Chapter 2

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WIRELESS.

There sits a little demon Above the Admiralty, To take the news of seamen Seafaring on the sea; So all the folk aboard-ships Five hundred miles away Can pitch it to their Lordships At any time of day.

The cruisers prowl observant; Their crackling whispers go; The demon says, "Your servant," And lets their Lordships know; A fog's come down off Flanders? A something showed off Wick? The captains and commanders Can speak their Lordships quick.

The demon sits a-waking; Look up above Whitehall-- E'en now, mayhap, he's taking The Greatest Word of all; From smiling folk aboard-ships He ticks it off the reel:-- "An' may it please your Lordships, A Fleet's put out o' Kiel!"

* * * * *

"Much indecision prevails as to what the value of sultanas will be in the near future."

_Daily Telegraph._

What the Germans want to know is the price of Sultans.

* * * * *

BLANCHE'S LETTERS.

WAR GOSSIP.

_Park Lane._

Dearest Daphne,--The situation here is unchanged, though we have made some progress in knitting. Forgive me, _m'amie_, but one does get so much into the _despatch_ habit! The other day I'd a letter from Babs, in which she told me she'd "nothing fresh to report on her right wing" before she pulled herself together.

Norty's at the front as a flying-man. He's finding out all sorts of things, dropping bombs on Zeppelins and covering himself with glory. I had a few lines from him last week. He dated from "A place in Europe" (they have to be _enormously_ cautious!), and said he was having the time of his life. He was immensely pleased with the last letter I managed to get through to him, and was particularly struck, he says, with my advice to him: "Find out all you can, and above all don't get caught;" he considers it simply _invaluable_ advice and says all airmen ought to have it written up in letters of gold somewhere or other.

Stella Clackmannan's had a fortnight's training as a nurse and is off. I ran in to see the dear thing the night before she left. She'd been posing to a photographer in her Red Cross uniform for _hours_ and _hours_ and was almost in a state of _collapse_; but the heroic darling said she was ready to do even _more than that_ for her country. In one photo she's sitting by a cot with her hands folded, looking sad but _very_ sweet. In another she's standing up, singing, "It's a long way to Tipperary;" and in a third she's bandaging someone (she had one of the foot-men in for this photo), and, _a mon avis_, it's the least successful of all. She appears to be _choking_ the poor man! However, they're immensely charming, and will all be seen in the "Aristocratic Angels of Mercy" page of next week's _People of Position_.

Dear Professor Dimsdale has only just got back to England from his eclipse expedition. I'm not sure now whether it was an eclipse or an occultation, but anyhow the only place where it could be properly seen was a mountain in the Austrian Tyrol. It was due in the middle of August, and the last week in July the Professor set off with his big telescope and his lenses and his assistants and his note-books and everything that was his. He lived a week or two on the mountain, to get used to the atmosphere and prepare all his things, so he didn't know what was going on in the world below. And then, just as the eclipse or whatever it was _began_, and the Professor was looking up at the sky for all he was worth, a lot of fearful creatures came rushing up the mountain and said there was a war and that he was an alien enemy and that he was making signals and that his big telescope was a new sort of howitzer; and they pushed him down the mountain, and broke his telescope and all his lenses, and tore up his note-books, and shook their fists at him and used such language that he said for the first time in his life he was sorry he was such a good linguist!

They finished by shutting him up in a fortress, and there he's been ever since. He hardly knows how it was he got away, but he believes the whole garrison was marched off to meet the Russians, and that they're all prisoners now--which is his only drop of comfort. I've tried to console him for having missed what he went to see. I said, "Perhaps the eclipse or whatever it was will happen again soon--or one like it." He groaned out, "My dear lady, that particular conjunction of the heavenly bodies will not occur again for 2,645 years, 9 months, 3 weeks and 2 days." So there it is, my dearest!

Would it cheer you up to hear a small romance of war and knitting? Here it is, then. Some time ago Monica Jermyn brought round some terrific mitts she'd knitted to go in one of my parcels for the troops. She's easily the worst knitter who ever held needles! "My _dear_ child," I said, "what simply ghastly mitts! They're full of mistakes." "What's it matter?" Monica answered. "Mistakes will keep them quite as warm as the right stitches. Besides, they're all right. I knit ever so much better now than when I used to make socks for the Deep Sea Fisherman last year." "That's not saying much," I said. "I remember those socks for the Deep Sea Fishermen, and I doubt whether even the _deepest_ sea fishermen would know how to put them on! What's this?" "It's a message to go with the mitts," replied Monica. This was the message:--"The girl who made these mitts hopes they will be a comfort to some dear brave hands fighting for her and her sisters in England." "Oh, my _dear_!" I remonstrated. "It's very _young_ and _romantic_ of you, but don't you think it's _just_ a little----" "No, I don't!" she cried. "And if it is, I don't care. Please, please let it go!" So it went.

Soon after that the Jermyns went down to their place in Sussex, and later I heard they'd some convalescent war heroes as guests. Monica wrote me: "All six of them are dear brave darlings, of course, but _one_ of them is _darlinger_ than the others. Tell it not in Gath, dear Blanche, but I think I've met my fate!" Later she wrote: "He's getting on splendidly. He turns out to be a cousin of the Flummerys. He performed _prodigies_ of valour, but won't say a _word_ about it. When he leaves us my heart will quite, _quite_ break--and I sometimes hope _his_ will too!"

Yesterday came the following:--"Claude and I belong to each other. And what, oh _what_ do you think helped to lead up to the dear, delicious finale? But wait. My hero is almost quite well now, and this morning, when we took what would have been our _last_ little walk in the grounds, it happened! He walks _beautifully_ now, though he still needs an arm at about the level of _mine_ to lean on. It was a chilly morning and, as I was looking down and trying to think of something to say, I gave a sudden shriek, for on his dear heroic wrists I recognised--_My Mitts_! And when he heard I'd made them he was just as _confondu_ as I was. 'They were in a bale of comfies sent to my company,' he said, 'and I had the ladling out of them to the men. But when I came to these mitts, with the sweet little message pinned to them, I simply couldn't part with them! And to think _you_ made them--and wrote the little message! It makes one believe in all those psychic what-d'-you-call-'ems.'

"I felt a crisis was coming and so I said hurriedly, 'Oh, I only wish they were worthier of--of--brave hands and wrists. I'm a wretched knitter--they're full of mistakes--I kept forgetting to keep to the pattern--it ought to have been, "_knit_ two together and _make_ one"--but of course you don't understand knitting.' 'I understand it right enough if _that's_ all there is to it,' he said. "Knit two together and make one." Monica--no, you mustn't run away----' And that's all you're going to be told, Blanche, except that the powers that be have given their consent and I'm too happy for words!"

_Et voila mon petit roman de guerre et de tricotage._

My poor Josiah is still at the uttermost edge of beyond. He began to come home, and the boat was chased and ran to an island for shelter, and then the island was taken by one of our enemies and he was a prisoner. Then it was retaken by one of the Allies and he was free again. Since then more things have happened and he's been a prisoner again, and free again. And now he's lost count, and says he doesn't know _what_ he is or _who's_ got the island!

Ever thine,

BLANCHE.

* * * * *

Illustration: _Cyclist._ "MANY RECRUITS GONE FROM THIS VILLAGE?"

_Shopkeeper._ "NO, SIR."

_Cyclist._ "OH, WHY'S THAT?"

_Shopkeeper._ "WELL, SIR, AFTER GOING CAREFULLY INTO THE MATTER, WE, IN THIS NEIGHBOURHOOD, DECIDED TO REMAIN ABSOLUTELY NEUTRAL."

* * * * *

FATHER WILHELM.

"You are bold, Father WILHELM," the young man said; "Your moustache, too, is fiercer than mine; But I'm tempted to ask by the size of your head, Do you really suppose you're divine?"

"In my youth," said his father, "you probably know That I held the most orthodox views; But since I have hypnotized HARNACK and CO. I simply believe what I choose."

"You are bold," said the youth, "as I've mentioned before, Yet you frequently talk through your hat; For you told us the English were worthless in war; Pray what was the reason of that?"

"In my earlier days," said his sire, "through and through I studied that decadent race, And in failing to prove that my forecast was true They have covered themselves with disgrace."

"You are bold," said the youth, "and the Nietzschean creed Cries, 'Down with the humble and meek;' Yet the sack of Louvain made your bosom to bleed; Why were you so painfully weak?"

"In my youth," said his father, "I studied the Arts With a zeal that no force could restrain; And the love of mankind which that study imparts Has made me unduly humane."

"You _were_ bold," said the youth, "but it seems to be clear That you're losing your grit and your fire; And, if I may whisper the hint in your ear, Don't you think that you ought to retire?"

"I've answered three questions," the KAISER replied, "That might baffle the wit of a ZANCIG; I'm tired of your talk and I'm sick of your 'side': Be off, or I'll send you to Danzig."

* * * * *

THE WAY OF THE TURK.

The position of Turkey is muddled and murky, But the course she's resolved to pursue Is true to her mind, which we constantly find _A l'Enver(s) et contre tous._

* * * * *

"The Hun and the Tartar stand together--_par mobile patrum_."

_Newcastle Daily Journal._

We cannot speak with equal confidence of the head of the Tartars, but the KAISER certainly makes a very mobile parent.

* * * * *

Illustration: _Cavalry Instructor_ (_to nervous Recruit_). "NOW THEN; NONE O' THEM COSSACK STUNTS 'ERE."

* * * * *

THE WATCH DOGS.

VII.

Dear Charles,--We haven't gone yet. Upon my word, we don't know what to do about it. We start off for the Continent and then we halt and ask ourselves, "Won't they be wanting us to go to Egypt and have a word with the enemy there?" So we come back and change our underclothes and start out again; but we haven't got far before a persistent subaltern starts a scare about invasions. At that we halt again and have a pow-wow. Thick underclothes for the Continent; thin underclothes for Egypt, but what underclothes for home defence? And that, old man, is the real difficulty about war: what clothes are you to make it in? Our official programme is, however, clearly defined now. It is this: We sail on or about ---- to ----, and thence to ----, pausing for a cup of tea at ----. We then change direction left and turn down by the butcher's shop and up past the post-office. Here we form fours, form two deep, slope arms, order arms, present arms, trail arms, ground arms, take up arms, pile arms, unpile arms, move to the right in fours, by the left, left wheel. The essence of these manoeuvres is that they make it impossible for even the most acute enemy to guess which is our real direction. He gathers that it is one of two things: it is either right or, failing that, left. But which? Ah, that is the secret! Sometimes I am in some doubt myself after having given the order.

Our musical _repertoire_ is extensive, and, I venture to think, very aptly and poetically expresses the feelings of soldiers in the several aspects of military life. Their deep-seated respect for ceremonial is expressed thus, to the _Faust_ airs:--

"All soldiers live on bread and jam; All soldiers eat it instead o' ham. And every morning we hear the Colonel say, 'Form fours! Eyes right! Jam for dinner to-day!'"

His heart's sorrow upon leaving his fatherland is rendered exactly thus:--

"The ship is now in motion; We're going to cross the Ocean. Good bye-er! Fare-well-er! Farewell for ever-mo-er!"

And lastly his deep concern for his country's and his own and everybody's welfare is thus put:--

"I don't care if the ship goes down, It doesn't belong to me."

We had a Divisional Field Day yesterday. Recollecting a previous experience, the G.O.C. sent for his three Brigadiers, when the division was assembled for action, and, it seems, said to them, "There must be less noise." The Brigadiers, returning to the field, called out each his four battalion-commanders and said to them, distinctly, "There must be less noise." The twelve battalion-commanders called out each his eight company-commanders, who called out each his four section-commanders, and in every instance was repeated, quite audibly, the same utterance, "There must be less noise." Three hundred and eighty-four section-commanders were engaged in impressing this order, with all the emphasis it deserved, upon the men, when the General rode on to the field. His anger was extreme. "THERE MUST BE LESS NOISE!" said he.

Yours ever,

Henry.

* * * * *

"The Press also avoids very carefully all discussion of the status of the Goeben and the Breslau. Practically the only reference to the subject is a remark in the _Frankfurter Zeitung_ that Turkey has alone to decide what ships are to fly under her flag."--_Times._

If Turkey decides that the _Goeben_ is to fly, we hope she will warn the man who works the searchlights at Charing Cross.

* * * * *

Illustration: A GLORIOUS EXAMPLE.

ABLE-BODIED CIVILIAN (_to Territorial_). "THAT OUGHT TO GIVE YOU A GOOD LEAD, MATE."

TERRITORIAL. "YES--AND I MEAN TO TAKE IT! WHAT ABOUT _YOU_?"

* * * * *

Illustration: A PRUSSIAN COURT-PAINTER EARNING AN IRON CROSS BY PAINTING PICTURES IN PRAISE OF THE FATHERLAND FOR NEUTRAL CONSUMPTION.

* * * * *

"CHARLIE" BERESFORD.

By TOBY, M.P.

"LORD CHARLES has broken his chest-bone--a piece of which was cut out in his boyhood leaving a cavity--his pelvis, right leg, right hand, foot, five ribs, one collar-bone three times, the other once, his nose three times." Thus Mr. COPE CORNFORD in one of the notes with which he illuminates the _Memoirs of Admiral Lord Charles Beresford_, published by Messrs. METHUEN in two volumes, illustrated with a score of plates, the portrait of Lady CHARLES adding the charm of rare beauty to the collection.

For many years I have been honoured by the friendship of Lord CHARLES, and have had frequent opportunity of witnessing his multiform supremacy. Till I read this amazing catalogue of calamities, I never dreamt that among other claims to distinction he might have been billed as The Fractured Man, principal attraction in a travelling show, eclipsing the One-Legged Camel, the Tinted Zebra, and the Weird-Eyed Wanton from the Crusty North, who can sing in five languages "It's a Long, Long Way to Tipperary." Ignoring the monotony of experience suffered by the ribs, and noting the obtrusiveness of one collar-bone, we may, with slight variation from a formula in use by the SPEAKER in the House of Commons, declare "The Nose has it." Happily no one regarding Lord CHARLES'S cheery countenance would guess that its most prominent feature had been "broken three times."

Here is a man whose life should be written. Fortunately the task has been undertaken by Lord CHARLES himself, and the world is richer by a book which, instructive in many ways, valuable as throwing side-lights on the slow advance of the Navy to the proud position which it holds to-day on the North Sea, bubbles over with humour.

Record opens in the year 1859, when Lord CHARLES entered the Navy, closing just half-a-century later, when he hauled down his flag and permanently came ashore. Within the space of fifty years there is crammed a life of adventure richly varied in range. A man of exuberant individuality, which has occasional tendency to obscure supreme capacity, of fearless courage, gifted with a combination of wit and humour, Lord CHARLES is the handy-man to whom in emergency everyone looked not only for counsel but for help. It is a paradox, but a probability, that had he been duller-witted, a more ponderous person, he would have carried more weight alike in the councils of the Admiralty at Whitehall and of the nation at Westminster.

As these memoirs testify, behind a smiling countenance he hides an unbending resolution to serve the public interest, whether aboard ship or in his place in Parliament. Perhaps the most familiar incident in his professional career is his exploit during the bombardment of Alexandria, when the signal flashed from the flag-ship, "Well done, _Condor_." A more substantial service was his command of what he describes as "the penny steamer" _Safieh_, whose manoeuvring on the Nile amid desperate circumstances averted from Sir CHARLES WILSON'S desert column, hastening to the rescue of GORDON, the fate which earlier had befallen STEWART.

Another splendid piece of work was accomplished when, after the bombardment of Alexandria he was appointed Provost-Marshal and Chief of Police, and had committed to his charge the task of restoring order. His conspicuous success on this occasion bore fruit many years later when he was offered the post of Chief Commissioner of Police in the Metropolis. His story of the Egyptian and Soudan Wars, carried through several chapters, is a valuable contribution to history. It suggests that, all other avenues to fame closed against him, Lord CHARLES would have made an enduring name as a war correspondent.

It is a circumstance incredible, save in view of the authority upon which it is stated, that, as part of the reward for his splendid service in the Soudan, Lord CHARLES narrowly escaped compulsory retirement from the Service before he had completed the time required to qualify for Flag Rank. The Queen's Regulations ordained that before a captain could win this prized position he must have completed a period of from five to six years of active service. In 1892, Lord CHARLES, the flag almost in reach of his hand, applied for permission to count-in the 315 days he was strenuously and brilliantly at work in the Soudan. The Board of Admiralty, invulnerable in their environment of red tape, refused the request, repeating the _non possumus_ when on two subsequent occasions the request was preferred.

It must be admitted that the Board had no reason to regard Lord CHARLES with favour or even with equanimity. When returned to Parliament, the man who had superintended the mending of the boiler on the penny steamboat on the Nile, devoted himself to the bigger task of mending the Navy, at that time in an equally pitiful condition. During his brief and solitary term of office as Junior Lord of the Admiralty, Lord CHARLES, who thought he was put there to do some work, drew up a memorandum on the necessity of creating at the Admiralty a Naval Intelligence Department. The memorandum was laid before the Board, and the Junior Lord was told he was meddling with high matters that did not come within the scope of his business. A few weeks later a Naval Intelligence Department (of a sort) was created. _Sic vos non vobis._

'Twas ever thus. Lord CHARLES, whether in office, on active service, or from his familiar place above the Gangway in the House of Commons, bringing to bear upon Naval affairs the gift of keen intuition and the endowment of long practical experience, has, with one exception, done more than any man living to deliver the Navy from mistakes inevitable in the case of the over-lordship of a civilian who is subject to currents of political and party feeling. By way of reward he has received more kicks than ha'pence.

* * * * *

Illustration: GERMANISED TURKEY.

"DERE YOU ARE, MEIN FRIENDT; DER SAME OLD FLAG MIT A _LEEDLE_ DIFFERENCE."

* * * * *

ANOTHER RUINED TRADE.

I had secured an empty compartment. Something in my blood makes me rush for an empty compartment. I suppose it is because I am a Briton, yet it was another Briton who intruded upon my privacy.

At the first glance I saw that he would talk to me about the--well, what do you expect? I can always tell when men want to talk about it. Would that I had the same subtle instinct when they wish to borrow money! I was ready for him. If he said, "Have you heard?" I was going to answer, "About the SECRETARY OF STATE FOR WAR ordering Lord FISHER to be imprisoned in the Tower as a spy? Why, my brother-in-law told me all about it last week."

Instead he put his hand on my knee and asked, "Are you a German?"

"Unless I am descended from HENGIST or HORSA," I replied, "there isn't an atom of culture in me."

"Then I can confide in you. A disturbance is advancing in this direction from Eastern Europe."

"You mean that the CROWN PRINCE is retreating towards us from Poland?"

"No," he snapped. "And another disturbance is coming from the vicinity of Iceland."

"Good heavens! This is too much. At my time of life how am I to learn how to pronounce Pzreykjavik."

"Let me tell you what I prophesy for the next few days. Saturday will be bright."

"Splendid! A cheerful week-end will do us all good."

"Sunday will be gloomy, and on Monday will come the downfall."

"WILLIAM'S or ours?"

"Accompanied by strong south-westerly winds, rising to a gale, and a rapid fall of the barometer. So now you know. My mind is easy. I have told someone. I have been cruelly censored--only allowed to predict just wet or fine from day to day. I felt that I must tell someone. The Censor and Count ZEPPELIN between them were killing me."

I pitied the agony of the professional weather forecaster. I promised to respect his confidence. I left the carriage proud of the fact that I was one of the two men in England who knew what Saturday's weather would be. That is why I left my umbrella at home while apparently every other man took his out. It is also the reason why my new topper was ruined. And now I wonder whether the prophet was mistaken, or whether at the last moment he detected signs of culture in me and lied.

* * * * *

From an Indian paper:--

"The Germans are continuing the questionable tactics of sowing floating mines in neutral waters to the danger of neutral shipping, as well as of British and French war vessels. They are apparently tying them in Paris, so as to make it more difficult to avoid them."

As a result, the _Iron Duke_ has had to give up entirely its morning run down the Rue de Rivoli. At the same time we are glad to hear that these floating mines are tied. It stops them from floating quite so much.

* * * * *

IN THE WINGS.

(NOTE: _If this essay in the well-informed manner achieves any success, the credit is largely due to the timely interruptions of the Censor._)