BOOKS AND BOOKMEN

Evening Star, Issue 16078, 1 April 1916, Page 4

BOOKS AND BOOKMEN

SONGS MADE BY SOLDIERS,

On the march, or in his huts jnd tents, the soldier will sing any song which takes his fancy, but better than all the rest he likes the songs he makes himself. Perhaps when the war is over some industrious person will make in anthology of the songs the Army invented for itself, but unless he is already at work he will miss many of the best of them. For these songs come and go. A battalion will adopt a particular chanty and sing it with enthusiasm for three weeks or a month, and then it will be almost forgotten for weeks. And, of course, the anthology, if it is made, will not be altogether complete. There are a few songs of unbounded popularity which would not look well in print. If I were to write out the verses of that cheerful ditty which begins “When I went to Gibraltar.” or that other which treats of one William who was a sailor, the very men who sing them on the march would go away into quiet corners to blush if they saw the words in print. Because he occasionally sings Rabelaisian ballads it must not bo inferred that the soldier has mislaid his sense of decency.

Quo particular song expresses the longing with which the soldier believes that he looks forward to the time when he will be able to return to civil life; When this little war is over, Oh, how happy I shall be! When I get my civvy suit on, No more soldiering for me.

There are other verses. Different brigades have their pet variations, but the spirit of them all is tho same. In any camp, when the rain is whipping the canvas, you can hear it rising from the tents in one form or another. And, of course, there is that other. “ Grousing, grousing, grousing,” it begins, and it has been sung by the rank and file for the last 15 years to my personal knowledge, and for goodness "only knows how long before that. Another, which has been heard wherever troops have been on the march, is in incoherent fragment: Wash me. in the water that they wash the dixies in, And I shall be whiter than the whitewash on the wall.

The chorus to ‘John Brown’s Body’ is, of course, eternally popular, and its popularity has been increased by a certain addition and alteration. “Glory, glory, hallelujah.” roars the platoon, and then ; Glory, glory, hallelujah ' As we go rolling homo, Happy is the man who swallowed a dustbin, As wc go rolling home.

Most of these chanties are very short, but there are some which are capable of infinite expansion, according to the ingenuity of the battalion bard. Here is a verse of one of them :

There's a copper on his beat over there, There's a copper on his beat over there, There’s a copper on his beat, you can tell him by his feet. There's a copper on his beat over there. I know six more verses of that song, bub unfortunately they cannot be printed. The third line offers great, possibilities, and they are frequently used to the full to insult unpopular people. Another popular form of the choral insult is : With the Middlesex in the firing line, And the 11. F.A. behind them; But when we look lor the A.S.C.. I'm hanged if we can find them. You alter the names of the units, of course, to suit yourself, sing lustily, and —look out for trouble. As a rule the trouble leaves nothing to be desired cither in quality or quantity.

There are a few ditties which combine instruction with amusement:-

At the halt ou the left form platoon, At the halt on the left form platoon, If the odd numbers don't mark time two

paces, How the deuce can the rest form pin toon ?

Various regiments sing their own praises, and the different battalions often have different versions of tho song. Tho Middlesex Regiment, for instance, have a song, I have been trying to got at the original version of it for months, entirely without success. Here arc some of the lines : We are the Middlesex boys, We know our manners, We spend our tanners. We are respected wherever wo go. When we pass along the high road. Doors and windows open wide. When you hear the sergeants shout “ Put those blessed Woodbines out!"

We are the Middlesex boys ! And let no Middlesex man write to me in his anger and explain that I have got it all wrong. For I can lay rny hand upon my heart and vow that in at least one battalion the song is sung in that form. And though it may look absurd in print, it is a fine thing to pall you along over that bad half-mile which occurs in every long march. The Ailny parodist holds nothing sacred. Then is a popular song about somebody's desire to go back to Dixie. Soma unknown bard has made a song to fit that tune—a song which expresses our conviction that the -Army of to-day is a hit of a curiosity ; Yon ought to join, You ought to join. You ought to join Fred Kamo’s army. Great big boots and blisters on your feet, vSevcn bob a week and nothing at all to eat.

You ought to join, You ought to join. You ought to join Fred Kamo’s army. We march in fours, We march in tile, We do squad drill all the blooming while,

You ought to join Fred Kamo's gang. Indeed, the Army is everlastingly -pouring scorn upon itself. There is one efiorua which was invented by a friend of mine—a sergeant of the Gordon Highlanders. Every battalion which hears the words adopts them and sings them with fervor: Send out tho Army and the. Yavy, Send out the rank and file, Send out the brave Territorials, They can very nearly march a mile (T don’t think!) Send out the lads of the Boys' Brigade—

They will keep old England free—- ■ Send out my mother, my sister, and my brother, But for goodness’ sake don't send mo!

When you have heard that doggerel sung by a battalion marching off to entrain for the front, yon are in a better position to understand the British Army than ever tho Kaiser and his generals have been. And I wonder what would happen to a German soldier who dared to sing .anything like this : We are but little soldiers meek, We only get seven bob a week; The more we do, tho more we may, It makes no difference to our pay. How ail these songs are made, where they come from, or how it happens that they are known to all tho Army I cannot tell. They are a part of that queer inheritance which awaits every newly-at-tested recruit. As primitive and as crude as a tho folk songs of tho past, they are as direct in their bearing, as exact in their faithfulness to the life of which they are a part. And if they have no other merit, it should be remembered that they have carried very many thousands of weary men over the miles of their journeying along the roads which cany them to their share in tile red business of our time.—“H.L,,” in tho ‘Daily Chronicle.’

A SURPRISE OFFER,

The highest price ever paid by any magazine for a serial, according to Miss Jeannette Gilder, writing in the New York ‘Sun,’ was that given to Messrs Nicolay and Hay for their ‘ Life of Lincoln ’ by the ‘Century’ magazine. "Roswell Smith, the president of the ‘ Century ’ Company,” she says, ‘‘first, offered £5,000. Nicolay and Hay looked at each other in ‘ mild surprise.’ Mr Smith took the exchange of glances to mean dissatisfaction. He left the room, walked up and down outside tearing bits of paper to fragmentsthen came back and offered them £IO,OOO. The offer was at once accented,"

• MEW PRICE OF THE " 6s” NOVEL. A new scale of book prices came into operation in London on January 10, under which books oubjoct to discount will be sold to the public in future at 16§ po" cent, below the published price, instead o: 25 per cent, below. The new price of a 6s novel under this calc is therefore ss, instead of 4s 6d.

The decision to raise prices was taken unanimously by ft thoroughly representative meeting of London was the result of circulars received from, many of the leading publishers intimating that* owing to the increased cost of materials (espocia’ly paper) and of labor the trade terms would he raised as from January 1 by varying amounts, working out on the average at Id in the Is of the published price of a book. Tho usual trade terms allowed the bookseller a discount of 25 per cent., with a small additional “settlement” discount for cash; but the terms also provided in most cases that the booksellers dozen should bo 13. Thus a. book published at, say, Is was sold to tho bookseller a& ohl per copy, and an order for a- do/on at 8s 6d would bring 13. Sold to the public at 9d a copy, the 13 books would yield a gross profit to the bookseller of Is 3d. In future tho bookseller, buying at 9d per copy and selling at 10d. wdl make a gross of 2s; but in those cases where the “ odd copy ”, disappears the profit will be only Is. As the publishers have also eligibly decreased the trade discount on books published at net prices, the booksellers contend that they, on the whole, will lose by the revision of prices. It is noteworthy that a few of the booksellers were in favor of keeping the retail price of the 6s novel at 4a 6d ; but it was decided by a large majority to n ako no exception to tho general rule that the discount to the public should in future ho 2d instead of 3d m the ls ; _T. here is some prospect of an increase of 3d m the price of some of the shilling “ library ” scries of reprints before long.

THOUGHTS OF .MASTER MINDS. “As far as commerce is concerned, Germany is a beaten nation.” —Mr Runciman. “While the enemy talks of jreace, we only think of war and victory.”—General Joffvo.

“The rulers of to-morrow depend entirely upon the schoolmaster o£ to-day.”—■ Mr S. B. Mais. “ This country is far too much governed by catch-words and peroration?. - ’ —Sir Edward Carson. “ Married life makes a man think more seriously of his duty towards his country.” —The Marquess of Crewe. “We are creating to-day, by long hours and high wages for children, hooligans for the future by absolutely demoralising them."—Mr A. J. Mimdella. “ It is just as important to organise now to keep our trade out of German clutches in the future as it is to organise an army to beat the linns.”—Lord Derby.