Courage! How many million times was the word spoken that night of
mobilization by women who saw the sudden pallor of their men, by
men who heard the cry of their women? I heard it in the streets,
spoken quite brutally sometimes, by men afraid of breaking down,
and with a passionate tenderness by other men, sure of their own
strength but pitiful for those whose spirit fainted at the spectre of
death which stood quite close.


11


In the days that followed the Second of August I saw the whole
meaning of mobilization in France--the call of a nation to arms--from
Paris to the Eastern frontier, and the drama of it all stirs me now as I
write, though many months have passed since then and I have seen
more awful things on the harvest fields of death. More awful, but not
more pitiful. For even in the sunshine of that August, before blood
had been spilt and the brooding spectre of war had settled drearily
over Europe, there was a poignant tragedy beneath the gallantry and
the beauty of that squadron of cavalry that I had seen riding out of
their barrack gates to entrain for the front. The men and the horses
were superb--clean-limbed, finely trained, exquisite in their pride of
life. As they came out into the streets of Paris the men put on the little
touch of swagger which belongs to the Frenchman when the public
gaze is on him. Even the horses tossed their heads and seemed to
realize the homage of the populace. Hundreds of women were in the
crowd, waving handkerchiefs, springing forward out of their line to
throw bunches of flowers to those cavaliers, who caught them and
fastened them to képi and jacket. The officers--young dandies of the