troops. They know you can't turn out ten
thousand rifles a week. They come and talk to any one in the trains, and
explain just how your defeat is going to be managed. It's just as though
they were talking of rounding up cattle."

Mr. Britling said they would soon be disillusioned.

Mr. Direck, with the confidence of his authentic observations, remarked
after a perceptible interval, "I wonder how."

He reverted to the fact that had most struck upon his imagination.

"Grown-up people, ordinary intelligent experienced people, taking war
seriously, talking of punishing England; it's a revelation. A sort of
solemn enthusiasm. High and low....

"And the trainloads of men and the trainloads of guns...."

"Liege," said Mr. Britling.

"Liege was just a scratch on the paint," said Mr. Direck. "A few
thousand dead, a few score thousand dead, doesn't matter--not a red cent
to them. There's a man arrived at the Cecil who saw them marching into
Brussels. He sat at table with me at lunch yesterday. All day it went
on, a vast unending river of men in grey. Endless waggons, endless guns,
the whole manhood of a nation and all its stuff, marching....

"I thought war," said Mr. Direck, "was a thing when most people stood
about and did the shouting, and a sort of special team did the fighting.
Well, Germany isn't fighting like that.... I confess it, I'm scared....
It's the very biggest thing on record; it's the very limit in wars.... I
dreamt last night of a grey flood washing everything in front of it. You
and me--and Miss Corner--curious thing, isn't it? that she came into
it--were scrambling up a hill higher and higher, with that flood pouring
after us. Sort of splashing into a foam of faces and helmets and
bayonets--and clutching hands--and red stuff.... Well, Mr. Britling, I
admit I'm a little bit overwrought about it, but I can assure you you
don't begin to realise in England what it is you've butted against...."

Section 15

Cissie did not come up to the Dower House that afternoon, and so Mr.
Direck, after some vague and transparent excuses, made his way to the
cottage.

Here his report become even more impressive. Teddy sat on the writing
desk beside the typewriter and swung his legs slowly. Letty brooded in
the armchair. Cissie presided over certain limited crawling operations
of the young heir.

"They could have the equal of the whole British Army killed three times
over and scarcely know it had happened. They're _