Part 9

_The children unborn shall acclaim The standard the Anzacs unfurled, When they made Australasia’s fame The wonder and pride of the world._

EDGAR WALLACE.

TO MY BATH

This lyric may be bad, O Muse, But do not press on me too hard; In times of war you must excuse Somewhat your bard. A dug-out where I have to bend My back, and even lodge my knees Against the roof, would suit our friend Diogenes— But hardly seems a meet abode For any would-be laureate Who’ll sing, ad lib., an epic—ode— Or hymn of hate. Consider my attempt to write Iambic tetrametric lines As influenced by gelignite And bombs—and mines. No high falutin’ stilted phrase, No feeble tribute of a “sub.,” Can ever adequately praise Thee, dearest Tub. Perchance I’m sun-scorched: then I sigh To hear thy crystal waters lap And trickle o’er my toes when I Turn on the tap. If blizzards fresh from Samothrace Are mingling with December snows, When icicles in clusters grace “My youthful hose A world too wide for my shrunk shanks”—— Then I, nostalgia stricken, dream, And see thy white enamelled banks Through clouds of steam. Just as when corybantic drakes (Or ducks, just as the case may be), With clamorous quack, seek limpid lakes, So seek I thee. But _baths_ are not our rations in Gallipoli. ’Tis too far south— “The _bubble_ reputation’s in The cannon’s mouth.”

H. H. U., Northamptonshire Regt.

ANZAC LIMERICKS

There’s a certain darned nuisance called “Beachy,” Whose shells are exceedingly screechy; But we’re keeping the score, And we’re after your gore— So look out, “Beachy Bill,” when we meet ye.

They’ve given us all respirators, And we’ve bundles of ancient _Spectators_; But we’d give up the two For a good oyster stew, Or a dixie of chipped pertaters.

C. D. MC.

Yes, that’s the red ribbon I’m wearing— Just a small strip of scarlet, you see, But there’s no one can tell how I prize it Nor the glow it occasions to me. For it speaks of the broad fields of honour Which we wrung from the red jaws of hell— And my eyes grow bedimmed for the cobbers[13] Who battled and conquered and fell.

Yes, that’s the V.C. How I won it, It isn’t for _me_ to relate. (We heroes are always so modest, And boasting’s a thing that I hate.) Well—seeing you write for the papers, I’ll make an exception of you; Don’t mention _my_ name if you write it, Tho’ every partic’lar is true.

It was during a fight for an outpost— It was called the Green Knoll, I believe— And the Turks on the top dealt out slaughter: They’d a week of defeat to retrieve. It was five thousand feet to the summit, And almost as steep as a wall; And they met every charge as we rushed it With bayonet, shrapnel, and ball.

’Twas defended by nine tiers of trenches (That’s strong for an outpost, you’ll guess), With twelve 42 centimetres, Which kicked up the deuce of a mess. We’d been fighting five days without resting, When the eighth line of trenches we took; For ev’ry man there was a hero— From me to the company’s cook.

And there was the knoll just before us— Some two hundred paces or more; With barb-wire and bayonets bristling, And the parapets sloppy with gore. And the howitzers roared like perdition And vomited fire and death; Till we saw it was madness to charge them, And halted a moment for breath.

Ah, stranger, imagine the picture, And then stand with horror aghast— _We had fought for a month without sleeping, And we stood facing failure at last!_ We had squandered the best of our Army, We had “stuck” to our ultimate gasp; And there, in the moment of triumph, The prize was to slip from our grasp.

Then suddenly out sprang the Major, His face lighted over with bliss— “Pass the word there for Lance-Private Wilson; _He_’ll find us a way out of this!” (If there’s one thing I hate, it is skiting,[14] When I hear it I always feel sore, So you won’t think I boast when I tell you He ought to have done it before!)

And a great cheer arose as I faced him And nodded (I never salute), And said to him: “I’ll see you thro’, sir, And win you some glory to boot. The chaps of the 16th Battalion Are not easy snoozers to beat; I’ve a notion (I says) that will lick them— ’Arf a dollar I line them a treat!

“I don’t want no red-tapey orders, And I don’t want no kudos nor pelf; You get back to your own little dug-outs, And I’ll tackle the knoll _by myself_! I’ll lay down my life for my country, For old England, the land of the free; And you’ll find that the bloke called Horatius Was only a trifle to me!”

Then I shook hands with all the battalion (There were only thirteen of us left), And they cheered me again till the foemen Must have thought us of senses bereft. And I gathered my arms and my rations, And girded myself for the fray— If I live to be ninety or over, I will always remember that day!

I had five hundred rounds for my rifle, And of hand bombs I took forty-one; A machine-gun was slung to my shoulders, And I carried a periscope gun. As for rations—well, all I took with me Was a tin of Fray Bentos[15] or two, And in my breast pocket I planted A nice Army biscuit to chew.

Then I waved a farewell to my cobbers— I was too much affected to speak; There are times when the bravest of soldiers Have feelings that render them weak. One tear—then I turned to the trenches, And charged like a lion at bay As I caught the last words of our Colonel, Crying: “Bonzer[16] ... Gorstrafem ... Hooray!”

You talk of charmed lives—I’d a thousand; As I rushed up that hill like a goat I got thirty-two shots thro’ my trousers And nine shrapnel balls thro’ my coat; And a Japanese bomb burst beneath me —For a moment I gave up all hope, But it proved the best thing that could happen, _For it pushed me half-way up the slope_.

Then a fifteen-inch shell came straight at me —I hadn’t a moment to shirk— But it struck on that hard Army biscuit And rebounded—and blew up a Turk! You doubt it? Well, if you want proof, sir, The truth of this tale to endorse, Here’s the biscuit—that dent in the middle Is where the shell struck it, of course!

Ah, yes, ’twas a terrible moment; I was then slightly wounded, ’tis true— Just a bayonet stab in the gizzard And a crack from a bullet or two. But I gathered new strength for the conflict, And, just as the darkness came down, I was under their parapets, resting, And I knew I had beaten them brown!

For this was the scheme I had worked on, ’Twas a little bit mean, you may say— But I knew that the Turks were half-famished, And fought on one biscuit a day; And the tins of Fray Bentos I carried, I chucked in the trench then and there; And I heard the poor beggars pounce on it, And I knew they were caught in the snare!

* * * * *

The morning broke, smiling and peaceful— Ah, shame that we soldiers must fight— ’Twas a piteous scene met my vision With the first rosy quivers of light. When I peeped in the trench, not a Turk, sir, Was left of that legion accurst— For they’d whacked the Fray Bentos among them, _And each man had perished from thirst_.

That’s the yarn. If you know the 16th, sir, You’ll know how our Colonel can smile. He said to me: “_Corporal_ Wilson, You’ve dished up the beggars in style.” Promotion! Some say I deserve it, But _that’s_ really nothing to me; I don’t want no honour or glory, But—that’s how I won the V.C.

“CROSSCUT,” 16th Battalion, A.I.F.

FOOTNOTES:

[13] Cobber is Australian for a tried and trusted friend.

[14] Skiting—Australian for “swanking” in speech. “Skite”—blatherskite.

[15] Fray Bentos is a brand of tinned meat.

[16] Bonzer—Australian for “excellent.”

ICY

Nobody seemed to know much about him except that he was generally considered by all those who knew of him in the squadron to be a “cold-foot,” and his nickname was appropriately “Icy.” Not that the others had any particular cause to call him that, but whenever “Beachy Bill” came screeching overhead he would involuntarily duck and then smile in that peculiar manner of his as much as to say, “I can’t help it!” Beachy wasn’t his worst enemy, though, for if there was anything that he dreaded it was those Turkish “75’s.”[17] It used to make us feel as if we could shake him when we saw how he would double himself up. And yet one never liked to attempt anything of the kind whenever he used that smile. Moreover, as he was over six feet in height and correspondingly strong, it would not have been politic. His was a baffling smile, recalling the peculiar smile of the “Monna Lisa,” and, like it, unfathomable. He was a very quiet kind of chap, and when it was his turn to do fatigues, he would go and perform whatever was required of him without ever grumbling. His mates used to take a mean advantage of his good nature, and would shunt all the work, such as sweeping out the “possie,” or trenches, on to him.

About the time of which I am writing we had noticed that Abdul was sapping somewhere down the gully. Sometimes we could distinguish dark shapes moving about, and no amount of sniping on our part would stop them. They worked only during the night, and each morning we found that the pile of new earth down the gully had grown higher. At last we understood his plan—and it came to our turn to make a counter move.

One evening I was told off among others to go out and dig a new trench in front of Abdul’s new sap. We had to block him from getting to a certain place on the little ridge which hitherto had been in “No-Man’s Land.” I noticed that Icy had also been told off, but he was to be one of the covering party. All that night we worked hard, digging ourselves in and filling sandbags which we threw up in front of us. At first we were undisturbed, but suddenly the bullets began to ping-ping over our heads, and we knew that Abdul had tumbled. Still, as he was himself intent on digging he did not come out at us, but contented himself by sniping, thinking to drive us off in that way. However, it was a bit late in the day for that; since by the time he found us out we had already several good sandbags filled, and these protected us as long as we kept well down.

Several of our chaps were winged, but as none of the wounds was very serious we didn’t mind that. When it had struck five in the morning we knocked off and retired to sleep away the day. Half a dozen bomb-throwers who had volunteered for the job then took our places, bringing with them a few bombs, their rifles, ammunition, water bottles, and a supply of bully beef and biscuits. There they spent the whole day, lying low under cover of the sandbags. But Abdul troubled them not! Next night we went out again to resume work, and then it was that certain things happened which made us look upon Icy in a different light.

We had no sooner started work than _ra-ta-ta-ta-ta_ went a machine-gun somewhere out to the left, and the bullets came pinging round hot and close, winging three and killing two on the first discharge.

John Turk had stolen a march on us by placing a machine-gun away out on his extreme flank where he could to a certain extent enfilade us. That sort of thing could not be allowed to last, as we had to bury our noses in the ground each time the confounded gun opened up. Our covering party, being out ahead of us, escaped the hail of bullets better than we did. The place was now becoming too hot to stay in, so the order came along to retire independently to our trenches, until something could be done to stop the machine-gun.

When we mustered again in the trenches, we found that one man of the covering party was missing. The man was Icy. As we were talking about him—wondering who should go back to look for him—there came the noise of a commotion from the direction of the Turkish machine-gun. Bang! bang! went a couple of bombs, followed by cries and shouts from Abdul, and above it all we were certain we heard fragments of language, of the category known in Australia as “bullocky.”[18] What could it mean? By this time the alarm had spread along the whole of Abdul’s front trenches, which belched forth liquid fire. In our own trenches everyone had mechanically sprung to arms; and we stood there wondering while for fifteen minutes the Turks fired without ceasing. Gradually the noise subsided—and we noticed that for some reason the machine-gun away on the left was strangely quiet.

An hour later we were stealing out again to have another attempt at completing our new trenches when I stumbled over the form of a man lying prone. Bending over to see him, I found it was Icy. His clothes were wet and sticky with blood, and half underneath his body there showed the muzzle of a machine-gun. As we lifted him up, we saw that the gun was there complete, tripod and all.

We took him into the lines and handed him over to the dressing-station; and just before we came away he opened his eyes and told enough for us to realise that Icy had sneaked over and stolen that Turkish gun. To this day we don’t quite know how he did it, as he never will talk about it; but before they took him on to the hospital ship next day—with his sixteen bullet wounds and scratches all told—there went down to see him a crowd in which I was amongst the foremost, which apologised to Icy very humbly.

And, do you know, he only smiled back at us in that funny old way of his.

E. A. M. W.

FOOTNOTES:

[17] The Turks had a battery of French “75’s” at Anzac, seized as the guns were coming from France during the blockade of Servia in the Balkan War.

[18] Bullocky—stands both for the bullock driver and for his chief gift.

THE TROJAN WAR, 1915

We care not what old Homer tells Of Trojan war and Helen’s fame. Upon the ancient Dardanelles New peoples write—in blood—their name.

Those Grecian heroes long have fled, No more the Plain of Troy they haunt; Made sacred by our Southern dead, Historic is the Hellespont.

Homeric wars are fought again By men who like old Greeks can die; Australian backblock heroes slain, With Hector and Achilles lie.

No legend lured these men to roam; They journeyed forth to save from harm Some Mother-Helen sad at home, Some obscure Helen on a farm.

And when one falls upon the hill— Then by dark Styx’s gloomy strand, In honour to plain Private Bill Great Agamemnon lifts his hand!

J. WAREHAM, 1st Aust. Field Amb.

THE PRICE

Dead figures writhe and beckon in my dream; Wild eyes look into mine; While I, bewildered, watch the bloody stream With misty eyes ashine.

It rends my heart, and I am nothing loath To have the murder cease. Horror it is and carnage, yet are both Part of the price of peace.

Corpl. COMUS, 2nd Bat., A.I.F.

KILLED IN ACTION

Where the ranges throw their shadows long before the day’s surrender, Down a valley where a river used to tumble to the sea, On a rising patch of level rest the men who dared to tender Life and all its sweetness for their love o’ liberty.

In a thousand miles of ugly scrubby waste and desolation, Just that little space of level showing open to the sea; Nothing there to lend it grandeur (sure, it needs no decoration) Save those rows of wooden crosses keeping silent custody.

There’s a band of quiet workers, artless lads who joked and chatted Just this morning; now they’re sullen and they keep their eyes away From the blanket-hidden body, coat and shirt all blood-bespattered, Lying motionless and waiting by the new-turned heap of clay.

There are records in the office—date of death and facts pertaining, Showing name and rank and number and disposal of the kit— More or less a business matter, and we have no time for feigning More than momentary pity for the men who have been hit.

There’s a patient mother gazing on her hopes so surely shattered (Hopes and prayers she cherished bravely, seeking strength to hide her fear), Boyhood’s dreams and idle memories—things that never really mattered— Lying buried where he’s buried ’neath the stars all shining clear.

There’s a young wife sorrow-stricken in her bitter first conception Of that brief conclusive message, harsh fulfilment of her dread; There are tiny lips repeating, with their childish imperception, Simple words that bring her mem’ries from the boundaries of the dead.

Could the Turk have seen this picture when his trigger-finger rounded, Would his sights have blurred a little had he heard that mother’s prayer? Could he know some things that she knew, might his hate have been confounded? But he only saw his duty, and he did it, fighting fair.

Just a barren little surface where the grave mounds rise ungainly, Monuments and tributes to the men who’ve done their share. Pain and death, the fruits of battle, and the crosses tell it plainly, Short and quick and silent suffering; would to God it ended there.

HARRY MCCANN, Headquarters, 4th Aust. Light Horse.

A GREY DAY IN GALLIPOLI

As I look westward towards the grey Ægean Sea, generally peaceful, deep blue and ofttimes appearing golden-hued by the mystic hand of sunset, but now flecked with ripples of white like a distant hill-side strewn with new-shorn lambs, and hurried on by the murmurings of the grey sea’s bride, the grey cloud-bearing Mother Wind, as she splashes the foreshore of this grey land with fleecy fringes of her mate, and makes her way over the grey hills, through rugged landslip or tangled, stunted, unfriendly evergreens, grey phantoms flit to and fro, passing with a careless nod, as it were, the little grey homes of those whose thoughts so seldom had time to feast on aught but the bright days before the Peril came; but who now, with a foretaste of hell in their souls, need only such a day as this to make them feel the presence of the grey world’s messenger whose name is Loneliness. Loneliness garbed in a mantle of merging grey sea and grey sky, trimmed with the spires and turrets of grey and seemingly unsouled ships, whose presence in the blue and gold days was as that of old friends well met, but which now seem to be ragged rents in the solemn dress of Loneliness, reminding one of a derelict’s slovenly covering held together over a hopeless breast by an old gold brooch—perhaps the gift of a mother or handed down from bygone ages. Loneliness comes not to all of us garbed in this fashion. To others, who look eastward, she comes dressed in the sombre clothes of the grey hill-side, and with yearning eyes beckons them on to the chances of the blue and gold life in Constantinople; or, perchance, if their luck is that of many another good soldier, to that other grey life forever with the grey seas, grey skies and grey forgetfulness on these ghostly, forsaken grey shores of Gallipoli.

N. ASH, 11th A.A.S.C.

MY ANZAC HOME

Come and see my little dug-out—way up on the hill it stands, Where I can get a lovely view of Anzac’s golden sands; When “Beachy Bill” is shelling, I can see just where he lands, From my cosy little dug-out on the hill.

It isn’t quite as roomy as the mansions of the Tsar; From sitting-room to bedroom is not so very far, For the dining- and the smoking-room you stay just where you are, In my cosy little dug-out on the hill.

The fleas they wander nightly, as soon as I’ve undressed, And after many weary hunts I’ve had to give them best. As the ants have also found it, there is very little rest In my cosy little dug-out on the hill.

I’ve a natty little cupboard, and it looks so very nice, ’Twas made to keep my bread and jam, my bacon and my rice; But now it’s nothing other than a home for orphan’d mice, In my cosy little dug-out on the hill.

There is no electric lighting in this blighted land of war, So I use some fat in syrup tins, and stand it on the floor— And when it’s working overtime I sweat from every pore, In my cosy little dug-out on the hill.

When the nights are clear and starry—then the scene is beautified By the silvery gleams and shadows that across the mountain glide; But if it’s wet and stormy—well, I go to sleep outside Of my cosy little dug-out on the hill.[19]

When the time comes round for parting from my little eight by four, And I can get a good night’s rest without a back that’s sore, Well—_perhaps_ some day I’ll miss you, and will long to live once more In the little cosy dug-out on the hill.

Corpl. GEORGE L. SMITH, 24th Sanitary Section, R.A.M.C.T.

FOOTNOTES:

[19] The roof of a dug-out, as usually designed, is a device for keeping the shrapnel out and letting the water in.

WHAT FRANK THOUGHT

A private sat under a tree. It was not the Lone Pine, but the other one. Winter had stripped it of foliage, and all around was bleak and uninviting.

In his bronzed fist, which had carried buckets and biscuits since April 25th, he held a letter, highly perfumed, from his “young lady”—she whom he had escorted on so many occasions to Sydney’s social events in the piping days of peace.

He had not heard from home since embarkation, and had often wondered, as he bathed in just enough water to temper a whisky and shaved by means of a lethal instrument better fitted for cutting a hedge than a beard, whether they really cared. A fit of hesitancy now seized him, and he hardly liked to read the letter. By means of the top of a tin of sardines which he had bought cheap—two bob he had paid for it on the beach—he saw his unshaven face, the neck of his soiled shirt, and his crop of unkempt hair. He was interrupted in this by the attentions a “little friend” was paying him. This he located. He then lighted the end of a cigarette (which he had kept stowed away in the top of his puttees) before risking another glance at himself in the top of the two-bob tin of sardines.

“What a guy,” he murmured. “If Jessie could see me now, would she turn me down for some cold-footed, well-groomed fellow? I don’t think. She’s all right, and would understand it’s no gipsy tea we’re at.”

However, it was with some slight nervousness that he opened the letter. Following the customary greetings, Jessie wrote: