"War isn't a pretty
game, but it does make for courage. We all know that. And things even
finer than mere fighting pluck. There was a man in my company, a Jacques
Decrusy. He was just a stupid peasant lad. We were crowded into one end
of the trench, about a score of us. The rest of it had fallen in, and we
couldn't move. And a bomb dropped into the middle of us; and the same
instant that it touched the ground Decrusy threw himself flat down upon
it and took the whole of it into his body. There was nothing left of him
but scraps. But the rest of us got off. Nobody had drugged him to do
that. There isn't one of us who was in that trench that will not be a
better man to the end of his days, remembering how Jacques Decrusy gave
his life for ours."
"I'll grant you all that, sir," answered the young soldier who had first
spoken. He had long, delicate hands and eager, restless eyes. "War does
bring out heroism. So does pestilence and famine. Read Defoe's account
of the Plague of London. How men and women left their safe homes, to
serve in the pest-houses, knowing that sooner or later they were doomed.
Pages:
415
416
417
418
419
420
421
422
423
424
425
426
427
428
429
430
431
432
433
434
435
436
437
438
439