Our Great Moments Sometimes Crash

Auckland Star, Volume LXXVI, Issue 100, 30 April 1945, Page 4

Our Great Moments Sometimes Crash

By CYRANO

THE English really must do some- •*■ thing about it. About what, you may ask. There are so many things that, in your opinion, the English should do something about. I mean the bagpipes. Well, what about the bagpipes? Do you want the English to suppress them? Because, if you do. let me tell you—. No. I don't propose anvthing so absurd. I want the English to get something that will rival the bagpipes as an instrument in war, however distantly. I feel that the English soldier won't stamp himself on the popular mind in proportion to his deserts until he adopts an instrument that he can take everywhere with him into battle and that" will be recognised everywhere as his symbol, his signature.

Fife or Concertina? In our reports of the war it is always the bagpipes. "The British krmy entered So-and-so preceded by the "pipers of a famous Scottish regiment." When that came over one dav an English woman asked me, in a voice edged with irony, if there weren't any English troops in the Armv I replied that the bagpipes, besides being most stirring—they are so to me who am not Scottish at all, and to millions like me—were particularly portable. I quoted Kipling on the banjo:

You couldn't pack a Broachvood half a leave a fiddle in the damp— You couldn't raft an organ up the Nile, And plav it in an Equatorial swamp. I travel with the cooking pots and pails, I'm sandwiched 'tween the coffee and dusty column checks and You'should hear me spur the rearguard to a walk!

You couldn't easily transport the instruments of a regimental band into the depths of the desert, but the bagpipes don't take up much room. The question is raised again by an incident in Montgomery's crossing of the Rhine. The 51st Highland Di\ 1sion led the way—at any rate on one sector—and in the first boat wa.-> a regimental piper, all ke jed UP- we carried no arms, only his beloved pipes. He was going to open up the moment he set foot on the| °thei side Alas, Fate was unkind to him, but of that more a little later. Mv immediate point is that the English should have a corresponding instrument. "Steady the drums and fifes!" Couldn't the fife be revived as battle music? Do you remember "The Drums of the Fore and Aft?" When the regiment an English one, had been driven back in disorder in a Frontier battle, the two boys decided something must be done to save the day, so they deliberately marched across open ground to "their death, fife and drum playing "The British Grenadiers And there are always the mouthorgan and the concertina, which would seem to suit the peculiar humour of English soldiery.

It Would Not Blow ► But to return to the Rhine crossing It was the piper's big moment, the biggest of his life. In the forefront of this historic battle, he was going to play the regiment into the Germany that lay across the Rhine. But when he came to play something went wrong; only a wail came from the instrument. "They wilna blaw!" he cried. We are not told why. Let us sympathise with him. He stands for all of us at some time or other. We have all had our great moments in some degree, when we were a centre of action, great moments that have "come off," or have collapsed in failure, covering us with disappointment and embarrassment. .Such experience starts early. I know a small child who was filled with the idea of taking a bunch of flowers to his teacher —his first gift. It was to be his great moment. He picked the flowers lovingly, tied them up, and went off in the school bus, but on getting up at the stopping place he left them on the seat; and was too shy to go back for them. His disappointment was acute; I imagine that for the rest of the day the world was a bitter place. I know a man who when he was at secondary school had to fire the first gun in a King's Birthday salute. He was adjudged the best cadet in the corps, and when the big moment came he was on his toes. He pulled the lanyard—and nothing happened. The One-Note Man Great or important moments for which much preparation has been made, are of many kinds. Some of you may remember H. M. Bateman's sequence of pictures in Punch"— "The Man Who Played the One Note." You see him getting up in the morning, breakfasting, and toddling off with his wind instrument to the orchestral concert. He has one note to play, and he plays it, returns home, has his dinner, and goes to bed. The one note is his day. If the instrument had given out at the critical time, he would have bee'n in a position similar to that of the unfortunate piper on the banks of the Rhine.

A good example of a moment that is the climax of much combined effort, is an eclipse of the sun. A party of scientists go across the world to some remote spot, to observe a phenomenon which lasts but a short while. Everything depends on the weather; will clouds cover the sun? If they do, disappointment will be severe, but not so agonising as it would be if an instrument failed. They tell two stories about Waimangu Geyser in the days when it shot up at unpredictable intervals to a height of a thousand feet or more. Photographers used to set their cameras and wait for days. One man was so terrified by the sudden eruption when it did come that he ran away without pressing his bulb. Another man worked his camera at the right moment, but the shutter stuck. It would be interesting to know if these two compared notes.

Across the World for a Race The longer a man has to wait for an ordeal, the worse it is. That is why cricket is apt to be more trying than other games. Fortunate is the young player who, in a big match, can wait with an absolutely quiet mind his turn to bat. George Smith, perhaps in his versatility the most remarkable athlete this country has known—he was sprinter, hurdler, and footballer— was as cool and collected a customer as ever played before a crowd, but he confessed he was nervous once. That was when he got on the mark for the 120 hurdles in the English amateur championships. On that day George was like the man who had to play one note. He had come all the way from New Zealand to do one attiing—to run in a race which would be over in a few seconds. Moreover it was a hurdle race, in which the slightest mistake would be fatal. However his moment proved re3lly great, he won. The moral of all this is to be found in Kipling's "If." I have quoted Kipling three times in this article, but I have no apology to make.