he slash ...
so, and so ... he cut off my arm.

"I remember no more, Monsieur. After a day ... two days, I find that I can
walk. I walk and walk. It is now one hundred and fifty miles from my home
... it is that I stay here until...."

I grasped the girl's left hand and turned away. I was sick. What if she had
been my sister?

And then I thought of the laws read aloud to us that morning. We soldiers,
fighting under the flag of the British Empire, were we to violate one
little rule ... were we to take any property, no matter how small, without
just payment to its owner; were we to drink one glass of beer too much ...
were we to overstep by a hair's breadth the smallest rule of the code of a
"soldier and a gentleman," we were liable to be shot.

What of the German who had ruined this young girl and maimed her body?
Believe me, I realized then, if never before, what we were fighting for. I
was ready to give every drop of blood in my veins to avenge the great
crimes that this little girl, in her frail person, typified.

We passed another night in the same billets. Next morning at five-thirty we
were roused to make a forced march, across country, of some twenty-two
miles. This was the hardest march of the entire time I was at the front.
Those ammunition boots! Those gol-darned, double distilled, dash, dash,
dash, dashed boots!

It was winter. There was heavy traffic over the roads. There were no road
builders, and precious little organization for the traffic. Part of the way
the surface had been cobblestones; now it was broken flints.

We started out gallantly enough with full packs, very full packs. Then, a
few miles out, one would see out of the corner of his eye, a shirt sail
quietly across the hedge-row; an extra pair of boots in the other
direction; another shirt, a bundle of writing paper; more shirts, more
boots. Packs were lightening. Down to fifty pounds now; forty, thirty,
twenty, ten ... the road was getting worse.

No one would give up. Half a dozen men stooped and slashed at their boots
to get room for a pet corn or a burning bunion. But every man pegged ahead.
This was the first forced march. We were on our way to the trenches. No man
dare run the risk of being dubbed a piker. We agonized, but persevered.

Armentieres was our objective. A fine city, this, and one which we might
have enjoyed under happier circumstances. It was under fire, but not badly
damaged, and consequently many thousands of the Im