"It was very funny! You"d have thought that our sister was driving these fifteen big louts before her."
No sooner were they in the street than the Germans gazed at one another.
Did it not look as if they had been kicked out of doors!
"Hullo! we are not people to be trifled with!"
They soon gave proofs of it. Suddenly they flung themselves upon the windows, doors, walls. We were forced to give way, and my mother-in-law opened the gate. This compliance with their wishes did not abate the a.s.sailants" anger. They rushed into the yard, and poured forth worse volleys of abuse than ever an Apache of Montmartre could invent.
"Ah," cried the sergeant, grinding his teeth in anger, "you are not tamed down here; you do not know what the Germans are! Come to Lierval; you will see there how the people have been curbed. They don"t say anything now.... They hold their tongues, I warrant you...."
One of his men drew the moral of this discourse by aiming his gun at us.
"Franzouss ... all shot."
They stayed two hours, strolling about the yard, muttering insults between their teeth. To complete our misfortune, the convoy spent the night in Morny. The men came back in the evening, and the commandant being away they made the most fearful row we had ever heard, from nine to eleven, and yet the Hussars were not bad at rough music.
They were not bad at many other jobs. They were acknowledged the most skilful hunters of hiding-places, and Sainte-Brute, with his acolytes, spent many a day in wandering through fields and gardens. They sought for holes that might conceal potatoes, corn, or--generally near to the houses--wine which they were so fond of. The Conventions of the Hague, it would seem, allow the invaders of a country to requisition wine, for the use of the "wounded"; so when the soldiers emptied a cellar or discovered a _cache_ they declared with gravity that it was all for the Red Cross. I suppose the Germans bear a likeness to zoophytes, what one of them absorbs is profitable to the others, and when wine had been unearthed "for the wounded" the whole pack were drunk for days together.
And these creatures took all--all. They destroyed systematically what they could not take away. After having despoiled us of our money, they seized corn, straw, vegetables, wine, milk, eggs. Poultry, cows, oxen, the very horses which the peasants had bought of them in a bad condition, and taken good care of, belonged to them, and they alone were ent.i.tled to dispose of them. All that was on the earth and beneath the earth, all that was growing and living--including the people--were their own property. They carried off the very paving-stones heaped up on the wayside to repair the roads. If they stay long enough they will carry away, cart after cart, the rich, fat earth of our soil, to spread over and fertilise the barren ground of Prussia. If they could find a means, with the help of their alchemists who have made a pact with the devil, they would take away our deep-blue sky in panels; they would drag along our bracing and mild air to purify the mists of the north.
As they cannot--despite their bargain with the devil--perform such feats of skill, they wreak revenge on us by spoiling our beautiful country.
Our farmers were furious when they saw the Germans--the first winter after their arrival--plough up fields throughout the land, unmindful of the limits and value of the soil. And what splendid tillage was theirs!
Their laziness turned up about ten centimetres of earth; they sowed seed, and put no manure; before they leave they want to exhaust the soil of which they are jealous, and which they would like to annihilate. They cut down nut trees to make b.u.t.t-ends of guns, and fruit trees to amuse themselves.
In the forests they committed downright murder. Where it is worth while they cut down trees of reasonable growth at regular intervals; anywhere else they break off saplings about one yard from the ground. In the wood of Festieux I know an immense beech-tree. Its trunk can hardly be encircled by four men with outstretched arms. In its boughs a n.o.bleman of the neighbourhood lived for several weeks at the time of the Revolution. As they found no means to fell this giant, the invaders have hewn pieces out of it all round, and cut off its upper branches. The poor tree will not outlive the invasion. On the outskirts of the villages, along the roads and brooks, the Germans cut down the beautiful trees, poplars, maples, chestnuts, which gave a poetical charm to the country. To spoil the land is the aim of our malignant foe. Truly, it will be long before songs and laughter are heard again in the wasted country. The nymphs of our groves seek in vain their verdant shades along the treeless rivulets, and flee away, sighing their elegies. Can anything be sadder than this? No epic could be more tragical, no ode could exalt our hearts more than this call, more than this immense wailing we are ever hearing. It is the very breath of our sullied, bruised, wounded country, and it will not cease until the day when her sons return, and striking her soil with their feet will say:
"Mother! O, mother! thy cause is avenged! We come back from the country of thy foes!"
PART III
"There is no one in the jungle so wise and good and clever and strong and gentle as the Bandar-log."
"We are great. We are free. We are wonderful. We are the most wonderful people in all the Jungle. We all say so, and so it must be true."--"The Monkey-People," RUDYARD KIPLING (_The Jungle Book_).
CHAPTER X
Herr Bubenpech had hardly been appointed commandant in Morny when the enemy took a new step in the organisation of the country. From that moment two or three spectacled scribes gathered together in a large schoolroom, labelled "Bureau" both in French and in German, and busied themselves with endless scribblings. They drew up lists of the male inhabitants of the village, who twice a month had to be present when their names were called over. They put in writing all the divers tasks required of the villagers. They kept an account of the allowance of food sometimes granted to the civilians. They distributed pa.s.sports and they superintended requisitions. From the outset Bubenpech seemed eager to show he was hard to please. The rural constable was ordered to announce that gold was to be brought to the "bureau," where the owners would be given bank-notes in its stead, according to the simplest exchange, 100 marks for 125 francs.
Pieces of gold are not readily drawn out of the stockings. Yet a few of them had to come forth. I am afraid that since then the invaders have managed to empty them; but at that time they were only at the heel.
By mere chance Morny had as yet paid no more than the contribution of war which had been levied on the whole country soon after the invasion.
Other villages less fortunate than ours had been overburdened with taxes upon the most ridiculous pretences. A poor hamlet, Coucy les Eppes, was fined six times during the s.p.a.ce of a few months. First came the general contribution. Then a fine of half a million francs was imposed upon the canton of Sissonne, to which Coucy belongs, and every village had to pay its share. It so happened that in September some soldiers, coming back from Reims, drove their carts through Sissonne, and as their carts were loaded with bottles of wine, they drank all the way, and threw empty bottles behind them. Then came motor-cars, which punctured their tyres on the broken gla.s.s. Great scandal! The civilians were accused of having put a trap for honest Prussian wheels. Their protestations availed nothing. The canton was condemned to a fine; the canton must pay; and Coucy paid like the other communes.
When all houses were searched after the great proclamation of November, an old flint-lock, kept in memory of an ancestor, was discovered in Coucy at an old maiden lady"s. It never struck the owner that she should have brought it to the Mayor"s house, or hidden it. And suppose the old maiden lady had shouldered the ancient gun? It is enough to make you shudder when you think of the danger the German army might have thus incurred. As quick as could be a few thousand francs were levied on the village which dared be subversive enough to conceal an old maid and an old gun. Even then the troubles of the poor village did not come to an end. A French aviator dropped a bomb on the station, and the bomb disturbed a few German carriages. The military authority knitted its brows.
"Why! This Coucy is talked of again! Let it have a good fine, and it will keep quiet."
For what reasons had this village to bleed itself and borrow from the town in order to pay the invader twice more, I do not know, but so it was. Morny"s turn was coming. One night a barn of the farm where the Hussars were quartered took fire, and was soon in a blaze with the straw it contained. The whole village ran to quench the conflagration. We stood near-by just long enough to see the peasants put the fire out with all speed, while the soldiers folded their arms, and were pleased to be amused. Von Bernhausen and Bubenpech looked on at the spectacle.
Then Von Bernhausen thought proper to rate the Mayor sharply:
"There are not people enough.... Go and fetch civilians.... Be quick...."
All the able-bodied men of the village were summoned, and they sweated while the Hussars made sport of them. The _Gazette des Ardennes_, which took the place of the _Journal de Guerre_ to the very best advantage, does not relate such accidents in this wise, but I can only narrate what my eyes have seen.
Bubenpech rubbed his hands. He had found an opportunity to show his zeal. With all speed he sent a report to the Staff, upon which he depended, stating that civilians had set the barn on fire out of spite.
He forgot to add that a few hours before the disaster the Hussars had burnt their dirty, lousy mattresses in the neighbourhood of the said barn, where, besides, soldiers had been seen smoking many a time with perfect serenity.
So stout gentlemen in full uniform came to Morny, and with reproachful looks stalked majestically through the streets. A chance was given us to atone for the misdeed. If within twenty-four hours information was lodged against the civilian who had set fire to the barn, the village might be forgiven. Should the contrary happen, a severe penalty would be immediately enforced. No denunciation, and for good reasons. The people were convinced that the soldiers had kindled the straw on purpose. The military authorities, grieved to the heart, imprisoned, without further delay, the Mayor and six notable persons. Then they deliberated upon the matter, and always regretfully imposed a fine of 16,000 francs on the village. They ordered the other prisoners to be set at liberty after three days, but kept the Mayor under lock and key for two weeks, ill fed and worse lodged. M. Lonet and another munic.i.p.al councillor went the round of the village, and did their best to get the sum required. They managed to collect 12,000 francs, and the Germans had to be content with that for the present. They knew only too well that they would catch us again.
Besides other cares worried us. In February 1915 our houses were again searched from top to bottom. It was proclaimed that the inhabitants should declare the quant.i.ty of corn, flour, and vegetables they had in store, so that the provisions might be requisitioned according to the needs of the German army. And mysterious sacks, closed baskets, furtive barrows were seen in Morny. There was an air of haste; men pa.s.sed close to the walls, went along out-of-the-way paths, up to attics, down into holes. When the day of perquisition came--the Germans believed their own eyes rather than the declarations of the natives--there were tears and gnashing of teeth. Treasures were discovered, potatoes and corn dug up.
The Germans laid hold of everything; they even despoiled the very poor of their slender provisions. For instance, our neighbours, the Branchiers, a very young couple, whose joint ages were less than forty years, who had only an empty purse and about thirty kilos of potatoes, were robbed to the very last shred.
That they might not lose a single potato they carefully raked Mme.
Turgau"s shed all around, and seized forty, though the poor woman has four children, who do not live upon nothing. We, in our house, tired of the war, hid nothing at all. We had possessed for a fortnight four sacks of wheat, which we had bought from a farmer, who had mysteriously sold this secret h.o.a.rd. Where, I beg of you, could you conceal four sacks of wheat in an honest house? Especially when you know from sad experience that the perquisitioners perform their office conscientiously. At Aulnois they had watered a cellar to make sure that the ground had not been newly dug. At Vaux they had not left twenty centimetres of a certain garden unexplored. After a long debate we decided to leave things as they were.
But if peace returns and I am able to build a house, it shall have hiding-places, wells, tanks, deep dungeons! Hollow walls shall open by means of secret springs, and two, three, five cellars shall be arrayed one beneath the other, which, in case of need, shall swallow up whole herds, to say nothing of a vast reserve of groceries.
Meanwhile, our goods being full in sight, Bubenpech, who, out of politeness, gave himself the trouble to search our house, visiting every cupboard and poking his nose everywhere, had been at no pains to discover them. He declared he was compelled to requisition the corn, but with a smile he left us our potatoes. Colette was indignant.
"Why! this fellow does not take our potatoes because he wants to be amiable! And our neighbours have been despoiled of everything! It is a shame! We must share with the others."
And we did.
A basket to right, a basket to left, a basket over the way, our provision well-nigh dwindled to nothing. After that we were in the same state as our neighbours. It is beyond doubt that some people had managed to save many things, and of course the Germans had surmised as much. Two or three days after the first perquisitions they dropped in unawares, and made very profitable visits. Mme. Turgau, for instance, had succeeded in hiding a sack of wheat, and the soldiers were hardly out of the way when she baked a loaf to celebrate her good fortune. The loaf, yellow and round, was displayed on the table, while on the ground lay the sack, saved from the wreck, and little Lucienne, a slender girl of twelve, as reasonable as a woman, was grinding corn in a coffee-mill.
Near at hand a dish was already full of flour; after a second operation of the same kind it would be fit for kneading. The mother was out, the baby girl, Claire, was busy sucking her thumb, with her admiring gaze on her sister; the last-born was asleep in its cradle.
Heavy steps broke the silence, big shadows appeared on the door-sill.
"The Prussians!"
The coffee-mill stopped short.
"Ah! ah!" the non-commissioned officer said, "you have corn; you stole it."
"No, sir, it is just a little bit I have gleaned with mamma."
"You stole it," replied the soldier. "Don"t you know that everything belongs to the Germans? If you have corn you must have stolen it."
And the perquisitioners carried away in triumph the small sack, the beautiful golden loaf, and even the dishful of half-ground flour. On coming back, Mme. Turgau found Lucienne in tears, Claire weeping in imitation of her sister, and Jacquot, ever ready to make an uproar, screaming at the top of his voice. After these fatal visits we had still more holes to take in in our belts. Nothing was ever left on our table.
The dishes, few in number, were immediately divided into seven parts, and every one thought when rising from table: "I could begin again with pleasure."
The question of light was another plague of our life. The last drop of petroleum, the last traces of linseed oil had been converted into smoke a long time before. We were obliged to use horse-oil like our neighbours.