|
Main
- books.jibble.org
My Books
- IRC Hacks
Misc. Articles
- Meaning of Jibble
- M4 Su Doku
- Computer Scrapbooking
- Setting up Java
- Bootable Java
- Cookies in Java
- Dynamic Graphs
- Social Shakespeare
External Links
- Paul Mutton
- Jibble Photo Gallery
- Jibble Forums
- Google Landmarks
- Jibble Shop
- Free Books
- Intershot Ltd
|
books.jibble.org
Previous Page
| Next Page
Page 6
_Teacher_. (_Calls_). Child, come! We must catch the train.
FOURTH ACT
_The scene is the same trench in the year 2018. It is three o'clock of
the afternoon, of the same summer day. A newly married couple have come
to see the trench. He is journeying as to a shrine; she has allowed
impersonal interests, such as history, to lapse under the influence of
love and a trousseau. She is, however, amenable to patriotism, and, her
husband applying the match, she takes fire--she also, from the story of
the trench_.
_He_. This must be the place.
_She_. It is nothing but a ditch filled with flowers.
_He_. The old trench. (_Takes off his hat_.)
_She_. Was it--it was--in the Great War?
_He_. My dear!
_She_. You're horrified. But I really--don't know.
_He_. Don't know? You must.
_She_. You've gone and married a person who hasn't a glimmer of history.
What will you do about it?
_He_. I'll be brave and stick to my bargain. Do you mean that you've
forgotten the charge of the Blank_th_ Americans against the Prussian
Guard? The charge that practically ended the war?
_She_. Ended the war? How could one charge end the war?
_He_. There was fighting after. But the last critical battle was here
(_looks about_) in these meadows, and for miles along. And it was just
here that the Blank_th_ United States Regiment made its historic dash.
In that ditch--filled with flowers--a hundred of our lads were mown down
in three minutes. About two thousand more followed them to death.
_She_. Oh--I do know. It was _that_ charge. I learned about it in
school; it thrilled me always.
_He_. Certainly. Every American child knows the story. I memorized the
list of the one hundred soldiers' names of my own free will when I was
ten. I can say them now. "Arnold--Ashe--Bennett--Emmet--Dragmore--"
_She_. Don't say the rest, Ted--tell me about it as it happened. (_She
slips her hand into his_.) We two, standing here young and happy,
looking forward to a, lifetime together, will do honor, that way, to
those soldiers who gave up their happy youth and their lives for
America.
_He_. (_Puts his arm around her_.) We will. We'll make a little memorial
service and I'll preach a sermon about how gloriously they fell and how,
unknowingly, they won the war--and so much more!
_She_. Tell me.
_He_. It was a hundred years ago about now--summer. A critical battle
raged along a stretch of many miles. About the centre of the
line--here--the Prussian Imperial Guards, the crack soldiers of the
German army, held the first trench--this ditch. American forces faced
them, but in weeks of fighting had not been able to make much
impression. Then, on a day, the order came down the lines that the
Blank_th_ United States Regiment, opposed to the Guard, was to charge
and take the German front trench. Of course the artillery was to prepare
for their charge as usual, but there was some mistake. There was no
curtain of fire before them, no artillery preparation to help them. And
the order to charge came. So, right into the German guns, in the face of
those terrible Prussian Guards, our lads went "over the top" with a
great shout, and poured like a flame, like a catapult, across the space
between them--No-Man's Land, they called it then--it was only
thirty-five yards--to the German trench. So fast they rushed, and so
unexpected was their coming, with no curtain of artillery to shield
them, that the Germans were for a moment taken aback. Not a shot was
fired for a space of time almost long enough to let the Americans reach
the trench, and then the rifles broke out and the brown uniforms fell
like leaves in autumn. But not all. They rushed on pell-mell, cutting
wire, pouring irresistibly into the German trench. And the Guards, such
as were not mown down, lost courage at the astounding impetus of the
dash, and scrambled and ran from their trench. They took it--our boys
took that trench--this old ditch. But then the big German guns opened a
fire like hail and a machine gun at the end--down there it must have
been--enfiladed the trench, and every man in it was killed. But the
charge ended the war. Other Americans, mad with the glory of it, poured
in a sea after their comrades and held the trench, and poured on and on,
and wiped out that day the Prussian Guard. The German morale was broken
from then; within four months the war was over.
Previous Page
| Next Page
|
|