A Canadian subaltern, Billy's letters to his mother

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A CANADIAN
SUBALTERN

BILLY'S LETTERS
TO HIS MOTHER

LONDON
CONSTABLE AND COMPANY LTD,

1917

RESPECTFULLY DEDICATED TO

THE BRAVE OFFICERS AND MEN

OF "BILLY'S" BATTALION

PREFACE

At the earnest solicitation of friends I am
publishing these letters, which were written
without any attempt at literary effect and
intended only for a mother's eye. I am
sure my son will be pleased if they are the
means of bringing even a passing pleasure
to those whose dear ones are now at the
Front, to those whose loved ones have
made the supreme sacrifice, and to any
others who may read this book. This be
my apology for offering them to the public.

''Billy's" Mother.

A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

November 23, 1915.

Well, the great adventure is on. We
sailed out of St. John at noon to-day amid
a perfect babel of noise. We have on board

with us the , a detail of Medical Corps,

the , and a detail of the Construction

Corps, troops in all. Between the

bands of the units, the bands in St. John,
the shrieks of what seemed a thousand

tugs which bobbed beside '' a regular

bedlam '' best describes the send-off. Every
pier looked as if it had been generously
salted and peppered from one end of the
harbour to the last long dock ; I say salted
and peppered, for the sea of faces and dark
clothes gave it that appearance. Well,
anyway, away we steamed out into the
East.

I can assure you. Mother, I felt rather
proud of being in khaki as we marched
through the thronged streets. The bands
playing martial airs seemed to send little
shivers up and down my spine, and, I
guess, awoke some of the old primordial
instinct of the caveman, for it sure seemed

10 A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

glorious to be onjthe way to fight. I
know you dear ones would have been
proud, too, of me and the men. I say
the men, for after all Tommy is the most
important man in the Army and our
whole battalion behaved like nature's
gentlemen in St. John. However, out we
steamed on a sea like an epergne base
— not a ripple hardly. Of course, we
didn't have much time but I managed to
stand about four p.m. and watch the
last grey humps of Canada fade into the
waves, my last glimpse of my native land
for some time to come, and do you know,
dear, that despite the fact there lay all my
associations, my love and everything that
any man holds dear, I can't say I was
sorry, for ahead there is something that
dwarfs all those details.

11.30 p.m. — Have just passed Cape Sable
lighthouse, the last link with land, flash-
ing in and out of the night. A beautiful
night, clear moonlit water, and just enough
breeze to send a salt spray up over the
bows.

Wednesday Evening. — Nothing new to-
day. The ocean like a millpond all day
and not even a roll to this old packet. We
have a few men who are seasick, but I
think they must be awfully upset with
something for it's smoother than Lake
Ontario.

BILLY'S LETTERS ii

Later, — I have just taken a turn on deck
and the wind is getting up, also the sea,
and a small look at the barometer informs
me she is at 29. The ist Officer says it
looks like a storm, so I fear me there is
dirty work aboard the lugger this evening.

Friday Evening. — This discrepancy is
due, not to seasickness, but to the fact
that I was on guard from 10 a.m. yesterday
till 10 a.m. to-day, and in about as bad
weather as I really care ever to see. It
started in Wednesday night and blew a
regular gale head on, for thirty-six hours.
There is no use in my trying to describe
it for I can't. Suffice it to say she was a
real storm. My clothes are not dry yet,
being soaked through and through. Every-
one was seasick, and if I could describe the
indescribable horror of men crowded to-
gether as they were in those days, I know
you wouldn't believe me. Oh ! it was
horrible. Sick by hundreds lying around
anywhere gasping for air. Some slept on
the decks in a drenched condition, spray
sweeping over them, and of thirty-nine
men on guard I finished up with nine, the
remainder all being sick. The stench below
was something to remember, and oh, how
I longed to take some of the men up into
our comfortable quarters. I was up for
practically twenty-four hours and on deck
two out of every six hours most of the

12 A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

time, except when making rounds on the
bridge, and my descriptive vocabulary
fails me when I try to tell you what the
tail end of it was like early this morning.
We have a slight list to port — coal moved,
probably — and she heaved and plunged
like a broncho in the huge waves that
drenched me clear up on the bridge. One
man of the crew was killed, washed off the
ladder leading to the crow's nest into the
forward winches. Broken neck. He was
buried this a.m. However, it has quieted
down now and to-night is smooth again.

Saturday Night. — By the way I forgot
to mention that I must be an Ai sailor,
for nearly every one has been ill but my-
self. I have eaten every meal and enjoyed
them and never felt the slightest squeam-
ishness, even at meals, despite the fact
that ** the Captains and Colonels departed "
(apologies to Rud) from the table very
hurriedly at times. There is no news
worthy of mention. We are again on a
sea of glass and it has been bright and
warm, in fact warmer than I've felt for
two months, and we're in mid-Atlantic.
To-night it is like Summer, and others who
have crossed before say it is colder in July
than this trip. Just at present we are
cleaving our way into a road of silver, for
the moon is shining directly over our bows,
and it is a wonderful sight apparently

BILLY'S LETTERS 13

moving up a shimmering carpet right to
the old man of green cheese fame. At
least that is the impression recorded by
me. A carpet of silver and grey lace, like
one of those red and black ones from the
sidewalk to a church door at weddings,
dancing ahead and only the lap, lap, lap
of the waters as one stands on the fo 'castle.

Monday Evening. — Nothing very new,
my dear, to write, just the old monotony
of the voyage, which, when it ends, will be
a relief. The sea has changed, and from
a head-on affair has turned about and we
get her abeam ! result, a roll in place of a
pitch. We are beginning to get into the
war zone more than before, and expect on
Tuesday and Wednesday to be near it if
not right in it.

Wednesday Morning. — Yesterday we had
a parade with life-belts on, every man on
board, and also lifeboat drill. It is really
our first taste of what is sure to come later,
that is, having to calmly face the possibility
of death, and do you know it really didn't
seem to bother me at all. I suppose the
thoughts of it for months and months have
somewhat dulled any sensibilities of '' yours
truly."

To-morrow we expect to be in .

Billy.

14 A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

In Camp, England.

December 5, 1915.
Dear Mother,

As you will see, we are here. Since
sending the sort of diary I wrote on board
boat, we have simply arrived and come
here. As we came up the channel in the
grey of the morning it surely looked good
to see land and the cliffs of Land's End
and Cornwall. The whole channel was
dotted with small steam trawlers used as
mine-sweepers, and then after we passed
The Lizard, and our signals were taken
from the shore station, out of the distance
came six torpedo-boat destroyers tearing
along at forty miles an hour and surrounded
us. Ahead, just over the horizon, steamed
a huge cruiser. Well, anyway, just after
lunch we steamed into Plymouth harbour,
a rare old spot indeed, filled with historic
memories and its history checkered with
incidents. Devonport beside it is a huge
naval dockyard, and revenue cutters and
naval tugs with tenders soon surrounded us
and our baggage, etc., was removed to
shore. As it was very late at night when
we arrived we remained on board all night
and started off at 9 a.m.

Two naval tugs named after two Ply-
mouth heroes, Raleigh and Drake, con-
veyed us to shore. Between frowning

BILLY'S LETTERS 15

walls of grey stone, with here and there
guns nosing their way out, we landed on
a quay and entrained in a long English
train. At eleven we started, arriving at
8 p.m., but just to dissect my feelings or
to describe to you the journey, is a task
I can scarcely begin. You know every-
thing was so different that my head fairly
ached from madly turning from one side
of the coach to the other in a vain en-
deavour to see everything from barmaids
to ruined castles, my first glimpse of
either. The quaint old churches with their
tiny graveyards ; the infinitesimal quad-
rangles of yellow, black, and red, called
fields ; the moss-covered banks and ivy-
clad houses ; the oaks festooned with ivy,
mistletoe and holly all in red and white
bloom ; the villages and towns all the
same, checkerboards of roofs with houses
identical as if they had been turned out of
a machine ; the shapely hedgerows ; the
quiet-looking sheep, and wild-eyed cattle ;
the rabbits scurrying at the train ; the
pheasants in hundreds, with here and there
a heron guarding a tiny pool ; the funny
little stations, yellow, exactly like the ones
in toy train sets, the white lines between
green ones signifying a road — all these are
jumbled up in my mind into a hodgepodge
of pictures that is so conglomerate I fear
me it will take some time to sort them out.

i6 A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

Of one thing I am certain, however, that
England is exactly as described in anything
I ever read and it fully '' lives up to its
picture-book reputation/' I little wonder
that England has produced Chaucer,
Milton, Shakespeare, Dickens, and after
looking at a grey and ivied church with
its old belfry and the funny grey slabs,
some aslant, some flat, some erect in the
iron-palinged graveyard, I can realize how
the Elegy was inspired.

Well, we arrived at a depot at 8 p.m.,
pitch dark, and were met by staff officers,
who escorted us here about four miles.
This is under the famous Aldershot com-
mand which has 200,000 troops in it and
there are several camps. We are the first
battalion of '' Canadians," as we are
called, to be here, and the other units
turned out, and cheer after cheer went up
as we marched in. There is a Brigade of
the Royal Sussex, the Middlesex ; then
regiments of Argyll and Sutherland High-
landers, Irish Fusiliers, Gloucesters and
others, all famous English corps. There
are twenty odd thousand in this camp
with room for seventy. Each platoon has
a long building to itself and every con-
venience that one could imagine . Water, hot
and cold baths, electric lights, game-rooms,
large, bright, airy mess-rooms, concrete
walks everywhere — in fact it is a revelation.

BILLY'S LETTERS 17

We oificers have splendid quarters. A
large house for mess with huts of eight
rooms, four to a room, at rear a fire-place
tiled in each room, and bath attached, so
we are not too bad.

However, if I tell all the news at once
I won't have anything to write for next
time, so will close. With fondest love to
all. Billy.

Have just remembered you will get this
about Christmas, so will wish you all a
very Merry Christmas and Happy New
Year. That's all I can send you just now,
but when I get up to London will send
something more tangible, but you under-
stand my position. There are no stores
here.

In Camp.

December 14, 1915.
Dear Mother,

Received the letter you wrote ad-
dressed to Army P.O., but have mislaid it
for the time, so cannot name date. How-
ever, as I want to catch the Canadian mail
will just ramble on.

Since I last wrote you I've had so many
impressions etched on my brain that it
will be a very incoherent affair, this letter.

i8 A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

You know everything is so totally foreign
to the style of life I've been accustomed
to that it is staggering. However, my im-
pressions, muddled as they seem, may
make reading. Ever since childhood I
have studied opposites, and I suppose that
one of the first impressions a child gets is
light and dark, after that heat and cold,
and it's about these latter I wish to write.
The cold over here is a very good cold that
is true to type. It is cold and goes clean
through, and the heat differentiates from
any heat which heretofore has caused my
corpuscles to quicken, by doing the exact
opposite of the cold, viz. it fails to pene-
trate. I am convinced that if there was
enough of it, it would be jake, but the
great aim and object of the nation here
seems to be to heat the chimney. At a
time when the slogan is, *' Conserve the
national resources," they are per second
shooting sufficient calories of heat out into
the wide world (through chimney pots)
to make Hades an air-cooled six-cylinder
self-starter, and Satan to resign. Their
grates are pretty, but as purveyors of
warmth where needed fail to suit '' yours
trooly." This is at least one of the most
vivid impressions I have and a poignant
regret as well. That much for the knock.
Now for some boosts. She surely is a
land and as I told you measures up in

BILLY'S LETTERS 19

scenic investiture better than any scenic
artist's stage production ever could hope to.

Last Wednesday we took part in Brigade
manoeuvres with the 117th Brigade of the
EngHsh Army, doing about eighteen miles'
march. It was the first day in which Old
Sol deigned to lighten his lamp for us and
a beautiful day for marching. Between
miles of hedges, along roads Uke pavement,
by tiny rivers, over quaint bridges, through
hamlets with typical inns as laid out by
Dickens & Co. and by a Smithy shop under
a chestnut tree that might have been the
one Longfellow wrote about. The hedges
complied with all regulations, draped in
fall grandeur, punctuated here and there
by a red exclamation mark in the form of
a holly bush and from which at intervals
scampered a sleek-looking grey hare or
else flew up a scared pheasant. Anyway
it was a day I will long remember, one in
which picture after picture was limned on
my memory in indelible colours.

It was a great sight, too, to see with
glasses from a hill all the troops in action :
cavalry, artillery, infantry, signallers,
cyclists and a large squad of aeroplanes
which glinted and dipped here and there in
the sunlight. We arrived back at 6 p.m.
tired, but I sure had enough thoughts to
keep me thinking, also wishing you could
have been with me to enjoy all the grandeur

20 A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

of it. Picturesque Surrey surely lives up
'to its reputation.

Saturday most of the boys went to
London, but Young, two others and my-
self went to Guilford, some fourteen miles.
It is a quaint old town modernized. Here
it was that Henry VIII murdered Anne
Boleyn, if you remember history, and I
saw an old Grammar school authorized in
1555 by Edward VI and still intact, as
well as other old buildings. We went over
by taxi. I had some purchases to make
and I can assure you that a £ doesn't go as
far here as a V at home ; as near as I can
figure everything is seven-and-six. It
seems to me a sort of national fetish,
either five-and-six or seven-and-six, and
I may add that your loving son was short
changed for somewhere near $2 as well as
I can figure. Of course this is a general
thing and anybody with a maple leaf is
game with no close season, so being pre-
pared in a measure I am sorer than ever.
A dimpled dame with a smile like Calypso,
a voice like Circe's pipe and a complexion
ct la Mrs. Gervais Graham, while selling
me a nail brush, eased the harpoon into me
so neatly that I never felt $2 worth of barb
till some time after when my numbed
senses limbered into action. It sure beats
all how easy one is, and I always figured
I was no simp ; but Barnum was right.

BILLY'S LETTERS 21

As I say, seven-and-six seems to be a
fetish. At least everything that one
wanted figured out at that price, except
a pair of gloves which I could buy in
Canada for $1.75 — here they ask only
eighteen shillings ! Somewhere I had a
vague idea that gloves were cheap over
here. Say not so.

There was, however, a marketable com-
modity known as dinner, which we pur-
chased at a *' Recommended Hostelry "
and which was only six shillings and three
pence. Wouldn't that cause your grey
locks to curl ? $1.52 for a second-class
meal in a third-rate .tavern served in
eighth-class style ; but oh, as a recompense
I had an opportunity of studying in her
native haunts Ye Barmaid. A ravishing
blonde type, evidently belonging to the
Amazonian family, nearly always found
in rear of polished mahogany raking her
lair of crystals and towels. Habits affable,
courteous, quick and usually gifted with
a line of repartee totally foreign to any
other species. So you see there was a rose
to the thorn even tho' the stab was a little
deep. I may also add that I was intro-
duced to Mr. Brown's October Ale, and
found that he is some kicker. At least he
has much more kick than his cousin Bud.
In fact Bud may be wiser but not nearly
as strong. Well, dears, there is very little

22 A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

more to tell except that with the exception
of one day it has rained almost continually.

Love to and all the family, also

remember me to anyone who cares.

Billy.

December 20, 1915.
Dear Mother,

Another week gone by and to catch
the Canadian mail must write to-night.
I've only had one letter from you since I
came and no picture of you, Maw ; perhaps
it has gone astray. However, 111 let you
know later.

To begin the chronicle of the week : It's
just the same old story, so many vivid
colours on my brain I cannot seem to
start. However, I am taking a course in
physical and bayonet fighting. It's all
courses over here : musketry, bombing,
artillery, entrenching or my own it seems
— ^half of the Lieutenants are at one or the
other. Mine is Swedish exercises. A wiry
little Englishman puts us through (two
hours in the morning and two in the after-
noon) the toughest kind of physical drill,
crashing hither and thither until I some-
times wonder if I'm a bird or only a
relative of the nimble chamois which I am
told leaps from crag to crag. At any rate

BILLY'S LETTERS 23

I've been stiff and sore ever since I started,
in fact there are a lot of muscles in my
carcass that I never even suspected, and
after four hours I say with fervour '' Straafe
Sweden/' We start soon to give it to the
companies, and believe me 111 get some
action then.

Something that made a profound im-
pression on me was a big service here
yesterday, 5000 men with four bands all
in a little glen. Can you imagine 5000
throats pealing out '' O Come, all Ye
Faithful " and '' Onward, Christian Sol-
diers " to the accompaniment of 150
instruments ? It echoed and reverberated
I'm sure for miles, and in the midst of all
the khaki one lone figure in a cassock of
white and black. If you could close your
eyes and see it as I do, I know you'd
appreciate it.

Well, I saw London, only a sort of
moving picture but nevertheless London,
Yesterday — Sunday — was a glorious fall
day, sunlit and warm, so as there were
very few staying in camp six of us decided
to go up to the city. We left at 12.05 P-i^-
and arrived back 11.30 p.m. Of course
I couldn't tell you much about the place ;
it is just a confused jumble of grey stone
buildings and ratthng taxis ; of khaki,
khaki everywhere, always attached to a
woman ; of narrow sidewalks and crowded

24 A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

hotels ; of old rose and gold restaurants
mirrored all around and reflecting princi-
pally gorgeously gowned women all sipping
tea and smoking cigarettes ; of varied
smells from sewers and cheap perfume to
roses ; of rumbling motor buses with,
sticking out prominently, Trafalgar Square ;
service in Westminster with a golden-
throated choir ; of women, women, women,
in fact, never knew there were so many ;
of dark streets at night ; of the Thames by
moonlight ; and oh ! a thousand and one
other views all hashed up. I think the real
things that stand out are the innumerable
women, apparently all smoking cigarettes,
and the price of dinner at the Cecil which
Fm not going to tell you as your frugal
mind would do a flivver Tm sure. But as
I remarked before, they get enough over
here. Of course you say '' Why go there ? "
but there are only certain places officers
are permitted to go, practically no restau-
rants outside the Criterion, Trocadero and
the Cecil and Savoy, outside Claridge's and
some of the high-priced hotels. But any-
way I enjoyed the fleeting trip and expect
to spend six days there when I get my
leave, and of course I want then to see the
sights that are worth seeing, not just the
hustle and bustle.

Well, there is nothing really more to
tell. We just go on each day with the

BILLY'S LETTERS 25

usual work. Last Friday was out again
with the Brigade with blank ammunition
machine guns and real shells in artillery.
We did good work and got the decision
over the four other battalions.

I think you had better address the mail
c/o Army P.O. as we may move from here
to some other camp.

I suppose that over there now it's cold
and lots of snow while here everything is
green. So different, and sometimes I
grow just a little '' Canada sick " despite
all the newness and the number of emotions
crowding around me. However, dears,
good night.

With all my love.

Billy.

New Year's Eve, 1915.
Dear Mother,

IVe had no word from any of you,
except the Christmas card from Auntie
and the photo forwarded from St. John,
for nearly two weeks. I got the photo
O.K. It arrived the morning after Christ-
mas and I am sure it is indeed a splendid
one of ''me own Maw.'' It surely did me
good to look into the dear old face and I
have it on the table where it is in full view
all the time. I also got the Christmas card
Aunty sent and a nice tie from the G-girls.

26 A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

I had already sent them one of our Christ-
mas cards. I also got a dilly box of eats

from my little girl , a five-pound box

of shortbread, about a pound of salted
almonds '' home brewed/' a Christmas
cake and two or three other kinds of
eatings. She's a dear thoughtful kid and
really seems to be awfully fond of me. You
know (this is strictly confidential) I'm very
fond of her, too, and somehow or other over
here the thoughts of those that are near and
dear, like you people at home, crowd
around one in the evenings when there's
not much to do, and tho' I'm not getting
sentimental, nearly every night before I
go to bed, I just quietly crash into the
night and look up at the stars and moon,
and look over there, wondering what you
all are doing. But anyway, dear, I am
going to give you her address so that if,
as may be, I don't come back, you can
write her, and I know you'll understand,
dear.

Well, I spent one of the most rotten
Christ mases I ever did. There were nine
of us marooned here, all the rest went away
on leave, and we were elected to stay.
It sure was a dismal hole. We just sat
around all day, in fact I never left the
mess except to see the men fed. They had
a real meal, turkey, cauliflower, potatoes,
soup, plum pudding, coffee. Of course our

BILLY'S LETTERS 27

men are very well fed, much better than
the British battalions, but it took eighty-
nine fifteen-pound turkeys to feed them.
However, to hark back, we '' ossifers "
spent a dickens of a day, and I sat lament-
ing upon the passing of the good old
Christmas, like Dickens wrote about. You
know everything is and was very glum —
so many families in mourning — that I
remarked that the days of Dickens had
fled, surely, but I certainly tried to wish
with Tiny Tim '' A Merry Christmas indeed,
God bless us every one ! *'

Well, dinner has intervened and Fve
intended ever since being here to write you
something about the country round about.
It is Surrey and one of the oldest settled
parts of England. Beautiful in the extreme,
large areas of woody land with rolling hills
and common land in great tracts. It also
can lay claim to some antiquity. As I told
you, we are only fifteen miles or so from
Aldershot, but close at hand are the
villages of Haslemere, Milford and Godal-
ming. We were at the latter place which
dates back, well, further than even I can
remember, and feel sure that you'll agree
when I say that I gazed with wonder on
an oak which dates back to the Doomsday
book in which it is mentioned. Ye gods,
think of it ! The other places are nearly
as ancient, all being mentioned in a grant

28 A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

from my old pal, King Alfred, to his
cousin somebody IVe forgotten ; how-
ever, as I never expect to meet him this
side of eternity, we will pass along. We
went through Haslemere the other day.
Its town hall is 300 years old and I should
have said that it really has no claim to
age, as I read on a moss-covered slab that
its charter only dated to 1180 something,
in fact it is a mere youth, beardless and
adolescent. My old red-headed friend,
Queen Betty, once attended a fair there.
It is famed as the residence of Tennyson,
Conan Doyle, Mrs. Humphry Ward and
Lord Wolseley, so you see, dear, in all
this bally land of hoary age, I feel like
a chip on an ocean. The Portsmouth
road we walk on every day started in the
Roman days, and I expect many a Druid
chanted weird words around a tree that
sighs and groans just outside my window.
Between here and Bramshot, seven miles,
where all the Canucks are, is the Devil's
Punch Bowl, a circular hollow where in
1786 a man was murdered. There is the
ruin of the gibbet where they hanged the
murderers, and I had a beer in the Red
Lion Inn near by, where they got the man
drunk before the murder. Can you
imagine that ? Dickens wrote about the
spot in Nicholas Nickleby where Nick and
Smike walked from Portsmouth. Look it up.

BILLY'S LETTERS 29

Well, to-day we were " inspected " by
General Steele. We lined up in a splash-
ing rain-storm and stood at attention for
about thirty minutes. I know that it was
while Sherman was being inspected he
made his famous epigram, '' War is Hell ! "
The only bright spot was when the band
struck up '' O Canada." It's the first time
it's been played since we left, and it surely
sounded great. Ill add, at first ; for after it
continued to play it during the whole dam
ceremony it sounded more like the Dead
March or any other bally dirge than any-
thing. Gee ! can you imagine listening to
the strains of Lavalle's hymn while I gazed
at a pile of red tiles, with aching legs and
feet until they all melted into one, then
honeycombed out again into regular
cylinders ? However, we're *' a fine body
of men." That is the stock phrase of
every reviewing officer until I began to
believe '' all men are liars." I know you
would have liked to see your son in full
war attire, full marching kit, blankets,
extra shoes, shaving utensils, haversack,
great coat, underwear, mess tin, rifle, 150
rounds of ammunition, revolver, binoculars,
— I think that's all, just fifty-four pounds
on ''me noble torso," and I resembled the
patient ass of burden more than ever
before. Hurrah for the life of a soldier !

There is some talk of us leaving for

30 A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

Egypt early in February, although no-
body knows anything, except those who
won't tell. We are miles above the English
battalions hereabouts in training, and can
give them all cards and spades physically.
Of course the cream of English manhood is
already there, and there are just the
remains, so it's not a fair comparison.
Well, dear, must close. Love to all,

including who I hope is well. Papers

come regularly, thanks. Billy

In Camp.

January 9, 1916.
Dear Mother,

I've just arrived back from a
wonderful six days in London and that is
the reason why you haven't heard before.
On my arrival here there were two letters
from you dated 12th and 19th December
and I was very glad to get them. Also
about thirty pounds' worth more goods

from that little girl in , including a

cake, tinned goods, lobster, pork and
beans, coffee, fruits, a whole box of spear-
mint gum, cigarettes, and an air pillow.
Some girl, eh ? However, I suppose you
want to hear all about Lunnon.

Firstly, I can tell you that I can't
describe it. I mean that adjectives won't

i

I

BILLY'S LETTERS 31

come, and anyway thousands more clever
than I, tho' not so handsome, have fallen
down ; but, dear, can you imagine the
thrills that pulsed through me as I gazed
on all the things and places that since
boyhood I've read and dreamed of ? Grey
old London bristling with historic spots
dear to every British boy's heart, I think,
and doubly dear to mine because I loved
history, whether by Green or Henty,
whether garbed in fiction or just the plain
red school book, and trebly dear because
of Dickens. You know. Mother, there is
something wells up in me nearly akin
to a tear when I think about them all.
Well, anyway I revelled for six days
there and walked and saw everything I
could. I spent a half -day in the musty
Old Tower, ransacked it from entrance
gate to the keep of the White Tower,
touched the spots where Anne Boleyn,
Lady Jane Grey, Dudley, Mary Queen of
Scots, and all the others lay and prayed
and died. Climbed twelfth-century stair-
ways, trod twelfth-century floorings, read
inscriptions dug on the walls by prisoners,
civil, political, or religious, and came out
in a daze, my memory flooded with
emotions. Then Westminster Abbey — it
is beyond me to tell you of the thoughts
engendered as I stood in the vaulted old
aisles, while a glorious golden-throated

32 A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

choir of boys pealed out anthems to the
crescendos and diminuendos of an organ
the Hke of which I never knew existed,
played by a hand that was guided by a
heart and brain directed Tm sure by
seraphs or cherubims. Dear, dear Mother,
all through it ebbed and flowed the desire
that you could have sat with me, and when
the lilting cadences of a boy singing The
Recessional melted into the peal of the
organ I think I cried because you weren't
there. You know, dear, I may never come
back, but Tm so thankful for the memory
of that wonderful service. That alone
dwarfs the thought that I stood in the
poets' corner, or that I walked where
countless thousands have been thrilled
before, or that above me hung tattered
old colours echoing of the gone glory of
some British regiment.

Then I walked miles in the old city
around spots immortalized by Dickens,
just started out and walked and walked.
Of course I lost my way, but * coppers '
were most obliging. I stood at noon in front
of the Mansion House and The Bank and
saw, I suppose, more traffic in a minute
than those dear old legs of yours dodged
in ten years, and I discovered why all
these places are called circuses. They
sure are full three-ring four-platform ones,
each deserving of being the *' Greatest

BILLY'S LETTERS 33

Show on Earth/' There is just as much
to see as in Ringhng Bros., and the differ-
ence seems to be there you look every
way so as not to miss anything ; on
Piccadilly Circus, for instance, you look
every way so as not to get anything. I
always felt certain that Fd have a hub
smashed in and wonder now just how I
escaped. I think the funniest sight I saw
was a costermonger with a donkey like a
minute and a cart like half a one, cross-
ways on Trafalgar Square and the Strand
one morning. A copper at one end shoved
and talked while another pulled and talked,
and every taxi and bus driver that was
held up sat and talked, and as Fm an
" ossifer " and presumably a gentleman, I
really couldn't write you what they said
or what the coster said back, but there
were some fine examples of the ^* retort
courteous " a la Anglais profanus.

Then we stayed up one night till four
and went at five to Co vent Garden Market.
That was a disappointment tho' as every-
thing was dark, so we only heard the noise
and smelled the smells. What, oh ! that's
sufficient.

I rode on top of a bus just for the
experience, which was some, and looked
down on humanity. Then we went to
Whitehall and saw the guard changed.
That is the only regiment not in khaki ;

34 A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

the guards there still being in gold, red
and tin plate. Being an officer I received
a regulation salute. Ha ! Ha !

We also gave Buckingham Palace the
" once over '' and went all through the
Park. Buckingham looked very nice, but
you know over it all are huge bomb nets
for protection, which I guess spoiled the
appearance. Then I did what everyone
does, I guess, got lost in the Cecil Hotel,
and sooner than ask I wandered into
forty different rooms for fifteen minutes.
Gee ! that is some shack for size. I also
learned that all the coal used to heat
London went into a shute just outside my
window at the Regent Palace hotel where
I stayed. At least they started just after
I got into bed and never even hesitated
till I got up, the din being accompanied by
raucous swear words and trite repartee
from the navvies. The hotel, which is a
new one, is some hotel, by the way, 1030
rooms, and they had 2100 guests for New
Year's. It surely is the last woid in hotels.
A winter garden, lounge, a Louis XVI
room, a palm room, a grill and everything
else you ever heard of and a lot no one
ever did, and reasonable too, six shillings
for bed and breakfast, a swell big room
and fair breakfast; but never let it be
said that London is cheap. I can attest
that the idea is erroneous for it sure

BILLY'S LETTERS 35

costs a pile of money to step around that
city.

However, it is London at night that I
should Hke to tell you of, if I can. You
understand practically no lights are allowed.
Stores, etc., pulled down blinds and only
a ray peeps out of doorways. There are
no street lights save ghastly green ones
that cause everyone to resemble an olive
in complexion ; and the buses and taxis
creep along with no headlights, and even
the side lamps, which must be oil, shrouded,
so that for a poor pedestrian to cross a
street is a dangerous undertaking. But to
look up at the steely sky is the sight :
Ribbons, seemingly miles long, shooting
in every direction as bright as the brightest
Northern lights, the anti-aircraft search-
lights. That is indeed a wonderful sight ;
the opaque little ghmmers that surround
one on the sidewalks, and those only on
main streets ; and up above, as one would
think for miles these powerful searchlights
sweeping across the sky ; and then the
slow-moving crowds, for they saunter
leisurely along at all times ; and the con-
tinuous nerve-racking honk, honk, honk,
of cars, punctuated by the shrill whistles
of theatre and restaurant doorkeepers call-
ing taxis, which are at a premium in the
evening, all impressed me wonderfully.
And then to step into the hotel rotundas

36 A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

from nearly abysmal darkness and a
veritable babel of harsh sounds — into a
brilliantly lit rotunda, resonant with hearty
laughter, male and female, encrusted as it
were by orchestras, is some transition, I
can assure you. To walk in and see the
women gorgeously gowned, and the officers
in khaki from the army, and naval blue
and gold, one almost forgets that 150 miles
away there is a war ; until suddenly, direct
from the trench, in walks a soldier, mud
from toes to crown, begrimed and laden
with heavy marching order, jostling his
way up to the desk through the immacu-
late throng. That brings it back, as does
also the sight of a poor fellow on crutches
or without an arm, but it scarcely seems
possible.

And what a study in character is there
in a cosmopolitan crowd. Here a festive
young lieutenant, there a florid -faced
naval man, yonder a paunchy Major, all
endeavouring to thoroughly enjoy life for
six days. And the women ! Oh the
women ! Heretofore I have been under the
impression that English women did not
know how to dress, but the frumps we see
are no criterion. '' Lord lumme ! " but
they sure do dress. Radiant blondes in
diaphanous garbs in greater numbers than
I ever imagined, beautiful brunettes and
sparkling sorrels in such profusion that

BILLY'S LETTERS 37

it is staggering. They all loll around
in the places irregardless of class. In the
Carlton tearoom one day a ravishing crea-
ture who turned out to be one of Eng-
land's first beauties, sat rubbing backs
nearly with a woman plainly a wanton,
and I am told it is an e very-day occurrence.
Anyway, they all sip tea or cocktails,
smoke cigarettes and display an amount
of silk encased leg to cause me to wonder
considerably. And do you know I, in a
measure, doubted my earliest beliefs in the
decency of womanhood after some of the
displays that I witnessed. Certainly a
shock to my morals and mentality as
heretofore constituted.

Now, my dear, must close, will write
more later, but we have to welcome the
Canadian Mechanical Transport who are
just arriving.

Love to all. Billy.

Later

Well, dear, after reading this over IVe
found that I haven't told you anything ;
at least so it seems. I can't believe that
my thoughts won't come, for I always
tried to tabulate everything that occurred
so that I could tell you about it, and
figured how to express it, but it seems
as tho' I can't think of them. When I

38 A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

started this page I thought I could, but
I can't. However, I certainly enjoyed my
trip and the memory of it will linger
long with me. I tried everywhere to buy
something for Aunty and you. But some-
how there seemed to be nothing for
women, except ordinary things. Every-
one sells war materials for men and the
bally shops seem crammed with nothing
but trench clothing, smokes, alcohol lamps,
safety razors and steel mirrors. I wanted
to get an antique for the house but
searched, and searched, and found nothing
I wanted that I could afford ; so finally
in desperation crashed into Harrod's and
purchased you each a pair of gloves. The
thoughts go with them even if they are
only commonplace ; you know that, dear
ones. However, I did buy a leather frame
for your picture. That was selfishness, I
suppose, but I did want to keep it nice
and it was awfully expensive, the frame,
nine shillings, but 111 just nip off some-
where else. Things cost like the devil here
and food is awful. Our mess is something
scandalous and I'm enclosing my last
month's bill to let you see it. It is nearly
$3775 for twenty-eight days for food and
some cigarettes, which is awful, you'll
agree. We got our $ioo here, but most of
it is gone for a revolver and binoculars.
These two sixty-five dollars alone — then

BILLY'S LETTERS 39

a compass and several small things such
as map case, fourteen shillings, etc., and
I've yet got to buy several small matters for
my kit.

Well, dear, will close again. Love and
write soon.

Royal Huts Hotel.

January 31, 1916.
Dear Mother,

I am only stopping here for an hour,
and as I have just finished tea, I thought
I would improve the shining hour, which
has been a mighty scarce article for the
last two weeks. My last epistle to you
was, I think, dashed off on a typewriter at
Bordon. Since then IVe had an eventful
career.

Dates are all messed up in my mind, but
a week last Friday we left Bordon after
two weeks of awful work and marched to
Wit ley, twenty-one miles. Saturday morn-
ing, under orders, the whole battalion left
for Bramshot, where we are now, and
Saturday night I was, on fifteen minutes'
notice, sent over to Aldershot to take an
advanced signalling course. Some move-
ment for your one and only, and if you
were a Sherlock Holmes you would deduce
that it presages something, and that some-

40 A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

thing is, that we are to move to France
as soon as we can be equipped, which is
about the third week in February. Of
course, dear, I know that that doesn't just
appeal to you as strongly as it does to me,
but it is really the best bit of news I ever
wrote you, from my view-point ; for, dear,
it bespeaks much : first, that we are a well-
disciplined and trained regiment ; secondly,
that we are physically fit to go ; and when
you consider that it was only in May last
that we started and that there are 45,000
troops over here from Canada, and we with
three others were selected to form a new
Brigade in the Second Division, youll
understand that we are proud. Just
think ; we leave the — th, — th, — th, and
all those others formed six months before
us, behind, and so I say again that we, as
a battalion, have reason to be proud.
And you, as my dear, dear Mother, have
also reason ; not just because Fm in the
battalion, but because your only son was
paid a great compliment. An Imperial
Army Sergeant-Major from Aldershot who
was in charge of the various platoons
for some time, and one of those old-time
regular army fellows to whom discipline is
a god, told the Colonel that my platoon
was the best disciplined one in the batta-
lion and exceptionally smart ; which is,
you'll admit, a feather in my cap, and for

BILLY'S LETTERS 41

which I was compHmented by my Colonel.
Then our Signalling Officer has been made
Brigade Signaller, which is a boost for
him, and one of our Majors is Acting
Brigade Major, and likely to obtain the
place permanently, and our Chaplain has
been made Brigade Chaplain ; all of which
reflects great credit on our battalion, and
we're trying awfully hard to live up to our
reputation. Now, aren't you proud ? One
of Canada's premier battalions and your
son a '' hossifer " in it ! I don't suppose,
dear, that gazing adown the vista of years
to the time of my babyhood you ever
dreamed that I should one day stand
where I am now. I suppose mothers like
you can sing '* I didn't raise my boy to be
a soldier " ; but since he is raised and is
a soldier, I do want my mother to be
proud of me. For, after all, dear, although
I've never notched very deep heretofore,
and, I know, not just accomplished what
you'd have had me do, still I think that
with your love for success, and the top of
the ladder, you'll be proud that I'm at
least a good lieutenant, for, oh, dear, I've
tried very hard. And so we're going '* over
there," perhaps soon after you get this
letter.

I want you at once to send me on a
card, if possible, obtained from the Bank
of Montreal, your signature, as I am going

42 A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

to make my bank account a joint one in
both our names, either to draw cheques.
This will enable you to draw out at any
time anything to my credit, and avoid the
expense of litigation or probate should
they bump me off. Send the signature
direct to the Bank as per enclosed cheque
address and Til arrange it here. Don't
delay a day. The cheque you will keep
so as to have it by you, to draw if you
want to.

I am expressing back to Canada my
rain-coat, also my great-coat or possibly
only the latter. We all had to buy what
they call trench coats, rubber coats, fleece
lined, which cost seven pounds fifteen
shillings,, as a great-coat is too heavy, and
if it gets wet takes days to dry out, so I
fear me is not much use. My other goods
I'm putting in storage in London and will
advise you in regard to them later. We
are all busy buying trench necessities, such
as high rubber boots, periscopes, Wolseley
valises, — a contrivance holding blankets
and clothes, as we are only allowed thirty-
five pounds of baggage outside what we
carry, and they must be in these valises.
They cost four pounds, but are essential,
otherwise you can't have anything taken.
Suit-cases and trunks are barred for obvious
reasons. In fact, when I get all dolled up
in heavy marching order which I described

BILLY'S LETTERS 43

before, I resemble a Christmas-tree that's
been having a night out more than any-
thing, and feel sure Richard III was in
somewhat a similar state when he uttered
that very salient remark, '' A horse, a
horse, my kingdom, etc/'

However, that doesn't explain why I
am at the Royal Huts which I started to
in the preamble. Well, last Sunday the
Colonel suddenly walked into the mess and
said, '' You'll go to Aldershot to-night
to take an advanced signalling course."
I remonstrated that an advanced signal-
ling was a trifle premature as I had never
even had an elementary one, but old
Tennyson knew whereof he spoke, '' Their 's
not to reason why," etc., and so, like a
lamb to Armour's, I hied me on my way.

Arrived, and the first thing Monday
morning they just flung at me through
space, six words a minute in Morse tele-
graph code on a delightful invention known
as a buzzer, which is the same as a door
bell run by a telegraph key. In view
of the fact that I'd never even been
introduced to one previously, and that I
certainly wasn't on speaking terms with
it, I failed to measure up, but I went to
the Commandant of the School and be-
tween talking to him and crying at him,
induced him to allow me to stay, insisting
in right good Canadian fashion that as

44 A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

Fd come to take a signalling course, it
was patent I could scarcely go home with-
out one. I tell you that gift of gab is
jake sometimes. So a sergeant was ap-
pointed to give me elementary instruction
in the various forms of army communica-
tion, viz. buzzer, heliograph — a sort of
Spanish - inquisition - looking affair, which
reflects the sun from a mirror across the
country — a lamp with a shutter in front
for sending at night, and also by wig-
wagging a flag thusly from here over to
there, and from this position over to this
other one ; a very simple little affair,
figured out by some of the mightiest
brains of all time, but requiring arms like
the village blacksmith to send and eyes
like a cat to read. Well, so far IVe
grubbed along, but you'll realize that to
learn Morse on six different instruments
in fourteen days is not just what in
restaurant life is called a '' short order."
However, Tm working from 9 a.m. "till
10 p.m. with three hours for lunch, the
indispensable tea and dinner, and hope to
acquire sufficient knowledge ere this week
is out to pass out at six words a minute.
So far, I'm just a conglomeration of
churned-up dots and dashes, and find my-
self going to sleep saying dot — dot — dash
— dash — damn — damn ; which all doesn't
explain why I'm here at Royal Huts. In

BILLY'S LETTERS 45

fact, Fm beginning to question if Til ever
tell you, as IVe just remembered that the
— th battalion has been broken up, only
a band and a few handy men left to clean
up. Solomon said, '* Pride goeth," etc.

Anyhow, to-day, being marooned at
Aldershot, and wanting mail, etc., I came
over to Bramshot, sixteen miles, and was
starting back, or rather did start back.
The mode of locomotion is a motor-bus
which is a pay-as-you-enter-run-when-it-
pleases affair. It resembles any street car
I ever remember, inasmuch as it seats
fourteen, but holds thirty-two. It seems
to have a deal of trouble in breathing,
and is rheumatic in every joint. I feel
sure if its pedigree were looked into, it
would have been sired by the first Ford
and damned by everyone who ever rode in
it. Well, we started out, the thirty-two
all being present at roll call, each one a
soldier (private) except his breath which
was and still is and likely will be (from
the ribald glee emitting from the bar) an
admixture of gin and beer, (not at all
like the fragrant rose of old England).
This breath when breathed upon one in
conjunction with a sweet-scented odour of
gasoline which leaks through the floor of
the bus, only convinces me that I have
nothing to fear from German gas. Well,
anyway, we got thus far when the bus

46 A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

busted ; at least she sat down figuratively,
and no amount of coaxing would induce
her to arise. So we jostled out and in
here where I am sitting awaiting the
arrival of another affair which I trust is
more physically fit than the other was.

I have no more paper, this being some
in my pocket, but must close anyway.
Don't forget all the instructions and ad-
dress always c/o Army P.O. Will write
you more fully during the week, but want
this to catch Canadian mail leaving
Monday.

Love to all. Billy.

February 8, 1916.
Dear Mother,

Your two letters written, one en
route, the other from Toronto, arrived on
the Canadian mail, and I was glad to hear
that you arrived safely. I also got some
letters last week at Aldershot telling me
of the desperate cold. Gee, that was sure
some cold. Eh ! A letter also arrived

from last week and one to-day from

. I am writing to her to thank for

the SOX, also to for the cigarettes.

I arrived back here Sunday night from
my signalling course and to-day received
word that I got '' Very good '' out of a
class of forty, which means I obtained

BILLY'S LETTERS 47

over ninety per cent., and the Colonel is
quite pleased and said to-night at mess,
" Oh, I knew you'd pull through." Well,
I landed back as I tell you and found that

, my Company Commander, or O. C.

Co'y, meaning Officer Commanding Com-
pany, was ill, and I was senior, so had
to take charge yesterday and to-day
of the whole company. That is, hold
orderly room, which is the soldiers' court
where he is punished for offences. For
instance, John Smith in private life is
John Smith ; here he is No. 41144, Pte.
Smith, John, and if he is wont to imbibe
too much of the '' cup that clears to-day
of past regrets," is placed in the clink. The
next day he is brought before his O. C.
Co'y who, if he feels he can adjudicate
upon the case, sentences him ; but as his
powers are limited, and if the case deserves
greater punishing, he remands him to a
higher court, viz. the Colonel or Com-
manding Officer. Well, I had to adjudi-
cate upon three yesterday and four to-day,
all for being absent without leave, which
is a crime in the army. By crime I mean
not as generally interpreted, but anything
for which he can be punished, and the
longer Fm in this game the more Fm
convinced that one can be punished for
anything ; and when a soldier is discharged
after years' service without a crime on his

48 A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

record, I certainly consider him a mighty
clever chap for covering up his crimes.
It certainly is a supreme example of the
two great classes, the convicted and the
unconvicted; for if the aforesaid No. 41144,
Pte.. Smith, John, while standing on parade
should be suddenly seized with a violent
tickling of his throat, such as you allay by
an application of jujube, and should spon-
taneously and ostentatiously burst forth
into a loud '' ahem," he can be very
severely dealt with under section forty of
the Army Act, the aforesaid cough '' being
prejudicial to good discipline." So you
see that anyone can be shot at sunrise for
blowing his nose. However, I carried on
with the C. O. Co'y's work for two days,
and of course being away first at Bordon
then Aldershot was not in touch very well.
Then we are being equipped to go to the
front and are changing old things for
new, and as the C. O .Co'y is responsible
(not me) for everything, there is a lot of
checking of figures. However, I am manag-
ing very well so far and haven't done any-
thing I shouldn't have. Then to-day
when I was in seeing the Major he told me
I was to have No. r Platoon. That
perhaps doesn't convey much to you, but
it is just this : No. i platoon is the
extreme right one when the battalion is in
battle and therefore its flank is quite

I

I

BILLY'S LETTERS 49

important. That is certainly a promo-
tion, in its way I mean, for unless I was
fitted to have command of it I wouldn't
get it. It is quite an important spot and
D.S.O.'s are usually won there, altho'
I'm not figuring on one. In answer to
your enquiry as to whether all officers
above me on the list were senior, *' yes."
But three officers above me are being left
here, which makes me fourth senior lieu-
tenant in the battalion. As for any notice

in the papers, the place is about 200

souls, and anyway one battalion more or
less doesn't matter very much here. A
battalion is such an infinitesimal affair
in this war, so I imagine the only place
you'll ever find anything about us will be
Canadian papers.

I was up in an aeroplane last week with
the O. C. Headquarters Flight at the
Royal Flying School, Aldershot, and en-
joyed the experience very much. We
went up about 2000 feet and I imagine I
should enjoy being an airman. There were
no sensations except a violent desire to
hang on, a sinking sensation at the stomach
when we volplaned and a violent desire
to get down where the air didn't bite
one's face and chill you to the marrow.
There was a slight rocking which tended to
produce mal de mer, or I suppose I should
say mal de air, but when one is hopping

50 A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

along anywhere from fifty miles to eighty
miles an hour youVe really no time to be
ill ; in fact, all I did was to hang on, and
just between you, me dear old Maw, and
myself (arid don't tell a soul) I wished
most of the time that Td never gone up.
But then that is like the Catholic con-
fessional, strictly confidential, and not to
be mentioned to a soul.

I spent Saturday and Sunday in London
en route from Aldershot and went in a
pouring rain to Westminster Abbey. Oh,
dear, there is something about that spot
that really is the story of the Empire in
a vast pocket edition that grips me. I
sat Sunday in the north transept and
heard the swelling (I think souls is the
best word for they induce tears in me
almost) sobs of that glorious organ and
listened to The Recessional. I heard
them once again, sitting beside the monu-
ments and statuary erected to Britain's
heroes, and oh, do you know, dear, I felt
the little wish creep in that some day my
name might go down to posterity in those
magnificent aisles. I was so close I could
touch the statue, '' Erected by the order of
King and Parliament as a testimonial to
William Pitt, Earl of Chatham, during
whose administration, in the reigns of
George II and George III, Great Britain
was exalted to a greater degree and glory

Page 50, line 17. For ''souls" read "sobs"

BILLY'S LETTERS 51

than in any other period '' ; those, if
memory serves aright, are the actual words
of the inscription, and, as I say, unbidden
came the desire that one day I might
prove worthy of a wee small honour
from my own native land, for, and to
which, I am continually longing. It's all
right to say it's cold, but then suddenly
take away from one all the things that
have surrounded you since childhood, sud-
denly remove all the environment that has
encircled your very being and you cannot
help but feel the lack. I miss the snow, the
crunch, crunch of it under marching feet, the
glisten of it in the sunshine and the glint
of it under the arc lights at night. I miss
the wind that stung the face and the cold
that pulsated the blood, and most of all
the air, the free, clean, sunshiny unmisty
air of the west ; and while I love England I
wouldn't trade one day of Western Cana-
dian climate with all its wintry rigours
for a whole winter here. Tho' I some-
times cursed a winter there I now ask
pardon and plead my ignorance as an
excuse, for snow is immeasurably better
;han the same depth of gooey mud.

We expect to leave sometime between
•"ebruary twenty-third and March first, but
ill be in France for some time ere going
Lctually into the mess, so don't figure
l*m in it as soon as these dates occur.

52 A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

You know, my dear, that it's all very
well to talk about writing to this one and
that one, but I never get a chance to start
a letter till 8.30 p.m., then it's usually
10.30 before it's finished, and I owe a
dozen to different people. If I find time
I'll write, but really some nights I'm so
tired I can't, so they'll have to understand.
Love to all.

Billy.

February 13, 1916.
My Dear Mother,

Your second letter written from
Toronto reached me this morning. As I
wrote you earlier in the week we are in
the throes of departure and Sunday is no
exception. Ten officers and a number of
men have been away all day firing at the
Rifle Ranges, and this morning in front
of our mess the Machine Gun class was
busy rattling away. As I tell you, that's
about all there is to think about. One
grows so narrow-minded in this business
unless you eat, sleep, breathe and perspire
war, its ethics, science and the practical
application of these, you might just as
well quit, and our Colonel doesn't give
one much chance to do anything but
absorb warfare. As I told you, we are in

BILLY'S LETTERS 53

the throes of departure, and I am told
unofficially that the Brigade sails on the

for France. You will not of course

receive this till after we've arrived there.

The weather here has improved quite
noticeably lately. The days have been
warm and bright, always for a few hours
in the middle the sun coming out and
caressing us and the landscape, so that it
makes life a little more bearable. There
is just a touch of spring in the air, the
buds bursting on the trees, and this after-
noon I saw several pussy willows and
some snowdrops out in bloom. Five of
us went for a long horseback ride this
afternoon, the first horse I've been on
since I left the farm, and a rough-gaited
bird it was. She had a sort of self -start-
ing six-cylinder action in her rear eleva-
tion and bumped along, also I bumped
along with her greatly to the detriment,
I fear, of certain portions of my anatomy,
and I fear me also I'm going to be " raw-
ther stiff " in the morning, as I certainly
can class my middle parts as being sore
right now. However, I enjoyed myself
thoroughly for two or three hours, and
laughed myself sick at one of the boys
who doesn't ride very well, who had the
wildest horse in the bunch and who cer-
tainly had a really rough time ; for as soon
as we started for home she refused to do

54 A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

anything but go, and of course all the
rest of them also insisted, and when his
bird heard the others behind, she legged
it faster and faster. We crashed along
for about seven miles through narrow
lanes and tiny villages, and very Gilpin-
like I can assure you. Dougal, the chap
I speak of, lost his cap and none of us
could turn our horses to get it. So as we
must always pay for our good times, I
fully expect to pay for mine to-morrow.

I had rather an unique experience the
other day which I want to tell you about.
Every one who hailed from this insular
kingdom, in Canada was wont to com-
plain in my ear of the slowness of barbers
over there and always related how much
faster the tonsorial artists of Britain
pushed in your whiskers. I also have been
told the same thing since my arrival
and Fve proven to myself the why and
wherefore of it. Having to go up to
London one day this week to the Record
Office, I slept in and missed my usual
shave before hiking three miles to the
train, so upon my arrival there proceeded
to buy a shave, something I haven't done
for months, I nearly can say years. So
seeing a sign, '' Ladies and Gentlemen's
Hair Dressing Saloon," I proceeded
therein. Well, a bald-headed person of
doubtful antecedents, judging from his

BILLY'S LETTERS 55

physiognomy, motioned me into a chair.
Not a white enamel becushioned one with
a neck-rest and numerous levers, but a
plain red plush, one showing unmistakably
that other thousands had sat on the
same seat. It was just the same type as
the C. P. R. or any R. R. in Canada issues
to their hard- worked station agents. Well,
I sat me down, not without some mis-
givings, and, grasping '' me noble counten-
ance," he tilted my head rearward until
I felt as tho' I were one of those contor-
tionist acts at a vaudeville show. He
smeared my face with lather and pro-
ceeded to scrape the protruding hairs off.
I say scrape advisedly, for it was a process
greatly resembling a man with a snow
shovel removing the accumulation of last
week's snow from the sidewalk. He didn't
take long, I'll admit, and well he might do
it in short time. Every time he let go of
my head I endeavoured to raise it, but,
someway, he always beat me to it and
grabbed it again ere I could sufficiently
stretch the muscles to erase the crick in it.
He surely was active and I took a keen
delight in seeing if I couldn't beat him
to it. Albeit I must confess he came off
best. Of course he was doing it every day
and it was my first game and I didn't even
have beginner's luck. Well, having re-
moved some hair and the outer tissue of

56 A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

epidermis, he smeared a solution of nitric
acid and chloride of lime and assisted me
to elevate my head to a normal position,
and, whisking off the apron, by gestures
suggested I arise. I did so with face
smarting and neck stiff and cricked beyond
straightening, I felt sure. Upon a close
examination which I made after a hurried
exit and fervent prayer of thanksgiving,
I found tiny tufts of whisker still there and
decided that the reason they do it quicker
is, first, because they don't do it, and,
second, if they took any longer they would
permanently dislocate their customers'
necks ; so I readily understand why there are
fewer barber shops and why every English-
man always carries a set of razors. Any-
way I certainly prefer mine own Gillette.

I've just paused a minute to listen to
the mess gramophone blare out '' The
Veteran's Song." A glorious baritone
sang it and as he came to the lines,
** Thank God when the young lads falter
we still have the brave old boys," I just
wondered if, when the crucial moment
came, I would falter. Of course, dear,
I can't falter, there are no more old boys
left and so we young lads must do our
best. And oh, dear, while I know it's not
in your heart I feel sure that you wouldn't
want me to falter, and, somehow, on the
eve of our departure we all have sobered

BILLY'S LETTERS 57

down a bit. At first at the news every-
one was gleeful, but we are quieter now.
Things have assumed their right aspect.
We all realize that it isn't a picnic we're
setting out for and so we've adjusted our
outlook and toned down our gaiety. Not
noticeably, perhaps, to an outsider, but
every now and then you'll find one or
two sitting quietly and a wistful look in
their eye. There isn't the laugh and the
jest that for months has been usual, and
so we go away over to France.

Now, my dear, there isn't much or in
fact anything more to say, except I don't
want you to worry. I know, Mother o'
mine, that's a useless order to give you,
but I surely mean it. You know we all
are intending to come back and I grow
every day more or less a fatalist. So don't
worry, I'll come home one of these days
and oh, how glad I'll be, dear, to fold
you in my arms and hear you call me
Willie. So, dear, don't fear for me.
Your God and mine, whom I know you
trust, is just as present there as in the
quiet solitude of your bedroom, and if
perchance He wills that I go out, well,
dear, it's just one more sorrow heaped on
your willing shoulders, one more pain to
your silver locks. But as the days go on
more and more forcibly is borne home the
fact that up there beyond the Gates of

58 A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

Pearl there is one Omnipresent, and He
will watch o'er me as he has done over
millions of other sons.

Good-bye, dearie. The last good-bye
for a time at least. TU write you from
France. Good-bye and God bless and
keep you safe for my return. Rilly

Love to all with heaps to Auntie and
Uncle when you write.

We've left the lights of London
And the dreary rain of Hants,
For we're slowly steaming outward
" Over there " to France.

The while I watch the choppy waves
And taste the salty foam,
My thoughts are ever speeding
To Canada and Home.

I wonder, be there thought-waves
Or static in the air
To shoot the thoughts I'm thinking
To my dear ones " Over there."

For " Over there " is two spots.
One is Flanders, damp and low.
While the other place is Canada,
My " Lady of the Snow."

And tho' my thoughts always are split
Betwixt the one and t'other,
I think to-night they're turning most
To Canada and Mother.

Crossing the Channel as the lights of Folkestone died into black
and Boulogne grew brighter.

Billy.

BILLY'S LETTERS 59

Somewhere.

February 26, 1916.
My Dear Mother,

Well, we arrived '' somewhere,'' and
are billeted, some miles at the rear of the
actual firing line where the boom of guns
comes to us ever and anon. So we are
actually in the ring side seats of the big
fight and soon will, I suppose, be actually
in the ring.

The trip here was very interesting, but
Fm not allowed to mention anything
about it so will have to tell you when I get
back. However, I can tell you that I had
my wish about the snow, for we landed
in the midst of a soft melting snowstorm
which has kept up intermittently ever
since. The whole country is covered
about a foot thick with soft snow and the
roads frozen hard, making walking and
transport difficult. In fact, the weather
has been very cold and almost like Cana-
dian winter, as the cold seems to go
clean through. However, the men and
all of us are happy and that counts a lot.
I've just thought all day what a complex
thing is human nature. We arrived here,
as I told you, in a blinding snowstorm
and after a twelve- to fifteen-mile march,
finally got into the barns, where we are
billeted, about eight o'clock at night.

6o A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

cold, horribly hungry and wet through,
every man sore and grouchy, railing
against the officers and any one else on
whom he could vent his spleen. It wasn't
an easy day and I, too, was dead tired,
but next morning in the clear cold air
we had changed completely. Everything
looked rosy and in the midst of it all
here and there a song or a cheery whistle,
and after a good warm meal we were
as chirpy as sparrows. Indeed, a contrast
from the night before. Human nature is
indeed a funny thing. I went out to-day
to buy some woollen gloves and other things
in a village about two miles away and I can
assure you that National song of ours,
*' The Maple Leaf our Emblem Dear/' is
just as fitting here as elsewhere. They sure
soak one here for anything.

We are quartered in a farmhouse, the
six company officers in one room of
Flemish architecture — great oaken beams
across the ceiling and a cold wind-swept
brick floor and no heat. The men in the
barns with plenty of straw are, I believe,
fairly warm, at least I hope warmer than
we are. The glass is out of our window
and the wind '' she's blow de herricane "
across the floor, wafting in all the varied
odours of the farmyard. However, it
must be worse in the trenches and every
cloud has its silver lining. But it's some

BILLY'S LETTERS 6i

miserable in the morning, arising and
shaving and washing at a pump with a
foot of snow on the ground.

They say that to be really a good
fighter a man must feel a personal ani-
mosity against his adversary. Well, I
feel certain that if old Kaiser Bill could
suddenly appear some morning when I
hop out of blankets and with goose flesh
over '' me noble frame,'' shiver and swear,
he'd find in me a foeman worthy of his
steel ; and I think as the hardships (which
really aren't so awfully hard) grow worse,
we all acquire that spirit of animosity.
The men, too, are not at all slow at ex-
pressing their opinion about the enemy,
and they seem to be ready to fight, so I
guess we will give a good account of our-
selves.

Everything is strange and new over
here. The very ground we walk on was
the scene of fierce fighting early in the
war. The fields, however, are all plowed
and crops in, in fact '* busy as usual " is
the motto, pigs, cows, etc., chewing away,
not even moving their ears. The build-
ings, however, bear mute testimony that
there is a war on, and in the fields here
and there are the remains of wire en-
tanglements. I picked up a rusty old
brass casing of a shell, while a few hundred
yards away a tiny forest of crosses mark

62 A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

the graves of some English soldiers, and
not far distant is a bog where, Fm told,
the Princess Pats were first cut up a year
ago.

It is all war over here. Every breath
you draw seems to charge your blood with
a desire to get into it, and it's truly sur-
prising how one actually feels no qualms
about going into the trenches. So far I
haven't felt the slightest tinge of fear, but
of course I don't know exactly how 111 act
when the crucial moment arrives ; but
I've practised control of myself in pre-
paration for it and I guess that's about
all it amounts to, self-control. Our first
touch of the real thing was a hospital
train we passed filled with the wounded
and seeing motor ambulances flying along
the road to and from the firing line. Occa-
sionally a stretcher with a bandaged figure
on it, and once a body lying on the road-
side, probably a real casualty. It's very
hard writing, everyone is talking and I
can't seem to collect my thoughts, also
it is some cold. I'm using a lone candle
so I think I've written enough. Excuse
paper which is out of my message book
and also the carbon copies, but I'm writing

the same letter to the little girlie in ,

and I know you'll excuse me. I'll try to
write you a letter again as soon as possible
and try to do so regularly.

BILLY'S LETTERS 63

Remember me to everyone and send

love to the . Heaps of love and

millions of thoughts of you and home.

Good-bye.

Billy.

Somewhere.

February 28, 1916.
Dear Mother,

Just a few lines to enclose some
documents, one a joint agreement for the
Bank which please forward direct, also
receipt for goods stored at Thomas Cook
& Sons. There is really nothing much
there, and I cannot think it would be
worth while to send for them from Canada,
as there is nothing of any great value.
However, here is the receipt.

Well, dear, the most important news I
have to tell you is that we move up into
the fight to-morrow and will be in the
ring for a starter for ten days or so. Just
to get our baptism of fire, as it were.

I received your two letters, the last
dated 14th inst., and you seem worried re
the Christmas parcel. I got it O.K. and
acknowledged it the same day. I think,
if memory serves me aright, the night
before I went to London. In fact Fm

64 A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

sure it was that night, as I gave the letters
to my man to post and will ask him re
them. As for others, well, previous letters
will have answered your queries.

Fm at present engaged in studying gas
and how to combat it, and it's very inter-
esting work. I have to walk each morning
about six miles, and this morning as
I walked along I couldn't help thinking
how peaceful everything looked. Bright
warm sunshine, glistening down on the
snow, birds twittering, quaint old houses
with cheery children running about and
wee wisps of smoke curling out of the
chimneys ; in fact the landscape might
have been a water-colour of any country,
so peaceful did it look. One would scarce
believe that a short twelve to fifteen
months ago this whole area was the scene
of actual fighting, nor yet realize that
less than a score of miles away the greatest
battles of all time are being waged. Indeed,
if it weren't for two things and you could
suddenly transplant some one from a
foreign land here, I feel sure it would be
hard to convince them of their where-
abouts. Two things, however, give away
the ending to the story ; first, ever and
anon rumbles over the land the reverbera-
tions of the guns, sometimes short,
staccato sounds, again long crashing rolls
ending in a sort of roar, and then, on the

i

BILLY'S LETTERS 65

pave roads, a never-ending line of trans-
port waggons either bearing up munitions
and coming back empty, or Red Cross
motor ambulances going empty and com-
ing back loaded. Nearly all the work is
done by mechanical transport (motor lor-
ries) which rattle and bump along at a
great rate, spraying rather than splashing
mud on you, while now and then a de-
spatch rider clad in khaki oilskins hurtles
by on a motor cycle, or a long line of
the famous two-decker London buses,
all painted War Office grey, crawl along,
sometimes loaded just as heavily as ever
they were on the Strand or Regent Street.
But every passenger is now a non-paying
one and there is no difference in style, all
in '' marching order.'' And speaking of
marching order reminds me that I was in
an *' estaminet " or cafe to-day, and there
was a chubby gamin of about four march-
ing to and fro with a water-bottle and
mess-tin strung from his shoulders and
over his left one a long poker, and would
you believe me, as we entered he came to
the '' present " with his poker, then calmly
strode back and forth as if on sentry go.
And this almost within range of the big
guns. The passive bearing and positive
equanimity of these villagers also seem
beyond one's ken. Business as usual is
evidently their slogan and they certainly

66 A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

lose no opportunity to carry on any kind
of bargain. As an example, the urchin,
whose home is where we billet, appeared
yesterday with one of our cap badges on,
and fearing mayhap that kleptomania was
developing and feeling that keenly in one
so young, I questioned him (for all the
kids have a smattering of '' Anglais ") as
to whence it came. Promptly came the
answer *' two eggs," '' Eengleesh soldier,''
so you see the French are just as thrifty as
ever. In fact, more so, I fancy, as every
second house has been turned into one of
these estaminets. It is possible to pur-
chase anything eatable from packages of
Quaker Oats to Heinz's Pork and Beans,
and drinkable from beer to champagne,
excluding spirits like whiskey or brandy.
As far as eats are concerned no one needs
anything staple anyway for we eat like
fighting cocks. Meat, some fresh, some
bully beef, bread or hard tack, potatoes
and one other vegetable, bacon for break-
fast, jam, tea, rice, cheese, condensed milk
and plenty of it. The meat is usually
beef, but alternated with mutton, and our
Company Commander, who is an old
British army officer, says this is a picnic.
Not knowing cannot say, but while there
are some discomforts they are absolutely
nothing to what I expected, and we are
all happy as kings. Of course Fm usually

BILLY'S LETTERS 67

happy, but I find myself breaking into
song every now and then just for sheer
joy. That is, I suppose, a rather queer
idea to any one who at a distance views
the situation, but such is the case.

I cannot recall to memory all the queer
things that have happened, as you may
imagine, but it certainly is a very funny
expedition. My French at the best is
none too healthy, being rather pale and
coming under the heading anaemic, so
I've had some queer times making myself
understood. In the first place through
which we marched several gamins crow-
ded along beside us crying ** Beeskit,
Beeskit,'' and I racked my brain for all
French salutations and forms of greeting,
but nothing seemed to fit, and finally a
little older boy said *' sou veneer," and I
tumbled. He wanted a biscuit like we
eat. Hard tack, in other words. It may
seem easy when it's spelled out, but when
a dirty-faced youngster grabs your thumb
and adds his weight to the already enor-
mous tonnage which you're carrying, your
powers of understanding cease and your
perspective rather clouds.

Well, my dear, I don't think there is
much more to tell, but will write from our
new quarters next week.

Love to all.

Billy.

68 A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

Somewhere.

March 6, 1916.
Dear Mother,

Your letter dated February 15
arrived to-day and finds me in hospital
where IVe been for five days. Nothing
serious but a nasty attack of '' toenail "
poisoning from eating something too near
the side of a tin. It occurred a week to-day,
just before we moved down to Brigade
reserve about two miles from the firing
line. I had nothing to eat for two days,
that is, could eat nothing, and suffered
from acute diarrhoea and then did thirteen
miles in marching order to here, which
was more or less of a '' via dolorosa "
for me, and when I arrived was glad to
lay me down in a dugout which leaked.
Next morning the Colonel and Medical
Officer insisted upon me going into hos-
pital, much against my will, for the
battalion moved up to the firing line,
for its first time that night. It was a
bitter disappointment to your '* only only "
for, dear, after one has laboured for
months studying and instructing his men,
and when the climax comes and all his
work is to be put into actual practice, it
comes hard to lie down and feel that he is
not to have a part in it. However, here I
am, hoping to get out to-day and go in the

BILLY'S LETTERS 69

line for four days the day after to-morrow.
Tm feeling much better, thank you, and
considerably stronger, I think I would
have been jake but for that march over
the pave roads which aggravated the case
considerably. Of those roads more anon.
Well, dear, here we are, as I say, a scant
two miles from the first-line trenches and
even here one is scarce able to realize that
there is a war. For instance this morn-
ing, to look out of the window the sun
is shining and birds singing. Here and
there a touch of snow glistening amongst
the green of the fields or fast being dyed
by the mud of the roads, and not a sound
of war penetrates the walls of the hospital.
Except for khaki moving around from the
window view nothing denotes war at all.
Of course it is not always like that and
there was a noisome bombardment the
first few nights. In fact the first night
when I lay in the dugout it seemed to
never cease. Battery after battery rum-
bled on and only a few hundred yards
away one of the real big guns thundered
occasionally. All this noise punctuating,
as it were, the tinny notes of a piano
grinding out a blare of ragtime from a
Y.M.C.A. hut, the while motor trucks
tattooed by on a road as it were beating
time for the piano. Incongruous, well I
should say so. It certainly, to one who

70 A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

hasn't seen it, must seem inexplicable.
And yet it exists not only here as an
isolated example but all up and down the
line. How truly remarkable are modern
conditions !

The hospital is run by a field ambulance
and is a large building of four stories with
a dozen smaller ones around it. Prior to
the war it was a convent and school and
still the patient nuns work here. Black-
robed and smiling they go about their
duties looking after Belgian refugees, doing
washing for the soldiers and running a
small hospice where officers can get a meal.
I haven't had one, but the boys tell me
they are great. Fried chicken, cauliflower
and pie. Pie I said. Imagine pie. To me
that overshadows the fact that they serve
with each meal a pint of champagne. Yes,
there certainly is a high light over the pie.
I care not what ; custard, apple, lemon,
raisin, mince, blueberry or cocoanut but,
I could certainly cultivate a quarter section
of pie right now. '' Much better this morn-
ing, nurse ! " The place has never been
shelled and in the officers' ward with me,
now, is a Colonel and a Major. The Colonel
said he asked one of the nuns how it came
that they had never been shelled. She
pointed to the crucifix (an inevitable symbol
in every room in every house that I've been
in over here) and said, *' We're kept by the

BILLY'S LETTERS 71

Grace of God/' and I believe it. To
think that for nineteen months in this
maelstrom of war from every quarter, the
buildings have never been hit and these
quiet nuns have gone about tending sick
and wounded, daily holding their matins
and vespers, seems to me a modern miracle.

" O, woman ! in our hours of ease,
Uncertain, coy, and hard to please,
When pain and anguish wring the brow
A ministering angel thou ! — "

As Fve Iain here the force of those
lines comes home more and more. You
know I've always said a nurse had a
halo around her head, well, here there's
nothing but males, mere male orderlies,
and oh, for the touch of woman's hand.
I know that if there was a woman, were
she princess or charwoman, that your
beef tea would at least be warm and have
salt in it, and there would be no sticky
sediment in the bottom of the cup. That,
a hundred other things I could recount,
betoken the lack of the touch feminine.
However, I've no desire to disparage the
work of the dirty, clumsy hands which
ministered unto me, for they are the boys
who in their turn go up into the line and
carry back the wounded. All honour to
them ! But that is just an insistent little
fact that presses home quite poignantly.

72 A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

After one has been a gay and festive
subaltern in the C. E. F. for ten months
one learns to do a weird yet fascinating
occupation known as Map Reading. It
consists of being able to trace one's way
on an ordnance map by means of hiero-
glyphical marks and to know by the
manner in which a road is shown whether
it is a first-class, or a second-class, or a
third-class, or a fourth-class road. Now, a
first-class road is supposed to be one, but
I think that the first-class roads here are
the ones mentioned in the epigram or
proverb, '* The Road to hell, etc.'' ; at
least they are hellish roads. They are all
pave roads and consist, first, of a line of
Flemish poplars on each side. Tall and
stately trees they are and from afar be-
token a quiet shady highway, a dolce far
niente effect, but, ye gods, what awful
purgatory to walk between those lovely
trees ! These pave roads consist of small
blocks (cobble stones), and I have it for
a fact from a respectable source that there
was a clause in the contract which called
that no two blocks be laid at the same
height or angle in any space not exceed-
ing ten metres in width by thirty metres
in depth. So you can readily imagine
that walking is anything but a pleasure.
In fact, if I were a parish priest and my
worthy confessees had hoofs like mine, I

BILLY'S LETTERS 73

could think up no greater penance than
to have them do five miles twice a day
over these roads. Peas in your shoes and
pave roads rank side by side. In any
event thirteen miles of them was too much
for '' me noble hoofs/' which at present are
blistered and sore. In fact any time after
the first five miles I would willingly have
walked on anything soft, Hampshire mud,
a custard pie, six inches of snow or an
eiderdown quilt. I certainly can never
recommend a walking tour in France.

Well, dear, I can't tell you much about
the trenches for I haven't been there, but
will doubtless have a few remarks about
them next time.

Received the joint agreement and will
forward it. You can tear up the one I
sent you.

Love to all. g^^^^.

Somewhere in France.

March 17, 1916.
Dear Mother,

Here I am again in hospital. It
seems as tho' I never get out of the bally
spot. Nothing serious, you know, just
crocked up with a deuce of a cold and a
very sore heel. The heel comes from en-

74 A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

deavouring to break in a new pair of shoes
and started with a bhster which Uke
Finney's Turnip, grew until the length,
breadth and depth thereof was something
to marvel at, and the pain in keeping
with the dimensions. Talk about exqui-
site torture, but I sure feel that the methods
of the Inquisition have nothing on this.
However, she is fast healing up and we
will go back to finish the breaking in of
the new shoes. This breaking in stuff is
no joke and I have not yet discovered
whether it consists in moulding the boot
to the shape of your foot or vice versa,
but I think it is vice versa.

Well, my dear, I've already done a tour
or two in the trenches and can assure
you that they are the only experiences
Tve had that fail to live up to their
reputation. Frankly, they were a keen
disappointment to me in every respect,
altho' I, perhaps, have not had sufficient
time to properly sample them. There
was mud and water to the prescribed
quantities all right, but things are not so
beastly uncomfortable and for forty-eight
hours I never lay down or was even in a
dugout owing to the crowded condition
of the line. Of course one was wet and
cold, but that's what we've been expect-
ing, and the hardships are not, so far,
nearly as great as I anticipated. Of

BILLY'S LETTERS 75

course there was the danger of getting
bumped off any time, but altho' Tm sure
at least two milHon shells and bullets
sang, shrieked, roared, rattled, whistled
(add here any adjective used by war cor-
respondents, they all fit) hurtled by and
around, none hit me. It was rather
terrifying 111 admit, but somehow or
other there was a distinct fascination
about it. One's nerves certainly require
to be constructed on the gyroscopic prin-
ciple, however, to stand the strain. But
the surprising thing was that despite all
information re accuracy hardly one shell
in ten does any damage. At least that was
the impression I got, for none of my men
were hit and the battalion up to the time
I was brought here had no casualties
after ten days in the front line. Of course
I realized that perhaps the weather con-
ditions were not as inclement as early in
the winter, but still I really can see no
such awful conditions as one pictured in
their mind's eye. I talked in England to
hundreds of men returned from the front,
and by piecing together their garbled
accounts, had a sort of patchwork quilt
composition which I chose to call my con-
ception of the trenches, a sort of pre-
impression, but I guess either I was a
bad artist or else the men I talked to
were bad raconteurs, for I surely saw

76 A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

nothing like my conception when we
finally reached the goal. While nothing
is so bad that it might not be worse, and
the same I suppose applies to things, good
conditions in the firing line are neither so
good they couldn't be better, nor yet so
bad they couldn't be worse. Everything
humanly possible is done for the comfort
of the men, and every dugout has a
brazier with charcoal and coke burning to
get warm by, and there is food to spare.
The meals are not of course served table
d'hote, and finger-bowls, I believe, even
in the best battalions, have been reserved
for future use ; but eat you can, and a
little management combined with the aid
of a company cook, does wonders at getting
a hot meal. Always granted that it is
discouraging in extremis, also provoca-
tive of much blasphemy when George the
cook is suddenly compelled to duck and
use as a shield the dixie or pan on which
rested your dinner. Because, despite all
efforts of the A. S. C. and your own
quartermaster-sergeant, there is only so
much for every one, and when yours has
commingled with the soup lying underfoot
it neither adds zest to your appetite nor yet
improves the flavour of ''Mulligan.'' Albeit
this does not occur thrice a day and we
usually are able to say inwardly, if not
aloud, ''For what we are about to receive."

I
I

BILLY'S LETTERS ^^

Of course sleep is rather a minus quan-
tity, particularly for officers, and it was
doubly so with us, for I know I felt at
times rather timid about the small sector
of trench I was responsible for and wanted
to be sure that nothing occurred. In
any event we have not yet acquired the
blase air or nonchalant bearing that
veterans of six months carry, so I say
sleep was lacking in large chunks. I am
now recharging the cells here, having lain
dormant for two days, in fact hibernated,
so to speak, despite the fact that out of
doors it is beautiful weather.

Yes, I think that the '* winter of our dis-
content " is gone for that laggard lover,
Old Sol, has for two days wooed Mother
Earth. And what an ardent affair ! None
of your brotherly pecks as kisses, but long
warm Elinor Glynny ones, so that she is
all dolled up in her spring sartorial effect.
Violets, snowdrops and crocuses under-
foot, bursting buds and the songs of
mating birds overhead, a blue filmy haze
rising from the ground and every now and
then a sleek grey Belgian hare scamper-
ing through the middle distance. That's
the picture that limns itself on your brain
as you walk along the road. Beauty,
beauty everywhere, till one wishes one
had the gift of a Turner to put on canvas
the glories of this French land. IVe just

78 A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

gloried in the view from my window here,
trying to forget that the whole land is
given over to war and that one or two
high explosives could dint the landscape
so badly as to mar it for sightseeing pur-
poses. It seems indeed a shame that so
beautiful a part of the world should be
warped out of all recognition. This hos-
pital or rest station for officers is in a
beautiful old Chateau placed on a small
hill in a circular basin. Around the valley,
as it were, runs a long arc of hills shutting
off the view after five or six miles, but in
between is really beyond my poor pen to
describe. Wonderfully treed are the im-
mediate grounds of the Chateau ; Oak,
Flemish poplar and several trees of un-
known (at least to me) species, their tops
gradually blending into one another till
the bottom of the hill is reached, a sort of
terraced lawn. Then the plain small farms
with their cluster of buildings around
them, tiny quadrangles and triangles
hedged off with mounds of earth and
sparse hedgerows where they grow their
crops. Here and there a haystack or a
terra-cotta roof shows up, while the smoke
from a village some three miles away,
veers upward just as lazily as our smoke
at home does on a lackadaisical day in
spring. Everything over here, dear, seems
to move so much slower than at home.

BILLY'S LETTERS 79

For instance, every village has its church
and spire, and every spire its chimes ; and
in place of clanging out with strident notes
its quarters, half and hour, languorously
the sounds float over in deep resonant
waves. Long, long seconds seem to elapse
between notes, in fact you count, say, ten,
and, knowing it's eleven, you figure youVe
missed one at the first, when '* blong ! "
over comes the final sound. So also the
windmills. I've read innumerable stories
about the lazy Dutch mills, and here they
are. Square, grey buildings with the
regulation four arms that turn slowly and
rather jerkily. They always seem to me
as if a tired man were turning them at a
windlass inside, and when the handle
reached the top, he got a little more
pressure on the downward stroke. I may
have failed to give you the right idea, but
it's here in my own brain. Well, I could
go on telling you about this picturesque
spot and describing the beauties of the
surrounding country indefinitely, but
better stop here.

As I tell you, we are quartered in this
old Chateau — truly an old-world place if
one ever existed. Set upon this hill with
magnificent grounds around, flower-beds,
rhododendron bushes, stately oaks, tall
slim poplars, deciduous trees of every kind
arching over long shaded walks which wind

8o A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

round and round, always coming back to
the Chateau. These walks, lined with
secluded spots and arbours, where per-
chance lurks an inviting rustic bench or
maybe a stone or marble statue in a
variety of subjects from Circe to Diana
and Mercury to Cupid. Then snuggling
in the side of the hill is a disused con-
servatory with hundreds of broken panes
and a seemingly impossible number of
flower-pots whole or otherwise ; and I
could not help thinking of you and your
watering-can and a certain third-story
garden I know of. Anyway there are pots
enough here that if filled would keep you
watering from dawn to dark. Adjoining
this is a very pretentious pheasant house
all wired off in pens and walks and con-
structed of mortar, stone and wood like a
Swiss Chalet, while stables and a most
modern garage are further on. As for the
house itself, a quaint old spot with high
corniced ceilings and walls covered with
tapestry. A large hall, dining-room, lounge,
salon and writing-room elaborately decor-
ated, and all connected by wide, high glass
doors. Beautiful parquet floors of Spanish
oak. The furniture is all old, very old,
some of it Louis XIV. Old candelabra,
antique brassware, etc., fill every corner,
while paintings, whose value I know not,
adorn the walls. And to offset this

BILLY'S LETTERS 8i

mediaeval old spot, it is lighted with both
gas and electricity and has lightning rods
and steam heat.

Will write again next week. Love to all
with heaps for you.

Billy.

Somewhere.

March 24, 1916.
Dear Mother,

As you will see by the heading I'm
at Somewhere. I believe you may have
heard of this place, but I know that its
importance is not known to you. Ask
any schoolboy the principal city of France
and hell say Paris, but '' Somewhere "
has recently so increased in population
that I believe it supersedes gay Paree in
importance to-day. Of course it is young ;
less than two years ago it was all peaceful
farming lands but to-day it is a vast
seething mass of humanity, its thorough-
fares teem with motors, while overhead
fast-flitting aeroplanes act as messengers.
It is, indeed, the most prominent spot in
the world to-day and gives promise. De-
sist, I prithee. It almost seems like the
good old pre-war days when one sold or
bought lots. However, dear, I to-day
received your letters dated March 6 and

82 A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

i6th and was very glad to hear from you
as usual. Mail-day means a lot over here,
you know. I also received another letter
earlier in the week, the date of which IVe
forgotten, and I think a parcel you sent
and some letters have gone astray. But
they'll turn up ; they always do. We've
moved twice since they came, and I
believe they were sent to hospital when
I was there, but just as surely as fate
they'll follow on, for the Army P.O. is a
wonderful institution and no matter where
or when you move, within a few hours
along comes your mail. For instance
yesterday we moved some miles and
Canadian mail is due to-day. No matter
where you are, along she comes.

Well, dear, as I say, a letter is always
most welcome, for it's the only link that
forges the ends of *' home " and '' here "
together. It's welcome whether it con-
tains a lot of news or just a little, because
really the alchemy of a dear one's hand-
writing causes all the dross of this war to
sink, the golden memories of home, happier
times, friends, and, best of all, love, to
rise up ; and then your letter was so
newsy, dear, and what a coincidence, the
dream I mean. By comparing dates I
think you'll find I was lying in hospital
when you dreamed and every few minutes
over and around flew aeroplanes. So

BILLY'S LETTERS 83

perchance there is something in telepathy
even more th,an just a web o' dreams.

Well, dear one, I really don't know
much to tell you, for actually news is
mighty scarce. You see officers censor
their own letters. That is, we seal them
up and they are not liable to be censored
at the base. We are put on our honour not
to mention anything of importance, and
it is left to our judgment what to tell ; so
really honour is a stricter censor than the
much-hated one at the base. However, we
moved from billets up nearer the firing
line and are four miles from the front line
trenches, in huts which are more or less
shelter-affairs. If one spoke about a
shelter in Canada, I always associated
with it at once the Salvation Army, or
the Children's Aid Society, or a nearby
doorway in a rainstorm. Here a shelter
consists of some pieces of two and six sur-
rounded by sacking, with perhaps a door.
Of course it is very healthy in dry weather
for all the air you get is filtered through
the sacking. However, I told you that
Old Sol was wooing Mother Earth. Well,
publish it not in Gath, but they had a tiff
last night and that hoary old beast Winter
called in his (Sol's) absence. The ground
was about an inch deep in snow this
morning and the atmosphere accordingly,
and now there is once more six inches of

84 A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

mud on the roads ; result being that she
was '' some chillsome " at six a.m. when
you arose and tremblingly tucked your
goose-fleshy legs into breeches and socks
*' dewy like the rose.'' C'est la vie.

I am sending you a photo of the little
girlie, one of four she sent me. I don't
mind telling you it is the worst of the
bunch and really isn't much like her, but
she is a dear thing, and I'm really not
horribly sentimental. As for your being
an in-law, I know you'll make just as
good a one as you do a Maw. Anyway
we'll try you out when I get back.

As for that code, my dear, if I'm taken
prisoner there's not much you could do.
I'm afraid Wilhelm wouldn't or couldn't
do anything, and I presume I would be
given the same treatment as the rest. Of
course food is a necessity, I'm told, and
Aunt EHzabeth could send bread and
stuff over. However, if I am taken, which

isn't likely, I'll misspell thus ,

if I think anything you could do through
Cousin Jane would be any use, and' if I
do not receive the parcels sent, which by
the way are a necessity, I'll misspell
receive or received by transposing ei to
ie ; both these will get by as natural, I
should say, but there is a very strict
censorship in regard to letters and they'll
only let you write two a month, I am told.

BILLY'S LETTERS 85

We are in a part of the line now which
is a trifle more Uvely than any we've been
in before. You see over here the aspect
of the war narrows down considerably.
You are really only interested in your
actual front, as it were, and usually have
enough to do to look after that. What
the Grand Duke Nicholas is doing, or
whether Turkey has been carved, or why
Manitoba voted dry, doesn't count. It's
what is Fritz going to do next in this few
yards of trench I'm responsible for, or I
wonder if we'll move in or out to-morrow ;
and one has plenty to do to see the men
fed and quartered and inspect their feet
and rifles twice a day and see they have
their proper amount of ammunition and an
emergency ration uneaten. You see an
emergency ration consists of a pound of
hard tack or biscuits, a small tin of tea
and sugar and a tin of corn beef. Every
man must always keep that, for it is
against regulations to eat it except when
in dire straits and on the orders of a
Company Commander. But once in a while
Tommy has a gnawing in his eight-cylinder
self-starting 1916 model stomach. Then
you see he has to report that ''I've lost
my iron ration. Sir." Of course you ask
where, and he says that someone stole it,
or the rats ran away with the works, or it
fell in a well, or a starving aviator came

86 A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

down and stopped him, so out of the good-
ness of his heart he gave him the food.
Almost any story made up on the instant
goes. You berate him for being careless,
knowing meanwhile he ate it, then proceed
to apply through your Company Com-
mander to the Colonel, thence the Quarter-
Master, who indents on the A. S. C. for
another. Hurrah for the Hfe of a soldier !
As I started to say, we narrow down
our view here and a perusal of Canadian
papers re the Canadian Corps can tell
more every day than we know. Anyway
the general opinion here seems to be that
the war can't last much longer than, say,
next fall. The Verdun affair means some-
thing and perhaps a few last gasps like
that will see the tag end in sight. There
is one thing I've always intended to con-
fide in you since we arrived here, and
that is I'm only another Henry Ford.
As a Peacemaker I'm a frost pure and
simple. I say this after unsuccessfully,
for many nights in succession, endeavour-
ing to arrange for an eight-hour armistice
between my left hip and a board floor. I
started out with the idea of a permanent
peace ; gradually felt I'd be satisfied
with an amnesty ; now an armistice is all
I crave. There is one consolation, I'll
never need a luxurious boudoir '' Apres
la guerre " (you'll see my French is quite

BILLY'S LETTERS 87

fluent, in fact I speak it just like a

Canadian). Albeit a disused dog kennel,
an abused woodshed or even a dilapidated
windmill (Canadian type), is a perfectly
elegant spot in which to sleep. Oster-
moors, homo-quinge beds or eiderdown
can be classed with Dodo or mastodons.
Herewith a small Encyclopaedia Soldier-
annica :

Batman : a soldier paid by you to be
absent when you want him.

Beer, Belgian : a liquid resembling beer
British or beer American ; evidently a
distant branch of the same family.

Billet : any place so designated by a
billeting officer.

Dugout : (a) men's, a patriotic dog
kennel that enlisted, (b) Officer's, a root
cellar that got into society.

Duty : anything, everything.

Heaven : (a) Leave, (&) Rum, (c) Heat.

Hell : working party.

Home : a poignant memory relegated
to the limbo of things unattainable.

Jam : a sticky substance invariably
made of plums, used to smear bread.

M.T. (Mechanical Transport) : a Jug-
gernautical affair demanding three-fourths
of the road and made to splash mud.

Projectile : see working party.

Rations : '* Man wants but little here
below."

88 A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

Rum : a warming elixir issued in tooth-
fuls by zealous officers.

Sausages : pork, a species of animal
extinct.

Sock : an ever wet, sticky article, used
as a covering for foot, hand or rifle.

Working party : hell.

Whiskey : well, the Governor of North
Carolina said

I really don't think there is any more
to say this time.

Remember me to any one who would

care to remember me, with love to

and heaps for you.

Billy.

April 5, 1916.
Dear Mother,

Just a few lines. IVe neglected you
horribly this week, but work has pressed
awfully. Saturday last, the battalion
moved up into the trenches, and just
before they left I was detailed to act as
Transport Officer. That is, nightly to
take up the rations to the men in addition
to many other duties.

It is no sinecure, I can assure you, as it
means cold-blooded riding on a horse at
the head of your transport column, seven
limbers, at a walk, along roads subjected

• BILLY'S LETTERS 89

to high explosives, shrapnel and whizz
bangs, in addition to being potted at by-
snipers when you get close to the trenches.

We go through one of the most famous
ruined cities of Belgium each night, which
they shell continuously, and also all along
the way. We leave at dusk, go sixteen
miles there and back, returning between
twelve p.m. and two a.m., and I would like
you to know all about it, but cannot spare
time just now to write, but will to-morrow.
A message has just come to say that the
roads are being shelled more than ever
to-night and we must proceed with
twenty yards interval between limbers,
that is to minimize the danger of the whole
transport being blown up.

You see troops must be fed. No excuses
gO'if rations don't come. If one way
fails you must have another, and your
brain amid the rumble of wheels and the
rattle and shriek of shells, is always figur-
ing a way out if one limber gets blown up.
Personally I prefer the trenches. There,
one has a rifle at least and the excitement
and lust of retaliation helps. This business
is deliberately, slowly and precisely walk-
ing into an inferno — one that puts Dante's
in the class of a skating rink. I had two
horses injured last night and one man shot
straight through his cap.

Anyway, dear, you and I are queer,

90 A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

psychically I mean. I've never had any
odd premonitions, but to-night I feel a
sense of foreboding, an impending danger,
so scribble these lines.

Of course you realize, dear, that one
schools oneself to dying if necessary. Not
that life isn't very sweet but, when one is
five seconds away from death for twenty-
four hours a day, one grows rather care-
less, I suppose. However, dear,. I feel
that way to-night as I know Tm riding
into it, so in case I get bumped off I wanted
to write you.

All my love and all my thoughts.

Billy.

I enclose a letter Fve never finished, I
want you to have.

Dear Mother,

Although it was only yesterday I
wrote you the mood is on me to-night and
I want to have a paper talk with you. You
see, dear, there's something new come into
my life and I just don't know how to
cope with it. Although it's old, old, I
guess it was old when Nineveh and Tyre
flourished ; yet right now in my own time,
my own heart, it is very real and so I want
to tell you about it.

You'll doubtless remember, dear, I spoke

BILLY'S LETTERS 91

often within the last two years or so of
having a home of my own. The ardent
longing that ever and anon pressed upon
me for something other than the vacuum
of a room when night came on. It was
always night when the desire came ; night,
when my thoughts, relieved from the duties
of the day, spent their own time in rambling
day-dreams. Always with night-time
came, I say, that insistent little wish for
something beside a bar-room, a club, a
theatre, a gilded restaurant, or the four
walls of a bedroom. Well, dear, I suppose
that wish was the forerunner of the new
something that has burst out into my
days and nights. That something that I
suppose must be called Love.

In retrospect to-night, I cannot recall
any event in my life of any importance
that you didn't know about first. With
the exception of a few boyish secrets that
really cannot be considered, I fail to rake
from memory's heap, one joy or sorrow
that your mother's intuition didn't learn
of or that I didn't tell you, and so, dear, L
want to go to you to-night, my Mother
Confessor.

Since I've really grown up and known
my mind I don't think I've ever been
what is popularly known as a ladies' man.
I never had my nails manicured but once,
and as a juggler of macaroons at after-

92 A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

noon teas T/m a decided frost. In fact,
reduced down, I guess I failed to qualify
in the opinion of the ladies. I am no
Apollo, and as a matter of fact was too
fond of my Ostermoor to arise early
enough to titivate myself. Perhaps,
largely because I had no incentive other
than a desire to be only neatly dressed,
I aroused in no woman more than a
passing interest. I was always content to
dance with them, take them to a theatre
and home, with an occasional kiss sur-
reptitiously stolen (IVe flattered myself).
Selfish perhaps, I made myself pleasant, or
tried to, because it gave me pleasure to trot
out a well-dressed, good-looking damsel.
But when I left her, that ended it.

But now, away over here in war-ridden
Belgium, comes the grand desire for just
one woman. It's a queer psychological
fact, that every man in khaki wants a
wife ; witness the war weddings. I pre-
sume it's the old primordial instinct come
out. He seems to want someone to leave
behind ; someone to fight for. He seems
to want the sensation of the cave man,
that of battling for one being, his woman.
So, the natural supposition comes that it's
one woman, my woman. At any rate con-
stantly there is, before me, the vision of
the face of the '' Girl I left behind me."
Queer Uttle memories that come intrud-

BILLY'S LETTERS 93

ing into my mind, which should perhaps
be employed in the weightier problem of
figuring out how many tins of the inevit-
able plum jam my platoon should draw
in to-night's rations, or some similar
worry. But as I say, the memory of her
intrudes in so many ways. Sometimes on
a route march, as I swing along in the
selfsame monotonous step — for one gets
to be an automaton at marching — the
pictures of her come back. A picture of
how she looked the first night I met her,
of the profile of her, marked in memory's
book at a movie, of sitting in the gleam
of a grate fire, of the last weepy moments
before the train left. All these and many
more recur with insistent demand for
my attention at queer times, and in
queer places. I think that every night
in that magic space of minutes that are
one's very own, the fleeting seconds between
the time I slide shiveringly into a blanket
and the drowsy instant I fall asleep,
comes the mental picture of her. And
because that has always been a sort of
sacred minute of mine own, a moment for
my deepest thought, my sincerest resolu-
tions, I feel sure that Love has come to me.
As I said before, the sensation is new —
the longing for one person in all the
world, so infinitely foreign heretofore —
I can scarcely dissect my feelings, can

94 A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

really not comprehend it. Albeit, the
desire for her is there, the heart-hunger
for the sight of her, the wish to be beside
her to-night, now, and ever. Ever the
plans for a future home — that seems to be
the goal of all the thoughts, no matter
where the train of memory started, nor
how tortuous the road ; always the end is
in the home 111 come back to, the home
IVe planned.

Billy.

Somewhere.

April i6, 1916.
Dear Mother,

Your letters of March 20, 26, 29 all
to hand. I received a parcel from Eaton's.
Thanks very much. Also the parcels from
Auntie for which I am going to write.

Well, my dear, I sent you a scribbled
little note some days ago but you see
everything is all right. The prescience of
the future was a little strong that evening,
I fear me, but I sure felt queer. As a
matter of fact nothing could have been
more quiet than that night. I guess I
mustn't let my vivid imagination run riot
any more. The nervous strain is abso-
lutely too much, so will not do it again.

Well, dear, Fm still on this transport

BILLY'S LETTERS 95

job, and I can assure you it will be some-
what of a relief to get off. You see you
sit on a nervous horse and head a pro-
cession up to the ration dump. It's
too bally cold-blooded an affair for me.
There one sits in calm majesty, as it were,
and from the time you start out till you
get within a few hundred yards of the
trenches, Fritz heaves over H. E. shrapnel
and whizz bangs — all very real forms of
fright fulness. Then as one gets up to the
line the road is peppered by indirect
machine-gun fire, and still one sits and
takes it. You see there is no retaliation,
— ^if one is on a front-line trench, well,
you could work off your superfluous hate
by fifteen rounds rapid ; or you know
that by a telephone you can have your
supporting battery heave a dozen or so
on to the heads of the Huns, thereby
proving to him you're asleep ; but this
old transport job is such a helpless, hope-
less affair. It's as much the moral effect
as anything, for, each time you start out,
you know that somewhere along the road
you're going to run into it and you bake
that thought into a russet-brown as it heats
in the oven of your mind. You see Napo-
leon said an army moved on its stomach,
and while movement these days is just a
trifle different from his time. Tommy to-
day has to have his beans, bully beef and

96 A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

jam, etc., just the same. There is no such
word as can't in the bright lexicon of a
subaltern, and I am thinking it applies
even more to a transport officer, for no
excuses are accepted if rations don't come.
If you get a bump there's a sergeant, if
both get it, a corporal, and finally a driver
to every team, who'll do his duty and get
the stuff there.

However, it is a wonderful experience
to ride along a road that is being shelled.
Perchance in the glory of a sunset, or in
the hght of the old moon, or yet again on
a coal-black night with rain making the
road like a banana peel on a granolithic
sidewalk, and you as miserable as a
human being can feel. It's wonderful, I
say, to look into the hell of a big shell
that bursts fifty feet away and of which
you can feel the concussion. In fact, the
longer I'm here the more wonderful this
war seems. The psychology of the human
element is most amazing. The other night
as I rode up a road, above my head was
the whish-whish-whish, ad infinitum, of
machine-gun fire, while on the ground the
put-put-put of the same, or rather other
guns ; and, will you believe me, I found
myself humming '' Little Grey Home of
the West." That sounds incredible but
nevertheless it is absolutely a fact.

Well, Old Mumsie, I'd like to recount

BILLY'S LETTERS 97

for you some of my impressions. For
instance, can you imagine riding along a
roadway, with the moon beneath a cloud
and, from right to left, the light of thou-
sands of flares going up ; flares that make
the white lights at Toronto Exhibition
Fireworks seem like a candle, as against
a 100 watt Mazda. As I say, flares radi-
ating a pale white glow, guns booming,
rifle fire cracking, and suddenly, out from
the clouds, comes the moon, and there,
beside the road, glistening in the light of
Luna, is one of the small graveyards which
punctuate the land. Perhaps fifty men
have been '' dumped '' — that's the word —
under those mounds, with the scant short
liturgy of the service read over them ; and
you see the gleaming, white wooden crosses
like so many spectres standing out against
the ground. " God's Acre," if ever there
was one, not one acre, but thousands that
for ever and a day will be a lasting tribute
to the manhood of the Empire. At one
place along my route there is a tiny road-
side shrine. It stands beside a road
untouched, and sentinels the tiny white
forest of crosses that loom out of the night.
That's but one picture limned in bold
lines on my brain ; there are dozens that
I can't write of. But one is a ride in
moonlight through a ruined city. Can you
picture a city as large as, well, Brandon ;

98 A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

a city noted for its wonderful Gothic
architecture, absolutely razed — ^not a whole
building left — ^here a wall, there a con-
glomeration of debris ; a city of homes
and stores deserted, save for a few soldiers
who control traffic through its streets and
who live like rats in a cellar ? I know you
couldn't picture it any more than my poor
pen can write of it, but still I wonder if you
can imagine the impression etched on my
mind as I rode between those ruined walls
while the moonlight sifted between crags
of bricks and fantastic minarets of mortar.
I dismounted the other night and went
into the ruins of a seventeenth-century
Cathedral, a glorious structure in its day,
a world-renowned spot ; and there in the
dusty debris of its chancel I stood and
thought. Gone was the spell of sanctity
that pervades one as he enters a conse-
crated place, gone the inimitable Gothic
work of its altar, gone the images of gold
and porcelain, the gold lace of the altar
cloth. Never again will the Nunc Dimittis
be chanted, never the incense of swinging
brazier scent the air, and never again will
a black-robed priest from his latticed
confessional box listen to the story of
human frailties. It's hard to tell you.
Mother o' mine, just the thoughts that
came and went, hard to dissect the notes
that sounded in my heart ; but one that

BILLY'S LETTERS 99

was as a clarion was the absence of a
GOD. That may sound funny or sacri-
legious, but it was the uppermost thought
in my mind. Here a house of His wrecked
until only a wall of broken stone and a
statue of the Virgin stood to remember it
by. Anyway, herewith a small piece of
hand-made lace dug from out the debris
and presumably made by pale-faced nuns
as part of the altar cloth. Til try and get
some more for Auntie. Do not attempt
to wash it. I also have some stained glass
which rU not be able to send yet.

.Well, dear, it's bedtime, which is a
movable feast in this land, and one must
grab as much as you can when you can.
Love to all.

Billy.

Flanders.

April zyth, 191 6.
My Dear Mother,

Fve been waiting every day for a
letter from you, but so far it seems that
there isn't one. It's over two weeks since
one came, and every day I've put off
writing, patiently waiting so that I could
answer it.
There really isn't very much news to

100 A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

write you this time. The transport oflficer.
came back, so I return to my company to-
night. The transport job was all right
but rd just as soon go back to my platoon.
However, the C. O. in turning over to the
T. O. said I had done good work and he
would remember it ; also, he wouldn't
remove me were it not for the fact that I
was a senior sub. in the regiment. So to-
morrow night up we go into the trenches,
into a real delightful spot ; at least
delightful in the fact that Fritz makes it
very warm there. Casualties have been
quite heavy there lately. From the dis-
tance comes the sounds of a band playing
'' Marching Through Georgia,'' and you
know I've a sneaking wish I were. The
bands out here are surely a great delight
for, on an afternoon, from the four quarters
come marches, waltzes, or overtures,
punctuated by an occasional artillery pre-
lude, and none too pleasantly obliterated
by the strident skirl of the pibroch.
Nevertheless the old adage that '' Music
hath charms " holds good out here and our
savage breasts are soothed and our minds
refreshed by the airs, be they martial or
motherly, that every band sends out, from
the famous Coldstreams, down to a cheep-
ing fife and drum.

Humour out here is a saving grace and I
can assure you there are lots of chances

BILLY'S LETTERS loi

to acquire the grace. For instance, while
passing through a certain town which has
been, and is, continually shelled, a soldier
on sentry duty in my hearing said, *' I was
sent back to do base duty. This is a 'ell
of a base.'' This caustic remark was
made as he stopped the transport to
inform me the road ahead was being
shelled, and as we stopped Fritz lobbed
"over a couple of shrapnel just ahead some
twenty yards. Of course no one who
hasn't been out here can appreciate the
story. You must know the setting ere the
crux penetrates, but I rode along and
laughed as much as if I were in Shea's and
Al Jolson was '* on."

But what I started to say was that the
most humorous humours we have are the
home papers with their vivid descrip-
tions, etc., gleaned by men who never go
nearer to the front than where the rail
head is, also the letters from budding
officers in Canada. For instance, I read
one the other day where a subaltern in

, who is in charge of the recruiting of

some battalion, said he certainly didn't
think that anything could be so arduous.
I'll bet if that guy knew how many laughs
he handed a lot of us out here he'd feel
qualified to start an act in vaudeville. I'll
also bet that if half the gang in Canada
who are breaking their necks to get com-

102 A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

missions, realized the responsibilities en-
tailed by a Sam Browne belt and two
stars on their sleeves, they'd not be so
anxious. It's jake swanking around
Canada as a Major, but it's different over
here. One's responsibilities seem enormous,
and really are, together with just the same
discomforts and hard work that anyone on
the front line goes through. Your men,
while they are men and must not be
treated as children, depend absolutely on
you for their very being. You are a sort
of last resort for everything in their lives,
from clothes and food to seeing their
effects go to their people after they are
gone to the '* Last Parade." You know,
dear, I sometimes think it's pathetic the
dependance of these chaps on me, and one
only really realizes what a King's Com-
mission means when you get out here.

I believe they've stopped publishing
casualties by battalions or are going to, so
now you'll never know whether we've been
bumped or not.

I've not found time to write to anyone
but you, lately, so you'll have to convey
my love or regards, as the case may be,
to everyone.

Heaps of love.

Billy.

BILLY'S LETTERS 103

'May 13, 1916.
Dear Mother,

I have your letters of the i6th, i8th
and 22nd of April, and altho' I've been
out of the trenches for five days I've not
been able to concentrate my thoughts on
writing.

We spent eight days of veritable hell in
a rotten part of the line, in fact the worst
part I've ever been in. We occupied a
series of holes, some connected and some
isolated, ranging in distance from thirty
to fifteen yards from Fritz's lines. They
were old German trenches taken some
time ago, and it is almost impossible to
do any great amount of work on them.

Well, as I say, we spent the time in
them, and I was heartily thankful to get
out. I went through my first heavy bom-
bardment at really close range. They
dumped '' Crumps," Coal Boxes, Shrapnel
and Whizz Bangs to the number of about
three hundred all around us for two
hours and then attacked. Just as night
overshadowed daylight and objects began
to grow indistinct, one of my sentries re-
ported a party out in the front. Suddenly
from our right, rapid fire and machine
guns opened up, and so I gave the order
*' fifteen rounds rapid." Keyed up and
ready were the boys, and we gave them a

104 A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

few hundred capsules of steel. Squeals,
grunts, and moans, then the reverberating
roar of machine guns, and rifle fire ceased.
So, our first real attack was repulsed.
Further on, our line suffered more heavily
but I guess we were fairly lucky. All the
night they kept at us with bombs, rifle
grenades and trench mortars to which we
replied in kind vigorously, but they learned
their lesson from that taut tense ten
minutes. No more attacks.

That is, I suppose, a pretty tame story
of a bombardment, an attack, its repul-
sion, but words fail me. The confines of
expression are not competent to tell you
much more. IVe refrained from writing,
hoping that in the interim some inspira-
tion would come that would adequately
convey to you a picture. I tried to dissect
my emotions so that you might visualize,
partially at least, what a day and a night
— twenty-four hours in a front-line trench
mean ; but I have failed dismally.

To begin with, the nervous strain is
great, and when one has his heart broken
in addition, it's hard to limn for another,
the lines etched on your soul, the im-
pression registered in your memory.

My heart was broken, dear, because
before this bombardment at all I lost
eighteen men of my own platoon ; eighteen
of the best and truest fellows IVe ever

BILLYHS LETTERS 105

known ; saw five of them die — one in my
arms — all hit by these devils of Huns —
hit by snipers who use explosive bullets
— a bullet that tears a hole as large as a
tomato can, and if it strikes anything
hard bursts into three pieces, each the
size of a quarter, that maims and wounds
— a bullet that if it hits the head tears off
the top.

God ! I wonder if you could even
imagine the primordial lust of battle that
courses through one's brain, the desire to
kill that permeates the muscle, the ex-
hilaration that comes when you know
youVe actually hit one of your enemies.

I can candidly say there was no fear in
me.

For months, in fact long ere we left old
Canada, the fear I had that dominated
my waking moments was not will I be
afraid, but will I be able to control my
fear. I was always afraid I would be
afraid. Well, after the bombardment
ceased I wasn't, and even during that two
hours of mental torture I wasn't afraid,
just nervous. But when I knew they were
actually coming, ah ! what exhilaration,
what primeval bloody thoughts I had !
A valiant desire came amid the fight to
do all the damage I could, and I rushed
from bay to bay of the sector of trench
I commanded, exhorting my men to be

io6 A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

steady and cursing them if they weren't,
here grabbing an extra rifle and blazing
its magazine full at the indistinct forms,
or there firing one shot from my revolver.
No fear, no thought of self ; just the hope
that we'd beat them off ; just the thought
constantly of what was best to do, how
best to preserve every life in my charge —
every life in my charge that was preserving
my life. So you see, analyzed and tested
down, the ancient self-preservation rule
holds good.

But the aftermath — the vacuum at the
stomach — the palpitating heart — the deep
breaths you needed, that, if you did not
take, it seemed as if you'd choke, the
feeling you must sit down — the desire for
a drink — the insatiable way in which you
ate up cigarette after cigarette in long
deep inhales — the hope they would not
start bombarding again — the cheery voice
you forced as you walked along a bath
mat and jokingly curbed your own desire
to shout by praising the men and belit-
ting '' the show " ; all these when your
emotions that had bubbled to the boiling
point again simmered down. That night
as I walked along and did my best to
restore the steadiness of my men, ever
and anon came those immortal lines of
Kipling :

BILLY'S LETTERS 107

" If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn, long after they are gone
And so hold on, when there is nothing in you
Except the Will, which says to them ' Hold on,' "

recurred again and again, and I offered
up to the Almighty, He whose name a
few minutes before I had taken in vain,
a fervent, silent, little prayer, that I
should be given the strength of will and
body to keep it up.

Then the interminable night with every
nerve and muscle strained in a long
*' stand to,'' with the added exertion of
placing an additional platoon that came
up as reinforcements, and the cramped,
numbed feeling as one sat in a narrow
trench with the intermittent rattle of rifle
fire, the insistent tattoo of a machine gun,
or the hazy smoke of flares that ever and
anon '* swizzed " up here and there, light-
ing in their ghastly magnesium the faces
of the men who, cramped and cold, waited
for they knew not what. All these factors,
I say, broke the nerve and strained the
mentality.

And the wait for dawn. I sat and
watched the sky star-studded, if ever it
was, watched Ursus Major, Polaris, The
Pleiades, Andromeda, a star I thought
was Saturn, and one I knew was Mars —
Mars the God we're propitiating over
here. I watched them and untold millions

io8 A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

more fade into the steel vault that, by
the alchemy of old Sol, melted into pris-
cilla grey and imperceptibly changed to
whity blue, while rimming the East was
the orange band that I knew some six
hours later would herald the dawn of day
to you in dear old Homeland. Then the
real diurnal '* stand to '' as dawn comes
up. Every man ready, alert and anxious,
until bright daylight dispels all fears of
an attack.

After that '' stand down " and then
Rum. Ah, that Rum ! If some of those
carping criers at home whose protests
against Tommy getting his tot could sit
with their feet numbed and chilled by
eighteen inches of stinking water, could
sit or stand for twenty-four hours a day
in a cramped crouch and feel, as I have
felt, that a chance to stretch their legs and
arms would be a luxury rivalling the
dearest wish that heretofore you'd ever
had ; I say, if some of those people at
home could do these things, oh how Td
love to take them for an eight-day tour,
I feel sure they'd never open their mouths
again. That mouthful of rum, about a
half wine-glass, trickles down warming
and burning, meanwhile restoring in a
man whose nerves are like the lace on a
window blind, a little vigour, a further lease
on life, that in the grey dawn seems cheap

BILLY'S LETTERS 109

at best. If they want to do away with
their own drinks let them, but until they've
been through the acid test of ninety-six
hours without much rest, ninety-six hours
of mental strain and physical exertion,
mayhap ninety-six hours when every
stitch of clothing has been wet through,
please let them keep their hands off the
question out here.

After that elixir, ** Stand down ! " when
only the various sentries are left on duty
all through the long day, but every man
cleans his rifle and equipments, and if any
water is available shaves, washes and tries
to scrape some of the mud from his
clothes. And then a breakfast. You who
at home sit down to a half of a succu-
lent grape-fruit or a sliced orange, with por-
ridge and cream (I had almost forgotten
that word), or a browned and sizzling
omelet with thin, crisp toast and a cup
of coffee, will never know what it is to boil
water over a candle wrapped in sacking.
The recipe for this is : Fold a piece of
sacking, preferably dry, if available, around
one and a half inches of waxed candle,
place these ingredients wick-end up in an
empty jam tin, which has been perfor-
ated with a knife ; on this one places
his mess -tin full of water and lights the
candle. Then comes in President Wilson's
idea, '' A watchful, waiting policy." Mean-

no A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

while, Fritz is sending notes in the form
of shrapnel, which, while conciliatory, are
nevertheless likely to cause a breach in
your relations with the aforesaid can and
candle, or even in your anatomy, if you
are in its way. Well, after youVe watched
and waited and heaped on more fuel,
which is obtained by cutting off the
fat from your meagre slice of bacon, the
water bubbles and actually boils. Then
you add a handful of tea and sugar mixed
by a thoughtful Quartermaster-sergeant,
and the ambrosia is ready to serve. This
with the unexpended portion of your extra
fuel mentioned above, which is crisped in
the same manner, forms your matutinal
feast, at least, with the addition of your
half-loaf of bread which is held in your
left hand, and eaten as a schoolboy does an
apple.

I fear that this epistle grows weary, so
will start with lots of little things. To
begin with, I received a parcel of socks,
candy, coffee and cream cheese from A. S.,
for which I wrote a note, also sent a

souvenir. I am sending a parcel

which is for you, two nose caps off German
shells and a bullet which clipped a piece
out of my sleeve, afterwards burying itself
in a good old sandbag.

Read the bottom of a Grape Nuts.
Don't waste postage on newspapers and

BILLY'S LETTERS iii

don't send anything except cakes, as we
can buy here, more cheaply than you,
fruits, etc. Canadian cigarettes always
acceptable, also handkerchiefs, cheapest
obtainable, as we lose vast quantities.

Socks are jake, for if we can't use them
ourselves we give them to the men.

Hope this bally " show " will be over in
a short time. Yours,

^ Billy.

P.S. — Later will send story of the poor
chap who died in my arms.

B.

See page 123.

London.

August 8, 1916.
My Dear Mother,

I am going to try to put on paper,
my dear, a few of the million pictures that
are etched in the gallery of my memory.
The picture Fm trying to pen for you is
the one which comes to me here in hospital
as I try to piece together the events lead-
ing up to the time that I got mine . I realize
full well how difficult it is to describe
** the front " to anyone who has never
seen a trench, and I know if I'm not
explicit sometimes you'll understand, I'm

112 A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

only doing my best. I fear me it will be
a poor best at that, for so many, many
times Fve said that only a Dante could
describe and Dore paint it.

To begin with, you must understand
that our brigade had been relieved at night
after eight days of very trying times in
which the Bosche put over about every
kind of projectile he owns, from Minen-
werfers or heavy trench mortars, to his
delectable whizz bangs. He didn't fail
even to present us with some of his famous
''Silent Annies,'' a large - calibre shell
which makes practically no noise till it
bursts. Well, as I say, we were relieved
and finally in the grey '' coolth " of dawn
arrived in billets.

After some breakfast, we proceeded to
go to bed, a most welcome thought. Off
came the sticky clothes that for sixteen
days — eight spent in reserve — had alter-
nately been wet through with sweat and
water, only to dry again ; and after a few
preliminary scratchings of sides and backs
and shoulders, we dropped into the pro-
found sleep that only weary men know
about on that first morning in billets.

I don't suppose I'm any bigger coward
than the average man, but I always felt
fervently thankful after a tour in the line
when we arrived in billets. There, while
not safe from long-range guns, one could

BILLY'S LETTERS 113

at least, relax, throw off the harassing
strain, physical and mental, drop as like
a cloak the responsibility incurred while
actually on the firing line. So, I say, I,
and Fm sure everyone else, was pleased
with the thought that for some time,
except for working parties, we were free.
A '' Thank God that's over ! '' feeling.

I was awakened by my man about ten
a.m. — so blessed shave and wash — some
more breakfast, and then we revelled in
the thought of a bath. We went from hut
to hut laughing and jesting, here com-
paring notes, there condoling with some
chap who ordered us to '' Get out, I didn't
get in till 7.30," happy and free, little
realizing what was going on a scant eight
miles away. Always, always, there came
the dull boom of guns, perhaps more
marked than usual, but we jocularly said
that the '' morning hate " was a little
worse, rather pitying the poor devils who
were getting it. We didn't know whether
it was the Huns or not, for our guns were
speaking more than ordinarily. As we
heard ours, up went that little wish one
always had that those shells wouldn't be
'' duds," and the hope they would knock
some of our dear enemy out. So, as I tell
you, we passed an hour, when the word
was brought to be ready to move *' in an
hour." Every man must pack his kit and

114 A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

not move from his own hut. Gone, of
course, was the bath. We rather regretted
that. We felt, I think, rather upset
because we had looked forward to a rest,
and I remember cursing the Bosche for
starting his dirty work so soon.

Gathered in anxious little groups we
awaited further word. After a couple of
hours, we heard some rumoured reports
that told only too well what we afterwards
learned. Well, we '* stood to " till some-
time in the afternoon, I couldn't say
just the hour for one loses all sense of
time ; then came the word to " move off.'*

Once more, with the slow step that is
used on the road to the front line, we
started. The first part of the journey was
easy. Occasionally a lone shrapnel would
burst on the road, but it was only when we
got up into the area where the " heavies *'
were that we felt the force of the bom-
bardment. Steadily we marched in the
bright afternoon sun, here and there halt-
ing ; at this corner turning off the main
road into a by-way because the Germans
were '' searching " the road, until just at
twilight tide we arrived, by devious by-
paths, outside *' Wipers."

The order was passed '* no lights, no
smoking, no noise." The last injunction
was entirely superfluous, for between the
shriek and boom of our shells, also theirs,

BILLY'S LETTERS 115

coupled with the rumble of the artillery
limbers that galloped up with more '* iron
rations/' one could scarce be heard. Here
we sat or sprawled in the dewy grass
awaiting orders. Just as twilight faded
into night, amid the roar of an excep-
tional burst of artillery, the sky lighted up
by what seemed millions of '' flares." The
whole place was bathed in the ghastly
magnesium white they cast about, the
scene here and there being punctuated by
a red or green rocket. It was indeed, I
can assure you, one of the prettiest sights
I've ever witnessed. The average pyro-
technic display pales considerably in com-
parison. This arc of light was continuous
for some few minutes, mingled with the
lurid yellow-red burst of shrapnel. The
colour of shrapnel bursting at night is
hard to liken ; it resembles more than
anything a deep tiger lily which bloomed
for an infinitesimal space, then melted into
black oblivion.

So, as I say, we waited, as good soldiers
always do, for orders. There wasn't much
talking, in fact, I imagine that everyone
was rather too busy with thoughts of
Home. Somehow in the veriest thick of
things, there's usually a thought of Home
creeps into your mind. However, here
and there a jest or a laugh came out. One
man as I passed said to his mate — '' Write

ii6 A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

to her." Some " her " who I suppose
would have been thrice as excited as he,
had she known. Occasionally, as a shell
burst somewhere near, the inevitable ques-
tion, '' Where did that one go ? " came
out ; but conversation was at a premium.
Just at the night of nights, an hour
before dawn, came the word to advance,
and in extended order across shell-swept
ground we started over an area pitted and
potted by shells, with here a clump of
scarred trees, or there a few gaunt stones,
the remnant of a building. Everything
is patterned in the Army by the Guards.
To do things as they do is the aim of
everyone, and while IVe never seen them
make an attack, I have walked along the
same road under heavy shelling. There-
fore I admire them. Albeit, I question
if ever the Guards went forward more
vaUantly than did those civilian soldiery
of ours. The Guards' line may perhaps
have been straighter, but it could waver
no less. The psychology of a soldier in
the brief moments of an attack or counter-
attack, is something beyond my ken.
In retrospect, I come on the thought I
had as I saw that line move forward : that
line of my men, the men whom I worked
over during months of training, the men,
who with me, had laughed and laboured,
cried and cursed for many moons, slowly

BILLY'S LETTERS 117

advancing to we knew not what. A
picture of a green sward in Canada months
before came back, and I recollected my
exhortations on keeping a line and steady
pace. I conjured up also the visions of
thousands in training who sweep over
grassy slopes not cut by shell fire or
devastated by warfare. I only tell you
this to show the queer kinks in my brain.

On we went in the grey of the early
morning, past verdant stretches of fields,
rank with ungarnered crops, which were
besprinkled with scarlet poppies. We
clambered through hedgerows of haw-
thorn in bloom, the smell of which mingled
with the sweet sickly odour of " lachry-
mators " or tear shells. We dodged shell
holes or climbed in and over the remains
of trenches, all the while drawing nearer,
nearer the ceaseless rattle of musketry,
the rhythmic rip of machine guns.

The order to fix bayonets passed along :
this done, the clicking of bolts, to ensure
that every magazine had its quota of
cartridges, sounded. Over a little rise we
came ; just ahead was a line of lurid
light and noise. Now, night was going
and against the sky we showed up quite
plainly, a long thin line of silhouettes,
the lighter fawn of the bombers' aprons,
each pocket bulging with its lemon-shaped
grenade, distinctive from the others. So

ii8 A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

on toward the line of lurid light and noise
we walked. They don't run nowadays ;
gone is the glory of the charge with its
huzzas and flashing swords ; it's slow and
steady does it.

This doesn't take long to write but it
was composed of minutes, each age-long ;
and looking at it now, I wonder how I,
or anyone, got so far amid the pande-
monium of bursting shells, siffling bullets
and detonating bombs.

From somewhere, one of our officers
rushed up and ordered me to retire to
a certain spot about a half-mile, as they,
I mean higher command, had decided
to postpone the counter-attack. Accord-
ingly, back we started. Daylight with
its turquoise sky had come and as we
plodded back the Germans saw the
irregular line. If before, we thought the
bombardment heavy now it was ten-
fold, a tearing, roaring inferno as the Hun
*' searched and bracketed " the entire area
in which our lines were. Shrapnel, whizz
bangs, high explosives, hurtled and burst
in nerve-shattering salvos. Everyone was
mixed up, some men of another company
with ours, also men of another battalion.
We walked steadily on, until, the barrage
becoming too hot, the order was given to
take cover. Some few of us managed to
crouch behind a hedgerow where, once a

BILLY'S LETTERS 119

trench, was now a shambles. Here for the
first time the really hell of the war came
to me. That trench, or what was left of it,
was congested with dead and dying. Men
crawled along, over dead bodies distorted
beyond only the ken of one who has been
there. We lifted wounded men a little
to one side while from each turn of the
trench came the heartrending, throaty
sob of dying. Ghastly ! well, I don't
suppose there's a word been coined in
English to describe it. Meanwhile, shrapnel
rained on its horrible hail, high explo-
sive lifted sandbag and bodies house-high.
Everywhere men lay half-buried, gasping.
Some, reason fled, climbed out only to be
struck down a few yards away. And all
this, kept up for what seemed aeons, but
really was only about three hours. One
chap, since dead, said to me, '* I thought
these devils were running short of shells.
Well, rd like to let some of those people
at home feel this." Feel is the right word,
for you '' feel " a heavy bombardment.
I care not how brave a man is, I say it
reduces him to the consistency of a jelly
fish. For after all, life is sweet and when
one is a fraction of a second from the grave,
he starts to ponder. Howbeit, the fire
abated and we gathered together what
few men we could. What regiment
mattered not. Messengers were sent to

120 A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

report to the Colonel as to our position.
There were just three officers left of the
company, so we held a council of war, and
endeavoured to see to the wounded, send-
ing out those slightly hurt, then sat down
to wait.

Oh ! What waiting it was ! Expectantly,
nervously, sitting while the time dragged
on. After an hour or two had elapsed,
one of the '' runners '' we had sent crawled
back to say that the Colonel had been
killed, he could find no other officers, and
would we get him a drink — all in a breath.
He was just a boy, eighteen I think, and
the strain was too much for him. He was
completely unstrung, for, after a while, he
laughed rather hysterically and babbled
incoherently. Suddenly he jumped up,
climbed into the open, his sole thought to
get away ; but there, a scant hundred
yards, we saw him fall. He had found
quiet and peace all right. After a time
one of the boys crawled out to find him
dead.

Gradually, as the morning wore on,
limping or crawling men came up to
report themselves. Men of other units,
men of our own, and one poor chap, quite
insane, who insisted that one of the
officers was his brother. Up above, aero-
planes purred, as, glinting in the sunlight,
they kept off the enemy machines, whose

BILLYHS LETTERS 121

object would have been to discover the
position of ourselves and other reinforce-
ments. I sat and looked at a little tri-
angular lake shimmering in the distance,
and longed for some fish. I recollect
resolving that when I got leave, the first
meal in England would be fish. Look-
ing back, I cannot remember that I ever
doubted I would get leave, the idea never
struck me that I might go on " The Long
Leave.'' So is the human brain consti-
tuted.

Regularly, at intervals all morning, the
area was shelled by the Germans. Start-
ing in one place they systematically
blasted almost every square yard of the
ground, and each time seemed to be worse
than the former ones ; tho' God knows
any one was a cataclysm.

The day wore on. In mid-afternoon

came word to proceed to there to

counter-attack a certain part of the line.
We gathered together the men, some
eighty that were immediately at hand,
and started off. It was a trip practically
in the open as any trenches had been so
battered as to be useless. From every
direction came long files of men, all
centralizing along a given line. I can't
remember the exact time the thing was
planned for, but we started off. Of course
so did the artillery. Ours opened up, and

122 A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

if we got unutterable hell before so did
the Germans now. However, they still
had some ammunition, and the shells
burst there — and there — and there — and
then

A drink of water ;

A scarlet cross fronting a vision in blue
and white ;

Cool deft hands ;

White sheets ;

The throb of a motor ;

The swirl of water ;

The tiny toot of an English engine ;

Another motor ;

A bunch of roses mixed up with eye-
glasses and perfume ;

A white handkerchief ;

A few jolts ;

A bed ;

Familiar street noises with the dawning
realization of a hospital in Blighty, dear
old London at last.

That's the best way I can tell you. Fm
enclosing a couple of pictures of the Red
House. Will write again this week.

Yours,

Billy.

BILLY'S LETTERS 123

MORITURUS TE SALUTAT

McCarthy was his name. On his attesta-
tion paper was the statement that he
was a chef, and in the C. E. F. he was
usually to be found in the cook house.
The chef of even a second-rate hotel
would have blushed had one linked his
name with Mac's, for I presume that he,
McCarthy, in his entire life had never
handled '' hors d'ceuvre varies," or that
*' boeuf froid '' suggested to him anything
but a joint of red and yellow roasted
yesterday. No, Mac knew nothing of table
d'hote meals or French pastry. His cook-
ing was of the kind known as Mulligan,
and a rattling good Mulligan he made.
I've stood and watched him many a day
last summer, as under the canvas cook
house of a camp in Canada, he diced
onions with a butcher knife, nonchalantly
stirring boiling rice with the same knife
— a perfunctory wipe on an erstwhile white
apron being as it were the '* entr'acte."
In fact, Mac's culinary abilities had been
fostered in camps not military, but lumber-
ing and construction. His was an art
that could set a pot of beans to soak
yesterday, and to-night, for 200 men,

124 A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

turn out a dish of '' pork and " so tempt-
ing that I was often wont to ask for a
plate of them myself. He also turned
out porridge in such quantities as to
stagger one who had never watched a
hungry hundred, fresh from one hour's
physical line up for their morning feast.
What boots it if there were lumps or
if perhaps one ^ got a small ladleful that
could have stood another quarter -hour
cooking ; it filled up that insatiable maw
of a man in training.

Such a cook was McCarthy, but he
shone in another sphere with even greater
briUiance than that of the cook house.
That was as a comedian.

His assets were cooking and comedy,
and when Generals and things came round
to '^ suspect " our battalion, all ranks
being on parade, these attributes did not
redound particularly to the glory of the
pageant. For McCarthy never learned
to '' present '' a Ross Mark HI in three
motions. Whether he carried his comedy
on to the parade ground of Generals, or
whether it was because his hands were
more adept with a chef's knife than a
rifle. 111 not judge ; but his '' present,"
done in manner similar to the way he
stirred the rice, always spoiled the effect,
and Fve often cursed him to myself when
hearing a movement behind me after all

BILLY'S LETTERS 125

was quiet, knew McCarthy to be still
'' presenting arms/'

However, forgotten were these little
faults when, just after reveille on orderly
dog duty, one walked into the kitchens
and McCarthy was the first to say —
'* Good morning, Sir ; it's a trifle cold this
morning. Will you have a cup of coffee ? "
I can't say about the other chaps, but
I always did, and as one overlooked the
kitchens, inquiring from the Sergeant
cook if things were under way or the
rations all right, McCarthy usually pro-
duced a crisp, hot-buttered slice of brown
toast. So, for these, we forgave those.

But as I say, far above his cooking was
his comedy. A master in the art of
repartee of his kind, he never failed to
have a jest ready when the chance came ;
or if the Y.M.C.A. man got up a concert,
McCarthy was sure to be there, either
headlining or as an added attraction. His
was the comedy that on the fields of
Flanders '' bucks up " a whole company,
nay a battalion, as some merry quip just
made is laughingly told from bay to
bay, so that in the midst of shelling a
laugh infectious and hearty rings as a
tocsin.

I couldn't tell you all the merry words
he uttered — all the good-natured banter
he gave between the day he 'listed and the

126 A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

day he died. And that reminds me, I
must to my muttons.

It was just at '* stand down '* one morn-
ing last May — a beautiful morn it was I
remember. The grass was green and the
shrapnel-scarred trees were trying to burst
out into a few sparse leaves. A haw-
thorn bush or two just to the rear of
the trench was white with bloom, as
Maeterlinck says '' Yielding up its soul
in perfume " distinctly noticeable even
among the varied smells of the trench. In
the distance, over from the Bosche
trenches, one heard the plaintive triple
cry of a cuckoo, that hoohoo, hoohoo, hoo-
hooed every morning. Here and there a
swallow flitted and dove in the first smile
of old Sol rimming the tree-tops to the
east, and all was still as still as that first
hour of dawn on the Front can be, some-
times.

I remember it well and thought how
ominous it was, and as I walked with a
once full rum jar along bay and traverse,
I pondered upon the stillness. I came to
the bay where McCarthy was on duty.
Alone he stood, lazily cleaning his rifle,
meanwhile watching a mess-tin of water
heating over a candle. He looked at the
rum jar and laughingly asked if he couldn't
have his ration, knowing full well that
I knew he'd had it ; when with a dull

BILLY'S LETTERS 127

boom from the east came the herald
announcing the morning hate. I passed on,
was in the traverse, when, hearing the
sough of a shell, I turned. There stood
McCarthy, rifle in hand, face turned to
the azure above and in his loudest tones
addressed the screaming shell with '* Good
morning, Fritz."

I heard him say it as plainly, as at the
same instant I heard it burst almost
directly overhead. Its pall of black smoke
hovered there, while its rain of death
descended with the peculiar indescrib-
able whine of shrapnel. It caromed off
my tin hat, it smashed the rum charge in
my hand, it ripped sandbag and tore
corrugated iron, but, as they say, *' It
didn't have my number on it." One of
the freaks of shell fire. It left me, but
took McCarthy.

I turned and saw him slowly sink
clutching at his tunic. I sent an inquir-
ing individual, whose head popped out
of a dugout close by, for the stretcher-
bearer, and with a man who came moved
McCarthy to another bay. There he lay
as I cut off his tunic, his shirt, only to
find his breast and shoulders peppered as
a colander. Just over his heart was a
huge ragged hole, from which the red
arterial blood pulsed slowly in great jets.
He was gone — I knew that — but I forced

128 A CANADIAN SUBALTERN

a quarter grain of morphia between the
blood-flecked Hps.

The stretcher-bearers came, but Mc-
Carthy needed no shell dressings, no iodine
capsule. The ashy grey of his face, the
wild stare of his eye, the convulsive clutch
of his hand betokened that the strange
metamorphosis known as Death was
silently creeping nigh.

I gave him a cup of water. As I lowered
his head a wan smile lit his countenance
and he weakly said — '' Do you remember.
Sir, the night you said ' Gunga Din ' ?
Well, that's how the water tastes." And
then to some of the boys who had gathered,
he turned, '' No more Mulligan, boys.''
And with the same smile to me, '' It's
funny. Sir, how I spoke to that shell. It
ain't often one calls their own number."

Which was how McCarthy, cook-come-
dian, in his own way, said

Moriturus Te Salutat.

PRINTED IN GKEAT BRITAIN BY
WM. BKSNDON AND SON, LTD., PLYMOUTH

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