New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1915-08-08

When an attack is made and hand-to-
hand fighting takes place men appear
on the surface for perhaps five min
utes while crossing or trying 10 cross
the short open space between trenches.
Then they fall back into their own
trenches or dive into the enemy's
works. and clouds of white smoke from
bursting hand grenades hang over the
trenches while the desperate battle
goes or for possession of that yard
wide ditch. | have seen the smoke OF
grenades over trenches, but never the
hands of the men who threw them.
Modern war is not spectacle. 1t
is an impression that leaves its imprint
on the soul. ! have seen the bodies OF
four soldiers lying between the oppos-
ing trenches $50 yards apart. No man
could reach his comrade to give him
decent burial.
Where Only Crows Could Reach.
have seen the body OF a dead SOL
der hanging to barbed wire entanglc-
ments twenty yards in front of the
trenches, and only crows could reach
him to peck his eyes. | have seen the
skeleton of a man long dead bleaching
on the Nevada desert. And the over
whelming impression in each case was
the awful loneliness of that death.
There is another great impression
one gets in the war zone, but this is
behind the lines-in the second and
third line trenches and the great re-
serve camps-and it is an entirely diff
ferent impression from what one re-
ceives in the first line.
Here, behind the battle front war Is
what it ought to be. Here is war as II
is, mean-these French "Poilus"
might be our own soldiers of fifty years
ago, living there in dugouts, gathering
around their camphres, ploughing
cheerfully through mud TO the daily
drudgery of camp life.
rode for three miles through dense
woods on a little 15-inch gauge COM
munication railroad that brought up
food, water, ammunition and supplies
of all kinds from a reserve camp 10 the
first line trenches. 1t ended only a
hundred yards in the rear of the tirss
line, and there where the railroad
ended began the life of war we know
and have read about so often-war as
II ought TO be.
We went to the front on a fiat car
drawn by three horses hitched tan
dem. Seats were roughly knocked to-
gether lengthwise of the car, and we
sat facing each other with our knees
interlocking so that all could squeeze
in. A "Poilu" mounted the lead horse
and arother rode the wheeler.
Might Have Fought for Grant.
That man who rode the wheeler
might have been one of Grants men
taking supplies up TO Thomas al Chick
amauga. His uniform-such as 1t was
was reproduction of that OF our men
in the Civil War. Those were Tennes-
see woods we were toiling through, and
the profile of the bearded "Poilu," who
carelessly bestrode his horse and urged
him faster into the zone OF tre, was a
perfect type OF the Northern armies.
Every man whose father served IN
our great war and has heard the tales
and read the stories of nifty years ago
every man whose heart thrills az the
sight Of the flag and the strains OF
"The Star Spangled Banner" should
love these French "Poilus' as his
blood brothers.
They are our own soldiers of the
great war fighting battles all over
again in the same surroundings ander
the same conditions and in those same
scraps and tag-ends Of uniforms. with
the same cheerful, hardy spirit. to the
end .,
Back of the lines is where you really
see both men and officers and near
them talk and get their spirit.
have heard great deal about con-
script armies. and on our way from
Paris to the front there was an Eng
lishman in our party who brought OUT
all the old stock arguments against