Light by Henri Barbusse (good novels to read in english txt) 📕

loses its hold no more, but becomes incarnate in us. It sets one small word resounding in our heads, between our teeth--"Forward!"--longer, more infinite than the uproar of the shells. It sets us making, towards the east or towards the north, bounds which are days and nights in length. It turns us into a chain which rolls along with a sound of steel--the metallic hammering of rifle, bayonet, cartridges, and of the tin cup which shines on the dark masses like a bolt. Wheels, gearing, machinery! One sees life and the reality of things striking and consuming and forging each other.

We knew well enough that we were going towards some tragedy that the chiefs knew of; but the tragedy was above all in the going there.

* * * * * *


We changed country. We left the trenches and climbed out upon the earth--along a great incline which hid the enemy horizon from us and protected us against him. The blackening dampness turned the cold into a thing, and laid frozen shudders on us. A pestilence surrounded us, wide and vague; and sometimes lines of pale crosses alongside our march spelled out death in a more precise way.

It was our tenth night; it was at the end of all our nights, and it seemed greater than they. The distances groaned, roared and growled, and would sometimes abruptly define the crest of the incline among the winding sheets of the mists. The intermittent flutters of light showed me the soldier who marched in front of me. My eyes, resting in fixity on him, discovered his sheepskin coat, his waist-belt, straining at the shoulder-straps, dragged by the metal-packed cartridge pouches, by the bayonet, by the trench-tool; his round bags, pushed backwards; his swathed and hooded rifle; his knapsack, packed lengthways so as not to give a handle to the earth which goes by on either side; the blanket, the quilt, the tentcloth, folded accordion-wise on the top of each other, and the whole surmounted by the mess-tin, ringing like a mournful bell, higher than his head. What a huge, heavy and mighty mass the armed soldier is, near at hand and when one is looking at nothing else!

Once, in consequence of a command badly given or badly understood, the company wavered, flowed back and pawed the ground in disorder on the declivity. Fifty men, who were all alike by reason of their sheepskins ran here and there and one by one--a vague collection of evasive men, small and frail, not knowing what to do; while non-coms ran round them, abused and gathered them. Order began again, and against the whitish and bluish sheets spread by the star-shells I saw the pendulums of the step once more fall into line under the long body of shadows.

During the night there was a distribution of brandy. By the light of lanterns we saw the cups held out, shaking and gleaming. The libation drew from our entrails a moment of delight and uplifting. The liquid's fierce flow awoke deep impulses, restored the martial mien to us, and made us grasp our rifles with a victorious desire to kill.

But the night was longer than that dream. Soon, the kind of goddess superposed on our shadows left our hands and our heads, and that thrill of glory was of no use.

Indeed, its memory filled our hearts with a sort of bitterness. "You see, there's no trenches anywhere about here," grumbled the men.

"And why are there no trenches?" said a wrongheaded man; "why, it's because they don't care a damn for soldiers' lives."

"Fathead!" the corporal interrupted; "what's the good of trenches behind, if there's one in front, fathead!"

* * * * * *


"Halt!"

We saw the Divisional Staff go by in the beam of a searchlight. In that valley of night it might have been a procession of princes rising from a subterranean palace. On cuffs and sleeves and collars badges wagged and shone, golden aureoles encircled the heads of this group of apparitions.

The flashing made us start and awoke us forcibly, as it did the night.

The men had been pressed back upon the side of the sunken hollow to clear the way; and they watched, blended with the solidity of the dark. Each great person in his turn pierced the fan of moted sunshine, and each was lighted up for some paces. Hidden and abashed, the shadow-soldiers began to speak in very low voices of those who went by like torches.

They who passed first, guiding the Staff, were the company and battalion officers. We knew them. The quiet comments breathed from the darkness were composed either of praises or curses; these were good and clear-sighted officers; those were triflers or skulkers.

"That's one that's killed some men!"

"That's one I'd be killed for!"

"The infantry officer who really does all he ought," Pélican declared, "well, he get's killed."

"Or else he's lucky."

"There's black and there's white in the company officers. At bottom you know, I say they're men. It's just a chance you've got whether you tumble on the good or the bad sort. No good worrying. It's just luck."

"More's the pity for us."

The soldier who said that smiled vaguely, lighted by a reflection from the chiefs. One read in his face an acquiescence which recalled to me certain beautiful smiles I had caught sight of in former days on toilers' humble faces. Those who are around me are saying to themselves, "Thus it is written," and they think no farther than that, massed all mistily in the darkness, like vague hordes of negroes.

Then officers went by of whom we did not speak, because we did not know them. These unknown tab-bearers made a greater impression than the others; and besides, their importance and their power were increasing. We saw rows of increasing crowns on the caps. Then, the shadow-men were silent. The eulogy and the censure addressed to those whom one had seen at work had no hold on these, and all those minor things faded away. These were admired in the lump.

This superstition made me smile. But the general of the division himself appeared in almost sacred isolation. The tabs and thunderbolts[1] and stripes of his satellites glittered at a respectful distance only. Then it seemed to me that I was face to face with Fate itself--the will of this man. In his presence a sort of instinct dazzled me.

[Footnote 1: Distinctive badge for Staff officers and others.--Tr.]

"Packs up! Forward!"

We took back upon our hips and neck the knapsack which had the shape and the weight of a yoke, which every minute that falls on it weighs down more dourly. The common march went on again. It filled a great space; it shook the rocky slopes with its weight. In vain I bent my head--I could not hear the sound of my own steps, so blended was it with the others. And I repeated obstinately to myself that one had to admire the intelligent force which sets all this deep mass in movement, which says to us or makes us say, "Forward!" or "It has to be!" or "You will _not_ know!" which hurls the world we are into a whirlpool so great that we do not even see the direction of our fall, into profundities we cannot see because they are profound. We have need of masters who know all that we do not know.

* * * * * *


Our weariness so increased and overflowed that it seemed as if we grew bigger at every step! And then one no longer thought of fatigue. We had forgotten it, as we had forgotten the number of the days and even their names. Always we made one step more, always.

Ah, the infantry soldiers, the pitiful Wandering Jews who are always marching! They march mathematically, in rows of four numbers, or in file in the trenches, four-squared by their iron load, but separate, separate. Bent forward they go, almost prostrated, trailing their legs, kicking the dead. Slowly, little by little, they are wounded by the length of time, by the incalculable repetition of movements, by the greatness of things. They are borne down by their bones and muscles, by their own human weight. At halts of only ten minutes, they sink down. "There's no time to sleep!" "No matter," they say, and they go to sleep as happy people do.

* * * * * *


Suddenly we learned that nothing was going to happen! It was all over for us, and we were going to return to the rest-camp. We said it over again to ourselves. And one evening they said, "We're returning," although they did not know, as they went on straight before them, whether they were going forward or backward.

In the plaster-kiln which we are marching past there is a bit of candle, and sunk underneath its feeble illumination there are four men. Nearer, one sees that it is a soldier, guarding three prisoners. The sight of these enemy soldiers in greenish and red rags gives us an impression of power, of victory. Some voices question them in passing. They are dismayed and stupefied; the fists that prop up their yellow cheekbones protrude triangular caricatures of features. Sometimes, at the cut of a frank question, they show signs of lifting their heads, and awkwardly try to give vent to an answer.

"What's he say, that chap?" they asked Sergeant Müller.

"He says that war's none of their fault; it's the big people's."

"The swine!" grunts Margat.

We climb the hill and go down the other side of it. Meandering, we steer towards the infernal glimmers down yonder. At the foot of the hill we stop. There ought to be a clear view, but it is evening--because of the bad weather and because the sky is full of black things and of chemical clouds with unnatural colors. Storm is blended with war. Above the fierce and furious cry of the shells I heard, in domination over all, the peaceful boom of thunder.

They plant us in subterranean files, facing a wide plain of gentle gradient which dips from the horizon towards us, a plain with a rolling jumble of thorn-brakes and trees, which the gale is seizing by the hair. Squalls charged with rain and cold are passing over and immensifying it; and there are rivers and cataclysms of clamor along