i8 
Land & Water 
June 6, 191 8 
His soliloquy fell on deaf ears. The umpire, who had 
maintained a massi\'e silence, suddenly looked up as another 
man took the place of the vanquished at the "home." As 
the new-comer grasped the bat, he was hailed with loud 
entreaties to "knock the ball out of Belgium," on the one 
hand; and, on the other, with sinister assurances that if he 
did his life would hardly be worth living. Meanwhili^, the 
pitcher, some twenty yards in front of him, and the catcher, 
a yard or two behind him, seemed to be engaged in mysterious 
intercourse in a deaf-and-dumb alphabet of their own. The 
pitcher was juggling with th;- ball as though not quite certain 
what to do with it, while the catcher was patting his gloved 
and ungloved hands together as though inviting him to join 
in th > ancient game of pat-a-cakc. All this pantomime 
would have been very disconcerting to a nervous batter. 
It was meant to be. In baseball everybody does his best 
t) put everybody else off his game, this is useful, for it 
teaches you self-c > ftdence ; also self-courage, for you will 
gi?t no encourag i nt. The next moment thf- pitcher 
suddenly brought ins hands together over his head, whirled 
them round in an ellipse, and hurled the bal: in the 
direction of the batter. 
A shell whined towards the field, and dropped with a 
roar and a great spurt of black earth and blacker smoke 
some half a mile away. The spectators ignored it. The 
captain who had been urging the M.O. to still more inflam- 
matory efforts, happening to glance in that direction, noted 
curi )usly a figure in yellow baggy clothes and a red tarbush 
advancing across the field. The figure alternately ran and 
stumbled. He noted, too, that the gun-fire t > the north- 
east had swelled to a loud continuous roar. A click recalled 
him to the game. The batsman had hit the ball to centre- 
field, and, dropping his stick, ran desperately towards the 
first base, about ninety yards to his right. The ball was 
fielded by the centre-field with incredible velocity and thrown 
to the baseman as the batter measured his length on the 
ground. Loud shouts of exultation arose from a group of 
Field Ambulance men under a row of poplars on one side 
of the field as a third machine-gunner entered on his innings. 
The new batsman fingered the "bat" nervously. 
" Don't be afraid of it ! It won't hurt you ! " shouted the 
ambulance men, encouragingly. "It ain't septic." 
"Who's bought you ? " shouted a man with a megaphone 
darkly at .the pitcher. .\nd he proceeded to make a number 
of defamatory remarks, chosen with extreme care, upon the 
age of the player, his deportment, his choice of a career, 
and his private morals. If you are of a sensitive disposition 
you had better not play baseball ; it ij verj- bad for self- 
esteem. But it is uncommonly good for self-control. 
At that moment a man, belted as on duty, thrust his way 
through the boisterous crowd, and, approaching the umpire, 
saluted and gave him a bit of paper. The umpire took the 
message and, having read it, suddenly turned his cap peak 
foremost. He raised his hand. "The game's called," he 
announced in a clear, slightly nasal voice. He turned, and. 
nodding towards the menacing roar in the north-east added, 
with a faint smile, "on account of the rain !" 
Silence fell upon the crowd as he paused for a moment. 
-Men turned one to another. Explosions of light suddenly 
appeared in the north-east, succeeded by three coloured stars 
one above the other, which scintillated brilHantly like gems 
reaching the village, the}' fell in and awaited orders. Thuy 
found the streets of V- choked with a stream of men, 
women, and children — on foot, on horseback, in carts, in 
perambulators, all with their faces turned towards the west, 
as though intent on some desperate pilgrimage. Incredibl}- 
old women and bed-ridden old men borne limply in wheel- 
barrows or carried in hand-carts, with their atrophied legs 
dangling helplessly over the sides, were being pushed or 
dragged through the crowd. The captain, glancing at these 
human derelicts, noticed curiously that one ancient paralytic 
reclined in a barrow with his hands ceaselessly twitching 
while his body and members remained rigid, like a poplar 
whose trunk and branches are still while the leaves at the 
extremities flutter ceaselessly. Young women, carrying 
babies at the breast and with children clutching at their 
skirts, their twinkling feet taking three steps to the mother's 
one, stumbled forward with the same set look upon their 
face. Some were bent double with the weight of large 
feather mattresses ; others held bird-cages, clocks, cats, 
caskets, in a close embrace. Now and then there was a 
scream as some cripple fell and the crowd pressed on and 
over him. And from this surging crowd there arose a single 
cry as though it possessed but a single voice, swelling into a 
loud diapason— " £fs Bodies viennent." 
There was a sound of wheels and a clatter of hoofs on the 
pavi behind, and the crowd turned in terror at the pursuit. 
They broke into a furrow, and through them galloped French 
gunners on horses with the traces cut, followed by other 
mounted men driving limbers without guns — and mercilesslv 
lashing the "leaders," whose mouths were white with foani. 
And they also cried " Les Bodies viennent," and passed on. 
They were followed by men on foot, wearing red fezzes ; 
their livid bluish faces, their lips flecked with froth, their 
hands fumbling at their throats, their gasps for breath added 
to the terror of the crowd with which they mingled. 
The captain eyed them with feelings in which anger and 
pity strove for mastery. "They've got the wind up, and no 
mistake," he said to a subaltern. "But what the hell's the 
matter with them ? They haven't got a scratch." 
"Their uniforms arc as clean as ours," speculated the sub- 
altern. "They can't have been buried. I've never seen 
that look on a man's face before." 
"That pitcher weren't no good," said a man in the ranks. 
"They oughter have taken him out of the box long ago." 
The men, who had been standing easy, now fell out, and 
fetched their rifles, packs, and ammunition. Water-bottles 
were filled, nominal rolls were checked, and for a few minutes 
the company quarter-master -sergeants were incredibly busy. 
The men squatted on the ground, wearing their equipment, 
with their packs lying on the "kicking-straps" beside them. 
They debated freely the respective merits of the two sides, 
the fielding, the pitching, the catching, and the prospects of a 
game that, as it happened, was never to be resumed. 
"COMP'NY!" shouted each company commander. 
The men scrambled to their feet and, putting out their 
cigarettes, put on their packs. 
"COMP'NY! 'SHUN!... FORM FOURS ! RIGHT' 
AT EASE. OUICK-K-K MARCH." 
The short spring day was drawing to a cIosl', the air grew 
cold, the shadows deepened. They marched along the Ypres 
I 
. ^ ^ rr - "'^'^ P"^'' '"°^^' tlirusting their wav through the refugees, and turning 
for a mmute, and then went out Two company orderly- off to the left near the asylum they crossed the canal just 
sergeants appeared on the edge of the crowd, wearing their ' ' " 
belts ; they were panting with exertion as thougli they had 
been running. A soldier from a Belgian working-party' with 
a shovel on his back, emerged in a patch of blue from the 
crowd of khaki, and, talking excitedly, pointed over his 
shoulder in the direction of the church. The crowd was hke 
a field of oats suddenly set in motion by a breeze ; each 
individual member of it seemed to be flickering to and fro, 
although the crowd as a whole remained stationary. 
"The battalion will fall in at once," said the subaltern, 
suddenly, in a changed tone of voice. "Heavy marching 
order." 
The breathless sergeants became articulate. 
'A' and 'B' Companies, stand to!" shouted the one. 
" 'C and 'D' Companies! Back to billets, boys; kits 
on, and fall in," shouted the other. 
"WTiat is it?" said the captain to one of the orderly 
sergeants. 
"The Germans have broken through on the left flank, sir." 
"Our bet's off," said one man to another. "Tell you 
what, mate ; I'll take you in three to one on the M.G.s 
next time." The odds were accepted. 
They streamed back to billets, discussing the match as 
they went. The orderly sergeants were everywhere at once 
— in their flanks and in their rear — rounding up the argu- 
mcntati\e laggards like sheep-dogs on a hillside. On 
north of the doomed city. Clouds of white and black and 
red dust rose above it, as shell after shell crashed down 
upon It. and died away in crayon upon the evening sky. 
In the west the sun was going down in a great conflagration. 
The air was still dry and clear, but to the north-east there 
was a faint greenish haze lying over the fields like a river- 
mist in the crepuscular light. In the fields, on either side 
of them, horses and cows lay dead on their backs in uncouth 
attitudes, with their legs sticking up towards the sky. A 
vast desolation brooded over the landscape. They" were 
alone. Not a living man or beast was to be seen. Dead 
men in bleached uniforms lay about in contorted attitudes— 
their faces livid and on their lips little bubbles of foam. 
Except for the intermittent roar of the guns, the air was 
still as death. In this vast mortuary not a bird sang. 
Ihe road dipped into a hollow, and as the column descended 
the advanced guard began to cough, theji the connecting files 
coughed and these phthisical sounds were gradually taken 
up by the whole column. Night had fallen, and in the dark 
solitudes these hollow sounds were as loud and distinct as 
the hooting of owls in a wood. 
"Silence in the ranks," said the captain, and then he 
begari to cough. His eyes watered. He sniffed 
This place stinks like a damned latrine," he said, irritably, 
as he blew his nose. 
"It's like chlnrofnrii!." s.ii^il one subaltern. 
