SOMEWHERE IN FRANCE

Evening Post, Volume XCIII, Issue 98, 25 April 1917, Page 10

SOMEWHERE IN FRANCE

AFTER THE PUSH

THE MEN AND THE FUTURE

(By Lauchlan Mac Lean Watt, in the

Scotsman.)

When I met tho Colonel riding at the head of his battalion, coming: from the trenches, and got from some of Uio lads the welcome, "Good old Stockaree," I wondered what the folks at home would think if they could see their boys.

It is sometimes strange how one meets with friends in the Land of War. In deed, it is wonderful: to think how ;few we do meet, when we consider how many whom we know are everywhere about, while yet we may bo shut out from contact with one another by the daily duties which keep us "running in our own groove. One day I met an elderly officer, of my acquaintance coming along, obviously under some excitement, sorrow chaeing gladness in his face. He said, "I heard that the New Zealanders were marching by, and my boy's battalion was amongst them. So I ran down the road and saw him; and we marched a bit of the way together. ' I haven't looked on the lad's face for over six years now. God keep him safe, to see his mother again." And he turned away quickly up the hill. Another time I was at the funeral of a poor brave lad from an. English regiment. Th 9 grave was in a little corner, off the -road ; and a big gun, within a few yards, was yelping its angry message to the foe, as we laid down the steeper, wrapped iv his brown blanket, to his last long sleeping place. As I finished the service a young officer came forward; and I saw he was one of my own church boys, fine, clear-eyed, bold —the only son of a worthy fireside fresh from college distinctions which spoke of the promise of the future. We_ spent the day together in my tent talking of all whom we knew and loved, and of a re^ cpnt experience through which he had passed, when ths wave of death had swept back, leaving him and a handful of men breathless on the verge of safety. We parted reluctantly with one. another, and just a few days later he led again his faithful fellows into the dark valley. And now he is sleeping till the final trumpet catl, where he fell with hie face forward. No wonder we are sometimes loath to part, when we meet and talk together, in the Land of the great Uncertainty. I was by that time far away in another sphere of activity, where sniper watched for sniper with a grimly tense vigilance, and tho listening stillness seemed lander than the roaring guns we had left behind us. But I often think of the place where his duet is sleeping, near the ruined village and the splintered forast through which our men went shouting to victory, laughing in the face of death, on a summer morning.

Some meetings wake sudden memories of home. One day I met a young officer from my parish searching for me in the streets of a French town. His heart had tllie glamour of the West born with it. I remembered his^ mother dying. She had forgotten tho ancient languago of her people, for she had early sought the south. But after all the years of the city her heart turned back along tho ways of remembrance, and she asked for a Gaelic psalm. And so a' friend came with roe, and we sang very softly by her bedside tho psalm which tho folks sing still, away where the low waves croon by quiet shores, at Communion, gatherings in the Hebrides. And she joined with us in spirit in a prayer in the fading tongue of her people, ere she went home, and we turned once more to the war. When I saw her boy there, I seemed to hear the cars going by again in the darkened streets; and home came very near my heart.

Among the first of tho lads I met in my regiment was one who came up to tell me how I had baptised him nineteen years since, in my first parish in the north. He seemed to tfhink that I should havo remembered his face, though I had never seen him since that day. Yet while he spoke to me, I could not

but see the cottage on the croft, on the hillside far away, where the corn wa» golden to the door, and the larks were singing in the blue sky overhead, and nobody had a thought of war in his heart, the day I went up to the baptism there

I often wonder if I shall ever hear the song of the lark again without hearing also the cry of strong men in (fheir agony. For often I have left the tent just for a moment's relief, and there, far above this sorrow of ours, how wondrously sounded that splendid rapture of music. OPPORTUNITIES FOR THE ARTIST There are constant opportunities for the artist amongst our men, if only the artist were there to catch the play of firelight on rugged faces, and the shapes and postures of comely manhood. Ono night we had a cinematograph show in a farm courtyard, .which wa3 packed with our fellows. The scene was unforgettable. Some heavy clouds hung overhead, but there were wide blue star-strewn spaces, where the sickle of , the now moon hung dimly, like a thing of dream. Tbe bare, gaunt skeleton rafters of the broken roofs of the barns and outhouses stood out black against j fche sky. And as the pictures flickered across tho screen, the hushed attention of the men was most infectious. Sometimes it was a scene of some of the places only too familiar to them—a ruined village, a shell-torn road, or a ! group of officers at the door of a brokendown house, to be greeted with a deep ! silence, or the swift intake of breath 1 which speaks of poignant remembrance, or a hearty dheer as this or that favourite personality appeared. Then there were ships, the sea-lions of Britannia; followed by laughter-provoking reproductions of Bairnsfatlfer's inimitable oartoons. The next time these men were crowded r together under the strain of deep emotion, they were themselves passing through an episode of imperial and international picture-making and map-changing, up where the guns were drumming the prelude of another act in the tragedy of war. For it was just a few days later that the laughing crowd in that moonlit courtyard went up the lino again. It is always very touching to see how thoughtful of otheTS tho men are, even when they themselves are in painful circumstances. I remember one man, seriously wounded. And Tasked, " Have you written to your mother?" He replied, " Not yet—you sse it is not easy for me." Sol offered to do it for him. But he said, "I'd rather do it myself. You see, if sho noticed that any other person had written it she'd begin to think that I had lost my hand." I lent him my pencil, and watched beside him while he laboriously, with his bandaged hand, spelt out a'loving letter, saying how glad he was to be so well, and how eagerly he was looking .forward to go home to her —in fact, all tho'nice things he could ,tell her, in order to keep her mind free from worry about her boy. THE CHAPLAIN'S WORK. ; The chaplain's "work is frequently of 1 a very miscellaneous nature, if he is human, and not too conscious of his uniform. It is not a double life that |'he leads, but a life all round. . For I example, one day in a tent I found the \ orderlies so busy that some of the patients were trying to shave themselves, and they were not finding it an easy task. So, as I saw blood stres-ming down the cheek of one- wounded fellow, i I essayed to finish the ioh. which I did, | without scars. Tho blood of a brave I man is too precious at present to be lightly flung away. But I had to promise to perform the same useful operation' for some of the others next day. One of them was wounded in tho chest, and was helpless, but he was worrying very much about his bristling beard. But my Gillette swept away his worry; and it was requisitioned for half a dozen like him. It must hay» been" somewhat of a trial for the patients, for the growth, with most of. them, was at least , a week old, and somo of it pretty thorny. But they were . thankful to be clean ■ again. , When I had finished theso; a 1 little lanky ■ chap, with a tiny fluff of down on his chin, said, " Me, too, please, sir." But the others laughed aloud, and one, lying flat, with many

wounds, panted out, " Come over here, mate, and I'll blow it off for you." While I was shaving one poor lad, who could scarcely breathe, he gasped, with a smile, "This would make a fine thing for the papers, or the ' movies.' " And a Scottisli boy siiid, " I'll te^l oor man when I get hame. I ne'er was shaved by a parish minister afore, and I dinna expect to be again." It brought a touch of variety into their life. And just as I finished the surgeon came along. " Hello, padre! " he cried, "what's this'you're at?" And then, with a laugh, he said, " Oh, well—who knows? It's not far from a parson's job, for cleanliness is next to godliness, of coarse."

The spirit of the men is splendidly steadfast. I remember the first wounded man I carried on a stretcher. I understood then what a heavy bit of work, not too much thought of, the stretcherbearers do. He had been shot in the shoulder, which was shattered, and the lung had been penetrated. But he was very plucky, and uncomplaining. He had lain a whole day in No Ma.n's Land ; and then, in the dark, he and his officer, also wounded, had crawled for some hours, till they got into some water, from which they could not extricate themselves, and only, with great difficulty could they keep their heads above it, till the rescue came. A little longer, and they must both have been drowned. It is hardly possible to conceive what it means. One fine young blue-eyed stalwart told me how he had lain out for thirty-six hours. "I was just on the brink of giving in, and turning round to. die, when I was picked up. All the time I was trying to get at my waterbotlle, which was under me. And at last, just before I was saved, I got hold of it, only to find that it had been pierced by a bullet, and every drop of water lost. That moment, if you like, was worse than death, after all my struggle, so deep and bitter was. the disappointment which it held for me."

Contentment is the first big thing that comes to a man, obliterating all things else. As one little Scotsman, or all that was left of him, said, " Thank ye, sir. I'm vera comfortable. Eh, my, it's fine to be in a bed, and get a drink o' sweet milk again." A FALLACY EXPLODED. Out here you get constant proof of the fallacy of the old alien belief that the Scot hae no humour. One day I came across three typical fellow-countrymen in their muddy kilts, sitting on a hummock together. I asked a dark, Celticfaced one of the- three his name. And when he told me what it was and where he came from on the mountain fringe, I said, "But you'll have the Gaelic?" "No a word," he answered. " I hadna .the^ intelligence to pick it up, and had to be content wi' English." "Oh," I said, " you had just swallowed it down too hastily with your porridge." The next man had a fine old Highland name, but without tho "Mac," which should (kave been before it. " What's become ot your 'Mac?'" I asked. And the first said, with a laugh, " It wasna wi' porridge that he swallowed it doon, ony wcy." The third had a very bad cold which was troubling him exceedingly, so that sometimes he could hardly speak. "You're a Scotsman, too,".I said. "Ye micht weePgness that, sir," was his reply, " an' me wi' sic a dry cough !" When the Push began, how keen everybody was, feeling that what all the world had been waiting for had come' at last. "We used to listen for the voice of the storm that was coming, and at length it came, when all along the wide horizon rang the horrid and yet magnificent clang of war. Earth had never heard anything like it. Such a chorus had never stirred the heart of man, until we. caught it. The wounded in the,ambulances heard it, and were glad. "Hark!" they would .say. "Now he's getting back his own." And they would lie down>, with shining eyes, upon-their pillow.

At midnight we went up to a hill, and we could not tear ourselves away. Fiercer and fiercer grew the direful thunders', with a grim crescendo, while all the time wild flashes stabbed the dark, and flares flickered everywhere. There were mesmeric fascination in the thought that away in front of us the titanic struggle between hell and the liberty of the ages was in process, and- that the .finest manhood of our ago was, enduring its passion, maimed, slain, yet stumbling, leaping, laughing forward through such a glory of effort, achievement, and sacrifice as never before was known. We were like children,' silenced by the stupendous wonder of it.

Then back into our circle swept the balance of the price that had been paid for the' beginning of the day of liberty. Every place filled to overflowing. There were men from Aberdeen and Glasgow with their torn and bloody tartans, men from Devonshire and. Cumberland, men from far places over the sea, swirled out of the inferno which had spattered them with mud and blood, and pierced them with bullet and splinter. It was a most memorable sight, those fellows, bearing all over theni the alphabet of the story of their colostsal struggle—their faces primed with the smoke and dust and sweat of battle, their clothes in ribbons and tatters—many of them utterly exhausted, some with the excitement, of th« fight upon them still, eager to convince everybody that the enemy were "on the run," and that we were "giving it to them in the neck." Some had to have their clothes cut off them. Some were giggling—some were unconscious, absolutely still, or softly moaning,-or talking to : invisible comrades. That was a. time of toil for all workers, patient, unremitting, without haste and without rest. "SO DIM AND PRAYERFUL." j It is then that one learns how little ' those who come through such a crisis | can tell, except in regard to what is at the end of their arm or in the immediate circle of their vision. I. was anxious about a young officer. In answer to my enquiries one said—"l seen him fa' deid." ",A.y," 3aid another, "his richt side was torn oot wi' a shell." But, I began, to feel, somehow, with a sort of second sight, that he was coming along some time. That night I went into one of the tent 3to keep mynelf busy, till what I hoped for should happen. There is nothing more impressive than a tent of these suffering men at,that time, so still it is, so dim 1 and prayerful. There was one boy near the door—* Scottish lad who had been a gunner. Ho seemed to be very weak, and I went over to ' his side. He thought I was his mother, and he said : "Put your arm under 1 my head,, mummy. I'll be easier then." And as I did so he began to say the Lord's Prayer, as so oiten he must have said it in the quiet hour at home, when the light was low, ere the curtain of sleep came down between him , and another day. He went through the prayer, groping in the middle of it, with * blind kind of stumbling difficulty. "Kiss me," ho whispered, and then he fell asleep, to wake no more on pain or wearineis in any hour thereafter. I passed .rom one to another; and when I found one lying wide-eyed in the stillness ■ I sat down beside him quietly for a little. We do not need to pray in •uttered words, in such a moment, ;on the verge of night. And some lifted up their browa for a good-bye touch ere I turned to go. Pulpits are cold places, spoken words seem empty after that. Phrases would falter into tear* if one tried to speak. When I went out it was raining, big, heavy drops falling through the blftex night ]ike y/eepiujt out of iQJ&awJ&i'ft,..*

And the ambulances: were steadily coming in. I stood among the others with a lantern, and looked into the Uze of evory man that was carried past. And, lo! after sixty or so had gone by, there was tho face of the man I sought for, looking up at me. What a shout of recognition passed between us, as he was carried on, through the rain to the ward.

You people at homo have reason to be proud of your boys, your husbands, and your sweethearts. The davn of the Big Push broke through a heavy mist, and the continuous crash of the big guns tore the German trenches till they were like a ploughed field. Arid when the order was given, the men went "over the top," and walked across the slope, as cool as if onflSeld manoeuvres, and smote the terror-stricken foe into defeat. Thero were no jealousies then. Said one Englishman to me—"We were to Bupport the Highlanders. They got it hot from a machine gun. And for a moment my heart stood still, as wo saw their line swerve under it for a breathing space— for you know, sir, what splendid stickers the kilties be."

The lessons of former advances were written deep on our memory. Everybody knew what he was to do, and where he was to go. There was no risk taken, as formerly, when the forward rush of impetuously brave regiments had carried them beyond the reach of reinforcements, and failure had corr.e swiftly up on the heels of success. We shall be beginning again soon. But the men are under no delusions. They have clearly before them the facts that, no_ matter what it is costing, it ir. a price not only to be paid but worth the paying, and that the Germans must have no weak-kneed mercy shown them, tor they have not played the game, and can only understand the meaning of the evil they have, loosened on the world when they see it flattened in indubitable defeat, and crushed Into absolute impotence for the future.' That is why we all object to pictures in the daily press of grinning groups in khaki as types of what we are. We are not downhearted, but we know too well the inner significance of war to pose like idiots at a picnic.