WHEN THE SOLDIERS' MAIL CAMB

Dominion, Volume 11, Issue 56, 29 November 1917, Page 6

WHEN THE SOLDIERS' MAIL CAMB

(By "Wi .")

"For a. bird of tho air Ehall carry the voice, nnd that which hath T.ingß shall tell tho matter."-Thc Preacher. A marvellous thing is rumour! Whisper something in somebody's car in Auckland, and, 10, within a week it is! discussed in Duncdin. Abolish the newspapers to-morrow, mid a little, bird shall carry the news, ,ind defy the, censor. Thirteen thousand miles away,, sons, brothers, fathers, and sweethearts, are fighting tho Devil Tnearnate, thePrussian, for tho sake o£ Freedom, Christianity, and—Home, sw-cet HrTie. Wβ wonder often and often how they aro getting on, whether their socks art hanging out, if they get our parcels all right, do they get enough to efi.t, art their officers decent 6orts, and so on. These little things matter more to iirt as we sit by cur firesides thinking about them than the biggest victory., for the one is a matter of the heart,, tho other of tho head. Then they write> to us and tell us all about it. How "Bill Jones was taking a stroll behind tho lines one day—being off duty—and whom do you think he met? Why, little Johnny Walker, the fellow wlw used to milk cows for old Sniggers id the Pukaratahi. Yes, and ho had a) blooming officer's uniform on, tool! What <lo you think of that? But he. stopped and shook hands just the same.. And then " You sec tho idea?' These • cheery; little bulletins come all the way of their thirteen thousand miles unheralded. We cannot say, as wo used to say: "Thoro'H be a mail in to-morrow, and we'll hear from Johnny." Nobody knows of their coming, except the Post Offico people, and they are not allowed to tell, because it is war-time. Between here and the firing-line is a grey, mysterious void out of which/ ships miraculously appear—grey, anonymous hulks, robbed of their identity— and pass out into the void again when they have finished their business with Now this is what the little bird told, and this is what I saw one Saturday night at the G.P.O. in Wellington. A big soldiers' mail had come in without a whisper of an announcement. TlflJ newspapers could say nothing. The# didn't know themselves till they cleared their letter-boxes. The Post Offico said nothing. But the little bird, defying the censor, fluttered here and there with its busy whisper, and singly, and by twos and threes, ae they heard tho news, people left their* homes, left tlw crowded Quay, left, the pictures, left the ice-cream shops,, and hurried to the G.P.O. The stairway to tho delivery counter above, where the soldiers' mail was being sort, ed gradually filled till it looked like a theatre queue. There were hundreds, men, women, children—fathers, mothers, brothers, sisters, sweethearts,, wives—all waiting patiently on the< Btepe. As the people at the top filed , into the counter and got their letters they came down one sido of the stairway while the others moved up etep by'step till their turn came. "Look here," I said to a man. "How on earth do these people get to know there's a mail in? The papers dont, tell them, and the Post Ofhce can t, announce it. Yet look at thisl" "It's as old as the bilk," he said. "Somewhere in the Bible, 1' forget where, it says: 'A bird of the air shall carry the voice.' K'b the little bird that told them." The night was hot, and the stilling atmosphere of tho crowded' stairway told on some of the women. There was one woman with a little boy. Wan and .tired she looked, but she waited on, getting nearer, step by stop, to her bulletin from the front, her anticipations sharpened by the delight on the faces of those who-, were coming down, opening their letters for, a hasty scan before settling down to chew them over word by word and; count the crosses at the bottom. One bright-eyed damsel got nino letters 1 ■ I said something to the little boy, but he was shy and tired, and merely nodded his head. His mother smiled and patted him. Then they moved up a few more steps and disappeared intothe delivery room. I wish this story could have a different ending, but— 1 - , Later on I was standing in tho street watching the crowd, when I suddonly saw the little boy and his mother. "Well, sonny," I. said, "did you get your letter all right?" He shook his head glumly. "Mummy never got a letter," he said. ' I didn't care to look at his mother just then. • But if "a bird of the air shall carry the voice," perhaps "that which hath wings shall tell of the matter."