ABOUT midday on 3 May a friend crossing the lounge of the hotel said casually1: ‘There’s been some kind of trouble at the Telephone Exchange, I hear.’ For some reason I paid no attention to it at the time.
That afternoon, between three and four, I was half-way down the Ramblas when I heard several rifle-shots behind me. I turned round and saw some youths, with rifles in their hands and the red and black handkerchiefs of the Anarchists3 round their throats, edging up a side — street that ran off the Ramblas northward4. They were evidently exchanging shots with someone in a tall octagonal tower — a church, I think — that commanded the side-street. I thought instantly: ‘It’s started!’ But I thought it without any very great feeling of surprise — for days past everyone had been expecting ‘it’ to start at any moment. I realized that I must get back to the hotel at once and see if my wife was all right. But the knot of Anarchists round the opening of the side-street were motioning the people back and shouting to them not to cross the line of fire. More shots rang out. The bullets from the tower were flying across the street and a crowd of panic-stricken people was rushing down the Ramblas, away from the firing; up and down the street you could hear snap — snap — snap as the shopkeepers slammed the steel shutters5 over their windows. I saw two Popular Army officers retreating cautiously from tree to tree with their hands on their revolvers. In front of me the crowd was surging into the Metro6 station in the middle of the Ramblas to take cover. I immediately decided8 not to follow them. It might mean being trapped underground for hours.
At this moment an American doctor who had been with us at the front ran up to me and grabbed me by the arm. He was greatly excited.
‘Come on, we must get down to the Hotel Falcon9.’ (The Hotel Falcon was a sort of boarding-house maintained by the P.O.U.M. and used chiefly by militiamen on leave.) ‘The P.O.U.M. chaps will be meeting there. The trouble’s starting. We must hang together.’
‘But what the devil is it all about?’ I said.
The doctor was hauling me along by the arm. He was too excited to give a very clear statement. It appeared that he had been in the Plaza12 de Cataluna when several lorry-loads of armed Civil Guards had driven up to the Telephone Exchange, which was operated mainly by C.N.T. workers, and made a sudden assault upon it. Then some Anarchists had arrived and there had been a general affray. I gathered that the ‘trouble’ earlier in the day had been a demand by the Government to hand over the Telephone Exchange, which, of course, was refused.
As we moved down the street a lorry raced past us from the opposite direction. It was full of Anarchists with rifles in their hands. In front a ragged13 youth was lying on a pile of mattresses14 behind a light machine-gun. When we got to the Hotel Falcon, which was at the bottom of the Ramblas, a crowd of people was seething15 in the entrance-hall; there was a great confusion, nobody seemed to know what we were expected to do, and nobody was armed except the handful of Shock Troopers who usually acted as guards for the building. I went across to the Comite Local of the P.O.U.M., which was almost opposite. Upstairs, in the room where militiamen normally went to draw their pay, another crowd was seething. A tall, pale, rather handsome man of about thirty, in civilian16 clothes, was trying to restore order and handing out belts and cartridge-boxes from a pile in the corner. There seemed to be no rifles as yet. The doctor had disappeared — I believe there had already been casualties and a call for doctors — but another Englishman had arrived. Presently, from an inner office, the tall man and some others began bringing out armfuls of rifles and handing them round. The other Englishman and myself, as foreigners, were slightly under suspicion and at first nobody would give us a rifle. Then a militiaman whom I had known at the front arrived and recognized me, after which we were given rifles and a. few clips of cartridges17, somewhat grudgingly18.
There was a sound of firing in the distance and the streets were completely empty of people. Everyone said that it was impossible to go up the Ramblas. The Civil Guards had seized buildings in commanding positions and were letting fly at everyone who passed. I would have risked it and gone back to the hotel, but there was a vague idea floating round that the Comite Local was likely to be attacked at any moment and we had better stand by. All over the building, on the stairs, and on the pavement outside, small knots of people were standing19 and talking excitedly. No one seemed to have a very clear idea of what was happening. All I could gather was that the Civil Guards had attacked the Telephone Exchange and seized various strategic spots that commanded other buildings belonging to the workers. There was a general impression that the Civil Guards were ‘after’ the C.N.T. and the working class generally. It was noticeable that, at this stage, no one seemed to put the blame on the Government. The poorer classes in Barcelona looked upon the Civil Guards as something rather resembling the Black and Tans, and it seemed to be taken for granted that they had started this attack on their own initiative. Once I heard how things stood I felt easier in my mind. The issue was clear enough. On one side the C.N.T., on the other side the police. I have no particular love for the idealized ‘worker’ as he appears in the bourgeois20 Communist’s mind, but when I see an actual flesh-and-blood worker in conflict with his natural enemy, the policeman, I do not have to ask myself which side I am on.
A long time passed and nothing seemed to be happening at our end of the town. It did not occur to me that I could ring up the hotel and find out whether my wife was all right; I took it for granted that the Telephone Exchange would have stopped working — though, as a matter of fact, it was only out of action for a couple of hours. There seemed to be about three hundred people in the two buildings. Predominantly they were people of the poorest class, from the back-streets down by the quays21; there was a number of women among them, some of them carrying babies, and a crowd of little ragged boys. I fancy that many of them had no notion what was happening and had simply fled into the P.O.U.M. buildings for protection. There was also a number of militiamen on leave, and a sprinkling of foreigners. As far as I could estimate, there were only about sixty rifles between the lot of us. The office upstairs was ceaselessly besieged22 by a crowd of people who were demanding rifles and being told that there were none left. The younger militia11 boys, who seemed to regard the whole affair as a kind of picnic, were prowling round and trying to wheedle23 or steal rifles from anyone who had them. It was not long before one of them got my rifle away from me by a clever dodge24 and immediately made himself scarce. So I was unarmed again, except for my tiny automatic pistol, for which I had only one clip of cartridges.
It grew dark, I was getting hungry, and seemingly there was no food in the Falcon. My friend and I slipped out to his hotel, which was not far away, to get some dinner. The streets were utterly25 dark and silent, not a soul stirring, steel shutters drawn26 over all the shop windows, but no barricades28 built yet. There was a great fuss before they would let us into the hotel, which was locked and barred. When we got back I learned that the Telephone Exchange was working and went to the telephone in the office upstairs to ring up my wife. Characteristically, there was no telephone directory in the building, and I did not know the number of the Hotel Continental29; after a searching from room to room for about an hour I came upon a guide-book which gave me the number. I could not make contact with my wife, but I managed to get hold of John McNair, the I.L.P. representative in Barcelona. He told me that all was well, nobody had been shot, and asked me if we were all right at the Comite Local. I said that we should be all right if we had some cigarettes. I only meant this as a joke; nevertheless half an hour later McNair appeared with two packets of Lucky Strike. He had braved the pitch-dark streets, roamed by Anarchist2 patrols who had twice stopped him at the pistol’s point and examined his papers. I shall not forget this small act of heroism30. We were very glad of the cigarettes.
They had placed armed guards at most of the windows, and in the street below a little group of Shock Troopers were stopping and questioning the few passers-by. An Anarchist patrol car drove up, bristling31 with weapons. Beside the driver a beautiful dark-haired girl of about eighteen was nursing a sub-machine-gun across her knees. I spent a long time wandering about the building, a great rambling32 place of which it was impossible to learn the geography. Everywhere was the usual litter, the broken furniture and torn paper that seem to be the inevitable33 products of revolution. All over the place people were sleeping; on a broken sofa in a passage two poor women from the quayside were peacefully snoring. The place had been a cabaret-theatre before the P.O.U.M. took it over. There were raised stages in several of the rooms; on one of them was a desolate34 grand piano. Finally I discovered what I was looking for — the armoury. I did not know how this affair was going to turn out, and I badly wanted a weapon. I had heard it said so often that all the rival parties, P.S.U.C., P.O.U.M., and C.N.T.–F.A.I. alike, were hoarding35 arms in Barcelona, that I could not believe that two of the principal P.O.U.M. buildings contained only the fifty or sixty rifles that I had seen. The room which acted as an armoury was unguarded and had a flimsy door; another Englishman and myself had no difficulty in prizing it open. When we got inside we found that what they had told us was true — there were no more weapons. All we found there were about two dozen small-bore rifles of an obsolete36 pattern and a few shot — guns, with no cartridges for any of them. I went up to the office and asked if they had any spare pistol ammunition37; they had none. There were a few boxes of bombs, however, which one of the Anarchist patrol cars had brought us. I put a couple in one of my cartridge-boxes. They were a crude type of bomb, ignited by rubbing a sort of match at the top and very liable to go off of their own accord.
People were sprawling38 asleep all over the floor. In one room a baby was crying, crying ceaselessly. Though this was May the night was getting cold. On one of the cabaret-stages the curtains were still up, so I ripped a curtain down with my knife, rolled myself up in it, and had a few hours’ sleep. My sleep was disturbed, I remember, by the thought of those beastly bombs, which might blow me into the air if I rolled on them too vigorously. At three in the morning the tall handsome man who seemed to be in command woke me up, gave me a rifle, and put me on guard at one of the windows. He told me that Salas, the Chief of Police responsible for the attack on the Telephone Exchange, had been placed under arrest. (Actually, as we learned later, he had only been deprived of his post. Nevertheless the news confirmed the general impression that the Civil Guards had acted without orders.) As soon as it was dawn the people downstairs began building two barricades, one outside the Comite Local and the other outside the Hotel Falcon. The Barcelona streets are paved with square cobbles, easily built up into a wall, and under the cobbles is a kind of shingle39 that is good for filling sand-bags. The building of those barricades was a strange and wonderful sight; I would have given something to be able to photograph it. With the kind — of passionate40 energy that Spaniards display when they have definitely decided to begin upon any job of work, long lines of men, women, and quite small children were tearing up the cobblestones, hauling them along in a hand-cart that had been found somewhere, and staggering to and fro under heavy sacks of sand. In the doorway41 of the Comite Local a German-Jewish girl, in a pair of militiaman’s trousers whose knee — buttons just reached her ankles, was watching with a smile. In a couple of hours the barricades were head-high, with riflemen posted at the loopholes, and behind one barricade27 a fire was burning and men were frying eggs.
They had taken my rifle away again, and there seemed to be nothing that one could usefully do. Another Englishman and myself decided to go back to the Hotel Continental. There was a lot of firing in the distance, but seemingly none in the Ramblas. On the way up we looked in at the food-market. A very few stalls had opened; they were besieged by a crowd of people from the working-class quarters south of the Ramblas. Just as we got there, there was a heavy crash of rifle — fire outside, some panes44 of glass in the roof were shivered, and the crowd went flying for the back exits. A few stalls remained open, however; we managed to get a cup of coffee each and buy a wedge of goat’s-milk cheese which I tucked in beside my bombs. A few days later I was very glad of that cheese.
At the street-corner where I had seen the Anarchists begin. firing the day before a barricade was now standing. The man behind it (I was on the other side of the street) shouted to me to be careful. The Civil Guards in the church tower were firing indiscriminately at everyone who passed. I paused and then crossed the opening at a run; sure enough, a bullet cracked past me, uncomfortably close. When I neared the P.O.U.M. Executive Building, still on the other side of the road, there were fresh shouts of warning from some Shock Troopers standing in the doorway — shouts which, at the moment, I did not understand. There were trees and a newspaper kiosk between myself and the building (streets of this type in Spain have a broad walk running down the middle), and I could not see what they were pointing at. I went up to the Continental, made sure that all was well, washed my face, and then went back to the P.O.U.M. Executive Building (it was about a hundred yards down the street) to ask for orders. By this time the roar of rifle and machine-gun fire from various directions was almost comparable to the din10 of a battle. I had just found Kopp and was asking him what we were supposed to do when there was a series of appalling45 crashes down below. The din was so loud that I made sure someone must be firing at us with a field-gun. Actually it was only hand-grenades, which make double their usual noise when they burst among stone buildings.
Kopp glanced out of the window, cocked his stick behind his back, said: ‘Let us investigate,’ and strolled down the stairs in his usual unconcerned manner, I following. Just inside the doorway a group of Shock Troopers were bowling46 bombs down the pavement as though playing skittles. The bombs were bursting twenty yards away with a frightful47, ear-splitting crash which was mixed up with the banging of rifles. Half across the street, from behind the newspaper kiosk, a head — it was the head of an American militiaman whom I knew well — was sticking up, for all the world like a coconut48 at a fair. It was only afterwards that I grasped what was really happening. Next door to the P.O.U.M. building there was a cafe with a hotel above it, called the Cafe Moka. The day before twenty or thirty armed Civil Guards had entered the cafe and then, when the fighting started, had suddenly seized the building and barricaded49 themselves in. Presumably they had been ordered to seize the cafe as a preliminary to attacking the P.O.U.M. offices later. Early in the morning they had attempted to come out, shots had been exchanged, and one Shock Trooper was badly wounded and a Civil Guard killed. The Civil Guards had fled back into the cafe, but when the American came down the street they had opened fire on him, though he was not armed. The American had flung himself behind the kiosk for cover, and the Shock Troopers were flinging bombs at the Civil Guards to drive them indoors again.
Kopp took in the scene at a glance, pushed his way forward and hauled back a red-haired German Shock Trooper who was just drawing the pin out of a bomb with his teeth. He shouted to everyone to stand back from the doorway, and told us in several languages that we had got to avoid bloodshed. Then he stepped out on to the pavement and, in sight of the Civil Guards, ostentatiously took off his pistol and laid it on the ground. Two Spanish militia officers did the same, and the three of them walked slowly up to the doorway where the Civil Guards were huddling50. It was a thing I would not have done for twenty pounds. They were walking, unarmed, up to men who were frightened out of their wits and had loaded guns in their hands. A Civil Guard, in shirt-sleeves and livid with fright, came out of the door to parley51 with Kopp. He kept pointing in an agitated52 manner at two unexploded bombs that were lying on the pavement. Kopp came back and told us we had better touch the bombs off. Lying there, they were a danger to anyone who passed. A Shock Trooper fired his rifle at one of the bombs and burst it, then fired at the other and missed. I asked him to give me his rifle, knelt down and let fly at the second bomb. I also missed it, I am sorry to say.
This was the only shot I fired during the disturbances53. The pavement was covered with broken glass from the sign over the Cafe Moka, and two cars that were parked outside, one of them Kopp’s official car, had been riddled54 with bullets and their windscreens smashed by bursting bombs.
Kopp took me upstairs again and explained the situation. We had got to defend the P.O.U.M. buildings if they were attacked, but the P.O.U.M. leaders had sent instructions that we were to stand on the defensive55 and not open fire if we could possibly avoid it. Immediately opposite there was a cinematograph, called the Poliorama, with a museum above it, and at the top, high above the general level of the roofs, a small observatory56 with twin domes57. The domes commanded the street, and a few men posted up there with rifles could prevent any attack on the P.O.U.M. buildings. The caretakers at the cinema were C.N.T. members and would let us come and go. As for the Civil Guards in the Cafe Moka, there would be no trouble with them; they did not want to fight and would be only too glad to live and let live. Kopp repeated that our orders were not to fire unless we were fired on ourselves or our buildings attacked. I gathered, though he did not say so, that the P.O.U.M. leaders were furious at being dragged into this affair, but felt that they had got to stand by the C.N.T.
They had already placed guards in the observatory. The next three days and nights I spent continuously on the roof of the Poliorama, except for brief intervals58 when I slipped across to the hotel for meals. I was in no danger, I suffered from nothing worse than hunger and boredom59, yet it was one of the most unbearable60 periods of my whole life. I think few experiences could be more sickening, more disillusioning61, or, finally, more nerve-racking than those evil days of street warfare62.
I used to sit on the roof marvelling63 at the folly64 of it all. From the little windows in the observatory you could see for miles around — vista65 after vista of tall slender buildings, glass domes, and fantastic curly roofs with brilliant green and copper66 tiles; over to eastward67 the glittering pale blue sea — the first glimpse of the sea that I had had since coming to Spain. And the whole huge town of a million people was locked in a sort of violent inertia68, a nightmare of noise without movement. The sunlit streets were quite empty. Nothing was happening except the streaming of bullets from barricades and sand-bagged windows. Not a vehicle was stirring in the streets; here and there along the Ramblas the trams stood motionless where their drivers had jumped out of them when the fighting started. And all the while the devilish noise, echoing from thousands of stone buildings, went on and on and on, like a tropical rainstorm. Crack-crack, rattle69 — rattle, roar — sometimes it died away to a few shots, sometimes it quickened to a deafening70 fusillade, but it never stopped while daylight lasted, and punctually next dawn it started again.
What the devil was happening, who was fighting whom, and who was winning, was at first very difficult to discover. The people of Barcelona are so used to street-fighting and so familiar with the local geography that they knew by a kind of instinct which political party will hold which streets and which buildings. A foreigner is at a hopeless disadvantage. Looking out from the observatory, I could grasp that the Ramblas, which is one of the principal streets of the town, formed a dividing line. To the right of the Ramblas the working-class quarters were solidly Anarchist; to the left a confused fight was going on among the tortuous71 by-streets, but on that side the P.S.U.C. and the Civil Guards were more or less in control. Up at our end of the Ramblas, round the Plaza de Cataluna, the position was so complicated that it would have been quite unintelligible72 if every building had not flown a party flag. The principal landmark73 here was the Hotel Colon74, the headquarters of the P.S.U.C., dominating the Plaza de Cataluna. In a window near the last 0 but one in the huge ‘Hotel Colon’ that sprawled75 across its face they had a machine-gun that could sweep the square with deadly effect. A hundred yards to the right of us, down the Ramblas, the J.S.U., the youth league of the P.S.U.C. (corresponding to the Young Communist League in England), were holding a big department store whose sandbagged side-windows fronted our observatory. They had hauled down their red flag and hoisted76 the Catalan national flag. On the Telephone Exchange, the starting-point of all the trouble, the Catalan national flag and the Anarchist flag were flying side by side. Some kind of temporary compromise had been arrived at there, the exchange was working uninterruptedly and there was no firing from the building.
In our position it was strangely peaceful. The Civil Guards in the Cafe Moka had drawn down the steel curtains and piled up the cafe furniture to make a barricade. Later half a dozen of them came on to the roof, opposite to ourselves, and built another barricade of mattresses, over which they hung a Catalan national flag. But it was obvious that they had no wish to start a fight. Kopp had made a definite agreement with them: if they did not fire at us we would not fire at them. He had grown quite friendly with the Civil Guards by this time, and had been to visit them several times in the Cafe Moka. Naturally they had looted everything drinkable the cafe possessed77, and they made Kopp a present of fifteen bottles of beer. In return Kopp had actually given them one of our rifles to make up for one they had somehow lost on the previous day. Nevertheless, it was a queer feeling sitting on that roof. Sometimes I was merely bored with the whole affair, paid no attention to the hellish noise, and spent hours reading a succession of Penguin78 Library books which, luckily, I had bought a few days earlier; sometimes I was very conscious of the armed men watching me fifty yards away. It was a little like being in the trenches79 again; several times I caught myself, from force of habit, speaking of the Civil Guards as ‘the Fascists’. There were generally about six of us up there. We placed a man on guard in each of the observatory towers, and the rest of us sat on the lead roof below, where there was no cover except a stone palisade. I was well aware that at any moment the Civil Guards might receive telephone orders to open fire. They had agreed to give us warning before doing so, but there was no certainty that they would keep to their agreement. Only once, however, did trouble look like starting. One of the Civil Guards opposite knelt down and began firing across the barricade. I was on guard in the observatory at the time. I trained my rifle on him and shouted across:
‘Hi! Don’t you shoot at us!’
‘What?’
‘Don’t you fire at us or we’ll fire back!’
‘No, no! I wasn’t firing at you. Look — down there!’
He motioned with his rifle towards the side-street that ran past the bottom of our building. Sure enough, a youth in blue overalls82, with a rifle in his hand, was dodging83 round the corner. Evidently he had just taken a shot at the Civil Guards on the roof.
‘I was firing at him. He fired first.’ (I believe this was true.) ‘We don’t want to shoot you. We’re only workers, the same as you are.’
He made the anti-Fascist81 salute84, which I returned. I shouted across:
‘Have you got any more beer left?’
‘No, it’s all gone.’
The same day, for no apparent reason, a man in the J.S.U. building farther down the street suddenly raised his rifle and let fly at me when I was leaning out of the window. Perhaps I made a tempting85 mark. I did not fire back. Though he was only a hundred yards away the bullet went so wide that it did not even hit the roof of the observatory. As usual, Spanish standards of marksmanship had saved me. I was fired at several times from this building.
The devilish racket of firing went on and on. But so far as I could see, and from all I heard, the fighting was defensive on both sides. People simply remained in their buildings or behind their barricades and blazed away at the people opposite. About half a mile away from us there was a street where some of the main offices of the C.N.T. and the U.G.T. were almost exactly facing one another; from that direction the volume of noise was terrific. I passed down that street the day after the fighting was over and the panes of the shop-windows were like sieves86. (Most of the shopkeepers in Barcelona had their windows criss-crossed with strips of paper, so that when a bullet hit a pane43 it did not shiver to pieces.) Sometimes the rattle of rifle and machine-gun fire was punctuated87 by the crash of hand-grenades. And at long intervals, perhaps a dozen times in all, there were tremendously heavy explosions which at the time I could not account for; they sounded like aerial bombs, but that was impossible, for there were no aeroplanes about. I was told afterwards — quite possibly it was true — that agents provocateurs were touching88 off masses of explosive in order to increase the general noise and panic. There was, however, no artillery-fire. I was listening for this, for if the guns began to fire it would mean that the affair was becoming serious (artillery is the determining factor in street warfare). Afterwards there were wild tales in the newspapers about batteries of guns firing in the streets, but no one was able to point to a building that had been hit by a shell. In any case the sound of gunfire is unmistakable if one is used to it.
Almost from the start food was running short. With difficulty and under cover of darkness (for the Civil Guards were constantly sniping into the Ramblas) food was brought from the Hotel Falcon for the fifteen or twenty militiamen who were in the P.O.U.M. Executive Building, but there was barely enough to go round, and as many of us as possible went to the Hotel Continental for our meals. The Continental had been ‘collectivized’ by the Generalite and not, like most of the hotels, by the C.N.T. or U.G.T., and it was regarded as neutral ground. No sooner had the fighting started than the hotel filled to the brim with a most extraordinary collection of people. There were foreign journalists, political suspects of every shade, an American airman in the service of the Government, various Communist agents, including a fat, sinister-looking Russian, said to be an agent of the Ogpu, who was nicknamed Charlie Chan and wore attached to his waist-band a revolver and a neat little bomb, some families of well — to-do Spaniards who looked like Fascist sympathizers, two or three wounded men from the International Column, a gang of lorry drivers from. some huge French lorries which had been carrying a load of oranges back to France and had been held up by the fighting, and a number of Popular Army officers. The Popular Army, as a body, remained neutral throughout the fighting, though a few soldiers slipped away from the barracks and took part as individuals; on the Tuesday morning I had seen a couple of them at the P.O.U.M. barricades. At the beginning, before the food-shortage became acute and the newspapers began stirring up hatred89, there was a tendency to regard the whole affair as a joke. This was the kind of thing that happened every year in Barcelona, people were saying. George Tioli, an Italian journalist, a great friend of ours, came in with his trousers drenched90 with blood. He had gone out to see what was happening and had been binding91 up a wounded man on the pavement when someone playfully tossed a hand-grenade at him, fortunately not wounding him seriously. I remember his remarking that the Barcelona paving-stones ought to be numbered; it would save such a lot of trouble in building and demolishing92 barricades. And I remember a couple of men from the International Column sitting in my room at the hotel when I came in tired, hungry, and dirty after a night on guard. Their attitude was completely neutral. If they had been good party-men they would, I suppose, have urged me to change sides, or even have pinioned93 me and taken away the bombs of which my pockets were full; instead they merely commiserated94 with me for having to spend my leave in doing guard-duty on a roof. The general attitude was: ‘This is only a dust-up between the Anarchists and the police — it doesn’t mean anything.’ In spite of the extent of the fighting and the number of casualties I believe this was nearer the truth than the official version which represented the affair as a planned rising.
It was about Wednesday (5 May) that a change seemed to come over things. The shuttered streets looked ghastly. A very few pedestrians95, forced abroad for one reason or another, crept to and fro, flourishing white handkerchiefs, and at a spot in the middle of the Ramblas that was safe from bullets some men were crying newspapers to the empty street. On Tuesday Solidaridad Obrera, the Anarchist paper, had described the attack on the Telephone Exchange as a ‘monstrous provocation’ (or words to that effect), but on Wednesday it changed its tune96 and began imploring97 everyone to go back to work. The Anarchist leaders were broadcasting the same message. The office of La Batalla, the P.O.U.M. paper, which was not defended, had been raided and seized by the Civil Guards at about the same time as the Telephone Exchange, but the paper was being printed, and a few copies distributed, from another address. I urged everyone to remain at the barricades. People were divided in their minds and wondering uneasily how the devil this was going to end. I doubt whether anyone left the barricades as yet, but everyone was sick of the meaningless fighting, which could obviously lead to no real decision, because no one wanted this to develop into a full-sized civil war which might mean losing the war against Franco. I heard this fear expressed on all sides. So far as one could gather from what people were saying at the time the C.N.T. rank and file wanted, and had wanted from the beginning, only two things: the handing back of the Telephone Exchange and the disarming98 of the hated Civil Guards. If the Generalite had promised to do these two things, and also promised to put an end to the food profiteering, there is little doubt that the barricades would have been down in two hours. But it was obvious that the Generalite was not going to give in. Ugly rumours100 were flying round. It was said that the Valencia Government was sending six thousand men to occupy Barcelona, and that five thousand Anarchist and P.O.U.M. troops had left the Aragon front to oppose them. Only the first of these rumours was true. Watching from the observatory tower we saw the low grey shapes of warships101 closing in upon the harbour. Douglas Moyle, who had been a sailor, said that they looked like British destroyers. As a matter of fact they were British destroyers, though we did not learn this till afterwards.
That evening we heard that on the Plaza de Espana four hundred Civil Guards had surrendered and handed their arms to the Anarchists; also the news was vaguely102 filtering through that in the suburbs (mainly working-class quarters) the C.N.T. were in control. It looked as though we were winning. But the same evening Kopp sent for me and, with a grave face, told me that according to information he had just received the Government was about to outlaw103 the P.O.U.M. and declare a state of war upon it. The news gave me a shock. It was the first glimpse I had had of the interpretation104 that was likely to be put upon this affair later on. I dimly foresaw that when the fighting ended the entire blame would be laid upon the P.O.U.M., which was the weakest party and therefore the most suitable scapegoat105. And meanwhile our local neutrality was at an end. If the Government declared war upon us we had no choice but to defend ourselves, and here at the Executive building we could be certain that the Civil Guards next door would get orders to attack us. Our only chance was to attack them first. Kopp was waiting for orders on the telephone; if we heard definitely that the P.O.U.M. was outlawed106 we must make preparations at once to seize the Cafe Moka.
I remember the long, nightmarish evening that we spent in fortifying108 the building. We locked the steel curtains across the front entrance and behind them built a barricade of slabs109 of stone left behind by the workmen who had been making some alterations110. We went over our stock of weapons. Counting the six rifles that were on the roof of the Poliorama opposite, we had twenty-one rifles, one of them defective111, about fifty rounds of ammunition for each rifle, and a few dozen bombs; otherwise nothing except a few pistols and revolvers. About a dozen men, mostly Germans, had volunteered for the attack on the Cafe Moka, if it came off. We should attack from the roof, of course, some time in the small hours, and take them by surprise; they were more numerous, but our morale112 was better, and no doubt we could storm the place, though people were bound to be killed in doing so. We had no food in the building except a few slabs of chocolate, and the rumour99 had gone round that ‘they’ were going to cut off the water supply. (Nobody knew who ‘they’ were. It might be the Government that controlled the waterworks, or it might be the C.N.T. — nobody knew.) We spent a long time filling up every basin in the lavatories113, every bucket we could lay hands on, and, finally, the fifteen beer bottles, now empty, which the Civil Guards had given to Kopp.
I was in a ghastly frame of mind and dog-tired after about sixty hours without much sleep. It was now late into the night. People were sleeping all over the floor behind the barricade downstairs. Upstairs there was a small room, with a sofa in it, which we intended to use as a dressing-station, though, needless to say, we discovered that there was neither iodine114 nor bandages in the building. My wife had come down from the hotel in case a nurse should be needed. I lay down on the sofa, feeling that I would like half an hour’s rest before the attack on the Moka, in which I should presumably be killed. I remember the intolerable discomfort115 caused by my pistol, which was strapped116 to my belt and sticking into the small of my back. And the next thing I remember is waking up with a jerk to find my wife standing beside me. It was broad daylight, nothing had happened, the Government had not declared war on the P.O.U.M., the water had not been cut off, and except for the sporadic117 firing in the streets everything was normal. My wife said that she had not had the heart to wake me and had slept in an arm-chair in one of the front rooms.
That afternoon there was a kind of armistice118. The firing died away and with surprising suddenness the streets filled with people. A few shops began to pull up their shutters, and the market was packed with a huge crowd clamouring for food, though the stalls were almost empty. It was noticeable, however, that the trams did not start running. The Civil Guards were still behind their barricades in the Moka; on neither side were the fortified119 buildings evacuated120. Everyone was rushing round and trying to buy food. And (MI every side you heard the same anxious questions: ‘Do you think it’s stopped? Do you think it’s going to start again?’ ‘It’ — the fighting — was now thought of as some kind of natural calamity121, like a hurricane or an earthquake, which was happening to us all alike and which we had no power of stopping. And sure enough, almost immediately — I suppose there must really have been several hours’ truce122, but they seemed more like minutes than hours — a sudden crash of rifle-fire, like a June cloud-burst, sent everyone scurrying123; the steel shutters snapped into place, the streets emptied like magic, the barricades were manned, and ‘it’ had started again.;
I went back to my post on the roof with a feeling of concentrated disgust and fury. When you are taking part in events like these you are, I suppose, in a small way, making history, and you ought by rights to feel like a historical character. But you never do, because at such times the physical details always outweigh124 everything else. Throughout the fighting I never made the correct ‘analysis’ of the situation that was so glibly125 made by journalists hundreds of miles away. What I was chiefly thinking about was not the rights and wrongs of this miserable126 internecine127 scrap128, but simply the discomfort and boredom of sitting day and night on that intolerable roof, and the hunger which was growing worse and worse — for none of us had had a proper meal since Monday. It was in my mind all the while that I should have to go back to the front as soon as this business was over. It was infuriating. I had been a hundred and fifteen days in the line and had come back to Barcelona ravenous129 for a bit of rest and comfort; and instead I had to spend my time sitting on a roof opposite Civil Guards as bored as myself, who periodically waved to me and assured me that they were ‘workers’ (meaning that they hoped I would not shoot them), but who would certainly open fire if they got the order to do so. If this was history it did not feel like it. It was more like a bad period at the front, when men were short and we had to do abnormal hours of guard-duty; instead of being heroic one just had to stay at one’s post, bored, dropping with sleep, and completely uninterested as to what it was all about.
Inside the hotel, among the heterogeneous130 mob who for the most part had not dared to put their noses out of doors, a horrible atmosphere of suspicion had grown up. Various people were infected with spy mania131 and were creeping round whispering that everyone else was a spy of the Communists, or the Trotskyists, or the Anarchists, or what-not. The fat Russian agent was cornering all the foreign refugees in turn and explaining plausibly132 that this whole affair was an Anarchist plot. I watched him with some interest, for it was the first time that I had seen a person whose profession was telling lies — unless one counts journalists. There was something repulsive133 in the parody134 of smart hotel life that was still going on behind shuttered windows amid the rattle of rifle-fire. The front dining-room had been abandoned after a bullet came through the window and chipped a pillar, and the guests were crowded into a darkish room at the back, where there were never quite enough tables to go round. The waiters were reduced in numbers — some of them were C.N.T. members and had joined in the general strike — and had dropped their boiled shirts for the time being, but meals were still being served with a pretence135 of ceremony. There was, however, practically nothing to eat. On that Thursday night the principal dish at dinner was one sardine136 each. The hotel had had no bread for days, and even the wine was running so low that we were drinking older and older wines at higher and higher prices. This shortage of food went on for several days after the fighting was over. Three days running, I remember, my wife and I breakfasted off a little piece of goat’s-milk cheese with no bread and nothing to drink. The only thing that was plentiful137 was oranges. The French lorry drivers brought quantities of their oranges into the hotel. They were a tough — looking bunch; they had with them some flashy Spanish girls and a huge porter in a black blouse. At any other time the little snob138 of a hotel manager would have done his best to make them uncomfortable, in fact would have refused to have them on the premises139, but at present they were popular because, unlike the rest of us, they had a private store of bread which everyone was trying to cadge140 from them.
I spent that final night on the roof, and the next day it did really look as though the fighting was coming to an end. I do not think there was much firing that day — the Friday. No one seemed to know for certain whether the troops from Valencia were really coining; they arrived that evening, as a matter of fact. The Government was broadcasting half-soothing, half-threatening messages, asking everyone to go home and saying that after a certain hour anyone found carrying arms would be arrested. Not much attention was paid to the Government’s broadcasts, but everywhere the people were fading away from the barricades. I have no doubt that it was mainly the food shortage that was responsible. From every side you heard the same remark:’ We have no more food, we must go back to work.’ On the other hand the Civil Guards, who could count on getting their rations107 so long as there was any food in the town, were able to stay at their posts. By the afternoon the streets were almost normal, though the deserted141 barricades were still standing; the Ramblas were thronged142 with people, the shops nearly all open, and — most reassuring143 of all — the trams that had stood so long in frozen blocks jerked into motion and began running. The Civil Guards were still holding the Cafe Moka and had not taken down their barricades, but some of them brought chairs out and sat on the pavement with their rifles across their knees. I winked144 at one of them as I went past and got a not unfriendly grin; he recognized me, of course. Over the Telephone Exchange the Anarchist flag had been hauled down and only the Catalan flag was flying. That meant that the workers were definitely beaten; I realized — though, owing to my political ignorance, not so clearly as I ought to have done — that when the Government felt more sure of itself there would be reprisals145. But at the time I was not interested in that aspect of things. All I felt was a profound relief that the devilish din of firing was over, and that one could buy some food and have a bit of rest and peace before going back to the front.
It must have been late that evening that the troops from Valencia first appeared in the streets. They were the Assault Guards, another formation similar to the Civil Guards and the Carabineros (i.e. a formation intended primarily for police work), and the picked troops of the Republic. Quite suddenly they seemed to spring up out of the ground; you saw them everywhere patrolling the streets in groups of ten — tall men in grey or blue uniforms, with long rifles slung146 over their shoulders, and a sub-machine-gun to each group. Meanwhile there was a delicate job to be done. The six rifles which we had used for the guard in the observatory towers were still lying there, and by hook or by crook147 we had got to get them back to the P.O.U.M. building. It was only a question of getting them across the street. They were part of the regular armoury of the building, but to bring them into the street was to contravene148 the Government’s order, and if we were caught with them in our hands we should certainly be arrested — worse, the rifles would be confiscated149. With only twenty-one rifles in the building we could not afford to lose six of them. After a lot of discussion as to the best method, a red-haired Spanish boy and myself began to smuggle150 them out. It was easy enough to dodge the Assault Guard patrols; the danger was the Civil Guards in the Moka, who were well aware that we had rifles in the observatory and might give the show away if they saw us carrying them across. Each of us partially151 undressed and slung a rifle over the left shoulder, the butt42 under the armpit, the barrel down the trouser-leg. It was unfortunate that they were long Mausers. Even a man as tall as I am cannot wear a long Mauser down his trouser-leg without discomfort. It was an intolerable job getting down the corkscrew staircase of the observatory with a completely rigid152 left leg. Once in the street, we found that the only way to move was with extreme slowness, so slowly that you did not have to bend your knees. Outside the picture-house I saw a group of people staring at me with great interest as I crept along at tortoise-speed. I have often wondered what they thought was the matter with me. Wounded in the war, perhaps. However, all the rifles were smuggled153 across without incident.
Next day the Assault Guards were everywhere, walking the streets like conquerors154. There was no doubt that the Government was simply making a display of force in order to overawe a population which it already knew would not resist; if there had been any real fear of further outbreaks the Assault Guards would have been kept in barracks and not scattered155 through the streets in small bands. They were splendid troops, much the best I had seen in Spain, and, though I suppose they were in a sense ‘the enemy’, I could not help liking156 the look of them. But it was with a sort of amazement157 that I watched them strolling to and fro. I was used to the ragged, scarcely-armed militia on the Aragon front, and I had not known that the Republic possessed troops like these. It was not only that they were picked men physically158, it was their weapons that most astonished me. All of them were armed with brand-new rifles of the type known as ‘the Russian rifle’ (these rifles were sent to Spain by the U.S.S.R., but were, I believe, manufactured in America). I examined one of them. It was a far from perfect rifle, but vastly better than the dreadful old blunderbusses we had at the front. The Assault Guards had one submachine-gun between ten men and an automatic pistol each; we at the front had approximately one machine-gun between fifty men, and as for pistols and revolvers, you could only procure159 them illegally. As a matter of fact, though I had not noticed it till now, it was the same everywhere. The Civil Guards and Carabineros, who were not intended for the front at all, were better armed and far better clad than ourselves. I suspect it is the same in all wars — always the same contrast between the sleek160 police in the rear and the ragged soldiers in the line. On the whole the Assault Guards got on very well with the population after the first day or two. On the first day there was a certain amount of trouble because some of the Assault Guards — acting161 on instructions, I suppose — began behaving in a provocative162 manner. Bands of them boarded trams, searched the passengers, and, if they had C.N.T. membership cards in their pockets, tore them up and stamped on them. This led to scuffles with armed Anarchists, and one or two people were killed. Very soon, however, the Assault Guards dropped their conquering air and relations became more friendly. It was noticeable that most of them had picked up a girl after a day or two.
The Barcelona fighting had given the Valencia Government the long — wanted excuse to assume fuller control of Catalonia. The workers’ militias163 were to be broken’ up and redistributed among the Popular Army. The Spanish Republican flag was flying all over Barcelona — the first time I had seen it, I think, except over a Fascist trench80. In the working-class quarters the barricades were being pulled down, rather fragmentarily, for it is a lot easier to build a barricade than to put the stones back. Outside the P.S.U.C. buildings the barricades were allowed to remain standing, and indeed many were standing as late as June. The Civil Guards were still occupying strategic points. Huge seizures164 of arms were being made from C.N.T. strongholds, though I have no doubt a good many escaped seizure165. La Batalla was still appearing, but it was censored166 until the front page was almost completely blank. The P.S.U.C. papers were un-censored and were publishing inflammatory articles demanding the suppression of the P.O.U.M. The P.O.U.M. was declared to be a disguised Fascist organization, and a cartoon representing the P.O.U.M. as a figure slipping off” a mask marked with the hammer and sickle167 and revealing a hideous168, maniacal169 face marked with the swastika, was being circulated all over the town by P.S.U.C. agents. Evidently the official version of the Barcelona fighting was already fixed170 upon: it was to be represented as a ‘fifth column’ Fascist rising engineered solely171 by the P.O.U.M.
In the hotel the horrible atmosphere of suspicion and hostility172 had grown worse now that the fighting was over. In the face of the accusations173 that were being flung about it was impossible to remain neutral. The posts were working again, the foreign Communist papers were beginning to arrive, and their accounts of the fighting were not only violently partisan174 but, of course, wildly inaccurate175 as to facts. I think some of the Communists on the spot, who had seen what was actually happening, were dismayed by the interpretation that was being put upon events, but naturally they had to stick to their own side. Our Communist friend approached me once again and asked me whether I would not transfer into the International Column.
I was rather surprised. ‘Your papers are saying I’m a Fascist,’ I said. ‘Surely I should be politically suspect, coming from the P.O.U.M.”
‘Oh, that doesn’t matter. After all, you were only acting under orders.’
I had to tell him that after this affair I could not join any Communist-controlled unit. Sooner or later it might mean being used against the Spanish working class. One could not tell when this kind of thing would break out again, and if I had to use my rifle at all in such an affair I would use it on the side of the working class and not against them. He was very decent about it. But from now on the whole atmosphere was changed. You could not, as before, ‘agree to differ’ and have drinks with a man who was supposedly your political opponent. There were some ugly wrangles176 in the hotel lounge. Meanwhile the jails were already full and overflowing177. After the fighting was over the Anarchists had, of course, released their prisoners, but the Civil Guards had not released theirs, and most of them were thrown into prison and kept there without trial, in many cases for months on end. As usual, completely innocent people were being arrested owing to police bungling178. I mentioned earlier that Douglas Thompson was wounded about the beginning of April. Afterwards we had lost touch with him, as usually happened when a man was wounded, for wounded men were frequently moved from one hospital to another. Actually he was at Tarragona hospital and was sent back to Barcelona about the time when the fighting started. On the Tuesday morning I met him in the street, considerably179 bewildered by the firing that was going on all round. He asked the question everyone was asking:
‘What the devil is this all about?’
I explained as well as I could. Thompson said promptly180:
‘I’m going to keep out of this. My arm’s still bad. I shall go back to my hotel and stay there.’
He went back to his hotel, but unfortunately (how important it is in street-fighting to understand the local geography!) it was a hotel in a part of the town controlled by the Civil Guards. The place was raided and Thompson was arrested, flung into jail, and kept for eight days in a cell so full of people that nobody had room to lie down. There were many similar cases. Numerous foreigners with doubtful political records were on the run, with the police on their track and in constant fear of denunciation. It was worst for the Italians and Germans, who had no passports and were generally wanted by the secret police in their own countries. If they were arrested they were liable to be deported181 to France, which might mean being sent back to Italy or Germany, where God knew what horrors were awaiting them. One or two foreign women hurriedly regularized their position by ‘marrying’ Spaniards. A German girl who had no papers at all dodged182 the police by posing for several days as a man’s mistress. I remember the look of shame and misery183 on the poor girl’s face when I accidentally bumped into her coming out of the man’s bedroom. Of course she was not his mistress, but no doubt she thought I thought she was. You had all the while a hateful feeling that someone hitherto your friend might be denouncing you to the secret police. The long nightmare of the fighting, the noise, the lack of food and sleep, the mingled184 strain and boredom of sitting on the roof and wondering whether in another minute I should be shot myself or be obliged to shoot somebody else had put my nerves on edge. I had got to the point when every time a door banged I grabbed for my pistol. On the Saturday morning there was an uproar185 of shots outside and everyone cried out: ‘It’s starting again!’ I ran into the street to find that it was only some Assault Guards shooting a mad dog. No one who was in Barcelona then, or for months later, will forget the horrible atmosphere produced by fear, suspicion, hatred, censored newspapers, crammed186 jails, enormous food queues, and prowling gangs of armed men.
I have tried to give some idea of what it felt like to be in the middle of the Barcelona fighting; yet I do not suppose I have succeeded in conveying much of the strangeness of that time. One of the things that stick in my mind when I look back is the casual contacts one made at the time, the sudden glimpses of non-combatants to whom the whole thing was simply a meaningless uproar. I remember the fashionably-dressed woman I saw strolling down the Ramblas, with a shopping-basket over her arm and leading a white poodle, while the rifles cracked and roared a street or two away. It is conceivable that she was deaf. And the man I saw rushing across the completely empty Plaza de Cataluna, brandishing187 a white handkerchief in each hand. And the large party of people all dressed in black who kept trying for about an hour to cross the Plaza de Cataluna and always failing. Every time they emerged from the side-street at the corner the P.S.U.C. machine-gunners in the Hotel Colon opened fire and drove them back — I don’t know why, for they were obviously unarmed. I have since thought that they may have been a funeral party. And the little man who acted as caretaker at the museum over the Poliorama and who seemed to regard the whole affair as a social occasion. He was so pleased to have the English visiting him — the English were so simpatico, he said. He hoped we would all come and see him again when the trouble was over; as a matter of fact I did go and see him. And the other little man, sheltering in a doorway, who jerked his head in a pleased manner towards the hell of firing on the Plaza de Cataluna and said (as though remarking that it was a fine morning): ‘So we’ve got the nineteenth of July back again!’ And the people in the shoe-shop who were making my marching-boots. I went there before the fighting, after it was over, and, for a very few minutes, during the brief armistice on 5 May. It was an expensive shop, and the shop-people were U.G.T. and may have been P.S.U.C. members — at any rate they were politically on the other side and they knew that I was serving with the P.O.U.M. Yet their attitude was completely indifferent. ‘Such a pity, this kind of thing, isn’t it? And so bad for business. What a pity it doesn’t stop! As though there wasn’t enough of that kind of thing at the front!’ etc., etc. There must have been quantities of people, perhaps a majority of the inhabitants of Barcelona, who regarded the whole affair without a nicker of interest, or with no more interest than they would have felt in an air-raid.
In this chapter I have described only my personal experiences. In the next chapter I must discuss as best I can the larger issues — what actually happened and with what results, what were the rights and wrongs of the affair, and who if anyone was responsible. So much political capital has been made out of the Barcelona fighting that it is important to try and get a balanced view of it. An immense amount, enough to fill many books, has already been written on the subject, and I do not suppose I should exaggerate if I said that nine-tenths of it is untruthful. Nearly all the newspaper accounts published at the time were manufactured by journalists at a distance, and were not only inaccurate in their facts but intentionally188 misleading. As usual, only one side of the question has been allowed to get to the wider public. Like everyone who was in Barcelona at the time. I saw only what was happening in my immediate7 neighbourhood, but I saw and heard quite enough to be able to contradict many of the lies that have been circulated. As before, if you are not interested in political controversy189 and the mob of parties and sub-parties with their confusing names (rather like the names of the generals in a Chinese war), please skip. It is a horrible thing to have to enter into the details of inter-party polemics190; it is like diving into a cesspool. But it is necessary to try and establish the truth, so far as it is possible. This squalid brawl191 in a distant city is more important than might appear at first sight.
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casually
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| adv.漠不关心地，无动于衷地，不负责任地 | |
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anarchist
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| n.无政府主义者 | |
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anarchists
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| 无政府主义者( anarchist的名词复数 ) | |
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northward
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| adv.向北；n.北方的地区 | |
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shutters
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metro
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immediate
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decided
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falcon
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din
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militia
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plaza
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ragged
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mattresses
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| 褥垫，床垫( mattress的名词复数 ) | |
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seething
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| 沸腾的，火热的 | |
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civilian
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| adj.平民的，民用的，民众的 | |
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cartridges
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| 子弹( cartridge的名词复数 )； （打印机的）墨盒； 录音带盒； （唱机的）唱头 | |
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grudgingly
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standing
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bourgeois
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| adj./n.追求物质享受的(人)；中产阶级分子 | |
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quays
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besieged
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wheedle
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dodge
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utterly
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drawn
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barricade
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barricades
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continental
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heroism
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bristling
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| a.竖立的 | |
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rambling
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inevitable
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| adj.不可避免的，必然发生的 | |
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desolate
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| adj.荒凉的，荒芜的；孤独的，凄凉的；v.使荒芜，使孤寂 | |
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hoarding
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| n.贮藏；积蓄；临时围墙；囤积v.积蓄并储藏（某物）( hoard的现在分词 ) | |
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obsolete
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| adj.已废弃的，过时的 | |
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ammunition
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| n.军火，弹药 | |
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sprawling
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| adj.蔓生的，不规则地伸展的v.伸开四肢坐[躺]( sprawl的现在分词 )；蔓延；杂乱无序地拓展；四肢伸展坐着（或躺着） | |
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39
shingle
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| n.木瓦板；小招牌(尤指医生或律师挂的营业招牌)；v.用木瓦板盖（屋顶）；把（女子头发）剪短 | |
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40
passionate
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| adj.热情的，热烈的，激昂的，易动情的，易怒的，性情暴躁的 | |
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41
doorway
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| n.门口，(喻)入门；门路，途径 | |
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42
butt
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| n.笑柄；烟蒂；枪托；臀部；v.用头撞或顶 | |
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43
pane
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| n.窗格玻璃，长方块 | |
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44
panes
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| 窗玻璃( pane的名词复数 ) | |
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45
appalling
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| adj.骇人听闻的，令人震惊的，可怕的 | |
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46
bowling
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| n.保龄球运动 | |
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47
frightful
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| adj.可怕的；讨厌的 | |
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48
coconut
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| n.椰子 | |
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49
barricaded
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| 设路障于，以障碍物阻塞( barricade的过去式和过去分词 )； 设路障[防御工事]保卫或固守 | |
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50
huddling
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| n. 杂乱一团, 混乱, 拥挤 v. 推挤, 乱堆, 草率了事 | |
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51
parley
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| n.谈判 | |
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52
agitated
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| adj.被鼓动的，不安的 | |
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53
disturbances
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| n.骚乱( disturbance的名词复数 )；打扰；困扰；障碍 | |
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54
riddled
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| adj.布满的；充斥的；泛滥的v.解谜，出谜题(riddle的过去分词形式) | |
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55
defensive
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| adj.防御的；防卫的；防守的 | |
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56
observatory
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| n.天文台，气象台，瞭望台，观测台 | |
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57
domes
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| n.圆屋顶( dome的名词复数 )；像圆屋顶一样的东西；圆顶体育场 | |
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58
intervals
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| n.[军事]间隔( interval的名词复数 )；间隔时间；[数学]区间；（戏剧、电影或音乐会的）幕间休息 | |
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59
boredom
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| n.厌烦，厌倦，乏味，无聊 | |
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60
unbearable
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| adj.不能容忍的；忍受不住的 | |
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61
disillusioning
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| 使不再抱幻想，使理想破灭( disillusion的现在分词 ) | |
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62
warfare
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| n.战争(状态)；斗争；冲突 | |
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63
marvelling
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| v.惊奇，对…感到惊奇( marvel的现在分词 ) | |
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64
folly
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| n.愚笨，愚蠢，蠢事，蠢行，傻话 | |
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65
vista
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| n.远景，深景，展望，回想 | |
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66
copper
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| n.铜；铜币；铜器；adj.铜(制)的；(紫)铜色的 | |
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67
eastward
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| adv.向东；adj.向东的；n.东方，东部 | |
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68
inertia
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| adj.惰性，惯性，懒惰，迟钝 | |
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69
rattle
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| v.飞奔，碰响；激怒；n.碰撞声；拨浪鼓 | |
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70
deafening
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| adj. 振耳欲聋的, 极喧闹的 动词deafen的现在分词形式 | |
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71
tortuous
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| adj.弯弯曲曲的，蜿蜒的 | |
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72
unintelligible
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| adj.无法了解的，难解的，莫明其妙的 | |
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73
landmark
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| n.陆标，划时代的事，地界标 | |
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74
colon
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| n.冒号，结肠，直肠 | |
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75
sprawled
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| v.伸开四肢坐[躺]( sprawl的过去式和过去分词)；蔓延；杂乱无序地拓展；四肢伸展坐着（或躺着） | |
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76
hoisted
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| 把…吊起，升起( hoist的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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77
possessed
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| adj.疯狂的；拥有的，占有的 | |
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78
penguin
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| n.企鹅 | |
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79
trenches
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| 深沟，地沟( trench的名词复数 )； 战壕 | |
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80
trench
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| n./v.(挖)沟，(挖)战壕 | |
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81
fascist
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| adj.法西斯主义的；法西斯党的；n.法西斯主义者，法西斯分子 | |
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82
overalls
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| n.（复）工装裤；长罩衣 | |
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83
dodging
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| n.避开，闪过，音调改变v.闪躲( dodge的现在分词 )；回避 | |
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84
salute
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| vi.行礼，致意，问候，放礼炮；vt.向…致意，迎接，赞扬；n.招呼，敬礼，礼炮 | |
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85
tempting
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| a.诱人的, 吸引人的 | |
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86
sieves
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| 筛，漏勺( sieve的名词复数 ) | |
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87
punctuated
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| v.（在文字中）加标点符号，加标点( punctuate的过去式和过去分词 )；不时打断某事物 | |
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88
touching
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| adj.动人的，使人感伤的 | |
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89
hatred
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| n.憎恶，憎恨，仇恨 | |
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90
drenched
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| adj.湿透的；充满的v.使湿透( drench的过去式和过去分词 )；在某人（某物）上大量使用（某液体） | |
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91
binding
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| 有约束力的，有效的，应遵守的 | |
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92
demolishing
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| v.摧毁( demolish的现在分词 )；推翻；拆毁（尤指大建筑物）；吃光 | |
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93
pinioned
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| v.抓住[捆住]（双臂）( pinion的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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94
commiserated
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| v.怜悯，同情( commiserate的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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95
pedestrians
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| n.步行者( pedestrian的名词复数 ) | |
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96
tune
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| n.调子；和谐，协调；v.调音，调节，调整 | |
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97
imploring
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| 恳求的，哀求的 | |
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98
disarming
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| adj.消除敌意的，使人消气的v.裁军( disarm的现在分词 )；使息怒 | |
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99
rumour
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| n.谣言，谣传，传闻 | |
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100
rumours
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| n.传闻( rumour的名词复数 )；风闻；谣言；谣传 | |
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101
warships
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| 军舰，战舰( warship的名词复数 )； 舰只 | |
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102
vaguely
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| adv.含糊地，暖昧地 | |
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103
outlaw
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| n.歹徒，亡命之徒；vt.宣布…为不合法 | |
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104
interpretation
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| n.解释，说明，描述；艺术处理 | |
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105
scapegoat
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| n.替罪的羔羊，替人顶罪者；v.使…成为替罪羊 | |
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106
outlawed
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| 宣布…为不合法（outlaw的过去式与过去分词形式） | |
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107
rations
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| 定量( ration的名词复数 )； 配给量； 正常量； 合理的量 | |
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108
fortifying
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| 筑防御工事于( fortify的现在分词 )； 筑堡于； 增强； 强化（食品） | |
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109
slabs
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| n.厚板，平板，厚片( slab的名词复数 )；厚胶片 | |
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110
alterations
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| n.改动( alteration的名词复数 )；更改；变化；改变 | |
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111
defective
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| adj.有毛病的，有问题的，有瑕疵的 | |
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112
morale
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| n.道德准则，士气，斗志 | |
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113
lavatories
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| n.厕所( lavatory的名词复数 )；抽水马桶；公共厕所（或卫生间、洗手间、盥洗室）；浴室水池 | |
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114
iodine
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| n.碘，碘酒 | |
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115
discomfort
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| n.不舒服，不安，难过，困难，不方便 | |
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116
strapped
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| adj.用皮带捆住的，用皮带装饰的；身无分文的；缺钱；手头紧v.用皮带捆扎(strap的过去式和过去分词)；用皮带抽打；包扎；给…打绷带 | |
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117
sporadic
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| adj.偶尔发生的 [反]regular；分散的 | |
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118
armistice
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| n.休战，停战协定 | |
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119
fortified
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| adj. 加强的 | |
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120
evacuated
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| 撤退者的 | |
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121
calamity
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| n.灾害，祸患，不幸事件 | |
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122
truce
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| n.休战，(争执，烦恼等的)缓和；v.以停战结束 | |
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123
scurrying
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| v.急匆匆地走( scurry的现在分词 ) | |
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124
outweigh
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| vt.比...更重，...更重要 | |
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125
glibly
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| adv.流利地，流畅地；满口 | |
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126
miserable
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| adj.悲惨的，痛苦的；可怜的，糟糕的 | |
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127
internecine
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| adj.两败俱伤的 | |
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128
scrap
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| n.碎片；废料；v.废弃，报废 | |
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129
ravenous
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| adj.极饿的，贪婪的 | |
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130
heterogeneous
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| adj.庞杂的；异类的 | |
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131
mania
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| n.疯狂；躁狂症，狂热，癖好 | |
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132
plausibly
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| 似真地 | |
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133
repulsive
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| adj.排斥的，使人反感的 | |
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134
parody
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| n.打油诗文，诙谐的改编诗文，拙劣的模仿；v.拙劣模仿，作模仿诗文 | |
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135
pretence
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| n.假装，作假；借口，口实；虚伪；虚饰 | |
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136
sardine
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| n.[C]沙丁鱼 | |
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137
plentiful
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| adj.富裕的，丰富的 | |
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138
snob
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| n.势利小人，自以为高雅、有学问的人 | |
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139
premises
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| n.建筑物，房屋 | |
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140
cadge
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| v.乞讨 | |
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141
deserted
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| adj.荒芜的，荒废的，无人的，被遗弃的 | |
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142
thronged
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| v.成群，挤满( throng的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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143
reassuring
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| a.使人消除恐惧和疑虑的，使人放心的 | |
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144
winked
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| v.使眼色( wink的过去式和过去分词 )；递眼色（表示友好或高兴等）；（指光）闪烁；闪亮 | |
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145
reprisals
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| n.报复（行为）( reprisal的名词复数 ) | |
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146
slung
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| 抛( sling的过去式和过去分词 )； 吊挂； 遣送； 押往 | |
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147
crook
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| v.使弯曲；n.小偷，骗子，贼；弯曲(处) | |
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148
contravene
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| v.违反，违背，反驳，反对 | |
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149
confiscated
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| 没收，充公( confiscate的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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150
smuggle
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| vt.私运；vi.走私 | |
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151
partially
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| adv.部分地，从某些方面讲 | |
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152
rigid
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| adj.严格的，死板的；刚硬的，僵硬的 | |
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153
smuggled
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| 水货 | |
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154
conquerors
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| 征服者，占领者( conqueror的名词复数 ) | |
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155
scattered
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| adj.分散的，稀疏的；散步的；疏疏落落的 | |
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156
liking
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| n.爱好；嗜好；喜欢 | |
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157
amazement
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| n.惊奇，惊讶 | |
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158
physically
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| adj.物质上，体格上，身体上，按自然规律 | |
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159
procure
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| vt.获得，取得，促成；vi.拉皮条 | |
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160
sleek
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| adj.光滑的，井然有序的；v.使光滑，梳拢 | |
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161
acting
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| n.演戏，行为，假装；adj.代理的，临时的，演出用的 | |
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162
provocative
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| adj.挑衅的，煽动的，刺激的，挑逗的 | |
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163
militias
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| n.民兵组织，民兵( militia的名词复数 ) | |
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164
seizures
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| n.起获( seizure的名词复数 )；没收；充公；起获的赃物 | |
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165
seizure
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| n.没收；占有；抵押 | |
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166
censored
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| 受审查的，被删剪的 | |
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167
sickle
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| n.镰刀 | |
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168
hideous
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| adj.丑陋的，可憎的，可怕的，恐怖的 | |
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169
maniacal
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| adj.发疯的 | |
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170
fixed
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| adj.固定的，不变的，准备好的；(计算机)固定的 | |
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171
solely
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| adv.仅仅，唯一地 | |
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172
hostility
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| n.敌对，敌意；抵制［pl.］交战，战争 | |
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173
accusations
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| n.指责( accusation的名词复数 )；指控；控告；（被告发、控告的）罪名 | |
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174
partisan
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| adj.党派性的；游击队的；n.游击队员；党徒 | |
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175
inaccurate
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| adj.错误的，不正确的，不准确的 | |
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176
wrangles
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| n.（尤指长时间的）激烈争吵，口角，吵嘴( wrangle的名词复数 )v.争吵，争论，口角( wrangle的第三人称单数 ) | |
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177
overflowing
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| n. 溢出物,溢流 adj. 充沛的，充满的 动词overflow的现在分词形式 | |
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178
bungling
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| adj.笨拙的，粗劣的v.搞糟，完不成( bungle的现在分词 )；笨手笨脚地做；失败；完不成 | |
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179
considerably
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| adv.极大地；相当大地；在很大程度上 | |
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180
promptly
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| adv.及时地，敏捷地 | |
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181
deported
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| v.将…驱逐出境( deport的过去式和过去分词 )；举止 | |
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182
dodged
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| v.闪躲( dodge的过去式和过去分词 )；回避 | |
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183
misery
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| n.痛苦，苦恼，苦难；悲惨的境遇，贫苦 | |
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184
mingled
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| 混合，混入( mingle的过去式和过去分词 )； 混进，与…交往[联系] | |
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185
uproar
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| n.骚动，喧嚣，鼎沸 | |
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186
crammed
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| adj.塞满的，挤满的；大口地吃；快速贪婪地吃v.把…塞满；填入；临时抱佛脚( cram的过去式) | |
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187
brandishing
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| v.挥舞( brandish的现在分词 )；炫耀 | |
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188
intentionally
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| ad.故意地，有意地 | |
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189
controversy
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| n.争论，辩论，争吵 | |
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190
polemics
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| n.辩论术，辩论法；争论( polemic的名词复数 )；辩论；辩论术；辩论法 | |
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191
brawl
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| n.大声争吵，喧嚷；v.吵架，对骂 | |
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