The times., 1897-06-06

/
village of Lamelti ,at the foot Of the hill,
and came pouring out of its single gate
| way and UP TO the very base of the slope on
which we stood, until for moment IL
1 looked as though hayonet charge would
| follow. But the Greeks opened on the
| little band below from the crest OF every
ridge, and it melted away to set fire to
| the village and then tramped hack across
| the plowed field in open order, re-
| treating steadily and with no undue haste.
F., To cover the advance on the village the
| Turkish batteries were firing rapidly and
| the air was torn with bullets and shells, not
| only from the guns on the plain, but also
| from the little mountain battery that
| answered them from the sugar-loaf hill
| behind us.
THE 'shrieking shrapnel' of which one
reads in the description of every battle
! did not sound to me SO much like a shrek
| as 1t did like the jarring sound OF teie-
| graph wires when some one strikes the
| pole from which they hang, and when they
| passed very close the noise was like the
rushing sound that rises between two rail-
road trains when they pass each other in
| opposite directions and at great speed.
| After few hours we learned by observa-
tion That when we heard a shell sound
overhead 1t had already struck somew here
beyond us, which was comforting, and
which is explained, OF course, by the fact
that the speedof the shellis SO much greater
than the rate at which sound travels.
We found the bullets much more disturb
ing; they seemed to he less open in their
warfare, and to steal UP and sneak by
leaving no sign and only whispering as
they passed. They moved under "A cloak
OF invisihlity, and made one feel as though
| he were the blind man in a game of blind
man 's-buff, where every one tapped MIN in
passing, leaving him puzzled and ignorant
as TO whittier they had gone and from what
point they would come next.
The bullets sounded like rustling silk,
or like numming bird son warm summers
day, or like the wind as IL is initiated on
the stage of tEeater. Any one who has
stood behind the scenes when a storm
is progressing on the stage knows the
little wheel wound with silk. that brushes
against another piece of silk and which
produces the whistling effect of the wind.
At Nelestino, where the firing was very
heavy. it was exactly as though some one
were turning one of these silk wheels, and
so rapidly as TO make the wind continuous
Toward midday men began to leave us
leaning heavily on the arm OF comride.
They wore puzzled, grieved look aud
stared wonderingly down at a limp arm
or a bleeding slash on the breast as though
they could not comprehend why out of so
many they should have been selected TO
suffer; and soon other men were drawn
back by the legs out of the trench and
laid on the grass with blanket thrown
over them, or left staring up with GLAZED,
drunken eyes at the hot sun. So many of
the men drew back from time to time
merely To stretch their cramped limbs, or
to smoke, or to break piece OF hard tis-
cult that these Others were only iistin-
guishahle by the fact that they did Lot
dodge when a shell swept over them:
and so natural did they look stretched in
the long grass that only after several
hours. when you noticed that they still
held the same position, did yen know
that they were dead.
THE scene of the battle, as, we saw it
when we looked behind us, wore strangely
commonplace air and one entirely of peace:
for. on account of the trenches, the rest
OF the Greek forces were hidden from view,
and although 5000 men were within
quarter of mile of us the only sign of
Their presence was the few feet of fresh
soil along the tops of the ridges. Had
1t not neen for the motionlesS figures un-
der the blankets and the wounded men who
rocked backward and forward, and those
who lay punched together beside us, the
place would have smiled and breathed with
peace. But when we stood up and looked
down over the trenches we could see the
blue masses of the Turkish force and the
flashes OF Their infantry fire, and the
great bursts of thick smoke that told where
the batteries stood When these clouds
came we would drop on our faces in time
to hear the shell scream overhead, and by
turning on one elbow tO see sudden up-
heaval in the sunny landscape behind us,
a squirt of earth and stones like minia-
ture geyser, which was filled with broken
branches and tufts of grass and pieces of
rock that lad withstood the touch of CEN
turies. As the Turkish aim grew better
these volcanoes appeared higher up the
hill, creeping nearer and nearer to the ram
part of fresh earth on the second trench
until the shells hammered it al last again
and again. sweeping it away and cutting
great gashes in it, through which we saw
figures of men caught up and hurled 10
one side, and others flineing themselves |
face downward as though they were div |
ing into water; and at the same instant
in our own trench the men would gasp |
as though they had been struck, too, and !
then, becoming conscious of having done |
this, would turn and smile sheepishly at |
each other and crawl closer into the bur
rows they had made in the earth.
''Just as the sun began to sink behind |
the hills, and the air was growing cooler, |
and every one was beginning to think that !
darkness would soon bring d suspension of |
bostilities, a fierce fire fIom one of the |
upper ridges told of some new advance on |
the part of the enemy. and the Turks sud- |
denly appeared below us, clambering out |
of a long gully though they sprang |
from the earth. On the moment the |
smiling landscape changed like scene in |
what had apparently been deserted hill
tops AMI stood outlinedin silhouette against |
the sunset, waves of smoke ran from crest |
to crest splitting flashes of red lame, and |
mems voices shrieked and shouted, and the
Turkish shells raced each other so fiercely |
that they beat out the air untilit groaned.
1t had cone up SO suddenly that it was like
two dogs springing at each others thIoats,
and in greater degree it had something
the sound of two wild animals struggling |
for life. Volley answered volley as though
with personal hate-one crashing in upon
the roll of the other, or beating it out of
recognition with the bursting roar of
heavy cannon; and to those who could do
nothing but lie face downward and listen
it seemed as though they had been caught
|