Evening Star Newspaper, February 6, 1930, Page 37

THE EVENING STORY One of World-Famous Works of Literature An Episode of War. BY STEPHEN CRANE. lieutenant’s rubber blanket lay ground and upon it he had the company's supply of coffee. als and other representatives of the grimy and hot-throated men who lined the breastwork had come for each portion. lieutenant was frowning and se- rious at this task of division. His lips irsed as he drew with his sword va- rious crevices in the heap until brown squares of coffee, astoundingly equal in size, appeared on the blanket. He was on 'the verge of a great triumph in mathematics and the corporals were square when suddenly the lieutenant cried out and looked quickly at a man An aide galloped furiously, dragged his horse suddenly to a halt, saluted and presented a paper. It was, for a won- | der, precisely like an historical paint- ing. !ro the rear of the general and his staff a group, composed of a bugler, two or three orderlies and the bearer of the corps standard, all upon maniacal horses, were working like slaves to hold their ground, preserve their respected interval, while the shells boomed in the air about them and caused their charges to make furious quivering leaps. A battery, a tumultuous and shini mass, was swirling toward the right. The wild thud of hoofs, the cries of the riders shouting blame and praise, menace and encouragement, and, last, the roar of the wheels, the slant of the glistening guns, brought the lieutenant THE EVENING STAR, WASHINGTON, D. €, THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 6, 1930, & wave on the rocks and when it fled onward this aggregation of Wwheels, levers, motors had a beautiful unity, as if 1t were a missile, The sound of it was a war chorus that reached into the depths of man’s emotion. The leutenant, still holding his arm as if it were of glass, stood watching this battery until all detafl of it was lost, save the figures of the riders, which rose and fell and waved lashes over the black mass, Later he turned his eves toward the battle where the shooting sometimes crackled like bush fires, sometimes sput- tered with exasperating regularity and sometimes reverberated like the thun- der. He saw the smoke rolling upward and saw crowds of men who ran an cheered, or stood and blazed away at the inscrutable distance. He came upon some stragglers and they told him how to find the fleld hospital They described its exact location. In ing | fact, these men, no longer having g’a‘n it than in the battle, knew more of others, They told the performance of every corps, every division, the opinion of every general. The lieutenant, car- rying his wounded arm rearward, looked upon them with wonder. out to him and inquired concerning things of which he knew nothing. One, seeing his arm, began to scold. “Why, man, that's no way to do. You want to fix that thing.” y}le appropriated the lieutenant and the lieutenant’s wound. He cut the sleeve and laid bare the arm, every nerve of which softly fluttered un- der his touch. He bound his handker- chief over the wound, scolding away in meantime. His tone allowed one fo think that he was in the habit of being wounded every day. The lieu- tenant hung his head, feeling, in this Ppresence, that he did not know how to be _correctly wounded. The low white tents of the hospital d | Were grouped around an old schoolhouse. There was here a singular commotion. In the foreground two ambulances in- terlocked wheels in the deep mud. The drivers were tossing the blame of it back and forth, gesticulating and be- rating, while from the ambulances, both crammed with wounded, there came an occasional groan. An interminable crowd of bandaged men were coming and going. Great numbers sat under the trees nursing heads or arms or legs. There was a dispute of some kind rag- ing on the steps of the schoolhouse. Sitting with his back against a tree & man with a face as gray as a new army blanket was serenely smoking a corncob pipe. The lieutenant wished to rush forward and inform him that he was dylnt . A busy surgeon was passing near the leutenant. “Good morning,” he said, with a friendly smile. Then he caught sight of the lieutenant's arm and his face at once changed. “Well, let’s have a look at it.” He seemed d sud- denly of a great contempt for the lieu- tenant. This wound evidently placed the latter on a very low social plan The doctor cried out impatiently, “Wh muttonhead had tied it up anyhow The lieutenant answered, “Oh, & man. n the wound was disciosed the doctor fingered it disdainfully. “Hump,” he sald. “You come along with me and I'll 'ten to you.” His volce contained the same scorn s if he R £ e lieutenan bee; but now his face flushed A:dvml Liowir into the doctor's eyes. “I guess I won't have it amputated,” he said, “Nonsense, man. No; 3 sense,” cried the doctor, N Gome along, now. ' I won't amputate i ot Do t. Come along. “Let said the lleutenant, bola% wrathfully, his glance fixed upon the door of the old schoolhouse, as sinister to him as the portals of death. And this is the story of how the lleu- tenant lost his arm. When he reached home his sisters, his mother, his wife, sobbed for a long time at the sight of the fat sleeve. “Oh, well” he said, tanding shamefaced id these tears, T don't suppose it matters so much all that.” e SRR, £1.5, T 5150 5.4 Port Edgar Naval Base, on the Pirth of Forth, near Edinburgh, Scotland, was recently offered for sale at auction, but there were no bidders above half the reserved price of $300,000, and it was withdrawn from sale. Now get the best coffee The master blend of five of the world’s best coffees e+ packed in vacuum ... with its delectable flavor brought oven-fresh to your cup! Nowataprice that enables every- body to have the finest near him as if he suspected it was a coffee. Get Boscul case of personal assault. The others cried out also when they saw blood upon the lieutenant’s sleeve. d winced like & man stung, At the roadside a brigade was making coffee and buzzing with talk like a girls’ boarding school, " Several office! Gerber’s STRAINED VEGETABLES to an intent pause. The battery swept in curves that stirred the heart; it made halts as dramatic as the crash of How’s the Roof After the Snow and Sleet ? Be on the safe side and coat the roof with a Reilly-recommended roof saver, ‘Whatever the type of “overhead” on * your house, we've the right paint pro. tector for it. ing was plainly audible, sadly, mystically, over the breastwork at the green face of the wood where now were many little puffs of white smoke. During this moment the men about him gazed statue-like and silent, astonished and awed by this catastrophe which happened when catastrophes were not oxpecud—-m -when they had leisure to ob- serve As the lieutenant stared at the wood they, t0o, swung their heads so that for another instant all hands, still silent, contemplated the distant forest as if their m! ‘were fixed upon the mystery of & bullet's journey. The officer had, of course, been com- mfll to take his sword into his left d. He did not hold it by the hilt. He gripped it at the middle of the blade awkwardly. Turning his eyes from the hostile wood, he looked at the sword as he held it there and seemed puzzled as to what to do with it, where to put it. In short, this weapon had of a sudden become a strange thing to him. He looked at it in a kind of stupefaction, as if he had been endowed with a trident, & scepter, or a spade. Pinally, he tried to sheath it. To sheath a sword held by the left hand, at the middle of the blade, in a scab- bard at the left hip, is & feat worthy of a sawdust ring. ;’hls ‘wounded officer uu“::ed in a desperate struggle with the [ and the wobbling scabbard, and the time of it he breathed like a ler. But at this instant the men, the spec- oke from their stone-like poses 1 Good paints, varnishes, stains, enamels and lacquers for all other needs. SPECIALLY LOW PRICES HUGH REILLY CO. 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At the time he leaned nervously backward and did not allow even his the body of the leutenant. wound gives strange dignity to him who bears it. Well men shy from this new and terrible majesty. It is as if the wounded man's hand is upon the cur- tain which hangs before the revelations of all existence—the meaning of ants, potentates, wars, cities, sunshine, snow, & feather dropped from a bird’s wing; and the power of it sheds radiance upon a bloody form and makes the other men understand sometimes that they are little. His comrades look at him 'with large eyes thoughtfully. Moreover, they fear vaguely that the weight of a finger upon him might send him head- Jong, precipitate the tragedy, hurl him at oncé into the dim, gray unknown. And so the orderly sergeant while lhnthlng the sword leaned nervously backward. ‘There were others who proffered as- sistance. One timidly presented his shoulder and asked the lieutenant if he cared to léan upon it, but the latter ‘waved him away mournfully. He wore the look of one who knows he is the helplessness. He again stared over the breastwork at the forest and then tu ‘went glowly rearward. He held his wrist tenderly in his left hand as if the wounded arm was made of very brittle glass. And the men in silence stared at the ‘wood, then at the departing lleutenant —um'\ at the wood, then at the lieu- tenant. As the wounded officer passed from the line of battle he was enabled to se¢ many things which as a participant m‘:.he fight 'ltl’e m:{‘l::nh:o him. 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