Evening star., 1939-11-20
Slaughter Is Seen
By Gibbs # Nazis
Hit Maginot Line
British Writer Doubts
Attack Will Come on
Western Front
By SIR PHILIP GIBBS,

WITH THE BRITISH FORCES,
In France, Nov. 10 (N.AN.A., by
Radio. With some of my friends
out here, I have been spending some
time this week in the French zone
of the war, and today we were in
the Maginot Line, that astounding
system of defense which makes an
impregnable fortress, mostly under
ground, against which it is impos-
sible to believe that any German
advance could be possible without
frightful slaughter and utter de-
struction.
During these days, have been
.deeply moved by the spirit and char
acter of the French officers and
men, with whom we have talked in
fort, dugout. gun emplacement and
subterranean passage.
D'Artagnan is not dead. Those
men who defended Verdun lost
100000 dead so that the enemy
should not pass. Their type sur
wives. Many of them who fought
In the last war stand to arms in
this, as they stood at Fort Douau-
mont, on whose slopes beyond Ver-
dun which once were slashed by
shell-flre. BY our side was French
colonel, who told us how the hattie
was saved and France saved by the
men who held on when most of
their comrades had been killed. A
young officer now is in charge of the
French fort. He had a fine, grave,
noble face. One knew somehow by
the look of him that he, too, would
hold on like that if need be.
And the French poilu in the viii
lagos through which we passed
villages now deserted by those who
dwelt there, so that no woman or
child is seen-has not changed in
type since the last war. I spoke to
many of them and saw thousands Of
them in billets. They are sturdy,
good-natured fellows.
I'VE live in mud" said one of
them, "but mud is better than
blood"
Received by French General.
Before going up to the line we
were received by French general,
who had his headquarters along
the roadside. We were dirty, muddy
and wet and we looked like tramps
when he came in to greet us. He
was a MISUNDERSTANDING man
with a strong, clean-cut face, like
Norman knight. He made
speech that was perfectly thought
out and little masterpiece of elo-
uuence on the reasons why France
and Great Britain we're at wax
with Germany again.
We looked into Germany there,
beyond Sierck, where three frontiers
meet-France, Germany and Lux
embourg. We had driven this way
past the forest of Warndt close to
Saarbruecken. There, from an OBJ
servation post, we could see the
last village in France. Beyond was
Perl and, farther away, Trier.
Below us was a long line of floods,
artificially made and helped by
heavy rains, rejecting the sunlight
of early morning below a chain of
low hills and darkly wooded heights,
each one of which was a French
strong point from which a fame
of fire would stream if any attack
came from the Rhine northeast of
us, where there was a no-man's
land kilometers wide between
France and Germany.
A few hidden guns fired some
distance away. 1t was 81 years
Since I had heard that sound of
machine-made thunder. But all was
quiet, with strong, uncanny quiet
ness over this far-reaching country
where hundreds of thousands of
men and hundreds of guns lie in
fields on both sides of an invisible
line, themselves invisible.
No Tumult of War.
1t was as quiet as the Surrey
Hills at dawn on November morn.
Here was no tumult of war, no
sense of imminent melee. But all
about us were the steel chambers
of an underground fort, from
which, at the turn of a wheel, long
tubes rose, heavy guns and how
itzers with a field of fire to sweep
the ground for miles around. Near
by was defending line of ma
chine gun posts and barber-wire
ENHANCEMENT. We looked down
into ditch, very deep and very
wide, with guns defending it from
one end. "A pretty trap for Ger