OUR SAVING GRACE

Dominion, Volume 11, Issue 6, 2 October 1917, Page 8

OUR SAVING GRACE

THE SPIRIT THAT WINS AGAINST LONG, LONG ODDS (By "Wi;") The saving grace of the Briton is his; traditional inability to appreciate thu seriousness of his case when he is really, critically, and desperately up against it, -the <x>nverted, who refuse to believe that youth should do anything but walkcarelully and uprightly,- who frown upon animal spiriLs, the vital exuberance of a tir'- y a happy mind, aR something to be exorcised by prayer and tasting, call it unseemly levity. Call ifc what you please, it wins' battles, holds lorlorn hopes, and flabbergasts . the enemy. Can the Teuton do it? "Not in a million years. ' Never in his creation, of sausages and sauerkraut. The Spirit ot Levity is the' Salt of the British.liace. It cheers up the shipwrecked, raises a. ' laugh at a wake, jokes in the law courts. puts grandmothers, mothers-in-law,' and undertakers in. tiio comic papers, and shrieks "Are we downhearted?"' when a, German 9.2 sends a dug-out to glory on a cold, wet night. So by these tokens shall we win the ■war. We have never doubted'it in our darkest hours before the dawn. If all Europe and Asia were under the heel of tho Hun still wo wouldn't doubt' it. A. marvellous, uncanny, irreverent-seeming ' thing, isn't it, that will send a man into the fog oi the fighting with his tongue* in his cheek, though, away at the back of his brain,, driven there by sheer pluck, a thought for his girl, his "home, and his. mother? Last Sunday I was coming over in the Duchess from Day's Bay, and in the smoker was a strange assortment of humans. There was an ex-Cabinet Minister smoking cigarettes' and expounding >'. political maxims to an audience of one. There was Tommy— youi don't : know Tommy—and her husband. There were three or four yawps who ought to hayei been in camp, a. grey-beard or two, arid some soldiers. These soldiers were all young, fresh-looking, and care-free. It's a young man's war all. right.. . As I looked at those soldiers I won- ' dered'whether any of them'ever thought seriously, introspectively, critically, about "the war. -They were all very quiet when they came on board. They flopped down on one of the cross-seats in a dog-tired , way, pushed their hats back from -their - brows, spread their legs, arid said no,'th'ing for a long time. Then one o£ them hummed softly, another joined him, then another, till they were all humming/ and I was able to make out the tune. : Was - it "Tipperary"? No?"The Broken Doll"?. -NoV."Home Fires"? No. None of these. It \ras a hymn! As I heard it my mind flew back to an evening 'in Saltcoats, on the Scottish West Coast. There, in the market place of that ancient fishing port and modern seaside resort, stood a small circle of Salvationists, the men in .their red jerseys, and blue, uniforms, and the women in poke bonnets and queer dresses—this was. over twenty yeans'ago. In the centre was the big drum. The captain played the; cornet, and one of the women,' I. ihink\ she must have been the captain's wife, led the 6inging in a strong clear soprano. Looking on was the usual crowd of loafers, small boys, and dogs. It was a still, soft August night, the kind of night in. a perfect British autumn that men ia the .far-flung outposts of Empire remember in the midst of'the fires, floods,, and:, blizzards of the land of their adoption. The leader of the singing lifted up her voice, and the cornet and the chores chimed in to the strain of "What a. Friend we have in Jesus," with the big drum.and the bass part coming in'at the end of eaoh alternate line with a' triple tum-tum-tum 'in the good old Salvation. Army way. "•' • ... Well, that was the tune these soldiers were humming in the smoking-cabin of the Duchess. I wondered at -their mood. The droning unison seemed to solemnise . the cabin, arid induce reflections on th 6 spirit of the times. ' We get that way ■. sometimes —even the worst of us* A lie mood seemed to catch the atmosphere ot the smoky cabin, and held it, till "Wake up, Jim !" said one of the hummers, suddenly breaking off'and sitting up.'"Let's have the .words for a change. "Kight-o!" said the others. Then came, the words—and bathos. 1 might hava known it.' "Wh—en this rotten war is o-'ver o—h, how very pleased I'll be —- (Chorus) Be—be—be. Wh—en I've got my civvy clo—thes on,No—more soldiering for me — ■■ (Chorus) Me—me—me. The spell was broken. . "Humph!" grunted an'aged looking soul on my left. " Unseemly levity, .said he. 1 • • »• . "No," I disagreed. "Ife.oiir saving grace." . ■ - ■ „ , -j i "I don't underetandyou, , he said, aC "Probably not," I eaid, "but it's win-* ning the war for you."