The men threw bombs from deep trenches and they were instructed to keep cover closely after hurling a grenade just as if there was a German trench across the way. But curiosity was too strong for them. Each wanted to see where his particular bomb hit and how much earth it would tear up. The bombs made only small scars in the earth, but they sent fragments of steel casing flying in all directions and several men were cut about the face by splinters. The seeming inability of the American to visualize battle conditions in training retards his progress in spite of his aptitude in other directions. A French officer was directing a platoon of Americans one day in skirmishing. They were to fire a round, run forward twenty paces, throw themselves flat and run forward again. One doughboy would raise himself up on his elbows and look about. The Frenchman, very much excited, ran over to him and said, "You must keep your head down or you will get shot. You must remember that bullets are flying all about you." As soon as the instructor's back was turned the soldier was up on his elbows again. "Hell," he said, "there ain't any bullets." In later phases of training the inferiority of the American to the French in imagination showed clearly. French veterans or recruits for that matter could work themselves up to a frenzy in sham battles and dash into an empty trench with a shout as if it were filled with Germans. Americans could not do that. They found it difficult to forget that practice was just practice. CHAPTER VI SUNNY FRANCE Later on "Sunny France" became a mocking byword uttered by wet and muddy men, but during the early days in the training area no one had any just complaint about the weather. Come to think of it there wasn't anything very wrong with those early days in rural France. Five o'clock was pretty early for getting up but the sun could do it and keep cheerful. It was glorious country with hills and forests and plowed fields and red roofed villages and smooth white roads. The country people didn't throw their hats in the air like Parisians, but they were kindly though calm. "Down in ----," said a little doughboy who came from an Indiana farm, "everybody you meet says 'bon jour' to you whether they know you or not. That means 'good morning.' I was in Chicago once and they don't do it there." It wasn't Eden though. There was the tobacco situation against that theory. To a good many soldiers, pleasant weather and kindly folk and ample rations meant nothing much. These were minor things. The quartermaster had no Bull Durham. When the supply of American tobacco and cigarettes ran out the men tried the French products but not for long. "So they call these Grenades," muttered a soldier as he examined a popular French brand of cigarettes, "I guess that's because you'd better throw 'em away right after you set 'em going."