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SUNDAY THE FIRST OF NOVEMBER 333
coifs and Red Cross armlets. Both officers and men are un-
armed. No rattling of sabres is heard. No one is commanded
to Divine Service. The soldiers are at liberty to spend the
hour of High Mass as they please. Yet the church is crowded
from end to end. These hardened warriors feel the need of
approaching God and hearing His word before they go forth
to face death.
A Divine Service in the field under the open sky is more
impressive in its way. But I cannot imagine anything more
beautiful than this High Mass in Bapaume Parish Church.
Perhaps they preferred to celebrate All Souls’ Day under these
lofty arches so as not to be disturbed by airmen. War is
inexorable and does not hesitate to kill the children of man,
even while performing their devotions, A Field Chaplain
told me that on Sunday the i8th of October he was preaching
on a hill-slope outside Douchy when a hostile aviator dropped
a couple of bombs, intending to interrupt the service in this
catastrophic manner. They exploded close to the listening
troops. No one stirred, and the preacher calmly continued
his sermon.
It is a strangely fascinating sight that meets my eye as it
travels over the nave from the raised floor of the chancel,
and I feel that my heart beats in unison with those of the
four thousand South Germans. Weather-beaten and sunburnt
they stand—a picture of manhood, imbued with iron will and
humble trust in God. Their field-grey uniforms have assumed
a tint now truly at one with the colour of the fields through
constant contact with the soil in trenches and " dug-
outs." But here and there I also observed the dark blue
tunics of Bavarian Landsturm men, sturdy and steadfast
like the solid rock from which the pillars of the church were
hewn.
I hear that the credit of decorating the church so festively
for All Souls’ Day was due to these Landsturm men. The
chancel had been transformed into a solid bank of foliage,
and all the pillars were hung with large green wreaths, in
remembrance of the fallen. But the most remarkable thing
of all was the reverence which the good Bavaiians had shown
to a small statue of Joan d’Arc standing on the left of the
choir just within the triumphal arch. There was nothing in
the least remarkable about this plaster image of the seventeen-
year-old Maid of Orleans. She was just as one sees her in
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