“ALIEN’S” LETTER FROM ENGLAND.

Otago Witness, Issue 3196, 16 June 1915, Page 71

“ALIEN’S” LETTER FROM ENGLAND.

April 22. Let everyone who has a good home thank God and the army and navy for it and the friends who help to make it cheerful. It is incredible that any should murmur at the restriction of pleasure or at any sacrifice that is necessary for the help of the soldiers who are suffering in their hundreds of thousands. fco greatly have the wounded multiplied in our midst that it has been asked of the milkmen and the children playing in the streets not to make more noise than is necessary and so add to the tortures by lack of sleep of those who already suffer. Every day adds to the thousands who are returning so sadly home, broken m body, but not in spirit, and the “slackers” of the Empire and those who feel the hardships of less comfort and less pleasure because of the war should all meet one troop-train at Victoria Station bringing the soldiers home. None but those who have neither humanity nor honour would grudge their utmost aid or feel anything but contempt for those whose gratitude goes no deeper than words. These are few; but there are some—Britons who are slaves to selfishness. During the bright days of the past week everybody has been on the move; hut the ftreets are shorn of their spring gaiety. Khaki for the men and mourning for the women are on every side, and of every motor car that- passes not one in ten seems occupied by those luxurious, pleasure-bent folk that make the normal life of a London season. Men in khaki, nurse?, or others on war business occupy nine cars out of every ten. Among the other pageants of the season that will he omitted this year, the King has decided that there shall not be any formal trooping of the colours on the occasion of his birthday in June, and it is regretted because this will be the fiftieth anniversary of his Majesty’s birthday. But he is very strongly of the opinion that there is no time in England just now for ceremonial of any kind that is not directly connected with the war. London hopes," however, not to be wholly deprived of some sort of military display to mark the day, and there is a scheme under consideration for his Majesty to review a portion of the great New Army. But nothing can be definitely fixed. The police authorities discourage anything that would tax the force unduly by a large assemblage of the people at any one spot, especially now that so many constables have joined the ranks, and it is not desired to call out the big new force of special constables unless in the case of national emergency.

The King and Queen, who have -worked as hard as the most hard-worked officials since the war began, were both rested and benefited by the stay at Windsor during Easter, and it is expected they will pass a great part of the summer there. His Majesty purposes continuing his round of visits to the “largest of the military camps throughout the country, honouring his soldiers in the making. A most wonderful description of the battle <jf Neuve Chapelle was published on Monday. It is the 'first full and unofficial account of the engagement, and the glorious story has thrilled England. ‘ ‘ Precious as they were, these lives of the best of England’s sons, the lessons wo learnt at N euvo Chapelle were worth the sacrifice. We bro e the German line and straightened ours. At on© period in the fight we turned the Kaiser s sturdiest and toughest fighters into disorderly rabble.” In that one sentence what a history of accomplishment! And the wonderful picture grows; a battle picture unsurpassed in this war of which we stay-at-homes neither see nor realise the realitv. We only see the khaki boys that go and those that return. The actuality has been so crudely stated that we can visualise only of our imagination and our sympathy. But here we see and realise the battle. The German trenches opposite ; the surprise attack in stealthy preparation for 30 hours ; the previous night; the endless files of men marching silently down the roads to face in the darkness the enemy’s positions. “. . . Watch the troops as they go by. Here come the Indians, dark faces beneath slouch hats, kukris slung behind in their waistbelt; not Gurkhas these—they are farther down the roa-d. —but Garbwalis, a tribe akin. Here are the Leicesters —“ The Tigers,” as they call them from their badge • here Territorials of the Royal Fusiliers ; here the Lincolns and the Berks; the silver cross of the Rifle Brigade, the star and hugl© of the Scottish Rifles, the Black Watch in their bonnets, the Northants the Worcesters (heroes of Yprec). Halted bv the roadside are the Middlesex the West Yorks, the Devons. Every burr of Britain from Land’s End to John o’ Groats is heard on these deserted highways.” Then tho dawn and the terrible fight, and with the next day’s dawn the Germans’ attempt to retake Neuve Chapelle. The slaughter was sickening In front of one of the brigades the Bavarians coming along at the ambling trot adopted by the German infantry at the assault, and bawling “Hourra!” in the approved fashion, blundered in<-o the fire of no fewer than 21 machine guns. The file® of men did not recede or stagger. They were just swept away. One moment one had the shouting, ambling crowd before one’® eyes- the next moment where it had been lay a writhing, convulsed pile of bodies heaped up on the brown earth. When day broke, amid the rattle of machine-gun and rifle fire the German corpses were seen to make ramparts behind which the wounded took cover In one case at least the Germans, feverishly digging themselves in, were actually seen to use the corpse of one or then com-

rades to finish off the parapet of their trench. All through the morning tho Gorman wounded crawled into the British Imrs, where they were well car°d for and petit down in onr ambulances. The G-urkhas stood up on iho parapet and called to the Germans to

(Specially Written for the Ladies’ Page.)

THE REALITIES OF THE HOUR

corao in. A man in the Rifle Brigade who had crawled out of the trench came back with nine Germans gingerly tailing behind him on all fours.

Then on to the last strongholds with high and undaunted courage, where every man was a hero. Some stood out conspicuously. It was here that the 6th Gordons lost their fine colonel. Lieutenant-colonel Maclean, who, lying in the open behind the trench with a bullet in his back, and suffering terribly, asked for a little morphia, and then sent the young officer away with the -words, ‘ ‘ Thank you ! And now, my boy, your place is not here. Go about your duty.” It is not onlv in the fighting line, but in the suffering and the dying that we are amazed at courage beyond praise.

Here is a little scene enacted in a, barn where a field ambulance had been installed, on the iron roof of which the bullets kept up a devil’s tattoo. It is night, and the doctor is going; his rounds among the closely packed files of wounded. “Doctor,” says a faint voice, “could you give mo a little morphia? My leg is shattered.” “Right, my man,” says the doctor, “but where are you?” '' moving my hand, doctor,” the voice went on,/‘I can’t move anything else.” The man iu»d his morphia., and wh*n his suffering had ceased a little, h« said to the doctor with a wan smile: “Well, there’s one thing about it, doctor. That’s cured my water on the knee.” And a ripple of laughter ran down the files of wounded men, Gordons, and Warwicks, and Guardsmen, packed together in that place of pain. Such is the spirit of our fighting men.

A spirit which even the enemies that hate us are compelled to admire. Sir John French in thanking the London Territorials for the splendid grit they have displayed throughout the war said they had fought even beyond the highest expectations, and this was the more remarkable because soldiering was not their chief business in life as with the regular army; they had volunteered for home defence originally, • and came greatly from the desk, the office, the shop, and the professions; but finer soldiers could scarcely be. The “devoted, tenacious courage” of the First Army calls forth the thanks, too, of the nation, thanks that can only be .expressed in doing what we can for their wounded bodies and for their widows and orphans.

There are those that think that when the war is over it will be a purification of the world; it will certainly be a readjustment of many class prejudices. Whatever civilisation may have done or undone for Britain, it has not killed the courage of the race.

Dr Lyttelton, head master of Eton, whose address on “Love Your Enemies” caused so much angry discussion a few weeks ago, and so much jubilation in Germany as taken to mean let the wrongdoers go unpunished, has now been explained by the learned doctor to mean no such thing. Tie used the word “love” in the Greek sense. He explains: “The Greek word used for love is not the same as for other kinds of love—of the emotions between friends etc.—arid is more of the deep, constant feeling of a father for the wrong-headed son or a schoolmaster for a boy. It allows, nay, demands, very stern severity rometiines. I should advocate such severity towards the Germans undoubtedly, nor have I said one word in an opposite sense.” This will be a surprise for the Germans who construed his former statemerit to deal gently by the devastating Huns.

The Americans in London have given energetic aid since the war began, and next week a matinee in aid of the American Women’s War Hospital, which they equipped, is to tak® place at Drury Lane Theatre, and is already an assured’ financial success, owing to the demand for stalls and boxes. The Queen, .Queen Alexandra, and Princess Victoria will be present in the Roval box, and in the box next to them tha Princess Royal and Princess Maud of Fife, and Queen Amelia of Portugal. Perhaps you may have come across some of the letters Miss Maxine Elliot has been writing to the American papers descriptive of her work of relief for the Belgian refugees. This famous American actress’s wort is on a relief barge in Belgium, and she mentions many well-known people in connection with it, among them being Kathleen Lady, Drogheda, Lady R-obert«on (Miss Elliot’s sister). Firing the American flag, which is ■everywhere sainted, the barge penetrates on its mission of mercy un the canals. “This has been a wonderful inumoy.” sd>e wrote n few weeks ago; “endless fortifications and trenches everywhere . . . horror, horror, everywhere. and the people them •wives are not sad. There in a family of five living in a hand-cart close by. and have been tbara five months! They have roofed the ton over with sacking and a strut) of canvas, and there thev took themselves away, and the soldier o fe°d them. . . . The guns roar uninterruptedly. It seems so incongruous to hoar the church hells chiming all dav Rirndav. and the cannon keeping a dreadful accompaniment.” And again she r <ire : “It is a miracle to have got here, and every officer is in a state of amazement at the feat. It is a-gainst every rnle for a woman to be at the front, but T have got be™ after eight weeks of Machiavellian scheming and slavery. I have arranged with a bakery close bv to bake several hundred loaves of bread a day. and vasterdav a bomb dropped in front of the door, killing a man and three horses. It tore a hole through one corner of the roof and broke every pane of glass in the bakery, and all the veast and bread for the day’s supply had 1o be thrown awav. it wa° so full of little glass splinters. Several other bombs were thrown farther on, killing eight people in all. It seems such senseless sort of

■warfare, for no one but little children and harmless civilians are the sufferers. You "would laugh if you could see K., Miss (J., and me scrubbing and cooking and washing up, generally from morning till night. We have no servants, and it is rather a relief to be without them —but my poor hands! Any cock in the world would be ashamed to own them. K. is splendid.” K. is Kathleen Lady Drogheda. So these brave women face hourly danger on their relief barge up and down the canals. It is always the facts, the realities of life, that are its greatest romances, and at this hour of the world's history there is reality and romance combined in every moment. Women no longer need sigh for their opportunity; it lies at hand. Only those unoccupied in any way 7 in this great occasion for devotion and patriotism need sigh. The difficulty is not to find an outlet for benevolence and kindness,_ but to supply all the needs.