of these sturdy men in his
brass hat, with his ruddy face and white mustache, but no thrill passed
down their ranks, no hoarse cheers broke from them because he was there,
as when Wellington sat on his white horse in the Peninsular War, or as
when Napoleon saluted his Old Guard, or even as when Lord Roberts, "Our
Bob," came perched like a little old falcon on his big charger.

Nine men out of ten in the ranks did not even know the name of their
army general or of the corps commander. It meant nothing to them. They
did not face death with more passionate courage to win the approval of a
military idol. That was due partly to the conditions of modern warfare,
which make it difficult for generals of high rank to get into direct
personal touch with their troops, and to the masses of men engaged. But
those difficulties could have been overcome by a general of impressive
personality, able to stir the imaginations of men by words of fire
spoken at the right time, by deep, human sympathy, and by the luck of
victory seized by daring adventure against great odds.

No such man appeared on the western front until Foch obtained the
supreme command. On the British front there was no general with the gift
of speech--a gift too much despised by our British men of action--or
with a character and prestige which could raise him to the highest rank
in popular imagination. During the retreat from Mona, Sir John French
had a touch of that personal power--his presence meant something to
the men because of his reputation in South Africa; but afterward, when
trench warfare began, and the daily routine of slaughter under German
gun-fire, when our artillery was weak, and when our infantry was ordered
to attack fixed positions of terrible strength without adequate support,
and not a dog's chance of luck against such odds, the prestige of the
Commander-in-Chief faded from men's minds and he lost place in their
admiration. It was washed out in blood and mud.

Sir Douglas Haig, who followed Sir John French, inherited the
disillusionment of armies who saw now that war on the western front was
to be a long struggle, with enormous slaughter, and no visible sign
of the end beyond a vista of dreadful years. Sir Douglas Haig, in his
general headquarters at St.-Omer, and afterward at Montreuil, near the
coast, had the affection and loyalty of the staff--officers. A man of
remarkably good looks, with fine, delicate features, strengthened by
the firm line of