456 CHAPTER 26 ‘THE FIRST woRLD WaE HENRI BARBUSSE rrom Under Fire: The Story of a Squad Fronch wuthor Henri Barkusse (1873-1985) enfisted voluntarily in 1914, but mas discharged as a result of battefietd injuries tm 1917, Already a succesful poet when the war began, Barbusse published Under Fige: The Story of @ Squad, a ftional- ised account of his wartime experiences, x 1916. The novel wes the Prix Gscourt the highest French literary honor. Barbusse’s enstwar sentiments, evieut in the bit fer sarcasin af Under Five, inspite him co become & pacifist and to joie the Coin- rmunist Party after the war. He wus living in ehe Soviet Uniom at the time of his death Under Fire documents the life of the pollu, the “hairy” French World War I soldier, srowgh a group porwat ofa squacron of men ewe from ail walks of life In the following excerpt from the opening of the novel. Barbusse introduces the soi- dies md roves ther single, overwhelming presecapaion —the quality of their grub, Fram Cinder Fire: The Story of # Squad, H. Barbuse, trandated by Fitewater Wray, EP. Dutton, 1917, Mesnil Joseph deowses: Blaine yawns; Marth- creau smokes, “eyes front.” Lamuse scratches himself ikea gorilla, and Eudore lke a marmose. Volpatte coughs, and says, “I'm kicking the bucket” Memil André has got out his micor and comb and is tending his fine chestnut beard as though it were a rare plant. The monot ‘nous calm is disturbed here and thee by the out breaks of ferocious resentment provoked by the Presence of parasites —endomic, chronic, and contagious. Barque, who is an observant man, sends an itinerant glance around, takes his pipe from his south spits, winks, and says— “Lsay, we don't resemble each odher much.” “Why should we?” says Larus. “It would be 4 miracle if we ih” Our agest We are of all ages. Ours is a ragi- iment in reserve which successive reinforcements have renewed partly with fighting units and partly with Terrtorials In our halfseetion there ate re- servists of the Territorial Army, new recruits, and dem: poils. Fouillade is forty; Blaire might be the father of Biguct, who is a gosling of Class 1913. The corporal calls Marthereau “Grandpa” or “Old Rubbish-hesp.” according as in jest or in earnest. Mesnil Toseph would be at the barracks if there were no wat. It isa comical effect when. we arc in charge of Sergeant Vigle a nice litle boy, with dab on his lip by way of mustache. When we were in guariers the other day, he played at skipping- rope with the kiddies. [n our illssorted ilock, in this family without kindred, this home without a hearth at which we gather, there are three gener> ations side by side, living. waiting, standing stil like unfinished statues, like posts ‘Our races? We are of all acess we come from ‘everywhere, [look at the two men beside me. Po»458 cuapven 26 Tu Finst WoRLD WAR ‘war will have risked their faces only atthe loop ‘Doles, unless in passing by, or under gold-laced caps. Yes, we ate truly and deeply different from euch other, But we are alike all the same. In spite tf this diversity of age, of country, of education, of position, of eversthing possible, in spite of the former gulf that kept us apart, we are in the main alike, Under the sume uncouth outlines we conceal and reveal the same ways and habits, the ssme imple nature of men who bave reverted to the state primeval The same language, compounded of dialect and the lang of workshop and barracks, seasoned ‘with the latest inventions, blends us in the sauce ‘of speach with the massed multitudes of men who (fer seatons now) have emptied France and -rowded together in the North-East Here, 100, linked by 2 fate from which there is no escape, swept willy-nilly by the vast adven- ture into one rank, we have no choice but to go as the weeks and months goalie. The terrible narrowness of the common life binds us cose, adapts us, merges us one in the other. Iisa sort of fatal contagion, Nor nes you, t0 see how alike wwe soldices are, be afar of-—at that distance, say, when we are oaly specks of the dustclouds that roll across the plain. ‘We are waiting, Weary of siting, we get up, cour joints creaking lke warping wood or old hinges. Damp rusts men as it rusts rifles; more slowly, but deeper. And we bein again, but act in the same way, to wait In a state of war, one is always waiting, We have become waiting machines, For the momeat itis food we acc wait- ing for. Then it will be the post. But cach in its turn. When we have done with dinner we wil think about the leters. After that, we shall et our selves t0 wait for something ele. Hunger and thirst are urgent instincts which formidably excite the teraper of my companions. [As the meal ges later they become gramblesome and angry. Theic need of food and drink snarls from their lips— “That's ight o'clock Now, why the hell doesn't it come? “There's the grubl" announces a pail who was on the look-out at the corner. “Time, too!" ‘And the storm of revilings ceases as if by magic. Wrath is changed into suekden content= ment. ‘Three breathless fatigue men, their faces streaming with tears of sweat, put down on the ground some large tins, a paraffin can, two.canvas buckets, and a fle of loaves, skewered on a stick Leaning against the wall of the trench, they mop their faces with their handkerchiefs or sleeves. And see Cocon go up to Pepére with a smile, and forgetfol ofthe abuse he had been: heaping on the other's reputation, he stretches out 2 cardial hand towards one af the cans in the collection that swells the circumference of Pépére after the man ner of a Wile-belt “"ivhat i there to eat!” 's there," is the evasive reply of the second fatigue man, whom experience has taught that a proclamation of the menu always evokes the bi temness of disillusion. So they set themselves to panting abuse of the length and the difficulties of the trip they have just accomplished: “Some crowds about, everywhere! It's a tough job to get along—got to disguise yourself as a cigarette pa- per, sometimes” —"And there are people who say they're shirkers in the kitchens!” As for him, he ‘would a hundred thousand times rather be with ‘the company in the trenches, to mount guard and dig. than earn his keep by such a job, twice a day during the migh Paradis, having lifted the lids of the jars sur- veys the recipients end announces, “Kidney beans n oi bully, puddings and eofiee—thats all.” ‘Now ee Dieu! bavls Tulacque. “And wine?" He summons the crowe: “Come and look Incr, all of yout That—thar’s the limit! We're done out cf our wine!” ‘Athirst and grimacing. they hurry wp: and from the profoundest depths of their being wells up the chorus of despair and. disappointment, “Oh, Hell”Mewar BaRAUssE: raow Under Fire: The Story of a Squad terloo, the miner from the Calonne pit, is his eyebrows are the color of straw, his eyes flax blue. Hts great golden head involved a long search in the stores to find the vast stee-blue curcen that bonnets him. Fouillade, the boatman from Cette, rolls bit wicked eyes in the Jong, lean face of a musketeer, with sunken cheeks and his skin the ‘enlot of a violin, Im good soath, my twa neighbors are as unlike as day and night. Cocon, na less, a slight and desiccated person fn spectacles, whose tint tells of corrogion in the ‘hernical vapors of great towns, contrasts with Bi- squet, a Breton in the rough, whose skin is gray and his jaw lke a paving-stone; and Mesnil André, the comfortable chemist from a country town ie ‘Normandy, who has such 2 handsome and silky ‘beard and who talks to much and so well—bhe has ‘itl in common with Lamuse, the fat peasant of oitou, whose cheeks and neck are like underdone beef. The suburban accent of Barque, whose long legs have scoured the streets of Paris in all direc- tions, alternates with the semi-Belgian cadence of those Northerners who came ftom the 8th Terri- torial with the sonorous speech, rolling on the syllables 35 if over cobblestone, that the 144th FOUTS out upon us; with the dialect thlown from those ant-like clusters that the Auvergnats so ob: stinately form among the rest. I remember the frst words of that wag, Tivete, when he arrived res enfants, 1 am from Clichy-la-Garenne! Can any one beat that?" —and che fist grievance that Paradis brought to me, “They don't give a damn for me, because I'm from Morva Our callings? A little of all—in the hump. tn those departed days when we had a social status, before we came to immure our destiny in the ‘molchills that we must always build up again as fast as rain and scrap-iron beat them down, what ‘were wef Sons of the soil and artisans mast. La- muse was a farmservant, Paradis a carter. Cadi hac, whose helmet rides loosely on his pointed head, though i is a juvenile sire—like a dome on a steeple, says Tirette—owns land. Papa Blaire was a small farmer in La Brie. Barque, porter and mes- 457 senger, performed acrobatic tricks with his earier tricycle among the trams and taxis of Paris, with solemn abuse (30 they say) for the pedestrians, fleeing like bewildered hens across the big streets and. squares. Corporal Bertrand, who: keeps him self ubways a litle aloof, correct, erect, and silent, with a sitwag and handsome face and forthe ight gaze, was foreman in a case-factory. Tisloir ddaubed carts with paint—and without grumbling, they say. Tolacque was barman atthe Throne Tav= ‘em in the suburbs: and Eudore of the pale and pleasant face kept a roadside café not very far from the front lines. It has been ill-used by the shells— naturally. for we all know that Eodore has no ck. Mesnil André. who still retains a trace of well- kept distinction, sold bicarbonate and infallible remedies at his pharmacy ina Grande Placr His brother Joseph was selling papers and ilhi= strated story-books in a station on the State Rail- ways at the same time that, in farcoff Lyons, Cocon, the man of spectacles and statistics, dressed ina black smock, busied himself behind the counters af an ironmongery, his bands glitter- ing with plumbago: while the Lumps of Bécuwe Adolphe and Poterloo, risen with the dawn, trailed about the coalpits of the North like weakling Will- nd. thee ate others among ux whose ‘eccupstions one can never recall, whom one confuses with one another; and the rural nom sdescripts who peddled ten trades at once in their packs, without counting the dubious Pépin, who can have had none at all. (While at the depot after sick leave, three months ago, they say, he got married—to secure the separation allowance.) ‘The liberal professions are not represented among those around me. Same teachers are sub- alterns in the company oF Red Cross met In the regiment a Marist Brother is sergeant in the Service de Sancé: a professional tenor is cyeist dispatch- rider to the Major: a “gentleman of independent means” is mess corporal to the C.HLR. But here there is nothing of all that. We are fighting men. we others, and we include hardly any intellectuals. cor men of the arts or of wealth, who daring this“then what's that in there says the fatigue rman, still muddily sweating, and using his faot to point at a bucket “Yes!” says Paradis, “my mistake, there is the fatigue man shrugs his shoulders, and hurls at Paradit a look of unspeakable scorn— “Now you're beginning! Get your gigslamps on, if your sight’s bad” He adds, “One cup each— rather lest perhape—sorne chucklehead bumped against me, coming through the Bayau du Bois, and a drop get «piled. “Abt” he hastens to add, raising his voiee, “if { hade't bees loaded up, tall. about the baot-toe he'd have got im the rump! But he hopped it on ‘his top gear, the brute!” In spite of this confident assurance, the fatigue man makes off himself, curses overtaking him 95 be goes, maledictions charged with offensive 1e- ections on his honesty and temperance, impre- cations inspiced by this revelation of a ration seduced. All the same, they throw themselves on the food, and eat it standing, squatting, kneeling, sit- newst JONGER: r2om The Storm of Sie! 458 ting on tins, or on haversacks pulled oat of the holes where they sleep—or even prone, their backs on the ground, disturbed ‘by passers-by, weursed at and cursing. Apart from these Heeting insults and jests, they say nothing, the primary and universal interest eing but to swallow, with their ‘mouths and the circumference thereof as greasy as a rifle-breech. Contentment is theirs. Review QUESTIONS 1. How different from one anosher are the sob ders in this squad? 2. What social characteristics do they share? 3, How “democratic” was World War f, accord ing to Barbusse? Why is food so important to these ment What point is Barbus trying to make abot the military experience in this passage?