New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1916-08-20


ant village of Sommeilles. 1t had been burne'
house by house and only the crumbled rocl
was left in piles along the roadside. | looked
at the church tower. On September morn
ing, at fourteen minutes of 9 o'clock, an in
cendiary she'll had cut through the steepl
of the church, disembowelled the great cocl
and set the roof blazing. There, facing tn
crossroads, the hands of the clock, once 81
busy with their time keeping, are frozen. Fo
twenty-three months they have registered
the instant of their own stoppage. On th'
minute hand, which holds line parallel will
that of the earth, a linnet has built its mes
Of straw. The hour hand, outpaced by II
companion at the moment of arrest, wa
marking time at slant too perilous for th'
home of little birds.
Together the hands had travelled steadily
through the hours that make the years foi
almost a century. High over the village
street they had sent the ploughman to his
field and the girl to her milking. Children
late from their play had scrambled home TO
supper, frightened by that lofty record Of
their guilt And how many lovers, straying
back from the deep protecting meadows, have
quickenad their step when the revealing
moonlight lighted that face? Now it marks
only cessation Il tells of the time when a
village ceased 20 live. Something came down
out of the distance ord destroyed the activ-
tiles Of Notwithstanding that made an
end Of play and love- Only the life of the
linnet goes on as if the world was still I'M
troubled. Northern France is held in that
cessation. Suddenly death came and touched
seven hundred villages. Nor can there ever
be a renewal of the old charm. The art Of the
builders is gone and the old sense of Sc
curity in a quiet. continuing world.
have been spending the recent days with
these peasants in the ruins of their shattered
world Little wooden ENGAGEMENTS are
springing up, as neat and bare as the bunga-
lows of summer visitors on the shore of a
Maine lake. Brisk brick houses and stores
lift out of crumbed rock with all the new
ness OF a mining camp. It is all very brave
and spirited. But it reminded me Of the new
wooden legs, with shining leather supports
and bright metal joints, which manned SOL
diers are wearing. Everything is there which
a mechanism can give but the life-giving
currents no longer flow. A spiritual mutla-
ton has been wrought on these peasant peo-
pie in destroying the familiar setting Of their
life. They had reached out flaments of habit
and love 10 the deep set hearth and ancient
rafters. The curve Of the village street was
familiar TO their eye, and the profile of the
s+aunch time resisting houses
From a new wooden structure, with one
fair sized very neat room in it, girl came
out to talk with US. She vas about twenty
years old, with settled sadness in her face
and dim pain in her voice Her old home
had stood on what was now a vegetable gar
den. A fragment of wall was still jutting up
out Of the potatoes. Everything that was
dear to her had been carefully burned by the
Germans
"All the same, it is my own home" she
said pointing back to the new shack. "it does
very we'll But ny mother could not stand it
that everything was gone. We ran away for
the few days that the Germans were here
Mother died eight days after we came
back"
The 5lst Regiment of German Infantry en-
tered the village, and burned it by squirting
petrol on piles Of straw in the houses The
machine they used was like bicycle pump,
a huge syringe. or the Town Hall simply the
front wall is standing carrying its date Of
1886. Seventeen steps 80 up its exterior,
leading to nothing but a pit Of rubbish
"For three days lay hidden without bread
to eat" said passerby.
An old peasant talked with u.s. He told US
that the Germans had come down in the night
and burned the village between and 6 in the
morning. A little later they fired on the
church. With petrol on hay they had burned
MS own home.
Tout brde," he kept repeating as he sent
his gaze around the wrecked village He
,estured with his stout wooden stick, swing
ng it around in a circle to show the COM
'leteness OF the destruction.
We went to his home. his new home, a
prick house; built oy the English Quakers,
Who have helped in much Of this reconstruc-
ion work. He and his wife live looking out
IN the ruin OF their cid home.