Chapters 1-3 Summary

A servant brings to a silent sanatorium word that war, as expected, is declared. The invalids, cultured, intelligent, and detached from worldly affairs, reflect on the horrors to come: 30 million soldiers dead, veritable mass suicides. Thrones will fall. Whether this can be the last of all wars is debated. Silence returns as each attends to his own pains. In the evening, they gather, will they could "Forbid the Storm," and hope for a transformed world.

Chapter 2 pictures a stormy dawn after a night of non-stop rifle and artillery fire, which has gone on for 15 months. The men of Cpl. Bertrand's reserve squad emerge from the ground to face another taskless day. They talk about the bombardment and the stench of the 129th as it trudges past. The squad is on call at night to build emergency earthworks at the front, during...