THE BELGIAN ARMY

Dominion, Volume 11, Issue 76, 22 December 1917, Page 10

THE BELGIAN ARMY

VISIT TO THE YSER FRONT

RUINS OF A PRE-WAR CIVILISATION

(By Ernile Cammaerts, in ihe "Dailv

Telegraph.")

I had not seen the Belgian front for three years. It was in December, 1914, on the morrow of the battle of the Yser, a vision of mud and rain, and i thousand hardships cheerfully borne, rhe work of re-equipment had scarcely started. Many things were still wanting, and some units looked, in their nedley of uniforms, liko' irregular bands >f brigands. A few farms could lie seen emerging from the floods, like islets from the sea, and the men had to wade knee-deep to reach their adranee posts. Everything was grey, nisty, silent, and mysterious—a desert haunted by an army of ghosts. Die thousands of dead whom wo had just lost made their presence felt, and there ivas a pervading reck m tlio air. To visit the Belgian trenches as the} *ie to-day, with the vivid memories ol ivhat tbov used to bo, is to step from Iream into reality, from the trial ol sacrifice into the hope of an early reivarcf: The bright weather, which we mioyed still increased the contrast. PFc moved in a world of colours where the warm tones of khaki and of the screens of "camouflage blended m strange harmony with the blue of the skv and the vivid'red of some freshly wrecked brick wall. The floods; were much lower, covered with lustlm reeds, aiiro with water-hens and sea»ults. Round Dixmude, RaniseapcUtred Nieuport shells were bursting injessantly. Field guns were barkmi! a way dose by, and the wees of mail} heavfos could now bc_ heard on 0111 side. From time to time somo long ;listanco shells winded overhead Every detail of the scene brought the same message of life, struggle, am readiness, from the sturdy helmeteel Eantrvman going to his rest camp attei a spell in the trenches, to the wellorganised defences in every village close to Che front, to the narrow footbidges leading to the advance post; in the floods where Belgians and t-cr-manfc confront each other every nipm in an amphibious war full of surprise and thrilling incidonts. ' For oven in the sector of the floods the front held by the Belgian army MS never ceased to be lively. .Willi fche execution of the counter-attack ol Steenstraote, during tlio second batt c 5f Ypres, 110 operation on a large scale lias been made since 1914, but tho artillery duel has never stopped for more than a few days, and there is not one night when some bombing expeeliuoi K some advance post raid elocs ne>l take place. Tlioso who would ge> t< tlio Belgian front with the preconceived idea that nothing happen? in ,. rjimrt-or might be sorely disillusioned Ihey might, for instance, undergo the same experience as tho Italian aiele-dc camp who, while accomnanyine ft- 11 ]?- Victor Emmanuel and King Albert ir their recent tour of insnQct-ioii, fount himself unexpectedly half-buried by s shell. Tt would b<* a great mistake t( judge the work of the Belgian army or. for the matter of that, of any army from the extremely concise and giiard eel utterances of the official <( com muniques."

A Contrast in Types. There is a small cemetery close to ths ciiwdi of Adinkerke, Hear Funics, where the peasants and fishermen ivhc lived in that village used to find c peaceful rest after a long and busy life*. Here, among tho civilians, close to the iron paling, is tho simple tomb.of our great national poet, Emilo Verhaeren. Tho cemetery has been enlarged to make room for some of the boys whom Belgium has lost sincc the battle of the Yser. Only those who died of wounds in tho neighbouring hospitals arc buried hero, and similar cemeteries oan be found closer to tho front and in the rear as far as Calais. I liavo walked through these rows of graves, standing eloso together, and read there many familiar names on many simple crosses. Rich men, poor men, students and labourers, some who fought since Liege, others who had come from the occupied provinces. Every tomb hears a. number. and before I had reached the end of tho last row I counted 2000 of them. There are, indeed, many more tilings happening than the official coinnnmioues allow us to dream .of.

T have, just snid Hint the tomb of Vovhaoren' is at Adiiikorke, but 'lis body is 110 longer there. Owing to the frequent German air raids to which the village has i been subjected lately, the poet's friends have had the _ coffin transported to a safer place, if any placo can bo called "safe" in independent Belgium, i For there is not a town, not a village, in this region which lias not received some German shell or bomb. Furnes itsolf, which used to be King Albert's headquarters, has had to be abandoned, not only by the soldiers, but even by the charitable British ladies who used to comfort and help the wounded and the destitute civilians. The picturesque old mr.rket place, once a scene of groat animation, is now deserted, and the grass is growing between its cobble-stones. A few of the old Spanish gables stand crooked at. a dangerous angle, and one house only is still inhabited by an old lady and her daughter, who keep a small cafe. The four or five soldiers and civilians who are allowed to romain in the town gather there, after their day's work, to drink a glass of beer and play a game of cards, for the Belgian instinct of companionship is hard to kill. I had the opportunity of talking with the old lady who presides over this peaceful assembly. She told me that she had only just come back from a lt she had been obliged to take in I ranee after the last raid, and she confessed to me that this war had been a great worry to her: "Oui, cette guerre, e'est bien ennuyeux. Ihc before I had met at Arras a French woman who had kept her little shop open throughout the bombardment, telie was very neatly dressed, and, with a bright smile, explained that she hau been congratulated by the "prefet. "Oui, m'sicu," she declared, "j suis uue martyrs d'Arras."' There you have the two types of Flemish and French temperament in a nutshell. They express themselves differently, but they act m the same way.

Brave English "Missis." From the top of the clock-house of Fumes, amid a cloud of frightened, cawing crows, you could see the whole country spread before you like a map " the evening light. Nieuport was clouded with bursting shells, and the straight lino of the Belgian front could clca > hn seen along the \ser floods as lai as, Caeskerke, and further on beyond Dixmudo and Loo, whore the enemy Uplands so close to our om, that, in cSiffi weather the faintest wnispcr can bo heard on cither bide, ai 1 invariably followed by a hail ol lia « grenades. Straight before us we could Bee Itamscapelle, which we had not been able to visit owing to a.uea\y bombardment, and PervyK, ,Joro we had called on two English ladies who established there a first-aid' stetion in 1914, and have remained faithful y at their post. Some change also had occurred there. The "miss," as they ar| called, have had to leave ilioir < old home owing to the visitation of a German shell, and to take « P new quarters at the end of the ° the ground floor of a red-tiled • ot, ta r .e. The 'first floor has disappeared, but the roof has been skilfully repaired and

lowered so that the house looks mm ar less 'like a Utile boy who has ti'i&s un his father's hat. If I did not fefiJ Lo be indiscreet, I should also n<eiition that one of these ladies—who, needless to say, remains a "miss for the sol liers —has married a Belgian officer, ind is now Madame la Baronne de p t There is not a corner of this Belgian front at Fumes, La Panne, Vdnikerke, or Pervyse, where Belgian Heroism has not been comforted by English kindness, and where tho smile . if som'e Englishwoman has not allocated the sufferings of some Belgian soldier. . . On my way back on the boat, as iucK vould have 'it, I met a Belgian officer 3ii leave, to whom I expressed my a<lniration for the transformation wliicii had occurred during these last years, ma how happy I felt to see the Belgian Army re-equipped and stronger ill men and material than it had ever jeer, bofore.' "Yes," ho answered, wa have worked a good deal, but there is something much moro amazing than these physical improvements; it is the fact that the men. after so many months of patient waiting, liave kept up their spirits. When Londoners see our soldiers coming on leave without tlieir trench equipment and in these uniforms tliey do not realise tho hard life which They are leading in Flanders, if, instead of enjoying this bright weather, you had experienced a spell of slush and rain, you would have gathered a very different impression, lou are Oi course, aware that it is nowhere possible to dig oneself 111 in this pait 3 f Flanders, so that everywhere our trenches must be built up with sandbags. That means, of course, that the least bombardment upsets your defence works, and obliges the men to repair them constantly. A spell of rain after dry weather is nearly as bad, and you can see your parapet nicking ( and slipping away before your eyes, lhen there is the "camouflages, those screens of reeds which you find so picturesque. Do you realise that these feeds must be cut at night in the Hoods and carried in bundles to the roads When they arc dried they are strung together and fixed by wires to polo.s ten feet high. And there are miles and miles of roads to be screened. You must never forget that there is 110 division of work in the Belgian Armv, 110 shock troops, 110 fatigue patties." We cannot afford that. The same man fills sandbags one day and joins in a raid tho next, after a three-mile ivalk. 1 once weighed one 'of my men s u'eatcoats after such a night march through the clay, mud, and the rain. Lt weighed over fifty pounds. Quite apart from the fact that the soldiers are cut off from their people, mid that a few only hear from them From time to time, there is the tedious monotony of pursuing the same work amid the same difficulties. _ In. every other army some shifting of troops is possible. \Vc are still marking time on the same -spot. Many men would gladly risk tlieir lives for a change of surroundings. As it is, tho only trouble we have with them is 111 trying to avoid useless losses. Only a few days ago 1 lost two men who, in spite of strict orders, were foolhardy enough to play cards 011 their parapet close to the German lines. And if by chance they kill a rabbit or any other game thev will not wait-until the evening to go and fetch it in full view of the snipers. There will be only one difficulty about an advance, to keep them from rushing into their own barrage. . But, of course, it cannot be helped. AYe must remain on Belgian soil, around the King. ■* • •'