Evening Republican, Volume 18, Number 281, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 28 November 1914 — Page 2

DAY ON THE BAHLEFRONT AS SEEN THROUGH EYES OF FRENCH SOLDIER

Being a Composite Account, Compiled From Many Sources and Founded on Incidents That Are Authentic, of a Battle as the Private Sees It—All in the Day’s Work of the Modem Warrior.*

(The private soldier—what does he do? What does he think? How does he feel? These are the questions that hundreds of persons Msk themselves every day. These are the questions which the censor rarely sees fit to answer. It Is only from the private's letters to his wife or his sweetheart that we can get an insight into the heart of the man whose sole duty It Is to Obey orders. The following article is an . attempt to reconstruct, out of the material furnished by hundreds of letters printed In the English and French newspapers, the battle as the private sees it. Manifestly the picture Is a composite one. but the incidents are authentic, every one!) London. Yesterday morning I inarched with my regiment from the Tillage of Roye in a northeasterly direction, not being exactly aware of my destination. We knew, however, that we were going to the front to relieve a regiment which for a week had been facing the shrapnel Are from the German howitzers. The march was not a long one, which pleased us mightily, for when there is fighting to be done we like to get it over with as quickly as possible. All the way we could hear the booming of great guns, and the lesser but no less ominous rattle of what they used to call musketry. This roaring and rattling grew in volume so steadily and at last became so terrific (though it was little more than dawn! that we realized we were approaching the big muss. Furnished With Day's Ration. I should say, of course, that we were in reality a part of a great detachment of whose numbers I have no definite knowledge. At a guess, there mlist have been 60,000 of us marching forward on this morning. We were furnished, each of us, with a day’s ration in addition to the emergency ration, with which we were each provided on leaving Paris, and upon which we have had as yet no occasion to make demand. All the ground over which we inarched had been fought over in the past week and there were many burned and ruined houses. Great trees had been cut down by shells and now and then in the open fields we could see immense caverns made by exploding ehells, some of which were wide enough and deep enough to hold a horse and wagon. In other places we saw the beginnings of trenches which had probably been evacuated before they were half completed. Now and then ®e would pass a scared peasant, but whether woman or man, they showed little animation. The horror of the Germans was too fresh in their minds. It was funny now and then to see a tiny little house surrounded by trees with autumn flowers blooming in the garden all about it, and no sign of war about the place, except the utter absence of life. The fields were bare of cattle. No dog rushed out to bark at the passing troops and defy their invasion; only now and then a cat sunned herself in the embrasure of the desolate window. Wounded Men Gay. We passed for a while heavily laden ammunition trains and chugging mo-tor-drawn field guns, big ones, even if they are not the 16-inchers they say the Germans are using. They looked quite big enough to us as we passed them. | Then we passed ambulance trains going in the other direction with poor wounded fellows, and some dead ones, too, probably, stretched out inside. We were ordered to halt while passing one of these trains, and the fellow stationed next to me and myself peeked under the cover. A youfig ffellow lying Inside raised his hand to us. “Go, get ’em, boys, biff, biff,” he said. "Biff, biff,*' by the way, is as much of a slogan as we have yet conceived. It doesn’t sound like-much, in telling, but it means a whole lot when a wounded soldier says it. Funny enough, the sight of that fellow did not frighten me or my pal in the slightest degree. We just wanted to go out there and “biff, biff,” as he said. It wasn’t long after this that we felt we were very nearly in the midst, of the engagement. Dusty fellows who had been in the trenches all night passed us going toward the rear. Bleary-eyed some of them were, but others were so cocky and jubilant you would have thought them drunk. All this time, remember, that same rattle and roar was in progress, and now fltaally we could smell the powder, and once a shell that must have contained ■shrapnel burst in a little clump of trees to our right and the .shot kicked tup a dust in the road not far ahead of us. Hill Torn by Exploding Shells. “Damn poor shooting, that!” said any pal, but he was wrong, because, without knowing It, we were almost at tthe battle front. A fellow dashed by tas on a horse, an adjutant he must lhave been, for almost immediately thereafter we were ordered to deploy. We left the road, and our company lacattered over a front probably fifty yards wide. There was a hill right in front of us —not a steep hill, but a gentle rise. Its whole surface was torn pip with trenches and great caverns that must have been made by exploding shells in the fighting of the day before. At this moment it began to rain. We had been expecting it all the morning, but had hoped that the storm would blow over, but there was no

such luck. As we climbed the hill the downpour grew in violence until our shoes were wet through and we sank up to our ankles in the soft red earth. They Sensed the Charge. Some of our fellows were coming down the nill as we came up. Others, stretched at full length at its brow, were firing from behind miserable little mounds of earth that they had cast up before we arrived. We knew what was expected of us, and if there were any orders given I didn’t hear them. We just went up quietly, kicked those other fellows out and lay down in the red earth that bore the Imprint of tbelr bodies. And then something hit the ground in front qf me with a noise like a slap on a pillow with the palm of one’s hand and “Lay down, you fool,” said my pal. "Can’t you see they’ve got the range?” That shot roused my ire. My rifle was loaded. I slipped it over the top of my little parapet and took a shot at the first puff of haze that I saw rise from the hill across the way. I hadn’t been ordered to shoot, but I felt I had to get back at that fellow who took a shot at me. How he saw me I don't know, for I hadn’t seen a sign of a man over there yet. Like a Great Wave. Somehow we got the idea there was something doing. “Hold ’em, boys!” said the lieutenant, who was kneeling just a few feet behind me, and sure enough down thg hide of the other hill, almost an instant, there rushed a whole troop of 'cavalry—uhlans, maybe, but more probably just regular horsemen. As far down the little valley as I could see they broke over the edge of that opposite hill like a great wave and swept down into the little valley where the brook flowed. I shot wildly two or three times, and then I realized I must make good, so I took careful aim at & fellow who had almost reached the brook, and so was about a quarter of a mile away, and fired. I put two more into him before he stopped, and then his horse — no, he didn’t rear up as I hoped he would, but just crumpled and threw him headlong.

His Pal Also Claimed Credit. “I got that one,” I said toTmy pal. He turned the funniest looking face I have ever seen toward me. “The devil you did. I got him myself,” he said. As a matter of fact, I think we both got him. I believe I got him twice. But they came on all the same, but there weren’t so many of them as there had been. The machine guns and our little Lebels were doing the work, and coming'up that hill through the bushes wasn’t an easy task for their horses, though we could see that by this time they were urging them on with might and main. Funny men, those Germans! They seemed to like to get killed. I wondered if they would get up the hill, and I turned over to load my rifle again. When I looked out they were almost there, a pitiful few of them, and those few were only a half dozen when they reached our lines. None came near me, but I saw some other fellows driving their bayonets, held in their hands, into the bellies of the horses. Day's Fighting to Be Done. And then there weren’t any of them. Only a few horses galloped madly about. Some of these horses were killed, I am sure, by their own shrapnel fire, for I had just become conscious that little iron balls were raining all about us, and then, as soon as I dared, I looked around and saw that there weren’t as many of us as there had been. I thought they would give qs a rest; but it was still morning, and there was a day’s fighting to be done, so we lay down in our trenches and began to take pot shots at the trenches on the other side. To the north and the sputh of us they were getting guns in position, and I saw that it wfcs soon going to be up tons to try to do just what they had done. They wanted our hill and we wanted theirs, but our methods were not quite so reckless. I was getting a little hungry; Funny I should think of such a thing at such a time, but I was hungry, and my pal was, too; so we took down our haversacks and gnawed a’little food. That made us thirsty, but the fellows in the rear were prepared, so we slipped back and took great swigs of water from a pail* they had there, and smoked a cigarette before going back to our positions. This sounds a little unlikely to you, maybe, and a little irregular; but, as a matter of fact, we all came about the same time. There was water for all of us, and we all went back to our places in unison. You don’t need orders for such things as that. The instinct seenft to hit everybody about the same time. . J Ordered .to Take Other Hill. / ' They weren’t doing much across the way. Our gunners had gotten their range apparently, and they were kept pretty busy preparing cover for themselves; so for an hour or two we just lay there and smoked and talked, chiefly smoked, and waited for something to happen. ' It wasn’t long 1 before something did happen. That little lieutenant got his orders from somewhere, and he told us we were to take that other hllL It was

THE EVENING REPUBLICAN, RENSSELAER, IND.

only half a mile away, but we knew that unless our gunners could keep the Germans pretty busy we’d never do it. While we were collecting our gear a funny thing happened. An aeroplane rose over the brow of the enemy’s hill full a mile high and soared almost directly over my head. If he had wanted to, he could have dropped a bomb, I guess, and blown me to bits; but he was a scout, not a fighter. I took a shot at him for luck. Maybe I pat a hole in one of his wings, but the chances are I fell short And then the little lieutenant said, "Go, get ’em, boys, biff, biff,” just as I knew he would, and we scrambled over our little redoubt, me and my pal and the whole line of us, and a whole lot more fellows who had gathering in the rear, and rushed, lickerty-split, down to those bushes. It must have surprised them that we were ready to come back at them so quickly, because I think that almost every one of us made the shelter of the bushes in safety; but it was hot enough there, heaven knows., It seemed to be raining shot, and now and then a shell would burst and I would imagine it had me, so we were glad enough when they told us to go on again. Anything was better than crouching there in those bushes, hardly able to see a thing. No Charge—Just Getting On. We forded the stream —it wasn’t more than six feet wide —and started to climb the hill just as their cavalry had done. Only our gunners had the range, and there wasn’t anything like the reception for us that they had got My pal and I and the little lieutenant seemed to make a little group. We just went on; sometimes he would take the lead and sometimes we would give him a lift. We puffed, and maybe staggered, because it was vary exhausting, not only the climb, tat the jag that, our nerves were on. Somehow we got there. 4 The lieutenant had his revolver in his hand, and he finished a round-head-ed German who aimed at me with his rifle clubbed. I reckon that German must have been the only live one in the vicinity, for I didn’t see any more. The main body seemed to have been driven out before we got there, so we just squatted down in the trenches they had made to catch our breath, and the funny part of it was that as far as we could see there were hundreds of us fellows squatting in those trenches, panting. The lieutenant was the first to collect himself. “We are a lot of fools,” he said, "sitting here without a cover. Don’t you fellows realize that they can pick us off as easy as not?” It was time we realized it, because they were picking us off —not me and my pal, you understand, or the lieutenant —but a dozen |>ther fellows all along the line.

Used Basins for Shovels. “Get to work there and dig,” he. said. And we dug as we had never dug before. We' knew we couldn’t go any further that day, and we wanted to make cover for ourselves that would last the night out, so with basins we shoveled the earth they had up until it gave us protection from their rifle fire. It would make a nice story right here if I could tell you that our little lieutenant had been killed or badly wounded in trying to save one of our lives, but he was no fool. He got behind the first pile of earth we raised and told us what to do next, and that, you will admit, was a much wiser thing for him to do than any tomfool bravery would have been. We had our position clinched. They were bringing guns down into the little valley by roads I hadn’t noticed before and hauling them up to the top of the hill near our position. When I saw that I knew that as far as we were concerned .we had done our work. All tills, and It was only two o’clock in the afternoon. The rest of the day we spent, digging. They brought up shovels from the supply wagons and we made a real breastworks, a whole lot better than any we had had since we left the Aisne. It was funny to see engineers, with levels and transits, working where only an hour before there had been more dead men than* livihg, but these poor* fellows were gone now, and from brave soldiers we became mere diggers in the soil. Speed was necessary, for the German doesn’t know when he is licked, and his fire upon our position was getting warmer all the. time. Trench Digging Is Drudgery. Digging trenches sounds like a simple thing; and so it is for the first hour, but after you have been working for two hours or more without any hot grub and nothing to smoke it becomes more like drudgery. I would rather charge with only half a chance of coming out alive than dig trenches for two hours. If you could think of the danger, if you could keep the noble part of it in the front of your mind, it wouldn’t be so bad; but just to dig like an ordinary drainman with a little lieutenant yapping about is a frightful bore. He is a good fellow, that lieutenant, and he shot my German friend, but he knew no more about getting work out of a lot of Paris clerks than he does about farming; and that is precious little, I wager. » But when the sun dropped into the hills behind us we had dug regular standing trenches four feet deep, with a breastwork high enough to cover anybody, and we Were mighty glad, I can tell you, when they told us to £ve it up and go back-and get some od. Other fellows came forward to take our places as we went back. They were clean and spick and span, and when I looked at my pal and he looked at me we burst Into a hearty laugh, for if there ever was a couple of disreputable looking citizens of the republic It was ourselves.

GIRL FROM THE CITY

By DONALD ALLEN.

(Copyright, 1914, by the McClure Newspaper Syndicate.) Now and then a college tudent Is called by his name is his mother gave it to him, but in the vast majority of cases it is Ly a • Ickname. Sometimes the appellation ts th individual, and sometimes it v rom it; but once bestowed .dole Brian Jeffries had been college a month before his hum .'.ettled on a nickname, and there was muc *ejuioIng that it fitted him. He was walking ut one evening from his boarding ouse *7he- .e was set upon by .hree oung ten. They were supposed .c be -tudents, and to be mistaken in their man, and they made it warm for oung Jeffries .or a minute. Then he rallied, and when he had landed three separate punches on three individual chins Che battle was over. Brian had delivered "the punch,” as sporting men say, and from that time on he was • nch” Jeffries. He was neither proud o' it nor disgusted with it When the summer vacation came the young man went to his home on the Sound. He might have gone camping or yachting or tramping, as *o many students do, but he was way behind in his studies, and his C ither had inquired of him: “Do you think I sent you to college to learn to row, swim, box and kick a football?" “Hardly, father,” was the reply. "You stand very low in your studies, my boy; and you must catch up. Spend your vacation at home and do it.” * It was a bit lonesome at The Oaks. Brian was an only child, and his mother was a semi-invalid and his father a quiet man who seldom entered into conversation. There were fishing and boating, and there was a trip to the village now and then in Che auto, and the remainder of the time was put in reading law and wondering why men with sense enough to peel a potato could not enact a law that a half-baked judge could not interpret twice alike in the same year. On his homecoming he had noticed two young ladies at Wave Crest —the next manor house below. One of therm was Miss Pryor, whose father owred the property, and the other was a stranger to him. When he sought Information of his mother she replied: “It is a young lady from the city visiting Miss Pryor. I do not even know her name.” “Hang it, if I,had ever been introduced to Miss Pryor here is a big chance for a flirtation.” “I’m sorry for you, but perhaps you’ll survive the disappointment.” At about the same hour Miss Callie Floyd, the visitor from the city, was asking of Miss Annette Pryor: “And who are the people at the other place ?” “Their name is Jeffries.” “Aren’t there any girls?” “No, only a son.” “College student?”

*.‘l believe so, and home now on his vacation.” “He must be a bit lonely.” “Well, it won’t be for us to cheer him up. I have heard that he was very wild and reckless at college.” “Why, he doesn’t look It,” said Miss Callie. “Oh, you are a physiognomist, are you? You can tell by a young man’s face fifty rods away whether he Is wild or not!" “I —I thought he had a pleasant face.” , “Let me tell you what they call him in college. It is ‘Punch’ Jeffries ! ” “But why? Does he drink more punch than anybody else?” “It must be that.’ A young man who knows him told me that he had three brawls before he had been in college a month. I hope he will make np excuse to get acquainted with us. We must prepare ourselves to snub him at-the first advance.” “Yes, ‘we must!” sighed Miss Callie as she turned away. Three days later Brian saw the young ladles, start for the village in the runaboqt, and he got out his auto and followed. Why he did it he did not stop to ask himself. Perhaps it was because he had a hope that he might get a near view of the girl from the city. - He was half a mile behind them, and keeping their . pace, when he heard a toot behind him and glanced back to see a young man burning up the road. That toot meant but one thing. It meant: “I am coming and you small potatoes with your cheap machines had better take to the woods!” » Even without the insulting tooting the oncomer would have found one ready to do him battle. Brian didn’t like the shape of his headgear. He didn’t like' his goggle?. He didn’t like the pose of his chin. Therefore, when the young man came sweeping up and would have passed on—he didn’t pass. He wanted to badly enough, but he couldn’t just manage It. With the two machines running neck and neck, the runabout was quickly overtaken and passed. Brian was on the Inside, and he was crowded oyer until the wheels'rubbed each other, and both young ladies screamed. They both recognized the college man. **The loafer!" exclaimed Miss Pryor.

"But he was racing!” extenuated Miss Callie. “And it was nothing to him whether he killed us or not!” “Didn’t hw have to race when he was challenged?” “No!’ < “And shouldn’t he want to win the race?” “Callie Floyd, you were within an ace of death, and yet you are ready to excuse such recklessness!” It was a week later, and Brian was in the village, on an errand and had no thought of the young ladies, when an auto, coming from the railroad depot and containing a lady as a passenger, began to act in a very queer manner. It ran from side to side of the street, and the screams of the lady soon collected a crowd. It was Brian Jeffries who first made out wiu th trouble was and sprang forward. The machine “had not got beyond ontroh but the chauffeur was too drunk V know what he was about The man vas hauled from his seat and cast into the road, and Brian expressed his willingness to drive the lady to her home. It was then that he noticed the Pryor runabout and the two young ladles, and he thought they .egarded him with -’omething like horror. “Isn’t it brutal!v shameful!" exclaimed Miss Pryor at she looked down at the man on the ground, and in a voice meant to be overheard. “But why did he do it?” queried Miss Callie. “Because he is a ruffian!” < “You are mistaken, young lady, ’ said a man beside their machine. ‘He did it because —” But the runabout was put in motion. Miss Pryor didn’t want to hear «he rest. There was something about «he Incident in the village paper three days later, but she refused to read. X Miss Callie returned to the city a week later, and although the young man was/ in no sense smitten ne hoped,and believed that she wasn’t so down on him as Miss Pryor. A year elapsed and Miss Callie came to spend the summer again, and Brian was spending another vacation with his law books. His father had said: “No use wasting your time. You will never make even a shyster lawyer. Why don’t you go fishing? It’s far more fun.” And the young man had said to himself: “I’ll just read up the law on hog-stealing and pretend to myself that I have been admitted to the bar.”

He saw Miss Callie, but she was twenty rods away and looking up an apple tree. He saw Miss Pryor, and she wasn’t but ten rods away and had a bludgeon in her hand. Brian Jeffries’ time was coming, however. One morning when the whales gamboled, the mermaids sang and the waters of the Sound were like w bogus half-dollar, the young man went down to take a dip In the briny. Before taking the dip he cast his eyes abroad, and a mile from shore he saw a female rowing a boat around with* one oar. He understood at once. She had lost the other oar and the tide was taking her toward Halifax ;.t the rate of four miles an hour. He waved his towel, uttered shouts of encouragement, and sprang into a boat rnd rowed as if life were at stake. As Brian drew nearer he saw that the girl was Miss Callie loyd. Nearer yet, and he saw that she was not a bit perturbed. The other oar lay in the boat. “Why, I —l thought—” he began, when she interrupted him with: “Mr. Jeffries, why are you called ‘Punch’?” “Because I punched three fellows who set out to punch me.” “I see. Why did you try to smash your runabot ’ last summer?” “Why, It Was merely a close shave, and I knew I could do It. The chap in the other auto was a ginx, and I didn't propose to let him crow over me.” "A very proper spirit, Mr. Jeffries, but why did you assault that poor chauffeur in the village?” “He was drunk and endangering the life of the lady In the tonneau.” “Proper spirit again. How many brawls have you had?” “Not one." “Um! Um! Mr. Jeffries, you can row back and I will follow at my leisure. And a man of proper spirit ought to be able to think up a way to handle* Miss Pryor.”

Substitutes for Daylight.

As a substitute for the ordinary glass lamp-globe, there has been introduced In Germany, a globe made of thin, translucent marble. The light produced from this globe Is declared by experts to be almost the exact counterpart of daylight Another German novelty in Illumination consists of a screen coated with an aluminum powder which, when placed before a light, transmits a glare exactly like daylight, by means of which even colors can be judged with perfect accuracy. f Should these German discoveries prove to be all that has been claimed for them, they will doubtless be universally adopted. Artificial light that Is a perfect substitute for daylight Is what the world has been waiting for.

Up In the Air.

“Where on earth did Patrice meet the man she’s going to marry?” "Nowhere on earth.” “Don’t try to be funny.” ' “I’m not trying to be funny. They were Introduced while both were passengers In a captive balloon.” ,

FOOLED THE PANTHER

UNCLE BILL OBJECTED TO FURNISHING HER MEAL. - - * " did Frontiersman Naturally Delights Relating to His Grandchildren How Narrowly He Escaped From Hideous Death. Uncle Bill Joyce lives down in southwestern Missouri, on the edge of the Ozark country. He has lived ther< a great many yean, for he is an old man now, and he is full of entertaining reminiscence of the days when that corner of the state was still almost a wilderness. Among the stories he loves to tell the open-mouthed children of a more sheltered generation is this account of a lively adventure with the animal that all old frontiersmen used to call a “painter.” Uncle Bill will begin: One day in the summer of 1857, I shouldered my rifl.' and started for a day’s hunt. I was bound for a small prairie some five or six miles from home. After hunting for deer a spell without seeing a sign, I turned into a small grove of walnut, oak and mulberry to hunt for squirrels. I got a good many of them during the morning. Once or twice I stopped to listen to a queer noise that I could hardly hear, It was so far away. It was a long, quavering cry that died away gradually. But It came no nearer, and finally stopped altogether. When It came nod’., I went to a spring I knew of and ate the lunch that I had brought with me. Then I thought I would go on to the prairie and hunt for wild bees —that was really what I had in mind when I started. But I felt sleepy, and thought I would take a nap* first, and so I stretched myself In a shady place and fell asleep. I woke a little later to find myself covered with leaves and small brush. I was puzzled sure enough, fpr I couldn’t think what could have covered me up, but I decided to find out. First I got a dead lor 'about six feet long,” laid It where I had slept, and covered it with leaves and brush. I looked to see whether my gun was loaded, and then I hid in a clump of bushes some twenty or twenty-five yards away. After about twenty minutes I heard a noise. I peered out of the bushes, and saw a large shepanther coming through the trees, followed by a quarter-grown cub. She circled round Jthi mound of leaves a couple of times; the cub followed every action of Its mother.-. After the second round, the old panther crouched as If for a spring. She crouched lower and lower, and kept drawing her feet closer together. She kept her byes fastened on the mound of leaves all the time, and swayed her tail from side to side with a slow, regular motion. When she had gathered her feet as close together as she could, she sprang/for the pile of leaves. She landed in the very middle of the pile, and gave several long, wicked rakes with her hind feet. Then she began to smell and scratch in the leaves. It didn’t take her long to find out that there wap nothing but an old log there, and she stopped scratching and began to look about. I thought that now was the time to settle matters. I was a little to her left and behind her; I caught a sight just at the base of her ear, and fired. She gave one leap and a shrill scream, and then lay still. After making sure that she was dead, I loqked for the cub. It was sitting near by on the side of a leaning tree,, spitting and snarling angrily. I aoon put an end to' that with a rifle ball. Lmever knew a man so well huntgijr aSsJ was without being hurt She probably took me for dead, and covered me to keep other animals from finding me while she went'after her cub.—Youth’s Companion.

That Settled It.

Mrs. Charles H. Anthony of'Muncie, whose beautiful wardrobe, designed by herself, Impressed Paris before the outbreak of the war, said to a New York - reporter the other day: * “Now is the time to Introduce modest, home-made fashions for the fall and winter. The European fashion market Is idle now. Let the American designer, then, get to work. “American women will welcome modest fashions, for few of them are as perverse as the American woman I heard about in Paris. “A friend said at a ball to this woman’s husband: "’How the men are flocking round your wife! I thought you said you’d never let her wear one of those shocking evening gowns without shoulderstraps?* “ *1 know,’ the other man answered, *but she happened to hear me say it* " —Buffalo Express.

The Zuyder Zee.

The Zuyder Zee, or Southern sea, wag formerly a lake surrounded by fens and marshes, its present extent being chiefly the result of floods which occurred in the thirteenth century. Its area is about two thousand square miles and the average depth from ten to nineteen feet. It has always been the work of the Hollanders to recover as much as possible of the land lost to them in this manner In past ages, and In the literal sense they can be said to have made half their country, having reclaimed over one million acres from sea, lake and river since the sixteenth century. \ ■ ■A ./-. ''l, - • .