There was little doubt that I should have to appeal to their courage again presently, for something unusual was happening in front of us.  It was maddening not to be able to pierce the luminous mist, behind which the enemy would be able to form up and take new positions without our knowledge.  Down behind the line of willows we could now barely distinguish, we were aware of mysterious sounds, making a kind of distant murmur.  They must come from the rattle of arms, orders given in whispers, footsteps slipping on the fat soil of plough-lands.  Listening heads craned over our parapets.  Each man was trying to hear, to understand, to see, and to divine, and each felt intuitively that the enemy was about to renew his assault.  The most absolute silence and the most impressive calm reigned in our trenches.  Yes, we were ready for them!  Let them come!

Then suddenly from the enemy’s camp there rose a solemn, harmonious hymn sung by hundreds of manly voices.  We could not distinguish the words uttered in the barbarian tongue.  But the music was perfectly audible, and I must confess that nothing caused me so much surprise throughout this eventful evening.  With what ardour and unanimity, and also, I am bound to admit, with what art, these men proclaimed their faith before rushing on death!  One could imagine no more magnificent temple for the prayers of soldiers about to offer up their lives than the spacious firmament above and the luminous night around.  We listened, touched and delighted.  The hymn continued for some time, and the music seemed to me noble and inspiring; the voices were true and the execution admirable.  But, above all, the singing conveyed a disturbing impression of disciplined and ordered piety.  To what lengths these men carry their love of command and obedience!

Suddenly the hymn broke off abruptly in a formidable uproar, above which rose thousands of voices shouting: 

“Hurrah!  Hurrah!  Cavalry!  Cavalry!”

Then, dominating the tumult, we heard their trumpets sounding the short, monotonous notes of the Prussian charge.

I leaped back into the trench.

        “Independent fire!”

The whole French line burst into a violent and deafening fusillade.  Each man seemed full of blind rage, of an exasperated lust for destruction.  I saw them take aim rapidly, press the trigger, and reload in feverish haste.  I was deafened and bewildered by the terrible noise of the firing in the narrow confines of the trench.  To our left, the machine-gun section of my friend F. kept up an infernal racket.

But the German line had suddenly dropped to the ground.  I could barely distinguish a swarm of grey shadows running about in the fog.  Then not a single dark figure was visible on the pale background of the tragic scene.  How many of the bodies we could no longer make out must have been lying lifeless, and how horrible their proximity must have been to the living stretched side by side with them!