Adventures and Letters [82]
in the old rooms in Florence. I was gone twenty-three days and was traveling nineteen of them, walking, riding; in sailboats, in the cars, and on steamers. I have had more experiences and adventures than I ever had before in three months and quite enough to last me for years. After my happy ride through Turkey and the retreat of the Greek army in Arta, of which I wrote you last, I have been in Thessaly where I saw the two days' battle of Velestinos from the beginning up to the end. It was the one real battle of the war and the Greeks fought well from the first to the last. I left Athens on the 29th of April with John Bass, a Harvard graduate, and a most charming and attractive youth who is, or was, in charge of the Journal men; Stephen Crane being among the number. He seems a genius with no responsibilities of any sort to anyone, and I and Bass left him at Velestinos after traveling with him for four days. Crane went to Volo, as did every other correspondent, leaving Bass and myself in Velestinos. As the villagers had run away, we burglarized the house of the mayor and made it our habitation while the courier hunted for food. It was like "The Swiss Family Robinson," and we rejoiced over the discovery of soap and tablecloths and stray knives and forks, just as though we had been cast on a desert island. Bass did the cooking and I laid the table and washed up and made the beds, which were full of fleas. But we had been sleeping on chairs and on the floor for a week so we did not mind much.
The second day we were awakened by cannon and you can imagine our joy and excitement. We had it all to ourselves for eight hours, as it took the other correspondents that long to arrive. It was an artillery and infantry battle and about 20,000 men were engaged on both sides. The Greeks fought from little trenches on the hills back of the town and the Turks advanced across a great green prairie. It was very long range and only twice did they get to within a quarter of a mile of our trenches. Bass and I went all over the Greek lines, for you were just as safe in one place as in another, which means that it wasn't safe anywhere, so we gave up considering that and followed the fight as best we could from the first trench, which was the only one that gave an uninterrupted view of the Turkish forces. It was a brilliantly clear day but opened with a hail storm, which enabled the Turks to crawl up half a mile in the sudden darkness. It also gave me the worst attack of sciatica I ever had. Fortunately, it did not come on badly until I reached Volo, when it suddenly took hold of me so that I could not walk. The trenches were wet with the rain and we had no clothes to change to, and two more showers kept us more or less wet all day. We had a fine view of everything and I learned a lot.
We were under a heavy fire for thirteen hours and certainly had some very close escapes. At times the firing was so fierce that if you had raised your arm above your head, the hand would have been instantly torn off. We had to lie on our stomachs with our chins in the dirt and not so much as budge. This was when the Turkish fire happened to be directed on our trench. At such times all the other trenches would fire so as to draw the attack away, and we would have to wait until it was over. The shells sounded like the jarring sound of telegraph wires when one hits the pole they hang from with a stone; and when the shells were close they sounded like the noise made by two trains passing in opposite directions when the wind is driven between the cars. The bullets were much worse than the shells as you could always hear them coming, and the bullets slipped up and passed you in a sneaking way with a noise like rustling silk, or if some one had torn a silk handkerchief with a sharp pull. One shell struck three feet from me and knocked me over with the dirt and stones and filled my nose and mouth with pebbles. I went back and dug it out of the ground while it was still hot and have it as a souvenir. I swore terribly at the bullets and
The second day we were awakened by cannon and you can imagine our joy and excitement. We had it all to ourselves for eight hours, as it took the other correspondents that long to arrive. It was an artillery and infantry battle and about 20,000 men were engaged on both sides. The Greeks fought from little trenches on the hills back of the town and the Turks advanced across a great green prairie. It was very long range and only twice did they get to within a quarter of a mile of our trenches. Bass and I went all over the Greek lines, for you were just as safe in one place as in another, which means that it wasn't safe anywhere, so we gave up considering that and followed the fight as best we could from the first trench, which was the only one that gave an uninterrupted view of the Turkish forces. It was a brilliantly clear day but opened with a hail storm, which enabled the Turks to crawl up half a mile in the sudden darkness. It also gave me the worst attack of sciatica I ever had. Fortunately, it did not come on badly until I reached Volo, when it suddenly took hold of me so that I could not walk. The trenches were wet with the rain and we had no clothes to change to, and two more showers kept us more or less wet all day. We had a fine view of everything and I learned a lot.
We were under a heavy fire for thirteen hours and certainly had some very close escapes. At times the firing was so fierce that if you had raised your arm above your head, the hand would have been instantly torn off. We had to lie on our stomachs with our chins in the dirt and not so much as budge. This was when the Turkish fire happened to be directed on our trench. At such times all the other trenches would fire so as to draw the attack away, and we would have to wait until it was over. The shells sounded like the jarring sound of telegraph wires when one hits the pole they hang from with a stone; and when the shells were close they sounded like the noise made by two trains passing in opposite directions when the wind is driven between the cars. The bullets were much worse than the shells as you could always hear them coming, and the bullets slipped up and passed you in a sneaking way with a noise like rustling silk, or if some one had torn a silk handkerchief with a sharp pull. One shell struck three feet from me and knocked me over with the dirt and stones and filled my nose and mouth with pebbles. I went back and dug it out of the ground while it was still hot and have it as a souvenir. I swore terribly at the bullets and