PANSIES
Thereare some pansies on my table, arranged in a broken glass one of the men has picked up among the rubble and débris of this shattered town. Dark mauve and yellow pansies, pretty, innocent looking little things. “Pansies—that’s for thoughts.”
Transport is rattling up and down the street—guns, limbers, G.S. wagons, water-carts, God knows what, and there are men marching along, mud-caked, weary, straggling, clinging fast to some German souvenir as they come one way; jaunty, swinging, clean, with bands a-blowing as they go the other. It is a dull grey day. There is “something doing” up the line. I can hear the artillery, that ceaseless artillery, pounding and hammering, and watch the scout aeroplanes, dim grey hawks in the distance, from the windows of the room above—the broken-down room with the plasterless ceiling, and the clothes scattered all over the floor.
“Pansies—that’s for thoughts.”
The regiment is up yonder—the finest regiment God ever made. They are wallowing in the wet, sticky mud of the trenches they have dug themselves into, what is left of them. They are watching and waiting, always watching and waiting for the enemy to attack.
And they are being bombarded steadily, pitilessly, without cessation. Some will be leaning against the parapet, sleeping the sleep of exhaustion, some will be watching, some smoking, if they have got any smokes left. I know them. Until the spirit leaves their bodies they will grin and fight, fight and grin, but always “Carry On.”
Last night they went up to relieve the —th, after they had just come out of the line, and were themselves due to be relieved. Overdue, in fact, but the General knew that he could rely on them, knew thatTHEYwould never give way, while there was a man left to fire a rifle. So he used them—as they have always been used, and as they always will be—to hold the line in adversity, to take the line when no one else could take it.
We have been almost wiped out five times, but the old spirit still lives, the Spirit of ourmighty dead. There are always enough “old men” left, even though they number but a score, with whom to leaven the lump of raw, green rookies that come to us, and to turn them into soldiers worthy of the Regiment.
Dark mauve pansies.
I knew all the old soldiers of the Brigade, I have fought with them, shaken hands with them afterwards—those who survived—mourned with them our pals who were gone—buried many a one of them.
This time I am out of it. Alone with the pansies ... and my thoughts. Thomson was killed last night; Greaves, Nicholson, Townley, between then and now. Nearly all the rest are wounded. Those who come back will talk of this fight, they will speak of hours and events of which I shall know nothing. For the first time I shall be on the outer fringe, mute ... with only ears to hear, and no heart to speak.
Perhaps they will come out to-morrow night. Or, early, very early the following morning. They will be tired—so tired they are past feeling it—unshaven, unwashed, and covered with mud from their steel helmetsdown to the soles of their boots. But they will be fairly cheerful. They will try to sing on the long, long march back here, as I have heard them so many times before. When they reach the edge of the town they will try to square their weary shoulders, and to keep step—and they will do it, too, heaven only knowshow, but they will do it. Their leader will feel very proud of them, which is only right and proper. He will call them “boys,” encourage the weak, inwardly admire and bless the strong. And he will be proud of the mud and dirt, proud of his six days’ growth of beard. Satisfied; because he has just done one more little bit, and the Good Lord has pulled him through it.
When they get to their billets they will cheer; discordantly, but cheer none the less. They will crowd into the place, and drop their kits and themselves on top of them, to sleep the sleep of the just—the well-earned sleep of utter fatigue.
In the morning they will feel better, and they will glance at you with an almost affectionate look in their eyes, for they know—as the men always know—whether you haveproved yourself, whether you have made good—or failed.
“Pansies ... that’s for thoughts....”
And I am out of it—out of itALL... preparing “To re-organise what is left of the regiment.”
For God’s sake, Holman, take away those flowers!