10 
LAND 
& 
WATER 
May 4, 1916 
lip the line was a broacl n\cr in fiood ; across it tlic re- 
mains of an iron girder bridge stood out of the water, 
twisted and bent by the force of a great explosion. This 
bridge had been destroyed early in the war, and the junc- 
tion with its supply depot captured by the very army 
whose safety was now threatened. To move the supplies 
lip line by rail was now impossible, and should the enemy 
win back what he had lost, his starving army would gain 
a new lease of life, and would be able to very seriously 
harass the rearguard of the Northern Army, and possibly 
to inflict severe losses, or even defeat. At all costs the 
supplies had to be removed or destroyed, and the enemy 
starved out. 
The position of the Northern Array was critical, 
because it had only succeeded in holding its opponents 
in check and lighting a drawn battle ; another desperate 
onslaught from the enemy, and the junction might oc 
lost. So the leader decided on the destruction of the 
su])plies, and a retirement across the river. 
All through the lirst night, troops had marched past 
the depot on their way to the river, where the pontonniers 
were laying bridges for their crossing. 
It was now evening; no troops remained on the 
junction side of the river, except the ca\alry, screening the 
army's movements. The second night of the retreat 
was drawing on, and the work of destruction at the 
jimction was nearly complete. 
Just an hour before midinght, the last train steamed 
out of the station, loaded to its utmost capacity with 
provisions and stores. The man with the spanner was 
given the order to let loose his hordes of wreckers ; already 
clouds of smoke rolled up thickly into the night from the 
lired buildings ; straw stacks burst into sudden flame, 
casting showers of sparks over the surrounding piles — 
sacks of flour that had been abandoned and masses of 
frozen meat. Everything conbustible was soon in a 
blaze ; crash followed crash as the buildings collapsed, 
sending forth immense bursts of fire and smoke ; a strong 
wind fanned the conflagration to fury, and blew wisps 
of burning straw through the darkness. There was a 
loud crackling now, a sound of hissing and tearing, as 
the destroyer worked apace. 
The men who had accomplished their task now 
made all haste to follow their friends to safety. A light 
engine followed by trucks moved up the hue ; on the 
trucks were swarms of grimy figures huddled, together 
some with their legs dangling over the edge of the trolleys, 
others lying asleep on the floor-boards. Their hands were 
sore and blistered ; .ill were parched with thirst and weak 
from exertion. 
As they glanced back they saw a red, wavering glow 
m the southern skyline. Few among them thought of the 
thousands of exhausted and hungry men out in the night— 
they too might have seen the glow in the sky and have 
guessed what it meant : the death of their hopes, the 
loss of that for which they had fought so desperately and 
suffered so much. Tnie ; the enemy was miles away, 
busy with his dead and wounded after the three days 
battle ; but hunger would not let him wait long, and 
even then he might have been advancing to wrest, if 
possible, some remnant of his prize from the burning. 
» * * * * * 
Through the small hours of the morning, while the 
work of destruction was proceeding at the junction, a 
steady stream of soldiers, guns and wagons filed across the 
river. A mile below the WTecked girder bridge two others 
had been constructed on pontoons ; they were placed 
close together — one on canvas boats for the infantry ; 
the other, a more solid affair on wooden pontoons for the 
artillery and transport. 
In the pale dawn-light, seen through the belts of 
mist that rose from the water and from either bank, the 
troops had an almost spectral appearance as they marched 
over the bridges, with no sound but their steady tread and 
the resonant rumbling of wheels as the guns and trans- 
])ort crossed on the pontoons. Regiments of infantry 
filed in seemingly endless procession from bank to bank ; 
many of the men slightly wounded, with head or limbs in 
bandages. Some of the gun shields were dinted — 
wounded men sat clinging together on the limbers. The 
batteries were followed by convoys of grey wagons, motor 
transport, and ambulance cars. 
The army had marched from the scene of the three 
day's conflict lest an undecided battle should be turned 
into defeat and disaster ; it had laid waste its paths and 
co\-ered its tracks^ and all that could not be taken away 
was' destroyed. 
By midday half the army was across the river. 
And all the while, behind them, train after train had 
rolled up from the southward, until on both lines some- 
thing like two miles of engines, trucks, and wagons ex- 
tended along some hundreds of yards from the ri\-er 
bank. 
Then, towards evening, after the last of the troops, 
save a few squadrons of cavalry had crossed over the 
river, began an amazing work of destruction. 
The girder bridge had spanned the ri\cr at a point, 
some little distance below the pontoons, where the banks 
were high and steep and where the drop into the river 
below was precipitous. Towards the wrecked bridge 
two trains began to move on the two parallel lines of 
rail ; at first slowly, then faster, imtil they leaped the 
bridge-head and crashed down through the shattered 
ironwork into the swirling water below. There was a 
roaring detonation as some of the ammunition exploded, 
throwing up a bursting cloud of mud, water and splinters. 
Two more trains were already coming on — this time 
from a rather greater distance — and they too plunged 
down thunderously into the flood — now thick with 
debris. Then two more — faster ; and so on, two by two, 
until the river was choked and glutted with wreckage. 
The drivers stuck to their engines until the\' had got the 
trains moving steadily, and then, jerking the throttle- 
levers down, they sprang from the foot-plates and left 
the trains to clatter forward to destruction. 
Gradually the piled wreckage began to show above 
the water ; grim ; distorted shapes of bent iron that 
seemed to gesticulate forlornly. Crates and boxes came 
loose, and spun down on the flood ; and the wreck and 
waste continued until every train had disappeared over 
the brink. 
At dusk the drivers and stragglers crossed the light 
bridge, while the pontonniers hurriedly dismantled the 
larger pontoon after a few squadrons of cavalry had 
crossed. A small charge demolished the lighter structure 
and the work was complete. 
The retiring army had covered its tracks by ruthless 
waste^but waste that meant salvation. 
There is much in Sussex Gorse, by Sheila Kayc-Sinith 
(Xisbet and Co., 6s.) to render the book comparable with 
Jitde the Obscure, although Jude was a failure, while Reuben 
Backfield was a success — and this work lacks the tremendous 
poignancy of the former novel, while Reuben's relations witl 
the opposite sex were not lacking in conventional morality. 
Reuben desired Boarzeli Moor, and, a small farmer at the 
time of his father's death, he bought his desire piece by piece 
It cost him his brother, his mother, his two wives, and al! 
his children ; it cost him, too, over seventy years of strenuous 
work together with the respect of his neighbours and all the 
friends he might have made. And yet the man was not S(j in- 
human that the reader cannot admire much of his character. 
He loved a place, a thing, as others may love sentient beings, 
and he sacrificed himself and all that he had to his one love— 
Boarzeli Moor. 
The book is well above the average length, yet not a page 
too long. It is made up of some of the strongest, most vivid 
writing of the last decade in spite of its author's detached 
manner of telling Reuben's story, and not only must it be 
ranked as a really outstanding novel, but also as a sincere and 
notable addition to that small part of the output of fiction 
which is also — in the best sense of the word — literature. 
Paris Reborn, by Herbert A. Gibbons (The Century Co., New 
York), is a diary of life in Paris during tlie first five months of 
the war, dealing with incidents of tin- mobilisation, the aero- 
plane attacks, the censorship, and all that made Paris memor- 
able during those months of threat and danger. The author 
shows, by means of these sketches, how the spirit of Paris 
rose to the level of the days, and how Paris — which is France, 
was reborn from the negation of all things to new beliefs and 
greater national aspirations — shows, too, how prayer came 
back into French lives, and the belief in things eternal and 
intangible was born out of the wreck of things tangible and 
material. One may gather, by reading such a book— whicli 
is evidence from a neutral writer, by the way— how it is that 
1' ranee is destined for victory in this war — how such a nation 
C )uld not be other than victorious. It is an inspiring work, 
well worthy of careful perusal. 
