o the war was over! The fact was too big to grasp all at once, but
nevertheless I felt an extraordinarily serene satisfaction. Then someone
said: "The people who've lost their sons and husbands--now's the time
they'll feel it." The truth of this remark struck me with sudden
violence. My serenity was broken and I looked into the blackness beneath
it. I knew what I was going to see, but, nevertheless, I looked, in
spite of myself, and saw innumerable rotting dead that lay unburied in
all postures on the bare, shell-tossed earth. A horror of death such as
I had never known before came upon me--a crushing, annihilating horror
that seemed to impart a fiendish character to the shouting and singing
in the camp, as though millions of demoniac spirits were howling and
dancing with devilish glee over the accomplishment of the greatest
iniquity ever known. At the same time I felt ashamed of not joining in
the general jubilation, and bitterly disappointed that my own
thoughts--always my worst enemies--should obsess me at this supreme
hour. But I knew that the war had lasted too long and that the world's
misery had been too great ever to be shaken off. I also knew that all
the dead had died in vain. In order to escape from my intolerable
meditations I sat up and began to talk to my neighbour:

"I suppose it'll be read out officially to-morrow morning?"

"Sure--and we'll get a day off at least."

We continued to talk of commonplace things. It was several hours after
midnight and the uproar was dying down a little. I felt sleepy and
something like contentment was beginning to steal over me once again.

Reveille did not sound until nine o'clock on the Monday morning. The
whistle blew for parade. There would, of course, be an official
announcement that the Armistice had been signed and perhaps a letter of
thanks to the "splendid troops who had won the war" (which would bore us
extremely) and a holiday (which would be welcomed with loud cheers).

We paraded. The Sergeant-Major addressed us:

"I'm sorry, boys, but nothing official's coom through. You must go to
work as usual. It's a damned shame, I know, but I can't help it. I
expect the message'll coom during the day and you're sure to get
to-morrow off."

There was a murmur in the ranks, but bewilderment deprived us of the
power of taking concerted action. A sudden fear seized me--could last
night's celebrations have been the result of a false alarm?

We marched off. But no one