invincible warriors, mindful of the glory of Radetzky and Prince Eugene of Savoy. With their blood they would enrich the broad fields of the monarchy's glory and victoriously fulfil the task predestined for them by history. With unflinching courage, heedless of their lives, they would rush forward beneath the shot-riddled banners of their regiments to new glory, to new victories.
Afterward, in the corridor, the chief of the medical staff said to this guileless young man : "My dear fellow, I can assure you it's all sheer waste of breath. Not Radetzky, not Prince Eugene of Savoy whom you're so keen on, could have made soldiers out of these skunks. It doesn't matter whether you talk to them like an angel or like a devil. They're a hopeless gang."
----
9.
Schweik at the Detention Barracks.
The last resort of people who were unwilling to go to the front was the detention barracks. I knew a schoolmaster who was not anxious to use his mathematical knowledge to assist the artillery in its shooting operations, and so he stole a watch from a lieutenant so as to get into the detention barracks. He did so with complete deliberation. The war did not impress or attract him. He considered it stark lunacy to fire at the enemy, and with shrapnel and shells to slaughter unfortunate teachers of mathematics, just like himself, on the other side, and so he calmly stole the watch.
----
They first investigated his state of mind, and when he said he had wanted to enrich himself, they despatched him to the detention barracks. There were quite a lot of people who served their time there for theft or fraud. Idealists and non-idealists. People who looked upon the army as a source of revenue, all those various quartermaster-sergeants at the base and at the front who committed all kinds of frauds with rations and pay, and also petty thieves who were a thousand times more honest than the persons who sent them there. Then too, the detention barracks contained those soldiers who had committed various other offences of a purely military character, such as insubordination, attempted mutiny, desertion. A special branch comprised the political prisoners, eighty per cent, of whom were quite innocent and ninety-nine per cent, of whom were condemned.
There was a magnificent legal staff, a mechanism such as is possessed by every state before its political, economic and moral collapse.
Every military unit contained Austria's hirelings who lodged information against the comrades who slept on the same mattresses with them and shared their bread with them on the march.
The police also supplied material to the detention barracks. The military censors of correspondence used to despatch there those who had written letters from the front to the ones whom they had left at home in distress. The gendarmes even handed over old retired farmers who sent letters to the front, and the court-martial rewarded them with twelve years' imprisonment for their words of comfort and the descriptions of the misery at home.
From the Hradcany detention barracks there was also a road which led by way of Brevnov to the exercise ground at Motol. In front went a man escorted by soldiers, with gyves on his hands, and behind him a cart containing a coffin. And on the exercise-ground at Motol a curt order, "An! Feuer !" 1 And in all the regiments and battalions they read in the regimental orders that another man had been shot for mutiny.
1 "Take aim! Fire!"
----
In the detention barracks a trinity, comprising Staff-Warder Slavik, Captain Linhart and Sergeant-Maj or Repa, nicknamed "the hangman," were already carrying out their duties, and nobody knows how many they beat to death in solitary confinement. On receiving Schweik, Staff-Warder Slavik cast at him a glance of mute reproach, as much as to say :
"So your reputation's damaged, is it? Is that why you've joined us? Well, my lad, we'll make your stay here a happy one, the same as we do to all who fall into our hands."
And in order to
Afterward, in the corridor, the chief of the medical staff said to this guileless young man : "My dear fellow, I can assure you it's all sheer waste of breath. Not Radetzky, not Prince Eugene of Savoy whom you're so keen on, could have made soldiers out of these skunks. It doesn't matter whether you talk to them like an angel or like a devil. They're a hopeless gang."
----
9.
Schweik at the Detention Barracks.
The last resort of people who were unwilling to go to the front was the detention barracks. I knew a schoolmaster who was not anxious to use his mathematical knowledge to assist the artillery in its shooting operations, and so he stole a watch from a lieutenant so as to get into the detention barracks. He did so with complete deliberation. The war did not impress or attract him. He considered it stark lunacy to fire at the enemy, and with shrapnel and shells to slaughter unfortunate teachers of mathematics, just like himself, on the other side, and so he calmly stole the watch.
----
They first investigated his state of mind, and when he said he had wanted to enrich himself, they despatched him to the detention barracks. There were quite a lot of people who served their time there for theft or fraud. Idealists and non-idealists. People who looked upon the army as a source of revenue, all those various quartermaster-sergeants at the base and at the front who committed all kinds of frauds with rations and pay, and also petty thieves who were a thousand times more honest than the persons who sent them there. Then too, the detention barracks contained those soldiers who had committed various other offences of a purely military character, such as insubordination, attempted mutiny, desertion. A special branch comprised the political prisoners, eighty per cent, of whom were quite innocent and ninety-nine per cent, of whom were condemned.
There was a magnificent legal staff, a mechanism such as is possessed by every state before its political, economic and moral collapse.
Every military unit contained Austria's hirelings who lodged information against the comrades who slept on the same mattresses with them and shared their bread with them on the march.
The police also supplied material to the detention barracks. The military censors of correspondence used to despatch there those who had written letters from the front to the ones whom they had left at home in distress. The gendarmes even handed over old retired farmers who sent letters to the front, and the court-martial rewarded them with twelve years' imprisonment for their words of comfort and the descriptions of the misery at home.
From the Hradcany detention barracks there was also a road which led by way of Brevnov to the exercise ground at Motol. In front went a man escorted by soldiers, with gyves on his hands, and behind him a cart containing a coffin. And on the exercise-ground at Motol a curt order, "An! Feuer !" 1 And in all the regiments and battalions they read in the regimental orders that another man had been shot for mutiny.
1 "Take aim! Fire!"
----
In the detention barracks a trinity, comprising Staff-Warder Slavik, Captain Linhart and Sergeant-Maj or Repa, nicknamed "the hangman," were already carrying out their duties, and nobody knows how many they beat to death in solitary confinement. On receiving Schweik, Staff-Warder Slavik cast at him a glance of mute reproach, as much as to say :
"So your reputation's damaged, is it? Is that why you've joined us? Well, my lad, we'll make your stay here a happy one, the same as we do to all who fall into our hands."
And in order to
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