death surrounds them and their lives could be taken away in any moment. Cummings, having been surrounded by Army deaths the majority of his career, still never warms to the smell of rotting corpses. Red, like the other soldiers, realizes he or one of his comrades could be killed any minute. Even when they grew used to death and saw it as "large and devastating and meaningless. Men who were killed were nearly men no longer around", a comrade's death would cause "the idea of death [to be] fresh and terrifying again". This fear of death also had a negative impact on the mental health and sanity of the men. For instance, Red states, "Goddam Army gets you so you're afraid to turn around". The men began to have a pessimistic view of life believing "All dead things... everything lives to die". This was especially so since "that's all [soldiers] can ever do in the Army, sit and think" which caused the thoughts and fears of death to be constant and prevalent. The first death in the novel introduces this theme into the narrative. Red observes Hennessey's death. The narrator reveals "[u]ntil Hennessy had been killed, Red had accepted all the deaths of the men he knew as something large and devastating and meaningless . . . Hennessey's death had opened a secret fear." Croft is also surprisingly moved by Hennessey's death. The narrator declares "Hennessey's death had opened to Croft vistas of such omnipotence that he was afraid to consider it directly. All day the fact hovered about his head, tantalizing him with odd dreams and portents of power." Gallagher's wife, Mary dies in childbirth in America. When Gallagher learns of her death, he continues to receive letters she sent before her death. Because of the disparity of time and space between men and women and their families during wartime, Gallagher considers that Mary "lived for him only at the exact time when he read her letters." On the mission across Mount Anaka, Roth discovers a baby bird, and the platoon, with the exception of Croft, are fascinated by the bird. The bird symbolizes innocence and the futility of death during war, as Roth cares for the baby bird and Croft is then enraged by it and crushes the bird in his hand. The contrast between Hearn and Roth's deaths reflects both the bonds of brotherhood made among soldiers