For fear of being thought to swagger, an Englishman will
understate his case. And so with the various English officers I met at
the front. There was no swank. They were downright, unassuming,
extremely efficient-looking men, quick to speak of German courage,
ready to give the benefit of the doubt where unproved outrages were in
question, but rousing, as I have said, to pale fury where their troops
were being unfairly attacked.
While the car was being brought to the door General Huguet pointed out
to me on the map where I was going. As we stood there his pencil drew
a light semicircle round the town of Ypres.
"A great battle," he said, and described it. Colonel Fitzgerald took
up the narrative. So it happened that, in the three different staff
headquarters, Belgian, French and English, executive officers of the
three armies in the western field described to me that great
battle--the frightful slaughter of the English, their re-enforcement
at a critical time by General Foch's French Army of the North, and the
final holding of the line.
The official figures of casualties were given me again: English
forty-five thousand out of a hundred and twenty thousand engaged; the
French seventy thousand, and the German over two hundred thousand.
Turning to the table, Colonel Fitzgerald picked up a sheet of paper
covered with figures.
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