May he rest in
peace.
CHAPTER X (p. 130)
A NOCTURNAL ADVENTURE
Our old battalion billets still,
Parades as usual go on.
We buckle in with right good will,
And daily our equipment don
As if we meant to fight, but no!
The guns are booming through the air,
The trenches call us on, but oh!
We don't go there, we don't go there!
I have come to the conclusion that war is rather a dull game, not that
blood-curdling, dashing, mad, sabre-clashing thing that is seen in
pictures, and which makes one fearful for the soldier's safety. There
is so much of the "everlastin' waitin' on an everlastin' road." The
road to the war is a journey of many stages, and there is much of what
appears to the unit as loitering by the wayside. We longed for action,
for some adventure with which to relieve the period of "everlastin'
waitin'."
Nine o'clock was striking in the room downstairs and the old man and
woman who live in the house were pottering about, locking doors, and
putting the place into order. Lying on the straw in the loft we (p. 131)
could hear them moving chairs and washing dishes; they have seven sons
in the army, two are wounded and one is a prisoner in Germany. They
are very old and are unable to do much hard work; all day long they
listen to the sound of the guns "out there." In the evening they wash
the dishes, the man helping the woman, and at night lock the doors and
say a prayer for their sons.
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