New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1917-06-20

/ Surely
/ Copyright. 1917. b. Rudyord KipIin5.
| All rights reseruedl
/ 1t does not need an expert TO dis
tinguish the notes of the several Ital-
ian fronts. One picks them up long
way behind the lines, from the troops
in rest or the traffic on the road. Even
behind Browning's lovely Asolo, where,
you will remember, Pippa passed sew
enty.six years since, announcing that
: "All's right with the world" one felt
the tightening in the air.
The officer, too, explained frankly
above his map:
"See where our frontier west of the
Dolomites dips south in this V-like
spearhead. That's the Trentino. Carl
baldi's volunteers were in full posses
sion of it In our War of independence.
( Prussia was our ally then against Aus
1 tria, but Prussia made peace when it
suited her-I'm talking Of 1S64-and
we had to accept the frontier that she
and Austria laid down. The Italian
/ frontier is bad one everywhere
| Prussia and Austria took care of that
but the Trentno section is specially
/ bad"
Mist wrapped the plateau we were
climbing. The mountains had changed
into rounded, almost barrel-shaped,
heights, steep above dry valleys. The
roads were many and new, but the lor-
ries held their pace; the usual old men
and boys were there to see to that.
Scotch moors, red uplands. SCARED with
trenches and punched with shell holes;
a confusion of hills without color and,
d
/ in the mist, almost without shape, rose
and dropped behind US. They hid
troops in their folds always waiting
troops-and the trenches multiplied
/ themselves high and low on their sides.
| Mountain in Rubbish
From Head to Heel
We descended mountain smashed
into rubbish from head to heel, but still
preserving outline, like wrinkles on
forehead, of trenches that had fol-
lowed its contours. A narrow, shallow
ditch ct might have been water main)
ran vertically up tho hill, cutting the
faded trenches at right angles.
"That was where our men stood be-
1 fore the Austrians were driven back In
their last push--the Asiago push, don't
YOU call it? 1t took the Austrians ten
DAVIS to work halfway down from the
ton Of the mountain. Our men drove
that trench straight up the hill, as you
see. Then they climbed, and the Aus
TRANS broke. It's not as bad as u
looks. because in this sort Of work, II
the enemy uphill misses his footup' ne
rolls down among your men, but If you
stumble you only slip back among your
friends"
! "Wbst did Il cost your" whispered.
"A good deal. And on that mountain
.cro,s the sorge-but the mist won't
let you see tour men fought fOr
week mostly without water. The
Austrians were the first people 70 lay
ont q line Of twelve-inch she'll holes on
a mountains side TO serve as trenches
It's almost a regulation trick on all the
fronts now, but It's annoying
]
He told tales of the long, bitter fight
when the Austrians thought, till Cen
eral Cadorna showed them otherwise,
they had the plains to the south az
their mercy. I should not care 70 be
An Austrian with the Boche behind me,
erercitus Romdnus in front
1t was the quietest Of fronts and the
least ostentatious Of armies. II lived
in great towns among forests, where
we found snow again in dirty, hollow
Aanked drifts, that were giving up all
the rubbish and refuse winter had hid
den. Labor battalions dealt with the
stuff, and there were no smells. Other
gangs mended she'll holes with speed;
the lorries do not like being checked.
Township But a
Battered Core
Another township. founded among
stones. stood empty except for the
cook, and a bored road member or two.
The population was up the hill digging
and blasting, or in the wooded park
like hollows Of lowlsnd. Battaiions