And so when I look back to the weeks of whose history I wish now to
give a truthful account, I am afraid of myself. I wish to give nothing
more than the facts, and yet that something that is _more_ than the
facts is of the first, and indeed the only, importance. Moreover the
last impression that I wish to convey is that war is a _hysterical_
business. I believe that that succession of days in the forest of
S----, the experience of Nikitin, Semyonov, Andrey Vassilievitch,
Trenchard and myself--might have occurred to any one, must have
occurred to many other persons, but from the cool safe foundation on
which now I stand it cannot but seem exceptional, even exaggerated.
Exaggerated, in very truth, I know that it is not. And yet this
life--so ordered, so disciplined, so rational, and THAT life--where do
they join?... I penetrated but a little way; my friends penetrated
into the very heart ... and, because I was left outside, I remain the
only possible recorder: but a recorder who can offer only signs,
moments, glimpses through a closing door.
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