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ON THE WAY TO THE FIFTH ARMY 75
The next village wc pass is Bantheville, from which the
population fired on the Germans from the windows when they
entered. The guilty persons were seized and hanged, and a
couple of houses which were fired from were burnt down.
Now the village was full of troops and transport columns.
Horrible-looking water-filled holes in the road and by the road-
side betokened the effect of the German guns during the
advance. In a field stands a whole row of wagons filled with
sacks of oats. Near by is a flying station and a field bakery
detachment with its engines, which look like baking ovens,
and its big yellow tents where the dough is kneaded and
moulded in gigantic troughs.
At length we drive back to Dun, where the traffic is if
possible still livelier than in the morning. It took some time
to make our way between the trains of vehicles on the bridges
and in the narrow village street. Proviant Kolonn i Wageti
23 with its team of four and drivers seemed to wish to bar
our way, but the officer in charge got a terrific scolding from
the Major. The noise—the shouting, the creaking of wagons,
the cracking of whips, the jolting and the neighing—in this
village road is indescribable. The 5th Army seems to be in
need of nothing, least of all of soldiers. As we pass through,
fresh regiments come marching along, singing and smoking.
When at last we get clear of the village we find no diminution
of traffic, but we are at least no longer helplessly blocked in
the narrow streets.
A sharp shower patters down once more on the arched
canvas roofs of the service wagons, and this poor land, so
saturated with blood and water, receives another drenching.
We ourselves come to no harm, but we cannot help thinking
of the soldiers lying frozen in the firing line. The trenches are
not a pleasant place to live in during these autumn rains. A
German officer once told me that the water was a foot deep in
many trenches, and that the men had no alternative but to
stand up in it. Sometimes they were able to dig " dug-outs
"
above the water level so as at least to have somewhere to sit
or lie, but any attempt at drying is futile. Even if it were
possible to make up a fire, this is strictly forbidden, as the
enemy’s gun-fire would be guided by the light.
Here comes a string of vehicles with long, rough tree trunks
for some bridge construction, there lies an upturned motor-
car which has come to grief. If a little stretch of road is
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