For where a 42-centimeter shell falls it does more
than merely alter landscape; almost you might say it alters geography.
In the open field, where he must aim his gun with his own eye and
discharge it with his own finger, I take it the Kaiser's private soldier
is no great shakes as a marksman. The Germans themselves begrudgingly
admitted the French excelled them in the use of light artillery. There
was wonderment as well as reluctance in this concession. To them it
seemed well-nigh incredible that any nation should be their superiors in
any department pertaining to the practice of war. They could not bring
themselves fully to understand it. It remained as much a puzzle to them
as the unaccountable obstinacy of the English in refusing to be budged
out of their position by displays of cold steel, or to be shaken by the
volleying, bull-like roar of the German charging cry, which at first the
Germans counted upon as being almost as efficacious as the bayonet for
instilling a wholesome fear of the German war god into the souls of
their foes.
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