Middletown transcript., 1914-11-07
HOW FRANCES BLACK MEN FROM
AFRICA FIGHT THEIR BATTLES

and his cap like fez without a tassel.
His Moroccan campaigns, he said,
we're mere practical jokes to the pres
ent butchery, and he told me this
story of the trenches, from which he
had just returned:
I'VE have a hard time making the
men stay down under cover. They
want to see what is going on. They
want to jump out and wave their guns
and shout insults at the enemy oc-
casionally as they used to in Mo-
rocco. Our captain, who was, Of
course, Frenchman, was as bad as
any. Except to sleep, he absolutely
refused to descend into the trenches.
He would kneel for hours on the
ground little to the rear watching
the enemy through his glasses and di-
recting our fire. When we remon-
strated with him he merely said, like
any Mohammedan, that bullet would
find him when his time came-neither
sooner nor later. But so many Of
our men paid for their temerity with
their lives that he, too, finally con-
sented to come down out Of the hail
of bullets which had never ceased
about him. Yesterday was his first
day in the trenches. About three
o'clock in the afternoon a shell burst
overhead. A piece of it hit him on
the crown and killed him instantly"
so you think it was because his
time had Gomez"
What else can one think? He had
found safety in the midst Of death,
but death had found him in what
should have been the midst of safety.
The captain was right. 1t is written"
Think "AIl's Fair In War;"
/ do not know the origin Of the
proverb, "All's fair in love and war"
but it has an ancient, oriental SAVIOR
and I suspect the Turcos thoroughly
subscribe to it. These African fight
ers are the only ones among the
allies whom have heard speak open
ly in praise of German ruses.
They're sly ones!" say the Turcos,
and wag their brown heads and grin
appreciation. They think it a very
good scheme of the Germans not to
make any effort to bury their dead
before retreating from one position to
another, for thus the pursuing enemy
must either bother to do the job him
self or else run the risk of discomfort
and even disease. They especially
admire the German trick of standing
up their dead, helmet on and gun in
hand, along a deserted trench, so that
the French will think the trench is
still defended. And the wonder to
them is, not that the Germans have
burned and shelled towns, but that
they have not done so more frequent
ly.
senegalese Worship Fetishes.
The Senegalese tirailleurs, although
the Turcos in certain of
their military ethics, are beings Of
an altogether different order. There
is but one Allah, and Mohammed is
his prophet" means nothing to them.
They worship fetishes. They are
black men of Timbuctoo and the
Ivory coast, where the fiery harmat-
tan blows southwestward off the Sa-
hara toward the sea.
Knowing that the forefathers Of
many of our own good American ne
groes had been captured by English
and Portuguese slavers in precisely
these regions, I expected to find some
thing familiar in the aspect of the
Senegalese rif1emen. l was destined
to disillusion. Three days ago on the
road to Reims, l overlook an entire
regiment. They stood or squatted or
sprawled for several hundred yards
along the grass at the edge of the
road, resting under the pop
lars, their rifles stacked, their white
officers withdrawn into groups, al
ways at some distance from the men.
Save for a red sash under their tu-
MICS, they were uniformed entirely in
dark blue, even to their cloth caps |
and their putties. l walked past |
them slowly, fascinated. Most wore
shoes, some we're barefooted in sand
ials, but I had to look very closely |
at the dark feet to distinguish this
They seemed very tired |
under the weight of their haversacks.
Their eyelids dropped like those of an
exhausted animal or of a man who has
been drugged.
Their Look Causes Shudder.
1t may have been this. or 1t may
have been the blodshot whites of
heir eyes which caused me to shud-
Ter slightly when one looked at me.
They scarcely spoke. Some sat star.
ng into space, bent forward over
heir long, thin legs, which extended
ike poles in front of them. A num-
)er were bearded-that is to say,
hey had across their upper lips and
lnder their chins a circle of black
lair, the center of which was a pair
If thick lips. When one Of them took
IF his cap to mop his brow 1 was
lmazed to see headdress like the en-
in the anthropolgy text
Dooks-a shaved head with a tuft on
op from which descended on all
ides little kinky strings Some, too,
lad earrings.
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