BATTLEFIELD GHOSTS

Otago Daily Times, Issue 16889, 29 December 1916, Page 8

BATTLEFIELD GHOSTS

SKEN BY SOLDIERS

The soft, mellow twilight of the summer evening was melting away into tho darkness of night. I was sitting among 100 or so soldiers in the quiei, pretty grourds of a military hospital. The conversation had drifted to ghosts, liy do grees it became clear to mo that on aJI battlefields, East and West, ghosts have been seen.

"1 was on sonlry-go outside a barn in I'rance," said one blue-clad hero, a man of serious turn of mind, between 30 and 40 years of age. " A full moon was shining so brightly in a cloudless sky," ho went on, " that I could see to read a newspaper. " Presently, far away, I heard a hound givo tongue —heard just one faint note. I recognised tho deep, mournful bay at once as that of a bloodhound. I picked up my rifle and looked in the from which it had come, but couldn't tee anything

" The country around was flat and treeless, and in other respects open, and even a hound 200 or 300 yards away could hardly havo escaped by notice. " Well, I suppose I continued to search for that hound for a good five minutes. But not a living thing anywhere, and, except for the voices of companions talking softly inside tho barn, nothing to be heard. Everywhere a dead silence — a dead quiet; everywhere the silenco of the grave. "Then something happened that caused mo to drop my rifle and froze the blood in my veins. <

" Not half a dozen yards away a braco of bloodhounds, coupled togethci, and with tongues hanging out of their mouths, galloped past with music as loud, as clear, and, in a way, as sweet as a peal of church bells. The dogs came into being before me. '

" An invisible something set them before my eyes; an invisible something snatched them away again. "I saw them for about the space of 20 seconds. Then the deep quiet again, unbroken even by the distant rumble of guns or some night bird's call. "" " I saw them so distinctly that I noticed they -were joined together by a short chain, so bright that it glistened in the moonlight, and that they were duncoloured.

" Moments went by before I could pick rap my rifle and move from the spot where I was standing. At last I managed to stagger into the barn.

" The place was lit by o couple of small, smoky lanterns, and most of the men therein awake and reading. " They laughed -when they saw me, remarking that I was so white that I might have been mistaken for a nico healthy corpse.

"I asked them if they had heard anything, and they said ' Nothing/ except the fall of mv rifle.

. "Then I told them the story. They didn't ridicule it, but took it quite seriously and fell to discussing it from a practical' point of view.

"The conclusion arrived at was that I had really heard a distant hound give tongue, and then, as I had searched the country before me for the animal, that I had fallen into momentary doze or stupor and dreamt or imagined the rest. "At this moment, however, up rattled some motor cars to carry us away to the firing line, to help get away some badlywounded men —men with limbs blown away, and in other respects 'horribly mutilated by the explosion of mines, and as at length we gazed on the poor fellows lying out in the cold night, just where they had been hurled, some groaning, fome suffering in silence, we could not help thinking there was something in tho apparition of the phantom hounds after all.

"Since then I have told the story to n good many others, and have learnt that others have also reen the hounds. Moreover, I have heard that on every occasion they have been seen something great has tat en place on the battle front."

Now we come to a human ghost, if a ghost can be called human; to an elderly French warrior with wliite beard, long white hair, and the equipment of 1870. This ghost has been coming and going ever since the beginning of the war. Now he has.,shown himself to marching troops —troons weary find on the point of losing confidence in themselves, their country, and their Allies, beckoning to them to take heart and push forward; now leading a charge to German trenches; now cropping up in the pathway of an enemy aEout to slay, and tripping him up or knocking his weapon out of his hand, yet remaining invisible to him: now bending over some wonnded man dying, with a great burning thirst, and giving him drink from the water-bottle the soldier carries, and thus saving his life. It is only for a few scurrying moments that the fine old soldier is seen. He is sturdy and strong, erect as an athlete of 20, with firm, swinging step, rosy cheeks, and laughing lips and eyes. Victory always follows close on his heels. Again and again he was seen at Verdun away back in the spring at those tjlack moments when it seemed that the Germans must achieve their object and break through the French defence.

Most of the men in the hospital grounds had heard something about the interesting old fellow, and some of them sufficient to" fill a. book.

The next man to tell a story was one who had fought at the Dardanelles. "Early one morning," he began, "I wa<; on outpost duty with a pa!. In time there came an enormous shell, and my friend was killed. His head and limb? were blown from his body, and lay in all directions—arms and legs everywhere, so to speak.

"He was about 50 yards from me when the thing happened, and the ghastliness of it all fairly rooted me to the ground. "At'length, as I stood like an image of bronze, with eyes riveted on the head, I noticed something that scared me more than ever. That head was moving; there was no mistake about that—it was rolling over and over, very slowly, and making for its body. Now the face was hidden in the dust'of the ground, now looking up in the skv.

"Then I noticed another pleasant detail. The arms and legs were moving too. Tho fingers of the hand were stretched wide apart, digging themselves into the ground and levering away; the toes of the big boots were getting a bite where they could, then giving a shove, and thus the legs were shifting. "In time all five reached the trunk at precisely the same moment: it had been a neck-and-neck rn.ee all the way; and. listen to this, I was gazing on a complete corpse. "I went and examined it, and, as far as I could see, it was not so much as bruised. Just the shock of the explosion had wrenched the life from it. "I felt I lad hnd a pretty good dose for the time being, and so 'shinned' it. I didn't stop before I had covered the mile lh;vt separated me from my company. "I wish somebody had been timing me. I reckon I covered that mile well inside five minutes —a wonderful performance, considering the going and my equipment. "I told' the fellows all that hr.d happened, and some of us went back, a bit gingerly, to give the remains a burial. "We"found the corpse exactly as I had last seen it —calm, beautiful, uninjured. "Yet I saw all I have said I saw as clearly as I see yonder trees." ''I believe you," said a hardened campaigner. "I myself have seen things a-s bad when shells have been bursting near me and bnllets whistling past my head, and I haven't had much sleep for weeks and precious little to eat. "At stich times ghosts come and go in a regular procession; at least, such is the caso with me."

— Although drinking glasses no longer tumble on tho table when they stand bottom side down, they still retain the name given them when they did tumble. Tho tumbling of tho first <rlass_ drinking vessel was not an accident. The tip-over was intentional, and it was intended to remind the convivial knight who used the glass that he must not eei down the vessel until he had drunk all the wine in it. If he did it would fipill on the table. The "tumbling" glasses did not remain long in favour, but the namo "tumbler" survives.