Chapter 1

Produced by Peter O'Connell

"Hello, Soldier!" Khaki Verse

by Edward Dyson

Many of these verse were originally printed in the "Bulletin," others in "Punch," "The Leader" and Melbourne "Herald." Some few are now published for the first time.

The paper famine leaving me no option but to print on peculiar paper, not wholly prohibitive or to defer the publication of my verses for an unknown period, the natural longing of a parent to parade his "well be- gotten" prevails. If my book is unusual and bizarre from a craftman's point of view, I plead the unusual times and extraordinary conditions. Of these times and conditions. I hope "Hello Soldier" is in some measure characteriastic.--Edward Dyson.

AUSTRALIA.

AUSTRALIA, my native land, A stirring whisper in your ear-- 'Tis time for you to understand Your rating now is A1, dear. You've done some rousing things of late. That lift you from the simple state In which you chose to vegetate.

The persons so superior, Whose patronage no more endures, Now have to fire a salvo for The glory that is fairly yours. At length you need no sort of crutch, You stand alone, you're voted "much"-- Get busy and behave as such.

No man from Oskosh, or from Hull, Or any other chosen place Can rise with a distended skull, And cast aspersions in your face. You're given all the world to know Your proper standing as a foe, And hats are off, and rightly so.

You furnished heroes for the fray, Your sterling merit's widely blown To all men's satisfaction say, Now have you proved it to your own? Now have you strength to stand and shine In your own light and say, "Divine The thing is that I do. It's mine!"

The cannon's stroke throws customs down The black and bottomless abyss, And quaking are the gilded crown And palsied feet of prejudice. The guns have killed, but it is true They bring to life things good and new. God grant they have awakened you!

My ears are greedy for the toast Of confidence before our guest, The loyal song, the manly boast Your splendid faith to manifest. In works of art and livelihood Shirk not the creed, "What's ours is good," Dread not to have it understood.

Australia, lift your royal brow, And have the courage of our pride, Audacity becomes you now, Be splendidly self-satisfied, No land from lowliness and dearth Has won to eminence on earth That was not conscious of its worth.

CONTENTS

AUSTRALIA BILLY KHAKI AS THE TROOPS WENT THROUGH MARSHAL NEIGH V.C. IN HOSPITAL SISTER ANN BRICKS MUD MICKIE MOLLYNOO JAM WEEPING WILLIE BILLJIM THE CRUSADERS PEACE, BLESSED PEACE THE HAPPY GARDENERS THE GERM JOEY'S JOB THE GIRL I LEFT BEHIND ME HOW HERMAN WON THE CROSS WHEN TOMMY CAME MARCHING HOME HELLO, SOLDIER! THE MORALIST REPAIRED OUT OF KHAKI THE SINGLE-HANDED TEAM BATTLE PASSES THE LETTERS OF THE DEAD BULLETS UNREDEEMED THE LIVING PICTURE THE IMMORTAL STRAIN THE UNBORN THE COMMON MEN THE CHURCH BELLS THE YOUNG LIEUTENANT THE ONE AT HOME THE HAPLESS ARMY

BILLY KHAKI

MARCHING somewhat out of order when the band is cock-a-hoop, There's a lilting kind of magic in the swagger of the troop, Swinging all aboard the steamer with her nose toward the sea. What is calling, Billy Khaki, that you're foot- ing it so free?

Though his lines are none too level, And he lacks a bit of style. And he's swanking like the devil Where the women wave and smile, He will answer with a rifle Trim and true from stock to bore, Where the comrades crouch and stifle In the reeking pit of war.

What is calling, Billy Khaki? There is thunder down the sky, And the merry magpie bugle splits the morn- ing with its cry, While your feet are beating rhythms up the dusty hills and down, And the drums are all a-talking in the hollow of the town.

Billy Khaki, is't the splendor of the song the kiddies sing, Or the whipping of the flags aloft that sets your heart a-swing? Is't the cheering like a paean of the toss- ing, teeming crowds, Or the boom of distant cannon flatly bumping on the clouds ?

What's calling, calling, Billy? 'Tis the rattle far away Of the cavalry at gallop and artillery in play; 'Tis the great gun's fierce concussion, and the smell of seven hells When the long ranks go to pieces in the sneezing of the shells.

But your eyes are laughing, Billy, and a ribald song you sing, While the old men sit and tell us war it is a ghastly thing, When the swift machines are busy and the grim, squat fortress nocks At your bolts as vain as eggs of gulls that spatter on the rocks.

When the horses sweep upon you to complete a sudden rout, Or in fire and smoke and fury some brave regiment goes out, War is cruel, Bill, and ugly. But full well you know the rest, Yet your heart is for the battle, and your face is to the west.

For if war is beastly, Billy, you can picture something worse-- There's the wrecking of an empire, and its broken people's curse; There are nations reft of freedom, and of hope and kindly mirth, And the shadow of an evil black upon the bitter earth.

So we know what's calling, Billy. 'Tis the spirit of our race, And its stir is in your pulses, and its light is on your face As you march with clipping boot-heels through the piping, howling town To uphold the land we live in, and to pull a tyrant down.

Thou his lines are none too level, And he's not a whale for style, And he's swanking like the devil When the women wave and smile He will answer with a rifle, Trim and true from stuck to bore, When the comrades sit and stifle In the smoking pit of war.

AS THE TROOP WENT THROUGH

I HEARD this day, as I may no more, The world's heart throb at my workshop door. The sun was keen, and the day was still; The township drowsed in, a haze of heat. A stir far off on the sleepy hill, The measured beat of their buoyant feet, And the lilt and thrum Of a little drum, The song they sang in a cadence low, The piping note of a piccolo.

The township woke, and the doors flew wide; The women trotted their boys beside. Across the bridge on a single heel The soldiers came in a golden glow, With throb of song and the chink of steel, The gallant crow of the piccolo. Good and brown they were, And their arms swung bare. Their fine young faces revived in me A boyhood's vision of chivalry.

The lean, hard regiment tramping down, Bushies, miners and boys from town. From 'mid the watchers the road along One fell in line with the khaki men. He took the stride, and he caught their song, And Steve went then, and Meneer, and Ben, Long Dave McCree, And the Weavers three, All whisked away by the "Come! Come! Come!" The lusty surge of the vaunting drum.

I swore a prayer for each soldier lad. He was the son that might have had; The tall, bold boy who was never mine, All brave with dust that the eyes laughed through, His shoulders square, and his chin in line, Was marching too with the gallant few. Passed the muffled beat Of their swanking feet, The swell of drum, the exulting crow, The wild-bird note of the piccolo.

They dipped away in the listless trees; A mother wept on her beaded knees For sons gone out to the long war's end; But more than mother or man wept I Who had no son in the world to send. The hour lagged by, and drifting high Came the fitful hum Of the little drum, And faint, but still with an ardent flow, The pibroch, call of the piccolo.

MARSHAL NEIGH, V.C.

HE came from tumbled country past the humps of Buffalo Where the snow sits on the mountain 'n' the Summer aches below. He'd a silly name like Archie. Squattin' sullen on the ship, He knew nex' to holy nothin' through the gor- forsaken trip.

No thoughts he had of women, no refreshin' talk of beer; If he'd battled, loved, or suffered vital facts did not appear; But the parsons and the poets couldn't teach him to discourse When it come to pokin' guyver at a pore, deluded horse.

If nags got sour 'n' kicked agin the rules of things at sea, Artie argued matters with 'em, 'n' he'd kid 'em up a tree. "Here's a pony got hystericks. Pipe the word for Privit Rowe," The Sargint yapped, 'n' all the ship came cluckin' to the show.

He'd chat him confidential, 'n' he'd pet 'n' paw the moke; He'd tickle him, 'n' flatter him, 'n' try him with a joke; 'N' presently that neddy sobers up, 'n' sez "Ive course, Since you puts it that way, cobber, I will be a better horse."

There was one pertickler whaler, known aboard ez Marshal Neigh, Whose monkey tricks with Privit Rowe was better than a play. He'd done stunts in someone's circus, 'n' he loved a merry bout, Whirlin' in to bust his boiler, or to kick the bottom out.

Rowe he sez: "Well, there's an idjit! Oh, yes, let her whiz, you beauty! Where's yer 'orse sense, little feller? Where's yer bloomin' sense iv duty? Well, you orter serve yer country!" Then there'd come a painful hush, 'N' that nag would drop his head-piece, 'n', so 'elp me cat, he'd blush.

We was heaped ashore be Suez, rifle, horse, 'n' man, 'n' tent, Where the land is sand, the water, 'n' the gory firmament. We had intervals iv longin', we had sweaty spells of work In the ash-pit iv Gehenner, dumbly waitin' fer the Turk.

We goes driftin' on the desert, nothin' doin', nothin' said, Till we get to think we're nowhere, 'n' arf fancy we are dead, 'N' the only 'uman interest on the red hori- zon's brim Is Marshal Neigh's queer faney fer the lad that straddles him.

Plain-livin's nearly, bored us stiff. The Major calls on Rowe To devise an entertainment. What his charger doesn't know Isn't in the regulations. Him 'n' Rowe is brothers met, 'N' that horse's sense iv humor is the oddest fancy yet.

But the Turk arrives one mornin' on the outer edge iv space. From back iv things his guns is floppin' kegs about the place, 'N' Privit Artie Rowe along with others iv the force Goes pig-rootin' inter battle, holdin' converse with his horse.

Little Abdul's quite a fighter, 'n' he mixes it with skill; But the Anzacs have him snouted,, 'n', oh, ma, he's feelin' ill. They wake the all-fired desert, 'n' the land for ever dead Is alive 'n' fairly creepin', and the skies are droppin' lead.

When they've got the Ot'man goin', little gaudy hunts begin. It fer us to chiv His Trousers. 'n' to round the stragglers in. Cuttin' closest to the raw, 'n' swearin' lovin' all the way, Is Artie from Molinga on his neddy, Marshal Neigh.

We're pursuin' sundry camels turkey-trottin' anyhow With the carriage iv an emu 'n' the action iv a cow, When a sand dune busts, 'n' belches arf a million iv the foe. They uncork a blanky batt'ry, 'n' it's, Allah, let her go!

We're not stayin' dinner, thank you. Lie along yer horse 'n' yell, While the bullets pip yer britches 'n' you sniff the flue of Hell. Here it is that Artie takes it good 'n' solid in the crust, He dives from out the saddle, 'n' is swallered in the dust.

I got through 'n' saw them pointin' where the Marshal faced the band. He was goin' where we came from, sniffin' bodies in the sand. Till he found Rowe snugglin' under, took him where his pants was slack, 'N' be all the Asiatic gods, he brought his soldier back!

With a bullet in his buttock, 'n' a drill hole in his ear, He dumped Artie down among us. Square 'n' all, how did we cheer! There's no medals struck fer neddies, but we rule there orter be, 'N' the pride iv all the Light Horse is old Marshal Neigh, V.C.

IN HOSPITAL.

IT is thirty moons since I slung me hook From the job at the hay and corn, Took me solemn oath, 'n' I straight forsook All the ways of life, dinkum ways 'n' crook, 'N' the things on which it was good to look Since the day when a bloke was born.

I was give a gun, 'n' a bay'net bright, 'N' a 'ell of a swag iv work, N' I dipped my lid to the big pub light, To the ole push cobbers I give "Good-night!" Slipped a kiss to 'er, 'n' I wings me flight For a date with the demon Turk.

Ez we pricked our heel to the skitin' drum. Square 'n' all, I was gone a mile. With a perky air, 'n' a 'eart ez glum Ez a long-dead cod, I was blind 'n' dumb, Holdin' do the tear that was bound to come At a word or a friendly smile.

Now I've seen it all, I may come out dead, But I 'ope never more a fool. I have scorched, 'n' thirsted, 'n' froze, 'n' bled, 'N' bin taught the use of the human head, For when all is done 'n' when all is said, War's a wonderful sort of school.

I've bin taught to get 'em 'n' never fret, 'N' to sleep without dreamin' when We have swarmed a slope with the red rain wet; I 'ave learned a pile, 'n' I'm learnin' yet; But the thing I've learned that I won't forget Is a way of not judgin' men.

We was shot down there in a dirty place-- From the mansions 'n' huts we'd come-- 'N' of all the welter the 'ardest case Was a little swine with a dimpled face, Who a year ago was dispensin' lace In a Carlton em-por-ee-um.

In the moochin' days of me giddy youth, When I kidded meself a treat, I'd have pass him one ez a gooey. 'Strewth On the track iv Huns, he's a eight-day sleuth, 'N' at tearin' into 'em nail 'n' tooth He's got Julius Caesar beat!

I ain't proud with him ; 'n' I'm modest, too, When dividin' a can of swill With a Algy boy from the wilds iv Kew. Cos I do not know what the cow will do When a Fritzy offers to sock me through; 'N' it's good to be livin' still.

There you are, you see! Oh! it makes you sore, When a bloke you despised at 'ome In them pifflin' days of the years before Takes a odds-on chance with the God of War, 'N' he tows you out with his left lung tore, 'N' a crack in his bleedin' dome!

'Twas a lad called Hugh done ez much for me. (He has curls 'n' he's fair 'n' slim). Well, I mind the days in the Port when we Puts it over Hugh coz we don't agree With his tone 'n' style, 'n' my foot was free When the push made a hack of him.

Now he's paid me back. I had struck a snag, And must creep through the battle spume All a flamin' age, with a grinnin' jag In me thigh, for water, or jest a fag. Like a crippled snake I was forced to drag Shattered flesh till the crack of doom.

When they saw me he was the one who came. 'N' he give me a raffish grin 'N' a swig. I wasn't so bad that shame Didn't get me then, for the lad was lame. They had passed him his, but his 'art was game. 'N' he coughed ez he brought me in.

I have tackled God on me bended knees, So He'll save him alive 'n' whole, For the sake of one who he thinks he sees When the Nurse's hands bring a kind of ease; And I thank God, too, for the things like these That have give me a sort of soul.

There are Percies, Algies, 'n' Claudes I've met Who could take it 'n' come agen, While the bullets flew in a screamin' jet. What in pain, 'n' death, and in mire 'n' sweat I 'ave learned from them that I won't forget Is a way of not judgin' men.

SISTER ANN.

I'M lyin' in a narrow bed, 'N' starin' at a wall. Where all is white my plastered head Is whitest of it all. My life is jist a whitewashed blank, With flamin' spurts of pain. I dunno who I've got to thank, I've p'raps been trod on by a tank, Or caught out in the rain When skies were peltin' fish-plates, bricks 'n' lengths of bullock-chain.

I'm lyin' here, a sulky swine, 'N' hatin' of the bloke Who's in the doss right next to mine With 'arf his girders broke. He never done no 'arm t me, 'N' he's pertickler ill; But I have got him snouted, see, 'N' all old earth beside but she Come with the chemist's swill, 'N' puts a kind, soft 'and on mine, 'n' all my nark is still.

She ain't a beaut, she's thirty two, She scales eleven stone; But, 'struth, I didn't think it true There was such women grown! She's nurse 'n' sister, mum 'n' dad, 'N' all that straight 'n' fine In every girl I ever had. When Gabr'el comes, 'n' all the glad Young saints are tipped the sign, You'll see this donah take her place, first angel in the line!

She's sweet 'n' cool, her touch is dew-- Wet lilies on yer brow. (Jist 'ark et me what never knew Of lilies up to now). She fits your case in 'arf a wink, 'N' knows how, why, 'n' where. If you are five days gone in drink, N' hoverin' on perdition's brink, It is her brother there. God how pain will take a man, and He has spoke with her!

I dunno if she ever sleeps Ten minutes at a stretch. A dozen times a night she creeps To soothe a screamin' wretch Who has a tiger-headed Hun A-gnawin' at his chest. 'N' when the long, 'ard flght is won, 'N' he is still 'n' nearly done, She smiles down on his rest, 'N' minds me of a mother with a baby at her breast.

The curly kid we cuddled when There was no splendid row (It seemed a little matter then, But feels so wondrous now). It's part of her. She's Joan iv Ark, Flo Nightingale, all fair 'N' dinkum dames who've made their mark If she comes tip-toe in the dark, We blighters feel her there. The whole pack perks up like a bird, 'n' sorter takes the air.

She chats you in a 'Ighland botch; But if our Sis saw fit To pitch Hindoo instead of Scotch I'd get the hang of it, Because her heart it is that talks What now is plain to me. At war where bloody murder stalks, 'N' Nick his hottest samples hawks. I have been given to see What simple human kindness is, what brotherhood may be.

BRICKS.

DEAR Ned, I now take up my pen to write you these few lines, And hopin' how they find you fit. Gorbli', it seems an age Since Jumbo ducked the Port, 'n' drilled 'n' polished to the nines, He walked his pork on Collins like a hero off the stage, Then hiked a rifle 'cross the sea this bleedin' war to wage.

The things what's 'appened lately calls to Jumbo's mind that day Our push took on the Peewee pack, 'n' belted out their lard, With twenty cops to top it off. But now I'm stowed away, A bullet in me gizzard where I took it good and hard, A-dealin'-stoush 'n' mullock to the Prussian flamin' Guard.

At Bullcoor mortal charnce had dumped a mutton-truck of us From good ole Port ker-flummox where we didn't orter be, All in a 'elpless hole-the Pug, Bill Carkeek, Son, 'n' Gus, Don, Steve, 'n' Jack, 'n' seven more, 'n', as it 'appens, me, With nothin' in since breakfast, 'n' a week to go for tea.

Worked loose from Caddy's bunch, we went it gay until we found We'd took to 'arf the ragin' German Hempire on our own. Then down we went so 'umble, with our noses in the ground, Takin' cover in the rubble. If a German head was shown It was fare-the-well to Herman with a bullet through the bone.

We slogged the cows remorseless, 'n' they laid for us a treat. We held that stinkin' cellar, though, 'n' when the day was done Son pussied on his bingie where a Maxie trim 'n' neat Had spit out loaded lightnin', and he slugged a tubby Hun, Then choked a Fritzie with his dukes, 'n' pinched the sooner's gun!

We rigged her on her knuckle-bones. Cri', how she lapped 'em up! We hosed 'em out with livin' lead. That was the second day. Me left eye I'd 'ave give for jest a bubble in a cup, Three fingers I'd 'ave parted for a bone I've flung away; But the butcher wasn't callin', 'n' the fountain didn't play.

T'was rotten mozzle, Neddo. We had blown out ever clip, 'N' 'blooed the hammunition for the little box of tricks. Each took a batten in his fist. Sez Billy "Let 'er rip!" But Son he claws his stubble. Sez--he: "Hold a brace of ticks." Then "Yow!" he pipes 'n' "Strewth!" he sez, "it's bricks, you blighters, bricks!"

There's more than 'arf a million spilt where somethin' hit a pub; We creeps among 'n' sorts 'em, stack afore, 'n' stack behind; The Hun is comin' at us with his napper like a tub-- You couldn't 'ope to miss it, pickled, par- alysed, 'n' blind. Sez Sonny: "Lay 'em open! Give 'em blotches on the rind!"

Then bricks was flyin' in the wind. Mine dinted Otto's chin; Ole Nosey got his brother, which he never more will roam. When Ulrich stopped a Port bookay he rolled his alley in. Their fire was somethin' fierce. Poor Son was blowin' blood 'n' foam, "Fill up," he coughs, "'n' plug 'em! S'elp me Gord, we're goin' 'ome!"

With bricks we drove right at 'em 'n' we wanged 'em best we could. 'Twas either bed 'n' breakfast or a scribble and a wreath. Haynes bust a Prussian's almond, took the bay'net where he stood, Then heaved his last 'arf-Brunswick, split the demon's grinnin' teeth, And Son went down in glory, with a German underneath!

We'd started out with gibbers in our clobber and our 'ats. They gave us floatin' lead enough to stop an army cor. We yelled like fiends, 'n' countered with a lovely flight of bats, Then rushed in close formation, heavin' cot- tages, n' tore Through blinded, bleedin' Bosches, 'n' lor love yeh, it was war!

We came peltin', headfirst, 'elpless, in a drain among a lot Of dirty, damned old Tommies (Gord! The best that ever blew!) Eight left of us, all punctured, each man holdin' what he'd got. Me wild, a rat hole in me lung, but in me mauley, too, A bull-nosed brick with whiskers where no whiskers ever grew.

There's nothin' doin' now. I wear me blan- kets like a toff. The way this fat nurse pets me, strewth, it's well to be so sick, A-dreamin' of our contract 'n' the way we pulled it off. I reckon Haig is phonin' Hughes: "Hullo, there, Billy. Quick-- A dozen of the pushes and a thousan' tons of brick!"

MUD.

THIS war's a waste of slurry, and its at- mosphere is mud, All is bog from here to sunset. Wadin' through We're the victims of a thicker sort of universal flood, With discomforts that old Noah never knew.

We have dubbed our trench The Cecil. There's a brass-plate and a dome, And a quagmire where the doormat used to be, If you're calling, second Tuesday is our reg'- lar day at home, So delighted if you'll toddle in to tea!

There is mud along the corridors enough to bog a cow; In the air there hangs a musty kind of woof; There's a frog-pond in the parlour, and the kitchen is a slough. She has neither doors nor windows, nor a roof.

When they post our bald somnambulist as missing from his flat We take soundings for the digger with a prop. By the day the board is gratis, by the week it's half of that; For the season there's a corresponding drop.

Opening off the spacious hallway is my natty little suite, A commodious and accessible abode. By judicious disposition, with exclusion of my feet, There is sleeping room for Oliver the toad.

Though the ventilation's gusty, and in gobs the ceiling falls-- Which with oral respiration disagrees-- Though there comes a certain quantity of seepage from the walls, There are some I knew in diggings worse than these.

On my right is Cobber Carkeek. There's a spring above his head, And his mattress is a special kind of clay. He's a most punctilious bloke about the fashion of his bed, And he makes it with a shovel every day.

Man is dust. If so, the Cobber has been puddled up a treat. On domestic sanitation he's a toff, For he lights a fire on Sunday, bakes his sur- face in the heat, Then he takes a little maul, and cracks it off.