When after eight days the rest is over
and we're going back to the trenches,
our place is so important
that without us they'd get a beating.
But it's all over, we've had enough.
Nobody's going for it any longer.
And with a heavy heart, as if sobbing,
we take our leave from the civilians.
Even without a fanfare
we climb up there with our heads down.
(chorus)
Farewell to love, farewell to life,
farewell to all women.
This odious war
is over forever more.
It's at Craonne, on the plateau
that we're to buy the farm.
For we are all dead men walking,
we're the expendable ones.
Eight days in the trenches, eight days of suffering,
and yet we keep hoping for the next shift
that we awaited ceaselessly
to come and relieve us tonight.
Suddenly in the silence of the night
a figure emerges.
It's an infantry officer
coming to replace us.
Carefully, in the shadows under the falling rain,
the little soldiers go seeking their graves.
It's a pity to see on the boulevards
all these fat swines having a good time.
They might enjoy the good life,
as for us, it's another story.
Instead of hiding, all these shirkers
would better go down into the trenches
to defend their wealth, for we poor destitute
are utterly penniless.
All the comrades lie buried here
to protect the wealth of these gentlemen.
Those who got the dough, those will make it,
it's for their sake that we kick the bucket.
But it's over, the grunts are about
to go on a strike.
It'll be your turn, you fat cats,
to climb onto the plateau.
For if you fancy to wage a war,
you should pay for it with your own skin.
Cette chanson a été créée par des soldats inconnus de la Première Guerre mondiale.
La version la plus connue parle des combats pour le Plateau de Californie, au-dessus du village de Craonne, une partie de la bataille du Chemin des Dames. Cette version a été publiée par Raymond Lefebvre en 1919.