FAGS.

Greymouth Evening Star, 20 July 1918, Page 6

FAGS.

When the cold is making ice-cream of the marrow of your bones, When you're shaking like a jelly and your feet are dead as stones, When your clothes and boots and blankets, and your rifle and your kit, Are soaked from Hell to breakfast, and the dugout where you sit Is leaking like a basket,- and upon the muddy floor The water lies in filthy pools, six inches deep or more, Tho' life seems cold and miserable and all the world is wet. You'll always get thro' somehow it you've got a cigarette. When you're lying in a listening post, 'way out beyond the wire, While a blasted Hun, behind a gun, fs doing rapid fire, When bullets whine about your head and sputter on the ground, When eyes are strained for every move, your ears for every sound, You'd b<?t your life a Hun patrol is prowling somewhere near. A shiver runs along your spine, that's very much like fear, You'll stick it to the finish—rbut I'll make a little bet, You'd feel a whole lot better if you had a cigarette. When Fritz is starting something, and his guns are on the blast. And the parapet r*oes up in chunks and .s-etiles down in dust, When the roly-poly "Rum Jar" comes a-wobbling thro' the air Till it lands upon a dugout—and the dugout isn't there ; When the air is full of dust and smoke and scraps of steel and noise. And you think you're booked for golden cr< wns and other heavenly joys, When your nerves are all a-tremble and your brain is all a-fret, It isn't half so hopeless if you've got a cigarette. When you're waiting for the whistle and your foot is on the rise, You bluff yourself it's lots of fun, and all Ihe lime you're wise To the fact that you may step one 'fore you've gone a dozen feet, And you wonder what it feels like, and your thoughts are far from sweet. Then von think about a little grave with R LP. on top, And you know you've got to go across, although you'd like to stop. When your backbone's limp as water and you're bathed.in icy sweat, Why, you'll feel a lot more cheerful it' you puff your cigarette. Then when you step a good 'un, and mo sireioner-bbu/iei's come And n.itcli you up wiui strings and spun is and baiiaages and gum, Then you til ink you'vo got a million wounds and mty thousand breaks, And your body's just a blasted sack packed fun ot pains and aches, Then you feel you've reached the finish, and you're sure your number's up, And you feel as weak as Belgian beer and helpless as a pup. But you'll know you're not down and out, that life's worth living yet, Then some old war-wise lied Cross guy slips you a cigarette. We can do without MacConachie's and Bully, and hard tack, When Fritz's curtain fire keeps the ration parties back. We can do without our great coats and our six, and shirts, and shoes ; We might almost—tho' I doubt it —gat along without cur booze. We can do without K.R. and It's and military law. We can beat the ancient Israelites at miking bricks without the straw. We can do no'end of things, and still win out, you bet, But I'd hate to think of soldiering without a cigarette. (Note. —The above lines were found en the field of battle "Somewhere in France." The writer echoes the sentiments of the men in the fighting line, and shows how the "fragant weed" is appreciated.)