This beer is sour. We have done our best, we French, our utmost, and it
isn't quite enough. We have made a supreme effort, but it hasn't cleared
the enemy from our country. _La guerre--c'est triste._"
He, too, fights on, but that overflow of vitality does not visit him, as
it comes to the youngsters of the first line. It is easy for the boys of
Brittany to die, those sailors with a rifle, the stanch Fusiliers
Marins, who, outnumbered, held fast at Melle and Dixmude, and for twelve
months made Nieuport, the extreme end of the western battle-line, a
great rock. It is easy, because there is a glory in the eyes of boys.
But the older man lives with second thoughts, with a subdued philosophy,
a love of security. He is married, with a child or two; his garden is
warm in the afternoon sun. He turns wistfully to the young, who are so
sure, to cheer him. With him it is bloodshed, the moaning of shell-fire,
and harsh command.
One afternoon at Coxyde, in the camp of the middle-aged--the
territorials--an open-air entertainment was given. Massed up the side of
a sand-dune, row on row, were the bearded men, two thousand of them.
There were flashes of youth, of course--marines in dark blue, with
jaunty round hat with fluffy red centerpiece; Zouaves with dusky
Algerian skin, yellow-sorrel jacket, and baggy harem trousers; Belgians
in fresh khaki uniform; and Red Cross British Quakers.
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