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

one may see, yet each of them is hardly anything, because he is isolated. It is almost a mistake to count them; what you see when you look at the multitude is an immensity made of nothing.

And the people of to-day--overloaded with gloom and intoxicated with prejudice--see blood, because of the red hangings of rostrums; they are fascinated by the sparkle of diamonds, of necklaces, of decorations, of the eyeglasses of the intellectuals. They have eyes but they see not, ears but they hear not; arms which they do not use; and they are thoughtless because they let others do their thinking! And the other half of this same multitude is yonder, looking for Man and looked for by Man, in the big black furrows where blood is scattered and the human race is disappearing. And still farther away, in another part of the world, the same throne-like platforms are crushing into the same immense areas of men; and the same gilded servants of royalty are scattering broadcast words which are only a translation of those which fell on us here.

Some women in mourning are hardly stains on this gloomy unity. They wander and turn round in the open spaces, and are the same as they were in ancient times. They are not of any age or any century, these murdered souls, covered with black veils; they are you and I.

My vision was true from top to bottom. The evil dream has become a concrete tragi-comedy which is worse. It is inextricable, heavy, crushing. I flounder from detail to detail of it; it drags me along. Behold what is. Behold, therefore, what will be--exploitation to the last breath, to the limit of wearing out, to death perfected!

I have overtaken Marie. By her side I feel more defenseless than when I am alone. While we watch the festival, the shining hurly-burly, murmuring and eulogistic, the Baroness espies me, smiles and signs to me to go to her. So I go, and in the presence of all she pays me some compliment or other on my service at the front. She is dressed in black velvet and wears her white hair like a diadem. Twenty-five years of vassalage bow me before her and fill me with silence. And I salute the Gozlans also, in a way which I feel is humble in spite of myself, for they are all-powerful over me, and they make Marie an allowance without which we could not live properly. I am no more than a man.

I see Tudor, whose eyes were damaged in Artois, hesitating and groping. The Baroness has found a little job for him in the castle kitchens.

"Isn't she good to the wounded soldiers?" they are saying around me. "She's a real benefactor!"

This time I say aloud, "_There_ is the real benefactor," and I point to the ruin which the young man has become whom we used to know, to the miserable, darkened biped whose eyelids flutter in the daylight, who leans weakly against a tree in face of the festive crowd, as if it were an execution post.

"Yes--after all--yes, yes," the people about me murmur, timidly; they also blinking as though tardily enlightened by the spectacle of the poor benefactor.

But they are not heard--they hardly even hear themselves--in the flood of uproar from a brass band. A triumphal march goes by with the strong and sensual driving force of its, "Forward! You shall _not_ know!" The audience fill themselves with brazen music, and overflow in cheers.

The ceremony is drawing to a close. They who were seated on the rostrum get up. Fontan, bewildered with sleepiness, struggles to put on a tall hat which is too narrow, and while he screws it round he grimaces. Then he smiles with his boneless mouth. All congratulate themselves through each other; they shake their own hands; they cling to themselves. After their fellowship in patriotism they are going back to their calculations and gratifications, glorified in their egotism, sanctified, beatified; more than ever will they blend their own with the common cause and say, "_We_ are the people!"

Brisbille, seeing one of the orators passing near him, throws him a ferocious look, and shouts, "Land-shark!" and other virulent insults.

But because of the brass instruments let loose, people only see him open his mouth, and Monsieur Mielvaque dances with delight. Monsieur Mielvaque, declared unfit for service, has been called up again. More miserable than ever, worn and pared and patched up, more and more parched and shriveled by hopelessly long labor--he blots out the shiny places on his overcoat with his pen--Mielvaque points to Brisbille gagged by the band, he writhes with laughter and shouts in my ear, "He might be trying to sing!"

Madame Marcassin's paralyzed face appears, the disappearance of which she unceasingly thinks has lacerated her features. She also applauds the noise and across her face--which has gone out like a lamp--there shot a flash. Can it be only because, to-day, attention is fixed on her?

A mother, mutilated in her slain son, is giving her mite to the offertory for the Lest-we-Forget League. She is bringing her poverty's humble assistance to those who say, "Remember evil; not that it may be avoided, but that it may be revived, by exciting at random all causes of hatred. Memory must be made an infectious disease." Bleeding and bloody, inflamed by the stupid selfishness of vengeance, she holds out her hand to the collector, and drags behind her a little girl who, nevertheless, will one day, perhaps, be a mother.

Lower down, an apprentice is devouring an officer's uniform with his gaze. He stands there hypnotized; and the sky-blue and beautiful crimson come off on his eyes. At that moment I saw clearly that beauty in uniforms is still more wicked than stupid.

Ah! That frightful prophecy locked up within me is hammering my skull, "I have confidence in the abyss of the people."

* * * * * *


Wounded by everything I see, I sink down in a corner. Truth is simple; but the world is no longer simple. There are so many things! How will truth ever change its defeat into victory? How is it ever going to heal all those who do not know! I grieve that I am weak and ineffective, that I am only I. On earth, alas, truth is dumb, and the heart is only a stifled cry!

I look for support, for some one who does not leave me alone. I am too much alone, and I look eagerly. But there is only Brisbille!

There is only that tipsy automaton; that parody of a man.

There he is. Close by he is more drunk than in the distance! Drunkenness bedaubs him; his eyes are filled with wine, his cheeks are like baked clay, his nose like a baked apple, he is almost blinded by viscous tufts. In the middle of that open space he seems caught in a whirlpool. It happens that he is in front of me for a moment, and he hurls at my head some furious phrases in which I recognize, now and again, the truths in which I believe! Then, with antics at once desperate and too heavy for him, he tries to perform some kind of pantomime which represents the wealthy class, round-paunched as a bag of gold, sitting on the proletariat till their noses are crushed in the gutter, and proclaiming, with their eyes up to heaven and their hands on their hearts, "And above all, no more class-wars!" There is something alarming in the awkwardness of the grimacing object begotten by that obstructed brain. It seems as if real suffering is giving voice through him with a beast's cry.

When he has spoken, he collapses on to a stone. With his fist, whose leather is covered with red hair, like a cow's, he hides the squalid face that looks as if it had been spat upon. "Folks aren't wicked," he says, "but they're stupid, stupid, stupid."

And Brisbille cries.

Just then Father Piot advances into the space, with his silver aureole, his benevolent smile, and the vague and continuous lisping which trickles from his lips. He stops in the middle of us, gives a nod to each one and continuing his ingenuous reflections aloud, he murmurs, "Hem, hem! The most important thing of all, in war, is the return to religious ideas. Hem!"

The monstrous calm of the saying makes me start, and communicates final agitation to Brisbille. Throwing himself upright, the blacksmith flourishes his trembling fist, tries to hold it under the old priest's chin, and bawls, "You? Shall I tell you how _you_ make me feel, eh? Why----"

Some young men seize him, hustle him and throw him down. His head strikes the ground and he is at last immobile. Father Piot raises his arms to heaven and kneels over the vanquished madman. There are tears in the old man's eyes.

When we have made a few steps away I cannot help saying to Marie, with a sort of courage, that Brisbille is not wrong in all that he says. Marie is shocked, and says, "Oh!"

"There was a time," she says, reproachfully, "when you set about him!"

I should like Marie to understand what I am wanting to say. I explain to her, that although he may be a drunkard and a brute, he is right in what he thinks. He stammers and hiccups the truth, but it was not he who made it, and it is whole and pure. He is a degraded prophet, but the relics of his dreams have remained accurate. And that saintly old man, who is devotion incarnate, who would not harm a fly, he is only a lowly servant of lies; but he brings his little link to the chain, and he smiles on the side of the executioners.

"One shouldn't ever confuse ideas with men. It's a mistake that does a lot of harm."

Marie lowers her head and says nothing; then she murmurs, "Yes, that's true."

I pick up the little sentence she has given me. It is the first time that approval of that sort has brought her near to me. She has intelligence within her; she understands certain things. Women, in spite of thoughtless impulses, are quicker in understanding than men. Then she says to me, "Since you came back, you've been worrying your head too much."

Crillon was on our heels. He stands in front of me, and looks displeased.

"I was listening to you just now," he says; "I must tell you that since you came back you have the air of a foreigner--a Belgian or an American. You say intolantable things. We thought at first your mind had got a bit unhinged. Unfortunately, it's not that. Is it because you've turned sour? Anyway, I don't know what advantage you're after, but I must cautionize you that you're anielating everybody. We must put ourselves in these people's places. Apropos of this, and apropos of that, you make proposals of a tendicious character which