A CHRISTIAN BURIAL.

Clutha Leader, Volume XLII, Issue 91, 23 May 1916, Page 7

A CHRISTIAN BURIAL.

A TRENCH INCIDENT. It occurred during a particularly bad night. The water m our trenches was a foot deep and the enemy's line only a few yards off. Just as the last light of day was merging into a specially dark night, one of our men was hit by three bombs at the same instant, and was killed. We picked him up and put him on a waterproof sheet. Though we were all used to the tearfulness of war th s lad's death seemed particularly hard, for we loved him. It hit each one of us in that trench right behind the throat, so to speak. He was so young, so good, of fine high spirits, and he had always set us such a Christian example. To bury the young fellow was full of risks, for the enemy had our place well marked, and all night their rifles swept the space between the trenches. Ail the same a small party of us dug a hole on the top, a few yards in front of our trench, and we placed the dead lad in it. Then the astounding and unique tiling happened l . Our sergeant ordered us all back into the trenches, but he remained behind alone by the grave. "Boys," we heard him say, "our dead comrade was a true Christian. And I'm going to see he gets a proper Christian burial, for he deserves it!" And l , would you believe it?—l can hardly realise it even now—our brave sergeant stood up amidst the awful hnil of lead from the German-, and calmly and touchingly read all the burial service over our dead comrade just as if it were an ordinary graves de! Bullets pelted round and over him. But lie just took no notice of them. He read the service quietly and with deep reverence. And:—ay, I am not ashamed to confess it too—many of us who had never prayed for years joined in. a* well as we could, with him, often saying the words after him right to tho end. It did us a power of good. The grand 1 , brave sergeant!_ Not a smglo bullet over touched him! It wis a miracle, that's all I can say. We are all impressed bv this, for unle.-s angels guarded him it seems utterly impossible to tell how he escaped.—From the 'Sunday at Home' for March.