He makes a friend of any stray animal he can
find. He shares his last franc with a chap who isn't his pal. He risks
his life quite inconsequently to rescue any one who's wounded. When
he's gone over the top with bomb and bayonet for the express purpose
of "doing in" the Hun, he makes a comrade of the Fritzie he
captures. You'll see him coming down the battered trenches with some
scared lad of a German at his side. He's gabbling away making
throat-noises and signs, smiling and doing his inarticulate best to be
intelligible. He pats the Hun on the back, hands him chocolate and
cigarettes, exchanges souvenirs and shares with him his last
luxury. If any one interferes with his Fritzie he's willing to
fight. When they come to the cage where the prisoner has to be handed
over, the farewells of these companions whose acquaintance has been
made at the bayonet-point are often as absurd as they are affecting. I
suppose one only learns the value of kindness when he feels the need
of it himself. The men out there have said "Good-bye" to everything
they loved, but they've got to love some one--so they give their
affections to captured Fritzies, stray dogs, fellows who've collected
a piece of a shell--in fact to any one who's a little worse off than
themselves. My ambulance-driver was like that with his "Sure, Mike."
He was like it during the entire drive. When he came to the white road
which climbs the ridge with all the enemy country staring at it, it
would have been excusable in him to have hurried.
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