Fields of Victory | Page 2

on the last stage of the struggle had been to some extent obscured and
misunderstood even amongst ourselves--still more, and very naturally,
amongst our Allies. Not, of course, by any of those in close contact
with the actual march of the war, and its directing forces; but rather by
that floating public opinion, now more intelligent, now more ignorant,
which plays so largely on us all, whether through conversation or the
press.
[1] My thanks are especially due to Lieut.-Colonel Boraston, of the
General Staff, and also to my friend Colonel John Buchan, whose
wonderful knowledge of the war, as shown in his History, has done so
much during the last four years to keep the public at home in touch
with all the forces of the Allies, but especially with the British Armies
and the British Navy, throughout the whole course of the struggle.
My object, then, was to bring out as clearly as I could the part that the
British Armies in France, including, of course, the great Dominion

contingents, played in the fighting of last year. To do so, it was
necessary also to try and form some opinion as to the respective shares
in the final result of the three great Armies at work in France in 1918;
to put the effort of Great Britain, that is, in its due relation to the whole
concluding act of the war. In making such an attempt I am very
conscious of its audacity; and I need not say that it would be a cause of
sharp regret to me should the estimate here given--which is, of course,
the estimate of an Englishwoman--offend any French or American
friend of mine. The justice and generosity of the best French opinion on
the war has been conspicuously shown on many recent occasions;
while the speech in Paris the other day of the If Dean of Harvard as to
the relative parts in the war--on French soil--of the Big Three--and the
reception given to it by an audience of American officers have, I
venture to think, stirred and deepened affection for America in the heart
of those English persons who read the report of a remarkable meeting.
But there is still much ignorance both here at home and among our
Allies, on both sides of the sea, of the full part played by the forces of
the British Empire in last year's drama. So it seemed to me, at least,
when I was travelling, a few months ago, over some of the battle-fields
of 1918; and I came home with a full heart, determined to tell the
story--the last chapter in England's Effort--broadly and sincerely, as I
best could; It was my firm confidence throughout the writing of these
letters that the friendship between Britain, France, and America--a
friendship on which, in my belief, rests the future happiness and peace
of the world--can only gain from free speech and from the free
comparison of opinion. And in the brilliant final despatch of Sir
Douglas Haig which appeared on April 12th, after six letters had been
written and sent to America, will be found, I venture to suggest, the full
and authoritative exposition of some at least of the main lines of
thought I have so imperfectly summarised in this little book.
The ten letters were written at intervals between February and May. It
seemed better, in republishing them, not to attempt much recasting.
They represent, mainly, the impressions of a journey, and of the
conversations and reading to which it led. I have left them very much,
therefore, in their original form, hoping that at least the freshness of
"things seen" may atone somewhat for their many faults.

FIELDS OF VICTORY
CHAPTER I
FRANCE UNDER THE ARMISTICE
London, February, 1919.
A bewildering three weeks spent in a perpetually changing
scene--changing, and yet, outside Paris, in its essential elements terribly
the same--that is how my third journey to France, since the war began,
appears to me as I look back upon it. My dear daughter-secretary and I
have motored during January some nine hundred miles through the
length and breadth of France, some of it in severe weather. We have
spent some seven days on the British front, about the same on the
French front, with a couple of nights at Metz, and a similar time at
Strasburg, and rather more than a week in Paris. Little enough! But
what a time of crowding and indelible impressions! Now, sitting in this
quiet London house, I seem to be still bending forward in the motor-car,
which became a sort of home to us, looking out, so intently that one's
eyes suffered, at the unrolling scene. I still see the grim desolation of
the Ypres salient; the heaps of ugly wreck that men call Lens and
Lieviny