New Zealand at the Front 1917: Pages 16 to 30

Section 2 of New Zealand at the Front 1917: Pages 16 to 30

THE SANITARY MAN TALKS (Taken from Life)

NOW, I've got a bit fed-up about the way you fellers is roustin' and kickin' up a fuss about the way things is in the line. Yer come, over 'ere expectin' to find trenches like they 'as in Featherston, with 'ole-proof shelters an' duckbaulks an' square travesties an' the like, wot no shells nor no other projidies can't perpetrate into. An' win yer finds that they's a war going on over 'ere. yer goes crook about it. Wot if yer strong pint is on'y a wavery kin' o' ditch ?

D'y expect a garden plot ? Yer only in a matter o' few days, an' 'en yer goes back inter billits wi' clean straw or pale asses ter sleep on, 'n French mazelles ter talk ter, an' beer ter drink, attached roof over yer 'eads, powder t' kill th' greybacks with, an' all th' other comforts y' was useter at 'ome. Just think o' th' decent times y' 'ave in caparison w' some o' th' other apartments o' the service. Wot about the blokes wot sits in the baskets of them obligation balloons, w'en th' Tubes comes over an' drops preposterous balls on 'em, an' they 'as t' come down in their parasols ! 'Ow'd you like ter be up about ten thousand feet in th' air, with on'y a bric-à-brac basket to 'ide in, wj' th' scrapnel a-bustin' all roun' yer ?

Somtimes, as I've bin walkin' down the considery line, or in the communion trenches, wi' m' grease oil
tin, I've watched them pore blighters up there in th' sossidges, an' I've thought to m'self that I wouldn't be them for a king's 'ansom. A bird's all right in the trenches 'slong 's e's got some sandbags up in front, an' a bit of a paradise be'ind 'im. An' now they're that clever wi' their preventin' frames an' disbanded metal an' sich, that a man's reely safer in th' line than wot 'e is out of it.

I on'y wisht some o' yer c'd 'a' bin -with us in Armen-blinkin'-tears, th' dav our areoplanes inflamed a good 'ali-dozen Allyman balloons, an' the preservers all got burnt up, like they was in th' insinuator. Then you'd a' knowed wot's hot ! So nex' time Fritz starts puttin' over minniewoppers an' things, just go away an' be thank-ful y've got a hole t' crawl inter, an' that yer not one o' them pore beggars in the
Flyin' Corpse, or even a centenary man like me, 's 'as t' get along with 'is tin o' grease oil all day, even if it's rainin' pineapplcs an' dud three-ought-threes. Yes, all right, sir!
Comin', sir ! I've only stopped 'ere to put some disafectecting on this 'ere mustard an' cress hole.

S'long, bovs I

Horatio John

ROUTE MARCHING

Tramp, tramp, tramp

Along the blinkin' cobbles;

Tramp-tramp-tramp,

Till every blighter hobbles.

Oh! we love these Flanders roads,

And our bally full-pack loads,

And the sergeant's jokes and goads

We don't think

Tramp-tramp -tramp,

Right through a dinkum village;

Tramp-tramp-tramp,

Past miles and miles of tillage.

Oh ! we love to leave a lass

("Keep your right, you silly ass!)

And estaminets to pass

We don't think!

Tramp-tramp-tramp,

Till our knees begin to sag

Tramp -tramp -tramp,

Till our feet begin to drag.

Oh! this marching game is Hell!

But we love the Col-o-nel,

And the Majors just as well-

We don't think !

Plod-plod-plod,

Another hour has passed

Plod-plod-plod,

A blooming halt at last

Each man dumps his blooming pack

Quit it, Dig.' You'll stop a crack !

Has a most refreshing snack-

We don't think !

Plod-plod-plod,

'Neath a ruddy, blazing sun:

Plod-plod-plod,

And our water-bottles done

But the C.O.'s on a nag-

Keep your right, you flaming dag ! ")

And he humps a great kit-bag-

We don't think !

Tramp -tramp-tramp,

We'll jolly soon be there

Tramp-tramp-tramp,

Why worry, grouse, or swear ?

Every man his neighbour slanders

Says he's got the mumps or glanders;

It's a jolly place, is Flanders-

We don't think !

Tramp-tramp-tramp,

The same old farm-house yard;

Tramp -tramp-tramp,

The same " Fall out the guard"

There's a barn for fighting men

Next a bleeding cattle-pen;

Yes, we'll come to France again-

We don't think!

Tramp-tramp-tramp,

I dream of it till morn;

Tramp-tramp-tramp,

Till the cheerless, chilly dawn

For reveille is at six-

("Here - fatigue to sweep the bricks! ")

And our metaphors we mix-

We don't think!

Tramp-tramp-tramp,

All the next darn crimson day;

Tramp-tramp-tramp,

But we're getting mighty gay

For we're near the blanky Line

"Say, old Digger, this is fine!"

For we'll soon create a shine-

We do think !

NECESSARY EVILS

0FFICERS is necessary evils ! I knows all about 'em. I used to be a batman to one once, but that was a long time ago. I was young and innocent in those days, and got taken in. "Must have them," you say!

Oh! certainly. Ammunition is no good without guns. They are the guns (pretty big ones too, sometimes), we are the ammunition. It's through them that we gets " fired : but it's not very often that we turns out duds."

A good many of them, from what I can see, ought to be labelled " spare parts," like wot a Lewis gun can't do without.

Some of them, though, are quite nice, like the one I used to bat for. He had great faith in mankind, but mankind did not have much in him.

He trusted me, poor devil, for he was no reader of faces. He was quite young, and believed in a girl called Phyllis. He always carried her photograph about him, and hung it up wherever he was staying. I had a good look at it, and think she believed in others besides him - all of which is by the way, though. He was an exception. I had to leave off being batman to him, for the C.O. gave me twenty-eight days 1st F.P. because I knew better than to carry out some orders that he had issued.

Officers usually looks nice and smart. I wish they had to turn down their trousers four inches over their puttees, though !-trousers that are about eighteen inches around the knee!

They are good advertisements for the regiment, and always do their best to keep its end up among the fair sex. They never suspect what they can do in this line till they try, and I think sometimes they are very sorry they ever tried.

On the parade ground they are a positive nuisance ; they usually look like accidents trying to get somewhere or to get something to happen.

Sometimes they knows too much about drill and inspectin'. In fact, they knows a devil of a lot. Then the sooner they leaves the better we likes 'em !

Yes, I have been a long time in this army, and I think I knows all about all sorts and kinds of officers. I always sums them up as soon as I sees 'em, and acts according. So you see now how it is I dodges the "mat " so often.

Dud

A TRAGEDY OF THE LINE

SOME say lie was born and bred on the wild plains of Canada; others declare he lived his life on the streets of London ; yet, uncertain and obscure though his origin may have been, lie was certainly tough and hardy, like others of his ilk who have played no small part in every campaign since the war began.

He, too, came swaggering to France, and after a spell at -- arrived in the line, where, strange to relate, he was shunned by nearly all. Neither by word nor sign did he show surprise. Unmoved, he merely waited : waited for the battle which cost Britain so many brave lives, a battle in which many looked to this late-comer for succour and relief.

It was two days after that costly struggle that I picked my way along our battered front line, over broken timbers, under twisted, crumpled iron, gazing in pity and sorrow at the dead that lay in almost lifelike attitudes amongst the litter and debris caused by the devastating German artillery fire. Groping my way farther, I stumbled over an almost shapeless and unrecognisable object, half-buried in the wreckage. Bending down for some signs of identification, to my astounded sight was revealed . . .the mysterious stranger . . . his side torn and ragged. Gently I removed the covering of mud, and gazing down beheld..... Fray Bentos !

(Fray Bentos was a brand of salted corned beef aka "bully beef"). H.L.

Honi The Fisherman

"The Island" was about three hectares in and sur rounded by a moat. In the moat were small fish. One night Honi the Maori went a-fishing. He had neither rod, nor line, nor hook; but we knew that the Maori was accustomed to catch fish with his hands. Three hours passed, and Honi had not returned. At ten o'clock we went out to seek -perhaps, if not too late, to succour him.

" Hon-i ! H-o-n-i ! " With pathos in our voices we called.

"H - 0 - N - I".

"Hi, you" came the reply, as the nude, wet form of the dusky pioneer emerged from the weedy depths.

" Nom de Dieu, Honi-we thought you were drowned! What luck-any fish ? "

"Plenty."

"Yes ; but have you caught any ?

"Lots."

"Bout how many?"

"Nearly two! "

S. S. CHOATE.

"BULLA BIFF"

THIS is a true little story of France - of the War. It is merely an incident. To me it is an incident symbolical of France's burden of grief and suffering. If, as you read, you find the language crude and abrupt, please know that to us life has become a matter of deep, keen impressions - impressions at times almost brutal in their detail and outline.

A mile or so across the fields of green wheat is a village. As I write I can see the broken tower of the church through the trees.

Half a mile from the church, on the cobbled main road, is a place where Ted and George and I used to go for a quiet bottle of champagne or an omelette. Madame made such splendid omelettes and the champagne was good.

And the girls -there were five of them- they were so bright and chatty and seemed much above the common peasant class of the village. They were such capable girls too. Some made lace, some made coffee, and some "made eyes." And always they seemed so genuinely glad to see us.

The youngest, aged twelve, was such a bonny child, big-built, with great wide eyes and tawny hair.

I called her " Bully-beef " because she was so plump. She was delighted and pronounced it "Bulla-Biff." And we all laughed merrily.

Then came the order to move up. We had two days on " The Ridge." You've read of "The Ridge." And on the evening of the second day I met the company with the rations as they came out. They told me that Ted had gone through the dressing station with a fragment of shrapnel in the temple. . . . He died. . .

George, when he came out of the sap, wobbled up to me all white; eyes deep sunken, lips trembling. George wasn't built for this sort of business ; he's too finely-natured. We shook hands and George leant on my shoulder and cried like a kid. You see, we'd been rather good pals, Ted and George and I.

I swore hard at George and called him seven sorts of an old fool. It was the only thing to do. After that I led him down to the M.O., who felt his pulse and nodded.

"Gas and shock; send his kit down." And I was glad George was going out.

The company, worn and tired, came back that night to the village, and the next day I stole half an hour to go and see Bulla-Biff.

She ran to meet me at the door, and while I was sipping my coffee she sat on my knee and questioned me on all manner of things in her quaint, broken English.

Soon I took my leave. That was at noon. At a quarter to one a German nine-point-two burst squarely through the roof of the shop. It tore the inside out of the building and left it a wrecked and hollow shell.

Bulla-Biff was killed, and her sister, and two soldiers. Madame was wounded. Next day I saw Bulla-Biff's funeral. There were twelve girls in white carrying flowers. It was all very beautiful.

I have seen men killed. I have heard the piteous cries of the sorely wounded. But never have I experienced such a sense of sadness and desolation as, hat in hand, I saw them bear away little Bulla-Biff and her flowers to the tiny cemetery by the canal.

CYRIL LA ROCHE.

FROM THE FIRING LINE - HIS LETTER

The Dinkum Dug-Out, FLANDERS, 27 July, 1917.

DEER LIDY,-

Seein' as 'ow you were so kind as to arst me an' my two mates to your 'orspitible lome, I ought ter 'ave written ter thank yer afore this, especially as we 'ad a meal in your 'ouse too, wich is the best meal I've 'ad fer menny a long day, with musick too from the gaytal-Lr, wich is an instroornent me an' my pal Dill is very fond ov, especihally me since hinfancy, wen an ole nigger we 'ad on the farm used to sing them same songs as you sang to us that evenin' after the vegetables an' the puddin', wich we seldom 'as out 'ere in France, likeawise at all properly cooked, wich it is a sin to spile good vegetables, especially in war tine.

Since I been back 'ere we been 'avin' a - I was agoin to put in wot we usually say, but it ain't a lidy's
word- but we 'ave bin 'avin' a blinkin' 'ot time, wot with gunnin' an' bombin', but we can stick it out all right if the peeple at 'ome don't get the wind hup about these hair raids, an' the wukkin' classes don't start a revolushun 'cos there beer is a little bit weak like, wich my pall Bill seys is not such a bad thing for them after all, and that English beer is still a good bit stronger than the French, but the Frenchies don't know 'ow to brew good beer, so with best respeckts to you an' the two kiddies, an' me an' me mate's thanks for your kind 'orspitall-ity to a puffict strainger, I remains,

Your umbel servent, JACK DIGGER.

P.S.-If yer should 'appen to 'ave a bit o' chewin' terbacker abaht yer don't ferget Bill an' me, as it sort o' bucks us hup in the lone nite watches, and kind o' pervents us from thinkin' ov 'ome.-J. D.

PAINTING THE BATH (An On-Leave Episode)

As I chipped my second egg at breakfast my wife came behind me and ruffled my hair. Obviously she wanted something.

" Darling," she said, "are you very busy ? "

" Why ? " I asked cautiously and of habit.

"Because I do wish you'd paint the bath. It is disgraceful."

"Nonsense ! " I said. " We will get a man up from the painter." At ten o'clock I went to the telephone and explained to a mild-voiced tired man the other end what I wanted. He promised to send someone. My wife scoffed openly.

" You forget we are at war," she said. " He'll never come."

" Rubbish! " I said, perhaps testily.

How can I forget we are at war when it takes four double whiskies on a wet day to-well, never mind, anyway, I'll try. They've promised to send a man."

At noon I saw the man coming, and I shouted upstairs to my wife with pardonable pride. I went to the door and opened it and a workman stood before me. He was carrying a large sheet of glass.

"I've come to put in the window," he said languidly as he brushed past me into the hall. It took me ten minutes and half a crown to persuade him that we had not got a broken window in the house. Finally, I backed him out of the door and talked to him through three inches of the chink. At last he went away, rebelliously muttering, "The boss said there was a window to put in."

For a few seconds I thought wildly of rushing to the top of the house and breaking a window for him. He was so crestfallen, and it seemed such a shame to turn away any workman willing to work at all. Then I went to the telephone again and explained, and half an hour later another man came with paint pots and brushes. My wife, who had been crowing, sobered down.

He looked at me sadly. " I've come to paint the brass," he said.

What sort of brass is it ? "

When I had shut the door on him I went to the study and bit hard on my pipe-stem. Then I rang up again and told the painter -well, I had told him about half what I wanted to when the girl at the exchange warned me and then cut me off.

" Much better do it yourself, dear," said my wife.

" I will" I said but not because I couldn't get a man. If they had been anything but hopeless idiots the wretched thing would have been half dry by now. I will go out and buy some paint." So I did, and I came back again with pots and brushes.

Have you ever painted a bath! No ? Well, it's perhaps as well, for you need a great deal of stamina, an india-rubber back, and an elastic vocabulary. My wife looked in for a while.

"Darling," she said, "you are in such a mess. You are just all over paint, and you've a big streak of white down one side of your nose

When I had locked the door on her I sat down on the edge of the wretched thing and cursed the whole Hohenzollern dynasty. Not even at the Front had the horrors of war been brought so completely home to me. Every time I went over one side the paint from the other ran down and formed an sticky pool in the hollow of the bath. I finally chased most of this down the plug-hole with my wife's toothbrush. At last I finished but it did not look too good to me. It resembled the face of a badly made-up vaudeville artist after twenty minutes' buck and wing dancing at 120 degrees in the shade. Anyway, I tried to wash myself in the spirit from the lamp under the hot plate, and went downstairs smelling like a pair of kid gloves just back, from the cleaner's.

We let it dry for three days and then the maid had the first hot bath. She had splashed about for ten minutes when the bathroom bell rang violently. I went hot and cold all over. The worst had happened- she had stuck to the paint!

When my wife came down from the bathroom sniffing, and asked me what we should do, perhaps I was a little terse.

" Do? " I shouted. " Give me the tin-opener and I'll cut her out of it and take her down to the plumber's! "

From the bathroom came the sound of weeping, and then I got a brain wave, and gave my wife a bottle of turpentine. "Take that to her and tell her to let out the water and pour this in the bath."

Tearfully my wife obeyed. She took the bottle and we waited outside on the landing. Then came a muffled voice of entreaty from inside.

"Please, I can't reach the plug," it said.

Now I am one of those men always desirous of helping the weaker sex, and I made a rush for the bathroom door. My wife was once a crack hockey player, and I came to some minutes later on the Landing below. She leant over the banisters.

"Noel," she said, " how could you ?

I didn't," I said sadly, and weakly lay back with my head on the stair treads again.

After an eternity of time I heard the sound of footsteps going upstairs and my wife came down to me again. We had a most miserable dinner, and as I sat and smoked in the study she came in and took away the big, soft cushion I have in my easy chair.

"I want that" I said sternly.

"So does Annie," said my wife, as she went out of the door.

I looked at the bath afterwards and wept salt tears into it. i had a mental bill running through my head. Cost of paint, 8s. ; brushes, 2s. 6d. Suit ruined, £6 6s. ; loss of time, reputation, domestic prestige, and waste of vocabulary, inestimable.

Next time I will scrape the bath with a pot scraper, but perhaps it doesn't matter. We have no maid
now.

NOEL ROSS.

New Zealand at the Front: 1917. Part of the Digger History Group.