The hamlet was
very silent--not a dog barked. There were no dogs.
I do not recall seeing any dogs at any time along the front, except at
La Panne. What has become of them? There were cats in the destroyed
towns, cats even in the trenches. But there were no dogs. It is not
because the people are not fond of dogs. Dunkirk was full of them when
I was there. The public square resounded with their quarrels and noisy
playing. They lay there in the sun and slept, and ambulances turned
aside in their headlong career to avoid running them down. But the
villages along the front were silent.
I once asked an officer what had become of the dogs.
"The soldiers eat them!" he said soberly.
I heard the real explanation later. The strongest dogs had been
commandeered for the army, and these brave dogs of Flanders, who have
always laboured, are now drawing _mitrailleuses_, as I saw them at
L----. The little dogs must be fed, and there is no food to spare. And
so the children, over whose heads passes unheeded the real
significance of this drama that is playing about them, have their own
small tragedies these days.
We got into the car again and it moved off. With every revolution of
the engine we were advancing toward that sinister line that borders No
Man's Land. We were very close. The road paralleled the trenches, and
shelling had begun again.
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