enthusiasm and exultation, suddenly paled and sickened. The
silence of the night was interrupted only by the low moaning of the
wounded that came regularly to us. It was hideous in its terrible
monotony. The moon had risen, throwing fantastic lights and
shadows over the desolate landscape and the heaped-up dead.
These grotesque piles of human bodies seemed like a monstrous
sacrificial offering immolated on the altar of some fiendishly cruel,
antique deity. I felt faint and sick at heart and near swooning away.
I lay on the floor for some time unconscious of what was going on
around me, in a sort of stupor, utterly crushed over the horrors
about me. I do not know how long I had lain there, perhaps ten
minutes, perhaps half an hour, when suddenly I heard a gruff, deep
voice behind me--the brigadier, who had come around to inspect
and to give orders about the outposts. His calm, quiet voice
brought me to my senses and I reported to him. His self-assurance,
kindness, and determination dominated the situation. Within five
minutes he had restored confidence, giving definite orders for the
welfare of every one, man and beast alike, showing his solicitude for
the wounded, for the sick and weak ones, and mingling praise and
admonition in just measure. As by magic I felt fortified. Here was a
real man undaunted by nervous qualms or by over-sensitiveness.
The horrors of the war were distasteful to him, but he bore them with
equanimity. It was, perhaps, the first time in my life that I regretted
that my artistic education had over-sharpened and overstrung my
nervous system, when I saw how manfully and bravely that man
bore what seemed to me almost unbearable. His whole machinery
of thinking was not complicated and not for a moment did qualms of
"Weltschmerz" or exaggerated altruism burden his conscience and
interfere with his straight line of conduct which was wholly
determined by duty and code of honor. In his private life he was an