Day before yesterday
it was Roye and Nesle; the Chateau of Ham; Jussy, Chauny and Prince
Eitel Friedrich's pavilion. To-morrow we hope to start for Soissons.
Yesterday we rested, because Mother Beckett had a shocking headache.
(Oh, it was pathetic and funny, too, what she said when we slipped back
into Compiegne at night! "Isn't it a comfort, Molly, to see a place
again where there are _whole_ houses?") After Soissons we shall return
to Compiegne and then go to Amiens with several of the war
correspondents, who have their own car. Women aren't allowed, as a rule,
to see anything of the British front, but it's just possible that Father
Beckett can get permission for his wife to venture within gazing
distance. Of course, she can't--or thinks she can't--stir without me!
We took still another road to Noyon (one must pass through Noyon going
toward the front, if one keeps Compiegne for one's headquarters) and the
slaughter of trees was the wickedest we'd seen: a long avenue of kind
giants murdered, and orchards on both sides of it. The Germans, it
seems, had circular saws, worked by motors, on purpose to destroy the
large trees in a hurry. They didn't protect their retreat by barring
the road with the felled trunks. They left most of the martyrs standing,
their trunks so nearly sawed through that a wind would have blown them
down. The pursuing armies had to finish the destruction to protect
themselves. Farms were exterminated all along the way; and little
hamlets--nameless for us--were heaps of blackened brick and stone,
mercifully strewn with flowers like old altars to an unforgotten god.
Pages:
231
232
233
234
235
236
237
238
239
240
241
242
243
244
245
246
247
248
249
250
251
252
253
254
255