.
The way lay between pleasant fir-clad hills, and late in the evening I reached the X regiment, with quite a good-sized house for its headquarters. The Colonel, who was very simple and businesslike, lived with his staff in the dining-room by a kind of half-light and with picnic fare, of which, as always in Russia, much more than his share was pressed upon the guest. The talk was that of comrades at serious work. These men will all go to the end, but they don't find it necessary to say so. When one said something about finishing at Berlin, a young officer put in with a smile: "Do you know, if we do, I expect none of us will be alive by then?"
I spent the night in the regimental doctor's hut, and next day went off to the artillery observation point. It was a clear day and we could see not only our own lines and the enemies', but also some of the Austrians walking about near their trenches. A shell from us sent them scattering back into their burrows, and our guns were then turned on one point after another, the shells, as we could see, always exploding on or very close to the object aimed at; this day, there was only a half-hearted reply. The following day, I saw the guns themselves at work; the place of the battery was not likely to be located. It is very seldom during the war that a Russian battery has been silenced by the enemy. The Austrians, on the other hand, often place their guns on the crests of hills and have suffered severely from the accuracy of the Russian artillery, which is one of the striking features of the whole campaign. There is, further, this difference, that the Russians never fire without a target, whereas the Austrians in the most systematic way sweep whole areas in turn, as a rule doing extraordinarily little damage for the powder expended. One colonel suggested that the Emperor Francis Joseph must have more money than he knows what to do with.
In the evening I set out with a party of soldiers for the infantry trenches. With a clear moon lighting the snow-clad slopes we made our way along the more exposed lines; there was no sign of life, though the Austrian trenches could be seen quite near. Passing under shelter we found the Russian mud huts, which take only three or four hours to make and give good cover from weather, bullets and shrapnel, but not from bombs. We sat for some time in an angle of the entrenchments; here several bombs had fallen close to a very exposed hut, in which however, the inhabitants still remained. We passed the night in another hut, which we could only enter in the dark for fear of drawing the enemy's fire. The scouts came in for instructions, headed by a young volunteer who was doing his first work of this kind. Voices went on long into the night; reports came in from various points. The scouts returned about 3 a.m. They had come on a body of Austrians double their force in a wood; they let themselves be nearly surrounded, then threw a hand-grenade with effect and scrambled back to our lines; as the whole Austrian line opened fire the reconnaissance had achieved its object, which was to ascertain whether the enemy had made any changes in his positions. In the early morning appeared an Austrian officer who had made his way across to us. He was smiling so broadly that I saw his smile before I saw the man. He was a Ruthenian and was married to a Serbian, so that all his sympathies were long since on our side; his wife was already under Russian rule in conquered Galicia, and his own great wish was to fight in the Serbian army. The Russian officers made him completely at home at once, putting their breakfast and their servants at his disposal; when a few hours later another Ruthenian fugitive arrived, our last-found ally helped to make him feel comfortable, stroking his face and relieving his apprehensions, amid the broad smiles of the Russian soldiers.
The day we spent under the fire of 180 bombs, which fell often along the line of the entrenchments, but only wounded some five or six men. It was very unpleasant for the infantry to have to sit under this alarming noise, and certainly the men would infinitely have preferred to attack. From the Austrian side no other sign was made, and there was no such mark as the Russian artillery or infantry think it worth while to fire at.
In the evening I was coming back on horseback in the twilight when a shell fell on the road close in front of me. This was the last as far as I was concerned, and I slept in comfort at the first-aid point of the regiment.
January 29.
On my way to the H regiment I had to pass over a commanding plateau, and from hence, looking backward, I could see endless and intermingling lines of wooded hills with the main masses of the Carpathians in the far distance. I commented to my orderly on the beauty of the view, and as usual when I made any pointless remark, he replied courteously, "I understand," which meant "I don't."
Shrapnel was falling by a fir-wood on the crest, and we took a lower road to the regimental staff. The Colonel was a soldier of an English type, with a grace which I have seldom seen in a man. Altogether, minds seem more at ease at the front than anywhere else in Russia; there is the fullest consciousness of heavy losses and of straining conditions, but all this seems only to make every-day life more simple. There was a strange incident after lunch: one of the regimental doctors had just gone out of the door when he was bitten by a mad dog that was running wild in the woods, and the place had to be burnt out with a hot iron. One comes on many "extras" of this kind, which have nothing to do with the war but seem to fit themselves into it.
When twilight was come, I made another of these foot-pace rides over frozen fields and gullies to the lines of the regiment. Halfway, by some trees and a stream, we met a very young soldier who reported the presence of "Free Austrians" in a neighbouring hut. These turned out to be only the local peasants; and my orderly, who was an old soldier, was very outspoken with his rebuke. We soon reached a hut, containing two commanders of battalions, with a young officer who seemed to me a type of that fearlessness that I have seen everywhere in the Russian army. They wanted to give away all their chocolates and other luxuries, and sent guides to take me to the trenches.
We had to climb one of the steepest hills I have ever gone up. Fortunately it was covered with light scrub: otherwise I should never have got to the top, for the frozen and clouted soil was so slippery that one slid back at every step. Yet up this hill the Russian troops had gone at night under the fire of the defending Austrians not many days before, and I was told that the ground was then in even worse condition. The storming of these hills one after the other calls for the most reckless courage; but this kind of task is the favourite work of the Russian soldier.
Halfway up, we took an "easy" in the mud hut of a superior officer. We sat together in the straw with our toes to the stove, and, as is often the case, the talk was not about the war at all, but about the human things that most interest the Russian mind: about the characters in Russian literature and the future of Russia. Naturally there is also a good deal now to be said about England; and nowhere more than in the trenches does one notice how every one wishes to give us the best word, just as the guest receives the best of the fare. England's share in the war was put to me, with a real thought and kindness, much better than I could have put it myself. In these rough surroundings where ordinary comforts must all be dispensed with, there is nothing that makes them seem so unnecessary or that so stamps the character of officers and men alike, as a certain delicacy of mind which seems to me the ideal of good breeding.
Reaching the top we went over some ground which by day was almost impassable and was covered with huge holes made by shells, and I slept in an officer's mud hut just behind the trenches, where the five of us lay literally packed in like sardines. Some shells fell during the night; but the Austrians did not ordinarily open a regular fire till ten in the morning. The last few days they had covered the brow of this hill with shells. A hut standing on the summit and some farm buildings in a hollow behind had been smashed to bits. To-day there was a fog, so that even the Austrians did not make their usual aimless cannonade. But they sent us in the course of the day what might be called a mixed packet: the mortars, field and mountain artillery machine guns and rifles all coming into play at one time or other. In particular there were chance rifle shots on all sides. The Russian trenches, despite the concentrated fire of the last few days, had suffered very little; and here as elsewhere it appeared that, though only explosive shells are effective against entrenchments, even they are comparatively harmless. This day I was able to pass along the front of the regiment and even further forward. My general impression was that the Russian superiority is so great that all neutral ground may almost be reckoned as Russian. The Russians are always ready to venture into this unknown land; the Austrians, on the contrary, expect attacks from all sides, answer every isolated shot with a wild volley, and are ready to fire at anything, even a fog. Two or three Austrian soldiers came across; they were loutish youths, not like soldiers, and had only quite recently joined the colours; there have been instances of prisoners who did not know to what regiment they belonged and had not yet received their rifles. I was present while the Colonel examined some prisoners, and the tale they told of the conditions in the Austrian trenches was pitiable: water in the trenches, thin coats and ridiculously ineffective boots, constant diarrhœa from eating fresh meat; the roughest treatment from the officers (nearly all Germans), who themselves avoided all danger and privations; a Hungarian battalion at one time put to discipline them and shots fired at them from behind; regiments reduced to a quarter of their strength, boy recruits without any training, discordant elements in a given regiment, a general and growing resentment against Germany and the German Kaiser, a keen longing for peace, and an almost epidemic desire to surrender. This is the consequence of six months' punching, which has, however, cost heavy losses to the Russians.
February 4.
Every one here—particularly the young men who are in the Red Cross—is naturally drawn as by a magnet to work being as near as possible to the actual front. Different people show this in different ways; some are restless, some are evidently there in thought, others keep it to themselves as an intimate purpose which they only mention when their desire is to be satisfied. Often this satisfaction is long in coming, even when it has long been worked for and seems quite near. F., a quiet, self-contained young man, asked leave to go off with the bearers in the hope of learning how to help later in carrying the wounded, and I saw him ride off in his grey mantle with set face; but that time he got no further than the regimental headquarters. K., one quiet evening, told me how all was arranged for regular volunteer work in the trenches, but everything is still uncertain and he will anyhow have to wait for some weeks.
The fact is that this creditable straining after the most dangerous work of all, for it is more dangerous than that of the soldiers in the firing line, does not easily fit in with the requirements of the army. There are certain dangers which it is madness to court, not only in one's own interest but in that of others, and especially of the troops themselves. For instance, a body of volunteer helpers would simply by their appearance indicate the positions of the troops and draw the fire of the enemy, and would probably have to return without any wounded. Such experiments have been made with doubtful success. It is only by following the wishes of the commanders, and learning from them how and when help can be given, that any good can be done; and this means that it is necessary to stand near to some given military unit and earn the confidence of its chief.
A few days ago I had a chance meeting with a few men in rough winter coats, who came in together and sat down to a hasty meal. They were of different ages, but all bore the stamp of the simple seriousness of the front. It was the same with their talk. We discussed the meaning of this war for the Russian soldier—that is, for the Russian peasant—and I expressed my conviction that this war is one of the greatest stages in history, in the manifestation of the true qualities of the Russian people to Europe. The quietest of the party, a middle-aged doctor, intervened to say that this idea pleased him; the Russian seemed uncultured because he took less thought for comforts and contrivances, but all his care was for the biggest things of all; the scope of his vision might indeed help to broaden the heart of Europe; and it was good to feel that all this quiet and selfless heroism would not go for nothing.
I learned that these men belonged to the most famous and the most forward of the Red Cross organisations. No. 14 is headed by a military man; it has three doctors, several students and 130 soldier-bearers. It was the first to attach itself to a given Division, and, by waiting for its chances and always keeping close up, it has so far made the most interesting experiments in volunteer help. I expressed my respect; but my acquaintances hastened to tell me that the reports of their work were highly exaggerated, and they gave me a plain prose picture of what they did and of things that might be done.
Yesterday I paid a visit to No. 14. They were in clean quarters in a little scattered village in the snow some five miles from the front. They had good quarters for first aid and some twenty very practical carriages for the transport of the wounded. The soldier-bearers were drawn up in line and received a message of thanks for their work from the General. Six of them, and two of the students, had the George medal for bravery, bestowed for their work on the San.
Travelling on to the regimental staff, we entered the atmosphere of which I have written above. The regimental surgeon described with enthusiasm the work of No. 14, especially when the regiment was in movement; at such times he could not have possibly coped with his work alone. He himself was forbidden by the regulations to work further forwards.
Somewhat farther on stood a village, with a lofty church that had been struck by several shells. To appear beyond the village was at once to draw fire, as it lay along the Dunajec, beyond which were the enemy. There was no natural cover; but our side of the stream, which is not a broad one, was lined with a kind of embankment. However, we also held the bridge and a bridge-head on the other side. As this bridge-head was faced and flanked by the enemy's trenches it was constantly under the closest fire; and every night, especially when it was dark, the bridge was under a continuous shower of bullets and shrapnel, while by day the appearance of a single person at once called forth a volley. We were not allowed to cross this bridge, nor was any one allowed to come across to us, for at the time of our visit it was under rifle fire and shrapnel. But in the earthworks beyond there has been put up in the trenches a first-aid point with approaches from the sides and all necessary appliances; here the wounded can be attended to and kept under some kind of shelter till a slackening of the fire, perhaps once in twenty-four hours, allows of their transport across the bridge; and here at this point, prohibited to the regimental surgeon, lives, sleeps and works Dr. Vladimir Petrovich Roshkov, who spoke to me of the quiet heroism of the Russian soldier and of his faith in the qualities of the Russian people.
February 21.
After my visit to No. 14 I was laid up with a bad chill, but after two weeks I was able to resume my journeyings.
I arrived at the N regiment in a cab, or rather did not arrive, because we stuck in a sea of mud. The Polish cabman, plaintive but polite, described it as an "awful drive," and seemed inclined to stay there all night, till some soldiers came and dragged us out.
The Colonel and his two adjutants lived in the usual hut. These Polish cottages are very clean and well furnished, with handsome stoves, decorated roofs, sometimes a divan, and in all cases rows of religious pictures encircled with wreaths of artificial flowers.
We had the usual telephone-interrupted night and a long talk about the Colonel's earlier experiences in Austria. He now had in front of him an Austrian regiment whose guest he had been when on his travels.
Next day I rode to some of the positions. One could get close up to them without danger. We walked forward, through brushwood and swamp, with sentries at various points, up to the rapid Dunajec. To the right some of our positions were across the stream; to the left it was itself the dividing line. Here there was a broken bridge, and on either side of the break were the opposing sentries, who occasionally took snapshots at each other at short range. The German lines and their wire entanglements were plainly visible, but at midday the view was as bare and desolate as the ship of the "Flying Dutchman" before the awakening. One of the most curious things in war is the tacit convention that develops itself illogically out of a set of circumstances entirely novel. In open day to show oneself here is ordinarily to be killed, yet at certain hours, fixed rather by instinct than by reason, there is an unspoken truce of which both sides take advantage. Photographs could be taken, and we returned in peace to the main positions.
In the evening I set out for some more distant trenches where the enemy was Austrian. I stopped to take tea at a point where some of the inhabitants were being examined. I have seen a good deal of this, and have always found that the Russians, if anything, erred on the side of leniency. There are undoubted communications between the lines, but, apart from the most obvious espionage, the most that is done is to remove suspects from the ground nearest to the trenches. We went forward on foot in the twilight, with a good moon and a clear sky, and with a full view of the enemy's ground, though we ourselves were indistinguishable from our surroundings. We soon came on the trenches, which were elaborate, deep, and for the most part dry. My host here was one of those ideal persons who seem made for such conditions of life. I will call him George, because he is one of the most worthy knights of that Order of bravery. I asked him how he won this distinction, and after starting the briefest account of a village taken and communications secured he broke it off saying: "For execution of orders." He was a big man with kind eyes, a manner prompt and natural, and the simplest address to his soldiers.
It was now comparatively safe to traverse a bit of more open ground and visit some other positions. Here again the works were excellent, and George required some still further improvements. The men were in good heart and vigour; and across the plain we could hear how the younger soldiers of a neighbouring regiment were singing in lusty chorus one of their favourite war-songs.
A voice came across from the Austrian lines which were here only a few hundred yards off: "The Russians are singing—Peace." Answering shouts of song came from the Austrian trenches, but they were feeble and soon ended sharply as if by order. We made our way back in the dark to our central entrenchments.
After a half-hour's talk on the straw in our earth hut the moon had waned, though the stars were still shining bright all over the sky. With a guide I passed through some trees down the slope to the river and beyond the line of our trenches. It was reported that there were signals and signs of movement beyond the river, and all the men were ordered to be clothed and ready.
My guide was one of those native gentlemen who are so common among the Russian peasants and are to be met everywhere in the army, entirely selfless, indifferent to all danger except for others, and full of quiet, childlike intelligence of the great issues engaged. His hand, a strong and gentle one, was there to help my every movement with the instinct of the most devoted of family servants. The whispered talk came with a strange freshness, and the whole atmosphere of our excursion was that of another world more real than our own. We entered a dwelling where the watch sat round a smoky camp fire. There was a brisk salute, and the answer to my greeting from England was "Very pleasant." What they all liked to hear about was how we were preparing new armies. "Then we'll take him on both sides," whispered my companion as we left the watch, "and we'll surround him—the barbarian."
We crept slowly forward till we came up with the second of the two advanced sentries, a young man crouched on his knee with rifle loaded and ready. Here we stayed a little time, with now and then the lowest whisper, and in front of us the rushing river, beyond which were the sentries of the enemy; sky and air were clear. We crept on to the forward sentry on the bank, and were crouching beside him when a rocket went up in front of us beyond the river followed by a blaze of light and then a second and a third. "Lie down, your nobility," whispered my companion, and we lay as still as we could together while four rifle shots cracked at us. We could hear each other's breathing in the few seconds while the blaze hung above us. We had all crawled back to the second sentry when the rocket went up again followed by more shots, but this time we had some little shelter. We returned and bade "Good-night" to the Watch and lay for a while in a shelter close by, with a whispered talk of our joint task. On the way up the hill there were more rockets and more shots at us, but we were soon back at the earth hut with its welcome shelter and its friendly host, and the straw screen that served as a door shut on a good night and a sound sleep.