James Hopper

“ For in him the blackest saying rang with a resonant gaiety that captivated every one. He had had a hard time of it, for six months in a trench in water to the knees, in an infamous sea of mud. Of this he gave us a most naturalistic narrative and description, one, I suppose, which really was war as war is. Only we did not want to know of war as war is. At that juncture, for the sake of France, for the sake of all civilization, it was absolutely necessary that every one should deceive himself a bit as to what war is. I came out of the meeting with Rouffeau in absolute consternation. ”

“ Civilization does not hurt; it is only returns to barbarism such as the famed Teutonic Kultur which hurt. France, despite its art, the gentleness of its civilization, was still iron at the core, as the bawling Teutons have discovered to their cost, as the shocked Englishmen have discovered to their rescue. But France before the war thought itself in the abyss, and the Rheims College of Athletes was one of the efforts made to derrick her out of the abyss. There Navarre had found his vocation, which, as he put it to me in a letter, was to "construct men." ”

“ The world was talking through its hat; it had been influenced by the cunning, patient, and sinister campaign of Germany, by the hypocrite, scandalized, and pinched exclamations of Tory England—the England of Salisbury and the Boer War, the England which then deucedly resembled the Prussia it is now fighting, the England, gone now, gone for good a decade before this war, the England gone forever, we hope. As a matter of fact, France's exquisite civilization had not hurt her at all. ”

“ France, in its great struggle, has now called upon its eighteen-year-old boys; but before sending them to the front, it is doing everything to make them fit for that hard life. And Navarre has been chosen as one of the men who develop those boyish bodies through careful and graduated physical exercises, something at which he had become an expert at Rheims and for which, with his patience, his love of the young, his passion for corporeal beauty, he is eminently fit. ”

“ He who has that work must be ceaselessly on the go between the cannon and the troops. Over ground savagely beaten, straight through tornado and tornado of infernal fire, he must wend his way with the message that may mean the poor trench soldier's life, which may mean the turning of the battle. Well, Navarre volunteered to be one of these men, and one of them he was for two years in the worst sectors, through the great Champagne drive, the attack on Verdun, and the Somme offensive. ”

“ So he is beside himself with rage and disgust at seeing this life, the only thing he owns, placed in jeopardy by what he thinks are merely the intrigues of wilful higher-ups who themselves hold their skins out of it. But listen well to his description of the fighting, and you 'll notice one thing. That he is fighting just like the rest, just as well as the rest, with a sort of gay courage, in fact, that many others may lack. When the battle is on, you see, he is French; he is a part of France, and no longer Rouffeau, with the mind that pierces both shams and respectable illusions. ”

“ You remember my speaking of that man, a brother-in-law of Navarre, an elderly, heavy man with a beard, living a small and sheltered and prudent life, a character as far removed from heroics as a flat, distended old slipper is from the boots of a musketeer. Well, on that day when Navarre was on leave, and we had gone to the small island on the Marne to live over again the old days, this man appeared as we lunched under the trees. There was a considerable company, Navarre's three sisters being there with the girl who was to become his wife the next day, and also the wives of Raymond and Rouffeau ”

“ And there is a third category, a small one, where the maternal instinct is so strong as to curdle into revolt. I know of one woman whose mind seems to have lost balance before the peril which has thus come to her son. When she speaks the word "Allies," it is with an inflection so full of venom and hatred that it leaves one with a little shudder along the spine. I have no doubt that if this unhappy mother could kill all Frenchmen, all Englishmen, all Italians, and all Russians by pressing a button, she would press the button. ”

“ Material was wanting; the deficiency had to be made up by sacrificing men. It was the beginning of underground warfare; the trenches were shallow and insufficient, the winter cold and wet, the troops poorly provisioned and clothed; a terrible time in which, still more than in the Battle of the Marne, still more than at Verdun, France displayed its heroism. ”

“ He had always shown love and gentleness toward children and a marvelous understanding of them. He now specialized upon building up children—building them up into fine men and women. The ideals at the college were those of ancient Greece—sun, freedom of limb, beauty of line. ”

“ Feeling his consciousness slipping, with the last of his strength he gathered the sketches he had been making through the day, let loose the parachute, and descended to earth, reaching it virtually a dead man. ”

“ NOW that we are at war, that our young men are volunteering or cheerfully accepting the draft which is to tell each one what the country expects of him, the agitation of mothers is something which at times gives pause. ”

“ Said he to me once, speaking of French statesmen: "They are very clever, yes. But would n't it be far better were they a little less clever and more God-fearing?"
Besides these four, Raymond, Navarre, Rouffeau, and Paddy, there were others in the group who in some way range themselves a bit on one side. There was Paul, a blond giant from the north of France. He was a notary's clerk, but his parents had been peasants, and peasant he was in his money-tightness and a sort of reasoned selfishness just saved from being unpleasant by a strict sense of justice. ”

“ They were to be composed half of Senegalese negroes, half of the most desperately reckless white men, and were to be thrown into any breach opened by a regular drive, to pass clear through or be annihilated. Raymond had volunteered to go as sergeant in one of these regiments. In any regiment the position of sergeant, as well as lieutenant, is an unhealthy one, for when a section leaves the trench for a charge, it is etiquette that its sergeant be the first one out. In this particular body of troops, though, it was a sort of glorified suicide. ”

“ His wandering, but always violent, affections had found the final harbor for which so strenuously and so blindly they had sought so long; he was marrying a charming, gifted, and very intelligent young woman, a school-teacher and also an athlete, since she danced the recreated Greek dances most beautifully. ”

“ I learned of it only when I saw the citation in the newspapers, and when I taxed him later with his lack of frankness, he said: "For an artillery-man to have the croix de guerre, that 's a blague, a bad joke. No artillery-man should have the medal till every one of those poor devils of infantrymen has his." ”

“ The artillery, it is popularly supposed, suffers little in this war. This is largely true of the heavy; when it comes to the seventy-fives, they are kept close to the actual fracas and used somewhat as machine-guns. Besides, there is in every battery one dangerous post; it is that of officier de liaison, the man who keeps the artillery in close communication with the infantry. ”

“ You know, those Germans they are much better soldiers than we are. Yes, they are. But they have one dirty habit: often they bury their dead right in their trench. We got in a German trench one day. We 'd sniff and sniff ”

“ If this paper is to have any value, it will be if it follows fact absolutely; so I am going to follow fact and go on and tell more of Jean Bart. Down the river a little ways from us a man named Guilleaume had a summer house—a man we did not like. We had taken a trip with him once, up the Marne to Meaux and beyond, before we knew him well and because he owned a four-oared barge we needed. He was fat and lazy and selfish; on the entire trip he had not done one single thing for any one but himself ”