Part 7

Chuckling a little, she dodged behind the clouds again; but it was too late. The mischief had been done, and in a trice the “shadowy figures” found themselves surrounded by about a dozen sons of the Sahara and a like number of business-like bayonets.

The result was a confused babble of voices for ten minutes, and then a procession to the Supply Officer’s tent. From where I was standing I could see and hear everything that passed, and everybody seemed to be trying to talk at once. As the “shadowy figures” could not speak a word of Arabic, and the Algerians vice versa, the result was laughable. But with the advent of the Supply Officer things took a different turn. He had been wakened from a sound sleep, and was arrayed in the pink pyjamas the girl had sent him, and a desire to be “firm in the matter.” He had no knowledge of Arabic, and was placing the “shadowy figures” under guard pending the arrival of an interpreter in the morning.

That would have been serious for the said “shadowy figures,” so I decided to see whether I could help them at all. I had borrowed a cobber’s flash civvy raincoat in the morning, and that and the Jacko pony I rode must have made the S.O. think I was an officer. Anyhow, he greeted me very decently; and when I told him I could yabber Arabic pretty fluently, he was more than delighted at my arrival.

Well, for a good ten minutes I did the interpreter stunt, and then I got him to dismiss the guard.

Then I opened the case for the defence. I pictured to him the love of the Colonial for his horse, the long night rides, and a dozen other pitiful things, and altogether put up such a beautiful tale that even old Judge Jeffreys would have had to declare the accused “Not guilty.” So the S.O. decided to give the “shadowy figures” a stern lecture, take their names and numbers, and refer the matter to their O.C. next morning. Forth came the note-book and down went the particulars. I am pretty hard in the dial, but I was glad he was not looking my way then. For every one of the four had a number with six figures in it and belonged to the 19th Light Horse Regiment, 9th Light Horse Brigade.

Luckily, he was a new man out, or the bluff wouldn’t have worked. But it did, and that was all that mattered then. He gave them the lecture, and in it repeated often, “I’ve been one too many for you fellows this time, what!”. Then he let them go, and as they left the tent the last one winked at me, and in that wink there was a world of mystery.

Five minutes later I was in the saddle again and thinking hard. I was wondering where the “shadowy figures” had left their horses, and whether they would bump further trouble on the way home. Then I remembered a young wady that runs by the side of the dump and turned the pony’s head toward it. Half-way to it, I met them coming back. But where there had been four “shadowy figures” there were SIX, and where there should have been four horses there were ten. And the spare nags were loaded heavily, too. The chap who gave me the wink told me the rest of the yarn, and here it is.

Two of them had acted as horse-holders while the other four had carried out the raiding part of the business. Three times they had returned without mishap, and it was on the fourth trip that the moon peeped out and made a mess of things.

It started to rain again then, so we parted; they to their bivvies and I to a sharp trot home.

Two hours after the sun came up, the chap who was “one too many” rolled out of bed and prepared his report for the O.C. 19th Light Horse Regiment, 9th Light Horse Brigade.

“ANON”

“The Light that Failed”

(And some that didn’t)

Among the many examples of ingenuity displayed by Billjim on service, the manufacture of illuminants, if you will pardon the prolixity, shines out the most brilliantly. The Sun itself is considered to be a pretty perfect and economical source of light, but it is not infallible. The annoying habit it has of dodging off about sundown excludes it from the category of the perfectly perfect, and Billjim is forced to procure a substitute to enable him to relieve the tedium of his evenings with the exhilarating influence of two-up, poker, swapping yarns and other harmless pursuits.

The issue candle is, of course, the recognized form of illuminant; but by the time the Greatest, the Sub-Greatest, the Q-Emmer, the Orderly-Room Ogre and the Sigs get their cut, the stock is usually depleted to a mere skeleton of its former fat self, and the insignificant stump that is left to shed its radiance around the humble bivvies of the rank and file, is, as often as not, irretrievably lost to sight owing to the shortage of telescopes in the unit’s equipment. Hence the exercise of Billjim’s ingenuity.

Some devices were truly efficient, others resembled the seeds that fell on stony ground; while one I know of was positively dangerous. The one in question was disapproved of from its very inception. The wise ones shook their heads dubiously, and opined that it was sheer flying in the face of Providence to use one’s issue of rum for the sacrilegious purpose of making air-gas for a blooming light. After the explosion occurred, and the blasphemous one was struck off the strength, they said, “I told him so,” and everybody was satisfied.

The most popular form is the slush-light, which is simply composed of any old thing that will hold grease, and any kind of grease that will fit into it; first, a layer of sand or clay is dumped into the jam, milk, cigarette or other tin; then a wick made of “3 x 2,” or issue flannelette, wrapped around a thin pine stick, is stuck upright in the middle of the sand or clay; and finally the grease is introduced, the quantity being governed by the amount one has been able to acquire. It is on record that some chaps have had the effrontery to use dubbin, yes, “dubbin!” but, of course, this is not official, just common furphy.

Next to the slushie comes the bottle-o; but to employ this it is necessary to have the above-mentioned rarity, candle. For candle one is not wholly dependent on the “issue” brand, for it has been known to be purchaseable at the canteen—when those institutions are in the vicinity. Supposing the possession of candle to be an established and material fact, the next necessity is a clear-glass bottle; old lime-juice bottles are excellent, and they can be found outside any officers’ mess, or the messes of troopers who “did a trot.” The bottom of the bottle is knocked out by insistent but vigorous tapping with the marlin-spike of a jack-knife till a hole is broken through, and then the rest is chipped off in small instalments till the end is quite out. The candle is then pared at the bottom end to fit the slope of the bottle neck, and a deep groove gouged in it, the candle, to admit air. Apply a match to the candle, drop it into the inverted bottle, and there is your light. If it is not very windy, of course, all that is necessary is to drop some melted grease on someone else’s tin hat, and stick the candle in it; simple, isn’t it?

There are a few of the lesser Edisons who eliminate disturbance by wind by curling a legging around the candle; but only a very narrow chink of light exudes from its gaping edges, and the odour of singeing leather is not pleasant.

One of the finest ideas was a combination of the slushie and the bottle-o. A squat chutney-bottle that fitted snugly into a toffee tin, was found, and the quality and steadiness of the light generated made drawn filament look painfully experimental. Some wire _tibbin_ bands secure the “globe” to the body, at the same time forming a handle.

The designs, elaborations and embellishments of the original idea are practically numberless; they range from the primitive cremation of a religious aunt’s epistles and incriminating love effusions up to the princely slushie-cum-bottle-o; and they radiate in all classes of bivvies, and shed their glory on the tangle of the newly erected as brightly as on the white-stoned splendour of the resident.

With these remarks, and any necessary apologies to the Dinkum Military Scribe, I shall leave them to shine on the just and the unjust, like their mighty lord, the Sun.

“SARG.”

A Night March

At twilight, when the air is cool, we prepare for our second consecutive night march. Overcoats and mufflers are put on, saddles are inspected to see that all is secure. Later it will be too dark, and we too tired to attend to such matters.

After a short wait we move off. Two to three hours steady plodding through the darkness, with the effects of fatigue scarcely noticeable. Then, suddenly, an utter weariness assails us, numbing limbs, distorting vision, and rendering minds a prey to tantalizing and disturbing thoughts—thoughts that mock and taunt; thoughts of feather beds and roaring fires; thoughts that accentuate our weariness and awake us to the realization of the cold.

We ride, with drooping eyelids, a swaying body, and a precarious seat, surrendered to the inevitable.

The column halts, and simultaneously we fall forward on our horses’ necks, hoping to ease our aching limbs. Hoping against hope to hear the order to dismount. A jerk, our horses move forward again, and disappointedly we resign ourselves to the further delusions of minds tortured from want of sleep.

Visions become distorted, we visualize the objects of our thoughts. A thought of water, and the road becomes a flowing stream. Thoughts of horses and trees, and in the darkness arises a village—a village that remains ever in the distance, and endures only so long as our thoughts are of villages. The horse ahead moves strangely; it appears to be dancing, and has taken unto itself the shape of a beast of prehistoric ages. By an effort of will we shake off this state of semi-somnolence, and, for a time, see things in their normal shapes again.

At last, the order to dismount. Tumbling off we throw ourselves down at our horses’ feet, indifferent to our position and its possibilities. With heads pillowed on arms, water-bottles or haversacks, we endeavour to win a few minutes respite. Follows sleep and blissful unconsciousness, until friendly hands awake us, and wearily we rise to a repetition of the last hour. On moving off some walk and lead their horses, stepping out briskly in an endeavour to dispel the ever-increasing drowsiness. It succeeds whilst walking, but a reaction sets in on regaining the saddle, leaving the walker in worse plight than ever.

With nerves on edge, we curse the numerous and apparently purposeless halts, become uncomplimentary about our leaders, revile horses for jogging and stumbling, warn companions of the damage they are likely to do if they persist in being careless with their rifles. Cheerful and good-tempered soldiers are few at 03.00.

And so on until we hail with relief the approach of dawn, which dispels the hallucinations of darkness.

“ARAM.”

A Gloomy Outlook

Amidst the universal joy—booming of guns, ringing of church bells, cheering, and the screeching of ships’ sirens—I am gloomy and ill at ease. I cannot share in the thanksgiving and tumultuous welcome of Peace; my mind is dark with foreboding, oppressed by thoughts of three things that have made so many happy lives miserable during the Great War.

With the knowledge that huge stocks of dubbin, bully and biscuits are on hand, how can a chap be joyful? They must be disposed of—not cast into the incinerator—and thoughts of the woe that they will cause make me sorrowful.

The war has ended, and with it the need for dubbin. Stacks of the beastly stuff must be disposed of before we are demobilized. There is no market for it, and nobody would take it as a gift. Offer it to a Light Horseman or a driver, and you would see stars not of the firmament. But I’m sure that The Heads won’t let it be wasted. It’ll be read out in orders soon, that all saddlery and harness must be anointed with dubbin once daily and twice on Sundays. There’s a good time coming!

Bully and biscuits are even dearer than dubbin to the granite hearts of Q.M.’s, but they’ll have to issue them now by the ton. Rapid consumption is the only way to get rid of the pyramids of B and B left on hand through Fritz throwing in the towel sooner than the Supply Office anticipated.

Army biscuits are beyond the capacity of Gyppos and Bedouin; if we strewed them broadcast over Palestine, they would lie there untouched, and ruin all agricultural prospects: even a stump-proof plough would crumple up if it struck an army biscuit. We can’t dump our stocks in the sea: think what would happen in a collision between a liner and an A. B.! No; we’ve got to eat the lot, empty every tin of bully and biscuits, and take the consequences like heroes.

“ARAM.”

Reconciliation

Full many a time we’ve known the call to arms, The sudden storm ... the aching aftermath, When spent companions slumbered ’neath the palms, And wooden crosses marked the wake of wrath.

Full often have we saddled up and sped Over the sand, sweeping along at large, Braving the fitful hurricanes of lead, Galloping down resistance in the charge.

Mute sorrow and great hardship have been ours, Long journeyings and escapades in force— But have we not beheld the poppy-flowers Nodding in red confusion on our course?

Yea, we have crossed the woeful waste of sand, Left sorrow far behind; and we have heard The skylarks carolling in the Holy Land, Where flower and tree commune with bee and bird.

“GERARDY.”

Mail Day

“The mail’s in!” The glad tidings are tossed from lip to lip and shouted down the lines, outstripping, and for the time suppressing, the current furphies, “Furlough to Australia,” “Peace Negotiations,” “A big Stunt,” and similar creations of the idle imaginative mind.

“There’s a mail in!”—A magic wand has been waved above the troops by an unseen hand and weariness and even sleep are banished from the war-worn soldiers. Even the sick are interested, and their eyes light up with an eager look of expectancy.

“There’s a mail in!” The chronic grouser forgets to grouse, the lead swinger lays aside the lead and, for the time, his petty pains, and they join the eager throng around the perspiring orderlies who are struggling with the jumbled mass of letters, papers and parcels, bringing chaos to order, sorting mail into squadrons and then into troops, ere it can be distributed.

What a study are the faces of that watching throng; what a joyous gleam leaps into the sleep-laden eyes of a tired youngster who has caught a glimpse of a letter addressed in the well-known hand of the mother who waits at home.

There is a youth just from school, who has not yet tasted the mad joy of battle, of a ding-dong mix up, when death shrieks through the air missing one by inches, by hairbreadths. Here, too, is the war-hardened warrior, who knew Anzac before the Suvla advance, who has met, fought and beaten the Turk from Romani to Jericho, the hero of a hundred fights, of scraps fought out on lonely patrol, that the world knows naught of, though to the individual they are more fraught with peril than a big battle.

To soldiers mail day is a day of bliss. Recruit or warrior, their faces portray the emotions that are surging through their breasts. Their eyes grow bright with eagerness as they watch the pile of mail assume shape and order under the deft hands of the postal orderlies.

Men moving out on outpost or patrol shout to their mates, “Get my mail, Jack,” “Get mine,” and ride off casting longing eyes at that waiting crowd; with joyful hearts they move out into the night, to outwit the enemy or return no more. But what care they—for it is mail day!

Before dawn, outpost and patrol return, weary and with sleep-laden eyes. They off-saddle and picket their horses, and dash into the bivvies for their mail. Matches are struck surreptitiously, candles are lighted and hidden by blankets, for lights are forbidden when in touch with the enemy; and thus are the letters eagerly read. Often Billjim falls asleep from sheer exhaustion, the last letter still clutched in his hand, and dreams of his Australian home; the fragrance of gum and wattle blossom are wafted to him from overseas on the cool night breeze.

Mail day, the most joyous and most tragic in a soldier’s life, brings messages of love and trust from dear ones, messages of faith and praise from friends; and at times news that is sorrow-laden.

“WIL COX.”

A Day Over the Lines

In the language of the Corps, “there was something doing,” for from dawn till dark machines had been coming and going on the aerodrome almost without a break; in fact, it was “some day.”

Just as the first grey streaks of dawn crept over the horizon the roar of a couple of hostile aircraft patrol machines taking off woke an otherwise peaceful camp. An hour later the orderly officer was bustling round two more machines, which were to leave on the early morning reconnaissance of the country behind the actual scene of operations and along the Turkish lines of communication, to search for any signs of fresh concentrations or reinforcements being hurried up.

At two hour intervals machines left in couples to patrol above our lines and prevent any possibility of Boche machines sneaking over, either to watch the movements of our troops or to bomb them; for, during a stunt, it was just as important for us to keep the Hun blind as to keep our own eyes well skinned.

To me fell the first patrol, and a call from the Orderly Officer at 3.30 a.m. was not received with the utmost courtesy. After hot tea and toast by candle light, we scrambled into warm leather coats, woollen-lined boots, gloves and helmets, and climbed aboard. By the time I had inspected my guns and the usual contents of the cockpit, the engine was ticking over and we were ready to start. It was still dark enough, as we took off, for the pilot to need all his lamps alight to see the various instruments, and, as we climbed, the crisp morning air set our blood tingling with the joy of living. When above the clouds at about 8000 feet the first rays of the rising sun shot across the sky, and very shortly the clouds, which until then had been snowy white, were bathed in a crimson glow that held us spell-bound with its beauty. Primarily, the crests of those billowy mists were tipped as with a wand of fire whilst, as we ascended into space and the sun gradually rose above the horizon, the colour spread over that sea of cloud until it appeared like a stupendous stream of lava belched forth from some volcano which, after years of quiescence, had suddenly burst into activity.

I have seen many sunrises under varying conditions, sunrises at whose beauty I marvelled, but never before had I witnessed anything that could come within coo-ee of the riotous blaze of colour that lay spread beneath us, covering the Holy Land, as it were, with a cloth of gold. It disappeared from view, however, all too soon, for, as the sun gained in strength and we in height, the colour slowly faded from fiery brilliance to a delicate pink until, finally, the clouds once again showed up in all their glistening purity.

It seemed impossible to realize, whilst nature was all aglow beneath us, that war was being waged with all its relentless cruelty, that guns were sending forth their messengers of death and pain, and, above all, that we, who had been privileged to witness the glory of God’s handiwork, were scanning the heavens for something in the way of Hun airmen to kill. To me it seemed a sacrilege that, on such a glorious day, hate should be animating the hearts of men, and that I should be a willing agent, eager for an opportunity of sending a fellow-mortal crashing to earth and death. The Hun, however, evidently deeming discretion the better part of valour, did not put in an appearance, and when, after three hours’ cruising up and down the lines, we returned to the aerodrome, I believe I was pleased that I had not been, by force of circumstances, compelled to share in sending some creature to meet his Maker.

So, throughout the day, the work went on, and, as a Hun “bus” was reported to have bombed our troops in the early morning, every one of our machines thereafter carried four bombs to drop on any suitable target that offered itself.

Whilst on afternoon reconnaissance, the observer located a large body of enemy troops, and, immediately on receipt of his report, a bomb raid was ordered on which every available machine was to be sent. Luckily, I was detailed for escort duty, and it was a pleasant experience to watch the bombing machines assembling overhead, as they arrived from the different aerodromes, and took up the allotted formation. About 5 p.m. the leader fired his light and thirty machines, like a flock of great birds, set off on their journey to play havoc with our old friend, the Turk. After dropping the bombs, all machines swooped down on the troops and used their spare machine gun ammunition in shooting them up and generally giving them a devil of a time.

All good things come to an end, and, finally, we set out for home, which we reached just as the sun, a ball of fire, was sinking to rest. The machines, glistening white in the reflected sunlight, resembled a flock of swans coming home, as, in slow, stately circles, one by one, they glided to earth. The Mediterranean, as calm and unruffled as a mill-pond, reflected the glory of the sun until its surface glowed like a sheet of burnished gold. By the time we, as escort, had seen the last of our charges land in safety and commenced our own descent, the sun was well below the skyline, and the narrow ribbon of the pink afterglow that skirted the horizon was all that remained to remind us of the sun and its glory.

H. BOWDEN FLETCHER.

Mounts and Remounts

On my arrival at the Unit, I considered myself fortunate when the corporal presented me with a fat, sleek remount, only lately up from the Base. My suspicions were not aroused until, preparing to mount, I discovered what an enormous supply of cameras the Troop possessed. All classes seemed to be represented, from the V.P.K. pip-squeak to the ponderous P.C. “Jericho Jane” variety. Maintaining a professional attitude, I mounted.