He was aware that these battalions with their commotions were woven red and startling into the gentle fabric of softened greens and browns.
It looked to be a wrong place for a battle field.
The skirmishers in advance fascinated him.
Their shots into thickets and at distant and prominent trees spoke to him of tragedies--hid-den, mysterious, solemn.
Once the line encountered the body of a dead soldier.He lay upon his back staring at the sky.
He was dressed in an awkward suit of yellowish brown.The youth could see that the soles of his shoes had been worn to the thinness of writing paper, and from a great rent in one the dead foot projected piteously.And it was as if fate had betrayed the soldier.In death it exposed to his enemies that poverty which in life he had perhaps concealed from his friends.
The ranks opened covertly to avoid the corpse.
The invulnerable dead man forced a way for him-self.The youth looked keenly at the ashen face.
The wind raised the tawny beard.It moved as if a hand were stroking it.He vaguely desired to walk around and around the body and stare;the impulse of the living to try to read in dead eyes the answer to the Question.
During the march the ardor which the youth had acquired when out of view of the field rapidly faded to nothing.His curiosity was quite easily satisfied.If an intense scene had caught him with its wild swing as he came to the top of the bank, he might have gone roaring on.This advance upon Nature was too calm.He had opportunity to reflect.He had time in which to wonder about himself and to attempt to probe his sensa-tions.
Absurd ideas took hold upon him.He thought that he did not relish the landscape.
It threatened him.A coldness swept over his back, and it is true that his trousers felt to him that they were no fit for his legs at all.
A house standing placidly in distant fields had to him an ominous look.The shadows of the woods were formidable.He was certain that in this vista there lurked fierce-eyed hosts.The swift thought came to him that the generals did not know what they were about.It was all a trap.Suddenly those close forests would bristle with rifle barrels.Ironlike brigades would ap-pear in the rear.They were all going to be sacrificed.The generals were stupids.The enemy would presently swallow the whole com-mand.He glared about him, expecting to see the stealthy approach of his death.
He thought that he must break from the ranks and harangue his comrades.They must not all be killed like pigs; and he was sure it would come to pass unless they were informed of these dangers.The generals were idiots to send them marching into a regular pen.There was but one pair of eyes in the corps.He would step forth and make a speech.Shrill and passionate words came to his lips.
The line, broken into moving fragments by the ground, went calmly on through fields and woods.
The youth looked at the men nearest him, and saw, for the most part, expressions of deep inter-est, as if they were investigating something that had fascinated them.One or two stepped with overvaliant airs as if they were already plunged into war.Others walked as upon thin ice.The greater part of the untested men appeared quiet and absorbed.They were going to look at war, the red animal--war, the blood-swollen god.And they were deeply engrossed in this march.
As he looked the youth gripped his outcry at his throat.He saw that even if the men were tottering with fear they would laugh at his warn-ing.They would jeer him, and, if practicable, pelt him with missiles.Admitting that he might be wrong, a frenzied declamation of the kind would turn him into a worm.
He assumed, then, the demeanor of one who knows that he is doomed alone to unwritten re-sponsibilities.He lagged, with tragic glances at the sky.
He was surprised presently by the young lieu-tenant of his company, who began heartily to beat him with a sword, calling out in a loud and insolent voice: "Come, young man, get up into ranks there.No skulking'll do here." He mend-ed his pace with suitable haste.And he hated the lieutenant, who had no appreciation of fine minds.He was a mere brute.
After a time the brigade was halted in the cathedral light of a forest.The busy skirmish-ers were still popping.Through the aisles of the wood could be seen the floating smoke from their rifles.Sometimes it went up in little balls, white and compact.
During this halt many men in the regiment began erecting tiny hills in front of them.They used stones, sticks, earth, and anything they thought might turn a bullet.Some built com-paratively large ones, while others seemed con-tent with little ones.
This procedure caused a discussion among the men.Some wished to fight like duelists, believ-ing it to be correct to stand erect and be, from their feet to their foreheads, a mark.They said they scorned the devices of the cautious.But the others scoffed in reply, and pointed to the veterans on the flanks who were digging at the ground like terriers.In a short time there was quite a barricade along the regimental fronts.
Directly, however, they were ordered to with-draw from that place.
