Part 6 (2/2)
”It's a pity you didn't,” Le Huray observed.
”Wot?”
”Twist yer bloomin' neck.”
”Look 'ere, my lad, if I comes over there I'll twist yer tongue and tie it up behind yer 'ead, an' it wont be a Blighty yer'll 'ave--no, it'll be a blooming' corfin.”
”Shut yer row, the two of you,” Casey shouted, ”yer like a couple wots been married a year, chewin' each others 'ead orf. Come yere an' give me a 'and, Stumpy.” And he turned again to the task of clearing a layer of mud from his rifle bolt with a grimy piece of rag an inch square.
There is a refres.h.i.+ng originality (sic) in the al fresco meals partaken of in the fresh open air, in a comfortable trench--so comfortable that legs are twelve inches too long, knees in the way of your chin, and somebody's boots making doormats of your tiny bit of cheese. Water and tea--when you get it--has a most uncommon flavour of petrol due to being transported in petrol cans. Stumpy was of the opinion that the War Office should be advised to utilise rum jars instead.
Fritz has a gentlemanly knack of dropping a sh.e.l.l near you and depositing a mighty chunk of black filth in the very midst of your grub.
Resultant language unprintable.
Slight falls of snow began to take place, the wind increased and nights in the trenches became one long vista of drawn-out agony. Hands and feet froze; maintain circulation was an absolute physical impossibility: but it had to be faced through the long, over long, hours of waiting, and there was no alternative, no remedy. You suffered, Royal Guernseys, men of a warm, sunny isle, who had not hitherto known the harsh winter of miles inland spots. But you stuck it well, rifle grasped in a hand gone stiff, face cut and blistered from the fierce wind; feet aching with inconceivable agony.
Gas, sent over in sh.e.l.ls, made an unpleasant addition to the already numerous ”attractions” of the picnic. There is in this form of gas two factors that materially a.s.sist in bringing about casualties. Firstly, this type of sh.e.l.l cannot usually be distinguished from a ”dud” and therefore alarm is rarely given until three or four of these sh.e.l.ls have landed, by which time, if the wind is in your direction, the gas is on you. Secondly, men are careless: ”Oh, the wind won't blow it this way ... might only be a 'dud,' too.”
Men regard and withstand all this hards.h.i.+p with varying moral. There are a few who sadly collapse before the onslaught of adverse circ.u.mstances, who give way without a fight to nervous prostration, and who are subject at times to wild spasms of uncontrolable trembling, finally going down the line with a form of sh.e.l.l-shock altogether distinct to shock from violent concussion.
Some are stoic, hanging on doggedly; characteristic of the quiet man from tiny Sark, who, failing to understand the why and wherefore of their presence in this h.e.l.l and yet individually conscious of a sacred duty to carry on, gave a constant example of philosophic acceptance of life as it was that indicated no lack of courage. Of very similar psychological tendency were the men from Alderney--a fine, physically, body of lads, if short--and from the more remote portions of Guernsey.
The town men were adept growlers, found something funny in everything and calmly palmed off all the arduous tasks upon the good-natured but less sly countrymen. It should be recalled, however, that a large percentage of these men were ”old soldiers,” had seen service at Guillemont with the Royal Irish, and were therefore au courant with every form of deep scheming.
The greater portion of the remnants of Guernsey's volunteer companies in the Royal Irish had after their first casualty been drafted into the Ten Hundred, a large proportion receiving--and rightly--promotion. They were fine types, born fighters, born soldiers, and, some of them, born schemers.
It would be futile to endeavour to convey that nowhere in the Ten Hundred were found men in whom a white streak was obviously apparent.
White of face and faint of heart; the first to avoid any undertaking where their skin was endangered: crouched far below the parapet, and who at the least indication of enemy activity gazed frenziedly rearward at the nearest line for a headlong retreat. One in perhaps every hundred.
Fear, the instinct to guard life; the warning of danger; the all-absorbing sense of primitive ancestors who have handed down an almost uncontrollable Fear of the Unknown, indelibly imprinted upon the brain and imbibed into the very blood from centuries of fearful watch upon the Death that came out of the Darkness.
The fear of death overcome, there grasps the young warrior in a sudden frenzy the revelation that in some critical moment he ”might funk it.”
There lies the crux of it. Afraid that he might BE AFRAID and bring upon him from the lips of those whose opinions he values most the fatal slur ”Coward.” For death is far better than that those men who have placed upon you--and you upon them--the implicit reliance of MAN for MAN, should find you wanting in the test and pa.s.s sentence upon you that a lifetime regret could not one whit abate.
Two hundred, perhaps three hundred, yards from the Front Line a Fritz blockhouse (a concrete, more or less sh.e.l.l-proof fortress, impervious to rifle and machine gun fire, utilised on a large scale by the Germans and garrisoned with machine guns) held an advantageous position bearing on the lines of communication leading up from Masnieres, thereby playing pretty havoc upon ration parties and all movement within focus of the enemy machine-gunners.
It HAD to be taken, without artillery support. The Ten Hundred were nearly let in for the job, but owing to alteration of date the Lancas.h.i.+re Fusiliers had the onus upon them.
Surprise was the great deciding factor.
It failed! Creeping over through the night one half of the journey was accomplished ... in one piercing whine of spiteful machine-gun fire Fritz almost wiped out the first wave. For an hour the British tried again and again with constantly refilling gaps, while upon them was turned every German machine gun in the area. From half a mile away the creeping line of advance could be gauged by the tone of firing. Higher, higher, in one mad high-pitched shriek, ten thousand shots in one minute from twenty or more enemy machine-guns sang and hummed in the inky pall.
The high key lowered; the mind pictured the khaki line retreating, reforming--forward again. Then up again the shrill staccato; line drawing nearer. Higher, faster, louder the Satanic scream of lead.
Higher, still higher! The head throbbed, beads glistened on the brow--surely the climax was reached. And then it lowered--failed again.
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