It was prettier than the real
thing up in the salient or beyond the Somme, where dead bodies lay in
upheaved earth among ruins and slaughtered trees. War at Montreuil was
quite a pleasant occupation for elderly generals who liked their
little stroll after lunch, and for young Regular officers, released
from the painful necessity of dying for their country, who were glad
to get a game of tennis, down below the walls there, after strenuous
office-work in which they had written "Passed to you" on many
"minutes," or had drawn the most comical caricatures of their
immediate chief, and of his immediate chief, on blotting-pads and
writing-blocks.
It seemed, at a mere glance, that all these military inhabitants of G.
H. Q. were great and glorious soldiers. Some of the youngest of them
had a row of decorations from Montenegro, Serbia, Italy, Rumania, and
other states, as recognition of gallant service in translating German
letters (found in dugouts by the fighting-men), or arranging for
visits of political personages to the back areas of war, or initialing
requisitions for pink, blue, green, and yellow forms, which in due
course would find their way to battalion adjutants for immediate
filling-up in the middle of an action.
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