officer. Only from Vienna.”
“That is in Austria. Anyway, it is all the same. They are all alike. Why have you no passport?”
“I had one. But I lost it.”
“You do not speak the hacky French of a German. What district are you from?”
“The district I was raised in is situated in a region where Germans still speak an old English tongue.”
“That is right. I know the district well. It is where English kings had a great influence up to the middle of the last century”
“Yes, sir, you are right. It is called Saxony.”
For the first time I learned that it is a good thing not to have a passport. If you haven’t any, nobody can find one in your pockets; so nobody can look up your record. Had they known that I had already robbed the French national railroad, it might have cost me two years, or even Devil’s Island. I got only two weeks.
When the first day in prison was over, taken up with registration, signing my name in dozens of books, bathing, weighing, medical examinations, I felt as though I had done a long and hard day’s work.
Kings and presidents don’t rule the world; the brass button is the real ruler.
Next morning, right after a poor breakfast which did no justice to the overestimated French cuisine, I was taken to the workshop.
In front of me was a pile of very peculiar-looking nameless things stamped out of bright tinned sheet iron. I wanted to know what they were. Nobody could tell me, neither my fellow-prisoners nor the wardens. One said that he was sure they were parts of a dirigible manufactured in different sections throughout the country. The day after the declaration of the new European war all these parts would be gathered together, and within less than a week about five thousand dirigibles would be ready for service. Others denied this and insisted that the little things had nothing to do with dirigibles, but were parts of secretly manufactured submarines. Again, others said they were parts of a new machine-gun, one as effective as the best in existence, but so light that a soldier could carry it like a rifle. Others, that they were parts of a tank that would have a speed of about seventy miles an hour. Another fellow told me that they were parts of a new type of airplane, each carrying no less than two hundred gas-bombs, fifty heavy nitroglycerin bombs, and three machine-guns, and having a speed of six hundred kilometers per hour, and a service-time of eighteen hours without refueling. Not one person, warden or prisoner, ever suggested that they might be parts of machinery or something else useful to mankind. Such an idea occurred to no one. It was the same everywhere in France. Whenever something was made that nobody knew anything about, everyone concluded that it was to be used in the next war to end war.
I myself could form no idea as to what these little things might be good for.
The warden in charge of the shop came up and said: “You count off this pile one hundred and forty-four pieces. Then you make a new little pile of a hundred and forty-four pieces. Then again you count off one hundred and forty-four pieces, pile them up neatly, and put them aside. That is your work.”
After I had counted the first pile, the warden returned. He looked at the little pile and said: “Are you sure there are exactly one hundred and forty-four pieces, not one more or less?”
“Yes, officer.”
“Better count them again. I trust you fully. But, please, I beg of you, count them with the greatest care. That’s why I gave you this special work. You look intelligent. I think you are the only man here who has the intelligence to do work with his brain and not with his hands.”
“You may be assured, officer, I shall do my best.”
“Please do. That’s a good boy. You see, suppose my superior checks up and finds one piece above or below the hundred and forty-four I have to deliver; I might get a terrible rebuke. I might even lose my job here. I would not know what to do, with a wife
“That is in Austria. Anyway, it is all the same. They are all alike. Why have you no passport?”
“I had one. But I lost it.”
“You do not speak the hacky French of a German. What district are you from?”
“The district I was raised in is situated in a region where Germans still speak an old English tongue.”
“That is right. I know the district well. It is where English kings had a great influence up to the middle of the last century”
“Yes, sir, you are right. It is called Saxony.”
For the first time I learned that it is a good thing not to have a passport. If you haven’t any, nobody can find one in your pockets; so nobody can look up your record. Had they known that I had already robbed the French national railroad, it might have cost me two years, or even Devil’s Island. I got only two weeks.
When the first day in prison was over, taken up with registration, signing my name in dozens of books, bathing, weighing, medical examinations, I felt as though I had done a long and hard day’s work.
Kings and presidents don’t rule the world; the brass button is the real ruler.
Next morning, right after a poor breakfast which did no justice to the overestimated French cuisine, I was taken to the workshop.
In front of me was a pile of very peculiar-looking nameless things stamped out of bright tinned sheet iron. I wanted to know what they were. Nobody could tell me, neither my fellow-prisoners nor the wardens. One said that he was sure they were parts of a dirigible manufactured in different sections throughout the country. The day after the declaration of the new European war all these parts would be gathered together, and within less than a week about five thousand dirigibles would be ready for service. Others denied this and insisted that the little things had nothing to do with dirigibles, but were parts of secretly manufactured submarines. Again, others said they were parts of a new machine-gun, one as effective as the best in existence, but so light that a soldier could carry it like a rifle. Others, that they were parts of a tank that would have a speed of about seventy miles an hour. Another fellow told me that they were parts of a new type of airplane, each carrying no less than two hundred gas-bombs, fifty heavy nitroglycerin bombs, and three machine-guns, and having a speed of six hundred kilometers per hour, and a service-time of eighteen hours without refueling. Not one person, warden or prisoner, ever suggested that they might be parts of machinery or something else useful to mankind. Such an idea occurred to no one. It was the same everywhere in France. Whenever something was made that nobody knew anything about, everyone concluded that it was to be used in the next war to end war.
I myself could form no idea as to what these little things might be good for.
The warden in charge of the shop came up and said: “You count off this pile one hundred and forty-four pieces. Then you make a new little pile of a hundred and forty-four pieces. Then again you count off one hundred and forty-four pieces, pile them up neatly, and put them aside. That is your work.”
After I had counted the first pile, the warden returned. He looked at the little pile and said: “Are you sure there are exactly one hundred and forty-four pieces, not one more or less?”
“Yes, officer.”
“Better count them again. I trust you fully. But, please, I beg of you, count them with the greatest care. That’s why I gave you this special work. You look intelligent. I think you are the only man here who has the intelligence to do work with his brain and not with his hands.”
“You may be assured, officer, I shall do my best.”
“Please do. That’s a good boy. You see, suppose my superior checks up and finds one piece above or below the hundred and forty-four I have to deliver; I might get a terrible rebuke. I might even lose my job here. I would not know what to do, with a wife
Similar Books
