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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/76911-0.txt b/76911-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..09e35cd --- /dev/null +++ b/76911-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,12369 @@ + +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 76911 *** + + + + + +Transcriber’s Notes + + Misspelled words have been corrected. These are identified by a + ♦ symbol in the text. The change description is shown immediately + below the paragraph or section in which the correction appears. + + Details and other notes may be found at the end of this text. + + + + +GOOD-BYE TO ALL THAT + + BY THE SAME AUTHOR + + POEMS (1914–1927) _William Heinemann_ + POEMS (1929) _The Seizin Press_ + MY HEAD, MY HEAD _Marlin Seeker_ + LAWRENCE AND THE ARABS _Jonathan Cape_ + LARS PORSENAZ OR THE FUTURE OF SWEARING _Kegan Paul_ + THE SHOUT _Elkin, Mathews and Marrot_ + + + [Illustration: ROBERT GRAVES] + + GOOD-BYE TO ALL THAT + + An Autobiography + + BY + + ROBERT GRAVES + + [Illustration: publisher logo] + + JONATHAN CAPE THIRTY BEDFORD SQUARE LONDON + + FIRST PUBLISHED 1929 SECOND IMPRESSION NOVEMBER 1929 + + PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAIN BY J. AND J. GRAY EDINBURGH + + MY DEDICATION IS AN EPILOGUE + + + + + LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS + + +Robert Graves, 1929 _Frontispiece_ + +Cuinchy Brick-stacks seen from a British trench on the Givenchy +canal-bank. The white placarded brick-stack is in the British support +line; the ones beyond are held by the Germans. The village of Auchy is +seen in the distance. (_By courtesy of the Imperial War Museum._) _To +face page_ 152 + +Trench Map showing the Cambrin-Cuinchy-Vermelles Trench Sector in the +summer of 1915. Each square-side measures 500 yards and is ticked off +into 50-yard units. Only the German trench-system is shown in detail; +a broken pencil-line marks the approximate course of the British +front trench. The minecraters appear as stars in No Man’s Land. The +brick-stacks in the German line appear as minute squares; those held by +the British are not marked. The intended line of advance of the 19th +Brigade on September 25th is shown in pencil on this map, which is the +one that I carried on that day 190 + +Maps. (_Reproduced by the courtesy of the Imperial War Museum._) + +Somme Trench Map—The Fricourt Sector, 1916. This map fits against the +map facing page 262 246 + +Somme Trench Map—Mametz Wood and High Wood, 1916. This map fits +against the map facing page 246 _To face page_ 262 + +Robert Graves, from a pastel by Eric Kennington 296 + +Various Records, mostly self-explanatory. The Court of Inquiry +mentioned in the bottom left-hand message was to decide whether the +wound of a man in the Public Schools Battalion—a rifle-shot through +his foot—was self-inflicted or accidental. It was self-inflicted. B. +Echelon meant the part of the battalion not in the trenches. Idol was +the code-name for the Second Battalion the Royal Welch Fusiliers. The +notebook leaf is the end of my 1915 diary only three weeks after I +began it; I used my letters home as a diary after that. The message +about Sergeant Varcoe was from Captain Samson shortly before his death; +I was temporarily attached to his company 322 + +1929, The Second Battalion the Royal Welch Fusiliers back to pre-war +soldiering. The regimental Royal goat, the regimental goat-major and +the regimental pioneers (wearing white leather aprons and gauntlets—a +special regimental privilege) on church parade at Wiesbaden on the +Rhine. The band follows, regimentally. The goat has a regimental number +and draws rations like a private soldier. ‘Some speak of Alexander, and +some of Hercules....’ _To face page_ 364 + + + + + WORLD’S END + + + The tympanum is worn thin. + The iris is become transparent. + The sense has overlasted. + Sense itself is transparent. + Speed has caught up with speed. + Earth rounds out earth. + The mind puts the mind by. + Clear spectacle: where is the eye? + + All is lost, no danger + Forces the heroic hand. + No bodies in bodies stand + Oppositely. The complete world + Is likeness in every corner. + The names of contrast fall + Into the widening centre. + A dry sea extends the universal. + + No suit and no denial + Disturb the general proof. + Logic has logic, they remain + Quiet in each other’s arms, + Or were otherwise insane, + With all lost and nothing to prove + That even nothing can be through love. + + LAURA RIDING + + (From _Love as Love, Death as Death_) + + + + + GOOD-BYE TO ALL THAT + + I + + +The objects of this autobiography, written at the age of thirty-three, +are simple enough: an opportunity for a formal good-bye to you and to +you and to you and to me and to all that; forgetfulness, because once +all this has been settled in my mind and written down and published it +need never be thought about again; money. Mr. Bentley once wrote: + + The science of geography + Is different from biography: + Geography is about maps, + Biography is about chaps. + +The rhyme might have been taken further to show how closely, +nevertheless, these things are linked. For while maps are the +biographical treatment of geography, biography is the geographical +treatment of chaps. Chaps who are made the subjects of biography have +by effort, or by accident, put themselves on the contemporary map +as geographical features; but seldom have reality by themselves as +proper chaps. So that _Who’s Who?_ though claiming to be a dictionary +of biography, is hardly less of a geographical gazetteer than _Burke’s +Peerage_.... One of the few simple people I have known who have +had a philosophic contempt for such gazetteering was Old Joe, a +battalion quartermaster in France. He was a proper chap. When he +had won his D.S.O. for being the only quartermaster in the +Seventh Division to get up rations to his battalion in the firing line +at, I think, the Passchendaele show, he was sent a slip to complete +with biographical details for the appropriate directory. He looked +contemptuously at the various headings. Disregarding ‘date and +place of birth,’ and even ‘military campaigns,’ he filled in two items +only: + + Issue . . Rum, rifles, etc. + Family seat . My khaki pants. + +And yet even proper chaps have their formal geography, however +little it may mean to them. They have birth certificates, passports, +relatives, earliest recollections, and even, sometimes, degrees and +publications and campaigns to itemize, like all the irrelevant people, +the people with only geographical reality. And the less that all these +biographical items mean to them the more particularly and faithfully +can they fill them in, if ever they feel so inclined. When loyalties +have become negligible and friends have all either deserted in alarm +or died, or been dismissed, or happen to be chaps to whom geography is +also without significance, the task is easy for them. They do not have +to wait until they are at least ninety before publishing, and even then +only tell the truth about characters long dead and without influential +descendants. + + * * * * * + +As a proof of my readiness to accept biographical convention, let +me at once record my two earliest recollections. The first is being +held up to the window to watch a carnival procession for the Diamond +Jubilee in 1897 (this was at Wimbledon, where I had been born on 24th +July 1895). The second, an earlier recollection still, is looking up +with a sort of despondent terror at a cupboard in the nursery, which +stood accidentally open and which was filled to the ceiling with octavo +volumes of Shakespeare. My father was organiser of a Shakespeare +reading circle. I did not know until long afterwards that it +was the Shakespeare cupboard, but I, apparently, had then a strong +instinct against drawing-room activities. It is only recently that I +have overcome my education and gone back to this early intuitional +spontaneousness. + +When distinguished visitors came to the house, like Sir Sidney Lee +with his Shakespearean scholarship, and Lord Ashbourne, not yet a +peer, with his loud talk of ‘Ireland for the Irish,’ and his saffron +kilt, and Mr. Eustace Miles with his samples of edible nuts, I knew +all about them in my way. I had summed up correctly and finally my +Uncle Charles of the _Spectator_ and _Punch_, and my Aunt Grace, who +came in a carriage and pair, and whose arrival always caused a flutter +because she was Lady Pontifex, and all the rest of my relations. And +I had no illusions about Algernon Charles Swinburne, who often used +to stop my perambulator when he met it on Nurses’ Walk, at the edge +of Wimbledon Common, and pat me on the head and kiss me; he was an +inveterate pram-stopper and patter and kisser. Nurses’ Walk lay between +‘The Pines,’ Putney (where he lived with Watts-Dunton) and the Rose +and Crown public-house, where he went for his daily pint of beer; +Watts-Dunton allowed him twopence for that and no more. I did not know +that Swinburne was a poet, but I knew that he was no good. Swinburne, +by the way, when a very young man, went to Walter Savage Landor, then a +very old man, and asked for and was given a poet’s blessing; and Landor +when a child had been patted on the head by Dr. Samuel Johnson; and +Johnson when a child had been taken to London to be touched by Queen +Anne for scrofula, the King’s evil; and Queen Anne when a child.... + +But I mentioned the Shakespeare reading circle. It went on for years, +and when I was sixteen curiosity finally sent me to one of the +meetings. I remember the vivacity with which my mother read the part +of Katherine in the _Taming of the Shrew_ to my father’s Petruchio, +and the compliments on their performance which the other members gave +me. Mr. and Mrs. Maurice Hill were two of the most popular members of +the circle. This meeting took place some years before they became Mr. +Justice Hill and Lady Hill, and some years, too, before I looked into +_The Shrew_. I remember the lemonade glasses, the cucumber sandwiches, +the _petits fours_, the drawing-room knick-knacks, the chrysanthemums +in bowls, and the semi-circle of easy chairs around the fire. The +gentle voice of Mr. Maurice Hill as Hortentio was admonishing my +father: ‘Thou go thy ways, thou hast tamed a cursed shrew.’ I myself +as Lucio was ending the performance with: ‘’Tis a wonder by your leave +she will be tamed so.’ I must go one day to hear him speak his lines as +Judge of the Divorce Courts; his admonishments have become famous. + +After earliest recollections I should perhaps give a passport +description of myself and let the items enlarge themselves. Date of +birth.... Place of birth.... I have given those. Profession. In my +passport I am down as ‘university professor.’ That was a convenience +for 1926, when I first took it out. I thought of putting ‘writer,’ but +people who are concerned with passports have complicated reactions to +the word. ‘University professor’ wins a simple reaction—dull respect. +No questions asked. So also with ‘army captain (pensioned list).’ + +My height is given as six feet two inches, my eyes as grey, and my hair +as black. To ‘black’ should be added ‘thick and curly.’ I am described +as having no special peculiarity. This is untrue. For a start, there +is my big, once aquiline, now crooked nose. I broke it at Charterhouse +playing Rugger with Soccer players. (I broke another player’s nose +myself in the same game.) That unsteadied it, and boxing sent it askew. +Finally, it was operated on. It is very crooked. It was once useful +as a vertical line of demarcation between the left and right sides of +my face, which are naturally unassorted—my eyes, eyebrows, and ears +being all set noticeably crooked and my cheek-bones, which are rather +high, being on different levels. My mouth is what is known as ‘full’ +and my smile is crooked; when I was thirteen I broke two front teeth +and became sensitive about showing them. My hands and feet are large. I +weigh about twelve-stone four. My best comic turn is a double-jointed +pelvis; I can sit on a table and rap like the Fox sisters with it. +One shoulder is distinctly lower than the other, but that is because +of a lung wound in the war. I do not carry a watch because I always +magnetize the main-spring; during the war, when there was an army order +that officers should carry watches and synchronize them daily, I had to +buy two new ones every month. Medically, I am a thoroughly ‘good life.’ + +My passport gives my nationality as ‘British subject.’ Here I might +parody Marcus Aurelius, who begins his Golden Book with the various +ancestors and relations to whom he owes the virtues of a worthy +Roman Emperor. Something of the sort about myself, and why I am not +a Roman Emperor or even, except on occasions, an English gentleman. +My mother’s father’s family, the von Ranke’s, was a family of Saxon +country pastors, not anciently noble. Leopold von Ranke, the first +modern historian, my great-uncle, brought the ‘von’ into the family. +To him I owe my historical method. It was he who wrote, to the scandal +of his contemporaries: ‘I am a historian before I am a Christian; my +object is simply to find out how the things actually occurred,’ +and of Michelet the French historian: ‘He wrote history in a style +in which the truth could not be told.’ Thomas Carlyle decried him as +‘Dry-as-Dust’; to his credit. To Heinrich von Ranke, my grandfather, +I owe my clumsy largeness, my endurance, energy, seriousness, and my +thick hair. He was rebellious and even atheistic in his youth. As +a medical student at a Prussian university he was involved in the +political disturbances of 1848. He and a number of student friends +demonstrated in favour of Karl Marx at the time of his trial for high +treason. Like Marx, they had to leave the country. He came to London +and finished his medical course there. In 1859 he went to the Crimea +with the British forces as a regimental surgeon. All I know about this +is a chance remark that he made to me as a child: ‘It is not always +the big bodies that are the strongest. When I was at Sevastopol in the +trenches I saw the great British Guards crack up and die by the score, +while the little sappers took no harm.’ Still, his big body carried him +very well. + +He married, in London, my grandmother, a Schleswig-Dane. She was +the daughter of Tiarks, the Greenwich astronomer. She was tiny, +saintly, frightened. Before her father took to astronomy the Tiarks +family had, it seems, followed the Danish country system, not at +all a bad one, of alternate professions for father and son. The odd +generations were tinsmiths and the even generations were pastors. My +gentler characteristics trace back to my grandmother. She had ten +children; the eldest of these was my mother, who was born in London. +My grandfather’s atheism and radicalism sobered down. He eventually +returned to Germany, where he became a well-known children’s doctor at +Munich. He was about the first doctor in Europe to insist on clean milk +for his child patients. When he found that he could not get clean +milk to the hospitals by ordinary means he started a model dairy-farm +himself. His agnosticism grieved my grandmother; she never ceased to +pray for him, but concentrated more particularly on saving the next +generation. She was a Lutheran. My grandfather did not die entirely +unregenerate; his last words were: ‘The God of my fathers, to Him at +least I hold.’ I do not know exactly what he meant by that, but it +was a statement consistent with his angry patriarchal moods, with his +acceptance of a prominent place in Bavarian society as Herr Geheimrat +Ritter von Ranke, and with his loyalty to the Kaiser, with whom once +or twice he went deer-shooting. It meant, practically, that he was +a good Liberal in religion as in politics, and that my grandmother +need not have worried. I prefer my German relations to my Irish +relations; they have high principles, are easy, generous, and serious. +The men have fought duels not for cheap personal honour, but in the +public interest—called out, for example, because they have protested +publicly against the scandalous behaviour of some superior officer +or official. One of them who was in the German consular service lost +seniority, just before the war, I was told, because he refused to use +the consulate as a clearing-place for secret-service reports. They are +not heavy drinkers either. My grandfather, as a student at the regular +university ‘drunks,’ was in the habit of pouring his beer down into his +eighteen-fortyish riding-boots. His children were brought up to speak +English in their home, and always looked to England as the home of +culture and progress. The women were noble and patient, and kept their +eyes on the ground when they went out walking. + +At the age of eighteen my mother was sent to England as companion to +a lonely old woman who had befriended my grandmother when she was +an orphan. For seventeen years she waited hand and foot on this old +lady, who for the last few years was perfectly senile. When she finally +died, my mother determined to go to India, after a short training as a +medical missionary. This ambition was baulked by her meeting my father, +a widower with five children; it was plain to her that she could do as +good work on the home-mission field. + +About the other side of my family. The Graves’ have a pedigree that +dates back to the Conquest, but is good as far as the reign of Henry +VII. Colonel Graves, the regicide, who was Ireton’s chief of horse, is +claimed as the founder of the Irish branch of the family. Limerick was +its centre. There were occasional soldiers and doctors in it, but they +were collaterals; in the direct male line was a sequence of rectors, +deans, and bishops. The Limerick Graves’ have no ‘hands’ or mechanical +sense; instead they have a wide reputation as conversationalists. In +those of my relatives who have the family characteristics most strongly +marked, unnecessary talk is a nervous disorder. Not bad talk as talk +goes; usually informative, often witty, but it goes on and on and +on and on and on. The von Ranke’s have, I think, little mechanical +aptitude either. It is most inconvenient to have been born into the +age of the internal-combustion engine and the electric dynamo and to +have no sympathy with them; a push bicycle, a primus stove, and an army +rifle mark the bounds of my mechanical capacity. + +My grandfather, on this side, was Protestant Bishop of Limerick. He had +eight, or was it ten, children. He was a little man and a remarkable +mathematician; he first formulated some theory or other of spherical +conics. He was also an antiquary, and discovered the key to ancient +Irish Ogham script. He was hard and, by reputation, far from +generous. A gentleman and a scholar, and respected throughout the +countryside on that account. He and the Catholic Bishop were on the +very best terms. They cracked Latin jokes at each other, discussed fine +points of scholarship, and were unclerical enough not to take their +religious differences too seriously. + +When I was in Limerick as a soldier of the garrison some twenty-five +years after my grandfather’s death, I heard a lot about Bishop Graves +from the townsfolk. The Catholic Bishop had once joked him about the +size of his family, and my grandfather had retorted warmly with the +text about the blessedness of the man who has his quiver full of +arrows, to which the Catholic answered briefly and severely: ‘The +ancient Jewish quiver only held six.’ My grandfather’s wake, they said, +was the longest ever seen in the town of Limerick; it stretched from +the cathedral right down O’Connell Street and over Sarsfield Bridge, +and I do not know how many miles Irish beyond. He blessed me when I was +a child, but I do not remember that. + +Of my father’s mother, who was a Scotswoman, a Cheyne from Aberdeen, I +have been able to get no information at all beyond the fact that she +was ‘a very beautiful woman.’ I can only conclude that most of what she +said or did passed unnoticed in the rivalry of family conversations. +The Cheyne pedigree was better than the Graves’; it was flawless right +back to the medieval Scottish kings, to the two Balliols, the first +and second Davids, and the Bruce. In later times the Cheynes had been +doctors and physicians. But my father is engaged at the same time as +myself on his autobiography, and no doubt he will write at length about +all this. + +My father, then, met my mother some time in the early ’nineties. He +had previously been married to one of the Irish Coopers, of Cooper’s +Hill, near Limerick. The Coopers were an even more Irish family than +the Graves’. The story is that when Cromwell came to Ireland and +ravaged the country, Moira O’Brien, the last surviving member of the +great clan O’Brien, who were the paramount chiefs of the country round +Limerick, came to him one day and said: ‘General, you have killed my +father and my uncles, my husband and my brothers. I am left as the sole +heiress of these lands. Do you intend to confiscate them?’ Cromwell +is said to have been struck by her magnificent presence and to have +answered that that certainly had been his intention. But that she could +keep her lands, or a part of them, on condition that she married one +of his officers. And so the officers of the regiment which had taken a +leading part in hunting down the O’Briens were invited to take a pack +of cards and cut for the privilege of marrying Moira and succeeding to +the estate. The winner was one Ensign Cooper. Moira, a few weeks after +her marriage, found herself pregnant. Convinced that it was a male +heir, as indeed it proved, she kicked her husband to death. It is said +that she kicked him in the pit of the stomach after making him drunk. +The Coopers have always been a haunted family and _Hibernicis ipsis +Hibernicores_. Jane Cooper, whom my father married, died of consumption. + +The Graves family was thin-nosed and inclined to petulance, but never +depraved, cruel, or hysterical. A persistent literary tradition; of +Richard, a minor poet and a friend of Shenstone; and John Thomas, +who was a mathematician and jurist and contributed to Sir William +Hamilton’s discovery of quaternions; and Richard, a divine and regius +professor of Greek; and James, an archaeologist; and Robert, who +invented the disease called after him and was a friend of Turner’s; +and Robert, who was a classicist and theologian and a friend of +Wordsworth’s; and Richard, another divine; and Robert, another divine; +and other Robert’s, James’s, Thomas’s and Richard’s, and Clarissa, one +of the toasts of Ireland, who married Leopold von Ranke (at Windermere +Church) and linked the Graves and von Ranke families a couple of +generations before my father and mother married. See the British Museum +catalogue for an eighteenth and nineteenth-century record of Graves’ +literary history. + +It was through this Clarissa-Leopold relationship that my father met my +mother. My mother told him at once that she liked _Father O’Flynn_, for +writing which my father will be chiefly remembered. He put the words +to a traditional jig tune, _The Top of Cork Road_, which he remembered +from his boyhood. Sir Charles Stanford supplied a few chords for the +setting. My father sold the complete rights for a guinea. The publisher +made thousands. Sir Charles Stanford, who drew a royalty as the +composer, also made a very large sum. Recently my father has made a few +pounds from gramophone rights. He has never been bitter about all this, +but he has more than once impressed on me almost religiously never to +sell for a sum down the complete rights of any work of mine whatsoever. + +I am glad in a way that my father was a poet. This at least saved me +from any false reverence of poets, and his work was never an oppression +to me. I am even very pleased when I meet people who know his work and +not mine. Some of his songs I sing without prejudice; when washing up +after meals or shelling peas or on similar occasions. He never once +tried to teach me how to write, or showed any understanding of my +serious work; he was always more ready to ask advice about his own +work than to offer it for mine. He never tried to stop me writing and +was glad of my first successes. His light-hearted early work is the +best. His _Invention of Wine_, for instance, which begins: + + Ere Bacchus could talk + Or dacently walk, + Down Olympus he jumped + From the arms of his nurse, + And though ten years in all + Were consumed by the fall + He might have fallen further + And fared a dale worse. + +After he married my mother and became a convinced teetotaller he lost +something of this easy playfulness. + +He broke the ecclesiastical sequence. His great-grandfather had been a +dean, his grandfather a rector, his father a bishop, but he himself was +never more than a lay-reader. And he broke the geographical connection +with Ireland, for which I cannot be too grateful to him. I am much +harder on my relations and much more careful of associating with them +than I am with strangers. But I can in certain respects admire my +father and mother. My father for his simplicity and persistence and my +mother for her seriousness and strength. Both for their generosity. +They never bullied me or in any way exceeded their ordinary parental +rights, and were grieved rather than angered by my default from formal +religion. In physique and general characteristics my mother’s side is +stronger in me on the whole. But I am subject to many habits of speech +and movement characteristic of the Graves’, most of them eccentric. +Such as finding it difficult to walk straight down a street, +getting tired of sentences when half-way through and leaving them in +the air, walking with the hands folded in a particular way behind the +back, and being subject to sudden and most disconcerting spells of +complete amnesia. These fits, so far as I can discover, serve no useful +purpose, and the worst about them is that they tend to produce in the +subject the same sort of dishonesty that deaf people have when they +miss the thread of conversation. They dare not be left behind and rely +on their intuition and bluff to get them through. This disability is +most marked in very cold weather. I do not now talk too much except +when I have been drinking or when I meet someone who was with me in +France. The Graves’ have good minds for purposes like examinations, +writing graceful Latin verse, filling in forms, and solving puzzles +(when we children were invited to parties where guessing games and +brain-tests were played we never failed to win). They have a good eye +for ball games, and a graceful style. I inherited the eye, but not +the style; my mother’s family are entirely without style and I went +that way. I have an ugly but fairly secure seat on a horse. There +is a coldness in the Graves’ which is anti-sentimental to the point +of insolence, a necessary check to the goodness of heart from which +my mother’s family suffers. The Graves’, it is fair to generalize, +though loyal to the British governing class to which they belong, and +so to the Constitution, are individualists; the von Ranke’s regard +their membership of the corresponding class in Germany as a sacred +trust enabling them to do the more responsible work in the service of +humanity. Recently, when a von Ranke entered a film studio, the family +felt itself disgraced. + +The most useful and at the same time most dangerous gift that I owe +to my father’s side of the family—probably more to the Cheynes than the +Graves’—is that I am always able, when it is a question of dealing with +officials or getting privileges from public institutions which grudge +them, to masquerade as a gentleman. Whatever I happen to be wearing; +and because the clothes I wear are not what gentlemen usually wear, +and yet I do not seem to be an artist or effeminate, and my accent and +gestures are irreproachable, I have even been ‘placed’ as the heir to +a dukedom, whose perfect confidence in his rank would explain all such +eccentricity. In this way I have been told that I seem, paradoxically, +to be more of a gentleman even than one of my elder brothers who +spent a number of years as a consular official in the Near East. His +wardrobe is almost too carefully a gentleman’s, and he does not allow +himself the pseudo-ducal privilege of having disreputable acquaintances +and saying on all occasions what he really means. About this being a +gentleman business: I paid so heavily for the fourteen years of my +gentleman’s education that I feel entitled occasionally to get some +sort of return. + + + + + II + + +My mother married my father largely, it seems, to help him out with +his five motherless children. Having any herself was a secondary +consideration. But first she had a girl, then she had another girl, and +it was very nice of course to have them, but slightly disappointing, +because she belonged to the generation and the tradition that made a +son the really important event; then I came and I was a fine healthy +child. She was forty when I was born and my father was forty-nine. +Four years later she had another son and four years later she had +still another son. The desired preponderance of male over female +was established and twice five made ten. The gap of two generations +between my parents and me was easier in a way to bridge than a single +generation gap. Children seldom quarrel with their grandparents, and I +have been able to think of my mother and father as grandparents. Also, +a family of ten means a dilution of parental affection; the members +tend to become indistinct. I have often been called: ‘Philip, Richard, +Charles, I mean Robert.’ + +My father was a very busy man, an inspector of schools for the +Southwark district of London, and we children saw practically nothing +of him except during the holidays. Then he was very sweet and playful +and told us stories with the formal beginning, not ‘once upon a time,’ +but always ‘and so the old gardener blew his nose on a red pocket +handkerchief.’ He occasionally played games with us, but for the most +part when he was not doing educational work he was doing literary work +or being president of literary or temperance societies. My mother was +so busy running the household and conscientiously carrying out her +social obligations as my father’s wife that we did not see her +continuously, unless on Sunday or when we happened to be ill. We had +a nurse and we had each other and that was companionship enough. My +father’s chief part in our education was to insist on our speaking +grammatically, pronouncing words correctly, and using no slang. He left +our religious instruction entirely to my mother, though he officiated +at family prayers, which the servants were expected to attend, every +morning before breakfast. Punishments, such as being sent to bed early +or being stood in the corner, were in the hands of my mother. Corporal +punishment, never severe and given with a slipper, was my father’s +business. We learned to be strong moralists and spent a great deal of +our time on self-examination and good resolutions. My sister Rosaleen +put up a printed notice in her corner of the nursery—it might just as +well have been put up by me: ‘I must not say bang bust or pig bucket, +for it is rude.’ + +We were given very little pocket-money—a penny a week with a rise to +twopence at the age of twelve or so, and we were encouraged to give +part at least of any odd money that came to us from uncles or other +visitors to Dr. Barnardo’s Homes and (this frightened us a bit) to +beggars. There was one blind beggar at Wimbledon who used to sit on the +pavement reading the Bible aloud in Braille; he was not really blind, +but able to turn his eyes up and keep the pupils concealed for minutes +at a time under drooping lids which were artificially inflamed. We +often gave to him. He died a rich man and had been able to provide his +son with a college education. The first distinguished writer that I +remember meeting after Swinburne was P. G. Wodehouse, a friend of one +of my brothers; he was then in the early twenties, on the staff of the +_Globe_, and was writing school stories in _The Captain_ magazine. +He gave me a penny, advising me to get marsh-mallows with it. I was too +shy to express my gratitude at the time; and have never since permitted +myself to be critical about his work. + +I had great religious fervour which persisted until shortly after my +confirmation at the age of sixteen. I remember the incredulity with +which I first heard that there actually were people, people baptized +like myself into the Church of England, who did not believe in Jesus. +I never met an unbeliever in all these years. As soon as I did, it +was all over with my simple, faith in the literal fundamentalist +interpretation of the Bible. This was bad luck on my parents, but +they were doomed to it. One married couple that I know, belonging to +the same generation, decided that the best way in the end to ensure a +proper religious attitude in their children, was not to teach them any +religion at all until they were able to understand it in some degree of +fulness. The children were sent to schools where no religious training +was given. At the age of thirteen the eldest boy came indignantly to +his father and said: ‘Look here, father, I think you’ve treated me very +badly. The other chaps laugh at me because I don’t know anything about +God. And who’s this chap Jesus? When I ask them they won’t tell me, +they think I am joking.’ So the long-hoped-for moment had arrived. The +father told the boy to call his sister, who was a year younger than +him, because he had something very important to tell them both. Then +very reverently and carefully he told them the Gospel story. He had +always planned to tell it to them in this way. The children did not +interrupt him. When finally he had finished there was a silence. Then +the girl said, rather embarrassed: ‘Really, father, I think that is the +silliest story I’ve heard since I was a kid.’ The boy said: ‘Poor +chap. But what about it, anyhow?’ + +I have asked many of my acquaintances at what point in their childhood +or adolescence they became class-conscious, but have never been given a +satisfactory answer. I remember when it happened to me. When I was four +and a half I caught scarlet fever; my younger brother had just been +born, and it was impossible for me to have scarlet fever in the house, +so I was sent off to a public fever hospital. There was only one other +bourgeois child in the ward; the rest were all proletarians. I did +not notice particularly that the attitude of the nurses or the other +patients to me was different; I accepted the kindness and spoiling +easily, because I was accustomed to it. But I was astonished at the +respect and even reverence that this other little boy, a clergyman’s +child, was given. ‘Oh,’ the nurses would cry after he had gone; ‘Oh,’ +they cried, ‘he did look a little gentleman in his pretty white +pellisse when they came to take him away.’ ‘He was a fair toff,’ echoed +the little proletarians. When I came home from hospital, after being +there about two months, my accent was commented on and I was told that +the boys in the ward had been very vulgar. I did not know what ‘vulgar’ +meant; it had to be explained to me. About a year later I met Arthur, a +boy of about nine, who had been in the ward and taught me how to play +cricket when I was getting better; I was then at my first preparatory +school and he was a ragged errand-boy. In hospital we had all worn the +same hospital nightgown, and I had not realized that we came off such +different shelves. But now I suddenly recognized with my first shudder +of gentility that there were two sorts of people—ourselves and the +lower classes. The servants were trained to call us children, even +when we were tiny, Master Robert, Miss Rosaleen, and Miss Clarissa, but +I had not realized that these were titles of respect. I had thought of +‘Master’ and ‘Miss’ merely as vocative prefixes used when addressing +other people’s children. But now I realized that the servants were the +lower classes, and that we were ourselves. + +I accepted this class separation as naturally as I had accepted +religious dogma, and did not finally discard gentility until +nearly twenty years later. My mother and father were never of the +aggressive, shoot-’em-down type. They were Liberals or, more strictly, +Liberal-Unionists. In religious theory, at least, they treated their +employees as fellow-creatures. But social distinctions remained clearly +defined. That was religion too: + + He made them high or lowly, + And ordered their estates. + +I can well recall the tone of my mother’s voice when she informed the +maids that they could have what was left of the pudding, or scolded +the cook for some carelessness. It was a forced hardness, made almost +harsh by embarrassment. My mother was _gemütlich_ by nature. She would, +I believe, have given a lot to be able to dispense with servants +altogether. They were a foreign body in the house. I remember what the +servants’ bedrooms used to look like. By a convention of the times they +were the only rooms in the house that had no carpet or linoleum; they +were on the top landing on the dullest side of the house. The gaunt, +unfriendly-looking beds, and the hanging-cupboards with faded cotton +curtains, instead of wardrobes with glass doors as in the other +rooms. All this uncouthness made me think of the servants as somehow +not quite human. The type of servant that came was not very good; only +those with not particularly good references would apply for a situation +where there were ten in the family. And because it was such a large +house, and there was hardly a single tidy person in the household, they +were constantly giving notice. There was too much work they said. So +that the tendency to think of them as only half human was increased; +they never had time to get fixed as human beings. + +The bridge between the servants and ourselves was our nurse. She gave +us her own passport on the first day she came: ‘Emily Dykes is my name; +England is my nation; Netheravon is my dwelling-place, and Christ is +my salvation.’ Though she called us Miss and Master she spoke it in no +servant tone. In a practical way she came to be more to us than our +mother. I began to despise her at about the age of twelve—she was then +nurse to my younger brothers—when I found that my education was now in +advance of hers, and that if I struggled with her I was able to trip +her up and bruise her quite easily. Besides, she was a Baptist and went +to chapel; I realized by that time that the Baptists were, like the +Wesleyans and Methodists, the social inferiors of the members of the +Church of England. + +I was brought up with a horror of Catholicism and this remained with +me for a very long time. It was not a case of once a Protestant always +a Protestant, but rather that when I ceased to be Protestant I was +further off than ever from being Catholic. I discarded Protestantism +in horror of its Catholic element. My religious training developed in +me a great capacity for fear (I was perpetually tortured by the fear +of hell), a superstitious conscience and a sexual embarrassment. I +was very long indeed in getting rid of all this. Nancy Nicholson and +I (later on in this story) were most careful not to give our four +children an early religious training. They were not even baptized. + +The last thing that is discarded by Protestants when they reject +religion altogether is a vision of Christ as the perfect man. That +persisted with me, sentimentally, for years. At the age of nineteen I +wrote a poem called ‘In the Wilderness.’ It was about Christ meeting +the scapegoat—a silly, quaint poem-and has appeared in at least seventy +anthologies. Its perpetual recurrence. Strangers are always writing to +me to say what a beautiful poem it is, and how much strength it has +given them, and would I, etc.? Here, for instance, is a letter that +came yesterday: + + Sir,—I heard with great delight your beautiful poem ‘In the + Wilderness,’ broadcast from 2LO last night, and am writing to you + because your poem has given me strength and hope. I am a gentlelady + in need—in great need—not of a gift, but of a _loan_, on interest of + 5 per cent. I also need a kind friend to show me human sympathy and + to help me if possible by an introduction to a really upright and + conscientious London solicitor who will fight my cause, not primarily + for the filthy lucre, but because it is waging the the battle of + Right against the most infamous Wrong. First of all I ask you to + believe that I am writing you the simple truth. I also am gifted as a + writer, but as my physical health has always been a great struggle, + and poverty from my childhood has been my lot, and I will not stoop + to write down to the popular taste, and perhaps, also, because I + have no influential friends to give me a helping hand, I earn very + little by my pen. But I know how to wield a pen, and I am going + to put myself into this letter just as I am—I am not apt to deceive, + I hate lies and every form of deception. This letter is ‘a bow sent + at a venture,’—to see if you would like to help a literary sister + who is being gravely wronged by her only near relative, an abnormal + woman, who has hated her for years without any cause. To be very + direct—I need £10 for one year at 5 per cent.—to be repaid £10, 10s. + 0d. I need it _at once, very urgently_—to pay arrears of furnished + digs—£3, 13s. 0d.—Milk Bill 16s. 8d., Grocery Bill 10s. 6d. and coal + 1s. 8d.—then to leave Bolton (the black town of mills which fogs + incessantly) and go for a change to Blackpool: then to go up to Town + to put my legal business into a London solicitor’s hands. I will + sign a Promissory Note for £10, 10s. 0d., to repay a year hence. I + am cultured and and highly educated and well-born. I was trained + to teach on the higher schools and I hold high testimonials for + teaching. But I overworked and at last became consumptive, and had + tuberculosis of both lungs. It was taken early and I am relatively + cured. But my teaching career is broken, and I do so love teaching. + In consequence of this I have a monthly pension from a Philanthropic + Society of £2, 11s. 8d. But it is so tiny, I cannot possibly live on + it, squeeze as I may. But an inheritance of over £1000 is mine, which + is being wrongly withheld from me by the rogue of a solicitor in + whose hands it is. I had one brother and one sister. The brother had + saved money, and insured himself in many ways against his old age. + The sister was well married to a man in good position; heartless, + and hardened with her worldly life, and abnormally unnatural. She + was expelled from two schools. She contracted an insane hatred of + me, her little sister, and being full of cupidity, has tried to rob + me of the little I have. My brother intended me to be his heir + and inherit all his money. He wrote her this. But he was not a good + brother and I did not visit him. He was a widower without offspring. + Then he died suddenly in 1926, Xmas. She got to his house and wired + me the death. Afterwards she wrote a few lines _but never told me the + date of the funeral and has hid everything about his affairs from + me_—his declared heir! She declared there was no Will to be found, + and when I arrived in the Midlands from Yorkshire and got to his + Vicarage _she, with her woman friend, had locked me out of the house, + to prevent my search for the Will_! Upon advice I issued a Caveat + and they at once _violated the Caveat_, and began to arrange for the + sale of furniture! I heard of it by chance and stopped the sale. Then + I was taken ill with my lungs in Derbyshire, whither I had returned + after engaging a lawyer to safeguard my interests on the spot. They + then corrupted my solicitor, who let me down badly, and I was ill in + Derby. They warned the Caveat, and I could not enter an appearance, + so it became abortive. Then my sister got herself made sole + Administratrix. I had intended to apply to be joint Administratrix. + Then began a series of fraudulent acts and maladministration. Her + solicitor is a rogue and he is trying to force me to ‘_approve_’ + his unsatisfactory accounts by withholding my share until I sign an + undertaking not to proceed against them afterwards. _One_ item in + accounts is falsified which I can prove, and other gross acts of + fraud can be proved. _Foul play_ has been pursued throughout, and + they are now shadowing me everywhere by hired agents who find out + the solicitors I employ and buy them off, or otherwise prevent their + acting against them for me. It is the _grossest_ case imaginable. I + hold all my documents and can prove everything. I have a clear and + strong case. But I need a _London_ solicitor—away from the North + where my sister lives in Northumberland—and I will not sink my + moral principle to accept, not my lawful Half-Share, but what they + choose to offer me, namely £919, 13s. 3d. and 18 months’ interest. I + want the Court to take over the administration. I have applied to the + solicitor for an advance upon my share and he refuses again in order + to _compel_ me to sign this infamous agreement. I had £50 in advance + in 1926 which is shown in accounts. I just need this £10 now so as to + pay up here and get to Blackpool—for I have been ill again with my + lungs, and I _badly_ need a change. + + Will you help a stranger with this not very big loan, and on + interest? I would bring all the accounts and papers to show you + when I come to town. And if I have found a friend in you, I shall + indeed thank God. You can trust me. I _am_ worthy, though I can give + no references, because the people are dead. But I think you do not + like being ‘bullied’ with such things. I am middle-aged, but a child + in heart—original—and just myself, and look rather ridiculously + young, without any artifice or makeup. + + But apart from the loan, I need a _friend_. The family used to sneer + at me that I ‘never made friends for what I could get out of them.’ + Truly I never did. I like rather to help others myself. I should + like to help _you_ if I could in any way. I just love to serve. My + life has been lonely, and both parents are dead, and I don’t make + friends lightly. So that is all. But I won’t finish without telling + you that I love the Master, the Lord Jesus Christ, as you love Him, + and trust Him in all this darkness. I always like to bring His Name + in—and so good night—I would be thankful if you will write to me in a + _registered_ letter. Some of my letters have gone astray, I fear + I do not trust the woman in these lodgings, and my letters are going + to a shop to be called for. + + I am, dear Sir, + + Yours very truly + + * * * * * (Miss). + + _P.S._—Do you think you could get a letter to me by _Saturday_? I do + so love your poems. + +I put this in here because it is not a letter to answer, nor yet +somehow a letter to throw away. The style reminds me of one of my +Irish female cousins. And that again reminds me of the ancient Irish +triad—‘Three ugly sisters: Chatter, Poverty, and Chastity.’ + + + + + III + + +I went to six preparatory schools. The first was a dame’s school at +Wimbledon. I went there at the age of six. My father, as an educational +expert, did not let me stay here long. He found me crying one day +at the difficulty of the twenty-three-times table, and there was a +Question and Answer History Book that we used which began: + + _Question_: Why were the Britons so called? + _Answer_: Because they painted themselves blue. + +My father said it was out of date. Also I was made to do mental +arithmetic to a metronome. I once wet myself for nervousness at this +torture. So I went to the lowest class of King’s College School, +Wimbledon. I was just seven years old, the youngest boy there, and they +went up to nineteen. I was taken away after a couple of terms because +I was found to be using naughty words. I was glad to leave that school +because I did not understand a word of the lessons. I had started +Latin and I did not know what Latin was or meant; its declensions and +conjugations were pure incantations to me. For that matter so were +the strings of naughty words. And I was oppressed by the huge hall, +the enormous boys, the frightening rowdiness of the corridors, and +compulsory Rugby football of which nobody told me the rules. I went +from there to another preparatory school of the ordinary type, also at +Wimbledon, where I stayed for about three years. Here I began playing +games seriously, was quarrelsome, boastful, and talkative, won prizes, +and collected things. The only difference between me and the other +boys was that I collected coins instead of stamps. The value of coins +seemed less fictitious to me than stamp values. My first training as a +gentleman was here. I was only once caned, for forgetting to bring +my gymnastic shoes to school, and then I was only given two strokes +on the hand with the cane. Yet even now the memory makes me hot with +fury. The principal outrage was that it was on the hand. My hands have +a great importance for me and are unusually sensitive. I live a lot in +them; my visual imagery is defective and so I memorize largely by sense +of touch. + +I seem to have left out a school. It was in North Wales, right away in +the hills behind Llanbedr. It was the first time I had been away from +home. I went there just for a term, for my health. Here I had my first +beating. The headmaster was a parson, and he caned me on the bottom +because I learned the wrong collect one Sunday by mistake. This was +the first time that I had come upon forcible training in religion. (At +my dame’s school we learned collects too, but were not punished for +mistakes; we competed for prizes—ornamental texts to take home and hang +over our beds.) There was a boy at this school called Ronny, and he was +the greatest thing that I had ever met. He had a house at the top of +a pine tree that nobody else could climb, and a huge knife, made from +the top of a scythe that he had stolen; and he killed pigeons with a +catapult and cooked them up in the tree. He was very kind to me; he +went into the Navy afterwards and deserted on his first voyage and was +never heard of again. He used to steal rides on cows and horses that +he found in the fields. And I found a book that had the ballads of +‘Chevy Chace’ and ‘Sir Andrew Barton’ in it; they were the first two +real poems that I remember reading. I saw how good they were. But, on +the other hand, there was an open-air swimming bath where all the boys +bathed naked, and I was overcome by horror at the sight. There was one +boy there of nineteen with red hair, real bad, Irish, red hair +all over his body. I had not known that hair grew on bodies. And the +headmaster had a little daughter with a little girl friend, and I was +in a sweat of terror whenever I met them; because, having no brothers, +they once tried to find out about male anatomy from me by exploring +down my shirt-neck when we were digging up pig-nuts in the garden. + +Another frightening experience of this part of my life was when I had +once to wait in the school cloakroom for my sisters, who went to the +Wimbledon High School. We were going on to be photographed together. +I waited about a quarter of an hour in the corner of the cloakroom. I +suppose I was about ten years old, and hundreds and hundreds of girls +went to and fro, and they all looked at me and giggled and whispered +things to each other. I knew they hated me, because I was a boy sitting +in the cloakroom of a girls’ school, and when my sisters arrived they +looked ashamed of me and quite different from the sisters I knew at +home. I realized that I had blundered into a secret world, and for +months and even years afterwards my worst nightmares were of this +girls’ school, which was always filled with coloured toy balloons. +‘Very Freudian,’ as one says now. My normal impulses were set back for +years by these two experiences. When I was about seventeen we spent +our Christmas holidays in Brussels. An Irish girl staying at the same +_pension_ made love to me in a way that I see now was really very +sweet. I was so frightened I could have killed her. + +In English preparatory and public schools romance is necessarily +homo-sexual. The opposite sex is despised and hated, treated as +something obscene. Many boys never recover from this perversion. I +only recovered by a shock at the age of twenty-one. For every one born +homo-sexual there are at least ten permanent pseudo-homo-sexuals +made by the public school system. And nine of these ten are as +honourably chaste and sentimental as I was. + +I left that day-school at Wimbledon because my father decided that the +standard of work was not good enough to enable me to win a scholarship +at a public school. He sent me to another preparatory school in the +Midlands; because the headmaster’s wife was a sister of an old literary +friend of his. It proved later that these were inadequate grounds. +It was a queer place and I did not like it. There was a secret about +the headmaster which a few of the elder boys shared. It was somehow +sinister, but I never exactly knew what it was. All I knew was that +he came weeping into the class-room one day beating his head with his +fists and groaning: ‘Would to God I hadn’t done it! Would to God I +hadn’t done it!’ I was taken away suddenly a few days later, which +was the end of the school year. The headmaster was said to be ill. I +found out later that he had been given twenty-four hours to leave the +country. He was succeeded by the second master, a good man, who had +taught me how to write English by eliminating all phrases that could +be done without, and using verbs and nouns instead of adjectives and +adverbs wherever possible. And where to start new paragraphs, and +the difference between O and Oh. He was a very heavy man. He used to +stand at his desk and lean on his thumbs until they bent at right +angles. (The school he took over was now only half-strength because +of the scandal. A fortnight later he fell out of a train on to his +head and that was the end of him; but the school is apparently going +on still; I am occasionally asked to subscribe to Old Boys’ funds for +chapel windows and miniature rifle ranges and so on.) I first learned +rugger here. What surprised me most at this school was when a boy +of about twelve, whose father and mother were in India, was told by +cable that they had both suddenly died of cholera. We all watched him +sympathetically for weeks after, expecting him to die of grief or turn +black in the face, or do something to match the occasion. Yet he seemed +entirely unmoved, and since nobody dared discuss the tragedy with him +he seemed to forget what had happened; he played about and ragged as +he had done before. We found that rather monstrous. But he could not +have been expected to behave otherwise. He had not seen his parents +for two years. And preparatory schoolboys live in a world completely +dissociated from home life. They have a different vocabulary, different +moral system, different voice, and though on their return to school +from the holidays the change over from home-self to school-self is +almost instantaneous, the reverse process takes a fortnight at least. A +preparatory-school boy, when off his guard, will often call his mother, +‘Please, matron,’ and will always address any man relation or friend +of the family as ‘Sir,’ as though he were a master. I used to do it. +School life becomes the reality and home life the illusion. In England +parents of the governing classes virtually finish all intimate life +with their children from about the age of eight, and any attempt on +their part to insinuate home feeling into school life is resented. + +Next I went to a typically good school in Sussex. The headmaster was +chary of admitting me at my age, particularly from a school with such a +bad recent history. Family literary connections did the trick, however, +and the headmaster saw that I was advanced enough to win a scholarship +and do the school credit. The depressed state I had been in since the +last school ended the moment I arrived. My younger brother followed me +to this school, being taken away from the day-school at Wimbledon, +and, later, my youngest brother went there straight from home. How good +and typical the school was can best be seen in the case of my youngest +brother, who is a typical good, normal person, and, as I say, went +straight from home to the school without other school influences. He +spent five or six years there—and played in the elevens—and got the +top scholarship at a public school—and became head boy with athletic +distinctions—and won a scholarship at Oxford and further athletic +distinctions—and a degree—and then what did he do? Because he was such +a typically good normal person he naturally went back as a master to +his old typically good preparatory school, and now that he has been +there some years and wants a change he is applying for a mastership +at his old public school and, if he gets it and becomes a house-master +after a few years, he will at last, I suppose, become a headmaster and +eventually take the next step and become the head of his old college at +Oxford. That is the sort of typically good preparatory school it was. +At this school I learned to keep a straight bat at cricket and to have +a high moral sense, and my fifth different pronunciation of Latin, and +my fifth or sixth different way of doing simple arithmetic. But I did +not mind, and they put me in the top class and I got a scholarship—in +fact I got the first scholarship of the year. At Charterhouse. And why +Charterhouse? Because of ἴστημι and ἵημι. Charterhouse was the only +public school whose scholarship examination did not contain a Greek +grammar paper and, though I was good enough at Greek Unseen and Greek +Composition, I could not conjugate ἴστημι and ἵημι conventionally. If +it had not been for these two verbs I would almost certainly have gone +to the very different atmosphere of Winchester. + + + + + IV + + +My mother took us abroad to stay at my grandfather’s house in Germany +five times between my second and twelfth year. After this he died +and we never went again. He had a big old manor-house ten miles from +Munich; it was called ‘Laufzorn,’ which means ‘Begone, care!’ Our +summers there were easily the best things of my early childhood. Pine +forests and hot sun, red deer and black and red squirrels, acres of +blue-berries and wild strawberries; nine or ten different kinds of +edible mushrooms that we went into the forest to pick, and unfamiliar +flowers in the fields—Munich is high up and there are outcrops of +Alpine flowers here and there—and the farm with all the usual animals +except sheep, and drives through the countryside in a brake behind my +grandfather’s greys. And bathing in the Iser under a waterfall; the +Iser was bright green and said to be the fastest river in Europe. We +used to visit the uncles who had a peacock farm a few miles away, and +a granduncle, Johannes von Ranke, the ethnologist, who lived on the +lakeshore of Tegensee, where every one had buttercup-blonde hair. And +occasionally my Aunt Agnes, Baronin von Aufsess, who lived some hours +away by train, high up in the Bavarian Alps, in Aufsess Castle. + +This castle was a wonder; it was built in the ninth century and had +been in the von Aufsess family ever since. The original building was +a keep with only a ladder-entrance half-way up. A medieval castle had +been added. Aufsess was so remote that it had never been sacked, and +its treasures of plate and armour were amazing. Each baron added to the +treasure and none took away. My Uncle Siegfried was the heir. He showed +us children the chapel with its walls hung with enamelled shields +of each Aufsess baron, impaled with the arms of the family into which +he married. These families were always noble. He pointed to a stone +in the floor which pulled up by a ring and said: ‘That is the family +vault where all we Aufsesses go when we die. I’ll go there one day.’ He +scowled comically. (But he was killed in the war as an officer of the +Imperial German Staff and I believe that they never found his body.) He +had a peculiar sense of humour. One day we children found him on the +pebbled garden path, eating the pebbles. He told us to go away, but, of +course, we would not. We sat down and tried to eat pebbles too. He told +us very seriously that eating pebbles was not a thing for children to +do; we should break our teeth. We agreed after trying one or two; so +to get rid of us he found us each a pebble which looked just like all +the other pebbles, but which crushed easily and had a chocolate centre. +But this was only on condition that we went away and left him to his +picking and crunching. When we came back later in the day we searched +and searched, but only found the ordinary hard pebbles. He never once +let us down in a joke. + +Among the treasures of the castle were a baby’s lace cap that had +taken two years to make, and a wine glass that my uncle’s old father, +the reigning baron, had found in the Franco-Prussian War standing +upright in the middle of the square in an entirely ruined village. For +dinner when we were there we had enormous trout. My father, who was a +fisherman, was astonished and asked the baron how they came to be that +size. The baron said that there was an underground river that welled up +close to the castle and the fish that came out with it were quite white +from the darkness, of enormous size and stone-blind. They also gave us +jam, made of wild roseberries, which they called ‘Hetchi-Petch.’ + +The most remarkable thing in the castle was an iron chest in a small +thick-walled white-washed room at the top of the keep. It was a huge +chest, twice the size of the door, and had obviously been made inside +the room—there were no windows but arrow-slits. It had two keys. +I could not say what its date was, but I recall it as twelfth or +thirteenth century work. There was a tradition that it should never be +opened unless the castle were in the most extreme danger. One key was +held by the baron and one by the steward; I believe the stewardship +was a hereditary office. The chest could only be opened by using both +keys, and nobody knew what was inside; it was even considered unlucky +to speculate. Of course we speculated. It might be gold, more likely it +was a store of corn in sealed jars, or even some sort of weapon—Greek +fire, perhaps. From what I know of the Aufsesses and their stewards, it +is inconceivable that the chest ever got the better of their curiosity. +The castle ghost was that of a former baron known as the Red Knight; +his terrifying portrait hung half-way up the turret staircase that took +us to our bedrooms. We slept for the first time in our lives on feather +beds. + +Laufzorn, which my grandfather had bought and restored from a ruinous +state, had nothing to compare with the Aufsess tradition, though it had +for a time been a shooting-lodge of the kings of Bavaria. Still, there +were two ghosts that went with the place; the farm labourers used to +see them frequently. One of them was a carriage which drove furiously +along without any horses, and before the days of motor-cars this was +frightening enough. And the banqueting hall was magnificent. I have +not been there since I was a child, so it is impossible for me to +recall its true dimensions. It seemed as big as a cathedral, and its +bare boards were only furnished at the four corners with little islands +of tables and chairs. The windows were of stained glass, and there were +swallows’ nests all along where the walls joined the ceiling. Roundels +of coloured light from the stained-glass windows, the many-tined +stags’ heads (that my grandfather had shot) mounted on the wall, +swallow-droppings on the floor under the nests and a little harmonium +in one corner where we sang German songs; these concentrate my memories +of Laufzorn. It was in three divisions. The bottom storey was part of +the farm. A carriage-drive went right through it, and there was also +a wide, covered courtyard—originally these had served for driving the +cattle to safety in times of baronial feud. On one side of the drive +was the estate steward’s quarters, on the other the farm servants’ inn +and kitchen. In the middle storey lived my grandfather and his family. +The top storey was a store-place for corn and apples and other farm +produce. It was up here that my cousin Wilhelm, who was killed in an +air-fight during the war, used to lie for hours shooting mice with an +air-gun. (I learned that he was shot down by a schoolfellow of mine.) + +The best part of Germany was the food. There was a richness and +spiciness about it that we missed in England. We liked the rye +bread, the black honey (black, I believe, because it came from the +combs of the previous year), the huge ice-cream puddings made with +fresh raspberry juice, and the venison, and the honey cakes, and the +pastries, and particularly the sauces made with different sorts of +mushrooms. And the bretzels, and carrots cooked with sugar, and summer +pudding of cranberries and blue-berries. There was an orchard close to +the house, and we could eat as many apples, pears, and greengages +as we liked. There were rows of blackcurrant and gooseberry bushes. The +estate, in spite of the recency of my grandfather’s tenure, and his +liberalism and experiments in modern agricultural methods, was still +feudalistic. The farm servants, because they talked a dialect that +we could not understand and because they were Catholics and poor and +sweaty and savage-looking, frightened us. They were lower even than the +servants at home; and as for the colony of Italians settled about half +a mile from the house, imported from Italy by my grandfather as cheap +labour for his brick-making factory, we associated them in our minds +with the ‘gypsies in the wood’ of the song. My grandfather took us over +the factory one day; he made me taste a lump of Italian _polenta_. My +mother told us afterwards (when a milk pudding at Wimbledon came to +table burnt and we complained about it), ‘Those poor Italians at the +factory used to burn their _polenta_ on purpose sometimes just for a +change of flavour.’ + +There were other unusual things at Laufzorn. There was a large pond +full of carp; it was netted every three or four years. The last year +we were there we were allowed to help. It was good to see the net +pulled closer and closer to the shallow landing corner. It bulged with +wriggling carp, and a big pike was threshing about among them. I was +allowed to wade in to help, and came out with six leeches, like black +rubber tubes, fastened to my legs; salt had to be put on them to make +them leave go. I do not remember that it hurt much. The farm labourers +were excited, and one of them, called The Jackal, gutted a fish with +his thumbs and ate it raw. And there was the truck line between the +railway station, two miles away, and the brick-yard. There was a fall +of perhaps one in a hundred from the factory to the station. The +Italians used to load up the trucks with bricks, and a squad of them +would give the trucks a hard push and run along the track pushing for +about twenty or thirty yards; and then the trucks used to sail off +all by themselves to the station. There was a big hay-barn where we +were allowed to climb up on the rafters and jump down into the springy +hay; we gradually increased the height of the jumps. It was exciting +to feel our insides left behind us in the air. Then the cellar, not +the ordinary beer cellar, but another that you went down into from the +courtyard. It was quite dark there except for a little slit-window; and +there was a heap of potatoes on the floor. To get to the light they had +put out long white feelers—a twisted mass. In one corner there was a +dark hole closed by a gate: it was a secret passage out of the house to +a ruined monastery, a mile or two away. My uncles had once been down +some way, but the air got bad and they had to come back. The gate had +been put up to prevent anyone else trying it and being overcome. + +When we drove out with my grandfather he was acclaimed by the principal +personages of every village we went through. At each village there +was a big inn with a rumbling skittle-alley and always a tall Maypole +banded like a barber’s pole with blue and white, the Bavarian national +colours. The roads were lined with fruit trees. The idea of these +unguarded public fruit trees astonished us. We could not understand +why there was any fruit left on them. Even the horse-chestnut trees on +Wimbledon Common were pelted with sticks and stones, long before the +chestnuts were ripe and in defiance of an energetic common keeper. The +only things that we could not quite get accustomed to in Bavaria were +the wayside crucifixes with the realistic blood and wounds, and +the _ex-voto_ pictures, like sign-boards, of naked souls in purgatory, +grinning with anguish in the middle of high red and yellow flames. We +had been taught to believe in hell, but did not like to be reminded of +it. Munich we found sinister—disgusting fumes of beer and cigar smoke +and intense sounds of eating, the hotly dressed, enormously stout +population in the trams and trains, the ferocious officials, the wanton +crowds at the art shops and picture galleries. Then there was the +Morgue. We were not allowed inside because we were children, but it was +bad enough to be told about it. Any notable who died was taken to the +Morgue and put in a chair, sitting in state for a day or two, and if he +was a general he had his uniform on, or if she was a burgomaster’s wife +she had on her silks and jewels; and strings were tied to their fingers +and the slightest movement of one of the strings would ring a great +bell, in case there was any life left in the corpse after all. I have +never verified the truth of all this, but it was true enough to me. +When my grandfather died about a year after our last visit I thought +of him there in the Morgue with his bushy white hair, and his morning +coat and striped trousers and his decorations and his stethoscope, and +perhaps, I thought, his silk hat, gloves, and cane on a table beside +the chair. Trying, in a nightmare, to be alive but knowing himself dead. + +The headmaster who caned me on the hand was a lover of German culture, +and impressed this feeling on the school, so that it was to my credit +that I could speak German and had been to Germany. At my other +preparatory schools this German connection was regarded as something +at least excusable and perhaps even interesting. It was not until I +went to Charterhouse that I was made to see it as a social offence. My +history from the age of fourteen, when I went to Charterhouse, to +just before the end of the war, when I began to realize things better, +was a forced rejection of the German in me. In all that first period I +used to insist indignantly that I was Irish and deliberately cultivate +Irish sentiment. I took my self-protective stand on the technical point +that it was the father’s nationality that counted. Of course I also +accepted the whole patriarchal system of things. It is difficult now +to recall how completely I believed in the natural supremacy of male +over female. I never heard it even questioned until I met Nancy, when I +was about twenty-two, towards the end of the war. The surprising sense +of ease that I got from her frank statement of equality between the +sexes was among my chief reasons for liking her. My mother had always +taken the ‘love, honour, and obey’ contract literally; my sisters +were brought up to wish themselves boys, to be shocked at the idea of +woman’s suffrage, and not to expect as expensive an education as their +brothers. The final decision in any domestic matter always rested with +my father. My mother would say: ‘If two ride together one must ride +behind.’ Nancy’s crude summary, ‘God is a man, so it must be all rot,’ +took a load off my shoulders. + +We children did not talk German well; our genders and minor parts of +speech were shaky, and we never learned to read Gothic characters +or script. Yet we had the feel of German so strongly that I would +say now that I know German far better than French, though I can read +French almost as fast as I can read English and can only read a German +book very painfully and slowly, with the help of a dictionary. I use +different parts of my mind for the two languages. French is a surface +acquirement and I could forget it quite easily if I had no reason to +use it every now and then. + + + + + V + + +I spent a good part of my early life at Wimbledon. My mother and father +did not get rid of the house, a big one near the Common, until some +time about the end of the war; yet of all the time I spent in it I can +recall little or nothing of significance. But after the age of eleven +or twelve I was away at school, and in the spring and summer holidays +we were all in the country, so that I was only at Wimbledon in the +Christmas holidays and for a day or two at the beginning and end of +the other holidays. London was only a half-hour away and yet we seldom +went there. My mother and father never took us to the theatre, not even +to pantomimes, and until the middle of the war I had only been to the +theatre twice in my life, and then only to children’s plays, taken by +an aunt. My mother wished to bring us up to be serious and to benefit +humanity in some practical way. She allowed us no hint of its dirtiness +and intrigue and lustfulness, believing that innocence was the surest +protection against them. Our reading was carefully censored by her. +I was destined to be ‘if not a great man at least a good man.’ Our +treats were educational or æsthetic, to Kew Gardens, Hampton Court, +the Zoo, the British Museum, or the Natural History Museum. I remember +my mother, in the treasure room at the British Museum, telling us with +shining eyes that all these treasures were ours. We looked at her +astonished. She said: ‘Yes, they belong to us as members of the public. +We can look at them, admire them, and study them for as long as we +like. If we had them back at home we couldn’t do more.’ + +We read more books than most children do. There must have been +four or five thousand books in the house. They consisted of an +old-fashioned scholar’s library bequeathed to my father by my namesake, +whom I have mentioned as a friend of Wordsworth, but who had a far more +tender friendship with Felicia Hemans; to this was added my father’s +own collection of books, mostly poetry, with a particular cupboard for +Anglo-Irish literature; devotional works contributed by my mother; +educational books sent to my father by their publishers in the hope +that he would recommend them for use in Government schools; and novels +and adventure books brought into the house by my elder brothers and +sisters. + +My mother used to tell us stories about inventors and doctors who gave +their lives for the suffering, and poor boys who struggled to the top +of the tree, and saintly men who made examples of themselves. There +was also the parable of the king who had a very beautiful garden which +he threw open to the public. Two students entered; and one, who was +the person of whom my mother spoke with a slight sneer in her voice, +noticed occasional weeds even in the tulip-beds, but the other, and +there she brightened up, found beautiful flowers growing even on +rubbish heaps. She kept off the subject of war as much as possible; she +always had difficulty in explaining to us how it was that God permitted +wars. The Boer War clouded my early childhood; Philip, my eldest +brother (who also called himself a Fenian), was a pro-Boer and there +was great tension at the breakfast-table between him and my father, +whose political views were always orthodox. + +The sale of the Wimbledon house solved a good many problems; it was +getting too full. My mother hated throwing away anything that could +possibly, in the most remote contingency, be of any service to anyone. +The medicine cupboard was perhaps the most significant corner +of the house. Nobody could say that it was untidy, exactly; all the +bottles had stoppers, but they were so crowded together that it was +impossible for anybody except my mother, who had a long memory, to +know what was at the back. Every few years, no doubt, she went through +this cupboard. If there was any doubtful bottle she would tentatively +re-label it. ‘This must be Alfred’s old bunion salve,’ and another, +‘Strychnine—query?’ Even special medicines prescribed for scarlet-fever +or whooping-cough were kept, in case of re-infection. She was always +an energetic labeller. She wrote in one of my school prizes: ‘Robert +Ranke Graves won this book as a prize for being first in his class +in the term’s work and second in examinations. He also won a special +prize for divinity, though the youngest boy in the class. Written by +his affectionate mother, Amy Graves. Summer, 1908.’ Home-made jam +used always to arrive at table well labelled; one small pot read: +‘Gooseberry, lemon and rhubarb—a little shop gooseberry added—Nelly +re-boiled.’ + +In a recent book, _Mrs. Fisher_, I moralized on three sayings and +a favourite story of my mother’s. I ascribed them there for the +argument’s sake to my Danish grandmother. They were these: + + ‘Children, I command you, as your mother, never to swing objects + around in your hands. The King of Hanover put out his eye by swinging + a bead purse.’ + + ‘Children, I command you, as your mother, to be careful when you + carry your candles up to bed. The candle is a little cup of grease.’ + + ‘There was a man once, a Frenchman, who died of grief because he + could never become a mother.’ + +And the story told in candlelight: + + ‘There was once a peasant family living in Schleswig-Holstein, where + they all have crooked mouths, and one night they wished to blow out + the candle. The father’s mouth was twisted to the left, so! and he + tried to blow out the candle, so! but he was too proud to stand + anywhere but directly before the candle, and he puffed and he puffed, + but could not blow the candle out. And then the mother tried, but her + mouth was twisted to the right, so! and she tried to blow, so! and + she was too proud to stand anywhere but directly before the candle, + and she puffed and puffed, but could not blow the candle out. Then + there was the brother with mouth twisted outward, so! and the sister + with the mouth twisted downward, so! and they tried each in their + turn, so! and so! and the idiot baby with his mouth twisted in an + eternal grin tried, so! And at last the maid, a beautiful girl from + Copenhagen with a perfectly formed mouth, put it out with her shoe. + So! Flap!’ + +These quotations make it clear how much more I owe, as a writer, to +my mother than to my father. She also taught me to ‘speak the truth +and shame the devil!’ Her favourite biblical exhortation was ‘My son, +whatever thy hand findeth to do, do it with all thy might.’ + +I always felt that Wimbledon was a wrong place, neither town nor +country. It was at its worst on Wednesdays, my mother’s ‘At Home’ day. +Tea was in the drawing-room. We were called down in our Sunday clothes +to eat cakes, be kissed, and be polite. My sisters were made to recite. +Around Christmas, celebrated in the German style, came a dozen or so +children’s parties; we used to make ourselves sick with excitement. +I do not like thinking of Wimbledon. Every spring and summer after my +third year, unless we happened to go to Germany, or to France as we did +once, we went to Harlech in North Wales. My mother had built a house +there. + +In the days before motor traffic began around the North Welsh coast, +Harlech was a very quiet place and little known, even as a golf centre. +It was in three parts. First, the village itself, five hundred feet +up on a steep range of hills; it had granite houses with slate roofs +and ugly windows and gables, chapels of seven or eight different +denominations, enough shops to make it the shopping centre of the +smaller villages around, and the castle, a favourite playground of +ours. Then there was the Morfa, a flat plain from which the sea +had receded; part of this was the golf links, but to the north was +a stretch of wild country which we used to visit in the spring in +search of plovers’ eggs. The sea was beyond the links—good hard sand +stretching for miles, safe bathing, and sandhills for hide and seek. + +The third part of Harlech, which became the most important to us, was +never visited by golfers or the few other summer visitors or by the +village people themselves; this was the desolate rocky hill-country at +the back of the village. As we grew older we spent more and more of +our time up there and less and less on the beach and the links, which +were the most obvious attractions of the place. There were occasional +farms, or rather crofts, in these hills, but one could easily walk +fifteen or twenty miles without crossing a road or passing close to a +farm. Originally we went up there with some practical excuse. For the +blue-berries on the hills near Maesygarnedd; or for the cranberries +at Gwlawllyn; or to find bits of Roman hypocaust tiling (with the +potter’s thumb-marks still on them) in the ruined Roman villas by +Castell Tomenymur; or for globe-flowers in the upper Artro; or to catch +a sight of the wild goats that lived at the back of Rhinog Fawr, the +biggest of the hills of the next range; or to get raspberries from the +thickets near Cwmbychan Lake; or to find white heather on a hill that +we did not know the name of away to the north of the Roman Steps. But +after a time we walked about those hills simply because they were good +to walk about on. They had a penny plain quality about them that was +even better that the twopence coloured quality of the Bavarian Alps. My +best friend at the time was my sister Rosaleen, who was one year older +than myself. + +I suppose what I liked about this country (and I know no country like +it) was its independence of formal nature. The passage of the seasons +was hardly noticed there; the wind always seemed to be blowing and the +grass always seemed to be withered and the small streams were always +cold and clear, running over black stones. Sheep were the only animals +about, but they were not nature, except in the lambing season; they +were too close to the granite boulders covered with grey lichen that +lay about everywhere. There were few trees except a few nut bushes, +rowans, stunted oaks and thorn bushes in the valleys. The winters were +always mild, so that last year’s bracken and last year’s heather lasted +in a faded way through to the next spring. There were almost no birds +except an occasional buzzard and curlews crying in the distance; and +wherever we went we felt that the rocky skeleton of the hill was only +an inch or two under the turf. Once, when I came home on leave from the +war, I spent about a week of my ten days walking about on these hills +to restore my sanity. I tried to do the same after I was wounded, +but by that time the immediate horror of death was too strong for the +indifference of the hills to relieve it. + +I am glad that it was Wales and not Ireland. We never went to Ireland, +except once when I was an infant in arms. We had no Welsh blood in us +and did not like the Harlech villagers much. We had no temptation to +learn Welsh or to pretend ourselves Welsh. We knew that country as a +quite ungeographical region; any stray sheep-farmers that we met who +belonged to the place we resented somehow as intruders on our privacy. +Clarissa, Rosaleen and I were once out on the remotest hills and had +not seen a soul all day. At last we came to a waterfall and two trout +lying on the bank beside it; ten yards away was the fisherman. He was +disentangling his line from a thorn-bush and had not seen us. So we +crept up quietly to the fish and put a sprig of white bell-heather +(which we had found that afternoon) in the mouth of each. We hurried +back to cover, and I said: ‘Shall we watch?’ but Clarissa said: ‘No, +don’t spoil it.’ So we came home and never spoke of it again even +to each other: and never knew the sequel.... If it had been Ireland +we would have self-consciously learned Irish and the local legends. +Instead we came to know the country more purely, as a place whose +history was too old for local legends; when we were up walking there +we made our own. We decided who was buried under the Standing Stone +and who had lived in the ruined round-hut encampment and in the caves +of the valley where the big rowans were. On our visits to Germany +I had felt a sense of home in my blood in a natural human way, but +on the hills behind Harlech I found a personal harmony independent +of history or geography. The first poem I wrote as myself concerned +that hill-country. (The first poem I wrote as a Graves was a free +translation of a satire by Catullus). + +My father was always too busy and absent-minded to worry much about us +children; my mother did worry. Yet she allowed us to go off immediately +after breakfast into the hills and did not complain much when we came +back long after supper-time. Though she had a terror of heights herself +she never restrained us from climbing about in dangerous places; so +we never got hurt. I had a bad head for heights and trained myself +deliberately and painfully to overcome it. We used to go climbing in +the turrets and towers of Harlech Castle. I have worked hard on myself +in defining and dispersing terrors. The simple fear of heights was the +most obvious to overcome. There was a quarry-face in the garden of +our Harlech house. It provided one or two easy climbs, but gradually +I invented more and more difficult ones for myself. After each new +success I had to lie down, shaking with nervousness, in the safe meadow +grass at the top. Once I lost my foothold on a ledge and should have +been killed; but it seemed as though I improvised a foothold in the +air and kicked myself up to safety from it. When I examined the place +afterwards it was almost as if the Devil had given me what he had +offered Christ in the Temptation, the freedom to cast myself down from +the rock and be restored to safety by the angels. Yet such events are +not uncommon in mountain climbing. George Mallory, for instance, did +an inexplicable climb on Snowdon once. He had left his pipe on a ledge +half-way down one of the precipices and scrambled back by a short cut +to retrieve it, then up again by the same way. No one saw just how +he did the climb, but when they came to examine it the next day for +official record, they found that it was an impossible overhang nearly +all the way. The rule of the Climbers’ Club was that climbs should +not be called after their inventors, but after natural features. An +exception was made in this case; the climb was recorded something +like this: ‘_Mallory’s Pipe_, a variation on Route 2; see adjoining +map. This climb is totally impossible. It has been performed once, in +failing light, by Mr. G. H. L. Mallory.’ + + + + + VI + + +About Charterhouse. Let me begin by recalling my feelings on the day +that I left, about a week before the outbreak of war. I discussed them +with a friend who felt much as I did. First we said that there were +perhaps even more typical public schools than Charterhouse at the +time, but that this was difficult to believe. Next, that there was no +possible remedy, because tradition was so strong that if one wished +to break it one would have to dismiss the whole school and staff and +start all over again. But that even this would not be enough, for the +school buildings were so impregnated with what was called the public +school spirit, but what we felt as fundamental badness, that they +would have to be demolished and the school rebuilt elsewhere and its +name changed. Next, that our only regret at leaving the place was that +for the last year we had been in a position as members of Sixth Form +to do more or less what we pleased. Now we were both going on to St. +John’s College, Oxford, which seemed by reputation to be merely a more +boisterous repetition of Charterhouse. We would be freshmen there, and +would naturally refuse to be hearty and public school-ish, and there +would be all the stupidity of having our rooms raided and being forced +to lose our temper and hurt somebody and be hurt ourselves. And there +would be no peace probably until we got into our third year, when we +would be back again in the same sort of position as now, and in the +same sort of position as in our last year at our preparatory school. +‘In 1917,’ said Nevill, ‘the official seal will be out on all this +dreariness. We’ll get our degrees, and then we’ll have to start as new +boys again in some dreary profession. My God,’ he said, turning to +me suddenly, ‘I can’t stand the idea of it. I must put something +in between me and Oxford. I must at least go abroad for the whole +vacation.’ I did not feel that three months was long enough. I had a +vague intention of running away to sea. ‘Do you realize,’ he said to +me, ‘that we have spent fourteen years of our life principally at Latin +and Greek, not even competently taught, and that we are going to start +another three years of the same thing?’ But, when we had said our very +worst of Charterhouse, I said to him or he said to me, I forget which: +‘Of course, the trouble is that in the school at any given time there +are always at least two really decent masters among the forty or fifty, +and ten really decent fellows among ♦the five or six hundred. We +will remember them, and have Lot’s feeling about not damning Sodom for +the sake of ten just persons. And in another twenty years’ time we’ll +forget this conversation and think that we were mistaken, and that +perhaps everybody, with a few criminal exceptions, was fairly average +decent, and we’ll say “I was a young fool then, insisting on impossible +perfection,” and we’ll send our sons to Charterhouse sentimentally, +and they’ll go through all we did.’ I do not wish this to be construed +as an attack on my old school, but merely as a record of my feelings +at the time. No doubt I was unappreciative of the hard knocks and +character-training that public schools are supposed to provide, and as +a typical Old Carthusian remarked to me recently: ‘The whole moral tone +of the school has improved out of all recognition since those days.’ + +♦ “the the” replaced with “the” + +As a matter of fact I did not go up to Oxford until five years later, +in 1919, when my brother, four years younger than myself, was already +in residence, and I did not take my degree until 1926, at the same time +as the brother who was eight years younger than myself. Oxford was +extraordinarily kind to me. I did no Latin or Greek there, though +I had a Classical Exhibition. I did not sit for a single examination. +I never had rooms at St. John’s, though I used to go there to draw +a Government grant for tuition fees. I lived outside the University +three-mile radius. For my last two undergraduate years I did not even +have a tutor. I have a warm feeling for Oxford. Its rules and statutes, +though apparently cast-iron, are ready for emergencies. In my case, at +any rate, a poet was an emergency. + +Whenever I come to the word ‘Charterhouse’ in this story I find myself +escaping into digressions, but I suppose that I must get through with +it. From the moment I arrived at the school I suffered an oppression +of spirit that I hesitate now to recall in its full intensity. It +was something like being in that chilly cellar at Laufzorn among the +potatoes, but being a potato out of a different bag from the rest. +The school consisted of about six hundred boys. The chief interests +were games and romantic friendships. School-work was despised by every +one; the scholars, of whom there were about fifty in the school at +any given time, were not concentrated in a single dormitory-house as +at Winchester, but divided among ten. They were known as ‘pro’s,’ and +unless they were good at games and willing to pretend that they hated +work as much as or more than the non-scholars, and ready whenever +called on to help these with their work, they usually had a bad +time. I was a scholar and really liked work, and I was surprised and +disappointed at the apathy of the class-rooms. My first term I was +left alone more or less, it being a school convention that new boys +should be neither encouraged nor baited. The other boys seldom spoke +to them except to send them on errands, or to inform them of breaches +of school convention. But my second term the trouble began. There +were a number of things that naturally made for my unpopularity. +Besides being a scholar and not outstandingly good at games, I was +always short of pocket-money. I could not conform to the social custom +of treating my contemporaries to food at the school shop, and because +I could not treat them I could not accept their treating. My clothes +were all wrong; they conformed outwardly to the school pattern, but +they were ready-made and not of the best-quality cloth that the other +boys all wore. Even so, I had not been taught how to make the best of +them. Neither my mother nor my father had any regard for the niceties +of modern dress, and my elder brothers were abroad by this time. The +other boys in my house, except for five scholars, were nearly all the +sons of business men; it was a class of whose interests and prejudices +I knew nothing, having hitherto only met boys of the professional +class. And I talked too much for their liking. A further disability was +that I was as prudishly innocent as my mother had planned I should be. +I knew nothing about simple sex, let alone the many refinements of sex +constantly referred to in school conversation. My immediate reaction +was one of disgust. I wanted to run away. + +The most unfortunate disability of all was that my name appeared on the +school list as ‘R. von R. Graves.’ I had only known hitherto that my +second name was Ranke; the ‘von,’ discovered on my birth certificate, +was disconcerting. Carthusians were secretive about their second names; +if these were fancy ones they usually managed to conceal them. Ranke, +without the ‘von’ I could no doubt have passed off as monosyllabic and +English, but ‘von Ranke’ was glaring. The business class to which most +of the boys belonged was strongly feeling at this time the threat and +even the necessity of a trade war; ‘German’ meant ‘dirty German.’ It +meant ‘cheap shoddy goods competing with our sterling industries,’ +and it also meant military menace, Prussianism, sabre-rattling. There +was another boy in my house with a German name, but English by birth +and upbringing. He was treated much as I was. On the other hand a +French boy in the house was very popular, though he was not much good +at games; King Edward VII had done his _entente_ work very thoroughly. +There was also considerable anti-Jewish feeling (the business prejudice +again) and the legend was put about that I was not only a German but a +German-Jew. + +Of course I always maintained that I was Irish. This claim was resented +by an Irish boy who had been in the house about a year and a half +longer than myself. He went out of his way to hurt me, not only by +physical acts of spite, like throwing ink over my school-books, hiding +my games-clothes, setting on me suddenly from behind corners, pouring +water over me at night, but by continually forcing his bawdy humour +on my prudishness and inviting everybody to laugh at my disgust; he +also built up a sort of humorous legend of my hypocrisy and concealed +depravity. I came near a nervous breakdown. School morality prevented +me from informing the house-master of my troubles. The house-monitors +were supposed to keep order and preserve the moral tone of the house, +but at this time they were not the sort to interfere in any case of +bullying among the juniors. I tried violent resistance, but as the odds +were always heavily against me this merely encouraged the ragging. +Complete passive resistance would probably have been better. I only got +accustomed to bawdy-talk in my last two years at Charterhouse, and it +was not until I had been some time in the army that I got hardened to +it and could reply in kind to insults. + +A former headmaster of Charterhouse, an innocent man, is reported +to have said at a Headmasters’ Conference: ‘My boys are amorous but +seldom erotic.’ Few cases of eroticism indeed ever came to his notice; +there were not more than five or six big rows all the time I was at +Charterhouse and expulsions were rare. But the house-masters knew +little about what went on in their houses; their living quarters +were removed from the boys’. There was a true distinction between +‘amorousness,’ by which the headmaster meant a sentimental falling +in love with younger boys, and eroticism, which was adolescent lust. +The intimacy, as the newspapers call it, that frequently took place +was practically never between an elder boy and the object of his +affection, for that would have spoilt the romantic illusion, which was +heterosexually cast. It was between boys of the same age who were not +in love, but used each other coldly as convenient sex-instruments. So +the atmosphere was always heavy with romance of a very conventional +early-Victorian type, yet complicated by cynicism and foulness. + + + + + VII + + +Half-way through my second year I wrote to my parents to tell them that +I must leave Charterhouse, because I could not stand life there any +longer. I told them that the house was making it plain that I did not +belong and that it did not want me. I gave them details, in confidence, +to make them take my demand seriously. They were unable to respect this +confidence, considering that it was their religious duty to inform +the house-master of all I had written them. They did not even tell me +what they were doing; they contented themselves with visiting me and +giving me assurances of the power of prayer and faith; telling me that +I must endure all for the sake of ... I have forgotten what exactly. +Fortunately I had not given them any account of sex-irregularities in +the house, so all that the house-master did was to make a speech that +night after prayers deterrent of bullying in general; he told us that +he had just had a complaint from a boy’s parents. He made it plain at +the same time how much he disliked informers and outside interference +in affairs of the house. My name was not mentioned, but the visit of +my parents on a day not a holiday had been noticed and commented on. +So I had to stay on and be treated as an informer. I was now in the +upper school and so had a study of my own. But this was no security; +studies had no locks. It was always being wrecked. After my parents’ +visit to the house-master it was not even possible for me to use the +ordinary house changing-room; I had to remove my games-clothes to a +disused shower-bath. My heart went wrong then; the school doctor said I +was not to play football. This was low water. My last resource was to +sham insanity. It succeeded unexpectedly well. Soon nobody troubled +about me except to avoid any contact with me. + +I must make clear that I am not charging my parents with treachery; +they were trying to help me. Their honour is beyond reproach.... One +day I went down to Charterhouse by the special train from Waterloo +to Godalming. I was too late to take a ticket; I just got into a +compartment before the train started. The railway company had not +provided enough coaches, so I had to stand up all the way. At Godalming +station the crowd of boys rushing out into the station-yard to secure +taxis swept me past the ticket collectors, so I had got my very +uncomfortable ride free. I mentioned this in my next letter home, just +for something to say, and my father sent me a letter of reproach. He +said that he had himself made a special visit to Waterloo Station, +bought a ticket to Godalming, and torn it up.... My mother was even +more scrupulous. A young couple on their honeymoon once happened to +stop the night with us at Wimbledon, and left behind them a packet of +sandwiches, some of which had already been eaten. My mother sent them +on. + +Being thrown entirely on myself I began to write poetry. This was +considered stronger proof of insanity than the formal straws I wore +in my hair. The poetry I wrote was not the easy showing-off witty +stuff that all the Graves’ write and have written for the last couple +of centuries. It was poetry that was dissatisfied with itself. When, +later, things went better with me at Charterhouse, I became literary +once more. + +I sent one of my poems to the school magazine, _The Carthusian_. On +the strength of it I was invited to join the school Poetry Society. +This was a most anomalous organization for Charterhouse. It consisted +of seven members. The meetings, for the reading and discussion of +poetry, were held once a month at the house of Guy Kendall, then +a form-master at the school, now headmaster of University College +School at Hampstead. The members were four sixth-form boys and two +boys a year and a half older than myself, one of whom was called +Raymond Rodakowski. None of them were in the same house as myself. At +Charterhouse no friendship was permitted between boys of different +houses or of different years beyond a formal acquaintance at work +or organized games like cricket and football. It was, for instance, +impossible for boys of different houses, though related or next-door +neighbours at home, even to play a friendly game of tennis or +squash-racquets together. They would never have heard the last of +it. So the friendship that began between me and Raymond was most +unconventional. Coming home one evening from a meeting of the society +I told Raymond about life in the house; I told him what had happened +a week or two before. My study had been raided and one of my more +personal poems had been discovered and pinned up on the public notice +board in ‘Writing School.’ This was the living-room of the members of +the lower school, into which, as a member of the upper school, I was +not allowed to go, and so could not rescue the poem. Raymond was the +first person I had been able to talk to humanly. He was indignant, and +took my arm in his in the gentlest way. ‘They are bloody barbarians,’ +he said. He told me that I must pull myself together and do something +about it, because I was a good poet, he said, and a good person. I +loved him for that. He said: ‘You’re not allowed to play football; why +don’t you box? It’s supposed to be good for the heart.’ So I laughed +and said I would. Then Raymond said: ‘I expect they rag you about +your initials.’ ‘Yes,’ I said, ‘they call me a dirty German.’ ‘I had +trouble, too,’ he said, ‘before I took up boxing.’ Raymond’s mother was +Scottish, his father was an Austrian Pole. + +Very few boys at Charterhouse boxed and the boxing-room, which was over +the school confectionery shop, was a good place to meet Raymond, whom, +otherwise, I would not have been able to see often. I began boxing +seriously and savagely. Raymond said to me: ‘You know these cricketers +and footballers are all afraid of boxers, almost superstitious. +They won’t box themselves for fear of losing their good looks—the +inter-house competitions every year are such bloody affairs. But do you +remember the Mansfield, Waller and Taylor show? That’s a good tradition +to keep up.’ + +Of course I remembered. Two terms previously there had been a meeting +of the school debating society which I had attended. The committee +of the debating society was usually made up of sixth-form boys; the +debates were formal and usually dull, but in so far as there was any +intellectual life at Charterhouse, it was represented by the debating +society—and by _The Carthusian_, always edited by two members of this +committee; both institutions were free from influence of the masters. +Debates were always held in the school library on Saturday night. +One debate night the usual decorous conventions were broken by an +invasion of ‘the bloods.’ The bloods were the members of the cricket +and football elevens. They were the ruling caste at Charterhouse; +the eleventh man in the football eleven, though a member of the +under-fourth form, had a great deal more prestige than the most +brilliant classical scholar in the sixth. Even ‘Head of the School’ was +an empty title. There was not, however, an open warfare between +the sixth-form intellectuals and the bloods. The bloods were stupid +and knew it, and had nothing to gain by a clash; the intellectuals +were happy to be left alone. So this invasion of the bloods, who had +just returned from winning a match against the _Casuals_, and had +probably been drinking, caused the debating society a good deal of +embarrassment. The bloods disturbed the meeting by cheers and cat-cries +and slamming the library magazine-folders on the table. Mansfield, as +president of the society, called them to order, but they continued +the disturbance; so Mansfield closed the debate. The bloods thought +the incident finished, but it was not. A letter appeared in _The +Carthusian_ a few days later protesting against the bad behaviour in +the debating society of ‘certain First Eleven babies.’ Three sets of +initials were signed and they were those of Mansfield, Waller and +Taylor. The school was astonished by this suicidally daring act; it +waited for Korah, Dathan and Abiram to be swallowed up. The captain of +football is said to have sworn that he’d chuck the three signatories +into the fountain in Founder’s Court. But somehow he did not. The fact +was that this happened early in the autumn term and there were only +two other First Eleven colours left over from the preceding year; new +colours were only given gradually as the football season advanced. The +other rowdies had only been embryo bloods. So it was a matter entirely +between these three sixth-form intellectuals and the three colours of +the First Eleven. And the First Eleven were uncomfortably aware that +Mansfield was the heavy-weight boxing champion of the school, Waller +the runner-up for the middle-weights, and that Taylor was also a person +to be reckoned with (a tough fellow, though not perhaps a boxer—I +forget). While the First Eleven were wondering what on earth to do +their three opponents decided to take the war into the enemy’s country. + +The social code of Charterhouse was based on a very strict caste +system; the caste-marks were slight distinctions in dress. A new +boy had no privileges at all; a boy in his second term might wear a +knitted tie instead of a plain one; a boy in his second year might +wear coloured socks; third year gave most of the privileges—turned +down collars, coloured handkerchiefs, a coat with a long roll, and so +on; fourth year, a few more, such as the right to get up raffles; but +very peculiar and unique distinctions were reserved for the bloods. +These included light grey flannel trousers, butterfly collars, coats +slit up the back, and the privilege of walking arm-in-arm. So the next +Sunday Mansfield, Waller and Taylor did the bravest thing that was ever +done at Charterhouse. The school chapel service was at eleven in the +morning, but the custom was for the school to be in its seats by five +minutes to eleven and to sit waiting there. At two minutes to eleven +the bloods used to stalk in; at one and a half minutes to came the +masters; at one minute to came the choir in its surplices; then the +headmaster arrived and the service started. If any boy was accidentally +late and sneaked in between five minutes to and two minutes to the +hour, he was followed by six hundred pairs of eyes; there was nudging +and giggling and he would not hear the last of it for a long time; it +was as though he were pretending to be a blood. On this Sunday, then, +when the bloods had come in with their usual swaggering assurance, an +extraordinary thing happened. + +The three sixth-formers slowly walked up the aisle magnificent in grey +flannel trousers, slit coats, First Eleven collars, and with pink +carnations in their buttonholes. It is impossible to describe the +astonishment and terror that this spectacle caused. Everyone looked at +the captain of the First Eleven; he had gone quite white. But by this +time the masters had come in, followed by the choir, and the opening +hymn, though raggedly sung, ended the tension. When chapel emptied +it always emptied according to ‘school order,’ that is, according to +position in work; the sixth form went out first. The bloods were not +high in school order, so Mansfield, Waller and Taylor had the start of +them. After chapel on Sunday the custom in the winter terms was for +people to meet and gossip in the school library; so it was here that +Mansfield, Waller and Taylor went. They had buttonholed a talkative +master and drawn him with them into the library, and there they kept +him talking until dinnertime. If the bloods had had courage to do +anything desperate they would have had to do it at once, but they +could not make a scene in the presence of a master. Mansfield, Waller +and Taylor went down to their houses for dinner still talking to the +master. After this they kept together as much as possible and the +school, particularly the lower school, which had always chafed under +the dress regulations, made heroes of them, and began scoffing at the +bloods as weak-kneed. + +Finally the captain of the eleven was stupid enough to complain to +the headmaster about this breach of school conventions, asking for +permission to enforce First Eleven rights by disciplinary measures. The +headmaster, who was a scholar and disliked the games tradition, refused +his request. He said that the sixth form deserved as distinctive +privileges as the First Eleven. The sixth form would therefore in +future be entitled to hold what they had assumed. After this the +prestige of the bloods declined greatly. + +At Raymond’s encouragement I pulled myself together and my third +year found things very much easier for me. My chief persecutor, +the Irishman, had left. It was said that he had had a bad nervous +breakdown. He wrote me a hysterical letter, demanding my forgiveness +for his treatment of me, saying at the same time that if I did not give +this forgiveness, one of his friends (whom he mentioned) was still in +the house to persecute me. I did not answer the letter. I do not know +what happened to him. The friend never bothered. + + + + + VIII + + +I still had no friends except among the junior members of the house, +to whom I did not disguise my dislike of the seniors; I found the +juniors were on the whole a decent lot of fellows. Towards the end of +this year, in the annual boxing and gymnastic display, I fought three +rounds with Raymond. There is a lot of sex feeling in boxing—the dual +play, the reciprocity, the pain not felt as pain. This exhibition match +to me had something of the quality that Dr. Marie Stopes would call +sacramental. We were out neither to hurt nor win though we hit each +other hard. + +This public appearance as a boxer improved my position in the house. +And the doctor now allowed me to play football again and I played +it fairly well. Then things started going wrong in a different way. +It began with confirmation, for which I was prepared by a zealous +evangelical master. For a whole term I concentrated all my thoughts on +religion, looking forward to the ceremony as a spiritual climax. When +it came, and the Holy Ghost did not descend in the form of a dove, and +I did not find myself gifted with tongues, and nothing spectacular +happened (except that the boy whom the Bishop of Zululand was blessing +at the same time as myself slipped off the narrow footstool on which +we were both kneeling), I was bound to feel a reaction. Raymond had +not been confirmed, and I was astonished to hear him admit and even +boast that he was an atheist. I argued with him about the existence of +God and the divinity of Christ and the necessity of the Trinity. He +said, of the Trinity, that anybody who could agree with the Athanasian +creed that ‘whoever will be saved must confess that there are not Three +Incomprehensibles but One Incomprehensible’ was saying that a man +must go to Hell if he does not believe something that is by definition +impossible to understand. He said that his respect for himself as a +reasonable being did not allow him to believe such things. He also +asked me a question: ‘What’s the good of having a soul if you have a +mind. What’s the function of the soul? It seems a mere pawn in the +game.’ I was shocked, but because I loved him and respected him I felt +bound to find an answer. The more I thought about it the less certain I +became that he was wrong. So in order not to prejudice religion (and I +put religion and my chances of salvation before human love) I at first +broke my friendship with Raymond entirely. Later I weakened, but he +would not even meet me, when I approached him, with any broad-church +compromise. He was a complete and ruthless atheist and I could not +appreciate his strength of spirit. For the rest of our time at +Charterhouse we were not as close as we should have been. I met Raymond +in France in 1917, when he was with the Irish Guards; I rode over to +see him one afternoon and felt as close to him as I had ever felt. He +was killed at Cambrai not long after. + +My feeling for Raymond was more comradely than amorous. In my fourth +year an even stronger relationship started. It was with a boy three +years younger than myself, who was exceptionally intelligent and +fine-spirited. Call him Dick, because his real name was the same as +that of another person in the story. He was not in my house, but +I had recently joined the school choir and so had he, and I had +opportunities for speaking to him occasionally after choir practice. +I was unconscious of sexual feeling for him. Our conversations were +always impersonal. Our acquaintance was commented on and I was warned +by one of the masters to end it. I replied that I would not have +my friendships in any way limited. I pointed out that this boy +was interested in the same things as myself, particularly in books; +that the disparity in our ages was unfortunate, but that a lack of +intelligence among the boys of my own age made it necessary for me to +find friends where I could. Finally the headmaster took me to task +about it. I lectured him on the advantage of friendship between elder +and younger boys, citing Plato, the Greek poets, Shakespeare, Michael +Angelo and others, who had felt the same way as I did. He let me go +without taking any action. + +In my fifth year I was in the sixth form and was made a house-monitor. +There were six house-monitors. One of them was the house games-captain, +a friendly, easy-going fellow. He said to me one day: ‘Look here, +Graves, I have been asked to send in a list of competitors for the +inter-house boxing competition; shall I put your name down?’ I had not +boxed for two terms. I had been busy with football and played for the +house-team now. And since my coolness with Raymond boxing had lost its +interest. I said: ‘I’m not boxing these days.’ ‘Well,’ he said, ‘young +Alan is entering for the welter-weights. He’s got a very good chance. +Why don’t you enter for the welter-weights too? You might be able to +damage one or two of the stronger men and make it easier for him.’ I +did not particularly like the idea of making things easier for Alan, +but I obviously had to enter the competition. I had a reputation to +keep up. I knew, however, that my wind, though all right for football, +was not equal to boxing round after round. I decided that my fights +must be short. The night before the competition I smuggled a bottle of +cherry-whisky into the house. I would shorten the fights on that. + +I had never drank anything alcoholic before in my life. When I was +seven years old I was prevailed on to sign the pledge. My pledge card +bound me to abstain by the grace of God from all spirituous liquors +so long as I retained it. But my mother took the card from me and put +it safely in the box-room with the Jacobean silver inherited from my +Cheyne grandmother, Bishop Graves’ diamond ring which Queen Victoria +gave him when he preached before her, our christening mugs, and the +heavy early-Victorian jewellery bequeathed to my mother by the old lady +whom she had looked after. And since box-room treasures never left the +box-room, I regarded myself as permanently parted from my pledge. I +liked the cherry-whisky a lot. + +The competitions started about one o’clock on a Saturday afternoon +and went on until seven. I was drawn for the very first fight and my +opponent by a piece of bad luck was Alan. Alan wanted me to scratch. +I said I thought that it would look bad to do that. We consulted the +house games-captain and he said: ‘No, the most sporting thing to do +is to box it out and let the decision be on points; but don’t either +of you hurt each other.’ So we boxed. Alan started showing off to +his friends, who were sitting in the front row. I said: ‘Stop that. +We’re boxing, not fighting,’ but a few seconds later he hit me again +unnecessarily hard. I got angry and knocked him out. This was the first +time I had ever knocked anyone out and I liked the feeling. I had drank +a lot of cherry-whisky. I rather muzzily realized that I had knocked +him out with a right swing on the side of the neck and that this blow +was not part of the ordinary school-boxing curriculum. Straight lefts; +lefts to body, rights to head; left and right hooks; all these were +known, but the swing was somehow neglected, probably because it was not +so ‘pretty.’ + +I went to the changing-room for my coat, and stout Sergeant Harris, +the boxing instructor, said: ‘Look here, Mr. Graves, why don’t you put +down your name for the middle-weight competition too?’ I cheerfully +agreed. Then I went back to the house and had a cold bath and more +cherry-whisky. My next fight was to take place in about half an hour +for the first round of the middle-weights. This time my opponent, +who was a stone heavier than myself but had little science, bustled +me about for the first round, and I could see that he would tire me +out unless something was done. In the second round I knocked him down +with my right swing, but he got up again. I was feeling tired, so +hastened to knock him down again. I must have knocked him down four or +five times that round, but he refused to take the count. I found out +afterwards that he was, like myself, conscious that Dick was watching +the fight. He loved Dick too. Finally I said to myself as he lurched +towards me again: ‘If he doesn’t go down and stay down this time, I +won’t be able to hit him again at all.’ This time I just pushed at his +jaw as it offered itself to me, but that was enough. He did go down and +he did stay down. This second knock-out made quite a stir. Knock-outs +were rare in the inter-house boxing competition. As I went back to the +house for another cold bath and some more cherry-whisky I noticed the +fellows looking at me curiously. + +The later stages of the competition I do not remember well. The only +opponent that I was now at all concerned about was Raymond, who +was nearly a stone heavier than myself and was expected to win the +middle-weights; but he had also tried for two weights, the middle and +the heavy, and had just had such a tough fight with the eventual winner +of the heavy-weights that he was in no proper condition to fight. So he +scratched his fight with me. I believe that he would have fought +all the same if it had been against someone else; but he was still fond +of me and wanted me to win. His scratching would give me a rest between +my bouts. A semifinalist scratched against me in the welter-weights, so +I only had three more fights, and I let neither of these go beyond the +first round. The swing won me both weights, for which I was given two +silver cups. But it had also broken both my thumbs; I had not got my +elbow high enough over when I used it. + +The most important thing that happened to me in my last I two years, +apart from my attachment to Dick, was that I got to know George +Mallory. He was twenty-six or twenty-seven then, not long up from +Cambridge. He was so young looking that he was often mistaken for a +member of the school. From the first he treated me as an equal, and +I used to spend my spare time reading books in his room or going for +walks with him in the country. He told me of the existence of modern +authors. My father being two generations older than myself and my +only link with books, I had never heard of people like Shaw, Samuel +Butler, Rupert Brooke, Wells, Flecker, or Masefield, and I was greatly +interested in them. It was at George Mallory’s rooms that I first met +Edward Marsh, who has always been a good friend to me, and with whom, +though we seldom see each other now, I have never fallen out: in this +he is almost unique among my pre-war friends. Marsh said that he liked +my poems, which George had showed him, but pointed out that they were +written in the poetic vocabulary of fifty years ago and that, though +the quality of the poem was not necessarily impaired by this, there +would be a natural prejudice in my readers against work written in 1913 +in the fashions of 1863. + +George Mallory, Cyril Hartmann, Raymond, and I published a +magazine in the summer of 1913 called _Green Chartreuse_. It was only +intended to have one number; new magazines at a public school always +sell out the first number and lose heavily on the second. From _Green +Chartreuse_ I quote one of my own contributions, of autobiographical +interest, written in the school dialect: + + My New-Bug’s Exam. + + When lights went out at half-past nine in the evening of the second + Friday in the Quarter, and the faint footfalls of the departing + House-Master were heard no more, the fun began. + + The Plead of Under Cubicles constituted himself examiner + and executioner, and was ably assisted by a timekeeper, a + question-recorder, and a staff of his disreputable friends. I + was a timorous ‘new-bug’ then, and my pyjamas were damp with the + perspiration of fear. Three of my fellows had been examined and + sentenced before the inquisition was directed against me. + + ‘It’s Jones’ turn now,’ said a voice. ‘He’s the little brute that + hacked me in run-about to-day. We must set him some tight questions!’ + + ‘I say, Jones, what’s the colour of the House-Master—I mean what’s + the name of the House-Master of the House, whose colours are black + and white? One, two, three....’ + + ‘Mr. Girdlestone,’ my voice quivered in the darkness. + + ‘He evidently knows the simpler colours. We’ll muddle him. What are + the colours of the Clubs to which Block Houses belong? One, two, + three, four....’ + + I had been slaving at getting up these questions for days, and just + managed to blurt out the answer before being counted out. + + ‘Two questions. No misses. We must buck up,’ said someone. + + ‘I say, Jones, how do you get to Farncombe from Weekites? One, two, + three....’ + + I had only issued directions as far as Bridge before being counted + out. + + ‘Three questions. One miss. You’re allowed three misses out of ten.’ + + ‘Where is Charterhouse Magazine? One, two, three, four....’ + + ‘Do you mean _The Carthusian_ office?’ I asked. + + Everyone laughed. + + ‘Four questions. Two misses. I say, Robinson, he’s answered far too + many. We’ll set him a couple of stingers.’ + + Much whispering. + + ‘What is the age of the horse that rolls Under Green? One, two, + three....’ + + ‘Six!’ I said, at a venture. + + ‘Wrong; thirty-eight. Six questions. Three misses! Think yourself + lucky you weren’t asked its pedigree.’ + + ‘What are canoeing colours? One, two, thr ...’ + + ‘There aren’t any!’ + + ‘You’ll get cocked-up for festivity; but you can count it. Seven + questions. Three misses. Jones?’ + + ‘Yes!’ + + ‘What was the name of the girl to whom rumour stated that last year’s + football secretary was violently attached? One, two, three, four....’ + + ‘Daisy!’ (It sounded a likely name.) + + ‘Oh really! Well, I happen to know last year’s football secretary; + and he’ll simply kill you for spreading scandal. You’re wrong anyhow. + Eight questions. Four misses!’ + + ‘You’ll come to my “cube” at seven to-morrow morning. See? Good + night!’ + + Here he waved his hair-brush over the candle, and a colossal shadow + appeared on the ceiling. + +The Poetry Society died about this time—and this is how it died. Two +of its sixth-form members came to a meeting and each read a rather +dull and formal poem about love and nature; none of us paid much +attention to them. But the following week they were published in _The +Carthusian_, and soon every one was pointing and giggling. Both poems, +which were signed with pseudonyms, were acrostics, the initial letters +spelling out a ‘case.’ ‘Case’ meant ‘romance,’ a formal coupling of two +boys’ names, with the name of the elder boy first. In these two cases +both the first names mentioned were those of bloods. It was a foolish +act of aggression in the feud between sixth form and the bloods. But +nothing much would have come of it had not another of the sixth-form +members of the Poetry Society been in love with one of the smaller +boys whose names appeared in the acrostics. In rage and jealousy he +went to the headmaster and called his attention to the acrostic—which +otherwise neither he nor any other of the masters would have noticed. +He pretended that he did not know the authors; but though he had not +been at the particular meeting where the poems were read, he could +easily have guessed them from the styles. Before things had taken this +turn I had incautiously told someone who the authors were; so I was +now dragged into the row as a witness against them. The headmaster +took a very serious view of the case. The two poets were deprived of +their monitorial privileges; the editor of _The Carthusian_, who, +though aware of the acrostics, had accepted the poems, was deprived +of his editorship and of his position as head of the school. The +informer, who happened to be next in school order, succeeded him in +both capacities; he had not expected this development and it made him +most unpopular. His consolation was a real one, that he had done it +all for love, to avenge the public insult done to the boy. And he was +a decent fellow, really. The Poetry Society was dissolved in disgrace +by the headmaster’s orders. Guy Kendall was one of the few masters +who insisted on treating the boys better than they deserved, so I was +sorry for him when this happened; it was an ‘I told you so’ for the +other masters, who did not believe either in poetry or in school uplift +societies. I owe a great debt of gratitude to Kendall; the meetings of +the Poetry Society were all that I had to look forward to when things +were at their worst for me. + +My last year at Charterhouse I devoted myself to doing everything I +could to show how little respect I had for the school tradition. In +the winter of 1913 I won a classical exhibition at St. John’s College, +Oxford, so that I could go slow on school work. Nevill Barbour and +I were editing the _Carthusian_, and a good deal of my time went in +that. Nevill, who as a scholar had met the same sort of difficulties +as myself, also had a dislike of most Charterhouse traditions. We +decided that the most objectionable tradition of all was compulsory +games. Of these cricket was the most objectionable, because it wasted +most time in the best part of the year. We began a campaign in favour +of tennis. We were not seriously devoted to tennis, but it was the +best weapon we had against cricket—the game, we wrote, in which the +selfishness of the few was supposed to excuse the boredom of the +many. Tennis was quick and busy. We asked Old Carthusian tennis +internationalists to contribute letters proposing tennis as the manlier +and more vigorous game. We even got the famous Anthony Wilding to +write. The games-masters were scandalized at this assault on cricket; +to them tennis was ‘pat ball,’ a game for girls. But the result of our +campaign was surprising. Not only did we double our sales, but a fund +was started for providing the school with a number of tennis-courts and +making Charterhouse the cradle of public-school tennis. Though delayed +by the war, these courts actually appeared. I noticed them recently as +I went past the school in a car; there seemed to be plenty of them. I +wonder, are there tennis-bloods at Charterhouse now? + +Poetry and Dick were now the only two things that really mattered. My +life with my fellow house-monitors was one of perpetual discord. I had +grudges against them all except the house-captain and the head-monitor. +The house-captain, the only blood in the house, spent most of his time +with his fellow bloods in other houses. The head-monitor was a scholar +who, though naturally a decent fellow, had been embittered by his first +three years in the house and was much on his dignity. He did more or +less what the other monitors wanted him to do, and I was sorry that I +had to lump him in with the rest. My love for Dick provoked a constant +facetiousness, but they never dared to go too far. I once caught one +of them in the bathroom scratching up a pair of hearts conjoined, with +Dick’s initials and mine on them. I pushed him into the bath and turned +the taps on. The next day he got hold of a manuscript note-book of mine +that I had left on the table in the monitors’ room with some other +books. It had poems and essay notes in it. He and the other monitors, +except the house-captain, annotated it critically in blue chalk and all +signed their initials. The house-captain would have nothing to do +with this: he thought it ungentlemanly. I was furious when I found what +had been done. I made a speech. I demanded a signed apology. I said +that if I were not given it within an hour I would choose one of them +as solely responsible and punish him. I said that I would now have a +bath and that the first monitor that I met after my bath I would knock +down. + +Whether by accident or whether it was that he thought his position +made him secure, the first monitor I met in the corridor was the +head-monitor. I knocked him down. It was the time of evening +preparation, which only the monitors were free not to attend. But a fag +happened to pass on an errand and saw the blow and the blood; so it +could not be hushed up. The head-monitor went to the house-master and +the house-master sent for me. He was an excitable, elderly man who had +some difficulty in controlling his spittle when angry. He made me sit +down in a chair in his study, then stood over me, clenching his fists +and crying in his high falsetto voice: ‘Do you realize you have done a +very brutal action?’ His mouth was bubbling. I was as angry as he was. +I jumped up and clenched my fists too. Then I said that I would do the +same thing to anyone who, after scribbling impertinent remarks on my +private papers, refused to apologize. ‘Private papers. Filthy poems,’ +said the house-master. + +I had another difficult interview with the headmaster over this. But +it was my last term, so he allowed me to finish my five years without +ignominy. He was puzzled by the frankness of my statement of love +for Dick. He reopened the question. I refused to be ashamed. I heard +afterwards that he had said that this was one of the rare cases of a +friendship between boys of unequal ages which he felt was essentially +moral. I went through one of the worst quarters of an hour of my +life on Dick’s account in this last term. When the master had warned +me about exchanging glances with Dick in chapel I had been infuriated. +But when I was told by one of the boys that he had seen the master +surreptitiously kissing Dick once, on a choir-treat or some such +occasion, I went quite mad. I asked for no details or confirmation. I +went to the master and told him he must resign or I would report the +case to the headmaster. He already had a reputation in the school for +this sort of thing, I said. Kissing boys was a criminal offence. I was +morally outraged. Probably my sense of outrage concealed a murderous +jealousy. I was surprised when he vigorously denied the charge; I could +not guess what was going to happen next. But I said: ‘Well, come to +the headmaster and deny it to him.’ He asked: ‘Did the boy tell you +this himself?’ I said ‘No.’ ‘Well then,’ he said, ‘I’ll send for him +here and he shall tell us the truth.’ So Dick was sent for and arrived +looking very frightened, and the house-master said menacingly: ‘Graves +tells me that I once kissed you. Is that true?’ Dick said: ‘Yes, it +is true.’ So Dick was dismissed and the master collapsed, and I felt +miserable. He said he would resign at the end of the term, which was +quite near, on grounds of ill-health. He even thanked me for speaking +directly to him and not going to the headmaster. That was in the summer +of 1914; he went into the army and was killed the next year. I found +out much later from Dick that he had not been kissed at all. It may +have been some other boy. + +One of the last events that I remember at Charterhouse was a debate +with the motion that ‘this House is in favour of compulsory military +service.’ The Empire Service League, or whatever it was called, of +which Earl Roberts of Kandahar, V.C., was the President, sent +down a propagandist to support the motion. There were only six votes +out of one hundred and nineteen cast against it. I was the principal +speaker against the motion, a strong anti-militarist. I had recently +resigned from the Officers’ Training Corps, having revolted against the +theory of implicit obedience to orders. And during a fortnight spent +the previous summer at the O.T.C. camp at Tidworth on Salisbury Plain, +I had been frightened by a special display of the latest military +fortifications, barbed-wire entanglements, machine-guns, and field +artillery in action. General, now Field-Marshal Sir William Robertson, +whose son was a member of the school, had visited the camp and +impressed upon us that war against Germany was inevitable within two +or three years, and that we must be prepared to take our part in it as +leaders of the new forces that would assuredly be called into being. Of +the six voters against the motion Nevill Barbour and I are, I believe, +the only ones who survived the war. + +My last memory was the headmaster’s good-bye. It was this: ‘Well, +good-bye, Graves, and remember this, that your best friend is the +waste-paper basket.’ + +I used to speculate on which of my contemporaries would distinguish +themselves after they left school. The war upset my calculations. +Many dull boys had brief brilliant military careers, particularly as +air-fighters, becoming squadron and flight commanders. ‘Fuzzy’ McNair, +the head of the school, won the V.C. as a Rifleman; young Sturgess, +who had been my study fag, distinguished himself more unfortunately +by flying the first heavy bombing machine of a new pattern across the +Channel on his first trip to France and making a beautiful landing +(having mistaken the landmarks) at an aerodrome behind the German +lines. A boy whom I admired very much during my first year at +Charterhouse was the Hon. Desmond O’Brien. He was the only Carthusian +in my time who cheerfully disregarded all school rules. He had skeleton +keys for the school library, chapel and science laboratories and used +to break out of his house at night and carefully disarrange things +there. The then headmaster was fond of O’Brien and forgave him much. +O’Brien had the key of the headmaster’s study too and, going there one +night with an electric torch, carried off a memorandum which he showed +me—‘Must expel O’Brien.’ He had a wireless receiving-station in one +of the out-of-bounds copses on the school grounds, and he discovered +a ventilator shaft down which he could hoot into the school library +from outside and create great disturbance without detection. One day +we were threatened with the loss of a Saturday half-holiday because +some member of the school had killed a cow with a catapult, and nobody +would own up. O’Brien had fired the shot; he was away at the time on +special leave for a sister’s wedding. A friend wrote to him about the +half-holiday. He sent the headmaster a telegram: ‘Killed cow sorry +coming O’Brien.’ At last, having absented himself from every lesson and +chapel for three whole days, he was expelled. He was killed early in +the war while bombing Bruges. + +At least one in three of my generation at school was killed. This was +because they all took commissions as soon as they could, most of them +in the infantry and flying corps. The average life of the infantry +subaltern on the Western front was, at some stages of the war, only +about three months; that is to say that at the end of three months he +was either wounded or killed. The proportions worked out at about four +wounded to every one killed. Of the four one was wounded seriously and +the remaining three more or less lightly. The three lightly wounded +returned to the front after a few weeks or months of absence and were +again subject to the same odds. The flying casualties were even higher. +Since the war lasted for four and a half years, it is easy to see why +the mortality was so high among my contemporaries, and why most of the +survivors, if not permanently disabled, were wounded at least two or +three times. + +Two well-known sportsmen were contemporaries of mine: A. G. Bower, +captain of England at soccer, who was only an average player at +Charterhouse, and Woolf Barnato, the Surrey cricketer (and millionaire +racing motorist), who also was only an average player. Barnato was in +the same house as myself and we had not a word to say to each other +for the four years we were together. Five scholars have made names for +themselves: Richard Hughes as a B.B.C. playwright; Richard Goolden as +an actor of old-man parts; Vincent Seligman as author of a propagandist +life of Venizelos; Cyril Hartmann as an authority on historical French +scandals; and my brother Charles as society gossip-writer on the middle +page of _The Daily Mail_. Occasionally I see another name or two in the +newspapers. There was one the other day—M ... who was in the news for +escaping from a private lunatic asylum. I remembered that he had once +offered a boy ten shillings to hold his hand in a thunderstorm and that +he had frequently threatened to run away from Charterhouse. + + + + + IX + + +George Mallory did something better than lend me books, and that +was to take me climbing on Snowdon in the school vacations. I knew +Snowdon very well from a distance, from my bedroom window at Harlech. +In the spring its snow cap was the sentimental glory of the landscape. +The first time I went with George to Snowdon we stayed at the Snowdon +Ranger Hotel at Quellyn Lake. It was January and the mountain was +covered with snow. We did little rock-climbing, but went up some good +snow slopes with rope and ice-axe. I remember one climb the objective +of which was the summit; we found the hotel there with its roof blown +off in the blizzard of the previous night. We sat by the cairn and +ate Carlsbad plums and liver-sausage sandwiches. Geoffrey Keynes, the +editor of the _Nonesuch Blake_, was there; he and George, who used to +go drunk with excitement at the end of his climbs, picked stones off +the cairn and shied them at the chimney stack of the hotel until they +had sent it where the roof was. + +George was one of the three or four best climbers in climbing history. +His first season in the Alps had been spectacular; nobody had expected +him to survive it. He never lost his almost foolhardy daring; yet +he knew all that there was to be known about climbing technique. +One always felt absolutely safe with him on the rope. George went +through the war as a lieutenant in the artillery, but his nerves were +apparently unaffected—on his leaves he went rock-climbing. + +When the war ended he was more in love with the mountains than ever. +His death on Mount Everest came five years later. No one knows whether +he and Irvine actually made the last five hundred yards of the +climb or whether they turned back or what happened; but anyone who +had climbed with George felt convinced that he did get to the summit, +that he rejoiced in his accustomed way and had not sufficient reserve +of strength left for the descent. I do not think that it was ever +mentioned in the newspaper account of his death that George originally +took to climbing when he was a scholar at Winchester as a corrective to +his weak heart. + +George was wasted at Charterhouse, where, in my time at least, he was +generally despised by the boys because he was neither a disciplinarian +nor interested in cricket or football. He tried to treat his classes +in a friendly way and that puzzled and offended them. There was a +tradition in the school of concealed warfare between the boys and the +masters. It was considered no shame to cheat, to lie, or to deceive +where a master was concerned; yet to do the same to a member of the +school was immoral. George was also unpopular with the house-masters +because he refused to accept this state of war and fraternized with the +boys whenever he could. When two house-masters who had been unfriendly +to him happened to die within a short time of each other he joked to +me: ‘See, Robert, how mine enemies flee before my face.’ I always +called him by his Christian name, and so did three or four more of his +friends in the school. This lack of dignity in him put him beyond the +pale both with the boys and the masters. Eventually the falseness of +his position told on his temper; yet he always managed to find four +or five boys in the school who were, like him, out of their element, +and befriended them and made life tolerable for them. Before the final +Everest expedition he had decided to resign and do educational work at +Cambridge with, I believe, the Workers’ Educational Association. He +was tired of trying to teach gentlemen to be gentlemen. + +I spent a season with George and a large number of climbers at the +hotel at Pen-y-Pass on Snowdon in the spring of 1914. This time it +was real precipice-climbing, and I was lucky enough to climb with +George, with H. E. L. Porter, a renowned technician of climbing, with +Kitty O’Brien and with Conor O’Brien, her brother, who afterwards +made a famous voyage round the world in a twenty-ton or five-ton or +some even-less-ton boat. Conor climbed principally, he told us, as a +corrective to bad nerves. He used to get very excited when any slight +hitch occurred; his voice would rise to a scream. Kitty used to chide +him: ‘Ach, Conor, dear, have a bit of wit,’ and Conor would apologize. +Conor, being a sailor, used to climb in bare feet. Often in climbing +one has to support the entire weight of one’s body on a couple of +toes—but toes in stiff boots. Conor said that he could force his naked +toes farther into crevices than a boot would go. + +But the most honoured climber there was Geoffrey Young. Geoffrey had +been climbing for a number of years and was president of the Climbers’ +Club. I was told that his four closest friends had all at different +times been killed climbing; this was a comment on the extraordinary +care with which he always climbed. It was not merely shown in his +preparations for a climb—the careful examination, foot by foot, of the +alpine rope, the attention to his boot-nails and the balanced loading +of his knapsack—but also in his cautiousness in the climbing itself. +Before making any move he thought it out foot by foot, as though it +were a problem in chess. If the next handhold happened to be just a +little out of his reach or the next foothold seemed at all unsteady +he would stop and think of some way round the difficulty. George used +sometimes to get impatient, but Geoffrey refused to be hurried. He +was short, which put him at a disadvantage in the matter of reach. He +was not as double-jointed and prehensile as Porter or as magnificent +as George, but he was the perfect climber. And still remains so. This +in spite of having lost a leg while serving with a Red Cross unit on +the Italian front. He climbs with an artificial leg. He has recently +published the only satisfactory text-book on rock-climbing. I was very +proud to be on a rope with Geoffrey Young. He said once: ‘Robert, you +have the finest natural balance that I have ever seen in a climber.’ +This compliment pleased me far more than if the Poet Laureate had told +me that I had the finest sense of rhythm that he had ever met in a +young poet. + +It is quite true that I have a good balance; once, in Switzerland, it +saved me from a broken leg or legs. My mother took us there in the +Christmas holidays of 1913–14, ostensibly for winter sports, but really +because she thought that she owed it to my sisters to give them a +chance to meet nice young men of means. About the third day that I put +on skis I went up from Champéry, where we were staying and the snow was +too soft, to Morgins, a thousand feet higher, where it was like sugar. +Here I found an ice-run for skeleton-toboggans. Without considering +that skis have no purchase on ice at all, I launched myself down it. +After a few yards my speed increased alarmingly and I suddenly realized +what I was in for. There were several sharp turns in the run protected +by high banks, and I had to trust entirely to body-balance in swerving +round them. I reached the terminus still upright and had my eyes damned +by a frightened sports-club official for having endangered my life +on his territory. + +In an essay on climbing that I wrote at the time, I said it was a +sport that made all others seem trivial. ‘New climbs or new variations +of old climbs are not made in a competitive spirit, but only because +it is satisfactory to stand somewhere on the earth’s surface where +nobody else has stood before. And it is good to be alone with a +specially chosen band of people—people that one can trust completely. +Rock-climbing is one of the most dangerous sports possible, unless one +keeps to the rules; but if one does keep to the rules it is reasonably +safe. With physical fitness in every member of the climbing team, a +careful watch on the weather, proper overhauling of climbing apparatus, +and with no hurry, anxiety or stunting, climbing is much safer than +fox-hunting. In hunting there are uncontrollable factors, such as +hidden wire, holes in which a horse may stumble, caprice or vice in +the horse. The climber trusts entirely to his own feet, legs, hands, +shoulders, sense of balance, judgment of distance.’ + +The first climb on which I was taken was up Crib-y-ddysgel. It was a +test climb for beginners. About fifty feet up from the scree, a height +that is really more frightening than five hundred, because death is +almost as certain and much more immediate, there was a long sloping +shelf of rock, about the length of an ordinary room, to be crossed from +right to left. It was without handholds or footholds worth speaking of +and too steep to stand upright or kneel on without slipping. It shelved +at an angle of, I suppose, forty-five or fifty degrees. The accepted +way to cross it was by rolling in an upright position and trusting to +friction as a maintaining force. Once I got across this shelf without +disaster I felt that the rest of the climb was easy. The climb was +called The Gambit. Robert Trevelyan, the poet, was given this test in +the previous season, I was told, and had been unlucky enough to fall +off. He was pulled up short, of course, after a few feet by the rope +of the leader, who was well belayed; but the experience disgusted him +with climbing and he spent the rest of his time on the mountains just +walking about. + +♦ “Crib-y-ddysgel” replaced with “Crib-y-ddysgl” + +Belaying means making fast on a projection of rock a loop of the rope +which is wound round one’s waist, and so disposing the weight of the +body that, if the climber above or below happens to slip and fall, the +belay will hold and the whole party will not go down together. Alpine +rope has a breaking point of a third its own length. Only one member of +the climbing team is moving at any given time, the others are belayed. +Sometimes on a precipice it is necessary to move up fifty or sixty +feet before finding a secure belay as a point from which to start the +next upward movement, so that if the leader falls and is unable to put +on a brake in any way he must fall more than twice that length before +being pulled up. On the same day I was taken on a spectacular though +not unusually difficult climb on Crib Goch. At one point we traversed +round a knife-edge buttress. From this knife-edge a pillar-like bit of +rock, technically known as a monolith, had split away. We scrambled up +the monolith, which overhung the valley with a clear five hundred feet +drop, and each in turn stood on the top and balanced. The next thing +was to make a long, careful stride from the top of the monolith to the +rock face; here there was a ledge just wide enough to take the toe of +a boot, and a handhold at convenient height to give an easy pull-up to +the next ledge. I remember George shouting down from above: ‘Be careful +of that foothold, Robert. Don’t chip the edge off or the climb will +be impossible for anyone who wants to do it again. It’s got to last +another five hundred years at least.’ + +I was only in danger once. I was climbing with Porter on an +out-of-the-way part of the mountain. The climb, known as the Ribbon +Track and Girdle Traverse, had not been attempted for about ten years. +About half-way up we came to a chimney. A chimney is a vertical fissure +in the rock wide enough to admit the body; a crack is only wide enough +to admit the boot. One works up a chimney sideways with back and knees, +but up a crack with one’s face to the rock. Porter was leading and +fifty feet above me in the chimney. In making a spring to a handhold +slightly out of reach he dislodged a pile of stones that had been +wedged in the chimney. They rattled down and one rather bigger than a +cricket ball struck me on the head and knocked me out. Fortunately I +was well belayed and Porter was already in safety. The rope held me up; +I recovered my senses a few seconds later and was able to continue. + +The practice of Pen-y-Pass was to have a leisurely breakfast and lie in +the sun with a tankard of beer before starting for the precipice foot +in the late morning. Snowdon was a perfect mountain for climbing. The +rock was sound and not slippery. And once you came to the top of any +of the precipices, some of which were a thousand feet high, but all +just climbable one way or another, there was always an easy way to run +down. In the evening when we got back to the hotel we lay and stewed in +hot baths. I remember wondering at my body—the worn fingernails, the +bruised knees, and the lump of climbing muscle that had begun to bunch +above the arch of the foot, seeing it as beautiful in relation to this +new purpose. My worst climb was on Lliwedd, the most formidable of +the precipices, when at a point that needed most concentration a raven +circled round the party in great sweeps. This was curiously unsettling, +because one climbs only up and down, or left and right, and the raven +was suggesting all the diverse possibilities of movement, tempting us +to let go our hold and join him. + + + + + X + + +I was at Harlech when war was declared; I decided to enlist a day +or two later. In the first place, though only a very short war was +expected—two or three months at the very outside—I thought that it +might last just long enough to delay my going to Oxford in October, +which I dreaded. I did not work out the possibilities of being actively +engaged in the war. I thought that it would mean garrison service +at home while the regular forces were away. In the second place, I +entirely believed that France and England had been drawn into a war +which they had never contemplated and for which they were entirely +unprepared. It never occurred to me that newspapers and statesmen +could lie. I forgot my pacifism—I was ready to believe the worst +of the Germans. I was outraged to read of the cynical violation of +Belgian neutrality. I wrote a poem promising vengeance for Louvain. +I discounted perhaps twenty per cent, of the atrocity details as +war-time exaggeration. That was not, of course, enough. Recently I +saw the following contemporary newspaper cuttings quoted somewhere in +chronological sequence: + + ‘When the fall of Antwerp got known the church bells were rung’ + (_i.e._ at Cologne and elsewhere in Germany).—_Kölnische Zeitung_. + + ‘According to the _Kölnische Zeitung_, the clergy of Antwerp were + compelled to ring the church bells when the fortress was taken.’—_Le + Matin_ (Paris.) + + ‘According to what _The Times_ has heard from Cologne, via + Paris, the unfortunate Belgian priests who refused to ring the + church bells when Antwerp was taken have been sentenced to hard + labour.’—_Carriere della Sera_ (Milan.) + + ‘According to information to the _Carriere della Sera_ from Cologne, + via London, it is confirmed that the barbaric conquerors of Antwerp + punished the unfortunate Belgian priests for their heroic refusal to + ring the church bells by hanging them as living clappers to the bells + with their heads down.’—_Le Matin_ (Paris.) + +When I was in the trenches a few months later I happened to belong to a +company mess in which four of us young officers out of five had, by a +coincidence, either German mothers or naturalized German fathers. One +of them said: ‘Of course I’m glad I joined when I did. If I’d put it +off for a month or two they’d have accused me of being a German spy. +As it is I have an uncle interned at Alexandra Palace, and my father’s +only been allowed to retain the membership of his golf club because +he has two sons in the trenches.’ I said: ‘Well, I have three or four +uncles sitting somewhere opposite, and a number of cousins too. One of +my uncles is a general. But that’s all right. I don’t brag about them. +I only advertise the uncle who is a British admiral commanding at the +Nore.’ + +Among my enemy relatives was my cousin Conrad, who was the same age +as myself, and the son of the German consul at Zurich. In January +1914 I had gone ski-ing with him between the trees in the woods above +the city. We had tobogganed together down the Dolderstrasse in Zurich +itself, where the lampposts were all sandbagged and family toboggans, +skidding broadside on at the turns, were often crashed into by +single-seater skeletons; arms and legs were broken by the score and the +crowds thought it a great joke. Conrad served with a crack Bavarian +regiment all through the war, and won the ‘Pour le Mérite’ Order, which +was more rarely awarded than the British Victoria Cross. He was killed +by the Bolsheviks after the war in a village on the Baltic where he +had been sent to make requisitions. He was a gentle, proud creature, +whose chief interest was natural history. He used to spend hours in the +woods studying the habits of wild animals; he felt strongly against +shooting them. Perhaps the most outstanding military feat was that of +an uncle who was dug out at the age of sixty or so as a lieutenant in +the Bavarian artillery. My youngest brother met him a year or two ago +and happened to mention that he was going to visit Rheims. My uncle +nudged him: ‘Have a look at the cathedral. I was there with my battery +in the war. One day the divisional general came up to me and said: +“Lieutenant, I understand that you are a Lutheran, not a Catholic?” +I said that this was so. Then he said: “I have a very disagreeable +service for you to perform, Lieutenant. Those misbegotten swine, the +French, are using the cathedral for an observation post. They think +they can get away with it because it’s Rheims Cathedral, but this is +war and they have our trenches taped from there. So I call upon you +to dislodge them.” I only needed to fire two rounds and down came the +pinnacle and the Frenchmen with it. It was a very neat bit of shooting. +I was proud to have limited the damage like that. Really, you must go +and have a look at it.’ + +The nearest regimental depot was at Wrexham: the Royal Welch Fusiliers. +The Harlech golf secretary suggested my taking a commission instead +of enlisting. He rang up the adjutant and said that I was a +public-school boy who had been in the Officers’ Training Corps at +Charterhouse. So the adjutant said: ‘Send him right along,’ and on 11th +August I started my training. I immediately became a hero to my family. +My mother, who said to me: ‘My race has gone mad,’ regarded my going as +a religious act; my father was proud that I had ‘done the right thing.’ +I even recovered, for a time, the respect of my uncle, C. L. Graves, of +_The Spectator_ and _Punch_, with whom I had recently had a tiff. He +had given me a sovereign tip two terms previously and I had written my +thanks, saying that with it I had bought Samuel Butler’s _Note Books_, +_The Way of All Flesh_ and the two _Erewhons_. To my surprise this had +infuriated him. + +The fellows who applied for commissions at the same time as myself +were for the most part boys who had recently failed to pass into the +Royal Military College at Sandhurst, and were trying to get into the +regular army by the old militia door—which was now known as the Special +Reserve. There were only one or two fellows who had gone into the army, +like myself, for the sake of the war and not for the sake of a career. +There were about a dozen of us recruit officers on the Square learning +to drill and be drilled. My Officers’ Training Corps experience made +this part easy, but I knew nothing about army traditions and made all +the worst mistakes; saluting the bandmaster, failing to recognize the +colonel when in mufti, walking in the street without a belt and talking +shop in the mess. But I soon learned to conform. My greatest difficulty +was to talk to men of the company to which I was posted with the +necessary air of authority. Many of them were old soldiers re-enlisted, +and I disliked bluffing that I knew more than they did. There were one +or two very old soldiers employed on the depot staff, wearing the +ribbon of Burma, 1885, and of even earlier campaigns, and usually also +the ribbon of the ‘Rooti’ or good service medal awarded for eighteen +years of undetected crime. There was one old fellow called Jackie +Barrett, a Kipling character, of whom it was said: ‘There goes Jackie +Barrett. He and his mucking-in chum deserted the regiment in Quetta and +went across the north-west frontier on foot. Three months later he gave +himself up as a deserter to the British consul at Jerusalem. He buried +his chum by the way.’ + +I was on the square only about three weeks before being sent off on +detachment duty to Lancaster to a newly-formed internment camp for +enemy aliens. The camp was a disused wagon-works near the river, a +dirty, draughty place, littered with old scrap-metal and guarded with +high barbed-wire fences. There were about three thousand prisoners +already there and more and more piled in every day; seamen arrested on +German vessels in Liverpool harbour, waiters from big hotels in the +north, an odd German band or two, harmless German commercial travellers +and shopkeepers. The prisoners were resentful at being interned, +particularly those who were married and had families and had lived +peaceably in England for years. The only comfort that we could give was +that they were safer inside than out; anti-German feeling was running +high, shops with German names were continually being raided and even +German women were made to feel that they were personally responsible +for the Belgian atrocities. Besides, we said, if they were in Germany +they would be forced into the army. At this time we made a boast of +our voluntary system. We did not know that there would come a time +when these internees would be bitterly envied by forcibly-enlisted +Englishmen because they were safe until the war ended. + +In the summer of 1915 _The Times_ reprinted in the daily column, +_Through German Eyes_, a German newspaper account by Herr Wolff, an +exchanged prisoner, of his experiences at Lancaster in 1914. _The +Times_ found very amusing Herr Wolff’s allegations that he and forty +other waiters from the Midland Hotel, Manchester, had been arrested +and taken, handcuffed _and fettered_, in special railway carriages to +Lancaster under the escort of fifty Manchester policemen armed with +carbines. But it was true, because I was the officer who took them over +from the chief inspector. He was a fine figure in frogged uniform and +gave me a splendid salute. I signed him a receipt for his prisoners and +he gave me another salute. He had done his job well and was proud of +it. The only mishap was the accidental breaking of two carriage windows +by the slung carbines. Wolff also said that even children were interned +in the camp. This was true. There were a dozen or so little boys from +the German bands who had been interned because it seemed more humane to +keep them with their friends than to send them to a workhouse. Their +safety in the camp caused the commandant great concern. + +I had a detachment of fifty Special Reservists, most of them with only +about six weeks’ service. They had joined the army just before war +started as a cheap way of getting a holiday at the training camp; to +find themselves forced to continue beyond the usual fortnight annoyed +them. They were a rough lot, Welshmen from the border counties, and +were constantly deserting and having to be fetched back by the police. +They made nervous sentries, and were probably more frightened of the +prisoners than the prisoners were of them. Going the round of sentries +on a dark night about 2 a.m. was dangerous. Very often my lantern used +to blow out and I would fumble to light it again in the dark and +hear the frightened voice of a sentry roar out, ‘Halt! Who goes there?’ +and know that he was standing with his rifle aimed and his magazine +charged with five live rounds. I used to gasp out the password just +in time. Rifles were often being fired off at shadows. The prisoners +were a rowdy lot; the sailors particularly were always fighting. I saw +a prisoner spitting out teeth and blood one morning. I asked him what +was wrong. ‘Oh, sir, one no-good friend give me one clap on the chops.’ +Frequent deputations were sent to complain of the dullness of the food; +it was the same ration food that was served to the troops. But after +a while they realized the war and settled down to sullen docility; +they started hobbies and glee parties and games and plans for escape. +I had far more trouble with my men. They were always breaking out of +their quarters. I could never find out how they did it. I watched all +the possible exits, but caught no one. Finally I discovered that they +used to crawl out through a sewer. They boasted of their successes with +the women. Private Kirby said to me: ‘Do you know, sir? On the Sunday +after we arrived, all the preachers in Lancaster took as their text, +“Mothers, take care of your daughters; the Royal Welch have come to +town.”’ + +The camp staff consisted of: + +A fatherly colonel of the Loyal North Lancashire Regiment, the +commandant. + +His secretary, by name C. B. Gull, one of the best-known pre-war +figures in Oxford, owner of the _Isis_, and combined divinity, +athletics and boxing coach. We used to box together to keep fit. He +also sponsored me as a candidate for the local lodge of The Royal +Antediluvian Order of Buffaloes. The Grand Marshal who officiated at +my initiation had drank four or five pints of ‘bitter-gatter’ and +a glass or two of ‘juniper’ (these were secret words) and continually +short-circuited in the ritual. He kept on returning to the part where +they intone: + + Grand Marshal: Spirit of true Buffaloism hover around I us! + + Response: Benevolence and joy ever attend us! + +The assistant-commandant, who alleged that he had ten years more +seniority than any other major in the British army and made wistful +jokes about his lost virility. His recurrent theme was: ‘If you only +knew how much that would mean to an old man like me.’ + +The adjutant, an East Lancashire lieutenant, by name Deane. The day +after war was declared a German armed cruiser had held up the neutral +liner in which he was sailing home from the Cape and taken him off. He +was forced to give his parole not to fight against Germany in the war. +The cruiser was subsequently sunk by a British ship, the _Highflyer_, +and Deane was rescued; but the signed parole was saved by the German +captain, who escaped in a boat and gave it in charge of the German +consul at Las Palmas. So Deane was forbidden the trenches, and when I +met him in 1917 he was a staff-colonel. + +A doctor who was the mess buffoon. I broke the scabbard of my sword on +his back one night. + +The interpreter, a Thomas Cook man who could speak every European +language but Basque. He admitted to a weakness in Lithuanian, and when +asked what his own nationality was would answer, ‘I am Wagon-Lits.’ + +I had an inconvenient accident. The telephone bell was constantly going +from Western Command Headquarters; it was installed in an office-room +where I slept on a sloping desk. One night Pack-Saddle (the +code-name for the Chief Supply Officer of the Western Command) rang +up shortly after midnight with orders for the commandant. They were +about the rationing of a batch of four hundred prisoners who were +being sent up to him from Chester and North Wales. I was half asleep +and not clever at the use of the telephone. In the middle of the +conversation, which was difficult because a storm was going on at the +time and Pack-Saddle was irritable, the line was, I suppose, struck by +lightning somewhere. I got a bad electric shock, and was unable to use +a telephone properly again until some twelve years later. + +Guarding prisoners seemed an unheroic part to be playing in the +war, which had now reached a critical stage; I wanted to be abroad +fighting. My training had been interrupted, and I knew that even when +I was recalled from detachment duty I would have to wait a month or +two at least before being sent out. When I got back to the depot in +October I found myself stale. The adjutant, a keen soldier, decided +that there were two things wrong with me. First of all, I dressed +badly. I had apparently gone to the wrong tailor, and had also had a +soldier-servant palmed off on me who was no good. He did not polish +my buttons and shine my belt and boots as he should have done, and +neglected me generally; as I had never had a valet before I did not +know how to manage him or what to expect of him. The adjutant finally +summoned me to the Orderly Room and threatened that he would not send +me to France until I had entirely overhauled my wardrobe and looked +more like a soldier. My company commander, he said, had reported me to +him as ‘unsoldierlike and a nuisance.’ This put me in a fix, because my +pay only just covered the mess bills, and I knew that I could not ask +my parents to buy me another outfit so soon after I had assured +them that I had everything necessary. The adjutant next decided that +I was not a sportsman. This was because on the day that the Grand +National (I think) was run all the young officers applied for leave +to see the race except myself, and I volunteered to take the job of +Orderly Officer of the Day for someone who wanted to go. + +I saw my contemporaries one by one being sent out to France to take +the place of casualties in the First and Second Battalions, while I +remained despondently at the depot. But once more boxing was useful. +Johnny Basham, a sergeant in the regiment, was training at the time +for his fight (which he won) with Boswell for the Lonsdale Belt, +welter-weight. I went down to the training camp one evening, where +Basham was offering to fight three rounds with any member of the +regiment, the more the merrier. One of the officers put on the gloves +and Basham got roars of laughter from the crowd as soon as he had taken +his opponent’s measure, by dodging about and playing the fool with +him. I asked Basham’s manager if I could have a go. He gave me a pair +of shorts and I stepped into the ring. I pretended that I knew nothing +about boxing. I led off with my right and moved about clumsily. Basham +saw a chance of getting another laugh; he dropped his guard and danced +about with a you-can’t-hit-me challenge. I caught him off his balance +and knocked him across the ring. He recovered and went for me, but I +managed to keep on my feet; I laughed at him and he laughed too. We had +three very brisk rounds, and he was decent in making it seem that I +was a much better boxer than I was by accommodating his pace to mine. +As soon as the adjutant heard the story he rang me up at my billet +and told me that he was very pleased to hear of my performance, +that for an officer to box like that was a great encouragement to the +men, that he was mistaken about my sportsmanship, and that to show his +appreciation he had put me down for a draft to go to France in a week’s +time. + +Of the officers who had been sent out before me several had already +been killed or wounded. Among the killed was Second-Lieutenant W. G. +Gladstone, whom we called Glad Eyes. He was in his early thirties; a +grandson of old Gladstone, whom he resembled in feature, a Liberal +M.P., and lord-lieutenant of his county. When war was hanging in the +balance he had declared himself against it. His Hawarden tenantry were +ashamed on his account, and threatened, he told us, to duck him in +the pond. Realizing, once war was declared, that further protest was +useless, he immediately joined the regiment as a second-lieutenant. His +political convictions remained. He was a man of great integrity and +refused to take the non-combative employment as a staff-colonel offered +him at Whitehall. When he went to France to the First Battalion he +took no care of himself. He was killed by a sniper when unnecessarily +exposing himself. His body was brought home for a military funeral at +Hawarden; I attended it. + +I have one or two random memories of this training period at Wrexham. +The landlord of my billet was a Welsh solicitor, who greatly +overcharged us while pretending amicability. He wore a wig—or, to +be more exact, he had three wigs, with hair of progressive lengths. +When he had worn the medium-sized hair for a few days he would put on +the wig with long hair, and say that, dear him, it was time to get a +hair-cut. Then he would go out of the house and in a public lavatory +perhaps or a wayside copse would change into the short-haired wig, +which he wore until it was time to change to the medium one again. +This deception was only discovered when one of the officers billeted +with me got drunk and raided his bedroom. This officer, whose name +was Williams, was an extreme example of the sly border Welshman. The +drunker he got the more shocking his confessions. He told me one day +about a girl he had got engaged to in Dublin, and even slept with +on the strength of a diamond engagement ring. ‘Only paste really,’ +he said. The day before the wedding she had had a foot cut off by a +Dalkey tram, and he had hurriedly left the city. ‘But, Graves, she was +a lovely, lovely girl before that happened.’ He had been a medical +student at Trinity College, Dublin. Whenever he went to Chester, the +nearest town, to pick up a prostitute, he not only used to appeal to +her patriotism to charge him nothing, but he always gave her my name. +I knew of this because these women used to write to me. One day I said +to him in mess: ‘In future you are going to be distinguished from all +the other Williams’ in the regiment by being called Dirty Williams.’ +The name stuck. By one shift or another he escaped all trench-service +except for a short spell in a quiet sector, and lasted the war out +safely. + +Private Robinson. He was from Anglesey, and had joined the Special +Reserve before the war for his health. In September the entire +battalion volunteered for service overseas except Robinson. He said he +would not go, and that he could be neither coaxed nor bullied. Finally +he was brought before the colonel, who was genuinely puzzled at his +obstinacy. Robinson explained that he was not afraid. ‘I have a wife +and pigs at home.’ The battalion was, in September, rigged out in a +temporary navy-blue uniform until khaki might be available. All but +Robinson. They decided to shame him. So he continued, by order, to +wear the peace-time scarlet tunic and blue trousers with a red stripe; +a very dirty scarlet tunic (they had put him on the kitchen staff). His +mates called him Cock Robin and sang a popular chorus at him: + + And I never get a knock + When the boys call Cock + Cockity ock, cock, + Cock Robin! + In my old red vest I mean to cut a shine.... + +But Robinson did not care: + + For the more they call me Robin Redbreast + I’ll wear it longer still. + I will wear a red waistcoat, I will, + I will, I will, I will, I will, I will![1] + +So in October he was discharged as medically unfit: ‘Of under-developed +intelligence, unlikely to be of service in His Majesty’s Forces,’ +and went home to his wife and pigs. While, of the singers, those who +survived Festubert in the following May did not survive Loos in the +following September. + +Recruit officers spent a good deal of their time at Company and +Battalion Orderly Room, learning how to deal with crime. Crime, +of course, meant any breach of army regulations; and there was plenty +of it. In these days Battalion Orderly Room would last four or five +hours every day, at the rate of one crime dealt with every three or +four minutes.; This was apart from the scores of less serious offences +tried by company commanders. The usual Battalion Orderly Room crimes +were desertion, refusing to obey an order, using obscene language to a +non-commissioned officer, drunk and disorderly, robbing a comrade, and +so on. On pay-nights there was hardly a man sober; and no attention was +paid so long as there was silence as soon as the company officer came +on his rounds just before Lights Out. (Two years later serious crime +had diminished to a twentieth of that amount, though the battalion was +treble its original strength, and though many of the cases that the +company officers had dealt with summarily now came before the colonel; +and there was practically no drunkenness.) + +There was a boy called Taylor in my company. He had been at Lancaster, +and I had bought him a piccolo to play when the detachment went out +on route-marches; he would give us one tune after another for mile +after mile. The other fellows carried his pack and rifle. At Wrexham, +on pay-nights, he used to sit in the company billet, which was a +drill-hall near the station, and play jigs for the drunks to dance to. +He never drank himself. The music was slow at first, but he gradually +quickened it until he worked them into a frenzy. He would delay this +climax until my arrival with the company orderly-sergeant. The sergeant +would fling open the door and bellow: ‘F Company, Attention!’ Taylor +would break off, thrust the piccolo under his blankets, and spring to +his feet. The drunks were left frozen in the middle of their capers, +blinking stupidly. + +In the first Battalion Orderly Room that I attended I was +surprised to hear a private soldier charged with a nursery offence, +about the committal of which expert evidence was given and heard +without a smile. I have an accurate record of the trial but my +publishers advise me not to give it here. + +Orderly Room always embarrassed and dispirited me. I never got used to +it even after sentencing thousands of men myself. There was something +shameful about it. The only change that the introduction of the +civilian element into the army brought was that about half-way through +the war an army order came out that henceforth the word of command was +to be ‘Accused and escort, right turn, quick march,’ etc., instead of +‘Prisoner and escort, right turn, quick march, etc.’ It was only very +seldom that an interesting case came up. Even the obscene language, +always quoted verbatim, was drearily the same; the only variation I +remember from the four stock words was in the case of a man charged +with using threatening and obscene language to an N.C.O. The man had, +it appeared, said to a lance-corporal who had a down on him: ‘Corporal +Smith, two men shall meet before two mountains.’ Humour only came from +the very Welsh Welshmen from the hills who had an imperfect command of +English. One of them, charged with being absent off ceremonial parade +and using obscene language to the sergeant, became very indignant in +Orderly Room and cried out to the colonel: ‘Colonel, sir, sergeant tole +me wass I for guard; I axed him no, and now the bloody bastard says +wass I.’ + +The greatest number of simultaneous charges that I ever heard preferred +against a soldier was in the case of Boy Jones at Liverpool in 1917. +He was charged with, first, using obscene language to the bandmaster; +the bandmaster, who was squeamish, reported it as: ‘Sir, he called +me a double effing c——.’ Next, with breaking out of the detention that +was awarded for this crime. Third, with ‘absenting himself from the +regiment until apprehended in the Hindenburg Line, France.’ Fourth, +with resisting an escort. Fifth, with being found in possession of +regimental property of the Cheshire Regiment. Boy Jones, who was only +fourteen and looked thirteen, had wriggled through the bars of his +detention-cell and, after getting a few things together at his hut, had +gone to Liverpool Exchange Station to wait for a victim. The victim was +a private in a Bantam Battalion just returning to France from leave. +He treated the bantam to a lot of drink and robbed him of his rifle, +equipment, badges and papers. He then went off in his place. Arrived +in France he was posted to the Bantam Battalion; but this did not suit +him. He wanted to be with his own regiment. He deserted the Bantams, +who were somewhere north of Arras, and walked south along the trenches +looking for his regiment, having now resumed his proper badges. After a +couple of days’ walk he found the Second Battalion and reported and was +immediately sent home, though he had a struggle with the escort at the +railhead. The punishment for all these offences was ten days confined +to camp and a spanking from the bandmaster. + +The most unusual charge was against the regimental goat-major (a +corporal); it was first framed as _Lese majesty_, but this was later +reduced to ‘disrespect to an officer: in that he, at Wrexham—on such +and such a date—did prostitute the Royal Goat, being the gift of +His Majesty the Colonel-in-Chief from His royal herd at Windsor, by +offering his stud-services to ——, Esq., farmer and goat breeder, of +Wrexham.’ The goat-major pleaded that he had done this out of +kindness to the goat, to which he was much attached. He was reduced to +the ranks and the charge of the goat given to another. + +The regular battalions of the regiment, though officered mainly by +Anglo-Welshmen of county families, did not normally contain more than +about one Welshman in fifty in the ranks. They were mainly recruited +in Birmingham. The only man at Harlech besides myself who had joined +the regiment at the start was a poor boy, a golf-caddie, who had got +into trouble a short time before for shoplifting. The chapels held +soldiering to be sinful, and in Merioneth the chapels were supreme. +Prayers were offered for me in the chapels, not because of the dangers +I ran in the war, but because I was in the army. Later, Lloyd George +persuaded the chapels that the war was a crusade. So there was a sudden +tremendous influx of Welshmen from North Wales. They were difficult +soldiers; they particularly resented having to stand still while the +N.C.O.’s swore at them. A deputation of North Welshmen came to me once +and said: ‘Captain Graves, sir, we do not like our sergeant-major; he +do curse and he do swear, and he do drink, and he is a maan of lowly +origin, too.’ + +At Wrexham we learned regimental history, drill, musketry, Boer War +field-tactics, military law and organization, how to recognize bugle +calls, how to work a machine-gun, and how to conduct ourselves as +officers on formal occasions. We dug no trenches, handled no bombs and +came to think of the company, not of the platoon, still less of the +section, as the smallest independent tactical unit. There were only +two wounded officers back from the front at the time; both had left +the Second Battalion on the retreat from Mons. Neither would talk much +of his experiences. All that one of them, Emu Jones, would tell +us was: ‘The first queer sight I saw in France was three naked women +hanging by their feet in a butcher’s shop.’ The other would say: ‘The +shells knock hell out of a man, especially the big black ones. Just +hell. And that fellow Emu; he wasn’t any good. We marched and marched +and he had a weak heart and used to faint and expect his poor, bloody +platoon to carry him as well as the rest of their load. We used to +swear he was shamming. Don’t believe what old Emu tells you of the +retreat.’ + + + + + XI + + +I will try to recall my war-time feelings about the Royal Welch +Fusiliers. I used to congratulate myself on having chosen, quite +blindly, this of all regiments. ‘Good God!’ I used to think, ‘suppose +that when the war broke out I had been living in Cheshire and had +applied for a commission in the Cheshire Regiment.’ I thought how +ashamed I should have been to find in the history of that regiment +(which was the old Twenty-second Foot, just senior in the line to the +Royal Welch, which was the Twenty-third) that it had been deprived +of its old title ‘The Royal Cheshires’ as a punishment for losing +a battle. Or how lucky not to have joined the Bedfords. Though the +Bedfords had made a name for themselves in this war, they were still +called ‘The Peacemakers.’ For they only had four battle-honours on +their colours and none of these more recent than the year 1711; it was +a sneer that their regimental motto was: ‘Thou shalt not kill.’ Even +the Black Watch, the best of the Highland regiments, had a stain on +its record; and everyone knew about it. If a Tommy of another regiment +went into a public bar where men of the Black Watch were drinking, and +felt brave enough to start a fight, he would ask the barmaid not for +‘pig’s ear,’ which is rhyming-slang for beer, but for a pint of ‘broken +square.’ Then belts would be unbuckled. + +The Royal Welch record was beyond reproach. There were twenty-nine +battle-honours on its colours, a number only equalled by two other +two-battalion regiments. And the Royal Welch had the advantage of these +since they were not single regiments, but recent combinations of two +regiments each with its separate history. The First Battalion of +the Royal Welch Fusiliers had twenty-six battle-honours of its own, the +remaining three having been won by the Second Battalion in its short +and interrupted existence. They were all good bloody battle-honours, +none of them like that battle of the Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders +into which, it was said, they had gone with nine hundred men and from +which they had come out with nine hundred and one—no casualties, and +a band-boy come of age and promoted a private. For many hard battles, +such as The Boyne and Aughrim and the capture of Lille, the Royal Welch +had never been honoured. The regiment had fought in each of the four +hardest fought victories of the British army, as listed by Sir John +Fortescue. My regimental history is rusty, but I believe that they +were The Boyne, Malplaquet, Albuhera and Inkerman. That is three out +of four. It may have been Salamanca or Waterloo instead of The Boyne. +It was also one of the six Minden regiments and one of the front-line +regiments at that. They performed the unprecedented feat of charging a +body of cavalry many times their own strength and driving it off the +field. The surrender at York Town in the American War of Independence +was the regiment’s single disaster, but even that was not a disgrace. +It was accorded the full honours of war. Its conduct in the hard +fighting at Lexington, at Guildford Court House, and in its suicidal +advance up Bunker’s Hill, had earned it them. + +I caught the sense of regimental tradition a day or two after I arrived +at the depot. In a cupboard in the junior anteroom at the mess, I +came across a big leather-bound ledger and pulled it out to see what +it was about. It was the Daily Order-book of the First Battalion in +the trenches before Sebastopol. I opened it at the page giving orders +for the attack on the Redan Fort. Such and such a company was +desired to supply volunteers for the storming party under Lieutenant +So-and-so. There followed details of their arms and equipment, the +number of ladders they were to carry, and the support to be afforded +by other companies. Then details of rations and supply of ammunition, +with an earnest Godspeed from the commanding officer. (A sketch of the +commanding officer was on the wall above my head, lying sick in his +tent at Scutari, wearing a cap-comforter for the cold.) And the next +entries were about clearing up after an unsuccessful attack—orders for +the burial of the dead, thanks from headquarters for the gallantry +vainly displayed, and a notice that the effects of the late Lieutenant +So-and-so, who had led the storming party, would be sold at public +auction in the trenches next day. In another day’s orders was the +notice of the Victoria Cross awarded to Sergeant Luke O’Connor. He had +lived to be Lieutenant-General Sir Luke O’Connor and was now colonel of +the regiment. + +The most immediate piece of regimental history that I met as a +recruit-officer was the flash. The flash is a fan-like bunch of five +black ribbons, each ribbon two inches wide and seven and a half inches +long; the angle at which the fan is spread is exactly regulated by +regimental convention. It is stitched to the back of the tunic collar. +Only the Royal Welch are privileged to wear it. The story is that the +Royal Welch were abroad on foreign service for several years in the +1830’s, and by some chance never received the army order abolishing +the queue. When the regiment returned and paraded at Plymouth the +inspecting general rated the commanding officer because his men were +still wearing their hair in the old fashion. The commanding officer, +angry with the slight, immediately rode up to London and won from +King William IV, through the intercession of some Court official, +the regimental privilege of continuing to wear the bunch of ribbons +in which the end of the queue was tied—the flash. It was to be a +distinctive badge worn by all ranks in reward for the regiment’s +exemplary service in the Napoleonic wars. + +The Army Council, which is usually composed of cavalry, engineer, and +artillery generals, with the infantry hardly represented, had never +encouraged regimental peculiarities, and perhaps could not easily +forget the irregularity of the colonel’s direct appeal to the Sovereign +in the matter of the flash. The flash was, at any rate, not sanctioned +by the Army Council on the new khaki service dress. None the less, +the officers and warrant-officers continued to wear it. There was a +correspondence in the early stages of the war, I was told, between the +regiment and the Army Council. The regiment maintained that since the +flash was a distinctive mark won in war it should be worn with service +dress and not merely with peace-time scarlet. The Army Council put +forward the objection that it was a distinctive mark for enemy marksmen +and particularly dangerous when worn only by officers. The regiment +retorted by inquiring on what occasion since the retreat from Corunna, +when the regiment was the last to leave Spain, with the key of the town +postern in the pocket of one of its officers, had any of His Majesty’s +enemies seen the back of a Royal Welch Fusilier? The Army Council was +firm, but the regiment was obstinate, and the matter was in abeyance +throughout the war. Once in 1917, when an officer of my company went to +Buckingham Palace to be decorated with the Military Cross, the King, +as colonel-in-chief of the regiment, showed a personal interest in the +matter. He asked: ‘You are serving in one of the line battalions?’ +‘The Second Battalion, Your Majesty.’ So the King gave him the order: +‘About turn,’ and looked at the flash, and then ‘About turn’ again. +‘Good,’ he said, ‘you’re still wearing it, I see,’ and then, in a stage +whisper: ‘Don’t ever let anyone take it from you.’ The regiment was +delighted. After the war, when scarlet was abandoned on the grounds +of expense, the Army Council saw that it could reasonably sanction +the flash on service dress for all ranks. As an additional favour +it consented to recognize another defiant regimental peculiarity, +the spelling of the word ‘Welch’ with a ‘c’. The permission was +published in a special Army Order in 1919. The _Daily Herald_ commented +‘’Strewth!’ as if it were unimportant. That was ignorance. The spelling +with a ‘c’ was as important to us as the miniature cap-badge worn at +the back of the cap was to the Gloucesters (a commemoration of the time +when they fought back to back: was it at Quatre Bras?). I have seen a +young officer sent off battalion parade because his buttons read Welsh +instead of Welch. ‘Welch’ referred us somehow to the antique North +Wales of Henry Tudor and Owen Glendower and Lord Herbert of Cherbury, +the founder of the regiment; it dissociated us from the modern North +Wales of chapels, liberalism, the dairy and drapery business, Lloyd +George, and the tourist trade. + +The regiment was extremely strict on the standard measurements of the +flash. When new-army battalions were formed and rumours came to Wrexham +that in, I think, the Eighteenth Battalion officers were wearing +flashes nearly down to their waists, there was great consternation. The +adjutant sent off the youngest subaltern on a special mission to the +camp of the Eighteenth Battalion, the colonel of which was not a Royal +Welch Fusilier, but a loan from one of the Yorkshire regiments. He +was to present himself at the Battalion Orderly Room with a large pair +of shears. + +The new-army battalions were as anxious to be regimental as the line +battalions. It once happened in France that a major of the Royal +Fusiliers entered the mess of the Nineteenth (Bantam) Battalion of +the Royal Welch Fusiliers. He greeted the mess with ‘Good afternoon, +gentlemen,’ and called for a drink from the mess sergeant. After he +had talked for a bit he asked the senior officer present: ‘Do you know +why I ordered that drink from the mess sergeant?’ The Welch Fusilier +said: ‘Yes, you wanted to see if we remembered about Albuhera.’ The +Royal Fusilier answered: ‘Well, our mess is just along behind that wood +there. We haven’t forgotten either.’ After Albuhera the few survivors +of the Royal Welch Fusiliers and the Royal Fusiliers had messed +together on the captured hill. It was then decided that henceforth and +for ever the officers of each regiment were honorary members of the +other’s mess, and the N.C.O.’s the same. + +Perhaps the most legendary item was Thomas Atkins. He was a private +soldier in the First Battalion who had served under Wellington in the +Peninsular War. It is said that when, many years later, Wellington +at the War Office was asked to approve a specimen form for military +attestation, he had ordered it to be amended from: ‘I, Private John Doe +of the blank regiment, do hereby, etc.,’ to ‘I, Private Thomas Atkins +of the Twenty-third Foot, do hereby, etc.’ And now I am going to spoil +the story, because I cannot for the life of me remember what British +grenadierish conduct it was that made Wellington remember. And so here +ends my very creditable (after eleven years) lyrical passage. + +I was, as a matter of fact, going on to St. David’s Night. To +the raw leeks eaten to the roll of the drum with one foot on a chair +and one on the mess table enriched with spoils of the Summer Palace +at Pekin. (They are not at all bad to eat raw, despite Shakespeare.) +And to the Royal Goat with gilded horns that once leapt over the mess +table with the drummerboy on its back. And Major Toby Purcell’s Golden +Spurs. And Shenkin Ap Morgan, the First Gentleman of Wales. And ‘The +British Grenadiers,’ the regimental march-past. I was going to explain +that British grenadiers does not mean, as most people think, merely +the Grenadier Guards. It includes all regiments, the Royal Welch among +them, which wear a bursting grenade as a collar and cap-badge to recall +their early employment as storm troops armed with bombs. + +In the war the Royal Welch Fusiliers grew too big; this damaged +regimental _esprit de corps_. Before the war there were the two line +battalions and the depot; the affiliated and flash-less territorials, +four battalions recruited for home service, could be disregarded, in +spite of their regular adjutants. The Third Battalion, which trained at +the depot, was a poor relation. Now more and more new-army battalions +were added (even a Twenty-fifth Battalion was on service in 1917, and +was as good a battalion as the Eighth). So the regiment (that is, +consensus of opinion in the two line battalions) only tentatively +accepted the new-army battalions one by one as they proved themselves +worthy, by service in the field. The territorials it never accepted, +disowning them contemptuously as ‘dog-shooters.’ The fact was that +three of the four territorial battalions failed signally in the Suvla +Bay landing at Gallipoli. One battalion, it was known, had offered +violence to its officers; the commanding officer, a regular, had not +cared to survive that day. Even the good work that these battalions +did later in Palestine could not cancel this disgrace. The +remaining territorial battalion was attached to the First Division +in France early in 1915, where, at Givenchy, it quite unnecessarily +lost its machine-guns. Regimental machine-guns in 1915 were regarded +almost as sacred. To lose one’s machine-guns before the annihilation +of the entire battalion was considered as bad as losing the regimental +colours would have been in any eighteenth or nineteenth-century +battle. The machine-gun officer had congratulated himself on removing +the machine-gun bolts before abandoning the guns; it would make them +useless to the enemy. But he had forgotten to take away the boxes of +spare-parts. The Second Battalion made a raid in the same sector a year +and a half later and recaptured one of the guns, which had been busy +against the British trenches ever since. + +As soon as we arrived at the depot we Special Reserve officers were +reminded of our great good fortune. We were to have the privilege of +serving with one or the other of the line battalions. In peace-time a +candidate for a commission in the regiment had not only to distinguish +himself in the passing-out examination at the Royal Military College, +Sandhurst, and be strongly recommended by two officers of the regiment, +but he had to have a guaranteed independent income that enabled him to +play polo and hunt and keep up the social reputation of the regiment. +These requirements were not insisted on; but we were to understand that +we did not belong to the ‘regiment’ in the special sense. To be allowed +to serve with it in time of war should satisfy our ambitions. We were +not temporary officers, like those of the new army, but held permanent +commissions in the Special Reserve battalion. We were reminded that +the Royal Welch considered themselves second to none, even to the +Guards. Representations had been made to the regiment after the +South African War, inquiring whether it was willing to become the +Welsh Guards, and it had indignantly refused; such a change would have +made the regiment junior, in the Brigade of Guards, even to the Irish +Guards only so recently formed. We were warned that while serving with +a line battalion we were none of us to expect to be recommended for +orders or decorations. An ordinary campaigning medal inscribed with +a record of service with the battalion should be sufficient reward. +Decorations were not regarded in the regiment as personal awards, but +as representative awards for the whole battalion. They would therefore +be reserved for the professional soldiers, to whom they would be more +useful than to us as helps to extra-regimental promotion. And this +was what happened. There must have been something like two or three +hundred Special Reserve officers serving overseas. But except for three +or four who were not directly recommended by the battalion commander, +but distinguished themselves while attached to brigade or divisional +staffs, or those who happened to be sent to new-army battalions or +other regiments, we remained undecorated. I can only recall three +exceptions. The normal proportion of awards, considering the casualties +we suffered, which was about sixty or seventy killed, should have been +at least ten times that amount. I myself never performed any feat for +which I might conceivably have been decorated throughout my service in +France. + +The regimental spirit persistently survived all catastrophes. Our First +Battalion, for instance, was annihilated within two months of joining +the British Expeditionary Force. Young Orme, who joined straight from +Sandhurst, at the crisis of the first battle of Ypres, found himself +commanding a battalion reduced to only about forty rifles. With +these and another small force, the remnants of the Second Battalion of +the Queen’s Regiment, reduced to thirty men and two officers, he helped +to recapture three lines of lost trenches and was himself killed. +The reconstituted battalion, after heavy fighting at Bois Grenier +in December, was again all but annihilated at the Aubers Ridge and +Festubert in the following May, and again at Loos in September, when +the one officer-survivor of the attack was a machine-gun officer loaned +from the South Staffordshire Regiment. The same sort of thing happened +time after time in fighting at Fricourt, the Quadrangle, High Wood, +Delville Wood, and Ginchy on the Somme in 1916, and again at Puisieux +and Bullecourt in the spring fighting of 1917. In the course of the +war at least fifteen or twenty thousand men must have passed through +each of the two line battalions, whose fighting strength was never more +than eight hundred. After each catastrophe the ranks were filled up +with new drafts from home, with the lightly wounded from the previous +disaster returning after three or four months’ absence, and with the +more seriously wounded returning after nine months or a year. + +In the First and Second Battalions throughout the war it was not merely +the officers and non-commissioned officers who knew their regimental +history. The men knew far more about Minden and Albuhera and Waterloo +than they did about the fighting on the other fronts or the official +causes of the war. + + + + + XII + + +In 1916, when on leave in England after being wounded on the Somme, I +began an account of my first few months in France. Unfortunately, I +wrote it as a novel and I have now to retranslate it into history. I +will give one reconstituted chapter: + +On arrival in France we six Royal Welch Fusilier officers went +to the Harfleur base-camp near Havre. Later it was to become an +educational centre for trench-routine, use of bombs, trench-mortars, +rifle-grenades, gas-helmets, and similar technicalities. But now we did +a route-march or two through the French countryside and that was all, +except for fatigues in Havre at the docks, helping the Army Service +Corps unload stores from ships. The town was gay. As soon as we had +arrived we were accosted by numerous little boys pimping for their +sisters. ‘I take you to my sister. She very nice. Very good jig-a-jig. +Not much money. Very cheap. Very good. I take you now. Plenty champagne +for me?’ We were glad when we got orders to go up the line. But +disgusted to find ourselves attached not to the Royal Welch Fusiliers, +but to the Welsh Regiment. + +We had heard little about the Welsh Regiment except that it was +tough but rough, and that the Second Battalion, to which we were now +attached, had a peculiar regimental history as the old Sixty-ninth +Foot. It had originally been formed as an emergency force from +pensioners and boy-recruits and sent overseas to do the work of a +regular battalion—I forget in which eighteenth-century campaign. At one +time it had served as marines. The Ups and Downs was the battalion’s +army nick-name, partly because 69 is a number which makes the same +sense whichever way up it is written. The 69 was certainly +upside-down when we joined it. All the company officers except two boys +recently from Sandhurst and a Special Reserve captain were attached +from other regiments. There were now six Royal Welch Fusiliers, two +South Wales Borderers, two East Surreys, two Wiltshires, one from the +Border Regiment, one from the King’s Own Yorkshire Light Infantry. Even +the quartermaster was an alien from the Connaught Rangers. There were +perhaps four time-serving N.C.O.’s left in the battalion. Of the men, +not more than fifty or so had been given more than a couple of months’ +training before being sent out; some had only three weeks’ training; +a great many had never fired a musketry course. This was because the +First Division had been in constant hard fighting since the previous +August; the Second Welsh had in eight months lost its full fighting +strength five times over. The last occasion was the Richebourg fighting +of 9th May, one of the worst disasters of the early part of the war; +the division’s epitaph in the official _communiqué_ read: ‘Meeting +with considerable opposition in the direction of the Rue du Bois, our +attacks were not pressed.’ + +The Welsh ranks had been made up first with reservists of the later +categories, then with re-enlisted men, then with Special Reservists of +pre-war enlistment, then with 1914 recruits of three or four months’ +training; but each class had in turn been exhausted. Now nothing +was left to send but recruits of the spring 1915 class, and various +sweepings and scourings. The First Battalion had, meanwhile, had the +same heavy losses. In Cardiff they advertised: ‘Enlist at the depot and +get to France quick.’ The recruits were principally men either over-age +or under-age—a repetition of regimental history—or men who had some +slight physical disability which prevented them from enlisting +in regiments more particular than the Welsh. I still have the roll of +my first platoon of forty men. The figures given for their ages are +misleading. When they enlisted all the over-age men had put themselves +in the late thirties and all the under-age men had called themselves +eighteen. But once in France the over-age men did not mind adding on +a few genuine years. No less than fourteen in the roll give their age +as forty or over and these were not all. Fred Prosser, a painter in +civil life, who admitted to forty-eight, was really fifty-six. David +Davies, collier, who admitted to forty-two, and Thomas Clark, another +collier who admitted to forty-five, were only one or two years junior +to Prosser. James Burford, collier and fitter, was even older than +these. When I first spoke to him in the trenches, he said: ‘Excuse me, +sir, will you explain what this here arrangement is on the side of +my rifle?’ ‘That’s the safety-catch. Didn’t you do a musketry course +at the depot?’ ‘No, sir, I was a re-enlisted man and I had only a +fortnight there. The old Lee-Metford didn’t have no safety-catch.’ I +asked him when he had last fired a rifle. ‘In Egypt in 1882,’ he said. +‘Weren’t you in the South African War?’ ‘I tried to re-enlist but they +told me I was too old, sir. I had been an old soldier when I was in +Egypt. My real age is sixty-three.’ He spent all his summers as a tramp +and in the bad months of the year worked as a collier, choosing a new +pit every season. I heard him and David Davies one night in a dug-out +opposite mine talking about the different seams of coals in Wales +and tracing them from county to county and pit to pit with technical +comments. It was one of the most informative conversations I ever heard. + +The other half of the platoon contained the under-age section. +There were five of these boys; William Bumford, collier, for instance, +who gave his age as eighteen, was really only fifteen. He used to get +into trouble for falling asleep on sentry duty. The official penalty +for this was death, but I had observed that he could not help it. I had +seen him suddenly go to sleep, on his feet, while holding a sandbag +open for another fellow to fill. So we got him a job as orderly to a +chaplain for a while, and a few months later all men over fifty and all +boys under eighteen were combed out and sent to the base. Bumford and +Burford were both sent; but neither escaped the war. Bumford was old +enough to be sent back to the battalion in the later stages of the war, +and was killed; Burford was killed, too, in a bombing accident at the +base-camp. Or so I was told—the fate of many of my comrades in France +has come to me merely as hearsay. + +The troop-train consisted of forty-seven coaches and took twenty-five +hours to arrive at Béthune, the rail-head. We went via St. Omer. It was +about nine o’clock in the evening and we were hungry, cold and dirty. +We had expected a short journey and so allowed our baggage to be put +in a locked van. We played nap to keep our minds off the discomfort +and I lost sixty francs, which was over two pounds at the existing +rate of exchange. On the platform at Béthune a little man in filthy +khaki, wearing the Welsh cap-badge, came up with a friendly touch of +the cap most unlike a salute. He was to be our guide to the battalion, +which was in the Cambrin trenches about ten kilometres away. He asked +us to collect the draft of forty men we had with us and follow him. We +marched through the unlit suburbs of the town. We were all intensely +excited at the noise and flashes of the guns in the distance. The men +of the draft had none of them been out before, except the sergeant +in charge. They began singing. Instead of the usual music-hall songs +they sang Welsh hymns, each man taking a part. The Welsh always sang +when they were a bit frightened and pretending that they were not; it +kept them steady. They never sang out of tune. + +We marched towards the flashes and could soon see the flare-lights +curving over the trenches in the distance. The noise of the guns grew +louder and louder. Then we were among the batteries. From behind us +on the left of the road a salvo of four shells came suddenly over our +heads. The battery was only about two hundred yards away. This broke +up _Aberystwyth_ in the middle of a verse and set us off our balance +for a few seconds; the column of fours tangled up. The shells went +hissing away eastward; we could see the red flash and hear the hollow +bang where they landed in German territory. The men picked up their +step again and began chaffing. A lance-corporal dictated a letter home: +‘Dear auntie, this leaves me in the pink. We are at present wading +in blood up to our necks. Send me fags and a lifebelt. This war is a +booger. Love and kisses.’ + +The roadside cottages were now showing more and more +signs of dilapidation. A German shell came over and then +whoo—oo—ooooooOOO—bump—CRASH! twenty yards away from the party. We +threw ourselves flat on our faces. Presently we heard a curious +singing noise in the air, and then flop! flop! little pieces of +shell-casing came buzzing down all around. ‘They calls them the musical +instruments,’ said the sergeant. ‘Damn them,’ said Frank Jones-Bateman, +who had a cut in his hand from a jagged little piece, ‘the devils have +started on me early.’ ‘Aye, they’ll have a lot of fun with you before +they’re done, sir,’ grinned the sergeant. Another shell came over. +Every one threw himself down again, but it burst two hundred yards +behind us. Only Sergeant Jones had remained on his feet and laughed at +us. ‘You’re wasting yourselves, lads,’ he said to the draft. ‘Listen by +the noise they make coming where they’re going to burst.’ + +At Cambrin village, which was about a mile from the front trenches, we +were taken into a ruined house. It had been a chemist’s shop and the +coloured glass lights were still in the window. It was the billet of +the Welsh company quartermaster-sergeants. Here we were issued with +gas-respirators and field dressings. This was the first respirator +issued in France. It was a gauze-pad filled with chemically-treated +cotton waste, to be tied across the mouth and nose. It seems it was +useless against German gas. I never put it to the test. A week or two +later came the ‘smoke-helmet,’ a greasy grey-felt bag with a talc +window to look through, but no mouthpiece. This also was probably +ineffective against gas. The talc was always cracking and there were +leaks where it was stitched into the helmet. + +These were early days of trench-warfare, the days of the jam-tin bomb +and the gas-pipe trench-mortar. It was before Lewis or Stokes guns, +steel helmets, telescopic rifle-sights, gas-shells, pill-boxes, tanks, +trench-raids, or any of the later improvements of trench-warfare. + +After a meal of bread, bacon, rum and bitter stewed tea sickly with +sugar, we went up through the broken trees to the east of the village +and up a long trench to battalion headquarters. The trench was cut +through red clay. I had a torch with me which I kept flashed on the +ground. Hundreds of field mice and frogs were in the trench. They had +fallen in and had no way out. The light dazzled them and we could +not help treading on them. So I put the torch back in my pocket. We had +no picture of what the trenches would be like, and were not far off the +state of mind in which one young soldier joined us a week or two later. +He called out very excitedly to old Burford who was cooking up a bit of +stew in a dixie, apart from the others: ‘Hi, mate, where’s the battle? +I want to do my bit.’ + +The trench was wet and slippery. The guide was giving hoarse directions +all the time. ‘Hole right.’ ‘Wire high.’ ‘Wire low.’ ‘Deep place here, +sir.’ ‘Wire low.’ I had never been told about the field telephone +wires. They were fastened by staples to the side of the trench, and +when it rained the staples were always falling out and the wire falling +down and tripping people up. If it sagged too much one stretched it +across the top of the trench to the other side to correct the sag, and +then it would catch one’s head. The holes were the sump-pits used for +draining the trenches. We were now under rifle-fire. I always found +rifle-fire more trying than shell-fire. The gunner was usually, I +knew, firing not at people but at map-references—cross-roads, likely +artillery positions, houses that suggested billets for troops, and so +on. Even when an observation officer in an aeroplane or captive balloon +or on a church spire was directing the gun-fire it seemed unaimed, +somehow. But a rifle bullet even when fired blindly always had the +effect of seeming aimed. And we could hear a shell coming and take +some sort of cover, but the rifle bullet gave no warning. So though we +learned not to duck to a rifle bullet, because once it was heard it +must have missed, it gave us a worse feeling of danger. Rifle bullets +in the open went hissing into the grass without much noise, but when we +were in a trench the bullets, going over the hollow, made a tremendous +crack. Bullets often struck the barbed wire in front of the +trenches, which turned them and sent them spinning in a head-overheels +motion—ping! rockety-ockety-ockety-ockety into the woods behind. + +Battalion headquarters was a dug-out in the reserve line about +a quarter of a mile from the front companies. The colonel, a +twice-wounded regular, shook hands with us and offered us the whisky +bottle. He said that we were welcome, and hoped that we would soon +grow to like the regiment as much as our own. It was a cosy dug-out +for so early a stage of trench-warfare. (This sector had only recently +been taken over from the French, who knew how to make themselves +comfortable. It had been a territorial division of men in the forties +who had a local armistice with the Germans opposite; there was no +firing and apparently even civilian traffic through the lines.) There +was an ornamental lamp, a clean cloth, and polished silver on the +table. The colonel, adjutant, doctor, second-in-command, and signalling +officer were at dinner. It was civilized cooking, with fresh meat and +vegetables. Pictures were pasted on the walls, which were wall-papered; +there were beds with spring mattresses, a gramophone, easy chairs. It +was hard to reconcile this with accounts I had read of troops standing +waist-deep in mud and gnawing a biscuit while shells burst all around. +We were posted to our companies. I went to C Company. ‘Captain Dunn is +your company commander,’ said the adjutant. ‘The soundest officer in +the battalion. By the way, remind him that I want that list of D.C.M. +recommendations for the last show sent in at once, but not more than +two names, or else they won’t give us any. Four is about the ration for +the battalion in a dud show.’ + +Our guide took us up to the front line. We passed a group of men +huddled over a brazier. They were wearing waterproof capes, for it +had now started to rain, and cap-comforters, because the weather was +cold. They were little men, daubed with mud, and they were talking +quietly together in Welsh. Although they could see we were officers, +they did not jump to their feet and salute. I thought that this was a +convention of the trenches, and indeed I knew that it was laid down +somewhere in the military textbooks that the courtesy of the salute was +to be dispensed with in battle. But I was wrong; it was just slackness. +We overtook a fatigue-party struggling up the trench loaded with +timber lengths and bundles of sandbags, cursing plaintively as they +slipped into sump-holes and entangled their burdens in the telephone +wire. Fatigue-parties were always encumbered by their rifles and +equipment, which it was a crime ever to have out of reach. When we had +squeezed past this party we had to stand aside to let a stretcher-case +past. ‘Who’s the poor bastard, Dai?’ the guide asked the leading +stretcher-bearer. ‘Sergeant Gallagher,’ Dai answered. ‘He thought he +saw a Fritz in No Man’s Land near our wire, so the silly b——r takes one +of them new issue percussion bombs and shoots it at ’im. Silly b——r aims +too low, it hits the top of the parapet and bursts back. Deoul! man, +it breaks his silly f——ing jaw and blows a great lump from his silly +f——ing face, whatever. Poor silly b——r! Not worth sweating to get him +back! He’s put paid to, whatever.’ The wounded man had a sandbag over +his face. He was dead when they got him back to the dressing-station. +I was tired out by the time I got to company headquarters. I was +carrying a pack-valise like the men, and my belt was hung with all +the usual furnishings—revolver, field-glasses, compass, whisky-flask, +wire-cutters, periscope, and a lot more. A Christmas-tree that was +called. (These were the days in which officers went out to France +with swords and had them sharpened by the armourer before sailing. +But I had been advised to leave my sword back in the billet where +we had tea; I never saw it again or bothered about it.) I was hot +and sweaty; my hands were sticky with the clay from the side of the +trench. C Company headquarters was a two-roomed timber-built shelter +in the side of a trench connecting the front and support lines. Here +were tablecloth and lamp again, whisky-bottle and glasses, shelves +with books and magazines, a framed picture of General Joffre, a large +mirror, and bunks in the next room. I reported to the company commander. + +I had expected him to be a middle-aged man with a breastful of medals, +with whom I would have to be formal; but Dunn was actually two months +younger than myself. He was one of the fellowship of ‘only survivors.’ +Captain Miller of the Black Watch in the same division was another. +Miller had only escaped from the Rue du Bois massacre by swimming down +a flooded trench. He has carried on his surviving trade ever since.[2] +Only survivors have great reputations. Miller used to be pointed at in +the streets when the battalion was back in reserve billets. ‘See that +fellow. That’s Jock Miller. Out from the start and hasn’t got it yet.’ +Dunn had not let the war affect his morale at all. He greeted me very +easily with: ‘Well, what’s the news from England? Oh sorry, first I +must introduce you. This is Walker—clever chap, comes from Cambridge +and fancies himself as an athlete. This is Jenkins, one of those +patriotic chaps who chucked up his job to come here. This is Price, who +only joined us yesterday, but we like him; he brought some damn +good whisky with him. Well, how long is the war going to last and who’s +winning? We don’t know a thing out here. And what’s all this talk about +war-babies? Price pretends he knows nothing about them.’ I told them +about the war and asked them about the trenches. + +‘About trenches,’ said Dunn. ‘Well, we don’t know as much about +trenches as the French do and not near as much as Fritz does. We can’t +expect Fritz to help, but the French might do something. They are +greedy; they won’t let us have the benefit of their inventions. What +wouldn’t we give for parachute-lights and their aerial torpedoes! But +there’s no connection between the two armies except when there’s a +battle on, and then we generally let each other down. + +‘When I was out here first, all that we did in the trenches was to +paddle about in water and use our rifles. We didn’t think of them as +places to live in, they were just temporary inconveniences. Now we work +all the time we are here, not only for safety but for health. Night +and day. First, the fire-steps, then building traverses, improving +the communication trenches, and so on; lastly, on our personal +comfort—shelters and dug-outs. There was a territorial battalion that +used to relieve us. They were hopeless. They used to sit down in the +trench and say: “Oh my God, this is the limit.” They’d pull out pencil +and paper and write home about it. Did no work on the traverses or on +fire positions. Consequence—they lost half their men from frost-bite +and rheumatism, and one day the Germans broke in and scuppered a lot +more of them. They allowed the work we’d done in the trench to go to +ruin and left the whole place like a sewage-farm for us to take over +again. We were sick as muck. We reported them several times to brigade +headquarters, but they never got any better. Slack officers, of +course. Well, they got smashed, as I say, and were sent away to be +lines-of-communication troops. Now we work with the First South Wales +Borderers. They’re all right. Awful chaps those territorial swine. +Usen’t to trouble about latrines at all; left food about and that +encouraged rats; never filled a sandbag. I only once saw a job of work +that they did. That was a steel loop-hole they put in. But they put +it facing square to the front and quite unmasked, so they had two men +killed at it—absolute death-trap. About our chaps. They’re all right, +but not as right as they ought to be. The survivors of the show ten +days ago are feeling pretty low, and the big new draft doesn’t know +anything yet.’ + +‘Listen,’ said Walker, ‘there’s too much firing going on. The men have +got the wind up over something. Waste of ammunition, and if Fritz knows +we’re jumpy he’ll give us an extra bad time. I’ll go up and stop them.’ + +Dunn went on. ‘These Welshmen are peculiar. They won’t stand being +shouted at. They’ll do anything if you explain the reason for it. They +will do and die, but they have to know their reason why. The best way +to make them behave is not to give them too much time to think. Work +them off their feet. They are good workmen. Officers must work too, not +only direct the work. Our time-table is like this. Breakfast at eight +o’clock in the morning, clean trenches and inspect rifles, work all +morning; lunch at twelve, work again from one till about six, when the +men feed again. “Stand-to” at dusk for about an hour, work all night, +“stand-to” for an hour before dawn. That’s the general programme. Then +there’s sentry duty. The men do two-hour sentry spells, then work two +hours, then sleep two hours. At night sentries are doubled, so our +working parties are smaller. We officers are on duty all day and +divide up the night in three-hourly watches.’ He looked at his wrist +watch. ‘I say,’ he said, ‘that carrying-party must have got the R.E. +stuff by now. Time we all got to work. Look here, Graves, you lie down +and have a doss on that bunk. I want you to take the watch before +“stand-to.” I’ll wake you up and show you round. Where the hell’s my +revolver? I don’t like to go out without that. Hello, Walker, what was +wrong?’ + +Walker laughed. ‘A chap from the new draft. He had never fired his +musketry course at Cardiff, and to-night he fired ball for the first +time. It seemed to go to his head. He’d had a brother killed up at +Ypres and he said he was going to avenge him. So he blazed off all his +own ammunition at nothing, and two bandoliers out of the ammunition-box +besides. They call him the Human Maxim now. His foresight’s misty with +heat. Corporal Parry should have stopped him; but he was just leaning +up against the traverse and shrieking with laughter. I gave them both +a good cursing. Some other new chaps started blazing away, too. Fritz +retaliated with machine-guns and whizz-bangs. No casualties. I don’t +know why. It’s all quiet now. Everybody ready?’ + +They went out and I rolled up in my blanket and fell asleep. Dunn woke +me about one o’clock. ‘Your watch,’ he said. I jumped out of the bunk +with a rustle of straw; my feet were sore and clammy in my boots. I was +cold, too. ‘Here’s the rocket-pistol and a few flares. Not a bad night. +It’s stopped raining. Put your equipment on over your raincoat or you +won’t be able to get at your revolver. Got a torch? Good. About this +flare business. Don’t use the pistol too much. We haven’t many flares, +and if there’s an attack we will want as many as we can get. But use +it if you think that there is something doing. Fritz is always +sending up flare lights, he’s got as many as he wants.’ + +He showed me round the line. The battalion frontage was about eight +hundred yards. Each company held two hundred of these with two +platoons in the front line and two platoons in the support line about +a hundred yards back. Dunn introduced me to the platoon sergeants, +more particularly to Sergeant Eastmond of the platoon to which I was +posted. He asked Sergeant Eastmond to give me any information that I +wanted, then went back to sleep, telling me to wake him up at once if +anything was wrong. I was left in charge of the line. Sergeant Eastmond +was busy with a working-party, so I went round by myself. The men of +the working-party, who were building up the traverses with sandbags +(a traverse, I learned, was a safety-buttress in the trench), looked +curiously at me. They were filling sandbags with earth, piling them +up bricklayer fashion, with headers and stretchers alternating, then +patting them flat with spades. The sentries stood on the fire-step at +the corners of the traverses, stamping their feet and blowing on their +fingers. Every now and then they peered over the top for a few seconds. +Two parties, each of an N.C.O. and two men, were out in the company +listening-posts, connected with the front trench by a sap about fifty +yards long. The German front line was about three hundred yards beyond +them. From berths hollowed in the sides of the trench and curtained +with sandbags came the grunt of sleeping men. + +I jumped up on the fire-step beside the sentry and cautiously raising +my head stared over the parapet. I could see nothing except the wooden +pickets supporting our protecting barbed-wire entanglement and a +dark patch or two of bushes beyond. The darkness seemed to move and +shake about as I looked at it; the bushes started travelling, +singly at first, then both together. The pickets were doing the same. I +was glad of the sentry beside me; his name, he told me, was Beaumont. +‘They’re quiet to-night, sir,’ he said, ‘a relief going on; I think so, +surely.’ I said: ‘It’s funny how those bushes seem to move.’ ‘Aye, they +do play queer tricks. Is this your first spell in trenches, sir?’ A +German flare shot up, broke into bright flame, dropped slowly and went +hissing into the grass just behind our trench, showing up the bushes +and pickets. Instinctively I moved. ‘It’s bad to do that, sir,’ he +said, as a rifle bullet cracked and seemed to pass right between us. +‘Keep still, sir, and they can’t spot you. Not but what a flare is a +bad thing to have fall on you. I’ve seen them burn a hole in a man.’ + +I spent the rest of my watch in acquainting myself with the geography +of the trench-section, finding how easy it was to get lost among _culs +de sac_ and disused alleys. Twice I overshot the company frontage and +wandered among the Munsters on the left. Once I tripped and fell with a +splash into deep mud. At last my watch was ended with the first signs +of dawn. I passed the word along the line for the company to stand-to +arms. The N.C.O’s whispered hoarsely into the dug-outs: ‘Stand-to, +stand-to,’ and out the men tumbled with their rifles in their hands. +As I went towards company headquarters to wake the officers I saw a +man lying on his face in a machine-gun shelter. I stopped and said: +‘Stand-to, there.’ I flashed my torch on him and saw that his foot was +bare. The machine-gunner beside him said: ‘No good talking to him, +sir.’ I asked: ‘What’s wrong? What’s he taken his boot and sock off +for?’ I was ready for anything odd in the trenches. ‘Look for yourself, +sir,’ he said. I shook the man by the arm and noticed suddenly +that the back of his head was blown out. The first corpse that I saw in +France was this suicide. He had taken off his boot and sock to pull the +trigger of his rifle with his toe; the muzzle was in his mouth. ‘Why +did he do it?’ I said. ‘He was in the last push, sir, and that sent him +a bit queer, and on top of that he got bad news from Limerick about +his girl and another chap.’ He was not a Welshman, but belonged to the +Munsters; their machine-guns were at the extreme left of our company. +The suicide had already been reported and two Irish officers came up. +‘We’ve had two or three of these lately,’ one of them told me. Then he +said to the other: ‘While I remember, Callaghan, don’t forget to write +to his next-of-kin. Usual sort of letter, cheer them up, tell them he +died a soldier’s death, anything you like. I’m not going to report it +as suicide.’ + +At stand-to rum and tea were served out. I had a look at the German +trenches through a periscope—a streak of sandbags four hundred yards +away. Some of these were made of coloured stuff, whether for camouflage +or from a shortage of plain canvas I do not know. There was no sign +of the enemy, except for a wisp or two of wood-smoke where they, too, +were boiling up a hot drink. Between us and them was a flat meadow +with cornflowers, marguerites and poppies growing in the long grass, a +few shell holes, the bushes I had seen the night before, the wreck of +an aeroplane, our barbed wire and theirs. A thousand yards away was a +big ruined house, behind that a red-brick village (Auchy), poplars and +haystacks, a tall chimney, another village (Haisnes). Half-right was a +pithead and smaller slag-heaps. La Bassée lay half-left; the sun caught +the weathervane of the church and made it twinkle. + +I went off for a sleep. The time between stand-to and breakfast +was the easy part of the day. The men who were not getting in a bit +of extra sleep sat about talking and smoking, writing letters home, +cleaning their rifles, running their thumb-nails up the seams of their +shirts to kill the lice, gambling. Lice were a standing joke. Young +Bumford handed me one like this. ‘We was just having an argument as to +whether it was best to kill the old ones or the young ones, sir. Morgan +here says that if you kill the old ones, the young ones will die of +grief, but Parry here, sir, he says that the young ones are easier to +kill and you can catch the old ones when they come to the funeral.’ He +appealed to me as an arbiter. ‘You’ve been to college, sir, haven’t +you?’ I said: ‘Yes, I had, but so had Crawshay Bailey’s brother +Norwich.’ This was held to be a wonderfully witty answer. _Crawshay +Bailey_ is one of the idiotic songs of Wales. (Crawshay Bailey himself +‘had an engine and he couldn’t make it go,’ and all his relations in +the song had similar shortcomings. Crawshay Bailey’s brother Norwich, +for instance, was fond of oatmeal porridge, and was sent to Cardiff +College, for to get a bit of knowledge.) After that I had no trouble +with the platoon at all. + +Breakfast at company headquarters was bacon, eggs, coffee, toast and +marmalade. There were three chairs and two ammunition-boxes to sit on. +Accustomed to company commanders in England not taking their junior +officers into their confidence, I was struck by the way that questions +of the day were settled at meal-times by a sort of board-meeting with +Dunn as chairman. On this first morning there was a long debate as to +the best way of keeping sentries awake. Dunn finally decided to issue +a company order against sentries leaning up against the traverse; it +made them sleepy. Besides, when they fired their rifles the flash +would come always from the same place. The Germans might fix a rifle +on the spot after a time. I told Dunn of the bullet that came between +Beaumont and myself. ‘Sounds like a fixed rifle,’ he said, ‘because not +one aimed shot in a hundred comes as close as that at night. And we had +a chap killed in that very traverse the night we came in.’ The Bavarian +Guards Reserve were opposite us at the time and their shooting was +good. They had complete control of the sniping situation. + +Dunn began telling me the characters of the men in my platoon; also +which N.C.O.’s were trustworthy and which had to be watched. He +was going on to tell me just how much to expect from the men at my +platoon inspection of rifles and equipment, when there was a sudden +alarm. Dunn’s servant came rushing in, his eyes blank with horror +and excitement: ‘Gas, sir, gas! They’re using gas.’ ‘My God!’ said +Price. We all looked at Dunn. He said imperturbably: ‘Very well, +Kingdom, bring me my respirator from the other room, and another pot of +marmalade.’ This was only one of many gas alarms. It originated with +smoke from the German trenches where breakfast was also going on; we +knew the German meal-times by a slackening down of rifle-fire. Gas was +a nightmare. Nobody believed in the efficacy of the respirators, though +we were told that they were proof against any gas the enemy could send +over. Pink army forms marked ‘Urgent’ were constantly arriving from +headquarters to explain how to use these contrivances. They were all +contradictory. First the respirators were to be kept soaking wet, then +they were to be kept dry, then they were to be worn in a satchel, then, +again, the satchel was not to be used. + +Frank Jones-Bateman came to visit me from the company on our +right. He mentioned with a false ease that he had shot a man just +before breakfast: ‘Sights at four hundred,’ he said. He was a quiet boy +of nineteen. He had just left Rugby and had a scholarship waiting for +him at Clare, Cambridge. His nickname was ‘Silent Night.’ + + + + + XIII + + +Here are extracts from letters that I wrote at this time: + +21_st May_ 1915.—Back in billets again at a coal-mining village +called La Bourse. It is not more than three miles and a half from +the trenches, but the mines are still working. As we came out of +the trenches the Germans were shelling the wood by Cambrin village, +searching for one of our batteries. I don’t think they got it, but it +was fun to see the poplar trees being lopped down like tulips when the +whizz-bangs hit them square. When we marched along the _pavé_ road from +Cambrin the men straggled about out of step and out of fours. Their +feet were sore from having had their boots on for a week—they only +have one spare pair of socks issued to them. I enclose a list of their +minimum load, which weighs about sixty pounds. A lot of extras get +put on top of this—rations, pick or shovel, periscope, and their own +souvenirs to take home on leave: + + Greatcoat 1 + Tin, mess 1 + „ cover 1 + Shirt 1 + Socks, pair 1 + Soap 1 + Towel 1 + Housewife 1 + Holdall 1 + Razor 1 + „ case 1 + Cardigan 1 + Cap, fatigue comforter 1 + Pay-book 1 + Disc, identity 1 + Waterproof sheet 1 + Tin of grease 1 + Field-service dressing 1 + Respirator 1 + Spine protector 1 + Jack knife 1 + Set of equipment + Lather brush 1 + Comb 1 + Fork 1 + Knife 1 + Spoon 1 + Tooth brush 1 + Laces, pair 1 + Rounds ammunition 150 + Rifle and bayonet + Rifle cover 1 + Oil bottle and pull-through. + Entrenching tool 1 + +Well, anyhow, marching on cobbled roads is difficult, so when +a staff-officer came by in a Rolls-Royce and cursed us for bad +march-discipline I felt like throwing something at him. Trench soldiers +hate the staff and the staff know it. The principal disagreement +seems to be about the extent to which trench conditions should modify +discipline. The La Bourse miners are old men and boys dressed in sloppy +blue clothes with bulging pockets. There are shell craters all around +the pit-head. I am billeted with a fatherly old man called Monsieur +Hojdés, who has three marriageable daughters; one of them lifted up +her skirt to show me a shell-wound on her thigh that laid her up last +winter. + +22_nd May_.—A colossal bombardment by the French at Souchez, a few +miles away—continuous roar of artillery, coloured flares, shells +bursting all along the ridge by Notre Dame de Lorette. I couldn’t +sleep. It went on all night. Instead of dying away it grew and grew +till the whole air rocked and shook; the sky was lit up with huge +flashes. I lay in my feather bed and sweated. This morning they tell me +there was a big thunderstorm in the middle of the bombardment. But, as +Walker says: ‘Where the gunder ended and the thunder began was hard to +say.’ The men had hot baths at the mines and cleaned up generally. +Their rifles are all in an advanced state of disrepair and many of +their clothes are in rags, but neither can be replaced, we are told, +until they are much worse. The platoon is billeted in a barn full of +straw. Old Burford, who is so old that he refuses to sleep with the +other men of the platoon, has found a doss in an out-building among +some farm tools. In trenches he will sleep on the fire-step even in the +rain rather than in a warm dug-out with the other men. He says that he +remembers the C.O. when he was in long skirts. Young Bumford is the +only man he’ll talk to. The platoon is always ragging Bumford for his +childish simplicity. Bumford plays up to it and begs them not to be too +hard on ‘a lad from the hills.’ + +23_rd May_.—We did company drill in the morning. Afterwards +Jones-Bateman and I lay on the warm grass and watched the aeroplanes +flying above the trenches pursued by a trail of white shrapnel puffs. +In the evening I was detailed to take out a working-party to Vermelles +les Noyelles to work on a second line of defence—trench digging and +putting up barbed wire under an R.E. officer. But the ground was hard +and the men were tired out when they got back about two o’clock in the +morning. They sang songs all the way home. They have one about Company +Quartermaster-Sergeant Finnigan: + + Coolness under fire, + Coolness under fire, + Mentioned in dispatches + For pinching the company rations, + Coolness under fire. + + Now he’s on the peg, + Now he’s on the peg, + Mentioned in dispatches + For drinking the company rum, + Now he’s on the peg. + +The chorus is: + + Whiter than the milky cokernuts, + Whiter than the milky cokernuts, + Wash me in the water + That you washed your dirty daughter in + And I shall be whiter than the milky cokernuts. + Nuts, + Nuts, + Oooooh nuts. + +Finnigan doesn’t mind the libel at all. + +This is what happened the other day. Two young miners, in another +company, disliked their sergeant, who had a down on them and gave +them all the most dirty and dangerous jobs. When they were in billets +he crimed them for things they hadn’t done. So they decided to kill +him. Later they reported at Battalion Orderly Room and asked to see +the adjutant. This was irregular, because a private is not allowed to +speak to an officer without an N.C.O. of his own company to act as +go-between. The adjutant happened to see them and said: ‘Well, what is +it you want?’ Smartly slapping the small-of-the-butt of their sloped +rifles they said: ‘We’ve come to report, sir, that we are very sorry +but we’ve shot our company sergeant-major.’ The adjutant said: ‘Good +heavens, how did that happen?’ They answered: ‘It was an accident, +sir.’ ‘What do you mean? Did you mistake him for a German?’ ‘No, +sir, we mistook him for our platoon sergeant.’ So they were both shot +by a firing squad of their own company against the wall of a convent at +Béthune. Their last words were the battalion rallying-cry: ‘Stick it, +the Welsh!’ (They say that a certain Captain Haggard first used it in +the battle of Ypres when he was mortally wounded.) The French military +governor was present at the execution and made a little speech saying +how gloriously British soldiers can die. + +You would be surprised at the amount of waste that goes on in trenches. +Ration biscuits are in general use as fuel for boiling up dixies, +because fuel is scarce. Our machine-gun crews boil their hot water by +firing off belt after belt of machine-gun ammunition at no particular +target, just generally spraying the German line. After several pounds’ +worth of ammunition has been used, the water in the guns—they are +water-cooled—begins to boil. They say they make German ration and +carrying parties behind the line pay for their early-morning cup of +tea. But the real charge will be on income-tax after the war. + +24_th May_.—To-morrow we return to trenches. The men are pessimistic +but cheerful. They all talk about getting a ‘cushy’ one to send them +back to ‘Blitey.’ Blitey is, it seems, Hindustani for ‘home.’ My +servant, Fry, who works in a paper-bag factory at Cardiff in civil +life, has been telling me stories about cushy ones. Here are two of +them. ‘A bloke in the Munsters once wanted a cushy, so he waves his +hand above the parapet to catch Fritz’s attention. Nothing doing. He +waves his arms about for a couple of minutes. Nothing doing, not a +shot. He puts his elbows on the fire-step, hoists his body upside down +and waves his legs about till he get blood to the head. Not a shot +did old Fritz fire. “Oh,” says the Munster man, “I don’t believe +there’s a damn squarehead there. Where’s the German army to?” He has +a peek over the top—crack! he gets it in the head. Finee.’ Another +story: ‘Bloke in the Camerons wanted a cushy bad. Fed up and far from +home, he was. He puts his hand over the top and gets his trigger finger +taken off, and two more beside. That done the trick. He comes laughing +through our lines by the old boutillery. “See, lads,” he says, “I’m aff +to bony Scotland. Is it na a beauty?” But on the way down the trench to +the dressing-station he forgets to stoop low where the old sniper was +working. _He_ gets it through the head too. Finee. We laugh fit to die.’ + +To get a cushy one is all that the old hands think of. Only twelve +men have been with the battalion from the beginning and they are all +transport men except one, Beaumont, a man in my platoon. The few +old hands who went through the last fight infect the new men with +pessimism; they don’t believe in the war, they don’t believe in the +staff. But at least they would follow their officers anywhere, because +the officers happen to be a decent lot. They look forward to a battle +because a battle gives more chances of a cushy one, in the legs or +arms, than trench warfare. In trench warfare the proportion of head +wounds is much greater. Haking commands this division. He’s the man who +wrote the standard textbook, _Company Training_. The last shows have not +been suitable ones for company commanders to profit by his directions. +He’s a decent man; he came round this morning to an informal inspection +of the battalion and shook hands with the survivors. There were tears +in his eyes. Sergeant Smith swore half-aloud: ‘Bloody lot of use that +is, busts up his bloody division and then weeps over what’s bloody +left.’ Well, it was nothing to do with me; I didn’t allow myself +to feel either for the general or for the sergeant. It is said here +that Haking has told General French that the division’s _morale_ has +gone completely. So far as I can see that is not accurate; the division +will fight all right but without any enthusiasm. It is said too that +when the new army comes out the division will be withdrawn and used on +lines of communication for some months at least. I don’t believe it. I +am sure no one will mind smashing up over and over again the divisions +that are used to being smashed up. The general impression here is that +the new-army divisions can’t be of much military use. + +28_th May_.—In trenches among the Cuinchy brick-stacks. Not my idea of +trenches. There has been a lot of fighting hereabouts. The trenches +have made themselves rather than been made, and run inconsequently +in and out of the big thirty-foot high stacks of brick; it is most +confusing. The parapet of one of the trenches which we do not occupy +is built up with ammunition-boxes and corpses. Everything here is +wet and smelly. The lines are very close. The Germans have half the +brick-stacks and we have the other half. Each side snipes down from the +top of its brick-stacks into the other’s trenches. This is also a great +place for rifle-grenades and trench-mortars. We can’t reply properly +to these; we have only a meagre supply of rifle-grenades and nothing +to equal the German sausage mortar bomb. This morning about breakfast +time, just as I came out of my dug-out, a rifle-grenade landed within +six feet of me. For some reason, instead of falling on its head and +exploding, it landed with its stick in the wet clay and stood there +looking at me. They are difficult to see coming; they are shot from +a rifle, with its butt on the ground, tilted, and go up a long way +before they turn over and come down. I can’t understand why this +particular rifle-grenade fell as it did; the chances were impossibly +against it. + +[Illustration: THE BRICKSTACKS AT GIVENCHY + +_Copyright Imperial War Museum._] + +Sausages are easy to see and dodge, but they make a terrible noise when +they drop. We have had about ten casualties in our company to-day from +them. I find that I have extraordinarily quick reactions to danger; but +every one gets like that. We can sort out all the different explosions +and disregard all the ones that don’t concern us—the artillery duel, +machine-gun fire at the next company to us, desultory rifle-fire. But +the faint plop! of the mortar that sends off the sausage or the muffled +rifle noise when a grenade is fired, we pick out at once. The men are +much afraid, yet always joking. The company sergeant-major stands +behind Number Eleven brick-stack and shoots at the sausages with a +rifle as they come over; trying to explode them in the air. He says +that it’s better than pigeon-shooting. He hasn’t hit one yet. Last +night a lot of stuff was flying about, including shrapnel. I heard one +shell whish-whishing towards me. I dropped flat. It burst just over the +trench. My ears sang as though there were gnats in them and a bright +scarlet light shone over everything. My shoulder was twisted in falling +and I thought I had been hit, but I hadn’t been. The vibration made my +chest sing, too, in a curious way, and I lost my sense of equilibrium. +I was much ashamed when the sergeant-major came along the trench and +found me on all fours, because I couldn’t stand up straight. It was at +a place where ‘Petticoat Lane’ runs into ‘Lowndes Square.’ + +There has been a dead man lying on the fire-step waiting to be taken +down to the cemetery to-night. He was a sanitary-man, killed last night +in the open while burying lavatory stuff between our front and support +lines. His arm was stretched out and, when he was got in, it was still +stiff, so that when they put him on the fire-step his stiff arm +stretched right across the trench. His comrades joke as they push it +out of the way to get by. ‘Out of the light, you old bastard. Do you +own this bloody trench?’ Or they shake hands with him familiarly. ‘Put +it there, Billy Boy.’ Of course, they’re miners and accustomed to +death. They have a very limited morality, but they keep to it. They +will, for instance, rob anyone, of anything, except a man in their own +platoon; they will treat every stranger as an enemy until he is proved +their friend, and then there is nothing they won’t do for him. They +are lecherous, the young ones at least, but without the false shame of +the English lecher. I had a letter to censor the other day written by +a lance-corporal to his wife. He said that the French girls were nice +to sleep with, so she mustn’t worry on his account, but that he far +preferred sleeping with her and missed her a great deal. + +6_th June_.—We have been billeted in Béthune, a fair-sized town about +seven miles or so behind the front line. There is everything one wants, +a swimming bath, all sorts of shops, especially a cake-shop, the best +I’ve ever met, a hotel where you can get a really good dinner, and a +theatre where we have brigade ‘gaffs.’ I saw a notice this morning on +a building by the Béthune-La Bassée canal—‘Troops are forbidden to +bomb fish. By order of the Town Major.’ Béthune is very little knocked +about, except a part called Faubourg d’Arras, near the station. I am +billeted with a family called Averlant Paul, in the Avenue de Bruay, +people of the official class. They are refugees from Poimbert. There +are two little boys and an elder sister, who is in what corresponds +with the under-fifth of the local high-school. She was worried last +night over her lessons and asked me to help her write out the theory of +decimal division. She showed me the notes she had taken; they were +full of abbreviations. I asked why she’d used abbreviations. She said: +‘The lady professor talked very fast because we were much hurried.’ +‘Why were you hurried?’ ‘Oh, because part of the school is used as a +billet for the troops and the Germans were shelling it, and we were +always having to take shelter in the cellar, and when we came back each +time there was less and less time left.’ + +9_th June_.—I am beginning to realize how lucky I was in my gentle +introduction to the trenches at Cambrin. We are now in a nasty salient +a little to the south of the brick-stacks, where casualities are always +heavy. The company had seventeen casualities yesterday from bombs and +grenades. The front trench averages thirty yards from the Germans. +To-day, at one part, which is only twenty yards away from an occupied +German sap, I came along whistling _The Farmer s Boy_, to keep up +my spirits, when suddenly I saw a group bending over a man lying at +the bottom of the trench. He was making a snoring noise mixed with +animal groans. At my feet was the cap he had worn, splashed with his +brains. I had never seen human brains before; I had somehow regarded +them as a poetical figment. One can joke with a badly-wounded man and +congratulate him on being out of it. One can disregard a dead man. +But even a miner can’t make a joke that sounds like a joke over a man +who takes three hours to die after the top part of his head has been +taken off by a bullet fired at twenty yards range. Beaumont, of whom I +told you in my last letter, was also killed. He was the last unwounded +survivor of the original battalion, except for the transport men. He +had his legs blown against his back. Every one was swearing angrily, +then an R.E. officer came up and told me that there was a tunnel +driven under the German front line and that if we wanted to do a +bit of bombing, now was the time. So he sent the mine up—it was not a +big one, he said, but it made a tremendous noise and covered us with +dirt—and the chaps waited for a few seconds for the other Germans to +rush up to help the wounded away and then they chucked all the bombs +they had. + +Beaumont had been telling me how he had won about five pounds in the +sweepstake after the Rue du Bois show. It was a sweepstake of the sort +that leaves no bitterness behind it. Before a show the platoon pools +all its available cash and the winners, who are the survivors, divide +it up afterwards. Those who are killed can’t complain, the wounded +would have given far more than that to escape as they have, and the +unwounded regard the money as a consolation prize for still being here. + +24_th June_. —We are billeted in the cellars of Vermelles, which was +taken and re-taken eight times last October. There is not a single +house undamaged in the place. I suppose it once had two or three +thousand inhabitants. It is beautiful now in a fantastic way. We came +up two nights ago; there was a moon shining behind the houses and the +shells had broken up all the hard lines. Next morning we found the +deserted gardens of the town very pleasant to walk about in; they are +quite overgrown and flowers have seeded themselves about wildly. Red +cabbages and roses and madonna lilies are the chief ornaments. There is +one garden with currant bushes in it. I and the company sergeant-major +started eating along the line towards each other without noticing +each other. When we did, we both remembered our dignity, he as a +company sergeant-major and I as an officer. He saluted, I asknowledged +the salute, we both walked away. After a minute or two we both +came back hoping the coast was clear and again, after an exchange of +salutes, had to leave the currants and pretend that we were merely +admiring the flowers. I don’t quite know why I was feeling like that. +The company sergeant-major was a regular and it was natural in him, +and I suppose that it was courtesy to his scruples that made me stop. +Anyhow, along came a couple of privates and stripped the bushes clean. + +This afternoon we had a cricket match, officers versus sergeants, in an +enclosure between some houses out of observation from the enemy. The +front line is perhaps three quarters of a mile away. I made top score, +twenty-four; the bat was a bit of a rafter, the ball was a piece of +rag tied round with string, and the wicket was a parrot cage with the +grisly remains of a parrot inside. It had evidently died of starvation +when the French evacuated the town. The corpse was perfectly clean and +dry and I recalled a verse of Skelton’s: + + Parrot is a fair bird for a ladie. + God of His goodness him framed and wrought. + When parrot is dead he doth not putrify, + Yea, all things mortal shall turn unto nought + Save mannës soul which Christ so dear bought, + That never can die, nor never die shall. + Make much of parrot, that popajay royal. + +The match was broken up suddenly by machine-gun fire. It was not +aimed at us; the Germans were shooting at one of our aeroplanes and +the bullets falling down from a great height had a penetrative power +greater than an ordinary spent bullet. + +This is a very idle life except for night-digging on the reserve +line. By day there is nothing to do. We can’t drill because it is +too near the German lines, and there is no fortification work to be +done in the village. To-day two spies were shot. A civilian who had +hung on in a cellar and had, apparently, been flashing news, and a +German soldier disguised as an R.E. corporal who was found tampering +with the telephone wires. We officers spend a lot of time practising +revolver-shooting. Jenkins brought out a beautiful target from the only +undestroyed living-room in our billet area. It was a glass case full of +artificial fruit and flowers, so we put it up on a post at fifty yards +range. He said: ‘I’ve always wanted to smash one of these damn things. +My aunt had one. It’s the sort of thing that _would_ survive an intense +bombardment.’ For a moment I felt a tender impulse to rescue it. But I +smothered it. So we had five shots each, in turn. Nobody could hit it. +So at last we went up to within twenty yards of it and fired a volley. +Someone hit the post and that knocked it off into the grass. Jenkins +said: ‘Damn the thing, it must be bewitched. Let’s take it back.’ The +glass was unbroken, but some of the fruit had come loose. Walker said: +‘No, it’s in pain; we must put it out of its suffering.’ He gave it the +_coup de gracê_ from close quarters. + +There is an old Norman church here, very much broken. What is left +of the tower is used as a forward observation post by the artillery. +I counted eight unexploded shells sticking into it. I went in with +Jenkins; the floor was littered with rubbish, broken masonry, smashed +chairs, ripped canvas pictures (some of them look several hundreds of +years old), bits of images and crucifixes, muddied church vestments +rotting in what was once the vestry. Only a few pieces of stained +glass remained fixed in the edges of the windows. I climbed up by way +of the altar to the east window and found a piece about the size +of a plate. I gave it to Jenkins. ‘Souvenir,’ I said. When he held +it up to the light it was St. Peter’s hand with the keys of heaven; +medieval glass. ‘I’m sending this home,’ he said. As we went out we met +two men of the Munsters. They were Irish Catholics. They thought it +sacrilegious for Jenkins to be taking the glass away. One of them said: +‘Shouldn’t take that, sir; it will bring you no luck.’[3] + +Walker was ragging Dunn this evening. ‘I believe you’ll be sorry when +the war’s over, skipper. Your occupation will be gone and you’ll have +to go back on the square at the depot for six months and learn how to +form fours regimentally. You missed that little part of the show when +you left Sandhurst and came straight here. You’ll be a full colonel by +then, of course. I’ll give the sergeant-major half a crown to make you +really sweat. I’ll be standing in civvies at the barrack-gate laughing +at you.’ + +There is a company commander here called Furber. His nerves are in +pieces, and somebody played a dirty joke on him the other day—rolling +a bomb, undetonated, of course, down the cellar steps to frighten him. +This was thought a great joke. Furber is the greatest pessimist out +here. He’s laid a bet with the adjutant that the trench lines will +not be more than a mile from where they are in this sector two years +hence. Every one laughs at Furber, but they like him because he sings +sentimental cockney songs at the brigade gaffs when we are back at +Béthune. + + + + + XIV + + +Now as the summer advanced there came new types of bombs and +trench-mortars, heavier shelling, improved gas-masks and a general +tightening up of discipline. We saw the first battalions of the new +army and felt like scarecrows by comparison. We went in and out of +the Cambrin and Cuinchy trenches, with billets in Béthune and the +neighbouring villages. By this time I had caught the pessimism of the +division. Its spirit in the trenches was largely defensive; the policy +was not to stir the Germans into more than their usual hostility. But +casualties were still very heavy for trench warfare. Pessimism made +everyone superstitious. I became superstitious too: I found myself +believing in signs of the most trivial nature. Sergeant Smith, my +second sergeant, told me of my predecessor in command of the platoon. +‘He was a nice gentleman, sir, but very wild. Just before the Rue du +Bois show he says to me: “By the way, sergeant, I’m going to get killed +to-morrow. I know that. And I know that you’re going to be all right. +So see that my kit goes back to my people. You’ll find their address in +my pocket-book. You’ll find five hundred francs there too. Now remember +this, Sergeant Smith, you keep a hundred francs yourself and divide +up the rest among the chaps left.” He says: “Send my pocket-book back +with my other stuff, Sergeant Smith, but for God’s sake burn my diary. +They mustn’t see that. I’m going to get it _here_!” He points to his +forehead. And that’s how it was. He got it through the forehead all +right. I sent the stuff back to his parents. I divided up the money and +I burnt the diary.’ + +One day I was walking along a trench at Cambrin when I suddenly dropped +flat on my face; two seconds later a whizz-bang struck the back +of the trench exactly where I had been. The sergeant who was with me, +walking a few steps ahead, rushed back: ‘Are you killed, sir?’ The +shell was fired from a battery near Auchy only a thousand yards away, +so that it must have arrived before the sound of the gun. How did I +know that I should throw myself on my face? + +I saw a ghost at Béthune. He was a man called Private Challoner who +had been at Lancaster with me and again in F company at Wrexham. When +he went out with a draft to join the First Battalion he shook my hand +and said: ‘I’ll meet you again in France, sir.’ He had been killed at +Festubert in May and in June he passed by our C Company billet where +we were just having a special dinner to celebrate our safe return from +Cuinchy. There was fish, new potatoes, green peas, asparagus, mutton +chops, strawberries and cream, and three bottles of Pommard. Challoner +looked in at the window, saluted and passed on. There was no mistaking +him or the cap-badge he was wearing. There was no Royal Welch battalion +billeted within miles of Béthune at the time. I jumped up and looked +out of the window, but saw nothing except a fag-end smoking on the +pavement. Ghosts were numerous in France at the time. + +There was constant mining going on in this Cambrin-Cuinchy sector. We +had the prospect of being blown up at any moment. An officer of the +R.E. tunnelling company was awarded the Victoria Cross while we were +here. A duel of mining and counter-mining was going on. The Germans +began to undermine his original boring, so he rapidly tunnelled +underneath them. It was touch and go who would get the mine ready +first. He won. But when he detonated it from the trench by an electric +lead, nothing happened. He ran down again into the mine, retamped +the charge, and was just back in time to set it off before the Germans. +I had been into the upper boring on the previous day. It was about +twenty feet under the German lines. At the end of the gallery I found +a Welsh miner, one of our own men who had transferred to the Royal +Engineers, on listening duty. He cautioned me to silence. I could +distinctly hear the Germans working somewhere underneath. He whispered: +‘So long as they work, I don’t mind; it’s when they stop.’ He did his +two-hour spell by candle-light. It was very stuffy. He was reading a +book. The mining officer had told me that they were allowed to read; it +didn’t interfere with their listening. It was a paper-backed novelette +called _From Mill Girl to Duchess_. The men of the tunnelling companies +were notorious thieves, by the way. They would snatch things up from +the trench and scurry off with them into their borings; just like mice. + +After one particularly bad spell of trenches I got bad news in a +letter from Charterhouse. Bad news in the trenches might affect a man +in either of two ways. It might drive him to suicide (or recklessness +amounting to suicide), or it might seem trivial in comparison with +present expediences and be disregarded. But unless his leave was due +he was helpless. A year later, when I was in trenches in the same +sector, an officer of the North Staffordshire Regiment had news from +home that his wife was living with another man. He went out on a raid +the same night and was either killed or captured; so the men with him +said. There had been a fight and they had come back without him. Two +days later he was arrested at Béthune trying to board a leave-train +to go home; he had intended to shoot up the wife and her lover. He +was court-martialled for deserting in the face of the enemy, but +the court was content to cashier him. He went as a private soldier to +another regiment. I do not know what happened afterwards. + +The bad news was about Dick, saying that he was not at all the innocent +sort of fellow I took him for. He was as bad as anyone could be. The +letter was written by a cousin of mine who was still at Charterhouse. +I tried not to believe it. I remembered that he owed me a grudge and +decided that this was a very cruel act of spite. Dick’s letters had +been my greatest stand-by all these months when I was feeling low; +he wrote every week, mostly about poetry. They were something solid +and clean to set off against the impermanence of trench life and +the uncleanness of sex-life in billets. I was now back in Béthune. +Two officers of another company had just been telling me how they +had jslept, in the same room, one with the mother and one with the +daughter. They had tossed for the mother because the daughter was a +‘yellow-looking little thing like a lizard.’ And the Red Lamp, the army +brothel, was round the corner in the main street. I had seen a queue +of a hundred and fifty men waiting outside the door, each to have his +short turn with one or the other of the three women in the house. My +servant, who had been in the queue, told me that the charge was ten +francs a man—about eight shillings at that time. Each woman served +nearly a battalion of men every week for as long as she lasted. The +assistant provost-marshal had told me that three weeks was the usual +limit, ‘after which the woman retires on her earnings, pale but proud.’ +I was always being teased because I would not sleep even with the nicer +girls. And I excused myself, not on moral grounds or on grounds of +fastidiousness, but in the only way they could understand: I said that +I didn’t want a dose. A good deal of talk in billets was about +the peculiar bed-manners of the French women. ‘She was very nice and +full of games. I said to her: “S’il vous plaît, ôtes-toi la chemise, ma +chérie.” But she wouldn’t. She said, “Oh no’-non, mon lieutenant. Ce +n’est pas convenable.”’ I was glad when we were back in trenches. And +there I had a more or less reassuring letter from Dick. He told me that +I was right, that my cousin had a spite against him and me, that he had +been ragging about in a silly way, but that there was not much harm to +it; he was very sorry and would stop it for the sake of our friendship. + +At the end of July, I and Robertson, one of the other five Royal Welch +officers who had been attached to the Welsh, got orders to proceed to +the Laventie sector, some miles to the north. We were to report to the +Second Battalion of the Royal Welch Fusiliers. Frank Jones-Bateman +and Hanmer Jones, two more of us, went to the First Battalion. The +remaining two of the six had already gone back, McLellan sick and +Watkin with bomb wounds that have kept him limping ever since. We were +sorry to say good-bye to the men; they all crowded round to shake +hands and wish us luck. And we felt a little sorry too that we had to +start all over again getting to know a new company and new regimental +customs. But it would be worth it, to be with our own regiment. +Robertson and I agreed to take our journey as leisurely as possible. +Laventie was only seventeen miles away, but our orders were to go there +by train; so a mess-cart took us down to Béthune. We asked the railway +transport officer what trains he had to Laventie. He told us one was +going in a few minutes; we decided to miss it. There was no train after +that until the next day, so we stopped the night at the Hotel de la +France. (The Prince of Wales, who was a lieutenant in the Fortieth +Siege Battery, was billeted there sometimes. He was a familiar +figure in Béthune. I only spoke to him once; it was in the public bath, +where he and I were the only bathers one morning. He was graciously +pleased to remark how emphatically cold the water was and I loyally +assented that he was emphatically right. We were very pink and white +and did exercises on the horizontal bar afterwards. I joked to Frank +about it: ‘I have just met our future King in a bath.’ Frank said: ‘I +can trump that. Two days ago I had a friendly talk with him in the +A.S.C. latrines.’ The Prince’s favourite rendezvous was the _Globe_, +a café in the Béthune market square reserved for British officers and +French civilians; principally spies by the look of them. I once heard +him complaining indignantly that General French had refused to let him +go up into the line.) + +The next day we caught our train. It took us to a junction, the name +of which I forget. Here we spent a day walking about in the fields. +There was no train until next day, when one took us on to Berguette, +a railhead still a number of miles from Laventie, where a mess-cart +was waiting for us in answer to a telegram we had sent. We finally +rattled up to battalion headquarters in Laventie High Street. We had +taken fifty-two hours to come seventeen miles. We saluted the adjutant +smartly, gave our names, and said that we were Third Battalion officers +posted to the regiment. He did not shake hands with us, offer us a +drink, or give us a word of welcome. He said coldly: ‘I see. Well, +which of you is senior? Oh, never mind. Give your particulars to +the regimental sergeant-major. Tell him to post whoever is senior +to A Company and the other to B Company.’ The sergeant-major took +our particulars. He introduced me to a young second-lieutenant of A +Company, to which I was to go. He was a special reservist of the East +Surrey Regiment and was known as the Surrey-man. He took me along +to the company billet. As soon as we were out of earshot of battalion +headquarters I asked him: ‘What’s wrong with the adjutant? Why didn’t +he shake hands or give me any sort of decent welcome?’ + +The Surrey-man said: ‘Well, it’s your regiment, not mine. They’re all +like that. You must realize that this is a regular battalion, one of +the only four infantry battalions in France that is still more or less +its old self. This is the Nineteenth Brigade, the luckiest in France. +It has not been permanently part of any division, but used as army +reserve to put in wherever a division has been badly knocked. So, +except for the retreat, where it lost about a company, and Fromelles, +where it lost half of what was left, it has been practically undamaged. +A lot of the wounded have rejoined since. All our company commanders +are regulars, and so are all our N.C.O.’s. The peace-time custom of +taking no notice of newly-joined officers is still more or less kept +up for the first six months. It’s bad enough for the Sandhurst chaps, +it’s worse for special reservists like you and Rugg and Robertson, it’s +worse still for outsiders like me from another regiment.’ We were going +down the village street. The men sitting about on the door-steps jumped +up smartly to attention as we passed and saluted with a fixed stony +glare. They were magnificent looking men. Their uniforms were spotless, +their equipment khaki-blancoed and their buttons and cap-badges +twinkling. We reached company headquarters, where I reported to my +company commander, Captain G. O. Thomas. He was a regular of seventeen +years’ service, a well-known polo-player, and a fine soldier. This is +the order that he would himself have preferred. He shook hands without +a word, waved me to a chair, offered a cigarette and continued +writing his letter. I found later that A was the best company I could +have struck. + +The Surrey-man asked me to help him censor some company letters before +going over to the battalion mess for lunch; they were more literate +than the ones in the Welsh regiment, but duller. On the way to the mess +he told me more about the battalion. He asked me whether it was my +first time out. ‘I was attached to the Second Welsh Regiment for three +months; I commanded a company there for a bit.’ ‘Oh, were you? Well, +I’d advise you to say nothing at all about it, then they’ll not expect +too much of you. They treat us like dirt; in a way it will be worse +for you than for me because you’re a full lieutenant. They’ll resent +that with your short service. There’s one lieutenant here of six years’ +service and second-lieutenants who have been out here since the autumn. +They have already had two Special Reserve captains foisted on them; +they’re planning to get rid of them somehow. In the mess, if you open +your mouth or make the slightest noise the senior officers jump down +your throat. Only officers of the rank of captain are allowed to drink +whisky or turn on the gramophone. We’ve got to jolly well keep still +and look like furniture. It’s just like peace time. Mess bills are very +high; the mess was in debt at Quetta last year and we are economising +now to pay that back. We get practically nothing for our money but +ordinary rations and the whisky we aren’t allowed to drink. + +‘We’ve even got a polo-ground here. There was a polo-match between the +First and Second Battalions the other day. The First Battalion had had +all their decent ponies pinched that time when they were sent up at +Ypres and the cooks and transport men had to come up into the line to +prevent a break through. So this battalion won easily. Can you +ride? No? Well, subalterns who can’t ride have to attend riding-school +every afternoon while we’re in billets. They give us hell, too. Two +of us have been at it for four months and haven’t passed off yet. +They keep us trotting round the field, with crossed stirrups most of +the time, and they give us pack-saddles instead of riding-saddles. +Yesterday they called us up suddenly without giving us time to change +into breeches. That reminds me, you notice everybody’s wearing shorts? +It’s a regimental order. The battalion thinks it’s still in India. +They treat the French civilians just like “niggers,” kick them about, +talk army Hindustani at them. It makes me laugh sometimes. Well, what +with a greasy pack-saddle, bare knees, crossed stirrups, and a wild +new transport pony that the transport men had pinched from the French, +I had a pretty thin time. The colonel, the adjutant, the senior major +and the transport officer stood at the four corners of the ring and +slogged at the ponies as they came round. I came off twice and got wild +with anger, and nearly decided to ride the senior major down. The funny +thing is that they don’t realize that they are treating us badly—it’s +such an honour to be serving with the regiment. So the best thing is to +pretend you don’t care what they do or say.’ + +I protested: ‘But all this is childish. Is there a war on here or isn’t +there?’ + +‘The battalion doesn’t recognize it socially,’ he answered. ‘Still, in +trenches I’d rather be with this battalion than in any other that I +have met. The senior officers do know their job, whatever else one says +about them, and the N.C.O.’s are absolutely trustworthy.’ + +The Second Battalion was peculiar in having a battalion mess instead of +company messes. The Surrey-man said grimly: ‘It’s supposed to be more +sociable.’ This was another peace-time survival. We went together +into the big château near the church. About fifteen officers of various +ranks were sitting in chairs reading the week’s illustrated papers +or (the seniors at least) talking quietly. At the door I said: ‘Good +morning, gentlemen,’ the new officer’s customary greeting to the mess. +There was no answer. Everybody looked at me curiously. The silence that +my entry had caused was soon broken by the gramophone, which began +singing happily: + + We’ve been married just one year, + And Oh, we’ve got the sweetest, + And Oh, we’ve got the neatest, + And Oh, we’ve got the cutest + Little oil stove. + +I found a chair in the background and picked up _The Field_. The door +burst open suddenly and a senior officer with a red face and angry +eye burst in. ‘Who the blazes put that record on?’ he shouted to the +room. ‘One of the bloody warts I expect. Take it off somebody. It +makes me sick. Let’s have some real music. Put on the _Angelus_.’ Two +subalterns (in the Royal Welch a subaltern had to answer to the name of +‘wart’) sprang up, stopped the gramophone, and put on _When the Angelus +is ringing_. The young captain who had put on _We’ve been married_ +shrugged his shoulders and went on reading, the other faces in the room +were blank. + +‘Who was that?’ I whispered to the Surrey-man. + +He frowned. ‘That’s Buzz Off,’ he said. + +Before the record was finished the door opened and in came the +colonel; Buzz Off reappeared with him. Everybody jumped up and said +in unison: ‘Good morning, sir.’ It was his first appearance that +day. Before giving the customary greeting and asking us to sit down he +turned spitefully to the gramophone: ‘Who on earth puts this wretched +_Angelus_ on every time I come into the mess? For heaven’s sake play +something cheery for a change.’ And with his own hands he took off the +_Angelus_, wound up the gramophone and put on _We’ve been married just +one year_. At that moment a gong rang for lunch and he abandoned it. +We filed into the next room, a ball-room with mirrors and a decorated +ceiling. We sat down at a long, polished table. The seniors sat at the +top, the juniors competed for seats as far away from them as possible. +I was unlucky enough to get a seat at the foot of the table facing the +commanding officer, the adjutant and Buzz Off. There was not a word +spoken down that end except for an occasional whisper for the salt +or for the beer—very thin French stuff. Robertson, who had not been +warned, asked the mess waiter for whisky. ‘Sorry, sir,’ said the mess +waiter, ‘it’s against orders for the young officers.’ Robertson was a +man of forty-two, a solicitor with a large practice, and had stood for +Parliament in the Yarmouth division at the previous election. + +I saw Buzz Off glaring at us and busied myself with my meat and +potatoes. + +He nudged the adjutant. ‘Who are those two funny ones down there, +Charley,’ he asked. + +‘New this morning from the militia. Answer to the names of Robertson +and Graves.’ + +‘Which is which?’ asked the colonel. + +‘I’m Robertson, sir.’ + +‘I wasn’t asking you.’ + +Robertson winced, but said nothing. Then Buzz Off noticed something. + +‘T’other wart’s wearing a wind-up tunic.’ Then he bent forward and +asked me loudly. ‘You there, wart. Why the hell are you wearing your +stars on your shoulder instead of your sleeve?’ + +My mouth was full and I was embarrassed. Everybody was looking at me. I +swallowed the lump of meat whole and said: ‘It was a regimental order +in the Welsh Regiment. I understood that it was the same everywhere in +France.’ + +The colonel turned puzzled to the adjutant: ‘What on earth’s the man +talking about the Welsh Regiment for?’ And then to me: ‘As soon as you +have finished your lunch you will visit the master-tailor. Report at +the orderly room when you’re properly dressed.’ + +There was a severe struggle in me between resentment and regimental +loyalty. Resentment for the moment had the better of it. I said under +my breath: ‘You damned snobs. I’ll survive you all. There’ll come a +time when there won’t be one of you left serving in the battalion to +remember battalion mess at Laventie.’ This time came, exactly a year +later.[4] + +We went up to the trenches that night. They were high-command trenches; +because water was struck when one dug down three feet, the parapet and +parados were built up man-high. I found my platoon curt and reserved. +Even when on sentry-duty at night they would never talk confidentially +about themselves and their families like my platoon in the Welsh +Regiment. Townsend, the platoon-sergeant, was an ex-policeman who had +been on the reserve when war broke out. He used to drive his men rather +than lead them. ‘A’ company was at Red Lamp Corner; the front trench +broke off short here and started again further back on the right. +A red lamp was hung at the corner, invisible to the enemy, but a +warning after dark to the company on our right not to fire to the left +of it. Work and duties were done with a silent soldier-like efficiency +quite foreign to the Welsh. + +The first night I was in trenches my company commander asked me to +go out on patrol; it was the regimental custom to test new officers +in this way. All the time that I had been with the Welsh I had never +once been out in No Man’s Land, even to inspect the barbed wire. In +the Welsh Regiment the condition of the wire was, I believe, the +responsibility of the battalion intelligence officer. I never remember +any work done on it by C Company. I think we left it to the Royal +Engineers. When Hewitt, the machine-gun officer, used to go out on +patrol sometimes it was regarded as a mad escapade. But with both +battalions of the Royal Welch Fusiliers it was a point of honour to +be masters of No Man’s Land from dusk to dawn. There was not a night +at Laventie that a message did not come down the line from sentry to +sentry: ‘Pass the word; officer’s patrol going out.’ My orders for this +patrol were to see whether a German sap-head was occupied by night or +not. + +I went out from Red Lamp Corner with Sergeant Townsend at about ten +o’clock. We both had revolvers. We pulled socks, with the toes cut +off, over our bare knees, to prevent them showing up in the dark and +to make crawling easier. We went ten yards at a time, slowly, not on +all fours, but wriggling flat along the ground. After each movement +we lay and watched for about ten minutes. We crawled through our own +wire entanglements and along a dry ditch; ripping our clothes on more +barbed wire, glaring into the darkness till it began turning round and +round (once I snatched my fingers in horror from where I had planted +them on the slimy body of an old corpse), nudging each other with +rapidly beating hearts at the slightest noise or suspicion, crawling, +watching, crawling, shamming dead under the blinding light of enemy +flares and again crawling, watching, crawling. (A Second Battalion +officer who revisited these Laventie trenches after the war was over +told me of the ridiculously small area of No Man’s Land compared with +the size it seemed on the long, painful journeys that he made over it. +‘It was like the real size of the hollow in a tooth compared with the +size it feels to the tongue.’) + +We found a gap in the German wire and came at last to within five yards +of the sap-head that was our objective. We waited quite twenty minutes +listening for any signs of its occupation. Then I nudged Sergeant +Townsend and, revolvers in hand, we wriggled quickly forward and slid +into it. It was about three feet deep and unoccupied. On the floor +were a few empty cartridges and a wicker basket containing something +large and smooth and round, twice as large as a football. Very, very +carefully I groped and felt all around it in the dark. I couldn’t guess +what it was. I was afraid that it was some sort of infernal machine. +Eventually I dared to lift it out and carry it back. I had a suspicion +that it might be one of the German gas-cylinders that we had heard +so much about. We got back after making the journey of perhaps two +hundred yards in rather more than two hours. The sentries passed along +the word that we were in again. Our prize turned out to be a large +glass container quarter-filled with some pale yellow liquid. This was +sent down to battalion headquarters and from there sent along to the +divisional intelligence office. Everybody was very interested in it. +The theory was that the vessel contained a chemical for re-damping gas +masks. I now believe it was the dregs of country wine mixed with +rainwater. I never heard the official report. The colonel, however, +told my company commander in the hearing of the Surrey-man: ‘Your new +wart seems to have more guts than the others.’ After this I went out +fairly often. I found that the only thing that the regiment respected +in young officers was personal courage. + +Besides, I had worked it out like this. The best way of lasting the +war out was to get wounded. The best time to get wounded was at night +and in the open, because a wound in a vital spot was less likely. Fire +was more or less unaimed at night and the whole body was exposed. +It was also convenient to be wounded when there was no rush on the +dressing-station services, and when the back areas were not being +heavily shelled. It was most convenient to be wounded, therefore, on +a night patrol in a quiet sector. You could usually manage to crawl +into a shell-hole until somebody came to the rescue. Still, patrolling +had its peculiar risks. If you were wounded and a German patrol got +you, they were as likely as not to cut your throat. The bowie-knife +was a favourite German patrol weapon; it was silent. (At this time +the British inclined more to the ‘cosh,’ a loaded stick.) The most +important information that a patrol could bring back was to what +regiment and division the troops opposite belonged. So if a wounded +man was found and it was impossible to get him back without danger to +oneself, the thing to be done was to strip him of his badges. To do +that quickly and silently it might be necessary first to cut his throat +or beat in his skull. + +Sir P. Mostyn, a lieutenant who was often out patrolling at Laventie, +had a feud on with a German patrol on the left of the battalion +frontage. (Our patrols usually consisted of an officer and one +or, at the most, two men. German patrols were usually six or seven men +under an N.C.O. German officers left as much as they decently could to +their N.C.O.’s. They did not, as one of our sergeant-majors put it, +believe in ‘keeping a dog and barking themselves.’) One night Mostyn +caught sight of his ♦opponets; he had raised himself on one knee to +throw a percussion bomb at them when they fired and wounded him in the +arm, which immediately went numb. He caught the bomb before it hit +the ground and threw it with his left hand, and in the confusion that +followed managed to return to the trench. + +♦ “opponets” replaced with “opponents” + +Like every one else I had a carefully worked out formula for taking +risks. We would all take any risk, even the certainty of death, to save +life or to maintain an important position. To take life we would run, +say, a one-in-five risk, particularly if there was some wider object +than merely reducing the enemy’s man-power; for instance, picking off +a well-known sniper, or getting fire ascendancy in trenches where the +lines were dangerously close. I only once refrained from shooting a +German I saw, and that was at Cuinchy about three weeks after this. +When sniping from a knoll in the support line where we had a concealed +loop-hole I saw a German, about seven hundred yards away, through my +telescopic sights. He was having a bath in the German third line. I +somehow did not like the idea of shooting a naked man, so I handed +the rifle to the sergeant who was with me and said: ‘Here, take this. +You’re a better shot than me.’ He got him, he said; but I had not +stayed to watch. + +About saving the lives of enemy wounded there was disagreement; the +convention varied with the division. Some divisions, like the Canadians +and a division of Lowland territorials, who had, they claimed, +atrocities to avenge, would not only take no risks to rescue +enemy wounded, but would go out of their way to finish them off. The +Royal Welch Fusiliers were gentlemanly: perhaps a one-in-twenty risk +to get a wounded German to safety would be considered justifiable. An +important factor in taking risks was our own physical condition. When +exhausted and wanting to get quickly from one point in the trenches to +another without collapse, and if the enemy were not nearer than four or +five hundred yards, we would sometimes take a short cut over the top. +In a hurry we would take a one-in-two-hundred risk, when dead tired a +one-in-fifty risk. In some battalions where the _morale_ was not high, +one-in-fifty risks were often taken in mere laziness or despair. The +Munsters in the First Division were said by the Welsh to ‘waste men +wicked’ by not keeping properly under cover when in the reserve lines. +In the Royal Welch there was no wastage of this sort. At no time in the +war did any of us allow ourselves to believe that hostilities could +possibly continue more than nine months or a year more, so it seemed +almost worth while taking care; there even seemed a chance of lasting +until the end absolutely unhurt. + +The Second Royal Welch, unlike the Second Welsh, believed themselves +better trench fighters than the Germans. With the Second Welsh it +was not cowardice but modesty. With the Second Royal Welch it was +not vainglory but courage: as soon as they arrived in a new sector +they insisted on getting fire ascendancy. Having found out from the +troops they relieved all possible information as to enemy snipers, +machine-guns, and patrols, they set themselves to deal with them one +by one. They began with machine-guns firing at night. As soon as one +started traversing down a trench the whole platoon farthest removed +from its fire would open five rounds rapid at it. The machine-gun +would usually stop suddenly but start again after a minute or two. +Again five rounds rapid. Then it usually gave up. + +The Welsh seldom answered a machine-gun. If they did, it was not with +local organized fire, beginning and ending in unison, but in ragged +confused protest all along the line. There was almost no firing at +night in the Royal Welch, except organized fire at a machine-gun or +a persistent enemy sentry, or fire at a patrol close enough to be +distinguished as a German one. With all other battalions I met in +France there was random popping off all the time; the sentries wanted +to show their spite against the war. Flares were rarely used in the +Royal Welch; most often as signals to our patrols that it was time to +come back. + +As soon as enemy machine-guns had been discouraged, our patrols would +go out with bombs to claim possession of No Man’s Land. At dawn next +morning came the struggle for sniping ascendancy. The Germans, we +were told, had special regimental snipers, trained in camouflaging +themselves. I saw one killed once at Cuinchy who had been firing all +day from a shell-hole between the lines. He had a sort of cape over his +shoulders of imitation grass, his face was painted green and brown, +and his rifle was also green fringed. A number of empty cartridges +were found by him, and his cap with the special oak-leaf badge. Few +battalions attempted to get control of the sniping situation. The +Germans had the advantage of having many times more telescopic sights +than we did, and steel loopholes that our bullets could not pierce. +Also a system by which the snipers were kept for months in the same +sector until they knew all the loopholes and shallow places in our +trenches, and the tracks that our ration-parties used above-ground by +night, and where our traverses came in the trench, and so on, +better than we did ourselves. British snipers changed their trenches, +with their battalions, every week or two, and never had time to learn +the German line thoroughly. But at least we counted on getting rid of +the unprofessional German sniper. Later we had an elephant-gun in the +battalion that would pierce the German loopholes, and if we could not +locate the loophole of a persistent sniper we did what we could to +dislodge him by a volley of rifle-grenades, or even by ringing up the +artillery. + +It puzzled us that if a sniper were spotted and killed, another sniper +would begin again next day from the same position. The Germans probably +underrated us and regarded it as an accident. The willingness of other +battalions to let the Germans have sniping ascendancy helped us; enemy +snipers often exposed themselves unnecessarily, even the professionals. +There was, of course, one advantage of which no advance or retreat of +the enemy could rob us, and that was that we were always facing more or +less East; dawn broke behind the German lines, and they seldom realized +that for several minutes every morning we could see them though still +invisible ourselves. German night wiring-parties often stayed out too +long, and we could get a man or two as they went back; sunsets were +against us, but sunset was a less critical time. Sentries at night were +made to stand with their head and shoulders above the trenches and +their rifles in position on the parapet. This surprised me at first. +But it meant greater vigilance and self-confidence in the sentry, +and it put the top of his head above the level of the parapet. Enemy +machine-guns were trained on this level, and it was safer to be hit in +the chest or shoulders than in the top of the head. The risk of unaimed +fire at night was negligible, so this was really the safest plan. +It often happened in battalions like the Second Welsh, where the +head-and-shoulder rule was not in force and the sentry just took a peep +now and then, that an enemy patrol would sneak up unseen to the British +wire, throw a few bombs and get safely back. In the Royal Welch the +barbed-wire entanglement was the responsibility of the company behind +it. One of our first acts on taking over trenches was to inspect and +repair it. We did a lot of work on the wire. + +Thomas was an extremely silent man; it was not sullenness but shyness. +‘Yes’ and ‘no’ was the limit of his usual conversation; it was +difficult for us subalterns. He never took us into his confidence about +company affairs, and we did not like asking him too much. His chief +interests seemed to be polo and the regiment. He was most conscientious +in taking his watch at night, a thing that the other company commanders +did not always do. We enjoyed his food-hampers sent every week from +Fortnum and Mason; we messed by companies when in the trenches. Our +only complaint was that Buzz Off, who had a good nose for a hamper, +used to spend more time than he would otherwise have done in the +company mess. This embarrassed us. Thomas went on leave to England +about this time. I heard about it accidentally. He walked about the +West End astonished at the amateur militariness that he met everywhere. +To be more in keeping with it he gave elaborate awkward salutes to +newly joined second-lieutenants and raised his cap to dug-out colonels +and generals. It was a private joke at the expense of the war. + +I used to look forward to our spells in trenches at Laventie. Billet +life meant battalion mess, also riding-school, which I found rather +worse than the Surrey-man had described it. Parades were carried +out with peace-time punctiliousness and smartness, especially the +daily battalion guard-changing which every now and then, when I was +orderly officer, it was my duty to supervise. On one occasion, after +the guard-changing ceremony and inspection were over and I was about +to dismiss the old guard, I saw Buzz Off cross the village street +from one company headquarters to another. As he crossed I called the +guard to attention and saluted. I waited for a few seconds and then +dismissed the guard, but he had not really gone into the biliet; he +had been waiting in the doorway. As soon as I dismissed the guard he +dashed out with a great show of anger. ‘As you were, as you were, stand +fast!’ he shouted to the guard. And then to me: ‘Why in hell’s name, +Mr. Graves, didn’t you ask my permission to dismiss the parade? You’ve +read the King’s Regulations, haven’t you? And where the devil are your +manners, anyhow?’ I apologized. I said that I thought he had gone into +the house. This made matters worse. He bellowed at me for arguing; +then he asked me where I had learned to salute. ‘At the depot, sir,’ I +answered. ‘Then, by heaven, Mr. Graves, you’ll have to learn to salute +as the battalion does. You will parade every morning before breakfast +for a month under Staff-sergeant Evans and do an hour’s saluting +drill.’ Then he turned to the guard and dismissed them himself. This +was not a particular act of spite against me but the general game of +‘chasing the warts,’ at which all the senior officers played. It was +honestly intended to make us better soldiers. + +I had been with the Royal Welch about three weeks when the Nineteenth +Brigade was moved down to the Béthune sector to fill a gap in the +Second Division; the gap was made by taking out the brigade of Guards +to go into the Guards Division which was then being formed. On +the way down we marched past Lord Kitchener. Kitchener, we were told, +commented to the brigadier on the soldier-like appearance of the +leading battalion—which was ourselves—but said cynically: ‘Wait until +they’ve been a week or two in the trenches; they will lose some of +that high polish.’ He apparently mistook us for one of the new-army +battalions. + +The first trenches we went into on our arrival were the Cuinchy +brick-stacks. The company I was with was on the canal-bank frontage, +a few hundred yards to the left of where I had been with the Welsh +Regiment at the end of May. The Germans opposite wished to be sociable. +They sent messages over to us in undetonated rifle-grenades. One of +these messages was evidently addressed to the Irish battalion we had +relieved: + + We all German korporals wish you English korporals a good day and + invite you to a good German dinner to-night with beer (ale) and + cakes. You little dog ran over to us and we keep it safe; it became + no food with you so it run to us. Answer in the same way, if you + please. + +Another message was a copy of the _Neueste Nachrichten_, a German army +newspaper printed at Lille. It gave sensational details of Russian +defeats around Warsaw and immense captures of prisoners and guns. +But we were more interested in a full account in another column of +the destruction of a German submarine by British armed trawlers; no +details of the sinking of German submarines had been allowed to appear +in any English papers. The battalion cared no more about the successes +or reverses of our Allies than it did about the origins of the +war. It never allowed itself to have any political feelings about the +Germans. A professional soldier’s job was to fight whomsoever the +King ordered him to fight; it was as simple as that. With the King as +colonel-in-chief of the regiment it was even simpler. The Christmas +1914 fraternization, in which the battalion was among the first to +participate, was of the same professional simplicity; it was not an +emotional hiatus but a commonplace of military tradition—an exchange of +courtesies between officers of opposite armies. + +Cuinchy was one of the worst places for rats. They came up from the +canal and fed on the many corpses and multiplied. When I was here with +the Welsh a new officer came to the company, and, as a token of his +welcome, he was given a dug-out containing a spring-bed. When he turned +in that night he heard a scuffling, shone his torch on the bed, and +there were two rats on his blankets tussling for the possession of a +severed hand. This was thought a great joke. + +The colonel called for a patrol to go out along the side of the +tow-path, where we had heard suspicious sounds on the previous night, +to see whether a working-party was out. I volunteered to go when it +was dark. But there was a moon that night so bright and full that it +dazzled the eyes to look at it. Between us and the Germans was a flat +stretch of about two hundred yards, broken only by shell-craters and an +occasional patch of coarse grass. I was not with my own company, but +lent to B, which had two officers away on leave. Childe-Freeman, the +company commander, said: ‘You’re not going out on patrol to-night, are +you? It’s almost as bright as day.’ I said: ‘All the more reason for +going; they won’t be expecting me. Will you please have everything +as usual? Let the men fire an occasional rifle and send up a flare +every half hour. If I go carefully they’ll not see me.’ But I was +nervous, and while we were having supper I clumsily knocked over a +cup of tea, and after that a plate. Freeman said: ‘Look here, I’ll +’phone through to battalion and tell them it’s too bright for you to +go out.’ But I knew Buzz Off would accuse me of cold feet, so Sergeant +Williams and I put on our crawlers and went out by way of a mine-crater +at the side of the tow-path. There was no need that night for the +usual staring business. We could see only too clearly. All we had +to do was to wait for an opportunity to move quickly, stop dead and +trust to luck, then move on quickly again. We planned our rushes from +shell-hole to shell-hole; the opportunities were provided by artillery +or machine-gun fire which would distract the sentries. Many of the +craters contained corpses of men who had been wounded and crept in and +died. Some of them were skeletons, picked clean by the rats. We got to +within thirty yards of a big German working-party who were digging a +trench ahead of their front line. Between them and us we could count +a covering party of ten men lying on the grass in their great-coats. +We had gone far enough. There was a German lying on his back about +twelve yards away humming a tune. It was the ‘Merry Widow’ waltz. The +sergeant, who was behind me, pressed my foot with his hand and showed +me the revolver he was carrying. He raised his eyebrows inquiringly. +I gave him the signal for ‘no.’ We turned to go back; it was hard not +to go back too quickly. We had got about half-way back when a German +machine-gun opened traversing fire along the top of our trenches. We +immediately jumped to our feet; the bullets were brushing the grass, +so it was safer to be standing up. We walked the rest of the way +back, but moving irregularly to distract the aim of the covering party +if they saw us. Back in the trench I rang up the artillery and asked +them to fire as much shrapnel as they could spare fifty yards short of +where the German front trench touched the tow-path; I knew that one of +the night-lines of the battery supporting us was trained near enough +to this point. A minute and a quarter later the shells started coming +over. We heard the clash of downed tools and distant shouts and cries; +we reckoned the probable casualties. The next morning at stand-to Buzz +Off came up to me: ‘I hear you were on patrol last night?’ I said: +‘Yes, sir.’ He asked me for particulars. When I had told him about the +covering party he cursed me for ‘not scuppering them with that revolver +of yours. Cold feet,’ he snorted as he turned away. + +One day while we were here the Royal Welch were instructed to shout +across to the enemy and induce them to take part in a conversation. +The object was to find out how strongly the German front trenches were +manned at night. A German-speaking officer in the company among the +brick-stacks was provided with a megaphone. He shouted: ‘Wie gehts +ihnen, kamaraden?’ Somebody shouted back in delight: ‘Ah, Tommee, hast +du den deutsch gelernt?’ Firing stopped and a conversation began across +the fifty yards or so of No Man’s Land. The Germans refused to say +what regiment they were. They would not talk any military shop. One of +them shouted out: ‘Les sheunes madamoiselles de La Bassée bonnes pour +coucher avec. Les madamoiselles de Béthune bonnes aussi, hein?’ Our +spokesman refused to discuss this. In the pause that followed he asked +how the Kaiser was. They replied respectfully that he was in excellent +health, thank you. ‘And how is the Crown Prince?’ he asked them. ‘Oh, +b——r the Crown Prince,’ shouted somebody in English, and was immediately +suppressed by his comrades. There was a confusion of angry voices and +laughter. Then they all began singing the ‘Wacht am Rhein.’ The trench +was evidently very well held indeed. + + + + + XV + + +This was the end of August 1915, and particulars of the coming +offensive against La Bassée were beginning to leak through the young +staff officers. The French civilians knew that it was coming and +so, naturally, did the Germans. Every night now new batteries and +lorry-trains of shells came rumbling up the Béthune-La Bassée road. +There were other signs of movement: sapping forward at Vermelles and +Cambrin, where the lines were too far apart for a quick rush across, +to make a new front line; orders for evacuation of hospitals; the +appearance of cavalry and new-army divisions. Then Royal Engineer +officers supervised the digging of pits at intervals in the front +line. They were sworn not to say what these were for, but we knew that +they were for gas-cylinders. Scaling ladders for climbing quickly out +of trenches were brought up by the lorry-load and dumped at Cambrin +village. As early as September 3rd I had a bet with Robertson that our +division would attack on this Cambrin-Cuinchy sector. When I went home +on leave on September 9th the sense of impending events was so great +that I almost wished I was not going. + +Leave came round for officers about every six or eight months in +ordinary times; heavy casualties shortened the period, general +offensives cut off leave altogether. There was only one officer in +France who was ever said to have refused to go on leave when his +turn came round—Cross of the Fifty-second Light Infantry (the Second +Battalion of the Oxford and Bucks Light Infantry, which insisted on +its original style as jealously as we kept our ‘c’ in ‘Welch’). Cross +is alleged to have refused leave on these grounds: ‘My father fought +with the regiment in the South African War and had no leave; my +grandfather fought in the Crimea with the regiment and had no leave. I +do not regard it in the regimental tradition to take home-leave when on +active service.’ Cross was a professional survivor and was commanding +the battalion in 1917 when I last heard of him. + +London seemed unreally itself. In spite of the number of men in uniform +in the streets, the general indifference to and ignorance about the +war was remarkable. Enlistment was still voluntary. The universal +catchword was ‘Business as usual.’ My family were living in London +now, at the house formerly occupied by my uncle, Robert von Ranke, the +German consul. He had been forced to leave in a hurry on August 4th, +1914, and my mother had undertaken to look after it for him while the +war lasted. So when Edward Marsh, then secretary to the Prime Minister, +rang me up from Downing Street to arrange a meal, someone intervened +and cut him off. The telephone of the German consul’s sister was, of +course, closely watched by the anti-espionage men of Scotland Yard. The +Zeppelin scare had just begun. Some friends of the family came in one +night. They knew I had been in the trenches, but were not interested. +They began telling me of the air-raids, of bombs dropped only three +streets off. So I said: ‘Well, do you know, the other day I was asleep +in a house and in the early morning an aeroplane dropped a bomb next +door and killed three soldiers who were billeted there, and a woman +and child.’ ‘Good gracious,’ they said, looking at me with sudden +interest, ‘what did you do then?’ I said: ‘I went to sleep again; I was +tired out. It was at a place called Beuvry, about four miles behind +the trenches.’ They said: ‘Oh, but that was in France,’ and the look +of interest faded from their faces, as though I had taken them in +with a stupid catch. I went up to Harlech for the rest of my leave, and +walked about on the hills in an old shirt and a pair of shorts. When I +got back, ‘The Actor,’ a regular officer in A Company, asked me: ‘Had +a good time on leave?’ I said ‘Yes.’ He said: ‘Go to many dances?’ +I said: ‘Not one.’ ‘What shows did you go to?’ ‘I didn’t go to any +shows.’ ‘Hunt?’ ‘No!’ ‘Slept with any nice girls?’ ‘No, I didn’t. Sorry +to disappoint you.’ ‘What the hell _did_ you do, then?’ ‘Oh, I just +walked about on some hills.’ ‘Good God,’ he said, ‘chaps like you don’t +deserve to go on leave.’ + +On September 19th we relieved the Middlesex at Cambrin, and it was +said that these were the trenches from which we were to attack. The +preliminary bombardment had already started, a week in advance. As I +led my platoon into the line I recognized with some disgust the same +machine-gun shelter where I had seen the suicide on my first night in +trenches. It seemed ominous. This was the first heavy bombardment that +I had yet seen from our own guns. The trenches shook properly and a +great cloud of drifting shell-smoke clouded the German trenches. The +shells went over our heads in a steady stream; we had to shout to make +our neighbours hear. Dying down a little at night, the noise began +again every morning at dawn, a little louder each time. We said: ‘Damn +it, there can’t be a living soul left in those trenches.’ And still +it went on. The Germans retaliated, though not very vigorously. Most +of their heavy artillery had been withdrawn from this sector, we were +told, and sent across to the Russian front. We had more casualties +from our own shorts and from blow-backs than from German shells. Much +of the ammunition that our batteries were using came from America and +contained a high percentage of duds; the driving-bands were always +coming off. We had fifty casualties in the ranks and three officer +casualties, including Buzz Off, who was badly wounded in the head. +This was before steel helmets were issued; we would not have lost +nearly so many if we had had them. I had two insignificant wounds on +the hand which I took as an omen on the right side. On the morning of +the 23rd Thomas came back from battalion headquarters with a notebook +in his hand and a map for each of us company officers. ‘Listen,’ he +said, ‘and copy out all this skite on the back of your maps. You’ll +have to explain it to your platoons this afternoon. To-morrow morning +we go back to Béthune to dump our blankets, packs, and greatcoats. On +the next day, that’s Saturday the 25th, we attack.’ It was the first +definite news we had been given and we looked up half startled, half +relieved. I still have the map and these are the orders as I copied +them down: + + First Objective.—_Les Briques Farm._—The big house plainly + visible to our front, surrounded by trees. To get this it is + necessary to cross three lines of enemy trenches. The first is three + hundred yards distant, the second four hundred, and the third about + six hundred. We then cross two railways. Behind the second railway + line is a German trench called the Brick Trench. Then comes the Farm, + a strong place with moat and cellars and a kitchen garden strongly + staked and wired. + + Second Objective.—_The Town of Auchy._—This is also plainly + visible from our trenches. It is four hundred yards beyond the Farm + and defended by a first line of trench half way across, and a + second line immediately in front of the town. When we have occupied + the first line our direction is half-right, with the left of the + battalion directed on Tall Chimney. + + Third Objective.—_Village of Haisnes._—Conspicuous by + high-spired church. Our eventual line will be taken up on the railway + behind this village, where we will dig in and await reinforcements. + +When Thomas had reached this point the shoulders of The Actor were +shaking with laughter. ‘What’s up?’ asked Thomas irritably. The Actor +asked: ‘Who in God’s Name is originally responsible for this little +effort?’ Thomas said: ‘Don’t know. Probably Paul the Pimp or someone +like that.’ (Paul the Pimp was a captain on the divisional staff, +young, inexperienced and much disliked. He ‘wore red tabs upon his +chest, And even on his undervest.’) ‘Between you and me, but you +youngsters be careful not to let the men know, this is what they call +a subsidiary attack. We’ll have no supports. We’ve just got to go over +and keep the enemy busy while the folk on our right do the real work. +You notice that the bombardment is much heavier over there. They’ve +knocked the Hohenzollern Redoubt to bits. Personally, I don’t give a +damn either way. We’ll get killed anyhow.’ We all laughed. ‘All right, +laugh now, but by God on Saturday we’ve got to carry out this funny +scheme.’ I had never heard Thomas so talkative before. ‘Sorry,’ The +Actor apologized, ‘carry on with the dictation.’ Thomas went on: + + ‘The attack will be preceded by forty minutes discharge of the + accessory,[5] which will clear the path for a thousand yards, so + that the two railway lines will be occupied without difficulty. Our + advance will follow closely behind the accessory. Behind us are three + fresh divisions and the Cavalry Corps. It is expected we shall have + no difficulty in breaking through. All men will parade with their + platoons; pioneers, servants, etc. to be warned. All platoons to be + properly told off under N.C.O.’s. Every N.C.O. is to know exactly + what is expected of him, and when to take over command in case of + casualties. Men who lose touch must join up with the nearest company + or regiment and push on. Owing to the strength of the accessory, men + should be warned against remaining too long in captured trenches + where the accessory is likely to collect, but to keep to the open and + above all to push on. It is important that if smoke-helmets have to + be pulled down they must be tucked in under the shirt.’ + +[Illustration: THE CAMBRIN—CUINCHY—VERMELLES TRENCH SECTOR] + +The Actor interrupted again. ‘Tell me, Thomas, do you believe in this +funny accessory?’ Thomas said: ‘It’s damnable. It’s not soldiering +to use stuff like that even though the Germans did start it. It’s +dirty, and it’ll bring us bad luck. We’re sure to bungle it. Look +at those new gas-companies, (sorry, excuse me this once, I mean +accessory-companies). Their very look makes me tremble. Chemistry-dons +from London University, a few lads straight from school, one or two +N.C.O.’s of the old-soldier type, trained together for three weeks, +then given a job as responsible as this. Of course they’ll bungle +it. How could they do anything else? But let’s be merry. I’m going on +again: + + ‘Men of company: what they are to carry: + + Two hundred rounds of ammunition (bomb-throwers fifty, and signallers + one hundred and fifty rounds). + + Heavy tools carried in sling by the strongest men. + + Waterproof sheet in belt. + + Sandbag in right coat-pocket. + + Field dressing and iodine. + + Emergency ration, including biscuit. + + One tube-helmet, to be worn when we advance, foiled up on the head. + It must be quite secure and the top part turned down. If possible + each man will be provided with an elastic band. + + One smoke-helmet, old pattern, to be carried for preference behind + the back where it is least likely to be damaged by stray bullets, etc. + + Wire-cutters, as many as possible, by wiring party and others; + hedging-gloves by wire party. + + Platoon screens, for artillery observation, to be carried by a man in + each platoon who is not carrying a tool. + + Packs, capes, greatcoats, blankets will be dumped, not carried. + + No one is to carry sketches of our position or anything likely to be + of service to the enemy.’ + +‘That’s all. I believe we’re going over first with the Middlesex in +support. If we get through the German wire I’ll be satisfied. Our guns +don’t seem to be cutting it. Perhaps they’re putting that off until the +intense bombardment. Any questions?’ + +That afternoon I repeated it all to the platoon and told them of +the inevitable success attending our assault. They seemed to believe +it. All except Sergeant Townsend. ‘Do you say, sir, that we have +three divisions and the Cavalry Corps behind us?’ he asked. ‘Yes,’ I +answered. ‘Well, excuse me, sir, I’m thinking it’s only those chaps on +the right that’ll get reinforcements. If we get half a platoon of Mons +Angels, that’s about all we will get.’ ‘Sergeant Townsend,’ I said, +‘you are a well-known pessimist. This is going to be a good show.’ The +next morning we were relieved by the Middlesex and marched back to +Béthune, where we dumped our spare kit at the Montmorency Barracks. The +battalion officers messed together in a big house near by. This billet +was claimed at the same time by the staff of a new-army division which +was to take part in the fighting next day. The argument was settled +in a friendly way by division and battalion messing together. It was, +someone pointed out, like a caricature of The Last Supper in duplicate. +In the middle of the long table sat the two pseudo-Christs, the +battalion colonel and the divisional general. Everybody was drinking a +lot; the subalterns were allowed whisky for a treat, and were getting +rowdy. They raised their glasses with: ‘Cheero, we will be messing +together to-morrow night in La Bassée.’ Only the company commanders +were looking worried. I remember C Company commander especially, +Captain A. L. Samson, biting his thumb and refusing to join in the +general excitement. I think it was Childe-Freeman of B company who said +that night: ‘The last time the regiment was in these parts it was under +decent generalship. Old Marlborough knew better than to attack the La +Bassée lines; he masked them and went round.’ + +The G.S.O. 1 of the new-army division, a staff-colonel, knew the +adjutant well. They had played polo together in India. I happened to +be sitting next to them. The G.S.O. 1 said to the adjutant, rather +drunkenly: ‘Charley, do you see that silly old woman over there? Calls +himself General Commanding. Doesn’t know where he is; doesn’t know +where his division is; can’t read a map properly. He’s marched the poor +sods off their feet and left his supplies behind, God knows where. +They’ve had to use their iron rations and what they could pick up in +the villages. And to-morrow he’s going to fight a battle. Doesn’t know +anything about battles; the men have never been in trenches before, +and to-morrow’s going to be a glorious balls-up, and the day after +to-morrow he’ll be sent home.’ Then he said, quite seriously: ‘Really, +Charley, it’s just like that, you mark my words.’ + +That night we marched back again to Cambrin. The men were singing. +Being mostly from the Midlands they sang comic songs instead of Welsh +hymns: _Slippery Sam_, _When we’ve Wound up the Watch on the Rhine_, +and _I do like a S’nice S’mince Pie_, to concertina accompaniment. The +tune of the _S’nice S’mince Pie_ ran in my head all next day, and for +the week following I could not get rid of it. The Second Welsh would +never have sung a song like _When we’ve Wound up the Watch on the +Rhine_. Their only songs about the war were defeatist: + + I want to go home, + I want to go home, + The coal-box and shrapnel they whistle and roar, + I don’t want to go to the trenches no more, + I want to go over the sea + Where the Kayser can’t shoot bombs at me. + Oh, I + Don’t want to die, + I want to go home. + +There were several more verses in the same strain. Hewitt, the Welsh +machine-gun officer, had written one in a more offensive spirit: + + I want to go home, + I want to go home. + One day at Givenchy the week before last + The Allmands attacked and they nearly got past. + They pushed their way up to the keep, + Through our maxim-gun sight we did peep, + Oh my! + They let out a cry, + They never got home. + +But the men would not sing it, though they all admired Hewitt. + +The Béthune-La Bassée road was choked with troops, guns, and transport, +and we had to march miles north out of our way to get back to Cambrin. +As it was we were held up two or three times by massed cavalry. +Everything seemed in confusion. A casualty clearing-station had been +planted astride one of the principal crossroads and was already being +shelled. When we reached Cambrin we had marched about twenty miles in +all that day. We were told then that the Middlesex would go over first +with us in support, and to their left the Second Argyll and Sutherland +Highlanders, with the Cameronians in support; the junior officers +complained loudly at our not being given the honour of leading the +attack. We were the senior regiment, they protested, and entitled to +the ‘Right of the Line.’ We moved into trench sidings just in front +of the village. There was about half a mile of communication trench +between us and the trenches proper, known as Maison Rouge Alley. It +was an hour or so past midnight. At half-past five the gas was to +be discharged. We were cold, tired and sick, not at all in the mood +for a battle. We tried to snatch an hour or two of sleep squatting +in the trench. It had been raining for some time. Grey, watery dawn +broke at last behind the German lines; the bombardment, which had been +surprisingly slack all night, brisked up a little. ‘Why the devil don’t +they send them over quicker?’ asked The Actor. ‘This isn’t my idea of a +bombardment. We’re getting nothing opposite us. What little there is is +going into the Hohenzollern.’ ‘Shell shortage. Expected it,’ answered +Thomas. We were told afterwards that on the 23rd a German aeroplane had +bombed the Army Reserve shell-dump and sent it up. The bombardment on +the 24th and on the day of the battle itself was nothing compared with +that of the previous days. Thomas looked strained and ill. ‘It’s time +they were sending that damned accessory off. I wonder what’s doing.’ + +What happened in the next few minutes is difficult for me now to sort +out. It was more difficult still at the time. All we heard back there +in the sidings was a distant cheer, confused crackle of rifle-fire, +yells, heavy shelling on our front line, more shouts and yells and a +continuous rattle of machine-guns. After a few minutes, lightly-wounded +men of the Middlesex came stumbling down Maison Rouge Alley to the +dressing-station. I was at the junction of the siding and the alley. +‘What’s happened? What’s happened?’ I asked. ‘Bloody balls-up’ was the +most detailed answer I could get. Among the wounded were a number +of men yellow-faced and choking, with their buttons tarnished green; +these were gas cases. Then came the stretcher cases. Maison Rouge Alley +was narrow and the stretchers had difficulty in getting down. The +Germans started shelling it with five-point-nines. Thomas went through +the shelling to battalion headquarters to ask for orders. It was the +same place that I had visited on my first night in the trenches. This +group of dug-outs in the reserve line showed very plainly from the +air as battalion headquarters, and should never have been occupied on +the day of a battle. Just before Thomas arrived the Germans put five +shells into it. The adjutant jumped one way, the colonel another, the +regimental sergeant-major a third. One shell went into the signals +dug-out and destroyed the telephone. The colonel had a slight wound on +his hand; he joined the stream of wounded and was carried as far as +the base with it. The adjutant took charge. All this time A Company +had been waiting in the siding for the rum to arrive; the tradition +of every attack was a double tot of rum beforehand. All the other +companies got it except ours. The Actor was cursing: ‘Where the bloody +hell’s that storeman gone?’ We fixed bayonets in readiness to go up to +the attack as soon as Thomas came back with orders. The Actor sent me +along the siding to the other end of the company. The stream of wounded +was continuous. At last Thomas’s orderly appeared, saying: ‘Captain’s +orders, sir: A Company to move up to the front line.’ It seems that +at that moment the storeman appeared with the rum. He was hugging the +rum-bottle, without rifle or equipment, red-faced and retching. He +staggered up to The Actor and said: ‘There you are, sir,’ then fell +on his face in the thick mud of a sump-pit at the junction of the +trench and the siding. The stopper of the bottle flew out and what +was left of the three gallons bubbled on the ground. The Actor said +nothing. It was a crime deserving the death-penalty. He put one foot +on the storeman’s neck, the other in the small of his back, and trod +him into the mud. Then he gave the order ‘Company forward.’ The company +went forward with a clatter of steel over the body, and that was the +last heard of the storeman. + +What had happened in the front line was this. At half-past four the +commander of the gas-company in the front line sent a telephone message +through to divisional headquarters: ‘Dead calm. Impossible discharge +accessory.’ The answer came back: ‘Accessory to be discharged at all +costs.’ Thomas’s estimate of the gas-company’s efficiency was right +enough. The spanners for unscrewing the cocks of the cylinders were +found, with two or three exceptions, to be misfits. The gas-men rushed +about shouting and asking each other for the loan of an adjustable +spanner. They discharged one or two cylinders with the spanners that +they had; the gas went whistling out, formed a thick cloud a few +yards away in No Man’s Land, and then gradually spread back into the +trenches. The Germans had been expecting the attack. They immediately +put their gas-helmets on, semi-rigid ones, better than ours. Bundles of +oily cotton-waste were strewn along the German parapet and set alight +as a barrier to the gas. Then their batteries opened on our lines. The +confusion in the front trench was great; the shelling broke several of +the gas-cylinders and the trench was soon full of gas. The gas-company +dispersed. + +No orders could come through because the shell in the signals dug-out +at battalion headquarters had cut communication both between +companies and battalion headquarters and between battalion headquarters +and division. The officers in the front trench had to decide on +immediate action. Two companies of the Middlesex, instead of waiting +for the intense bombardment which was to follow the forty minutes +of gas, charged at once and got as far as the German wire-which our +artillery had not yet attempted to cut. What shelling there had been +on it was shrapnel and not high explosive; shrapnel was no use against +barbed wire. The Germans shot the Middlesex men down. It is said that +one platoon found a gap and got into the German trench. But there +were no survivors of the platoon to confirm the story. The Argyll and +Sutherland Highlanders went over too, on their left. Two companies, +instead of charging at once, rushed back to the support line out of the +gas-filled front trench and attacked from there. It will be recalled +that the front line had been pushed forward in preparation for the +battle; these companies were therefore attacking from the old front +line. The barbed wire entanglements in front of this trench had not +been removed, so that they were caught and machine-gunned between +their own front and support lines. The leading companies were equally +unsuccessful. When the attack started, the German N.C.O.’s had jumped +up on the parapet to encourage their men. It was a Jaeger regiment and +their musketry was good. + +The survivors of the first two companies of the Middlesex were lying in +shell-craters close to the German wire, sniping and making the Germans +keep their heads down. They had bombs to throw, but these were nearly +all of a new type issued for the battle; the fuses were lit on the +match-and-matchbox principle and the rain had made them useless. The +other two companies of the Middlesex soon followed in support. +Machine-gun fire stopped them half-way. Only one German machine-gun +was now in action, the others had been knocked out by rifle or +trench-mortar fire. Why the single gun remained in action is a story in +itself. + +It starts like this. British colonial governors and high-commissioners +had the privilege of nominating one or two officers from their +countries to be attached in war-time to the regular British forces. +Under this scheme the officers appointed began as full lieutenants. +The Governor-General of Jamaica (or whatever his proper style may be) +nominated the eighteen-year-old son of a rich Jamaica planter. He was +sent straight from Jamaica to the First Middlesex. He was good-hearted +enough but of little use in the trenches. He had never been out of +the island in his life and, except for a short service with the West +Indian militia, knew nothing of soldiering. His company commander took +a fatherly interest in Young Jamaica, as he was called, and tried to +teach him his duties. This company commander was known as The Boy. +He had twenty years’ service in the Middlesex, and the unusual boast +of having held every rank from ‘boy’ to captain in the same company. +His father, I believe, had been the regimental sergeant-major. The +difficulty was that Jamaica was a full lieutenant and so senior +to the other experienced subalterns in the company, who were only +second-lieutenants. The colonel decided to shift Jamaica off on some +course or extra-regimental appointment at the earliest opportunity. +Somewhere about May or June he had been asked to supply an officer +for the brigade trench-mortar company, and he had sent Jamaica. +Trench-mortars at that time were dangerous and ineffective; so the +appointment seemed suitable. At the same time the Royal Welch Fusiliers +had also been asked to detail an officer, and the colonel had sent +Tiley, an ex-planter from Malay, who was what is called a fine natural +soldier. He had been chosen because he was attached from another +regiment and had showed his resentment at the manner of his welcome +somewhat too plainly. By September mortars had improved in design and +become an important infantry arm; Jamaica was senior to Tiley and was +therefore in the responsible position of commanding the company. + +When the Middlesex made the charge, The Boy was mortally wounded as +he climbed over the parapet. He fell back and began crawling down +the trench to the stretcher-bearers’ dug-out. He passed Jamaica’s +trench-mortar emplacement. Jamaica had lost his gun-team and was +serving the trench-mortars himself. When he saw The Boy he forgot about +his guns and ran off to get a stretcher-party. Tiley meanwhile, on the +other flank, opposite Mine Point, had knocked out the machine-guns +within range. He went on until his gun burst. The machine-gun in the +Pope’s Nose, a small salient opposite Jamaica, remained in action. + +It was at this point that the Royal Welch Fusiliers came up in support. +Maison Rouge Alley was a nightmare; the Germans were shelling it with +five-nines bursting with a black smoke and with lachrymatory shells. +This caused a continual scramble backwards and forwards. There were +cries and counter-cries: ‘Come on!’ ‘Get back, you bastards!’ ‘Gas +turning on us!’ ‘Keep your heads, you men!’ ‘Back like hell, boys.’ +‘Whose orders?’ ‘What’s happening?’ ‘Gas!’ ‘Back!’ ‘Come on!’ ‘Gas!’ +‘Back!’ Wounded men and stretcher-bearers were still trying to squeeze +past. We were alternately putting on and taking off our gas-helmets +and that made things worse. In many places the trench was filled in +and we had to scramble over the top. Childe-Freeman got up to +the front line with only fifty men of B Company; the rest had lost +their way in some abandoned trenches half-way up. The adjutant met +him in the support line. ‘You ready to go over, Freeman?’ he asked. +Freeman had to admit that he had lost most of his company. He felt +this keenly as a disgrace; it was the first time that he had commanded +a company in battle. He decided to go over with his fifty men in +support of the Middlesex. He blew his whistle and the company charged. +They were stopped by machine-gun fire before they had passed our own +entanglements. Freeman himself died, but of heart-failure, as he stood +on the parapet. After a few minutes C Company and the remainder of B +reached the front line. The gas-cylinders were still whistling and the +trench full of dying men. Samson decided to go over; he would not have +it said that the Royal Welch had let down the Middlesex. There was a +strong comradely feeling between the Middlesex and the Royal Welch. The +Royal Welch and Middlesex were drawn together in dislike of the Scots. +The other three battalions in the brigade were Scottish, and ♦the +brigadier was a Scot and, unjustly no doubt, accused of favouring them. +Our adjutant voiced the general opinion: ‘The Jocks are all the same, +the trousered variety and the bare-backed variety. They’re dirty in +trenches, they skite too much, and they charge like hell—both ways.’ +The Middlesex, who were the original Diehard battalion, had more than +once, with the Royal Welch, considered themselves let down by the +Jocks. So Samson with C and the rest of B Company charged. One of the +officers told me later what happened to himself. It had been agreed +to advance by platoon rushes with supporting fire. When his platoon +had run about twenty yards he signalled them to lie down and open +covering fire. The din was tremendous. He saw the platoon on the left +flopping down too, so he whistled the advance again. Nobody seemed +to hear. He jumped up from his shell-hole and waved and signalled +‘Forward.’ Nobody stirred. He shouted: ‘You bloody cowards, are you +leaving me to go alone?’ His platoon sergeant, groaning with a broken +shoulder, gasped out: ‘Not cowards, sir. Willing enough. But they’re +all f——ing dead.’ A machine-gun traversing had caught them as they rose +to the whistle. + +♦ “the the” replaced with “the” + +Our company too had become separated by the shelling. The Surrey-man +got a touch of gas and went coughing back. The Actor said he was +skrim-shanking and didn’t want the battle. This was unfair. The +Surrey-man looked properly sick. I do not know what happened to him, +but I heard that the gas was not much and that he managed, a few months +later, to get back to his own regiment in France. I found myself with +The Actor in a narrow trench between the front and support lines. This +trench had not been built wide enough for a stretcher to pass the +bends. We came on The Boy lying on his stretcher wounded in the lungs +and the stomach. Jamaica was standing over him in tears, blubbering: +‘Poor old Boy, poor old Boy, he’s going to die; I’m sure he is. He’s +the only one who was decent to me.’ The Actor found we could not get +by. He said to Jamaica: ‘Take that poor sod out of the way, will you? +I’ve got to get my company up. Put him into a dug-out or somewhere.’ +Jamaica made no answer; he seemed paralysed by the horror of the +occasion. He could only repeat: ‘Poor old Boy, poor I old Boy.’ ‘Look +here,’ said The Actor, ‘if you can’t shift him into a dug-out we’ll +have to lift him on top of the trench. He can’t live now and we’re +late getting up.’ ‘No, no,’ Jamaica shouted wildly. The Actor lost his +temper and shook Jamaica roughly by the shoulders. ‘You’re the +bloody trench-mortar wallah, aren’t you?’ he asked fiercely. Jamaica +nodded miserably. ‘Well, your battery is a hundred yards from here. Why +the hell aren’t you using your gas-pipes on that machine-gun in the +Pope’s Nose? Buzz off back to them.’ And he kicked him down the trench. +Then he called over his shoulder: ‘Sergeant Rose and Corporal Jennings, +lift this stretcher up across the top of the trench. We’ve got to +pass.’ Jamaica leaned against a traverse. ‘I do think you’re the most +heartless beast I’ve ever met,’ he said weakly. + +We went on up to the front line. It was full of dead and dying. The +captain of the gas-company, who had kept his head and had a special +oxygen respirator, had by now turned off the gas. Vermorel-sprayers +had cleared out most of the gas, but we still had to wear our masks. +We climbed up and crouched on the fire-step, where the gas was not so +thick—gas was heavy stuff and kept low. Then Thomas arrived with the +remainder of A Company and, with D, we waited for the whistle to follow +the other two companies over. Fortunately at this moment the adjutant +appeared. He told Thomas that he was now in command of the battalion +and he didn’t care a damn about orders; he was going to cut his losses. +He said he would not send A and D over until he got definite orders +from brigade. He had sent a runner back because telephone communication +was cut, and we must wait. Meanwhile the intense bombardment that was +to follow the forty minutes’ discharge of gas began. It concentrated on +the German front trench and wire. A good deal of it was short and we +had further casualties in our trenches. The survivors of the Middlesex +and of our B and C Companies in craters in No Man’s Land suffered +heavily. + +My mouth was dry, my eyes out of focus, and my legs quaking under +me. I found a water-bottle full of rum and drank about half a pint; it +quieted me and my head remained clear. Samson was lying wounded about +twenty yards away from the front trench. Several attempts were made to +get him in. He was very badly hit and groaning. Three men were killed +in these attempts and two officers and two men wounded. Finally his own +orderly managed to crawl out to him. Samson ordered him back, saying +that he was riddled and not worth rescuing; he sent his apologies to +the company for making such a noise. We waited for about a couple of +hours for the order to charge. The men were silent and depressed. +Sergeant Townsend was making feeble, bitter jokes about the good old +British army muddling through and how he thanked God we still had a +navy. I shared the rest of the rum with him and he cheered up a little. +Finally a runner came with a message that the attack was off for the +present. + +Rumours came down the trenches of a disaster similar to our own in the +brick-stack area, where the Fifth Brigade had gone over, and again at +Givenchy, where it was said that men of the Sixth Brigade at the Duck’s +Bill salient had fought their way into the enemy trenches, but had been +bombed out, their own supply of bombs failing. It was said, however, +that things were better on the right, where there had been a slight +wind to take the gas over. There was a rumour that the First, Seventh, +and Forty-seventh Divisions had broken through. My memory of that day +is hazy. We spent it getting the wounded down to the dressing-station, +spraying the trenches and dug-outs to get rid of the gas, and clearing +away the earth where trenches were blocked. The trenches stank with a +gas-blood-lyddite-latrine smell. Late in the afternoon we watched +through our field-glasses the advance of the reserves towards Loos and +Hill 70; it looked like a real break through. They were being heavily +shelled. They were troops of the new-army division whose staff we had +messed with the night before. Immediately to the right of us was the +Highland Division, whose exploits on that day Ian Hay has celebrated in +_The First Hundred Thousand_; I suppose that we were ‘the flat caps on +the left’ who ‘let down’ his comrades-in-arms. + +As soon as it was dusk we all went out to get in the wounded. Only +sentries were left in the line. The first dead body I came upon was +Samson’s. I found that he had forced his knuckles into his mouth to +stop himself crying out and attracting any more men to their death. He +had been hit in seventeen places. Major Swainson, the second-in-command +of the Middlesex, came crawling in from the German wire. He seemed to +be wounded in the lungs, the stomach and a leg. Choate, a Middlesex +second-lieutenant, appeared; he was unhurt, and together we bandaged +Swainson and got him into the trench and on a stretcher. He begged me +to loosen his belt; I cut it with a bowie-knife that I had bought in +Béthune for use in the fighting. He said: ‘I’m about done for.’[6] We +spent all that night getting in the wounded of the Royal Welch, the +Middlesex and those of the Argyll and Sutherland who had attacked from +the front trench. The Germans behaved generously. I do not remember +hearing a shot fired that night, and we kept on until it was +nearly dawn and we could be plainly seen; then they fired a few shots +in warning and we gave it up. By this time we had got in all the +wounded and most of the Royal Welch dead. I was surprised at some of +the attitudes in which the dead had stiffened—in the act of bandaging +friends’ wounds, crawling, cutting wire. The Argyll and Sutherland +had seven hundred casualties, including fourteen officers killed out +of the sixteen that went over; the Middlesex five hundred and fifty +casualties, including eleven officers killed. + +Two other Middlesex officers besides Choate were unwounded; their names +were Henry and Hill, second-lieutenants who had recently come with +commissions from, I think, the Artists’ Rifles; their welcome in the +Middlesex had been something like mine in the Royal Welch. They had +been lying out in shell-holes in the rain all day, sniping and being +sniped at. Henry, according to Hill, had dragged five wounded men into +his shell-hole and thrown up a sort of parapet with his hands and a +bowie-knife that he was carrying. Hill had his platoon sergeant with +him, screaming for hours with a stomach wound, begging for morphia; he +was dying, so Hill gave him five pellets. We always carried morphia +with us for emergencies like this. When Choate, Henrv and Hill arrived +back in the trenches with a few stragglers they reported at the +Middlesex headquarters. Hill told me the story. The colonel and the +adjutant were sitting down to a meat pie when he and Henry arrived. +Henry said: ‘Come to report, sir. Ourselves and about ninety men of +all companies. Mr. Choate is back, unwounded, too.’ They looked up +dully. The colonel said: ‘So you’ve come back, have you? Well, all the +rest are dead. I suppose Mr. Choate had better command what’s left of +A Company, the bombing officer will command what’s left of B (the +bombing officer had not gone over but remained with headquarters), Mr. +Henry goes to C Company, Mr. Hill to D. The Royal Welch are holding +the front line. We are here in support. Let me know where to find you +if I want you. Good night.’ There was no offer to have a piece of meat +pie or a drink of whisky, so they saluted and went miserably out. +They were called back by the adjutant. ‘Mr. Hill! Mr. Henry!’ ‘Sir?’ +Hill said that he expected a change of mind as to the propriety with +which hospitality could be offered by a regular colonel and adjutant +to temporary second-lieutenants in distress. But it was only to say: +‘Mr. Hill, Mr. Henry, I saw some men in the trench just now with their +shoulder-straps unbuttoned and their equipment fastened anyhow. See +that this practice does not occur in future. That’s all.’ Henry heard +the colonel from his bunk complaining that he had only two blankets and +that it was a deucedly cold night. Choate arrived a few minutes later +and reported; the others had told him of their reception. After he had +saluted and reported that Major Swainson, who had been thought killed, +was wounded and on the way down to the dressing-station, he leaned over +the table, cut a large piece of meat pie and began eating it. This +caused such surprise that nothing further was said. He finished his +meat pie and drank a glass of whisky, saluted, and joined the others. + +Meanwhile, I had been given command of the survivors of B Company. +There were only six company officers left in the Royal Welch. Next +morning there were only five. Thomas was killed by a sniper. He was +despondently watching the return of the new-army troops on the right. +They had been pushed blindly into the gap made by the advance of +the Seventh and Forty-seventh Divisions on the previous afternoon; they +did not know where they were or what they were supposed to do; their +ration supply had broken down. So they flocked back, not in a panic, +but stupidly, like a crowd coming back from a cup final. Shrapnel was +bursting above them. We noticed that the officers were in groups of +their own. We could scarcely believe our eyes, it was so odd. Thomas +need not have been killed; but he was in the sort of mood in which he +seemed not to care one way or the other. The Actor took command of A. +We lumped our companies together after a couple of days for the sake of +relieving each other on night watch and getting some sleep. The first +night I agreed to take the first watch, waking him up at midnight. When +I went to call him I could not wake him up; I tried everything. I shook +him, shouted in his ear, poured water over him, banged his head against +the side of the bed. Finally I threw him on the floor. I was desperate +for want of sleep myself, but he was in a depth of sleep from which +nothing could shake him, so I heaved him back on the bunk and had to +finish the night out myself. Even ‘Stand-to!’ failed to arouse him. I +woke him at last at nine o’clock in the morning and he was furious with +me for not having waked him at midnight. + +The day after the attack we spent carrying the dead down to burial +and cleaning the trench up as well as we could. That night the +Middlesex held the line while the Royal Welch carried all the unbroken +gas-cylinders along to a position on the left flank of the brigade, +where they were to be used on the following night, September 27th. +This was worse than carrying the dead; the cylinders were cast-iron +and very heavy and we hated them. The men cursed and sulked, but got +the carrying done. Orders came that we were to attack again. Only +the officers knew; the men were only to be told just beforehand. It +was difficult for me to keep up appearances with the men; I felt like +screaming. It was still raining, harder than ever. We knew definitely +this time that ours was only a subsidiary night attack, a diversion +to help a division on our right to make the real attack. The scheme +was the same as before. At four p.m.the gas was to be discharged again +for forty minutes, then came a quartet of an hour’s bombardment, and +then the attack. I broke the news to the men about three o’clock. They +took it very well. The relations of officers and men, and of senior +and junior officers, had been very different in the excitement of the +attack. There had been no insubordination, but a greater freedom, as +if everyone was drunk together. I found myself calling the adjutant +Charley on one occasion; he appeared not to mind it in the least. For +the next ten days my relations with my men were like those I had with +the Welsh Regiment; later discipline reasserted itself and it was only +occasionally that I found them intimate. + +At four p.m., then, the gas went off again. There was a strong wind +and it went over well; the gas-men had brought enough spanners this +time. The Germans were absolutely silent. Flares went up from the +reserve lines and it seemed as though all the men in the front line +were dead. The brigadier decided not to take too much for granted; +after the bombardment he sent out twenty-five men and an officer of +the Cameronians as a feeling-patrol. The patrol reached the German +wire; there was a burst of machine-gun and rifle fire and only two +wounded men regained the trench. We: waited on the fire-step from four +to nine o’clock, with fixed; bayonets, for the order to go over. My +mind was a blank except for the recurrence of ‘S’nice smince spie, +s’nice smince spie.... I don’t like ham, lamb or jam and I don’t +like roley-poley....’ The men laughed at my singing. The sergeant who +was acting company sergeant-major said to me: ‘It’s murder, sir.’ ‘Of +course it’s murder, you bloody fool,’ I agreed. ‘But there’s nothing +else for it, is there?’ It was still raining. ‘But when I see’s a +s’nice smince spie, I asks for a helping twice....’ At nine o’clock we +were told that the attack was put off; we were told to hold ourselves +in readiness to attack at dawn. + +No order came at dawn. And no more attacks were promised us after +this. From the morning of September 24th to the night of October 3rd +I had in all eight hours of sleep. I kept myself awake and alive by +drinking about a bottle of whisky a day. I had never drank it before +and have seldom drank it since; it certainly was good then. We had no +blankets, greatcoats, or waterproof sheets. We had no time or material +to build new shelters, and the rain continued. Every night we went out +to get in the dead of the other battalions. The Germans continued to +be indulgent and we had few casualties. After the first day or two the +bodies swelled and stank. I vomited more than once while superintending +the carrying. The ones that we could not get in from the German wire +continued to swell until the wall of the stomach collapsed, either +naturally or punctured by a bullet; a disgusting smell would float +across. The colour of the dead faces changed from white to yellow-grey, +to red, to purple, to green, to black, to slimy. + +On the morning of the 27th a cry was heard from No Man’s Land. It +was a wounded man of the Middlesex who had recovered consciousness +after two days. He was close to the German wire. Our men heard it and +looked at each other. We had a lance-corporal called Baxter and he +was tender-hearted. He was the man to boil up a special dixie of +tea for the sentries of his section when they came off duty. When he +heard the wounded man cry out he ran up and down the trench calling for +a volunteer to come out with him and bring the man in. Of course no +one would go; it was death to put one’s head over the trench. He came +running to ask me. I excused myself as the only officer in the company. +I said I would come out with him at dusk, but I would not go now. So +he went out himself. He jumped quickly over the parapet, then strolled +across waving a handkerchief; the Germans fired at him to frighten him, +but he came on, so they let him come up close. They must have heard the +Middlesex man themselves. Baxter continued towards them and, when he +got up to the Middlesex man, he stopped and pointed to show the Germans +what he was at. Then he dressed the man’s wounds, gave him a drink of +rum and some biscuit that he had with him, and told him that he would +come back again for him in the evening. He did come back for him with a +stretcher-party and the man eventually recovered. I recommended Baxter +for the Victoria Cross, being the only officer who had seen the thing +done; but he only got a Distinguished Conduct Medal. + +The Actor and I had decided to get into touch with the battalion on +our right. It was the Tenth Highland Light Infantry. I went down +their trench some time in the morning of the 26th. I walked nearly +a quarter of a mile before seeing either a sentry or an officer. +There were dead men, sleeping men, wounded men, gassed men, all lying +anyhow. The trench had been used as a latrine. Finally I met a Royal +Engineer officer. He said to me: ‘If the Boche knew what an easy job +it was, he’d just walk over and take this trench.’ So I came back and +told The Actor that we might expect to have our flank in the +air at any moment. We turned the communication trench that made the +boundary between the two battalions into a fire-trench facing right; a +machine-gun was mounted to put up a barrage in case they ran. On the +night of the 27th the Highlanders mistook some of our men, who were out +in No Man’s Land getting in the dead, for the enemy. They began firing +wildly. The Germans retaliated. Our men caught the infection, but were +at once told to cease fire. ‘Cease fire’ went along the trench until +it came to the H.L.I., who misheard it as ‘Retire.’ A panic seized +them and they came rushing back. Fortunately they came down the trench +instead of over the top. They were stopped by a sergeant of the Fifth +Scottish Rifles, a territorial battalion now in support to ourselves +and the Middlesex. He chased them back into their trench at the point +of the bayonet. + +On the 3rd of October we were relieved. The relieving troops were a +composite battalion consisting of about a hundred men of the Second +Royal Warwickshire Regiment and about seventy Royal Welch Fusiliers, +all that was left of our own First Battalion. Hanmer Jones and Frank +Jones-Bateman had both been wounded. Frank had his thigh broken with +a rifle-bullet while stripping the equipment off a wounded man in No +Man’s Land; the cartridges in the man’s pouches had been set on fire by +a shot and were exploding.[7] We went back to Sailly la Bourse for a +couple of days, where the colonel rejoined us with his bandaged hand, +and then further back to Annezin, a little village near Béthune, where +I lodged in a two-roomed cottage with an old woman called Adelphine Heu. + + + + + XVI + + +At Annezin we reorganized. Some of the lightly wounded rejoined for +duty and a big draft from the Third Battalion arrived, so that in a +week’s time we were nearly seven hundred strong, with a full complement +of officers. Old Adelphine made me comfortable. She used to come +into my room in the morning when I was shaving and tell me the local +gossip—how stingy her daughter-in-law was, and what a rogue the Maire +was, and about the woman at Fouquières who had just been delivered of +black twins. She said that the Kaiser was a bitch and spat on the floor +to confirm it. Her favourite subject was the shamelessness of modern +girls. Yet she herself had been gay and beautiful and much sought after +when she was young she said. She had been in service as lady’s maid +to a rich draper’s wife of Béthune, and had travelled widely with her +in the surrounding country, and even over the border into Belgium. +She asked me about the various villages in which I had recently been +billeted, and told me scandal about the important families who used +to live in each. She asked me if I had been in La Bassée; she did not +realize that it was in the hands of the enemy. I said no, but I had +tried to visit it recently and had been detained. ‘Do you know Auchy, +then?’ I said that I had seen it often from a distance. ‘Then perhaps +you know a big farm-house between Auchy and Cambrin called Les Briques +Farm?’ I said, startled, that I knew it very well, and that it was a +strong place with a moat and cellars and a kitchen garden now full of +barbed wire. She said: ‘Then I shall tell you. I was staying there in +1870. It was the year of the other war and there was at the house a +handsome young _petit-caporal_ who was fond of me. So because he was a +nice boy and because it was the war, we slept together and I had a +baby. But God punished me and the baby died. That’s a long time ago.’ + +She told me that all the girls in Annezin prayed every night for the +war to end and for the English to go away as soon as their money was +spent. She said that the clause about the money was always repeated in +case God should miss it. + +Troops serving in the Pas de Calais loathed the French; except for +occasional members of the official class, we found them thoroughly +unlikeable people, and it was difficult to sympathize with their +misfortunes. They had all the shortcomings of a border people. I wrote +home about this time: + +‘I find it very difficult to love the French here. Even when we have +been billeted in villages where no troops have been before, I have not +met a single case of the hospitality that one meets among the peasants +of other countries. It is worse than inhospitality here, for after +all we are fighting for their dirty little lives. They suck enormous +quantities of money out of us too. Calculate how much has flowed into +the villages around Béthune, which for many months now have been +continuously housing about a hundred thousand men. Apart from the money +that they get paid directly as billeting allowance, there is the pay +that the troops spend. Every private soldier gets his five-franc note +(nearly four shillings) every ten days, and spends it on eggs, coffee, +and beer in the local _estaminets_; the prices are ridiculous and the +stuff bad. In the brewery at Béthune, the other day, I saw barrels +of already thin beer being watered from the canal with a hose-pipe. +The _estaminet_-keepers water it further.’ (The fortunes made in the +war were consolidated after the Versailles Treaty, when every peasant +in the devastated areas staked preposterous compensation claims +for the loss of possessions that he had never had.) It was surprising +that there were so few clashes between the British and French as there +were. The Pas de Calais French hated us and were convinced that when +the war was over we intended to stay and hold the Channel ports. It +was impossible for us at the time to realize that it was all the same +to the peasants whether they were on the German or the British side of +the line—it was a foreign military occupation anyhow. They were not +at all interested in the sacrifices that we were making for ‘their +dirty little lives.’ Also, we were shocked at the severity of French +national accountancy; when we were told, for instance, that every +British hospital train, the locomotive and carriages of which had been +imported from England, had to pay a £200 fee for use of the rails on +each journey they made from railhead to base. + +The fighting was still going on around Loos. We could hear the guns +in the distance, but it was clear that the thrust had failed and that +we were now skirmishing for local advantages. But on October 13th +there was a final flare-up; the noise of the guns was so great that +even the inhabitants of Annezin, accustomed to these alarms, were +properly frightened, and began packing up in case the Germans broke +through. Old Adelphine was in tears with fright. Early that afternoon +I was in Béthune at the _Globe_ drinking champagne-cocktails with some +friends who had joined from the Third Battalion, when the assistant +provost-marshal put his head in the door and called out: ‘Any officers +of the Fifth, Sixth, or Nineteenth Brigades here?’ We jumped up. ‘You +are to return at once to your units.’ ‘Oh God,’ said Robertson, ‘that +means another show.’ Robertson had been in D Company and so escaped +the charge. ‘We’ll be pushed over the top to-night to reinforce +someone, and that’ll be the end of us.’ + +We hurried back to Annezin and found everything in confusion. ‘We’re +standing-to—at half an hour’s notice for the trenches,’ we were told. +We packed up hastily and in a few minutes the whole battalion was out +in the road in fighting order. We were to go up to the Hohenzollern +Redoubt and were now issued with new trench maps of it. The men were in +high spirits, even the survivors of the show. They were singing songs +to the accompaniment of an accordion and a penny whistle. Only at one +time, when a ‘mad-minute’ of artillery noise was reached, they stopped +and looked at each other, and Sergeant Townsend said sententiously: +‘That’s the charge. Many good fellows going west at this moment; maybe +chums of ours.’ Gradually the noise died down, and a message came at +last from brigade that we would not be needed. It had been another +dud show, chiefly to be remembered for the death of Charles Sorley, a +captain in the Suffolks, one of the three poets of importance killed in +the war. (The other two were Isaac Rosenberg and Wilfred Owen.) + +This ended the operations for 1915. Tension was relaxed. We returned to +battalion mess, to company drill, and to riding-school for the young +officers. It was as though there had been no battle except that the +senior officers were fewer and the Special Reserve element larger. +Two or three days later we were back in trenches in the same sector. +In October I was gazetted a captain in the Third (Special Reserve) +Battalion. Promotion in the Third Battalion was rapid for subalterns +who had joined early, because the battalion had trebled its strength +and so was entitled to three times as many captains as before. It +was good to have my pay go up several shillings a day, with an +increase of war bonus and possible gratuity and pension if I were +wounded, but I did not consider that side of it much. It was rank that +was effective overseas. And here I was promoted captain over the heads +of officers who had longer trench service and were older and better +trained than myself. I went to the adjutant and offered not to wear the +badges of rank while serving with the battalion. He said not unkindly: +‘No, put your stars up. It can’t be helped.’ I knew that he and the +colonel had no use for Special Reserve captains unless they were +outstandingly good, and would not hesitate to get rid of them. + +A Special Reserve major and captain had been recently sent home from +the First Battalion, with a confidential report of inefficiency. I +was anxious to avoid any such disgrace. Nor was my anxiety unfounded; +shortly after I left the Second Battalion two other Special Reserve +captains, one of whom had been promoted at the same time as myself, +were sent back as ‘likely to be of more service in the training of +troops at home.’ One of them was, I know, more efficient than I was. + +I was in such a depressed state of nerves now that if I had gone into +the trenches as a company officer I should probably have modified my +formula for taking risks. Fortunately, I had a rest from the front +line, being attached to the brigade sappers. Hill of the Middlesex was +also having this relief. He told me that the Middlesex colonel had made +a speech to the survivors of the battalion as soon as they were back +in billets, telling them that the battalion had been unfortunate but +would soon be given an opportunity of avenging its dead and making a +fresh and, this time he hoped, successful attack upon La Bassée. ‘I +know you Diehards! You will go like lions over the top.’ Hill’s +servant had whispered confidentially to Hill: ‘Not on purpose I don’t, +sir!’ The sapping company specialized in maintaining communication +and reserve trenches in good repair. I was with it for a month before +being returned to ordinary company duty. My recall was a punishment for +failing, one day when we were in billets, to observe a paragraph in +battalion orders requiring my presence on battalion parade. + +My remaining trench service with the Second Battalion this autumn was +uneventful. There was no excitement left in patrolling, no horror in +the continual experience of death. The single recordable incident I +recall was one of purely technical interest, a new method that an +officer named Owen and myself invented for dealing with machine-guns +firing at night. The method was to give each sentry a piece of string +about a yard long, with a cartridge tied at each end; when the +machine-gun started firing, sentries who were furthest from the fire +would stretch the string in the direction of the machine-gun and peg +it down with the points of the cartridges. This gave a pretty accurate +line on the machine-gun. When we had about thirty or more of these +lines taken on a single machine-gun we fixed rifles as accurately +as possible along them and waited for it; as soon as it started we +opened five rounds rapid. This gave a close concentration of fire and +no element of nervousness could disturb the aim, the rifles being +secured between sandbags. Divisional headquarters asked us for a report +of the method. There was a daily exchange of courtesies between our +machine-guns and the Germans’ at stand-to; by removing cartridges +from the ammunition belt it was possible to rap out the rhythm of the +familiar call: ‘Me—et me do—wn in Pi—cca-di—ll—y,’ to which the Germans +would reply, though in slower tempo, because our guns were faster +than theirs: ‘Se—e you da—mned to He—ll first.’ + +It was late in this October that I was sent a press-cutting from +_John Bull_. Horatio Bottomley, the editor, was protesting against +the unequal treatment for criminal offences meted out to commoners +and aristocrats. A young man, he said, convicted in the police-court +of a criminal offence was merely bound over and put in the care of +a physician—because he was the grandson of an earl! An offender not +belonging to the influential classes would have been given three +months without the option of a fine. The article described in some +detail how Dick, a sixteen-year old boy, had made ‘a certain proposal’ +to a corporal in a Canadian regiment stationed near ‘Charterhouse +College,’ and how the corporal had very properly given him in charge +of the police. This news was nearly the end of me. I decided that Dick +had been driven out of his mind by the war. There was madness in the +family, I knew; he had once shown me a letter from his grandfather +scrawled in circles all over the page. It would be easy to think of him +as dead. + +I had now been in the trenches for five months and was getting past +my prime. For the first three weeks an officer was not much good in +the trenches; he did not know his way about, had not learned the +rules of health and safety, and was not yet accustomed to recognizing +degrees of danger. Between three weeks and four months he was at +his best, unless he happened to have any particular bad shock or +sequence of shocks. Then he began gradually to decline in usefulness +as neurasthenia developed in him. At six months he was still more or +less all right; but by nine or ten months, unless he had a few weeks’ +rest on a technical course or in hospital, he began to be a drag on +the other members of the company. After a year or fifteen months he +was often worse than useless. Officers had a less laborious but +a more nervous time than the men. There were proportionately twice as +many neurasthenic cases among officers as among men, though the average +life of a man before getting killed or wounded was twice as long as an +officer’s. Officers between the ages of twenty-three and thirty-three +had a longer useful life than those older or younger. I was too young. +Men over forty, though they did not suffer from the want of sleep so +much as those under twenty, had less resistance to the sudden alarms +and shocks. Dr. W. H. R. Rivers told me later that the action of one +of the ductless glands—I think the thyroid—accounted for this decline +in military usefulness. It pumped its chemical into the blood as a +sedative for tortured nerves; this process went on until the condition +of the blood was permanently affected and a man went about his tasks in +a stupid and doped way, cheated into further endurance. It has taken +some ten years for my blood to run at all clean. The unfortunates were +the officers who had two years or more continuous trench service. In +many cases they became dipsomaniacs. I knew three or four officers +who had worked up to the point of two bottles of whisky a day before +they were lucky enough to get wounded or sent home in some other way. +A two-bottle company commander of one of our line battalions still +happens to be alive who, in three shows running, got his company +needlessly destroyed because he was no longer capable of taking clear +decisions. + +Aside from wounds, gas, and the accidents of war, the life of the +trench soldier was, for the most part, not unhealthy. Food was +plentiful and hard work in the open air made up for the discomfort +of wet feet and clothes and draughty billets. A continual need for +alertness discouraged minor illnesses; a cold was thrown off in a few +hours, an attack of indigestion was hardly noticed. This was +true, at least, in a good battalion, where the men were bent on going +home either with an honourable wound or not at all. In an inferior +battalion the men would prefer a wound to bronchitis, but would not +mind the bronchitis. In a bad battalion they did not care ‘whether,’ in +the trench phrase, ‘the cow calved or the bull broke its bloody neck.’ +In a really good battalion, as the Second Battalion was when I went +to it first, the question of getting wounded and going home was not +permitted to be raised. Such a battalion had a very small sick list. +In the 1914–15 winter there were no more than four or five casualties +from ‘trench feet’ in the Second, and the following winter no more than +eight or nine; the don’t-care battalions lost very heavily indeed. +Trench feet was almost entirely a matter of morale, in spite of the +lecture-formula that N.C.O.’s and officers used to repeat time after +time to the men: ‘Trench feet is caused by tight boots, tight puttees +or any other clothing calculated to interfere with the circulation of +blood in the legs.’ Trench feet was caused rather by going to sleep +with wet boots, cold feet, and depression. Wet boots, by themselves, +did not matter. If the man warmed his feet at a brazier or stamped +them until they were warm and then went off to sleep with a sandbag +tied round them he took no harm. He might even fall asleep with cold, +wet feet, and they might swell slightly owing to tightness of boots or +puttees; but trench feet only came if he did not mind getting trench +feet or anything else, because his battalion had lost the power of +sticking things out. At Bouchavesnes on the Somme in the winter of +1916–17 a battalion of dismounted cavalry lost half its strength in two +days from trench feet; our Second Battalion had just had ten days in +the same trenches with no cases at all. + +Autumn was melancholy in the La Bassée sector; in the big poplar +forests the leaves were French yellow and the dykes were overflowing +and the ground utterly sodden. Béthune was not the place it had been; +the Canadians billeted there drew two or three times as much pay as our +own troops and had sent the prices up. But it was still more or less +intact and one could still get cream buns and fish dinners. + +In November I had orders to join the First Battalion, which was +reorganizing after the Loos fighting. I was delighted. I found it in +billets at Locon, behind Festubert, which was only a mile or two to the +north of Cambrin. The difference between the two battalions continued +markedly throughout the war, however many times each battalion got +broken. The difference was that the Second Battalion at the outbreak of +war had just finished its eighteen years overseas tour, while the First +Battalion had not been out of England since the South African War. The +First Battalion was, therefore, less old-fashioned in its militarism +and more human; livers were better; the men had dealings with white +women and not with brown. It would have been impossible in the First +Battalion to see what I once saw in the Second—a senior officer +pursuing a private soldier down the street, kicking his bottom because +he had been slack in saluting. The First Battalion was as efficient and +as regimental, on the whole more successful in its fighting, and a much +easier battalion to live in. + +The battalion already had its new company commanders and I went as +second-captain to young Richardson of A Company. He was from Sandhurst, +and his company was one of the best that I was ever with. They were +largely Welshmen of 1915 enlistment. None of the officers in the +company were more than twenty-two or twenty-three years old. A +day or two after I arrived I went to visit C Company, where a Third +Battalion officer whom I knew was commanding. The C’s greeted me in a +friendly way. As we were talking I noticed a book lying on the table. +It was the first book (except my Keats and Blake) that I had seen since +I came to France that was not either a military text-book or a rubbish +novel. It was the _Essays of Lionel Johnson_. When I had a chance I +stole a look at the fly-leaf, and the name was Siegfried Sassoon. I +looked round to see who could possibly be called Siegfried Sassoon and +bring _Lionel Johnson_ with him to the First Battalion. He was obvious, +so I got into conversation with him, and a few minutes later we were +walking to Béthune, being off duty until that night, and talking about +poetry. Siegfried had, at the time, published nothing except a few +privately-printed pastoral pieces of eighteen-ninetyish flavour and a +satire on Masefield which, about half-way through, had forgotten to +be a satire and was rather good Masefield. We went to the cake shop +and ate cream buns. At this time I was getting my first book of poems, +_Over the Brazier_, ready for the press; I had one or two drafts in my +pocket-book and showed them to Siegfried. He told me that they were too +realistic and that war should not be written about in a realistic way. +In return he showed me some of his own poems. One of them began: + + Return to greet me, colours that were my joy, + Not in the woeful crimson of men slain.... + +This was before Siegfried had been in the trenches. I told him, in my +old-soldier manner, that he would soon change his style. + +That night the whole battalion went up to work at a new defence +scheme at Festubert. Festubert was nightmare, and had been so since the +first fighting there in 1914, when the inmates of its lunatic asylum +had been caught between two fires and broken out and run all over the +countryside. The British trench line went across a stretch of ground +marked on the map as ‘Marsh, sometimes dry in the summer.’ It consisted +of islands of high-command trench, with no communication between them +except at night, and was a murderous place for patrols. The battalion +had been nearly wiped out here six months previously. We were set to +build up a strong reserve line. It was freezing hard and we were unable +to make any progress on the frozen ground. We came here night after +night. We raised a couple of hundred yards of trench about two or +three feet high, at the cost of several men wounded from casual shots +skimming the trench in front of us. Work was resumed by other troops +when the thaw came and a thick seven foot-high ramp built. We were told +later that it gradually sank down into the marsh, and in the end was +completely engulfed. + +When I left the Second Battalion I was permitted to take my servant, +Private Fahy (known as Tottie Fay, after the actress), with me. Tottie +was a reservist from Birmingham who had been called up when war broke +out, and had been with the Second Battalion ever since. By trade he +was a silversmith and he had recently, when on leave, made a cigarette +case and engraved it with my name as a present. He worked well and +we liked each other. When he arrived at the First Battalion he met a +Sergeant Dickens who had been his boozing chum in India seven or eight +years back; so they celebrated it. The next morning I was surprised to +find my buttons not polished and no hot water for shaving. I was +annoyed; it made me late for breakfast. I could get no news of Tottie. +On my way to rifle inspection at nine o’clock at the company billet I +noticed something unusual at the corner of a farm-yard. It was Field +Punishment No. 1 being carried out—my first sight of it. Tottie was +the victim. He had been awarded twenty-eight days for ‘drunkenness in +the field.’ He was spread-eagled to the wheel of a company limber, +tied by the ankles and wrists in the form of an X. He remained in +this position—‘Crucifixion,’ they called it—for several hours a day; +I forget how many, but it was a good working-day. The sentence was to +be carried out for as long as the battalion remained in billets, and +was to be continued after the next spell of trenches. I shall never +forget the look that Tottie gave me. He was a quiet, respectful, +devoted servant, and he wanted to tell me that he was sorry for having +let me down. His immediate reaction was an attempt to salute; I could +see him try to lift his hand to his forehead, and bring his heels +together, but he could do nothing; his eyes filled with tears. The +battalion police-sergeant, a fierce-looking man, had just finished +knotting him up when I arrived. I told Tottie that I was sorry to see +him in trouble. That drink, as it proved, did him good in the end. I +had to find another servant. Old Joe, the quartermaster, knowing that +Tottie was the only trained officer’s servant in the battalion, took +him from me when his sentence expired; he even induced the colonel +to remit a few days of it. Tottie was safer in billets with Old Joe +than in trenches with me. Some time in the summer of the following +year his seven years’ contract as a reservist expired. When their +‘buckshee seven’ expired, reservists were sent home for a few days and +then ‘deemed to have re-enlisted under the Military Service Act,’ and +recalled to the battalion. But Tottie made good use of his leave. +His brother-in-law was director of a munitions factory and took Tottie +in as a skilled metal-worker. He was made a starred man—his work was so +important to industry that he could not be spared for military service, +so Tottie is, I hope, still alive. Good luck to him and to Birmingham. +Sergeant Dickens was a different case. He was a fighter, and one of +the best N.C.O.’s in either battalion of the regiment. He had been +awarded the d.c.m. and Bar, the Military Medal and the French +Médaille Militaire. Two or three times already he had been promoted to +sergeant’s rank and each time been reduced for drunkenness. He escaped +field-punishment because it was considered sufficient for him to lose +his stripes, and whenever there was a battle Dickens would distinguish +himself so conspicuously as a leader that he would be given his stripes +back again. + +Early in December the rumour came that we were going for divisional +training to the back areas. I would not believe it, having heard +stories of this kind too often, and was surprised when it turned out to +be true. Siegfried Sassoon, in his _Memoirs of a Fox-hunting Man_, has +described this battalion move. It was an even more laborious experience +for our A Company than for his C Company. We got up at five o’clock +one morning, breakfasted hastily, packed our kits, and marched down to +the railhead three miles away. Here we had the task of entraining all +the battalion stores, transport and transport-animals. This took us to +the middle of the morning. We then entrained ourselves for a ten-hour +journey to a junction on the Somme about twenty miles away from the +front line. The officers travelled in third-class apartments, the men +in closed trucks marked: ‘Hommes 40, chevaux 8’—they were very stiff +when they arrived. ‘A’ Company was called on to do the detraining +job too. When we had finished, the dixies of tea prepared for us were +all cold. The other companies had been resting for a couple of hours; +we had only a few minutes. The march was along _pavé_ roads and the +rough chalk tracks of the Picardy downland. It started about midnight +and finished about six o’clock next morning, the men carrying their +packs and rifles. There was a competition between the companies as +to which would have the fewest men falling out; A won. The village +we finally arrived at was called Montagne le Fayel. No troops had +been billeted here before, and its inhabitants were annoyed at being +knocked up in the middle of the night by our advance-guard to provide +accommodation for eight hundred men at two hours’ notice. We found +these Picard peasants much more likeable than the Pas de Calais people. +I was billeted with an old man called Monsieur Elie Caron, a retired +schoolmaster with a bright eye and white hair. He lived entirely on +vegetables, and gave me a vegetarian pamphlet entitled _Comment Vivre +Cent Ans_. We already knew of the coming Somme offensive, so this was a +good joke. He also gave me Longfellow’s _Evangeline_ in English. I have +always been sorry for English books stranded in France, whatever their +demerits; so I accepted it and later brought it home. + +We were at Montagne for six weeks. The colonel, who appears in +Siegfried’s book as Colonel Winchell, was known in the regiment as +Scatter, short for Scatter-cash, because when he first joined the +regiment he had been so lavish with his allowance. Scatter put the +battalion through its paces with peace-time severity. He asked us to +forget the trenches and to fit ourselves for the open warfare that +was bound to come once the Somme defences were pierced. Every other +day was a field-day; we were back again in spirit to General +Haking’s _Company Training_. Even those of us who did not believe in +the break-through thoroughly enjoyed these field-days. The guns could +only just be heard in the distance, it was quite unspoilt country, and +every man in the battalion was fit. Days that were not field-days were +given up to battalion drill and musketry. This training seemed entirely +unrelated to war as we had experienced it. We played a lot of games, +including inter-battalion rugger; I played full-back for the battalion. +Three other officers were in the team; Richardson as front-row +scrum-man; Pritchard, another Sandhurst boy, who was fly-half; and +David Thomas, a Third Battalion second-lieutenant, who was an inside +three-quarter. David Thomas and Siegfried were the closest friends I +made while in France. David was a simple, gentle fellow and fond of +reading. Siegfried, he, and I were together a lot. + +One day David met me in the village street. He said: ‘Did you hear +the bugle? There’s a hell of a row on about something. All officers +and warrant-officers are to meet in the village schoolroom at once. +Scatter’s looking as black as-thunder. No one knows yet what the axe +is about.’ We went along together and squeezed into one of the school +desk-benches. When the colonel entered and the room was called to +attention by the senior major, David and I hurt ourselves standing up, +bench and all. Scatter told us all to be seated. The officers were +in one class, the warrant-officers and non-commissioned officers in +another. The colonel glared at us from the teacher’s desk. He began his +lecture with general accusations. He said that he had lately noticed +many signs of slovenliness in the battalion—men with their pocket-flaps +undone, and actually walking down the village street with their +hands in their trousers-pockets—boots unpolished—sentries strolling +about on their beats at company billets instead of marching up and +down in a soldier-like way—rowdiness in the _estaminets_—slackness in +saluting—with many other grave indications of lowered discipline. He +threatened to stop all leave to the United Kingdom unless discipline +improved. He promised us a saluting parade every morning before +breakfast which he would attend in person. All this was general axe-ing +and we knew that he had not yet reached the particular axe. It was +this: ‘I have here principally to tell you of a very disagreeable +occurrence. As I was going out of my orderly room early this morning I +came upon a group of soldiers; I will not mention their company. One +of these soldiers was in conversation with a lance-corporal. You may +not believe it, but it was a fact that he addressed the corporal by his +Christian name; _he called him Jack_. The corporal made no protest. To +think that the First Battalion has sunk to a level where it is possible +for such familiarity to exist between N.C.O.’s and the men under their +command! Naturally, I put the corporal under arrest, and he appeared +before me at once on the charge of ‘conduct unbecoming to an N.C.O.’ +He was reduced to the ranks, and the man was given field-punishment +for using insubordinate language to an N.C.O. And, I warn you, if any +further case of the sort comes to my notice—and I expect you officers +to report the slightest instance to me at once instead of dealing +with it as a company matter....’ I tried to catch Siegfried’s eye, +but he was busy avoiding it, so I caught David’s instead. This is one +of those caricature scenes that now seem to sum up the various stages +of my life. There was a fresco around the walls of the class-room +illustrating the evils of alcoholism. It started with the innocent +boy being offered a drink by his mate, and then his downward path, +culminating in wife-beating, murder, and _delirium tremens_. + +The battalion’s only complaint against Montagne was that women were not +so easy to get hold of in that part of the country as around Béthune; +the officers had the unfair advantage of being able to borrow horses +and ride into Amiens. I remained puritanical. There was a Blue Lamp at +Amiens as there was at Abbéville, Havre, Rouen, and all the big towns +behind the lines. The Blue Lamp was for officers, as the Red Lamp was +for men. It was most important for discipline to be maintained in this +way. + +In January the Seventh Division sent two company officers from each +brigade to instruct troops at the base. I and a captain in the Queen’s +were the two who had been out longest, so we were chosen; it was a gift +of two months longer life to us. + + + + + XVII + + +I was one of about thirty instructors at the Havre ‘Bull Ring,’ where +newly-arrived drafts were sent for technical instruction before going +up the line. Most of my colleagues were specialists in musketry, +machine-gun, gas, or bombs. I had no specialist training, only general +experience. I was put on instructional work in trench relief and trench +discipline in a model set of trenches. My principal other business was +arms-drill. One day it rained, and the commandant of the Bull Ring +suddenly ordered me to lecture in the big concert hall. ‘There are +three thousand men there waiting for you, and you’re the only available +officer with a loud enough voice to make himself heard.’ They were +Canadians, so instead of giving my usual semi-facetious lecture on +‘How to be happy though in the trenches,’ I paid them the compliment +of telling them the story of Loos, and what a balls-up it was, and +why it was a balls-up. It was the only audience that I ever held for +an hour with real attention. I expected the commandant to be furious +with me because the principal object of the Bull Ring was to inculcate +the offensive spirit, but he took it well and I had several more +concert-hall lectures put on me after this. + +In the instructors’ mess the chief subjects of conversation besides +local and technical talk were _morale_, the reliability of various +divisions in battle, the value of different training methods, and +war-morality, with particular reference to atrocities. We talked more +freely there than would have been possible either in England or in the +trenches. We decided that about a third of the troops in the British +Expeditionary Force were dependable on all occasions; these were the +divisions that were always called on for the most important tasks. +About a third were variable, that is, where a division contained +one or two bad battalions, but could be more or less trusted. The +remainder were more or less untrustworthy; being put in positions of +comparative safety they had about a quarter of the casualties that the +best divisions had. It was a matter of pride to belong to one of the +recognized best divisions—the Seventh, the Twenty-ninth, Guards’, First +Canadian, for instance. They were not pampered when in reserve as the +German storm-troops were, but promotion, leave, and the chance of a +wound came quicker in them. The mess agreed that the most dependable +British troops were the Midland county regiments, industrial Yorkshire +and Lancashire troops, and the Londoners. The Ulsterman, Lowland Scots +and Northern English were pretty good. The Catholic Irish and the +Highland Scots were not considered so good—they took unnecessary risks +in trenches and had unnecessary casualties, and in battle, though +they usually made their objective, they too often lost it in the +counter-attack; without officers they were no good. English southern +county regiments varied from good to very bad. All overseas troops were +good. The dependability of divisions also varied with their seniority +in date of promotion. The latest formed regular divisions and the +second-line territorial divisions, whatever their recruiting area, were +usually inferior. Their senior officers and warrant-officers were not +good enough. + +We once discussed which were the cleanest troops in trenches, taken +in nationalities. We agreed on a list like this, in descending order: +English and German Protestants; Northern Irish, Welsh and Canadians; +Irish and German Catholics; Scottish; Mohammedan Indians; Algerians; +Portuguese; Belgians; French. The Belgians and French were put +there for spite; they were not really dirtier than the Algerians or +Portuguese. + +Atrocities. Propaganda reports of atrocities were, we agreed, +ridiculous. Atrocities against civilians were surely few. We remembered +that while the Germans were in a position to commit atrocities +against enemy civilians, Germany itself, except for the early Russian +cavalry raid, had never had the enemy on her soil. We no longer +believed accounts of unjustified German atrocities in Belgium; know +the Belgians now at first-hand. By atrocities we meant, specifically, +rape, mutilation and torture, not summary shootings of suspected spies, +harbourers of spies, _francs-tireurs_, or disobedient local officials. +If the atrocity list was to include the accidental-on-purpose +bombing or machine-gunning of civilians from the air, the Allies +were now committing as many atrocities as the Germans. French and +Belgian civilians had often tried to win our sympathy and presents +by exhibiting mutilations of children—stumps of hands and feet, for +instance—representing them as deliberate, fiendish atrocities when they +were merely the result of shell-fire, British or French shell-fire as +likely as not. We did not believe that rape was any more common on the +German side of the line than on the Allied side. It was unnecessary. +Of course, a bully-beef diet, fear of death, and absence of wives made +ample provision of women necessary in the occupied areas. No doubt +the German army authorities provided brothels in the principal French +towns behind the line, as did the French on the Allied side. But the +voluntary system would suffice. We did not believe stories of forcible +enlistment of women. + +As for atrocities against soldiers. The difficulty was to say where +to draw the line. For instance, the British soldier at first +regarded as atrocious the use of bowie-knives by German patrols. After +a time he learned to use them himself; they were cleaner killing +weapons than revolvers or bombs. The Germans regarded as atrocious +the British Mark VII rifle bullet, which was more apt to turn on +striking than the German bullet. For true atrocities, that is, personal +rather than military violations of the code of war, there were few +opportunities. The most obvious opportunity was in the interval +between surrender of prisoners and their arrival (or non-arrival) at +headquarters. And it was an opportunity of which advantage was only +too often taken. Nearly every instructor in the mess knew of specific +cases when prisoners had been murdered on the way back. The commonest +motives were, it seems, revenge for the death of friends or relations, +jealousy of the prisoner’s pleasant trip to a comfortable prison camp +in England, military enthusiasm, fear of being suddenly overpowered +by the prisoners or, more simply, not wanting to be bothered with the +escorting job. In any of these cases the conductors would report on +arrival at headquarters that a German shell had killed the prisoners; +no questions would be asked. We had every reason to believe that the +same thing happened on the German side, where prisoners, as useless +mouths to feed in a country already on short rations, were even +less welcome. We had none of us heard of prisoners being more than +threatened at headquarters to get military information from them; +the sort of information that trench-prisoners could give was not of +sufficient importance to make torture worth while; in any case it was +found that when treated kindly prisoners were anxious, in gratitude, to +tell as much as they knew. + +The troops that had the worst reputation for acts of violence +against prisoners were the Canadians (and later the Australians). +With the Canadians the motive was said to be revenge for a Canadian +found crucified with bayonets through his hands and feet in a German +trench; this atrocity was never substantiated, nor did we believe the +story freely circulated that the Canadians crucified a German officer +in revenge shortly afterwards. (Of the Australians the only thing to +be said was that they were only two generations removed from the days +of Ralph Rashleigh and Marcus Clarke.) How far this reputation for +atrocities was deserved, and how far it was due to the overseas habit +of bragging and leg-pulling, we could not decide. We only knew that to +have committed atrocities against prisoners was, among the overseas +men, and even among some British troops, a boast, not a confession. + +I heard two first-hand accounts later in the war. + +A Canadian-Scot: ‘I was sent back with three bloody prisoners, you +see, and one was limping and groaning, so I had to keep on kicking the +sod down the trench. He was an officer. It was getting dark and I was +getting fed up, so I thought: “I’ll have a bit of a game.” I had them +covered with the officer’s revolver and I made ’em open their pockets. +Then I dropped a Mills’ bomb in each, with the pin out, and ducked +behind a traverse. Bang, bang, bang! No more bloody prisoners. No good +Fritzes but dead ’uns.’ + +An Australian: ‘Well, the biggest lark I had was at Morlancourt when +we took it the first time. There were a lot of Jerries in a cellar and +I said to ’em: “Come out, you Camarades.” So out they came, a dozen of +’em, with their hands up. “Turn out your pockets,” I told ’em. They +turned ’em out. Watches and gold and stuff, all dinkum. Then I said: +“Now back into your cellar, you sons of bitches.” For I couldn’t +be bothered with ’em. When they were all down I threw half a dozen +Mills’ bombs in after ’em. I’d got the stuff all right, and we weren’t +taking prisoners that day.’ + +The only first-hand account I heard of large-scale atrocities was from +an old woman at Cardonette on the Somme, with whom I was billeted in +July 1916. It was at Cardonette that a battalion of French Turcos +overtook the rear guard of a German division retreating from the Marne +in September 1914. The Turcos surprised the dead-weary Germans while +they were still marching in column. The old woman went, with gestures, +through a pantomime of slaughter, ending: ‘Et enfin, ces animaux leur +ont arraché les oreilles et les ont mis à la poche.’ The presence +of coloured troops in Europe was, from the German point of view, we +knew, one of the chief Allied atrocities. We sympathized. Recently, +at Flixécourt, one of the instructors told us, the cook of a corps +headquarter-mess used to be visited at the château every morning by +a Turco; he was orderly to a French liaison officer. The Turco used +to say: ‘Tommy, give Johnny pozzy,’ and a tin of plum and apple jam +used to be given him. One afternoon the corps was due to shift, so +that morning the cook said to the Turco, giving him his farewell tin: +‘Oh, la, la, Johnny, napoo pozzy to-morrow.’ The Turco would not +believe it. ‘Yes, Tommy, mate,’ he said, ‘pozzy for Johnny to-morrow, +to-morrow, to-morrow.’ To get rid of him the cook said: ‘Fetch me the +head of a Fritz, Johnny, to-night. I’ll ask the general to give you +pozzy to-morrow, to-morrow, to-morrow.’ ‘All right, mate,’ said the +Turco, ‘me get Fritz head to-night, general give me pozzy to-morrow.’ +That evening the mess cook of the new corps that had taken over the +château was surprised to find a Turco asking for him and swinging +a bloody head in a sandbag. ‘Here’s Fritz head, mate,’ said the Turco, +‘general give me pozzy to-morrow, to-morrow, to-morrow.’ As Flixécourt +was twenty miles or more behind the line.... He did not need to end the +story, but swore it was true, because he had seen the head. + +We discussed the continuity of regimental _morale_. A captain in a +line battalion of one of the Surrey regiments said: ‘It all depends on +the reserve battalion at home.’ He had had a year’s service when the +war broke out; the battalion, which had been good, had never recovered +from the first battle of Ypres. He said: ‘What’s wrong with us is that +we have a rotten depot. The drafts are bad and so we get a constant +re-infection.’ He told me one night in our sleeping hut: ‘In both the +last two attacks that we made I had to shoot a man of my company to +get the rest out of the trench. It was so bloody awful that I couldn’t +stand it. It’s the reason why I applied to be sent down here.’ This +was not the usual loose talk that one heard at the base. He was a good +fellow and he was speaking the truth. I was sorrier for Phillips—that +was not his name—than for any other man I met in France. He deserved +a better regiment. There was never any trouble with the Royal Welch +like that. The boast of every good battalion in France was that it +had never lost a trench; both our battalions made it. This boast had +to be understood broadly; it meant never having been forced out of a +trench by an enemy attack without recapturing it before the action +ended. Capturing a German trench and being unable to hold it for lack +of reinforcements did not count, nor did retirement from a trench by +order or when the battalion of the left or right had broken and left a +flank in the air. And in the final stages of the war trenches could be +honourably abandoned as being entirely obliterated by bombardment, +or because not really trenches at all, but a line of selected +shell-craters. + +We all agreed on the value of arms-drill as a factor in _morale_. +‘Arms-drill as it should be done,’ someone said, ‘is beautiful, +especially when the company feels itself as a single being and each +movement is not a movement of every man together, but a single movement +of one large creature.’ I used to have big bunches of Canadians to +drill four or five hundred at a time. Spokesmen came forward once and +asked what sense there was in sloping and ordering arms and fixing and +unfixing bayonets. They said they had come to France to fight and not +to guard Buckingham Palace. I told them that in every division of the +four in which I had served there had been three different kinds of +troops. Those that had guts but were no good at drill; those that were +good at drill but had no guts; and those that had guts and were good at +drill. These last fellows were, for some reason or other, much the best +men in a show. I didn’t know why and I didn’t care. I told them that +when they were better at fighting than the Guards’ Division they could +perhaps afford to neglect their arms-drill. + +We often theorized in the mess about drill. We knew that the best drill +never came from being bawled at by a sergeant-major, that there must be +perfect respect between the man who gives the order and the men that +carry it through. The test of drill came, I said, when the officer gave +an incorrect word of command. If the company could carry through the +order intended without hesitation, or, suppose the order happened to be +impossible, could stand absolutely still or continue marching without +any disorder in the ranks, that was good drill. The corporate spirit +that came from drilling together was regarded by some instructors +as leading to loss of initiative in the men drilled. Others denied this +and said it acted just the other way round. ‘Suppose there is a section +of men with rifles, and they are isolated from the rest of the company +and have no N.C.O. in charge and meet a machine-gun. Under the stress +of danger that section will have that all-one-body feeling of drill and +will obey an imaginary word of command. There will be no communication +between its members, but there will be a drill movement. Two men will +quite naturally open fire on the machine-gun while the remainder +will work round, part on the left flank and part on the right, and +the final rush will be simultaneous. Leadership is supposed to be +the perfection for which drill has been instituted. That is wrong. +Leadership is only the first stage. Perfection of drill is communal +action. Drill may seem to be antiquated parade-ground stuff, but it is +the foundation of tactics and musketry. It was parade-ground musketry +that won all the battles in our regimental histories; this war will be +won by parade-ground tactics. The simple drill tactics of small units +fighting in limited spaces—fighting in noise and confusion so great +that leadership is quite impossible.’ In spite of variance on this +point we all agreed that regimental pride was the greatest moral force +that kept a battalion going as an effective fighting unit, contrasting +it particularly with patriotism and religion. + +Patriotism. There was no patriotism in the trenches. It was too remote +a sentiment, and rejected as fit only for civilians. A new arrival who +talked patriotism would soon be told to cut it out. As Blighty, Great +Britain was a quiet, easy place to get back to out of the present +foreign misery, but as a nation it was nothing. The nation included +not only the trench-soldiers themselves and those who had gone home +wounded, but the staff, Army Service Corps, lines of communication +troops, base units, home-service units, and then civilians down to the +detested grades of journalists, profiteers, ‘starred’ men exempted from +enlistment, conscientious objectors, members of the Government. The +trench-soldier, with this carefully graded caste-system of honour, did +not consider that the German trench-soldier might have exactly the same +system himself. He thought of Germany as a nation in arms, a unified +nation inspired with the sort of patriotism that he despised himself. +He believed most newspaper reports of conditions and sentiments in +Germany, though believing little or nothing of what he read about +conditions and sentiments in England. His cynicism, in fact, was not +confined to his own country. But he never underrated the German as +a soldier. Newspaper libels on Fritz’s courage and efficiency were +resented by all trench-soldiers of experience. + +Religion. It was said that not one soldier in a hundred was inspired +by religious feeling of even the crudest kind. It would have been +difficult to remain religious in the trenches though one had survived +the irreligion of the training battalion at home. A regular sergeant at +Montagne, a Second Battalion man, had recently told me that he did not +hold with religion in time of war. He said that the niggers (meaning +the Indians) were right in officially relaxing their religious rules +when they were fighting. ‘And all this damn nonsense, sir—excuse me, +sir—that we read in the papers, sir, about how miraculous it is that +the wayside crucifixes are always getting shot at but the figure of our +Lord Jesus somehow don’t get hurt, it fairly makes me sick, sir.’ This +was to explain why in giving practice fire-orders from the hill-top he +had shouted out: ‘Seven hundred, half left, bloke on cross, five +rounds consecrate, fire!’ His platoon, even the two men whose letters +home always had the same formal beginning: ‘Dear Sister in Christ,’ or +‘Dear Brother in Christ,’ blazed away. + +The troops, while ready to believe in the Kaiser as a comic personal +devil, were aware that the German soldier was, on the whole, more +devout than himself in the worship of God. In the instructors’ mess +we spoke freely of God and Gott as opposed tribal deities. For the +regimental chaplains as a body we had no respect. If the regimental +chaplains had shown one tenth the courage, endurance, and other human +qualities that the regimental doctors showed, we agreed, the British +Expeditionary Force might well have started a religious revival. But +they had not. The fact is that they were under orders not to get mixed +up with the fighting, to stay behind with the transport and not to +risk their lives. No soldier could have any respect for a chaplain +who obeyed these orders, and yet there was not in our experience one +chaplain in fifty who was not glad to obey them. Occasionally on a +quiet day in a quiet sector the chaplain would make a daring afternoon +visit to the support line and distribute a few cigarettes, and that was +all. But he was always in evidence back in rest-billets. Sometimes the +colonel would summon him to come up with the rations and bury the day’s +dead, and he would arrive, speak his lines, and hastily retire. The +position was made difficult by the respect that most of the commanding +officers had for the cloth, but it was a respect that they soon +outwore. The colonel in one battalion I served with got rid of four new +chaplains in as many months. Finally he applied for a Roman Catholic +chaplain, alleging a change of faith in the men under his command. For, +as I should have said before, the Roman Catholics were not only +permitted in posts of danger, but definitely enjoined to be wherever +fighting was so that they could give extreme unction to the dying. And +we had never heard of an R.C. chaplain who was unwilling to do all that +was expected of him and more. It was recalled that Father Gleeson of +the Munsters, when all the officers were put out of action at the first +battle of Ypres, stripped off his black badges and, taking command of +the survivors, held the line. + +Anglican chaplains were remarkably out of touch with their troops. I +told how the Second Battalion chaplain just before the Loos fighting +had preached a violent sermon on the battle against sin, and how one +old soldier behind me had grumbled: ‘Christ, as if one bloody push +wasn’t enough to worry about at a time.’ The Catholic padre, on the +other hand, had given his men his blessing and told them that if they +died fighting for the good cause they would go straight to Heaven, or +at any rate would be excused a great many years in Purgatory. Someone +told us of the chaplain of his battalion when he was in Mesopotamia, +how on the eve of a big battle he had preached a sermon on the +commutation of tithes. This was much more sensible than the battle +against sin, he said; it was quite up in the air, and took the men’s +minds off the fighting. + +I was feeling a bit better after a few weeks at the base, though the +knowledge that this was only temporary relief was with me all the time. +One day I walked out of the mess to begin the afternoon’s work on the +drill ground. I had to pass by the place where bombing instruction was +given. A group of men was standing around the table where the various +types of bombs were set out for demonstration. There was a sudden +crash. An instructor of the Royal Irish Rifles had been giving a +little unofficial instruction before the proper instructor arrived. He +had picked up a No. 1 percussion grenade and said: ‘Now, lads, you’ve +got to be careful with this chap. Remember that if you touch anything +while you’re swinging it, it will go off.’ To illustrate the point he +rapped it against the edge of the table. It killed him and another man +and wounded twelve others more or less severely. + + + + + XVIII + + +I rejoined the First Battalion in March, finding it in the line again, +on the Somme. It was the primrose season. We went in and out of the +Fricourt trenches, with billets at Morlancourt, a country village at +that time untouched by shell-fire. (Later it was knocked to pieces; +the Australians and the Germans captured and recaptured it from each +other several times, until there was nothing left except the site.) +‘A’ Company headquarters were in a farmhouse kitchen. We slept in our +valises on the red-brick floor. The residents were an old lady and her +daughter. The old lady was senile and paralysed; about all she could +do was to shake her head and say: ‘Triste, la guerre.’ We called her +‘Triste la Guerre.’ Her daughter used to carry her about in her arms. + +The Fricourt trenches were cut in chalk, which was better in wet +weather than the La Bassée clay. We were unlucky in having a +battalion-frontage where the lines came closer to each other than at +any other point for miles. It was only recently that the British line +had been extended down to the Somme. The French had been content, as +they usually were, unless they definitely intended a battle, to be at +peace with the Germans and not dig in too near. But here there was +a slight ridge and neither side could afford to let the other hold +the crest, so they shared it, after a prolonged dispute. It was used +by both the Germans and ourselves as an experimental station for new +types of bombs and grenades. The trenches were wide and tumbledown, +too shallow in many places, and without sufficient traverses. The +French had left relics of their nonchalance—corpses buried too near +the surface; and of their love of security—a number of lousy but deep +dug-outs. We busied ourselves raising the front-line parapet and +building traverses to limit the damage of the trench-mortar shells +that were continually falling. Every night not only the companies in +the front line but both support companies were hard at work all the +time. It was even worse than Cuinchy for rats; they used to run about +A Company mess while we were at meals. We used to eat with revolvers +beside our plates and punctuate our conversation with sudden volleys +at a rat rummaging at somebody’s valise or crawling along the timber +support of the roof above our heads. A Company officers were gay. We +had all been in our school choirs except Edmund Dadd, who sang like a +crow, and we used to chant church anthems and bits of cantatas whenever +things were going well. Edmund insisted on joining in. + +We were at dinner one day when a Welsh boy came rushing in, hysterical +with terror. He shouted out to Richardson: ‘Sirr, sirr, there is a +trenss-mortar in my dug-out.’ This in sing-song Welsh made us all shout +with laughter. Richardson said: ‘Cheer up, 33 Williams, how did a +big thing like a trench-mortar happen to be in your dug-out?’ But 33 +Williams could not explain. He went on again and again: ‘Sirr, sirr, +there is a trenss-mortar in my dug-out!’ Edmund Dadd went out to +investigate. He found that a trench-mortar shell had fallen into the +trench, bounced down the dug-out steps, exploded and killed five men. +33 Williams had been lying asleep and had been protected by the body of +another man; he was the only one unhit. + +[Illustration: SOMME TRENCH MAP + +CONTALMAISON—FRICOURT + +_Copyright Imperial War Museum._] + +Our greatest trial was the canister. It was a two-gallon drum with a +cylinder inside containing about two pounds of an explosive called +ammonal that looked like salmon paste, smelt like marzipan, and when +it went off sounded like the day of judgment. The hollow around the +cylinder was filled with scrap metal apparently collected by the +French villagers behind the German line—rusty nails, fragments of +British and French shells, spent bullets, and the screws, nuts, and +bolts that heavy lorries leave behind on the road. We dissected one +canister that had not exploded and found in it, among other things, +the cog-wheels of a clock and half a set of false teeth. The canister +was easy to hear coming and looked harmless in the air, but its shock +was as shattering as the very heaviest shell. It would blow in any but +the deepest dug-outs; and the false teeth and cog-wheels and so on +would go flying all over the place. We could not agree how a thing of +that size was fired. The problem was not solved until 1st July, when +the battalion attacked from these same trenches and found one of the +canister-guns with its crew. It was a wooden cannon buried in the earth +and fired with a time-fuse. The crew offered to surrender, but our men +refused; they had sworn for months to get the crew of that gun. + +One evening I was in the trench with Richardson and David Thomas (near +‘Trafalgar Square,’ should anyone remember that trench-junction) when +we met Pritchard and the adjutant. We stopped to talk. Richardson +complained what a devil of a place it was for trench-mortars. Pritchard +said: ‘That is where I come in.’ He was the battalion trench-mortar +officer and had just been given the first two Stokes mortar-guns +that we had seen in France. Pritchard said: ‘They’re beauties. I’ve +been trying them out and to-morrow I’m going to get some of my own +back. I can put four or five shells in the air at the same time.’ The +adjutant said: ‘About time, too. We’ve had three hundred casualties +in the last month here. It doesn’t seem so many as that because we’ve +had no officer casualties. In fact we’ve had about five hundred +casualties in the ranks since Loos, and not a single officer.’ Then +he suddenly realized that he had said something unlucky. David said: +‘Touch wood.’ Everybody sprang to touch wood, but it was a French +trench and unriveted. I pulled a pencil out of my pocket; that was wood +enough for me. Richardson said: ‘I’m not superstitious, anyway.’ + +The next evening I was leading up A Company for a working-party. B and +D Companies were in the line and we overtook C, which was also going up +to work. David was bringing up the rear of C. He was looking strange, +worried about something. I had never seen him anything but cheerful all +the time I had known him. I asked what was the matter. He said: ‘Oh, +I’m fed up and I’ve got a cold.’ C Company went along to the right of +the battalion frontage and we went along to the left. It was a weird +kind of night, with a bright moon. A German occupied sap was only +forty or fifty yards away. We were left standing on the parapet piling +up the sandbags, with the moon behind us, but the German sentries +ignored us—probably because they had work on hand themselves. It often +happened when both sides were busy putting up proper defences that +they turned a blind eye to each other’s work. Sometimes, it was said, +the rival wiring-parties ‘as good as borrowed each other’s mallets’ +for hammering in the pickets. The Germans were much more ready to live +and let live than we were. (The only time, so far as I know, besides +Christmas 1914, that both sides showed themselves in daylight without +firing at each other was once at Ypres when the trenches got so flooded +that there was nothing for it but for both sides to crawl out on top +to avoid drowning.) There was a continual exchange of grenades and +trench-mortars on our side; the canister was going over and the +men found it difficult to get out of its way in the dark. But for the +first time we were giving the enemy as good as they gave us. Pritchard +had been using his Stokes’ mortar all day and had sent over two or +three hundred rounds; twice they had located his emplacement and he had +had to shift hurriedly. + +‘A’ Company worked from seven in the evening until midnight. We must +have put thousands of sandbags into position, and fifty yards of front +trench were beginning to look presentable. About half-past ten there +was rifle-fire on the right and the sentries passed down the news +‘officer hit.’ Richardson at once went along to see who it was. He came +back to say: ‘It’s young Thomas. He got a bullet through the neck, +but I think he’s all right; it can’t have hit his spine or an artery +because he’s walking down to the dressing-station.’ I was pleased +at this news. I thought that David would be out of it long enough +perhaps to escape the coming offensive and perhaps even the rest of +the war. At twelve o’clock we had finished for the night. Richardson +said to me: ‘Von Ranke’ (only he pronounced it Von Runicke—it was my +regimental nickname), ‘take the company down for their rum and tea, +will you? They’ve certainly deserved it to-night. I’ll be along in +a few minutes. I’m going out with Corporal Chamberlen to see what +work the wiring-party’s been doing all this time.’ So I took the men +back. When we were well started I heard a couple of shells come over +somewhere behind us. I noticed them because they were the only shells +fired that night; five-nines they seemed by the noise. We were nearly +back at Maple Redoubt, which was the name of the support line on the +reverse side of the hill, when we heard the cry ‘Stretcher-bearers!’ +and after a while a man came running to say: ‘Captain Graves is hit.’ +There was a general laugh and we went on; but a stretcher-party +went up anyhow to see what was wrong. It was Richardson; the shells +had caught him and the corporal among the wire. The corporal had his +leg blown off, and died of wounds a day or two later. Richardson had +been blown into a shell-hole full of water and had lain there stunned +for some minutes before the sentries heard the corporal’s cries and +realized what had happened. He was brought down semi-conscious; he +recognized us, told us he wouldn’t be long away from the company, and +gave us instructions about it. The doctor said that he had no wound in +any vital spot, though the skin of his left side was riddled, as we had +seen, with the chalky soil blown up against him. We felt a relief in +his case, as in David’s, that he would be out of it for a while. + +Then news came that David had died. The regimental doctor, a throat +specialist in civil life, had told him at the dressing-station: ‘You’ll +be all right, only don’t raise your head for a bit.’ David had then, +it was said, taken a letter from his pocket, given it to an orderly, +and said: ‘Post that.’ It was a letter written to a girl in Glamorgan, +to be posted in case he got killed. Then the doctor saw that he was +choking; he tried trachotomy, but it was too late. Edmund and I were +talking together in the company headquarters at about one o’clock when +the adjutant came in. He looked ghastly. He told us that Richardson had +died at the dressing-station. His heart had been weakened by rowing +(he had been in the Eight at Radley) and the explosion and the cold +water had been too much for it. The adjutant said to me nervously: ‘You +know, somehow I feel, I—I feel responsible in a way for this; what +I said yesterday at ‘Trafalgar Square.’ Of course, really, I don’t +believe in superstition, but....’ Just at that moment there was a +noise of whizz-bang shells about twenty yards off; a cry of alarm, +followed by: ‘Stretcher-bearers!’ The adjutant turned quite white and +we knew without being told what it meant. We hurried out. Pritchard, +having fought his duel all night, and finally silenced the enemy, was +coming off duty. A whizz-bang had caught him at the point where the +communication trench reached Maple Redoubt; it was a direct hit. The +casualties of that night were three officers and one corporal. + +It seemed ridiculous when we returned without Richardson to A Company +billets to find ‘Triste La Guerre’ still alive and to hear her once +more quaver out ‘Triste, la guerre’ when her daughter explained that +the _jeune capitaine_ had been killed. The old woman had taken a fancy +to the _jeune capitaine_; we used to chaff him about it. I felt David’s +death worse than any other death since I had been in France. It did not +anger me as it did Siegfried. He was acting transport-officer and every +night now, when he came up with the rations, he went out on patrol +looking for Germans. It just made me feel empty and lost. + +One of the anthems that we used to sing was: ‘He that shall endure to +the end, shall be saved.’ The words repeated themselves in my head +like a charm whenever things were bad. ‘Though thousands languish +and fall beside thee, And tens of thousands around thee perish, Yet +still it shall not come nigh thee.’ And there was another bit: ‘To an +inheritance incorruptible.... Through faith unto salvation, Ready to +be revealed at the last trump.’ For ‘trump’ we always used to sing +‘crump.’ ‘The last crump’ was the end of the war and would we ever +hear it burst safely behind us? I wondered whether I could endure to +the end with faith unto salvation. I knew that my breaking point was +near now, unless something happened to stave it off.... It was +not that I was frightened. Certainly I feared death; but I had never +yet lost my head through fright, and I knew that I never would. Nor +would the breakdown come as insanity; I did not have it in me. It would +be a general nervous collapse, with tears and twitchings and dirtied +trousers. I had seen cases like that. + +The battalion was issued with a new gas-helmet, popularly known as ‘the +goggle-eyed b——r with the tit.’ It differed from the previous models. +One breathed in through the nose from inside the helmet and breathed +out through a special valve held in the mouth. I found that I could not +manage this. Boxing with an already broken nose had recently displaced +the septum, so that I was forced to breathe through my mouth. In a +gas-attack I would be unable to use the helmet and it was the only type +claimed to be proof against the new German gas. The battalion doctor +advised me to have an operation done as soon as I could. + +These months with the First Battalion have already been twice recorded +in literary history; though in both cases in a disguise of names +and characters. The two books are Siegfried Sassoon’s _Memoirs of a +Fox-hunting Man_, and _Nothing of Importance_, by Bill Adams, the +battalion sniping and intelligence officer. Adam’s book did not +sell, but was as good a book as 1917 censorship allowed; it should +be re-printed. Adams was killed; in fact, three out of five of the +officers of the First Battalion at that time were killed in the Somme +fighting. Scatter’s dream of open warfare was not realized. He himself +was very seriously wounded. Of A Company choir there is one survivor +besides myself—C. D. Morgan, who had his thigh smashed, and was still +in hospital sometime after the war ended. + + + + + XIX + + +When I was given leave in April 1916 I went to a military hospital in +London and had my nose operated on. It was a painful operation, but +performed by a first-class surgeon and cost me nothing. In peace-time +it would have cost me sixty guineas, and another twenty guineas in +nursing-home fees. After hospital I went up to Harlech to walk on the +hills. I had in mind the verse of the psalm: ‘I will lift up mine eyes +unto the hills, from whence cometh my help.’ That was another charm +against trouble. I bought a small two-roomed cottage from my mother, +who owned considerable cottage property in the neighbourhood. I bought +it in defiance of the war, as something to look forward to when the +guns stopped (‘when the guns stop’ was how we always thought of the end +of the war). I whitewashed the cottage and put in a table, a chair, a +bed and a few dishes and cooking utensils. I had decided to live there +by myself on bread and butter, bacon and eggs, lettuce in season, +cabbage and coffee; and to write poetry. My war-bonus would keep me +for a year or two at least. The cottage was on the hillside away from +the village. I put in a big window to look out over the wood below +and across the Morfa to the sea. I wrote two or three poems here as a +foretaste of the good life coming after the war. + +It was about this time, but whether before or after my operation I +cannot remember, that I was taken by my father to a dinner of the +Honourable Cymmrodorion Society—a Welsh literary club—where Lloyd +George, then Prime Minister, and W. M. Hughes, the Australian Prime +Minister, were to speak. Hughes was perky, dry and to the point; +Lloyd George was up in the air on one of his ‘glory of the Welsh +hills’ speeches. The power of his rhetoric was uncanny. I knew that +the substance of what he was saying was commonplace, idle and false, +but I had to fight hard against abandoning myself with the rest of the +audience. The power I knew was not his; he sucked it from his hearers +and threw it back at them. Afterwards I was introduced to him, and when +I looked closely at his eyes they were like those of a sleep-walker. + +I rejoined the Third Battalion at Litherland, near Liverpool, where +it had been shifted from Wrexham as part of the Mersey defence force; +I liked the Third Battalion. The senior officers were generous in +not putting more work on me than I wished to undertake, and it was +good to meet again three of my Wrexham contemporaries who had been +severely wounded (all of them, by a coincidence, in the left thigh) +and seemed to be out of it for the rest of the war—Frank Jones-Bateman +and ‘Father’ Watkin, who had been in the Welsh Regiment with me, and +Aubrey Attwater, the assistant adjutant, who had gone to the Second +Battalion early in 1915 and had been hit when out on patrol. Attwater +had come from Cambridge, at the outbreak of war and was known as +‘Brains’ in the battalion. The militia majors, who were for the most +part country gentlemen with estates in Wales, and had no thoughts in +peace-time beyond hunting, shooting, fishing, and the control of their +tenantry, were delighted with Attwater’s informative talk over the +port at mess. Sergeant Malley, the mess-sergeant, would go round with +his ‘Light or vintage, sir?’ and the old majors would say to Attwater: +‘Now, Brains! Tell us about Shakespeare. Is it true that Bacon wrote +him?’ Or, ‘Well, Brains! What do you think about this chap Hilaire +Belloc? Does he really know when the war’s going to end?’ And Attwater +would humorously accept his position as combined encyclopaedia and +almanac. Sergeant Malley was another friend whom I was always pleased +to meet again. He could pour more wine into a glass than any other man +in the world; it bulged up over the top of a glass like a cap and he +was never known to spill a drop. + +Wednesdays were guest-nights in the mess, when the married officers who +usually dined at home were expected to attend. The band played Gilbert +and Sullivan music behind a curtain. In the intervals the regimental +harper gave solos—Welsh melodies picked out rather uncertainly on a +hand-harp. When the programme was over the bandmaster was invited to +the senior officers’ table for his complimentary glass of light or +vintage. When he was gone, and the junior officers had retired, the +port went round and round, and the conversation, at first very formal, +became rambling and intimate. Once, I remember, a senior major laid +it down axiomatically that every so-called sportsman had at one time +or another committed a sin against sportsmanship. When challenged, +he cross-examined each of his neighbours in turn, putting them on +their honour to tell the truth. One of them, blushing, admitted that +he had once shot grouse two days before the Twelfth: ‘It was my last +chance before I rejoined the battalion in India.’ Another said that +when a public-school boy, and old enough to know better, he had +killed a sitting pheasant with a stone. The next one had gone out +with a poacher—in his Sandhurst days—and crumbled poison-berry into a +trout-stream. An even more scandalous admission came from a new-army +major, a gentleman-farmer, that his estate had been overrun with +foxes one year and, the headquarters of the nearest hunt being thirty +miles away, he had given his bailiff permission to protect the +hen-roosts with a gun. Finally it was the turn of the medical officer +to be cross-examined. He said: ‘Well, once when I was a student at St. +Andrews a friend asked me to put ten bob for him on a horse in the +Lincolnshire. I couldn’t find my bookmaker in time. The horse lost and +I never returned the ten bob.’ At this one of the guests, an officer +in the King’s Own Scottish Borderers, became suddenly excited, jumped +up and leant over the table, doubling his fists. ‘And was not the name +of the horse Strathspey? And will you not pay me my ten shillings now +immediately?’ + +The camp was only separated by the bombing-field from Brotherton’s, +where a specially sensitive explosive for detonators was made. The +munition makers had permanently yellow faces and hands and drew +appropriately high wages. Attwater used to argue at mess sometimes what +would happen if Brotherton’s blew up. Most of us held that the shock +would immediately kill all the three thousand men of the camp besides +destroying Litherland and a large part of Bootle. He maintained that +the very closeness of the camp would save it; that the vibrations would +go over and strike a big munition camp about a mile away and set that +off. One Sunday afternoon Attwater limped out of the mess and suddenly +saw smoke rising from Brotherton’s. Part of the factory was on fire. +The camp fire-brigade was immediately bugled for and managed to put +the fire out before it reached a vital spot. So the argument was never +decided. I was at Litherland only a few weeks. On 1st July 1916 the +Somme offensive started, and all available trained men and officers +were sent out to replace casualties. I was disappointed to be sent back +to the Second Battalion, not the First. + +It was in trenches at Givenchy, just the other side of the canal +from the Cuinchy brick-stacks. I arrived at the battalion on July +5th to find it in the middle of a raid. Prisoners were coming down +the trench, scared and chattering to each other. They were Saxons +just returned from a divisional rest and a week’s leave to Germany. +Their uniforms were new and their packs full of good stuff to loot. +One prisoner got a good talking-to from C Company sergeant-major, a +Birmingham man, who was shocked at a packet of indecent photographs +found in the man’s haversack. It had been a retaliatory raid. Only a +few days before, the Germans had sent up the biggest mine blown on the +Western front so far. It caught our B Company—the B’s were proverbially +unlucky. The crater, which was afterwards named Red Dragon Crater after +the Royal Welch regimental badge, must have been about thirty yards +across. There were few survivors of B Company. The Germans immediately +came over in force to catch the other companies in confusion. Stanway, +who had been a company sergeant-major on the retreat and was now an +acting-major, rallied some men on the flank and drove them back. Blair, +B Company commander, was buried by the mine up to his neck and for the +rest of the day was constantly under fire. Though an oldish man (he had +the South African ribbon), he survived this experience, recovered from +his wounds, and was back in the battalion a few months later. + +This raid was Stanway’s revenge. He organized it with the colonel; the +colonel was the Third Battalion adjutant who had originally sent me +out to France. The raid was elaborately planned, with bombardments and +smoke-screen diversions on the flanks. A barrage of shrapnel shifted +forward and back from the German front line to the supports. The +intention was that the Germans at the first bombardment should go +down into the shell-proof dug-outs, leaving only their sentries in the +trench, and reappear as soon as the barrage lifted. When it came down +again they would make another dash for the dug-outs. After this had +happened two or three times they would be slow in coming out at all. +Then, under cover of a smoke-screen, the raid would be made and the +barrage put down uninterruptedly on the support and reserve lines to +prevent reinforcements. My only part in the raid, which was successful, +was to write out a detailed record of it at the colonel’s request. It +was not the report for divisional headquarters but a page of regimental +history to be sent to the depot to be filed in regimental records. In +my account I noted that for the first time for two hundred years the +regiment had reverted to the pike. Instead of rifle and bayonet some of +the raiders had used butchers’ knives secured with medical plaster to +the end of broomsticks. This pike was a lighter weapon than rifle and +bayonet and was useful in conjunction with bombs and revolvers. + +An official journalist at headquarters also wrote an account of the +raid. The battalion enjoyed the bit about how they had gone over +shouting ‘Remember Kitchener!’ and ‘Avenge the _Lusitania_!’ ‘What a +damn silly thing to shout,’ said someone. ‘Old Kitchener was all right, +but nobody wants him back at the War Office, that I’ve heard. And as +for the _Lusitania_, the Germans gave her full warning, and if it +brings the States into the war, it’s all to the good.’ + +There were not many officers in the Second who had been with it when +I left it a month after Loos, but at any rate I expected to have a +friendlier welcome than the first time I had come to the battalion at +Laventie. But, as one of them recorded in his diary: ‘Graves had a +chilly reception, which surprised me.’ The reason was simple. One of +the officers who had joined the Third Battalion in August 1914, +and had been on the Square with me, had achieved his ambition of a +regular commission in the Second Battalion. He was one of those who had +been sent out to France before me as being more efficient and had been +wounded before I came out. But now he was only a second-lieutenant in +the Second Battalion, where promotion was slow, and I was a captain +in the Third Battalion. Line-battalion feeling against the Special +Reserve was always strong, and jealousy of my extra stars made him +bitter. It amused him to revive the suspicion raised at Wrexham by my +German name that I was a German spy. Whether he was serious or not I +cannot say, probably he could not have said either; but the result was +that I found myself treated with great reserve by all the officers +who had not been with me in trenches before. It was unlucky that the +most notorious German spy caught in England had assumed the name +of Karl Graves. It was put about that he was a brother of mine. My +consolation was that there was obviously a battle due and that would +be the end either of me or of the suspicion. I thought to myself: ‘So +long as there isn’t an N.C.O. told off to watch me and shoot me on the +slightest appearance of treachery.’ Such things had been known. As a +matter of fact, though I had myself had no traffic with the enemy, +there was a desultory correspondence kept up between my mother and her +sisters in Germany; it came through her sister, Clara von Faber du +Faur, mother of my cousin Conrad, whose husband was German consul at +Zurich. It was not treasonable on either side, merely a register of the +deaths of relations and discreet references to the war service of the +survivors. The German aunts wrote, as the Government had ordered every +German with relations or friends in enemy or neutral countries to do, +pointing out the righteousness of the German cause and presenting +Germany as the innocent party in a war engineered by France and Russia. +My mother, equally strong for the Allied cause, wrote back that they +were deluded. The officers I liked in the battalion were the colonel +and Captain Dunn, the battalion doctor. Doctor Dunn was what they call +a hard-bitten man; he had served as a trooper in the South African War +and won the d.c.m. He was far more than a doctor; living at +battalion headquarters he became the right-hand man of three or four +colonels in succession. When his advice was not taken this was usually +afterwards regretted. On one occasion, in the autumn fighting of 1917, +a shell burst among the headquarters staff, knocking out adjutant, +colonel, and signals officer. Dunn had no hesitation in pulling off the +red-cross armlets that he wore in a battle and becoming a temporary +combatant officer of the Royal Welch, resigning his duties to the +stretcher-bearer sergeant. He took command and kept things going. The +men were rather afraid of him, but had more respect for him than for +anyone else in the battalion. + + + + + XX + + +Four days after the raid we heard that we were due for the Somme. +We marched through Béthune, which had been much knocked about and +was nearly deserted, to Fouquières, and there entrained for the +Somme. The Somme railhead was near Amiens and we marched by easy +stages through Cardonette, Daours, and Buire, until we came to the +original front line, close to the place where David Thomas had +been killed. The fighting had moved two miles on. This was on the +afternoon of 14th July. At 4 a.m. on the 15th July we moved up the +Méaulte-Fricourt-Bazentin road which wound through ‘Happy Valley’ +and found ourselves in the more recent battle area. Wounded men and +prisoners came streaming past us. What struck me most was the number +of dead horses and mules lying about; human corpses I was accustomed +to, but it seemed wrong for animals to be dragged into the war like +this. We marched by platoons, at fifty yards distance. Just beyond +Fricourt we found a German shell-barrage across the road. So we left it +and moved over thickly shell-pitted ground until 8 a.m., when we found +ourselves on the fringe of Mametz Wood, among the dead of our new-army +battalions that had been attacking Mametz Wood. We halted in thick +mist. The Germans had been using lachrymatory shell and the mist held +the fumes; we coughed and swore. We tried to smoke, but the gas had got +into the cigarettes, so we threw them away. Later we wished we had not, +because it was not the cigarettes that had been affected so much as our +own throats. The colonel called up the officers and we pulled out our +maps. We were expecting orders for an attack. When the mist cleared +we saw a German gun with ‘First Battalion Royal Welch Fusiliers’ +chalked on it. It was evidently a trophy. I wondered what had +happened to Siegfried and my friends of A Company. We found the +battalion quite close in bivouacs; Siegfried was still alive, as were +Edmund Dadd and two other A Company officers. The battalion had been in +heavy fighting. In their first attack at Fricourt they had overrun our +opposite number in the German army, the Twenty-third Infantry Regiment, +who were undergoing a special disciplinary spell in the trenches +because an inspecting staff-officer, coming round, had found that all +the officers were back in Mametz village in a deep dug-out instead of +up in the trenches with their men. (It was said that throughout that +bad time in March in the German trenches opposite to us there had been +no officer of higher rank than corporal.) Their next objective had been +The Quadrangle, a small copse this side of Mametz Wood. I was told +that Siegfried had then distinguished himself by taking single-handed +a battalion frontage that the Royal Irish Regiment had failed to take +the day before. He had gone over with bombs in daylight, under covering +fire from a couple of rifles, and scared the occupants out. It was a +pointless feat; instead of reporting or signalling for reinforcements +he sat down in the German trench and began dozing over a book of poems +which he had brought with him. When he finally went back he did not +report. The colonel was furious. The attack on Mametz Wood had been +delayed for two hours because it was reported that British patrols were +still out. ‘British patrols’ were Siegfried and his book of poems. ‘It +would have got you a D.S.O. if you’d only had more sense,’ +stormed the colonel. Siegfried had been doing heroic things ever since +I had left the battalion. His nickname in the Seventh Division was +‘Mad Jack.’ He was given a Military Cross for bringing in a wounded +lance-corporal from a mine-crater close to the German lines, under +heavy fire. He was one of the rare exceptions to the rule against the +decoration of Third Battalion officers. I did not see Siegfried this +time; he was down with the transport having a rest. So I sent him a +rhymed letter, by one of our own transport men, about the times that +we were going to have together when the war ended; how, after a rest +at Harlech, we were going for a visit to the Caucasus and Persia and +China; and what good poetry we would write. It was in answer to one +he had written to me from the army school at Flixécourt a few weeks +previously (which appears in _The Old Huntsman_). + +[Illustration:SOMME TRENCH MAP + +Martinpuich Sector + +_Copyright Imperial War Museum._] + +I went for a stroll with Edmund Dadd, who was now commanding A Company. +Edmund was cursing: ‘It’s not fair, Robert. You remember A Company +under Richardson was always the best company. Well, it’s kept up its +reputation, and the C.O. shoves us in as the leading company of every +show, and we get our objectives and hold them, and so we’ve got to do +the same again the next time. And he says that I’m indispensable in the +company, so he makes me go over every time instead of giving me a rest +and letting my second-in-command take his turn. I’ve had five shows +in just over a fortnight and I can’t go on being lucky every time. +The colonel’s about due for his c.b. Apparently A Company is +making sure of if for him.’ + +For the next two days we were in bivouacs outside the wood. We were in +fighting kit and the nights were wet and cold. I went into the wood +to find German overcoats to use as blankets. Mametz Wood was full of +dead of the Prussian Guards Reserve, big men, and of Royal Welch and +South Wales Borderers of the new-army battalions, little men. There +was not a single tree in the wood unbroken. I got my greatcoats +and came away as quickly as I could, climbing over the wreckage of +green branches. Going and coming, by the only possible route, I had +to pass by the corpse of a German with his back propped against a +tree. He had a green face, spectacles, close shaven hair; black blood +was dripping from the nose and beard. He had been there for some days +and was bloated and stinking. There had been bayonet fighting in the +wood. There was a man of the South Wales Borderers and one of the Lehr +regiment who had succeeded in bayoneting each other simultaneously. A +survivor of the fighting told me later that he had seen a young soldier +of the Fourteenth Royal Welch bayoneting a German in parade-ground +style, automatically exclaiming as he had been taught: ‘In, out, on +guard.’ He said that it was the oddest thing he had heard in France. + +I found myself still superstitious about looting or collecting +souvenirs. The greatcoats were only a loan, I told myself. Almost the +only souvenir I had allowed myself to keep was a trench periscope, +a little rod-shaped metal one sent me from home; when I poked it up +above the parapet it offered only an inch-square target to the German +snipers. Yet a sniper at Cuinchy, in May, drilled it through, exactly +central, at four hundred yards range. I sent it home, but had no time +to write a note of explanation. My mother, misunderstanding, and +practical as usual, took it back to the makers and made them change it +for a new one. + +Our brigade, the Nineteenth, was the reserve brigade of the +Thirty-third Division; the other brigades, the Ninety-ninth and +Hundredth, had attacked Martinpuich two days previously and had been +stopped with heavy losses as soon as they started. Since then we had +had nothing to do but sit about in shell-holes and watch the artillery +duel going on. We had never seen artillery so thick. On the 18th +we moved up to a position just to the north of Bazentin le Petit to +relieve the Tyneside Irish. I was with D Company. The guide who was +taking us up was hysterical and had forgotten the way; we put him under +arrest and found it ourselves. As we went up through the ruins of the +village we were shelled. We were accustomed to that, but they were gas +shells. The standing order with regard to gas shells was not to put +on one’s respirator but hurry on. Up to that week there had been no +gas shells except lachrymatory ones; these were the first of the real +kind, so we lost about half a dozen men. When at last we arrived at +the trenches, which were scooped at a roadside and only about three +feet deep, the company we were relieving hurried out without any of the +usual formalities; they had been badly shaken. I asked their officer +where the Germans were. He said he didn’t know, but pointed vaguely +towards Martinpuich, a mile to our front. Then I asked him where and +what were the troops on our left. He didn’t know. I cursed him and he +went off. We got into touch with C Company behind us on the right and +with the Fourth Suffolks not far off on the left. We began deepening +the trenches and locating the Germans; they were in a trench-system +about five hundred yards away but keeping fairly quiet. + +The next day there was very heavy shelling at noon; shells were +bracketing along our trench about five yards short and five yards over, +but never quite getting it. We were having dinner and three times +running my cup of tea was spilt by the concussion and filled with dirt. +I was in a cheerful mood and only laughed. I had just had a parcel of +kippers from home; they were far more important than the bombardment—I +recalled with appreciation one of my mother’s sayings: ‘Children, +remember this when you eat your kippers; kippers cost little, yet if +they cost a hundred guineas a pair they would still find buyers among +the millionaires.’ Before the shelling had started a tame magpie had +come into the trench; it had apparently belonged to the Germans who +had been driven out of the village by the Gordon Highlanders a day or +two before. It was looking very draggled. ‘That’s one for sorrow,’ +I said. The men swore that it spoke something in German as it came +in, but I did not hear it. I was feeling tired and was off duty, so +without waiting for the bombardment to stop I went to sleep in the +trench. I decided that I would just as soon be killed asleep as awake. +There were no dug-outs, of course. I always found it easy now to sleep +through bombardments. I was conscious of the noise in my sleep, but I +let it go by. Yet if anybody came to wake me for my watch or shouted +‘Stand-to!’ I was alert in a second. I had learned to go to sleep +sitting down, standing up, marching, lying on a stone floor, or in any +other position, at a moment’s notice at any time of day or night. But +now I had a dreadful nightmare; it was as though somebody was handling +me secretly, choosing the place to drive a knife into me. Finally, he +gripped me in the small of the back. I woke up with a start, shouting, +and punched the small of my back where the hand was. I found that I had +killed a mouse that had been frightened by the bombardment and run down +my neck. + +That afternoon the company got an order through from the brigade to +build two cruciform strong-points at such-and-such a map reference. +Moodie, the company commander, and I looked at our map and laughed. +Moodie sent back a message that he would be glad to do so, but would +require an artillery bombardment and strong reinforcements because +the points selected, half way to Martinpuich, were occupied in +force by the enemy. The colonel came up and verified this. He said that +we should build the strong-point about three hundred yards forward and +two hundred yards apart. So one platoon stayed behind in the trench +and the other went out and started digging. A cruciform strong-point +consisted of two trenches, each some thirty yards long, crossing at +right angles to each other; it was wired all round, so that it looked, +in diagram, like a hot-cross bun. The defenders could bring fire to +bear against an attack from any direction. We were to hold each of +these points with a Lewis gun and a platoon of men. + +It was a bright moonlight night. My way to the strong-point on +the right took me along the Bazentin-High Wood road. A German +sergeant-major, wearing a pack and full equipment, was lying on his +back in the middle of the road, his arms stretched out wide. He was a +short, powerful man with a full black beard. He looked sinister in the +moonlight; I needed a charm to get myself past him. The simplest way, I +found, was to cross myself. Evidently a brigade of the Seventh Division +had captured the road and the Germans had been shelling it heavily. It +was a sunken road and the defenders had begun to scrape fire-positions +in the north bank, facing the Germans. The work had apparently been +interrupted by a counter-attack. They had done no more than scrape +hollows in the lower part of the bank. To a number of these little +hollows wounded men had crawled, put their heads and shoulders inside +and died there. They looked as if they had tried to hide from the black +beard. They were Gordon Highlanders. + +I was visiting the strong-point on the right. The trench had now been +dug two or three feet down and a party of Engineers had arrived +with coils of barbed wire for the entanglement. I found that work had +stopped. The whisper went round: ‘Get your rifles ready. Here comes +Fritz.’ I lay down flat to see better, and about seventy yards away in +the moonlight I could make out massed figures. I immediately sent a man +back to the company to find Moodie and ask him for a Lewis gun and a +flare-pistol. I restrained the men, who were itching to fire, telling +them to wait until they came closer. I said: ‘They probably don’t +know we’re here and we’ll get more of them if we let them come right +up close. They may even surrender.’ The Germans were wandering about +irresolutely and we wondered what the game was. There had been a number +of German surrenders at night recently, and this might be one on a big +scale. Then Moodie came running with a Lewis gun, the flare-pistol, +and a few more men with rifle-grenades. He decided to give the enemy a +chance. He sent up a flare and fired a Lewis gun over their heads. A +tall officer came running towards us with his hands up in surrender. +He was surprised to find that we were not Germans. He said that he +belonged to the Public Schools Battalion in our own brigade. Moodie +asked him what the hell he was doing. He said that he was in command of +a patrol. He was sent back for a few more of his men, to make sure it +was not a trick. The patrol was half a company of men wandering about +aimlessly between the lines, their rifles slung over their shoulders, +and, it seemed, without the faintest idea where they were or what +information they were supposed to bring back. This Public Schools +Battalion was one of four or five others which had been formed some +time in 1914. Their training had been continually interrupted by large +numbers of men being withdrawn as officers for other regiments. The +only men left, in fact, seemed to be those who were unfitted to +hold commissions; yet unfitted by their education to make good soldiers +in the ranks. The other battalions had been left behind in England as +training battalions; only this one had been sent out. It was a constant +embarrassment to the brigade. + +I picked up a souvenir that night. A German gun-team had been shelled +as it was galloping out of Bazentin towards Martinpuich. The horses and +the driver had been killed. At the back of the limber were the gunners’ +treasures. Among them was a large lump of chalk wrapped up in a piece +of cloth; it had been carved and decorated in colours with military +mottos, the flags of the Central Powers, and the names of the various +battles in which the gunner had served. I sent it as a present to Dr. +Dunn. I am glad to say that both he and it survived the war; he is in +practice at Glasgow, and the lump of chalk is under a glass case in +his consulting room. The evening of the next day, July 19th, we were +relieved. We were told that we would be attacking High Wood, which we +could see a thousand yards away to the right at the top of a slope. +High Wood was on the main German battle-line, which ran along the +ridge, with Delville Wood not far off on the German left. Two British +brigades had already attempted it; in both cases the counter-attack had +driven them out. Our battalion had had a large number of casualties and +was now only about four hundred strong. + +I have kept a battalion order issued at midnight: + + To O.C. B Co. 2nd R.W.F. 20.7.16. + + Companies will move as under + to same positions in S14b + as were to have been + taken over from Cameronians aaa + A Coy. 12.30 a.m. + B Coy. 12.45 a.m. + C Coy. 1 a.m. + D Coy. 1.15 a.m. aaa + At 2 a.m. Company Commanders + will meet C.O. at X + Roads S14b 99. aaa + Men will lie down and + get under cover but equipment + will not be taken off aaa + +S14b 99 was a map reference for Bazentin churchyard. We lay here on +the reverse slope of a slight ridge about half a mile from the wood. +I attended the meeting of company commanders; the colonel told us the +plan. He said: ‘Look here, you fellows, we’re in reserve for this +attack. The Cameronians are going up to the wood first, then the Fifth +Scottish Rifles; that’s at five a.m. The Public Schools Battalion +are in support if anything goes wrong. I don’t know if we shall +be called on; if we are, it will mean that the Jocks have legged it. +As usual,’ he added. This was an appeal to prejudice. ‘The Public +Schools Battalion is, well, what we know, so if we are called for, that +means it will be the end of us.’ He said this with a laugh and we all +laughed. We were sitting on the ground protected by the road-bank; a +battery of French 75’s was firing rapid over our heads about twenty +yards away. There was a very great concentration of guns in Happy +Valley now. We could hardly hear what he was saying. He told us that +if we did get orders to reinforce, we were to shake out in artillery +formation; once in the wood we were to hang on like death. Then he said +good-bye and good luck and we rejoined our companies. + +At this juncture the usual inappropriate message came through from +Division. Division could always be trusted to send through a warning +about verdigris on vermorel-sprayers, or the keeping of pets in +trenches, or being polite to our allies, or some other triviality, when +an attack was in progress. This time it was an order for a private in C +Company to report immediately to the assistant provost-marshal back at +Albert, under escort of a lance-corporal. He was for a court-martial. +A sergeant of the company was also ordered to report as a witness in +the case. The private was charged with the murder of a French civilian +in an estaminet at Béthune about a month previously. Apparently there +had been a good deal of brandy going and the French civilian, who had +a grudge against the British (it was about his wife), started to tease +the private. He was reported, somewhat improbably, as having said: +‘English no bon, Allmand trés bon. War fineesh, napoo the English. +Allmand win.’ The private had immediately drawn his bayonet and run the +man through. At the court-martial the private was exculpated; the +French civil representative commended him for having ‘energetically +repressed local defeatism.’ So he and the two N.C.O.’s missed the +battle. + +What the battle that they missed was like I pieced together afterwards. +The Jocks did get into the wood and the Royal Welch were not called +on to reinforce until eleven o’clock in the morning. The Germans put +down a barrage along the ridge where we were lying, and we lost about +a third of the battalion before our show started. I was one of the +casualties. + +It was heavy stuff, six and eight inch. There was so much of it that +we decided to move back fifty yards; it was when I was running that +an eight-inch shell burst about three paces behind me. I was able +to work that out afterwards by the line of my wounds. I heard the +explosion and felt as though I had been punched rather hard between +the shoulder-blades, but had no sensation of pain. I thought that +the punch was merely the shock of the explosion; then blood started +trickling into my eye and I felt faint and called to Moodie: ‘I’ve +been hit.’ Then I fell down. A minute or two before I had had two very +small wounds on my left hand; they were in exactly the same position +as the two, on my right hand, that I had got during the preliminary +bombardment at Loos. This I had taken as a sign that I would come +through all right. For further security I had repeated to myself a line +of Nietsche’s, whose poems, in French, I had with me: + + Non, tu ne peus pas me tuer. + +It was the poem about a man on the scaffold with the red-bearded +executioner standing over him. (This copy of Nietsche, by the +way, had contributed to the suspicions about me as a spy. Nietsche was +execrated in the papers as the philosopher of German militarism; he +was more popularly interpreted as a William le Queux mystery-man—the +sinister figure behind the Kaiser.) + +One piece of shell went through my left thigh, high up near the groin; +I must have been at the full stretch of my stride to have escaped +emasculation. The wound over the eye was nothing; it was a little chip +of marble, possibly from one of the Bazentin cemetery headstones. This +and a finger wound, which split the bone, probably came from another +shell that burst in front of me. The main wound was made by a piece of +shell that went in two inches below the point of my right shoulder and +came out through my chest two inches above my right nipple, in a line +between it and the base of my neck. + +My memory of what happened then is vague. Apparently Doctor Dunn came +up through the barrage with a stretcher-party, dressed my wound, and +got me down to the old German dressing-station at the north end of +Mametz Wood. I just remember being put on the stretcher and winking at +the stretcher-bearer sergeant who was looking at me and saying: ‘Old +Gravy’s got it, all right.’ The dressing-station was overworked that +day; I was laid in a corner on a stretcher and remained unconscious for +more than twenty-four hours. + +It was about ten o’clock on the 20th that I was hit. Late that night +the colonel came to the dressing-station; he saw me lying in the corner +and was told that I was done for. The next morning, the 21st, when they +were clearing away the dead, I was found to be still breathing; so they +put me on an ambulance for Heilly, the nearest field-hospital. The pain +of being jolted down the Happy Valley, with a shell-hole at every +three or four yards of the roads, woke me for awhile. I remember +screaming. But once back on the better roads I became unconscious +again. That morning the colonel wrote the usual formal letters of +condolence to the next-of-kin of the six or seven officers who had been +killed. This was his letter to my mother: + + 22/7/16 + + Dear Mrs. Graves, + + I very much regret to have to write and tell you your son has died + of wounds. He was very gallant, and was doing so well and is a great + loss. + + He was hit by a shell and very badly wounded, and died on the way + down to the base I believe. He was not in bad pain, and our doctor + managed to get across and attend him at once. + + We have had a very hard time, and our casualties have been large. + Believe me you have all our sympathy in your loss, and we have lost a + very gallant soldier. + + Please write to me if I can tell you or do anything. + + Yours sincerely, + + * * * + +Later he made out the official casualty list and reported me died of +wounds. It was a long casualty list, because only eighty men were left +in the battalion. + +Heilly was on the railway; close to the station was the +hospital—marquee tents with the red cross painted prominently on the +roofs to discourage air-bombing. It was fine July weather and the +tents were insufferably hot. I was semi-conscious now, and realized +my lung-wound by the shortness of breath. I was amused to watch the +little bubbles of blood, like red soap-bubbles, that my breath made +when it escaped through the hole of the wound. The doctor came over to +me. I felt sorry for him; he looked as though he had not had any sleep +for days. I asked him for a drink. He said: ‘Would you like some tea?’ +I whispered: ‘Not with condensed milk in it.’ He said: ‘I’m afraid +there’s no fresh milk.’ Tears came to my eyes; I expected better of +a hospital behind the lines. He said: ‘Will you have some water?’ I +said: ‘Not if it’s boiled.’ He said: ‘It is boiled. And I’m afraid I +can’t give you anything with alcohol in it in your present condition.’ +I said: ‘Give me some fruit then.’ He said: ‘I have seen no fruit for +days.’ But a few minutes later he came back with two rather unripe +greengages. I felt so grateful that I promised him a whole orchard when +I recovered. + +The nights of the 22nd and 23rd were very bad. Early on the morning of +the 24th, when the doctor came to see how I was, I said: ‘You must send +me away from here. The heat will kill me.’ It was beating through the +canvas on my head. He said: ‘Stick it out. It’s your best chance to lie +here and not to be moved. You’d not reach the base alive.’ I said: ‘I’d +like to risk the move. I’ll be all right, you’ll see.’ Half an hour +later he came back. ‘Well, you’re having it your way. I’ve just got +orders to evacuate every case in the hospital. Apparently the Guards +have been in it up at Delville Wood and we’ll have them all coming in +to-night.’ I had no fears now about dying. I was content to be wounded +and on the way home. + +I had been given news of the battalion from a brigade-major, wounded in +the leg, who was in the next bed to me. He looked at my label and said: +‘I see you’re in the Second Royal Welch Fusiliers. Well, I saw your +High Wood show through field-glasses. The way your battalion shook +out into artillery formation, company by company-with each section of +four or five men in file at fifty yards interval and distance—going +down into the hollow and up the slope through the barrage, was the +most beautiful bit of parade-ground drill I’ve ever seen. Your company +officers must have been superb.’ I happened to know that one company at +least had started without a single officer. I asked him whether they +had held the wood. He said: ‘They hung on at the near end. I believe +what happened was that the Public Schools Battalion came away as soon +as it got dark; and so did the Scotsmen. Your chaps were left there +alone for some time. They steadied themselves by singing. Later, the +chaplain—R.C. of course—Father McCabe, brought the Scotsmen back. They +were Glasgow Catholics and would follow a priest where they wouldn’t +follow an officer. The middle of the wood was impossible for either the +Germans or your fellows to hold. There was a terrific concentration +of artillery on it. The trees were splintered to matchwood. Late that +night the survivors were relieved by a brigade of the Seventh Division; +your First Battalion was in it.’ + +That evening I was put in the hospital train. They could not lift +me from the stretcher to put me on a bunk, for fear of starting +hæmorrhage in the lung; so they laid the stretcher on top of it, with +the handles resting on the head-rail and foot-rail. I had been on the +same stretcher since I was wounded. I remember the journey only as a +nightmare. + +My back was sagging, and I could not raise my knees to relieve the +cramp because the bunk above me was only a few inches away. A German +officer on the other side of the carriage groaned and wept unceasingly. +He had been in an aeroplane crash and had a compound fracture of the +leg. The other wounded men were cursing him and telling him to +stow it and be a man, but he went on, keeping every one awake. He was +not delirious, only frightened and in great pain. An orderly gave me +a pencil and paper and I wrote home to say that I was wounded but all +right. This was July 24th, my twenty-first birthday, and it was on +this day, when I arrived at Rouen, that my death officially occurred. +My parents got my letter two days after the letter from the colonel; +mine was dated July 23rd, because I had lost count of days when I was +unconscious; his was dated the 22nd.[8] They could not decide whether +my letter had been written just before I died and misdated, or whether +I had died just after writing it. ‘Died of wounds’ was, however, so +much more circumstantial than ‘killed’ that they gave me up. I was in +No. 8 Hospital at Rouen; an ex-château high above the town. The day +after I arrived a Cooper aunt of mine, who had married a Frenchman, +came up to the hospital to visit a nephew in the South Wales Borderers +who had just had a leg amputated. She happened to see my name in a list +on the door of the ward, so she wrote to my mother to reassure her. On +the 30th I had a letter from the colonel: + + 30/7/16 + + Dear von Runicke, + + I cannot tell you how pleased I am you are alive. I was told your + number was up for certain, and a letter was supposed to have come in + from Field Ambulance saying you had gone under. + + Well, it’s good work. We had a rotten time, and after succeeding + in doing practically the impossible we collected that rotten crowd + and put them in their places, but directly dark came they legged it. + It was too sad. + + We lost heavily. It is not fair putting brave men like ours alongside + that crowd. I also wish to thank you for your good work and bravery, + and only wish you could have been with them. I have read of bravery + but I have never seen such magnificent and wonderful disregard for + death as I saw that day. It was almost uncanny—it was so great. I + once heard an old officer in the Royal Welch say the men would follow + you to Hell; but these chaps would bring you back and put you in a + dug-out in Heaven. + + Good luck and a quick recovery. I shall drink your health to-night. + + * * + +I had little pain all this time, but much discomfort; the chief pain +came from my finger, which had turned septic because nobody had taken +the trouble to dress it, and was throbbing. And from the thigh, where +the sticky medical plaster, used to hold down the dressing, pulled +up the hair painfully when it was taken off each time the wound was +dressed. My breath was very short still. I contrasted the pain and +discomfort favourably with that of the operation on my nose of two +months back; for this I had won no sympathy at all from anyone, because +it was not an injury contracted in war. I was weak and petulant and +muddled. The R.A.M.C. bugling outraged me. The ‘Rob All My Comrades,’ +I complained, had taken everything I had except a few papers in my +tunic-pocket and a ring which was too tight on my finger to be pulled +off; and now they mis-blew the Last Post flat and windily, and with the +pauses in the wrong places, just to annoy me. I remember that I +told an orderly to put the bugler under arrest and jump to it or I’d +report him to the senior medical officer. + +Next to me was a Welsh boy, named O. M. Roberts, who had joined us +only a few days before he was hit. He told me about High Wood; he had +reached the edge of the wood when he was wounded in the groin. He had +fallen into a shell-hole. Some time in the afternoon he had recovered +consciousness and seen a German officer working round the edge of the +wood, killing off the wounded with an automatic pistol. Some of our +lightly-wounded were, apparently, not behaving as wounded men should; +they were sniping. The German worked nearer. He saw Roberts move and +came towards him, fired and hit him in the arm. Roberts was very weak +and tugged at his Webley. He had great difficulty in getting it out +of the holster. The German fired again and missed. Roberts rested the +Webley against the lip of the shell-hole and tried to pull the trigger; +he was not strong enough. The German was quite close now and was going +to make certain of him this time. Roberts said that he just managed to +pull the trigger with the fingers of both hands when the German was +only about five yards away. The shot took the top of his head off. +Roberts fainted. + +The doctors had been anxiously watching my lung, which was gradually +filling with blood and pressing my heart too far away to the left of my +body; the railway journey had restarted the hæmorrhage. They marked the +gradual progress of my heart with an indelible pencil on my skin and +said that when it reached a certain point they would have to aspirate +me. This sounded a serious operation, but it only consisted of putting +a hollow needle into my lung through the back and drawing the blood off +into a vacuum flask through it. I had a local anæsthetic; it hurt +no more than a vaccination, and I was reading the _Gazette de Rouen_ +as the blood hissed into the flask. It did not look much, perhaps half +a pint. That evening I heard a sudden burst of lovely singing in the +courtyard where the ambulances pulled up. I recognized the quality +of the voices. I said to Roberts: ‘The First Battalion have been in +it again,’ and asked a nurse to verify it; I was right. It was their +Delville Wood show, I think, but I am uncertain now of the date. + +A day or two later I was taken back to England by hospital ship. + + + + + XXI + + +I had sent my parents a wire that I would be arriving at Waterloo +Station the next morning. The way from the hospital train to the +waiting ambulances was roped off; as each stretcher case was lifted off +the train a huge hysterical crowd surged up to the barrier and uttered +a new roar. Flags were being waved. It seemed that the Somme battle +was regarded at home as the beginning of the end of the war. As I idly +looked at the crowd, one figure detached itself; it was my father, +hopping about on one leg, waving an umbrella and cheering with the best +of them. I was embarrassed, but was soon in the ambulance. I was on the +way to Queen Alexandra’s Hospital, Highgate. This was Sir Alfred Mond’s +big house, lent for the duration of the war, and a really good place to +be in; having a private room to myself was the most unexpected luxury. + +What I most disliked in the army was never being alone, forced to live +and sleep with men whose company in many cases I would have run miles +to avoid. + +I was not long at Highgate; the lung healed up easily and my finger +was saved for me. I heard here for the first time that I was supposed +to be dead; the joke contributed greatly to my recovery. The people +with whom I had been on the worst terms during my life wrote the most +enthusiastic condolences to my parents: my housemaster, for instance. +I have kept a letter dated the 5th August 1916 from _The Times_ +advertisement department: + +_Captain Robert Graves._ + + Dear Sir, + + We have to acknowledge receipt of your letter with reference to the + announcement contradicting the report of your death from wounds. + Having regard, however, to the fact that we had previously published + some biographical details, we inserted your announcement in our issue + of to-day (Saturday) under ‘Court Circular’ without charge, and we + have much pleasure in enclosing herewith cutting of same. + + Yours, etc. + +The cutting read: + +Captain Robert Graves, Royal Welch Fusiliers, officially reported died +of wounds, wishes to inform his friends that he is recovering from his +wounds at Queen Alexandra’s Hospital, Highgate, N. + + * * * + +Mrs. Lloyd George has left London for Criccieth. + + * * * + +I never saw the biographical details supplied by my father; they might +have been helpful to me here. Some letters written to me in France +were returned to him as my next-of-kin. They were surcharged: ‘Died of +wounds—present location uncertain.—P. Down, post-corporal.’ The only +inconvenience that my death caused me was that Cox’s Bank stopped my +pay and I had difficulty in persuading it to honour my cheques. I had +a letter from Siegfried telling me that he was overjoyed to hear I was +alive again. (I wondered whether he had been avenging me.) He was now +back in England with suspected lung trouble. We agreed to take our +leave together at Harlech when I was better. Siegfried wrote that he +was nine parts dead from the horror of the Somme fighting. + +I was able to travel early in September. We met at Paddington. +Siegfried bought a copy of _The Times_ at the bookstall. As usual +we turned to the casualty list first; and found there the names of +practically every officer in the First Battalion, either killed or +wounded. Edmund Dadd was killed. His brother Julian, in Siegfried’s +company, wounded. (Shot through the throat, as we learned later, only +able to talk in a whisper, and for months utterly prostrated. It +had been at Ale Alley at Ginchy, on 3rd September. A dud show; the +battalion had been outflanked in a counter-attack.) News like this in +England was far more upsetting than when one was in France. I was still +very weak and could not help crying all the way up to Wales. Siegfried +said bitterly: ‘Well, I expect the colonel got his c.b. at +any rate.’ England was strange to the returned soldier. He could not +understand the war-madness that ran about everywhere looking for a +pseudo-military outlet. Every one talked a foreign language; it was +newspaper language. I found serious conversation with my parents all +but impossible. A single typical memorial of this time will be enough: + + A MOTHER’S ANSWER TO + ‘A COMMON SOLDIER’ + + By A Little Mother + +A MESSAGE TO THE PACIFISTS. A MESSAGE TO THE BEREAVED. A MESSAGE TO THE + TRENCHES + +_Owing to the immense demand from home and from the trenches for this +letter, which appeared in the ‘Morning Post,’ the Editor found it +necessary to place it in the hands of London publishers to be reprinted +in pamphlet form, seventy-five thousand copies of which were sold in +less than a week direct from the publishers._ + + _Extract from a Letter from Her Majesty_ + +‘The Queen was deeply touched at the “Little Mother’s” beautiful +letter, and Her Majesty fully realizes what her words must mean to our +soldiers in the trenches and in hospitals.’ + + * * * * * + + _To the Editor of the ‘Morning Post’_ + +Sir,—As a mother of an only child—a son who was early and eager to do +his duty—may I be permitted to reply to Tommy Atkins, whose letter +appeared in your issue of the 9th inst.? Perhaps he will kindly convey +to his friends in the trenches, not what the Government thinks, not +what the Pacifists think, but what the mothers of the British race +think of our fighting men. It is a voice which demands to be heard, +seeing that we play the most important part in the history of the +world, for it is we who ‘mother the men’ who have to uphold the honour +and traditions not only of our Empire but of the whole civilized world. + +To the man who pathetically calls himself a ‘common soldier,’ may I say +that we women, who demand to be heard, will tolerate no such cry as +‘Peace! Peace!’ where there is no peace. The corn that will wave over +land watered by the blood of our brave lads shall testify to the future +that their blood was not spilt in vain. We need no marble monuments to +remind us. We only need that force of character behind all motives to +see this monstrous world tragedy brought to a victorious ending. +The blood of the dead and the dying, the blood of the ‘common soldier’ +from his ‘slight wounds’ will not cry to us in vain. They have all +done their share, and we, as women, will do ours without murmuring and +without complaint. Send the Pacifists to us and we shall very soon show +them, and show the world, that in our homes at least there shall be no +‘sitting at home warm and cosy in the winter, cool and “comfy” in the +summer.’ There is only one temperature for the women of the British +race, and that is white heat. With those who disgrace their sacred +trust of motherhood we have nothing in common. Our ears are not deaf to +the cry that is ever ascending from the battlefield from men of flesh +and blood whose indomitable courage is borne to us, so to speak, on +every blast of the wind. We women pass on the human ammunition of ‘only +sons’ to fill up the gaps, so that when the ‘common soldier’ looks back +before going ‘over the top’ he may see the women of the British race on +his heels, reliable, dependent, uncomplaining. + +The reinforcements of women are, therefore, behind the ‘common +soldier.’ We gentle-nurtured, timid sex did not want the war. It is no +pleasure to us to have our homes made desolate and the apple of our +eye taken away. We would sooner our lovable, promising, rollicking +boy stayed at school. We would have much preferred to have gone on +in a light-hearted way with our amusements and our hobbies. But the +bugle call came, and we have hung up the tennis racquet, we’ve fetched +our laddie from school, we’ve put his cap away, and we have glanced +lovingly over his last report which said ‘Excellent’—we’ve wrapped them +all in a Union Jack and locked them up, to be taken out only after the +war to be looked at. A ‘common soldier,’ perhaps, did not count on +the women, but they have their part to play, and we have risen to our +responsibility. We are proud of our men, and they in turn have to be +proud of us. If the men fail, Tommy Atkins, the women won’t. + + Tommy Atkins to the front, + He has gone to bear the brunt. + Shall ‘stay-at-homes’ do naught but snivel and but sigh? + No, while your eyes are filling + We are up and doing, willing + To face the music with you—or to die! + +Women are created for the purpose of giving life, and men to take it. +Now we are giving it in a double sense. It’s not likely we are going +to fail Tommy. We shall not flinch one iota, but when the war is over +he must not grudge us, when we hear the bugle call of ‘Lights out,’ +a brief, very brief, space of time to withdraw into our own secret +chambers and share with Rachel the Silent the lonely anguish of a +bereft heart, and to look once more on the college cap, before we +emerge stronger women to carry on the glorious work our men’s memories +have handed down to us for now and all eternity. + + Yours, etc., + + A Little Mother. + + * * * * * + + EXTRACTS AND PRESS CRITICISMS + +‘The widest possible circulation is of the utmost importance.’—_The +Morning Post_. + +‘Deservedly attracting a great deal of attention, as expressing with +rare eloquence and force the feelings with which the British wives +and mothers have faced and are facing the supreme sacrifice.’—_The +Morning Post_. + +‘Excites widespread interest.’—_The Gentlewoman_. + +‘A letter which has become celebrated.’—_The Star_. + +‘We would like to see it hung up in our wards.’—_Hospital Blue_. + +‘One of the grandest things ever written, for it combines a height of +courage with a depth of tenderness which should be, and is, the stamp +of all that is noblest and best in human nature.’—_A Soldier in France_. + +‘Florence Nightingale did great and grand things for the soldiers of +her day, but no woman has done more than the “Little Mother,” whose now +famous letter in the Morning Post has spread like wild-fire from trench +to trench. I hope to God it will be handed down in history, for nothing +like it has ever made such an impression on our fighting men. I defy +any man to feel weak-hearted after reading it.... My God! she makes us +die happy.’—_One who has Fought and Bled_. + +‘Worthy of far more than a passing notice; it ought to be reprinted and +sent out to every man at the front. It is a masterpiece and fills one +with pride, noble, level-headed, and pathetic to a degree.’—_Severely +Wounded_. + +‘I have lost my two dear boys, but since I was shown the “Little +Mother’s” beautiful letter a resignation too perfect to describe has +calmed all my aching sorrow, and I would now gladly give my sons twice +over.’—_A Bereaved Mother_. + +‘The “Little Mother’s” letter should reach every corner of the earth—a +letter of the loftiest ideal, tempered with courage and the most +sublime sacrifice.’—_Percival H. Monkton_. + +‘The exquisite letter by a “Little Mother” is making us feel +prouder every day. We women desire to fan the flame which she has so +superbly kindled in our hearts.’—_A British Mother of an Only Son_. + + * * * * * + +At Harlech, Siegfried and I spent the time getting our poems in order; +Siegfried was at work on his _Old Huntsman_. We made a number of +changes in each other’s verses; I remember that I proposed amendments +which he accepted in his obituary poem ‘To His Dead Body’—written +for me when he thought me dead. We were beginning to wonder whether +it was right for the war to be continued. It was said that Asquith +in the autumn of 1915 had been offered peace-terms on the basis of +_status quo ante_ and that he had been willing to consider them; that +his colleagues had opposed him, and that this was the reason for the +fall of the Liberal Government, and for the ‘Win-the-War’ Coalition +Government of Lloyd George that superseded it. We both thought that +the terms should have been accepted, though Siegfried was more +vehement than I was on the subject. The view we had of the war was +now non-political. We no longer saw it as a war between trade-rivals; +its continuance seemed merely a sacrifice of the idealistic younger +generation to the stupidity and self-protective alarm of the elder. +I made a facetious marginal note on a poem I wrote about this time, +called _Goliath and David_ (in which the biblical legend was reversed +and David was killed by Goliath): + + ‘War should be a sport for men above forty-five only, the Jesse’s, + not the David’s. “Well, dear father, how proud I am of you serving + your country as a very gallant gentleman prepared to make even the + supreme sacrifice. I only wish I were your age: how willingly would + I buckle on my armour and fight those unspeakable Philistines! As it + is, of course, I can’t be spared; I have to stay behind at the War + Office and administrate for you lucky old men.” “What sacrifices I + have made,” David would sigh when the old boys had gone off with a + draft to the front singing _Tipperary_. “There’s father and my Uncle + Salmon and both my grandfathers, all on active service. I must put a + card in the window about it.”’ + +We defined the war in our poems by making contrasted definitions of +peace. With Siegfried it was hunting and nature and music and pastoral +scenes; with me it was chiefly children. When I was in France I used +to spend much of my spare time playing with the French children of the +villages in which I was billeted. I put them into my poems, and my own +childhood at Harlech. I called my book _Fairies and Fusiliers_, and +dedicated it to the regiment. + +Siegfried stayed a few weeks. When he had gone I began the novel on +which my earlier war chapters are based, but it remained a rough draft. + +In September I went for a visit to Kent, to the house of a First +Battalion friend who had recently been wounded. His elder brother +had been killed in the Dardanelles, and his mother kept his bedroom +exactly as he had left it, with the sheets aired, his linen always +freshly laundered, and flowers and cigarettes by his bedside. She was +religious and went about with a vague bright look on her face. The +first night I spent there my friend and I sat up talking about the war +until after twelve o’clock. His mother had gone to bed early, after +urging us not to get too tired. The talk excited me but I managed to +fall asleep at about one o’clock. I was continually awakened by sudden +rapping noises which I at first tried to disregard but which grew +louder and louder. They seemed to come from everywhere. I lay in a cold +sweat. About three o’clock I heard a diabolic yell and a succession of +laughing, sobbing shrieks that sent me flying to the door. I collided +in the passage with the mother, who, to my surprise, was fully dressed. +She said: ‘It’s nothing. One of the maids has hysterics. I am so sorry +you have been disturbed.’ So I went back to bed, but I could not sleep +though the noises had stopped. In the morning I said to my friend: ‘I’m +leaving this place. It’s worse than France.’ + + * * * * * + +In November Siegfried and I rejoined the battalion at Litherland and +shared a hut together. We decided that it was no use making a protest +against the war. Every one was mad; we were hardly sane ourselves. +Siegfried said that we had to ‘keep up the good reputation of the +poets,’ as men of courage, he meant. The best place for us was back +in France away from the more shameful madness of home service. Our +function there was not to kill Germans, though that might happen, but +to make things easier for the men under our command. For them the +difference between being under someone whom they could count as a +friend, someone who protected them as much as he could from the grosser +indignities of the military system and having to study the whims of +any thoughtless, petty tyrant in an officer’s tunic, was all the +difference in the world. By this time the ranks of both line battalions +were filled with men who had enlisted for patriotic reasons and the +professional-soldier tradition was hard on them.... Siegfried, for +instance, on (I think) the day before the Fricourt attack. The attack +had been rehearsed for a week over dummy trenches in the back areas +until the whole performance was perfect, in fact almost stale. +Siegfried was told to rehearse once more. Instead, he led his platoon +into a wood and read to them—nothing military or literary, just the +_London Mail_. Though the _London Mail_ was not in his line, Siegfried +thought that the men would enjoy the ‘Things We Want to Know’ column. + +Officers of the Royal Welch were honorary members of a neighbouring +golf club. Siegfried and I used to go there often. He played golf and +I hit a ball alongside him. I had once played at Harlech as a junior +member of the Royal St. David’s, but I had given it up before long +because it was bad for my temper. I was afraid of taking it up again +seriously, so now I limited myself to a single club. When I mishit it +did not matter. I played the fool and purposely put Siegfried off his +game; he was a serious golfer. It was the time of great food shortage; +the submarines sank about every fourth food ship, and there was a +strict meat, butter and sugar ration. But the war did not seem to have +reached the links. The principal business men of Liverpool were members +of the club and did not mean to go short while there was any food at +all coming in at the docks. Siegfried and I went to the club-house for +lunch on the day before Christmas; there was a cold buffet in the club +dining-room offering hams, barons of beef, jellied tongues, cold roast +turkey and chicken. A large, meaty-faced waiter presided. Siegfried +satirically asked him: ‘Is this all? There doesn’t seem to be quite +such a good spread as in previous years.’ The waiter apologized: ‘No, +sir, this isn’t quite up to the usual mark, sir, but we are expecting a +more satisfactory consignment of meat on Boxing Day.’ The dining-room +at the club-house was always full, the links were practically deserted. + +The favourite rendezvous of the officers of the Mersey garrison +was the Adelphi Hotel. It had a cocktail bar and a swimming bath. +The cocktail bar was generally crowded with Russian naval officers, +always very drunk. One day I met a major of the King’s Own Scottish +Borderers there. I saluted him. He told me confidentially, taking me +aside: ‘It’s nice of you to salute me, my boy, but I must confess +that I am not what I seem. I wear a crown on my sleeve and so does +a company sergeant-major; but then he’s not entitled to wear these +three cuff bands and the wavy border. Look at them, aren’t they +pretty? As I was saying, I’m not what I seem to be. I’m a sham. I’ve +got a sergeant-major’s stomach.’ I was quite accustomed to drunken +senior officers, so I answered respectfully: ‘Really, major, and how +did you come to get that?’ He said: ‘You think I’m drunk. Well, I am +if you like, but it’s true about my stomach. You see I was in that +Beaumont-Hamel show and I got shot in the guts. It hurt like hell, let +me tell you. They got me down to the field-hospital. I was busy dying; +there was a company sergeant-major in the hospital at the time and +he had got it through the head, and _he_ was busy dying, too, and he +did die. Well, as soon as the sergeant-major died they took out that +long gut, whatever you call the thing, the thing that unwinds—they say +it’s as long as a cricket pitch—and they put it into me, grafted it on +somehow. Wonderful chaps these medicos. They can put in spare parts as +if one was a motor-car. Well, this sergeant-major seems to have been an +abstemious man; the lining of the new gut is much better than my old +one; so I’m celebrating it. I only wish I had his kidneys too.’ + +An R.A.M.C. captain was sitting by. He broke into the conversation. +‘Yes, major, I know what a stomach wound’s like. It’s the worst of the +lot. You were lucky to reach the field-ambulance alive. The best +chance is to lie absolutely still. I got mine out between the lines, +bandaging a fellow. I flopped into a shell-hole. My stretcher-bearers +wanted to carry me back, but I wasn’t having any. I kept everyone off +with a revolver for forty-eight hours. That saved my life. I couldn’t +count on a spare gut waiting for me at the dressing-station. My only +chance was to lie still and let it heal.’ + +In December I attended a medical board; they examined my wound and +asked me how I was feeling. The president wanted to know whether I +wanted a few months more home service. I said: ‘No, sir, I should be +much obliged if you would pass me fit for service overseas.’ In January +I went out again. + +I went back as an old soldier; my kit and baggage proved it. I had +reduced the Christmas tree that I first brought out to a pocket-torch +with a fourteen-day battery in it, and a pair of insulated wire-cutters +strong enough to cut German wire (the ordinary British army issue +would only cut British wire). Instead of a haversack I had a pack +like the ones the men carried, but lighter and waterproof. I had lost +my revolver when I was wounded and had not bought another; rifle and +bayonet could always be got from the battalion. (Not carrying rifle +and bayonet made officers conspicuous in an attack; in most divisions +now they carried them, and also wore trousers rolled down over their +puttees like the men, because the Germans had been taught to recognize +them by their thin knees.) Instead of the heavy blankets that I had +brought out before I now had an eiderdown sleeping-bag in an oiled-silk +cover. I also had Shakespeare and a Bible, both printed on india-paper, +a Catullus and a Lucretius in Latin, and two light weight, folding, +canvas arm-chairs, one as a present for Yates the quartermaster, +the other for myself. I was wearing a very thick whipcord tunic with a +neat patch above the second button and another between the shoulders; +it was my only salvage from the last time out except the pair of +ski-ing boots which I was wearing again, reasonably waterproof—my +breeches had been cut off me in hospital. + +There was a draft of ten young officers with me. As Captain Charles +Edmonds notes in his book _A Subaltern’s War_, young officers at this +time were expected to be ‘roistering blades with wine and women.’ These +ten did their best. Three of them got venereal disease at Rouen. In +each case, I believe, it was the first time that they had been with +women. They were strictly brought-up Welsh boys of the professional +classes and knew nothing about prophylactics. One of them was sharing +a hut with me. He came in very late and very drunk one night from the +_Drapeau Blanc_, a well-known blue-lamp brothel, woke me up and began +telling me what a wonderful time he had. ‘He had never known before,’ +he said, ‘what a wonderful thing sex was.’ I said irritably and in some +disgust: ‘The _Drapeau Blanc_? Then I hope to God you washed yourself.’ +He was very Welsh and on his dignity. ‘What do you mean, captain? I did +wass my fa-ace and ha-ands.’ There were no restraints in France as in +England; these boys had money to spend and knew that they had a good +chance of being killed within a few weeks anyhow. They did not want to +die virginal. So venereal hospitals at the base were always crowded. +(The troops took a lewd delight in exaggerating the proportion of army +chaplains to combatant officers treated there.) The _Drapeau Blanc_ +saved the life of scores of them by incapacitating them for future +trench service. + +The instructors at the Bull Ring were full of bullet-and-bayonet +enthusiasm which they tried to pass on to the drafts. The drafts +were now, for the most part, either forcibly enlisted men or wounded +men returning, and at this dead season of the year it was difficult +for anyone to feel enthusiastic on arrival in France. The training +principle had recently been revised. _Infantry Training_, 1914, had +laid it down politely that the soldier’s ultimate aim was to put out +of action or render ineffective the armed forces of the enemy. This +statement was now not considered direct enough for a war of attrition. +Troops were taught instead that their duty was to hate the Germans and +kill as many of them as possible. In bayonet-practice the men were +ordered to make horrible grimaces and utter blood-curdling yells as +they charged. The bayonet-fighting instructors’ faces were permanently +set in a ghastly grin. ‘Hurt him, now! In at his belly! Tear his guts +out!’ they would scream as the men charged the dummies. ‘Now that upper +swing at his privates with the butt. Ruin his chances for life. No +more little Fritzes! ... Naaaoh! Anyone would think that you _loved_ +the bloody swine, patting and stroking ’em like that. Bite him, I say! +Stick your teeth in him and worry him! Eat his heart out!’ + +Once more I was glad to be sent up to the trenches. + + + + + XXII + + +I was posted to the Second Battalion again. I found it near +Bouchavesnes on the Somme. It was a very different Second Battalion. No +riding-school, no battalion-mess, no Quetta manners. I was more warmly +welcomed this time; my suspected spying activities were forgotten. +But the day before I arrived, the colonel had been wounded while out +in front of the battalion inspecting the wire. He had been shot in +the thigh by one of the ‘rotten crowd’ of his letter, who mistook him +for a German and fired without challenging; he has been in and out of +nursing homes ever since. Doctor Dunn asked me with kindly disapproval +what I meant by coming back so soon. I said that I could not stand +England any longer. He told the acting C.O. that I was, in his opinion, +unfit for trench service, so I was put in command of the headquarter +company. I went to live with the transport back at Frises, where the +Somme made a bend. My company consisted of regimental clerks, cooks, +tailors, shoemakers, pioneers, transport men, and so on, who in an +emergency could become riflemen and used as a combatant force. We were +in dug-outs close to the river, which was frozen completely over except +for a narrow stretch of fast water in the middle. I had never been so +cold in my life; it made me shudder to think what the trenches must +be like. I used to go up to them every night with the rations, the +quartermaster being sick; it was about a twelve-mile walk there and +back. The general commanding the Thirty-third Division had teetotal +convictions on behalf of his men and stopped their issue of rum except +for emergencies; the immediate result was a much heavier sick-list +than the battalion had ever had. The men had always looked forward to +their tot of rum at the dawn stand-to as the one bright moment +of the twenty-four hours. When this was denied them, their resistance +weakened. I took the rations up through Cléry, which had been a wattle +and daub village of some hundreds of inhabitants. The highest part +of it now standing was a short course of brick wall about three feet +high; the rest was enormous overlapping shell-craters. A broken-down +steam-roller by the roadside had the name of the village chalked on it +as a guide to travellers. We often lost a horse or two at Cléry, which +the Germans continued to shell from habit. + +[Illustration: ROBERT GRAVES + +from a pastel by Eric Kennington] + +Our reserve billets for these Bouchavesnes trenches were at Suzanne. +They were not really billets, but dug-outs and shelters. Suzanne was +also in ruins. The winter was the hardest since 1894–5. The men played +inter-company football matches on the river, which was now frozen two +feet thick. I remember a meal here in a shelter-billet; stew and tinned +tomato on metal plates. Though the food came in hot from the kitchen +next door, before we had finished it there was ice on the edge of the +plate. In all this area there were no French civilians, no unshelled +houses, no signs of cultivation. The only living creatures that I saw +except soldiers and horses and mules were a few moorhen and duck in +the narrow unfrozen part of the river. There was a shortage of fodder +for the horses, many of which were sick; the ration was down to three +pounds a day, and they had only open standings. I have kept few records +of this time, but the memory of its misery survives. + +Then I had bad toothache, and there was nothing for it but to take a +horse and ride twenty miles to the nearest army dental station. The +dentist who attended me was under the weather like everyone else. +He would do nothing at first but grumble what a fool he had been to +offer his services to his country at such a low salary. ‘When I +think,’ he said, ‘of the terrible destruction to the nation’s teeth +that is being done by unqualified men at home, and the huge fees that +they are exacting for their wicked work, it makes me boil with rage.’ +There followed further complaints against the way he was treated and +the unwillingness of the Royal Army Medical Corps to give dentists any +promotion beyond lieutenant’s rank. Later he began work on my tooth. +‘An abscess,’ he said, ‘no good tinkering about with this; must pull it +out.’ So he yanked at it irritably and the tooth broke off. He tried +again; there was very little purchase and it broke off again. He damned +the ineffective type of forceps that the Government supplied. After +about half an hour he got the tooth out in sections. I rode home with +lacerated gums. + +I was appointed a member of a field general court-martial on an Irish +sergeant charged with ‘shamefully casting away his arms in the presence +of the enemy.’ I had heard about the case unofficially. He had been +maddened by an intense bombardment, thrown down his rifle, and run with +the rest of his platoon. An army order, secret and confidential, had +recently instructed me that, in the case of men tried for their life +on other charges, sentence might be mitigated if conduct in the field +had been exemplary; but cowardice was only punishable with death and no +medical excuses could be accepted. But I knew that there was nothing +between sentencing the man to death and refusing to take part in the +proceedings. If I chose the second course I would be court-martialled +myself, and a reconstituted court would bring in the death verdict +anyhow. Yet I would not sentence a man to death for an offence which +I might have committed myself in the same circumstances. I was in a +dilemma. I met the situation by evading it. There was one other +officer in the battalion with the year’s service, as a captain, which +entitled him to sit on a field general court-martial. I found him +willing to take my place. He was hard-boiled and glad of a trip to +Amiens, and I took over his duties for him. + +Executions were frequent in France. My first direct experience of +official lying was when I was at the base at Havre in May 1915 and read +the back-files of army orders in the officers’ mess at the rest-camp. +There were something like twenty reports of men shot for cowardice or +desertion; yet not a week later the responsible Minister in the House +of Commons, answering a question from a pacifist member, had denied +that sentence of death for a military offence had been carried out in +France on any member of His Majesty’s forces. + +The acting commanding-officer was sick and irritable; he felt the +strain badly and took a lot of whisky. One spell he was too sick to be +in the trenches, and came down to Frises, where he shared a dug-out +with Yates the quartermaster and myself. I was sitting in my arm-chair +reading the Bible and came on the text: ‘The bed is too narrow to lie +down therein and the coverlet too small to wrap myself therewith.’ +‘I say, James,’ I said, ‘that’s pretty appropriate for this place.’ +He raised himself on an elbow, genuinely furious. ‘Look here, von +Runicke,’ he said, ‘I am not a religious man. I’ve cracked a good +many of the commandments since I’ve been in France; but while I am in +command here I refuse to hear you or anyone bloody else blaspheme Holy +Writ.’ I liked James a lot. I had met him first on the day I arrived +at Wrexham to join the regiment. He was just back from Canada and +hilariously throwing chairs about in the junior ante-room of the mess. +He had been driving a plough through virgin soil, he told us, and +reciting Kipling to the prairie-dogs. His favourite piece was (I may be +misquoting): + + Are ye there, are ye there, are ye there? + Four points on a ninety-mile square. + With a helio winking like fun in the sun, + Are ye there, are ye there, are ye there? + +He had been with the Special Reserve a year or two before he emigrated. +He cared for nobody, was most courageous, inclined to be sentimental, +and probably saw longer service with the Second Battalion in the war +than any officer except Yates. + +A day or two later, because he was still sick and I was the senior +officer of the battalion, I attended the Commanding Officers’ +Conference at brigade headquarters. Opposite our trenches was a German +salient and the brigadier wanted to ‘bite it off’ as a proof of the +offensive spirit of his command. Trench soldiers could never understand +the Staff’s desire to bite off an enemy salient. It was not a desirable +thing to be exposed to fire from both flanks; if the Germans were in a +salient, our obvious duty was to keep them there as long as they could +be persuaded to stay. We concluded that it was the passion for straight +lines for which headquarters were well known, and that it had no +strategic or tactical significance. The attack had been twice proposed +and twice cancelled because of the weather. This was towards the end of +February, in the thaw. I have a field-message referring to it, dated +the 21st: + + Please cancel Form 4 of my + AA 202 units will draw from + 19th brigade B. Echelon the following + issue of rum which will + be issued to troops taking + part in the forth coming + operations at the discretion of + O.C. units 2nd R.W.F. 7½ gallons. + +Even this promise of special rum could not encourage the battalion. +Every one agreed that the attack was unnecessary, foolish, and +impossible. The company commanders assured me that to cross the three +hundred yards of No Man’s Land, which because of constant shelling +and the thaw was a morass of mud more than knee-deep, would take even +lightly-armed troops four or five minutes. It would be impossible for +anyone to reach the German lines while there was a single section +of Germans with rifles to defend them. The general, when I arrived, +inquired in a fatherly way how old I was, and whether I was not proud +to be attending a Commanding Officers’ Conference at the age of +twenty-one. I said that I had not examined my feelings, but that I was +an old enough soldier to realize the ♦impossibility of the attack. The +colonel of the Cameronians, who were also to be engaged, took the same +line. So the attack was finally called off. That night I went up with +rations as usual; the battalion was much relieved to hear the decision. + +♦ “impossiblity” replaced with “impossibility” + +We had been heavily shelled on the way up, and while I was at +battalion headquarters having a drink a message came to say that D +Company limber had been hit by a shell. As I went to inspect the damage +I passed the chaplain, who had come up with me from Frises bend, and a +group of three or four men. He was gabbling the burial service over a +dead man lying on the ground covered with a waterproof sheet. It was +a suicide case. The misery of the weather and the knowledge of the +impending attack had been too much for him. This was the last dead man +I was to see in France, and like the first, a suicide. + +I found that the limber, which contained petrol tins of water for +the company, had had a direct hit. There was no sign of the horses; +they were highly prized horses, having won a prize at a divisional +horse-show some months back for the best-matched pair of the division. +So the transport sergeant and I sent the transport back and went +looking for the horses in the dark. We stumbled through miles of +morass that night but could not find them or get any news of them. We +used to boast that our transport animals were the best in France. Our +transport men were famous horse-thieves, and no less than eighteen of +our stable had been stolen from other units at one time or another, +for their good looks. There were even two which we had ‘borrowed’ from +the Scots Greys. The horse I rode to the dentist came from the French +police; its only fault was that it was the left-hand horse of the +police squadron, and so had a tendency to pull to the wrong side of the +road. We had never lost a horse to any other battalion, so naturally +Sergeant Meredith and I, who had started out with the rations at about +four o’clock in the afternoon, kept on with the search until long after +midnight. When we reached Frises at about three o’clock in the morning +I was completely exhausted. I collapsed on my bunk. + +The next day it was found that I had bronchitis and I went back in +an ambulance to Rouen, once more to No. 8 Red Cross hospital. The major +of the R.A.M.C. recognized me and said: ‘What on earth are _you_ doing +out in France, young man? If I find you in my hospital again with those +lungs of yours I’ll have you court-martialled.’ + +The quartermaster wrote to me there that the horses had been found +shortly after I had gone; they were unhurt except for grazes on their +bellies and were in the possession of the machine-gun company of the +Fourth Division; the machine-gunners were found disguising them with +stain and trying to remove the regimental marks. + +At Rouen I was asked to say where in England I would like to go to +hospital. I said, at random, ‘Oxford.’ + + + + + XXIII + + +So I was sent to Oxford, to Somerville College, which, like the +Examination Schools, had been converted into a hospital. It occurred to +me here that I was probably through with the war, for it could not last +long now. I both liked and disliked the idea. I disliked being away +from the regiment in France and I liked to think that I would probably +be alive when the war ended. As soon as I was passed fit Siegfried had +got boarded toe and tried to follow me to the Second Battalion. He was +disappointed to find me gone. I felt I had somehow let him down. But +he wrote that he was unspeakably relieved to know that I was back at +Oxford. + +I liked Oxford and wanted to stay there. I applied, on the strength of +a chit from the Bull Ring commandant at Havre, for an instructional +job in one of the Officer-Cadet Battalions quartered in the men’s +colleges. I was posted to the Wadham Company of No. 4 Battalion. +These battalions had not been formed long; they had grown out of +instructional schools for young officers. The cadet course was only +three months (later increased to four), but it was a severe one and +particularly intended to train platoon commanders in the handling of +the platoon as an independent unit. About two-thirds of the cadets were +men recommended for commissions by colonels in France, the remainder +were public-school boys from the officers’ training corps. Much of the +training was drill and musketry, but the important part was tactical +exercises with limited objectives. We used the army textbook S.S. 143, +or ‘_Instructions for the training of platoons for offensive action_, +1917,’ perhaps the most important War Office publication issued during +the war. The author is said to have been General Solly-Flood, +who wrote it after a visit to a French army school. From 1916 on the +largest unit possible to control in sustained action was the platoon. +Infantry training had hitherto treated the company as the chief +tactical unit. + +Though the quality of the officers had deteriorated from the regimental +point of view (in brief, few of the new officers were now gentlemen), +their deficiency in manners was amply compensated for by their greater +efficiency in action. The cadet-battalion system, in the next two +years, saved the army in France from becoming a mere rabble. We failed +about a sixth of the candidates for commissions; the failures were +sometimes public-school boys without the necessary toughness, but +usually men who had been recommended, from France, on compassionate +grounds—rather stupid platoon sergeants and machine-gun corporals +who had been out too long and were thought to need a rest. Our final +selection of the right men to be officers was made by watching them +play games, principally rugger and soccer. The ones who played rough +but not dirty and had quick reactions were the men we wanted. We spent +most of our spare time playing games with them. I had a platoon of New +Zealanders, Canadians, South Africans, two men from the Fiji Island +contingent, an English farm-labourer, a Welsh miner and two or three +public-school boys. They were a good lot and most of them were killed +later on in the war. The New Zealanders went in for rowing; the record +time for the river at Oxford was made by a New Zealand eight that year. +I found the work too much for my lungs, for which the climate of Oxford +was unsuitable. I kept myself going for two months on a strychnine +tonic and then collapsed again. I fainted and fell downstairs one +evening in the dark, cutting my head open; I was taken back to +Somerville. I had kept going as long as I could. + +I had liked Wadham, where I was a member of the senior common-room and +had access to the famous brown sherry of the college; it is specially +mentioned in a Latin grace among the blessings vouchsafed to the +fellows by their Creator. My commanding officer, Colonel Stenning, +in better times University Professor of Hebrew, was a fellow of the +college. The social system at Oxford was dislocated. The St. John’s +don destined to be my moral tutor when I came up was a corporal in +the General Reserve; he wore grey uniform, drilled in the parks, and +saluted me whenever we met. A college scout had a commission and was +instructing in the other cadet battalion. There were not, I suppose, +more than a hundred and fifty undergraduates at Oxford at this time; +these were Rhodes scholars, Indians, and men who were unfit. I saw +a good deal of Aldous Huxley, Wilfred Childe, and Thomas Earp, who +were running an undergraduates’ literary paper of necessarily limited +circulation called _The Palatine Review_, to which I contributed. Earp +had set himself the task of keeping the Oxford tradition alive through +the dead years; he was president and sole member, he said, of some +seventeen undergraduate social and literary societies. In 1919 he was +still in residence, and handed over the minute-books to the returning +university. Most of the societies were then reformed. + +I enjoyed being at Somerville. It was warm weather and the discipline +of the hospital was easy. We used to lounge about in the grounds in our +pyjamas and dressing-gowns, and even walk out into St. Giles’ and down +the Cornmarket (also in pyjamas and dressing-gowns) for a morning cup +of coffee at the Cadena. And there was a V.A.D. probationer with +whom I fell in love. I did not tell her so at the time. This was the +first time that I had fallen in love with a woman, and I had difficulty +in adjusting myself to the experience. I used to meet her when I +visited a friend in another ward, but we had little talk together. I +wrote to her after leaving hospital. When I found that she was engaged +to a subaltern in France I stopped writing. I had seen what it felt +like to be in France and have somebody else playing about with one’s +girl. Yet by the way she wrote reproving me for not writing she may +well have been as fond of me as she was of him. I did not press the +point. There was the end of it, almost before it started. + +While I was with the cadet battalion I used to go out to tea nearly +every Sunday to Garsington. Siegfried’s friends, Philip and Lady +Ottoline Morrell, lived at the manor house there. The Morrells were +pacifists and it was here that I first heard that there was another +side to the question of war guilt. Clive Bell was working on the manor +farm; he was a conscientious objector, and had been permitted to do +this, as work of national importance, instead of going into the army. +Aldous Huxley, Lytton Strachey and the Hon. Bertrand Russell were +frequent visitors. Aldous was unfit, otherwise he would certainly have +been in the army like Osbert and Sacheverell Sitwell, Herbert Read, +Siegfried, Wilfred Owen, myself and most other young writers of the +time, none of whom now believed in the war. Bertrand Russell, who was +beyond the age of liability for military service but an ardent pacifist +(a rare combination), turned sharply on me one afternoon and said: +‘Tell me, if a company of men of your regiment were brought along to +break a strike of munition makers and the munition makers refused to +submit, would you order the men to fire?’ I said: ‘Yes, if everything +else failed. It would be no worse than shooting Germans, really.’ +He was surprised and asked: ‘Would your men obey you?’ ‘Of course +they would,’ I said; ‘they loathe munition makers and would be only +too glad of a chance to shoot a few. They think that they’re all +skrim-shankers.’ ‘But they realize that the war’s all wicked nonsense?’ +‘Yes, as well as I do.’ He could not understand my attitude. + +Lytton Strachey was unfit, but instead of allowing himself to be +rejected by the doctors he preferred to appear before a military +tribunal as a conscientious objector. He told us of the extraordinary +impression that was caused by an air-cushion which he inflated during +the proceedings as a protest against the hardness of the benches. +Asked by the chairman the usual question: ‘I understand, Mr. Strachey, +that you have a conscientious objection to war?’ he replied (in his +curious falsetto voice), ‘Oh no, not at all, only to _this_ war.’ +Better than this was his reply to the chairman’s other stock question, +which had previously never failed to embarrass the claimant: ‘Tell me, +Mr. Strachey, what would you do if you saw a German soldier trying to +violate your sister?’ With an air of noble virtue: ‘I would try to get +between them.’ + +In 1916 I met more well-known writers than ever before or since. There +were two unsuccessful meetings. George Moore had just written _The +Brook Kerith_ and my neurasthenic twitchings interrupted the calm, +easy flow of his conversational periods. He told me irritably not to +fidget; in return I taunted him with having introduced cactus into the +Holy Land some fifteen centuries before the discovery of America, its +land of origin. At the Reform Club, H. G. Wells, who was Mr. Britling +in those days and full of military optimism, talked without +listening. He had just been taken for a ‘Cook’s Tour’ to France and had +been shown the usual sights that royalty, prominent men of letters, and +influential neutrals were shown by staff-conductors. He described his +experiences at length and seemed unaware that I and the friend who was +with me had also seen the sights. But I liked Arnold Bennett for his +kindly unpretentiousness. And I liked Augustine Birrell. I happened to +correct him when he said that the Apocrypha was not read in the church +services; and again when he said that Elihu the Jebusite was one of +Job’s comforters. He tried to over-ride me in both points, but I called +for a Bible and proved them. He said, glowering very kindly at me: ‘I +will say to you what Thomas Carlyle once said to a young man who caught +him out in a misquotation, “Young man, you are heading straight for the +pit of Hell!”’ + +And who else? John Galsworthy; or was my first meeting with him a year +or two later? He was editor of a magazine called _Réveillé_, published +under Government auspices (and was treated very ungenerously), the +proceeds of which were to go to a disabled-soldier fund. I contributed. +When I met him he asked me technical questions about soldier-slang—he +was writing a war-play and wanted it accurate. He seemed a humble man +and except for these questions listened without talking. This is, +apparently, his usual practice; which explains why he is a better +writer if a less forceful propagandist than Wells.... And Ivor Novello, +in 1918. Then aged about twenty and already world famous as the author +and composer of the patriotic song: + + Keep the home fires burning + While the hearts are yearning.... + +There was some talk of his setting a song of mine. I found him, +wearing a silk dressing-gown, in a setting of incense, cocktails, many +cushions, and a Tree or two. I felt uncomfortably military. I removed +my spurs (I was a temporary field-officer at the time) out of courtesy +to the pouffes. He was in the Royal Naval Air Service, but his genius +was officially recognized and he was able to keep the home fires +burning until the boys came home. + +By this time the War Office had stopped the privilege that officers +had enjoyed, after coming out of hospital, of going to their own homes +for convalescence. It was found that many of them took no trouble to +get well quickly and return to duty, they kept late nights, drank, +and overtaxed their strength. So when I was somewhat recovered I was +sent to a convalescent home for officers in the Isle of Wight. It was +Osborne Palace; my bedroom had once been the royal night-nursery of +King Edward VII and his brothers and sisters. This was the strawberry +season and fine weather; the patients were able to take all Queen +Victoria’s favourite walks through the woods and along the quiet +sea-shore, play billiards in the royal billiard-room, sing bawdy songs +in the royal music-room, drink the Prince Consort’s favourite Rhine +wines among his Winterhalters, play golf-crocquet and go down to Cowes +when in need of adventure. We were made honorary members of the Royal +Yacht Squadron. This is another of the caricature scenes of my life; +sitting in a leather chair in the smoking-room of what had been and +is now again the most exclusive club in the world, drinking gin and +ginger, and sweeping the Solent with a powerful telescope. + +I made friends with the French Benedictine Fathers who lived near by; +they had been driven from Solesmes in France by the anti-clerical +laws of 1906, and had built themselves a new abbey at Quarr. The +abbey had a special commission from the Vatican to collect and edit +ancient church music. Hearing the fathers at their plain-song made us +for the moment forget the war completely. Many of them were ex-army +officers who had, I was told, turned to religion after the ardours of +their campaigns or after disappointments in love. They were greatly +interested in the war, which they saw as a dispensation of God for +restoring France to Catholicism. They told me that the freemason +element in the French army had been discredited and that the present +Supreme Command was predominantly Catholic—an augury, they said, of +Allied victory. The guest-master showed me the library of twenty +thousand volumes, hundreds of them blackletter. The librarian was an +old monk from Béthune and was interested to hear from me an accurate +account of the damage to his quarter of the town. The guest-master +asked me whether there were any books that I would like to read in +the library. He said that there were all kinds there—history, botany, +music, architecture, engineering, almost every other lay subject. I +asked him whether there was a poetry section. He smiled kindly and +said, no, poetry was not regarded as improving. + +The Father Superior asked me whether I was a _bon catholique_. I +replied no, I did not belong to the true religion. To spare him a +confession of agnosticism I added that my parents were Protestants. +He said: ‘But if ours is the true religion why do you not become a +Catholic?’ He asked the question in such a simple way that I felt +ashamed. But I had to put him off somehow, so I said: ‘Reverend father, +we have a proverb in England never to swap horses while crossing a +stream. I am still in the war, you know.’ I offered: ‘Peut-être après +la guerre.’ This was a joke with myself; it was the stock answer that +the Pas de Calais girls were ordered by their priests to give to Allied +soldiers who asked for a ‘Promenade, mademoiselle?’ It was seldom +given, I was told, except for the purpose of bargaining. All the same, +I half-envied the Fathers their abbey on the hill, finished with wars +and love affairs. I liked their kindness and seriousness; the clean +whitewashed cells and the meals eaten in silence at the long oaken +tables, while a novice read the _Lives of the Saints_; the food, mostly +cereals, vegetables and fruit, was the best I had tasted for years—I +was tired of ration beef, ration jam, ration bread and cheese. At +Quarr, Catholicism ceased to be repulsive to me. + +Osborne was gloomy. Many of the patients there were neurasthenic and +should have been in a special neurasthenic hospital. A. A. Milne was +there, as a subaltern in the Royal Warwickshire Regiment, and in the +least humorous vein. Vernon Bartlett, of the Hampshire Regiment, who +had introduced me to the Quarr Fathers, decided with me that something +must be started. So we founded the ‘Royal Albert Society’; its aim +was to revive interest in the life and times of the Prince Consort. +I was president and my regalia consisted of a Scottish dirk, Hessian +boots, and a pair of side-whiskers. Official business was not allowed +to proceed until the announcement had been duly made that the whiskers +were on the table. Membership was open only to those who professed +themselves students of the life and works of the Prince Consort, those +who had been born in the province of Alberta in Canada, those who had +resided for six months or upwards by the banks of the Albert Nyanza, +those who held the Albert Medal for saving life, or those who were +linked with the Prince Consort’s memory in any other signal way. +The members were expected to report at each meeting reminiscences that +they had collected from old palace-servants and Osborne cottagers, +throwing light on the human side of the Consort’s life. We had about +fifteen members and ate strawberries. On one occasion about a dozen +officers came in to join the society; they professed to have the +necessary qualifications. One said that he was the grandson of the +man who had built the Albert Memorial; one had worked at the Albert +Docks; and one actually did possess the Albert Medal for saving life; +the others were mere students. They submitted quietly at first to the +ceremonies and business, but it was soon apparent that they were not +serious and had come to break up the society; they were, in fact, most +of them drunk. They began giving indecent accounts of the private life +of the Prince Consort, alleging that they could substantiate them with +documentary evidence. Bartlett and I got worried; it was not that +sort of society. So, as president, I rose and told in an improved +version the story which had won the 1914 All-England Interregimental +Competition at Aldershot for the worst story of the year. I linked it +up with the Prince Consort by saying that he had been told it by John +Brown, the Balmoral ghillie, in whose pawky humour Queen Victoria used +to find such delight, and that it had prevented him from sleeping for +three days and nights, and was a contributory cause of his premature +death. The story had the intended effect; the interrupters threw up +their hands in surrender and walked out. It struck me suddenly how far +I had come since my first years at Charterhouse seven years back, and +what a pity it was that I had not used the same technique there. + +On the beach one day Bartlett and I saw an old ship’s fender; the +knotted ropes at the top had frayed into something that looked like +hair, so Bartlett said to me: ‘Poor fellow, I knew him well. He was +in my platoon in the Hampshire Regiment and jumped overboard from the +hospital ship.’ A little farther along we found an old pair of trousers +half in the water, and a coat, and then some socks and a boot. So we +dressed up Bartlett’s old comrade, draped sea-weed over him where +necessary, and walked on. Soon after we met a coastguard and turned +back with him. We said: ‘There’s a dead man on the beach.’ He stopped a +few yards off and said, holding his nose: ‘Pooh, don’t he ’alf stink!’ +We turned again, leaving him with the dead, and the next day read in +the Isle of Wight paper of a hoax that ‘certain convalescent officers +at Osborne’ had played on the coroner. Bartlett and I were nonsensical, +and changed the labels of all the pictures in the galleries. Anything +to make people laugh. But it was hard work. + + + + + XXIV + + +I used to hear from Siegfried regularly. He had written in March from +the Second Battalion asking me to pull myself together and send him +a letter because he was horribly low in spirits. He complained that +he had not been made at all welcome. A Special Reserve officer who +had transferred to the Second Battalion and was an acting-captain had +gone so far as to call him a bloody wart and allude to the bloody +First Battalion. He had swallowed the insult, but was trying to get +transferred to the First Battalion. The Second was resting until the +end of the month about two miles from Morlancourt (where we had been +together in the previous March), surrounded by billows of mud slopes +and muddy woods and aerodromes and fine new railroads, where he used +to lollop around on the black mare of an afternoon watching the shells +bursting away by the citadel. The black mare was a beautiful combative +creature with a homicidal kink, only ridden by Siegfried. David Thomas +and I once watched him breaking her in. His patience was wonderful. +He would put the mare at a jump and she would sulk; and he would not +force her but turn her around and then lead her back to it. Time after +time she refused, but could not provoke his ill-temper or make him +give up his intention. Finally she took the jump in mere boredom. It +was a six-footer, and she could manage higher than that. He was in C +Company now, he wrote, with a half-witted platoon awaiting his orders +to do or die, and a beast of a stiff arm where Dr. Dunn had inoculated +him, sticking his needle in and saying: ‘Toughest skin of the lot, but +you’re a tough character, I know.’ Siegfried protested that he was not +so tough as Dunn thought. He was hoping that the battalion would +get into some sort of show soon; it would be a relief after all these +weeks of irritation and discomfort and disappointment. (That was a +feeling that one usually had in the Second Battalion.) He supposed that +his _Old Huntsman_ would not be published until the autumn. He had seen +the _Nation_ that week, and commented how jolly it was for him and me +to appear as a military duet singing to a pacifist organ. ‘You and me, +the poets who mean to work together some day and scandalize the jolly +old Gosse’s and Strachey’s.’ (Re-reading this letter now I am reminded +that the occasion of the final end of our correspondence ten years +later was my failure to observe the proper literary punctilios towards +the late Sir Edmund Gosse, c.b. And, by the way, when the _Old +Huntsman_ appeared, Sir Edmund severely criticized some lines of an +allegorical poem in it: + + ... Rapture and pale Enchantment and Romance + And many a slender sickly lord who’d filled + My soul long since with lutanies of sin + Went home because he could not stand the din. + +This, he considered, might be read as a libel on the British House of +Lords. The peerage, he said, had proved itself splendidly heroic in the +war.) + +Siegfried had his wish; he was in heavy fighting with the battalion in +the Hindenburg Line soon after. His platoon was then lent as support +to the Cameronians, and when, in a counter-attack, the Cameronians +were driven out of some trenches that they had won, Siegfried, with a +bombing party of six men, regained them. He was shot through the throat +but continued bombing until he collapsed. The Cameronians rallied +and returned, and Siegfried’s name was sent in for a Victoria +Cross. The recommendation was refused, however, on the ground that the +operations had not been successful; for the Cameronians were later +driven out again by a bombing party under some German Siegfried. + +He was back in England and very ill. He told me that often when he went +out he saw corpses lying about on the pavement. He had written from +hospital, in April, how bloody it was about the Second Battalion. Yates +had sent him a note saying that four officers were killed and seven +wounded in the show at Fontaine-les-Croiselles, the same place that he +had been at, and it had been a ‘perfectly bloody battle.’ But there +had been an advance of about half a mile, which seemed to Siegfried +to be some consolation. Yet, in the very next sentence, he wrote how +mad it made him to think of all the good men being slaughtered that +summer, and all for nothing. The bloody politicians and ditto generals +with their cursed incompetent blundering and callous ideas would go +on until they were tired of it or had got all the kudos they wanted. +He wished he could do something to protest against it, but even if he +were to shoot the Premier or Sir Douglas Haig they could only shut him +up in a madhouse like Richard Dadd of glorious memory. (I recognized +the allusion. Dadd was an early nineteenth-century painter who made +out a list of people who deserved to be killed. The first on the list +was his father. He picked him up one day in Hyde Park and carried him +on his shoulders for nearly half a mile before publicly drowning him +in the Serpentine.) Siegfried went on to say that if he refused to go +out again as a protest they would only accuse him of being afraid of +shells. He asked me whether I thought we would be any better off by the +end of that summer of carnage. We would never break their line. So far, +in April, we had lost more men than the Germans. The Canadians at +Vimy had lost appallingly, yet the official _communiqués_ were lying +unblushingly about the casualties. Julian Dadd had come to see him in +hospital and, like every one else, urged him not to go out again, to +take a safe job at home—but he knew that it was only a beautiful dream, +that he would be morally compelled to go on until he was killed. The +thought of going back now was agony, just when he had got back into +the light again—‘Oh life, oh sun.’ His wound was nearly healed and he +expected to be sent for three weeks to a convalescent home. He didn’t +like the idea, but _anywhere_ would be good enough if he could only be +quiet and see no one, just watch the trees dressing up in green and +feel the same himself. He was beastly weak and in a rotten state of +nerves. The gramophone in the ward plagued him beyond endurance. The +_Old Huntsman_ had come out that spring after all, and, for a joke, +he had sent a copy to Sir Douglas Haig. He couldn’t be stopped doing +_that_ anyhow. + +In June he had gone to visit the Morrells just before I left hospital +at Oxford. He had no idea I was still there, but he wrote that perhaps +it was as well that we didn’t meet, neither of us being at our best; +at least one of us should be in a normal frame of mind when we were +together. I had asked what he had been writing since he came home, +and he answered that five poems of his had appeared in the _Cambridge +Magazine_ (one of the few pacifist journals published in England +at the time, the offices of which were later raided by militarist +flying-cadets). He said that none of them were much good except as digs +at the complacent and perfectly —— people who thought the war ought to +go on indefinitely until every one was killed except themselves. The +pacifists were urging him to produce something red hot in the style +of Barbusse’s _Under Fire_ but he couldn’t do it; he had other +things in his head, _not poems_. I didn’t know what he meant by this +but hoped that it was not a programme of assassination. He wrote that +the thought of all that happened in France nearly drove him dotty +sometimes. He was down in Kent, where he could hear the guns thudding +all the time across the Channel, on and on, until he didn’t know +whether he wanted to rush back and die with the First Battalion or stay +in England and do what he could to prevent the war going on. But both +courses were hopeless. To go back and get killed would be only playing +to the gallery—and the wrong gallery—and he could think of no way of +doing any effective preventive work at home. His name had been sent +in for an officer-cadet battalion appointment in England, which would +keep him safe if he wanted to take it; but it seemed a dishonourable +way out. Now at the end of July another letter came: it felt rather +thin. I sat down to read it on the bench dedicated by Queen Victoria to +John Brown (‘a truer and more faithful heart never burned within human +breast’). When I opened the envelope a newspaper-cutting fluttered out; +it was marked in ink: ‘_Bradford Pioneer_, Friday, July 27, 1917.’ I +read the wrong side first: + + The C.O.’s must be Set Free + + _By Philip Frankford_ + + The conscientious objector is a brave man. He will be remembered as + one of the few noble actors in this world drama when the impartial + historian of the future sums up the history of this awful war. + + The C.O. is putting down militarism. He is fighting for freedom + and liberty. He is making a mighty onslaught upon despotism. And, + above all, he is preparing the way for the final abolition of war. + + But thanks to the lying, corrupt, and dastardly capitalist Press + these facts are not known to the general public, who have been taught + to look upon the conscientious objectors as skunks, cowards, and + shirkers. + + Lately a renewed persecution of C.O.’s has taken place. In spite of + the promises of ‘truthful’ Cabinet Ministers, some C.O.’s have been + sent to France, and there sentenced to death—a sentence afterwards + transferred to one of ‘crucifixion’ or five or ten years’ hard + labour. But even when allowed to remain in this country we have to + chronicle the most scandalous treatment of these men—the salt of + the earth. Saintly individuals like Clifford Allen, Scott Duckers, + and thousands of others, no less splendid enthusiasts in the cause + of anti-militarism, are in prison for no other reason than because + they refuse to take life; and because they will not throw away + their manhood by becoming slaves to the military machine. These men + must be freed. The political ‘offenders’ of Ireland ... + +Then I turned over and read: + + Finished with the War + + _A Soldier’s Declaration_ + + (This statement was made to his commanding officer by + Second-Lieutenant S. L. Sassoon, Military Cross, recommended for + D.S.O., Third Battalion Royal Welch Fusiliers, as + explaining his grounds for refusing to serve further in the army. He + enlisted on 3rd August 1914, showed distinguished valour in France, + was badly wounded and would have been kept on home service if he had + stayed in the army.) + + I am making this statement as an act of wilful defiance of military + authority, because I believe that the war is being deliberately + prolonged by those who have the power to end it. + + I am a soldier, convinced that I am acting on behalf of soldiers. + I believe that this war, upon which I entered as a war of defence + and liberation, has now become a war of aggression and conquest. I + believe that the purposes for which I and my fellow-soldiers entered + upon this war should have been so clearly stated as to have made it + impossible to change them, and that, had this been done, the objects + which actuated us would now be attainable by negotiation. + + I have seen and endured the sufferings of the troops, and I can + no longer be a party to prolong these sufferings for ends which I + believe to be evil and unjust. + + I am not protesting against the conduct of the war, but against the + political errors and insincerities for which the fighting men are + being sacrificed. + + On behalf of those who are suffering now I make this protest aganst + the deception which is being practised on them; also I believe that I + may help to destroy the callous complacence with which the majority + of those at home regard the continuance of agonies which they do not + share, and which they have not sufficient imagination to realize. + + _July_ 1917. S. Sassoon. + +This filled me with anxiety and unhappiness. I entirely agreed +with Siegfried about the ‘political errors and insincerities’; I +thought his action magnificently courageous. But there were more +things to be considered than the strength of our case against the +politicians. In the first place, he was not in a proper physical +condition to suffer the penalty which he was inviting, which was to +be court-martialled, cashiered and imprisoned. I found myself most +bitter with the pacifists who had encouraged him to make this gesture. +I felt that, not being soldiers, they could not understand what it +would cost Siegfried emotionally. It was wicked that he should attempt +to face the consequences of his letter on top of his Quadrangle and +Fontaine-les-Croiselles experiences. I knew, too, that as a gesture it +was inadequate. Nobody would follow his example either in England or in +Germany. The war would obviously go on, and go on until one side or the +other cracked. + +I decided to intervene. I applied to appear before the medical board +that was sitting next day; and I asked the board to pass me fit for +home service. I was not fit and they knew it, but I asked it as a +favour. I had to get out of Osborne and attend to things. Next I +wrote to the Hon. Evan Morgan, with whom I had canoed at Oxford a +month or two previously. He was private secretary to one of the +Coalition Ministers. I asked him to do everything he could to prevent +republication of or comment on the letter in the newspapers, and to +arrange that a suitable answer should be given to Mr. Lees Smith, +then the leading pacifist M.P. and now Postmaster-General in the +Labour Cabinet, when he brought up a question in the House about it. +I explained to Morgan that I was on Siegfried’s side really, but +that he should not be allowed to become a martyr in his present +physical condition. Next I wrote to the Third Battalion. I knew that +the colonel, a South Welshman, was narrowly patriotic, had never been +to France, and could not possibly be expected to take a sympathetic +view. But the senior major, an Irishman, was humane, so I wrote to him +explaining the whole business, asking him to make the colonel see it +in a reasonable light. I told him of Siegfried’s recent experiences +in France. I suggested that he should be medically boarded and given +indefinite leave. + +[Illustration: VARIOUS RECORDS + +Mostly self-explanatory] + +The next news I heard was from Siegfried, who wrote from the Exchange +Hotel, Liverpool, that no doubt I was worrying about him. He had come +up to Liverpool a day or two before and walked into the Third Battalion +orderly room at Litherland feeling like nothing on earth, but probably +looking fairly self-possessed. The senior-major was commanding, the +colonel being away on holiday. (I was much relieved at this bit of +luck.) The senior-major, who was nicer than anything I could imagine +and made him feel an utter brute, had consulted the general commanding +Mersey defences. And the general was consulting God ‘or someone like +that.’ Meanwhile, he was staying at the hotel, having sworn not to +run away to the Caucasus. He hoped, in time, to persuade them to be +nasty about it, and said that he did not think that they realized that +his performance would soon be given great publicity. He hated the +whole business more than ever, and knew more than ever that he was +right and would never repent of what he had done. He said that things +were looking better in Germany, but that Lloyd George would probably +say that it was a ‘plot.’ The politicians seemed to him incapable of +behaving like human beings. + +The general consulted not God but the War Office, and the War Office +was persuaded not to press the matter as a disciplinary case, +but to give Siegfried a medical board. Morgan had done his part of +the work well. The next task I set myself was to persuade Siegfried +to take the medical board. I rejoined the battalion and met him at +Liverpool. He looked very ill; he told me that he had just been down +to the Formby links and thrown his Military Cross into the sea. We +discussed the whole political situation; I told him that he was right +enough in theory; but that every one was mad except ourselves and one +or two others, and that it was hopeless to offer rightness of theory +to the insane. I said that the only possible course for us to take +was to keep on going out to France till we got killed. I now expected +myself before long to go back for the fourth time. I reminded him of +the regiment; what did he think that the First and Second Battalions +would think of him? How could they be expected to understand his point +of view? They would say that he was ratting, that he had cold feet, +and was letting the regiment down by not acting like a gentleman. How +would Old Joe, even, understand it (and he was the most understanding +man in the regiment)? To whom was his letter addressed? The army could, +I repeated, only understand it as cowardice, or at the best as a lapse +from good form. The civilians were more mad and hopeless than the army. +He would not accept this view, but I made it plain that his letter had +not been given and would not be given the publicity he intended; so, +because he was ill, and knew it, he consented to appear before the +medical board. + +So far, so good. The next thing was to rig the medical board. I applied +for permission to give evidence as a friend of the patient. There were +three doctors on the board—a regular R.A.M.C. colonel and major, and a +captain, who was obviously a ‘duration of the war’ man. I had not +been long in the room when I realized that the colonel was patriotic +and unsympathetic, that the major was reasonable but ignorant, and that +the captain was a nerve-specialist, right-minded, and my only hope. +I had to go through the whole story again. I was most deferential to +the colonel and major, but used the captain as an ally to break down +their scruples. I had to appear in the rôle of a patriot distressed +by the mental collapse of a brother-in-arms, a collapse directly due +to his magnificent exploits in the trenches. I mentioned Siegfried’s +‘hallucinations’ in the matter of corpses in Piccadilly. The irony of +having to argue to these mad old men that Siegfried was not sane! It +was a betrayal of truth, but I was jesuitical. I was in nearly as bad +a state of nerves as Siegfried myself and burst into tears three times +in the course of my statement. Captain McDowall, whom I learned later +to be a well-known morbid psychologist, played up well and the colonel +was at last persuaded. As I went out he said to me: ‘Young man, you +ought to be before this board yourself.’ I was most anxious that when +Siegfried went into the board-room after me he should not undo my work +by appearing too sane. But McDowall argued his seniors over. + +Siegfried was sent to a convalescent home for neurasthenics at +Craiglockhart, near Edinburgh. I was detailed as his escort. Siegfried +and I both thought this a great joke, especially when I missed the +train and he reported to ‘Dottyville,’ as he called it, without me. +At Craiglockhart, Siegfried was in the care of W. H. R. Rivers, +whom we now met for the first time, though we already knew of him +as a neurologist, ethnologist and psychologist. He was a Cambridge +professor and had made a point of taking up a new department of +research every few years and incorporating it in his comprehensive +anthropological scheme. He died shortly after the war when he was on +the point of contesting the London University parliamentary seat as +an independent Labour candidate; intending to round off his scheme +with a study of political psychology. He was busy at this time with +morbid psychology. He had over a hundred neurasthenic cases in his +care and diagnosed their condition largely through a study of their +dream-life; his posthumous book _Conflict and Dream_ is a record of +this work at Craiglockhart. It was not the first time that I had heard +of Rivers in this capacity. Dick had come under his observation after +the police-court episode. Rivers had treated him, and after a time +pronounced him sufficiently cured to enlist in the army. Siegfried and +Rivers soon became close friends. Siegfried was interested in Rivers’ +diagnostic methods and Rivers in Siegfried’s poems. Before I returned +from Edinburgh I felt happier. Siegfried began to write the terrifying +sequence of poems that appeared next year as _Counter-Attack_. Another +patient at the hospital was Wilfred Owen, who had had a bad time with +the Manchester Regiment in France; and, further, it had preyed on his +mind that he had been accused of cowardice by his commanding officer. +He was in a very shaky condition. It was meeting Siegfried here that +set him writing his war-poems. He was a quiet, round-faced little man. + + + + + XXV + + +I went back to Liverpool. The president of the medical board had been +right: I should not have been back on duty. The training at the camp +was intensive and I was in command of a trained-men company and did +not allow myself sufficient rest. I realized how bad my nerves were +when one day, marching through the streets of Litherland on a battalion +route-march, I saw three men wearing gas-masks standing by an open +manhole in the road. They were bending over a dead man; his clothes +were sodden and stinking, and his face and hands were yellow. Waste +chemicals of the munitions factory had got into the sewage system and +he had been gassed when he went down to inspect. The men in masks had +been down to get him up. The company did not pause in its march so I +had only a glimpse of the group; but it was so like France that I all +but fainted. The band-music saved me. + +I was detailed as a member of a court-martial which sat in the camp. +The accused was a civilian alleged to have enlisted under the Derby +Scheme, but not to have presented himself when his class was called to +the colours. He was a rabbit, a nasty-looking little man. I tried to +feel sympathetic but found it difficult, even when he proved that he +had never enlisted. His solicitor handed us a letter from a corporal +serving in France, who explained that he had, while on leave, enlisted +in the rabbit’s name because he had heard that the rabbit had been +rabbiting with his wife. This rabbiting the rabbit denied; but he +showed that the colour of the eyes recorded on the enlistment-form was +blue while his own were brown, so it seemed that the story was true so +far. But a further question arose: why had he not enlisted under +the Military Service Act, if he was a fit man? He said that he was +starred, having done responsible work in a munitions factory for the +necessary length of time before the Military Service Act had become +law. However, we had police evidence on the table to show that his +protection certificates were forged, that he had not been working on +munitions before the Military Service Act, and that therefore he was in +the class of those ‘deemed to have enlisted,’ and so a deserter in any +case. There was nothing for it but to sentence him to the prescribed +two years’ imprisonment. He broke down and squealed rabbit-fashion, and +said that he had conscientious objections against war. It made me feel +contemptible, as part of the story. + +Large drafts were now constantly being sent off to the First, Second, +Ninth, and Tenth Battalions in France, and to the Eighth Battalion in +Mesopotamia. There were few absentees among the men warned for the +drafts. But it was noticeable that they were always more cheerful about +going in the spring and summer when there was heavy fighting on than +in the winter months when things were quiet. (The regiment kept up its +spirit even in the last year of the war. Attwater told me that big +drafts sent off in the critical weeks of the spring of 1918, when the +Germans had broken through the Fifth Army, went down to the station +singing and cheering enthusiastically. He said that they might have +been the reservists that he and I had seen assembling at Wrexham on +12th August 1914, to rejoin the Second Battalion just before it sailed +for France.) The colonel always made the same speech to the draft. The +day that I rejoined the battalion from the Isle of Wight I went via +Liverpool Exchange Station and the electric railway to Litherland. +Litherland station was crowded with troops. I heard a familiar +voice making a familiar speech; it was the colonel bidding Godspeed +to a small draft of men who were rejoining the First Battalion. ‘... +going cheerfully like British soldiers to fight the common foe ... +some of you perhaps may fall.... Upholding the magnificent traditions +of the Royal Welch Fusiliers....’ The draft cheered vigorously; rather +too vigorously, I told myself. When he had finished I went over and +greeted a few old friends: 79 Davies, 33 Williams, and the Davies who +was nicknamed ‘Dym Bacon,’ which was Welsh for ‘there isn’t any bacon.’ +(He had won the nickname in his recruit days. He was the son of a Welsh +farmer and accustomed to good food and so he complained about his +first morning’s breakfast, shouting out to the orderly-sergeant: ‘Do +you call this a bloody breakfast, man? Dym bacon, dym sausages, dym +herrings, dym bloody anything. Nothing but bloody bread and jaaam.’) +There was another well-remembered First Battalion man—d.c.m. +and rosette, Médaille Militaire, Military Medal, no stripe. ‘Lost them +again, sergeant?’ I asked. He grinned: ‘Easy come, easy go, sir.’ Then +the train came in and I put out my hand with ‘Good luck!’ ‘You’ll +excuse us, sir,’ he said. The draft shouted with laughter and I saw +why my hand had not been wrung, and also why the cheers had been so +ironically vigorous. They were all in handcuffs. They had been detailed +a fortnight before for a draft to Mesopotamia; but they wanted to +go back to the First Battalion, so they overstayed their leave. The +colonel, not understanding, put them into the guardroom to make sure of +them for the next draft. So they were now going back in handcuffs under +an escort of military police to the battalion of their choice. The +colonel, as I have already said, had seen no active service himself; +but the men bore him no ill-will for the handcuffs. He was a +good-hearted man and took a personal interest in the camp kitchens, had +built a cinema-hut within the camp, been reasonably mild in orderly +room, and done his best not to drive returned soldiers too hard. + +I decided to leave Litherland somehow. I knew what the winter would be +like with the mist coming up from the Mersey and hanging about the camp +full of T.N.T. fumes. When I was there the winter before I used to sit +in my hut and cough and cough until I was sick. The fumes tarnished all +buttons and made our eyes smart. I considered going back to France but +I knew this was absurd as yet. Since 1916 the fear of gas had been an +obsession; in any unusual smell that I met I smelt gas—even a sudden +strong scent of flowers in a garden was enough to set me trembling. And +I knew that the noise of heavy shelling would be too much for me now. +The noise of a motor-tyre exploding behind me would send me flat on +my face or running for cover. So I decided to go to Palestine, where +gas was not known and shell-fire was said to be inconsiderable in +comparison with France. Siegfried wrote from Craiglockhart in August: +‘What do you think of the latest push? How splendid this attrition is! +As Lord Crewe says: “We are not the least depressed.”’ I matched this +with a remark of Lord Carson’s: ‘The necessary supply of heroes must +be maintained at all costs.’ At my next medical board I asked to be +passed in the category of B2. This meant: ‘Fit for garrison service at +home.’ I reckoned on being sent to the Third Garrison Battalion of the +regiment, now under canvas at Oswestry in Wales. From there, when I +felt a bit better, I would get myself passed B1, which meant: ‘Fit for +garrison service abroad,’ and would, in due course, go to a garrison +battalion of the regiment in Egypt. Once there it would be easy +to get passed A1 and join the Twenty-fourth or Twenty-fifth (new-army) +Battalion in Palestine. + +So presently I was sent to Oswestry. A good colonel, but the material +at his disposal was discouraging. The men were mostly compulsory +enlistments, and the officers, with few exceptions, useless. The first +task I was given was to superintend the entraining of battalion stores +and transport; we were moving to Kinmel Park Camp, near Rhyl. I was +given a company of one hundred and fifty men and allowed six hours for +the job. I chose fifty of the stronger men and three or four N.C.O.’s +who looked capable, and sent the rest away to play football. By +organizing the job in the way that I had learnt in the First Battalion +I got these fifty men to load the train in two hours less than the +scheduled time. The colonel congratulated me. At Rhyl he gave me the +job of giving ‘further instruction’ to the sixty or so young officers +who had been sent to him from the cadet-battalions. Few officers in the +battalion had seen any active service. Among the few was Howell Davies +(now literary editor of the _Star_), who had had a bullet through his +head and was in as nervous a condition as myself. We became friends, +and discussed the war and poetry late at night in the hut; we used to +argue furiously, shouting each other down. + +It was at this point that I remembered Nancy Nicholson. I had first +met her at Harlech, where the Nicholsons had a house, when I was on +leave in April 1916 after the operation on my nose. She was sixteen +then, on holiday from school. I had made friends with her brother +Ben, the painter, whose asthma had kept him out of the army. When I +went back to France in 1917 I had gone to say good-bye to Ben and the +rest of the family on the way to Victoria Station, and the last +person to say good-bye to me at that time was Nancy, I remembered her +standing in the doorway in her black velvet dress. She was ignorant +but independent-minded, good-natured, hard, and as sensible about the +war as anybody at home could be. In the summer of 1917 (shortly after +the episode with the Somerville nurse) I had seen her again and we had +gone together to a revue, the first revue I had been to in my life. It +was _Cheep_, Lee White was in it, singing of Black-eyed Susans, and how +‘Girls must all be Farmers’ Boys, off with skirts, wear corduroys,’ +and Nancy told me that she was now on the land herself. She showed +me her paintings, illustrations to Stevenson’s _Child’s Garden of +Verses_, my child-sentiment and hers—she had a happy childhood to look +back on—answered each other. I liked all her family, particularly her +mother, now dead, Mabel Nicholson, the painter, a beautiful wayward +Scotch-melancholy person. William Nicholson, again ‘the painter,’ is +still among my friends. Tony, a brother, just older than Nancy, was a +gunner, waiting to go to France. + +I began a correspondence with Nancy about some children’s rhymes of +mine which she was going to illustrate. Then I found that I was in love +with her, and on my next leave, in October 1917, I visited her at the +farm where she was working, at Hilton in Huntingdonshire. I helped her +to put mangolds through a slicer. She was alone, except for her black +poodle, among farmers, farm labourers, and wounded soldiers who had +been put on land-service. I was alone too in my Garrison Battalion. Our +letters became more intimate after this. She warned me that she was a +feminist and that I had to be very careful what I said about women; the +attitude of the Huntingdon farmers to their wives and daughters kept +her in a continual state of anger she said. + +I had been passed B1 now, but orders came for me to proceed to +Gibraltar. This was a disarrangement of my plans. Gibraltar was a +dead-end; it would be as difficult to get from there to Palestine +as it would be from England. A friend in the War Office undertook +to cancel the order for me until a vacancy could be found in the +battalion in Egypt. At Rhyl I was enjoying the first independent +command I had yet had in the army. I got it through a scare of an +invasion of the north-east coast, to follow a sortie of the German +Fleet. A number of battalions were sent across England for its defence. +All fit men of the Third Garrison Battalion were ordered to move at +twenty-four hours’ notice to York. (There was a slight error, however, +in the Morse message from War Office to Western Command. Instead of +dash-dot-dash-dash they sent dash-dot-dash-dot, so the battalion was +sent to Cork instead. Yet it was not recalled, being needed as much in +Cork as in York; Ireland was in great unrest since the Easter rising +in 1916, and Irish troops at the depots were giving away their rifles +to Sinn Feiners.) The colonel told me that I was the only officer he +could trust to look after the remainder of the battalion—thirty young +officers and four or five hundred men engaged in camp-duties. He left +me a competent adjutant and three officers’ chargers to ride. He also +asked me to keep an eye on his children, whom he had to leave behind +until a house was found for them at Cork; I used to play about a good +deal with them. There was also a draft of two hundred trained men under +orders for Gibraltar. + +I got the draft off all right, and the inspecting general was so +pleased with the soldier-like appearance that the adjutant and I had +given them that he sent them all to the camp cinema at his own expense. +This gave me a good mark with the colonel in Ireland. The climax +of my good services was when I checked an attempt on the part of the +camp quartermaster to make the battalion responsible for the loss of +five hundred blankets. It happened like this. Suddenly one night I had +three thousand three hundred leave-men from France thrown under my +command; they were Irishmen, from every regiment in the army, and had +been held up at Holyhead on the way home by the presence of submarines +in the Irish Sea. They were rowdy and insubordinate, and for the four +days that they were with me I had little rest. The five hundred missing +blankets were some of the six thousand six hundred that had been issued +to them, and had probably been sold in Rhyl to pay for cigarettes and +beer. I was able to prove at the Court of Inquiry that the men, though +attached to the battalion for purposes of discipline, had been issued +with blankets direct from the camp quartermaster’s stores before coming +to it. The loss of the blankets might be presumed to have taken place +between the time of issue and the time that the men arrived in the +battalion lines. I had given no receipt to the camp quartermaster for +the blankets. The Court of Inquiry was held in the camp quartermaster’s +private office; but I insisted that he should leave the room while +evidence was being taken, because it was now no longer his private +office but a Court of Inquiry. He had to go out, and his ignorance +of my line of defence saved the case. This success, and the evidence +that I was able to give the colonel of presents accepted by the +battalion mess-president when at Rhyl, from wholesale caterers (the +mess-president had tried to make me pay my mess-bill twice over and +this was my retaliation), so pleased the colonel that he recommended me +for the Russian Order of St. Anne, with Crossed Swords, of the Third +Class. So, after all, I would not have left the army undecorated +but for the October revolution, which cancelled the award-list. + +I saw Nancy again in December when I went to London, and we decided to +get married at once. We attached no importance to the ceremony. Nancy +said she did not want to disappoint her father, who liked weddings and +things. I was still expecting orders for Egypt and intending to go on +to Palestine. Nancy’s mother said that she would permit the marriage +on one condition: that I should go to a London lung specialist to see +whether I was fit for eventual service in Palestine. I went to Sir +James Fowler, who had visited me at Rouen when I was wounded. He told +me that my lungs were not so bad, though I had bronchial adhesions and +my wounded lung had only a third of its proper expansion; but that +my general nervous condition made it folly for me to think of active +service in any theatre of war. + +Nancy and I were married in January 1918 in St. James’ Church, +Piccadilly. She was just eighteen and I was twenty-two. George Mallory +was the best man. Nancy had read the marriage-service for the first +time that morning and had been horrified by it. She all but refused +to go through the ceremony at all, though I had arranged for it to be +modified and reduced to the shortest possible form. Another caricature +scene to look back on: myself striding up the red carpet wearing +field-boots, spurs, and sword; Nancy meeting me in a blue-check silk +wedding dress, utterly furious; packed benches on either side of the +church, full of relatives; aunts using handkerchiefs; the choir boys +out of tune; Nancy savagely muttering the responses, myself shouting +them out in a parade-ground voice. Then the reception. At this stage of +the war, sugar was practically unobtainable; the wedding cake was in +three tiers, but all the sugar icing was plaster. The Nicholsons +had had to save up their sugar and butter cards for a month to make +the cake taste anything like a cake at all. When the plaster case +was lifted off there was a sigh of disappointment from the guests. A +dozen of champagne had been got in. Champagne was another scarcity and +there was a rush towards the table. Nancy said: ‘Well, I’m going to +get something out of this wedding, at any rate,’ and grabbed a bottle. +After three or four glasses she went off and changed back into her +land-girl’s costume of breeches and smock. My mother, who had been +thoroughly enjoying the proceedings, caught hold of E. V. Lucas, who +was standing next to her, and exclaimed: ‘Oh dear, I wish she had not +done that.’ The embarrassments of our wedding night were somewhat eased +by an air-raid; bombs were dropping not far off and the hotel was in an +uproar. + +A week later she returned to her farm and I to my soldiers. It was an +idle life now. I had no men on parade; they were all employed on camp +duties. And I had found a lieutenant with enough experience to attend +to the ‘further instruction’ of the young officers. My orderly room +took about ten minutes a day; crime was rare, and the adjutant always +had ready and in order the few documents to be signed; and I was free +to ride my three chargers over the countryside for the rest of the +day. I used to visit the present Archbishop of Wales frequently at his +palace at St. Asaph; his son had been killed in the First Battalion. +We found that we had in common a taste for the curious. I have kept a +postcard from him which runs as follows: + + The Palace, St. Asaph. + + Hippophagist banquet held at Langham’s Hotel, February 1868. + + A. G. Asaph. + +(I met numbers of bishops during the war but none since; except +the Bishop of Oxford, in a railway carriage in 1927, who was discussing +the beauties of Richardson. And the Bishop of Liverpool, at Harlech, in +1923. I was making tea on the sea-shore when he came out from the sea +in great pain, having been stung in the thigh by a jellyfish. He gladly +accepted a cup of tea, tut-tutting miserably to himself that he had +been under the impression that jellyfish only stung in foreign parts. +As a record of the occasion he gave me a silver pencil which he had +found in the sandhills while undressing.) + +I grew tired of this idleness and arranged to be transferred to +the Sixteenth Officer Cadet Battalion in another part of the same +camp. It was the same sort of work that I had done at Oxford, and I +was there from February 1918 until the Armistice in November. Rhyl +was much healthier than Oxford and I found that I could play games +without danger of another breakdown. A job was found for Nancy at a +market-gardener’s near the camp, so she came up to live with me. A +month or two later she found that she was to have a baby and had to +stop land work; she went back to her drawing. + +None of my friends had liked the idea of my marriage, particularly to +anyone as young as Nancy; one of them, Robbie Ross, Wilde’s literary +executor, whom I had met through Siegfried and who had been very good +to me, had gone so far as to try to discourage me by hinting that there +was negro blood in the Nicholson family, that it was possible that +one of Nancy’s and my children might revert to coal-black. Siegfried +found it difficult to accustom himself to the idea of Nancy, whom he +had not met, but he still wrote. After a few months at Craiglockhart, +though he in no way renounced his pacifist views, he decided that +the only possible thing to do was, after all, to go back to France. +He had written to me in the previous October that seeing me again had +made him more restless than ever. Hospital life was nearly unbearable; +the feeling of isolation was the worst. He had had a long letter from +Old Joe to say that the First Battalion had just got back to rest from +Polygon Wood; the conditions and general situation were more appalling +than anything he had yet seen—three miles of morasses, shell-holes and +dead men and horses through which to get the rations up. Siegfried +said that he would rather be anywhere than in hospital; he couldn’t +bear to think of poor Old Joe lying out all night in shell-holes and +being shelled (several of the ration party were killed, but at least, +according to Joe, ‘the battalion got its rations’). If only the people +who wrote leading articles for the _Morning Post_ about victory could +read Joe’s letter! + +It was about this time that Siegfried wrote the poem _When I’m asleep +dreaming and lulled and warm_, about the ghosts of the soldiers who +had been killed, reproaching him in his dreams for his absence from +the trenches, saying that they had been looking for him in the line +from Ypres to Frise and had not found him. He told Rivers that he +would go back to France if they would send him, making it quite clear +that his views were exactly the same as they had been in July when he +had written the letter of protest—only more so. He demanded a written +guarantee that he would be sent back at once and not kept hanging about +in a training battalion. He wrote reprehending me for the attitude I +had taken in July, when I was reminding him that the regiment would +only understand his protest as a lapse from good form and a failure to +be a gentleman. It was suicidal stupidity and credulity, he said, +to identify oneself in any way with good form or gentlemanliness, and +if I had real courage I wouldn’t be acquiescing as I was. He pointed +out that I admitted that the people who sacrificed the troops were +callous b——s, and that the same thing was happening in all countries +except parts of Russia. I forget how I answered Siegfried. I might have +pointed out that when I was in France I was never such a fire-eater as +he was. The amount of Germans that I had killed or caused to be killed +was negligible compared with his wholesale slaughter. The fact was that +the direction of Siegfried’s unconquerable idealism changed with his +environment; he varied between happy warrior and bitter pacifist. His +poem: + + To these I turn, in these I trust, + Brother Lead and Sister Steel; + To his blind power I make appeal, + I guard her beauty clean from rust.... + +was originally written seriously, inspired by Colonel Campbell, +v.c.’s bloodthirsty ‘Spirit of the Bayonet’ address at an army +school. Later he offered it as a satire; and it is a poem that comes +off whichever way you read it. I was both more consistent and less +heroic than Siegfried. + +I have forgotten how it was worked and whether I had a hand in it, but +he was sent to Palestine this time. He seemed to like it there, and I +was distressed in April to have a letter from ‘somewhere in Ephraim,’ +that the division was moving to France. He wrote that he would be sorry +to be in trenches, going over the top to take Morlancourt or Méaulte. +Seeing that we had recaptured Morlancourt had brought it home to him. +He said that he expected that the First and Second Battalions had +about ceased to exist by now for the _n_th time. I heard again from +him at the end of May, from France. He quoted Duhamel. ‘It was written +that you should suffer without purpose and without hope, but I will +not let all your sufferings be lost in the abyss.’ Yet he wrote the +next paragraph in his happy-warrior vein, saying that his men were the +best that he’d ever served with. He wished I could see them. I mightn’t +believe it, but he was training them bloody well. He couldn’t imagine +whence his flamelike ardour had come, but it had come. His military +efficiency was derived from the admirable pamphlets that were now +issued, so different from the stuff we used to get two years before. +He said that when he read my letter he began to think, damn Robert, +damn every one except his company, which was the smartest turn-out ever +seen, and damn Wales and damn leave and damn being wounded and damn +everything except staying with his company until they were all melted +away. (Limping and crawling across the shell-holes, lying very still +in the afternoon sunshine in dignified desecrated attitudes.) I was to +remember this mood when I saw him (_if_ I saw him) worn out and smashed +up again, querulous and nerve-ridden. Or when I read something in the +casualty list and got a polite letter from Mr. Lousada, his solicitor. +There never was such a battalion, he said, since 1916, but in six +months it would have ceased to exist. + +Nancy’s brother, Tony, was also in France now. Nancy’s mother made +herself ill with worrying about him. Early in July he was due to +come home on leave; I was on leave myself at the end of one of the +four-months’ cadet courses, staying with the rest of Nancy’s family +at a big Tudor house near Harlech. It was the most haunted house that +I have ever been in, though the ghosts were invisible except in the +mirrors. They would open and shut doors, rap on the oak panels, +knock the shades off lamps, and drink the wine from the glasses at our +elbows when we were not looking. The house belonged to an officer in +the Second Battalion whose ancestors had most of them died of drink. +There was only one visible ghost, a little yellow dog that appeared on +the lawn in the early morning to announce deaths. Nancy saw it one day. + +This was the time of the first Spanish influenza epidemic and Nancy’s +mother caught it, but she did not want to miss Tony when he came +on leave. She wanted to go to theatres with him in London; they +were devoted to each other. So when the doctor came she reduced her +temperature with aspirin and pretended that she was all right. But she +knew that the ghosts in the mirrors knew. She died in London on July +13th, a few days later. While she was dying her chief feeling was one +of pleasure that Tony had got his leave prolonged on her account. (Tony +was killed two months later.) Nancy’s mother was a far more important +person to her than I was, and I was alarmed of the effect that the +shock of her death might have on the baby. A week later I heard that +on the day that she had died Siegfried had been shot through the head +while making a daylight patrol through long grass in No Man’s Land. And +he wrote me a verse letter which I cannot quote, though I should like +to do so. It is the most terrible of his war-poems. + +And I went on mechanically at my cadet-battalion work. The candidates +for commissions we got were no longer gentlemen in the regimental +sense—mostly Manchester cotton clerks and Liverpool shipping clerks—but +they were all experienced men from France and were quiet and well +behaved. We failed about one in three. And the war went on and on. +I was then writing a book of poems called _Country Sentiment_. +Instead of children as a way of forgetting the war, I used Nancy. +_Country Sentiment_, dedicated to her, was a collection of romantic +poems and ballads. At the end was a group of pacifist war-poems. It +contained one about the French civilians—I cannot think how I came to +put so many lies in it—I even said that old Adelphine Heu of Annezin +gave me a painted china plate, and that her pride was hurt when I +offered to pay her. The truth is that I bought the plate from her for +about fifteen shillings and that I never got it from her. Adelphine’s +daughter-in-law would not allow her to give it up, claiming it as her +own, and I never got my money back from Adelphine. This is only one of +many of my early poems that contain falsities for public delectation. + +In November came the Armistice. I heard at the same time news of the +death of Frank Jones-Bateman, who had gone back again just before the +end, and of Wilfred Owen, who often used to write to me from France, +sending me his poems. Armistice-night hysteria did not touch the camp +much, though some of the Canadians stationed there went down to Rhyl to +celebrate in true overseas style. The news sent me out walking alone +along the dyke above the marshes of Rhuddlan (an ancient battle-field, +the Flodden of Wales) cursing and sobbing and thinking of the dead. + + + + + XXVI + + +In the middle of December the cadet-battalions were wound up and the +officers, after a few days’ leave, were sent back to their units. The +Third Battalion of the Royal Welch was now at Limerick. I decided to +overstay my leave until Nancy’s baby was born. She was expecting it +early in January 1919, and her father had taken a house at Hove for the +occasion. Jenny was born on Twelfth Night. She was neither coal-black +nor affected by the shocks of the previous months. Nancy had had no +foreknowledge of the experience—I assumed that she knew—and it took her +years to recover from it. I went over to Limerick; the battalion was at +the Castle Barracks. I lied my way out of the over-staying of leave. + +Limerick was a Sinn Fein stronghold, and there were constant clashes +between the troops and the young men of the town, yet little +ill-feeling; Welsh and Irish got on well together, as inevitably as +Welsh and Scottish disagreed. The Royal Welch had the situation well +in hand; they made a joke of politics and used their entrenching-tool +handles as shillelaghs. It looked like a town that had been through +the war. The main streets had holes in them like shell-craters and +many of the bigger houses seemed on the point of collapse. I was told +by an old man at an antique shop that no new houses were now built +in Limerick, that when one house fell down the survivors moved into +another. He said too that everyone died of drink in Limerick except +the Plymouth Brethren, who died of religious melancholia. Life did not +start in the city before about a quarter past nine in the morning. At +nearly nine o’clock once I walked down O’Connell Street and found it +deserted. When the hour chimed, the door of a magnificent Georgian +house was flung open and out came, first a shower of slops, which just +missed me, then a dog, which lifted up its leg against a lamp-post, +then a nearly naked child, which sat down in the gutter and rummaged +in a heap of refuse for dirty pieces of bread; finally a donkey, which +began to bray. Ireland was exactly as I had pictured it. I felt its +charm as dangerous. Yet when I was detailed to take out a search-party +in a neighbouring village for concealed rifles I asked the adjutant to +find a substitute; I said that I was an Irishman and did not wish to be +mixed up in Irish politics. + +I realized too that I had a new loyalty, to Nancy and the baby, tending +to overshadow regimental loyalty now that the war was over. Once I was +writing a rhymed nonsense letter to Nancy and Jenny in my quarters +overlooking the barrack square: + + Is there any song sweet enough + For Nancy or for Jenny? + Said Simple Simon to the Pieman: + ‘Indeed, I know not any.’ + + I have counted the miles to Babylon, + I have flown the earth like a bird, + I have ridden cock-horse to Banbury Cross, + But no such song have I heard. + +At that moment some companies of the battalion returned to barracks +from a route-march; the drums and fifes drew up under my window, +making the panes rattle with _The British Grenadiers_. The insistent +repetition of the tune and the hoarse words of command as the parade +formed up in the square, company by company, challenged Banbury +Cross and Babylon. _The British Grenadiers_ succeeded for a moment in +forcing their way into the poem: + + Some speak of Alexander, + And some of Hercules, + +but were driven out: + + But where are there any like Nancy and Jenny, + Where are there any like these? + +I had ceased to be a British grenadier. + +So I decided to resign my commission at once. I consulted the priority +list of trades for demobilization and found that agricultural workers +and students were among the first classes to go. I did not particularly +want to be a student again. I would rather have been an agricultural +worker (Nancy and I spoke of farming when the war ended), but I had no +agricultural background. And I found that I could take a two years’ +course at Oxford with a Government grant of two hundred pounds a year, +and would be excused the intermediate examination (Mods.) on account of +war-service. The preliminary examination (Smalls) I had already been +excused because of a certificate examination that I had taken while +still at Charterhouse. So there only remained the finals. The grant +would be increased by a children’s allowance. This sounded good enough. +It seemed absurd at the time to suppose that university degrees would +count for anything in a regenerated post-war England; but Oxford was +a convenient place to mark time until I felt more like working for my +living. We were all so accustomed to the war-time view, that the +only possible qualification for peace-time employment would be a good +record of service in the field, that we took it for granted that our +scars and our commanding-officers’ testimonials would get us whatever +we wanted. A few of my fellow-officers did manage, as a matter of fact, +to take advantage of the patriotic spirit of employers before it cooled +again, sliding into jobs for which they were not properly qualified. + +I wrote to a friend in the Demobilization Department of the War Office +asking him to expedite my demobilization. He wrote back that he would +do his best, but that I must be certified not to have had charge of +Government moneys for the last six months; and I had not. But the +adjutant had just decided to put me in command of a company. He said +that he was short of officers whom he knew could be trusted with +company accounts. The latest arrivals from the new-army battalions +were a constant shame to the senior officers. Paternity-orders, +stumer cheques, and drunk on parade were frequent. Not to mention +table-manners, at which Sergeant Malley would stand aghast. There were +now two mess ante-rooms, the junior and the senior, yet if a junior +officer was regimentally a gentleman (belonged, that is, to the North +Wales landed gentry or had been to Sandhurst) he was invited to use the +senior ante-room and be among his own class. All this must have seemed +very strange to the three line-battalion second-lieutenants captured in +1914, now promoted captain by the death of most of their contemporaries +and set free by the terms of the Armistice. + +The adjutant cancelled the intended appointment only when I promised +to help him with the battalion theatricals that were being arranged +for St. David’s Day; I undertook to play Cinna in _Julius Cæsar_. His +change of mind saved me over two hundred pounds. Next day the +senior lieutenant in the company that I was to have taken over went off +with the company cash-box, and I would have been legally responsible. +Before the war he used to give displays at Blackpool Pier as _The +Handcuff King_; he got away safely to America. + +I went out a few miles from Limerick to visit my uncle, Robert Cooper, +at Cooper’s Hill. He was a farmer, a retired naval officer, and had +been having his ricks burnt and cattle driven. He was very despondent. +Through the window he showed me distant cattle grazing beside the +Shannon. ‘They have been out there all winter,’ he said, ‘and I haven’t +had the heart to go out and look at them these three months.’ I spent +the night at Cooper’s Hill and woke up with a chill. I knew that it +was the beginning of influenza. At the barracks I found that the War +Office telegram had come through for my demobilization, but that +all demobilization among troops in Ireland was to be stopped on the +following day for an indefinite period because of the troubles there. +The adjutant, showing me the telegram, said: ‘We’re not going to let +you go. You promised to help us with those theatricals.’ I protested, +but he was firm. I did not intend to have my influenza out in an Irish +military hospital with my lungs in their present state. + +I had to think quickly. I decided to make a run for it. The +orderly-room sergeant had made my papers out on receipt of the +telegram. I had all my kit ready packed. There only remained two things +to get: the colonel’s signature to the statement that I had handled +no company moneys, and the secret code-marks which only the battalion +demobilization officer could supply—but he was hand-in-glove with the +adjutant, so it was no use asking him for them. The last train +before demobilization ended was the six-fifteen from Limerick the +same evening, February 13th. I decided to wait until the adjutant had +left the orderly room and then casually ask the colonel to sign the +statement, without mentioning the adjutant’s objection to my going. The +adjutant remained in the orderly room until five minutes past six. As +soon as he was out of sight I hurried in, saluted, got the colonel’s +signature, saluted, hurried out to collect my baggage. I had counted +on a jaunting-car at the barrack gates but none was to be seen. I had +about five minutes left now and the station was a good distance away. I +saw a corporal who had been with me in the First Battalion. I shouted +to him: ‘Corporal Summers, quick! Get a squad of men. I’ve got _my +ticket_ and I want to catch the last train back.’ Summers promptly +called four men; they picked up my stuff and doubled off with it, +left, right, left, to the station. I tumbled into the train as it was +moving out of the station and threw a pound-note to Corporal Summers. +‘Good-bye, corporal, drink my health.’ + +But still I had not my demobilization code-marks and knew that when +I reached the demobilization centre at Wimbledon they would refuse +to pass me out. I did not care very much. Wimbledon was in England, +and I would at least have my influenza out in an English and not an +Irish hospital. My temperature was running high now and my mind was +working clearly as it always does in fever. My visual imagery, which is +cloudy and partial at ordinary times, becomes defined and complete. At +Fishguard I bought a copy of the _South Wales Echo_ and read in it that +there would be a strike of London Electric Railways the next day, 14th +February, if the railway directors would not meet the men’s demands. +So when the train steamed into Paddington and while it was still +moving I jumped out, fell down, picked myself up and ran across to +the station entrance, where, in spite of competition from porters—a +feeble crew at this time—I caught the only taxi in the station as its +fare stepped out. I had foreseen the taxi-shortage and could afford +to waste no time getting to Wimbledon. I brought my taxi back to the +train, where scores of stranded officers looked at me with envy. One, +who had travelled down in my compartment, had been met by his wife. +I said: ‘Excuse me, but would you like to share my taxi anywhere? (I +have influenza, I warn you.) I’m going down to Wimbledon, so I only +need go as far as Waterloo; the steam-trains are still running.’ They +were delighted; they said that they lived out at Ealing and had no idea +how to get there except by taxi. On the way to Waterloo he said to me: +‘I wish there was some way of showing our gratitude. I wish there was +something we could do for you.’ I said: ‘Well, there is only one thing +in the world that I want at the moment. But you can’t give it to me, +I’m afraid. And that,’ I said, ‘is the proper code-marks to complete +my demobilization papers. I’ve bolted from Ireland without them, and +there’ll be hell to pay if the Wimbledon people send me back.’ He +rapped on the glass of the taxi and stopped it. Then he got down his +bag, opened it, and produced a satchel of army forms. He said: ‘Well, I +happen to be the Cork District Demobilization Officer and I’ve got the +whole bag of tricks here.’ So he filled my papers in. + +At Wimbledon, instead of having to wait in a queue for nine or ten +hours as I had expected, I was given priority and released at once; +Ireland was officially a ‘theatre of war’ and demobilization from +theatres of war had priority over home-service demobilization. So +after a hurried visit to my parents, who were living close by, I +continued to Hove, arriving at supper-time. When I came in, I had a +sudden terror that made me unable to speak. I seemed to see Nancy’s +mother. She was looking rather plump and staid and dressed unlike +herself, and did not appear to recognize me. She was sitting at the +table between Nancy and her father. It was like a bad dream; I did +not know what to say or do. I knew I was ill, but this was worse than +illness. Then Nicholson introduced me: ‘This is Nancy’s Aunt Dora, just +over from Canada.’ + +I warned them all that I had influenza; and hurried off to bed. Within +a day or two everybody in the house had caught it except Nicholson +and the baby and one servant who kept it off by a gipsy’s charm. I +think it was the leg of a lizard tied in a bag round her neck. A new +epidemic as bad as the summer one had started; there was not a nurse +to be had in Brighton. Nicholson at last found two ex-nurses. One was +competent, but frequently drunk, and when drunk she would ransack all +the wardrobes and pile the contents into her own bags; the other, +sober but incompetent, would stand a dozen times a day in front of +the open window, spread out her arms, and cry in a stage-voice: ‘Sea, +sea, give my husband back to me.’ The husband, by the way, was not +drowned, merely unfaithful. A doctor, found with difficulty, said that +I had no chance of recovering; it was septic pneumonia now and both my +lungs were affected. But I had determined that, having come through +the war, I would not allow myself to succumb to Spanish influenza. +This, now, was the third time in my life that I had been given up as +dying, and each time because of my lungs. The first occasion was when +I was seven years old and had double-pneumonia following measles. Yet +my lungs are naturally very sound, possibly the strongest part +of me and, therefore, my danger mark. This time again I recovered and +was up a few weeks later in time to see the mutiny of the Guards, when +about a thousand men of all regiments marched out from Shoreham Camp +and paraded through the streets of Brighton in protest against camp +discipline. + +The reaction against military discipline between the Armistice and +the signing of peace delighted Siegfried and myself. Siegfried had +taken a prominent part in the General Election which Lloyd George +forced immediately after the Armistice, asking for a warrant for +hanging the Kaiser and making a stern peace. He had been supporting +Philip Snowden’s candidature on a pacifist platform and had faced a +threatening civilian crowd, trusting that his three wound stripes +and the mauve and white ribbon of his military cross would give him +a privileged hearing. Snowden and Ramsay McDonald were perhaps the +two most unpopular men in England at the end of the war. We now half +hoped that there would be a general rising of ex-service men against +the Coalition Government, but it was not to be. Once back in England +the men were content to have a roof over their heads, civilian food, +beer that was at least better than French beer, and enough blankets +at night. They might find overcrowding in their homes, but this could +be nothing to what they had been accustomed to; in France a derelict +four-roomed cottage would provide billets for sixty men. They had won +the war and they were satisfied. They left the rest to Lloyd George. +The only serious outbreak was at Rhyl, where there was a two days’ +mutiny of Canadians with much destruction and several deaths. The +signal for the outbreak was the cry: ‘Come on, the Bolsheviks.’ + +When I was well enough to travel, Nancy, I and the baby went +up to Harlech, where Nicholson had lent us his house to live in. We +were there for a year. I discarded my uniform, having worn nothing +else for four and a half years, and looked into my school trunk to +see what I had to wear. There was only one suit that was not school +uniform and I had grown out of that. I found it difficult to believe +that the war was over. When I had last been a civilian I had been +still at school, so I had no experience of independent civilian +life. The Harlech villagers treated me with the greatest respect. At +the Peace Day celebrations in the castle I was asked, as the senior +of the officers present who had served overseas, to make a speech +about the glorious dead. I have forgotten what I said, but it was in +commendation of the Welshman as a fighting man and was loudly cheered. +I was still mentally and nervously organized for war; shells used to +come bursting on my bed at midnight even when Nancy was sharing it +with me; strangers in day-time would assume the faces of friends who +had been killed. When I was strong enough to climb the hill behind +Harlech and revisit my favourite country I found that I could only +see it as a prospective battlefield. I would find myself working out +tactical problems, planning how I would hold the Northern Artro valley +against an attack from the sea, or where I would put a Lewis-gun if I +were trying to rush Dolwreiddiog farm from the brow of the hill, and +what would be the best position for the rifle-grenade section. I still +had the army habit of commandeering anything of uncertain ownership +that I found lying about; also a difficulty in telling the truth—it +was always easier for me now when overtaken in any fault to lie my way +out. I applied the technique of taking over billets or trenches to a +review of my present situation. Food, water supply, possible dangers, +communication, sanitation, protection against the weather, fuel +and lighting—each item was ticked off as satisfactory. And other loose +habits of war-time survived, such as stopping passing motors for a +lift, talking without embarrassment to my fellow-travellers in railway +carriages, and unbuttoning by the roadside without shame, whoever was +about. And I retained the technique of endurance, a brutal persistence +in seeing things through, somehow, anyhow, without finesse, satisfied +with the main points of any situation. But I modified my language, +which had suddenly become foul on the day of Loos and had been foul +ever since. The chief difference between war and peace was money. I +had never had to worry about that since my first days at Wrexham; I +had even put by about £150 of my pay, invested in War Bonds. Neither +Nancy nor I knew the value of money and this £150 and my war-bonus of, +I think, £250 and a disability pension that I was now drawing of £60 a +year, and the occasional money that I got from poetry, seemed a great +deal altogether. We engaged a nurse and a general servant and lived as +though we had an income of about a thousand a year. Nancy spent much of +her time drawing (she was illustrating some poems of mine), and I was +busy getting _Country Sentiment_ in order and writing reviews. + +I was very thin, very nervous, and had about four years’ loss of +sleep to make up. I found that I was suffering from a large sort of +intestinal worm which came from drinking bad water in France. I was +now waiting until I should be well enough to go to Oxford with the +Government educational grant; it seemed the easiest thing to do. I knew +that it would be years before I was fit for anything besides a quiet +country life. There was no profession that I wished to take up, though +for a while I considered school-mastering. My disabilities were +many; I could not use a telephone, I was sick every time I travelled +in a train, and if I saw more than two new people in a single day it +prevented me from sleeping. I was ashamed of myself as a drag on Nancy. +I had been much better when I was at Rhyl, but my recent pneumonia had +set me back to my condition of 1917. + +Siegfried had gone to live at Oxford as soon as he was demobilized, +expecting me to join him. But after being there for a term or so he +became literary editor of the newly-published _Daily Herald_. He gave +me books to review for it. In these days the _Daily Herald_ was not +respectable. It was violent. It was anti-militarist. It was the only +daily paper that protested against the Versailles Treaty and the +blockade of Russia by the British Fleet. The Versailles Treaty shocked +me; it seemed to lead certainly to another war and yet nobody cared. +When the most critical decisions were being taken at Paris, public +interest was concentrated entirely on three home-news items: Hawker’s +Atlantic flight and rescue, the marriage of Lady Diana Manners, and +a marvellous horse called The Panther, which was the Derby favourite +and came in nowhere. The _Herald_ spoilt our breakfast for us every +morning. We read in it of unemployment all over the country, due to the +closing of munition factories, of ex-service men refused re-instatement +in the jobs that they had left in the early stages of the war, of +market-rigging, lockouts, and abortive strikes. I began to hear news, +too, of my mother’s relatives in Germany and the penury to which +they had been reduced, particularly those who were retired officials +and whose pension, by the collapse of the mark, was reduced to a few +shillings a week. Nancy and I took all this to heart; we now called +ourselves socialists. + +The attitude of my family was doubtful. I had fought gallantly +for my country—indeed I was the only one of my father’s five sons of +military age who had seen active service—and was entitled to every +consideration because of my shell-shocked condition; but my socialism +and sympathy for the Bolsheviks outraged them. I once more forfeited +the goodwill of my Uncle Charles. My father tried to talk me over, +reminding me that my brother Philip had once been a pro-Boer and a +Fenian, but had recovered from his youthful revolutionary idealism and +come out all right in the end. Most of the elder members of my family +were in the Near East, either married to British officials or British +officials themselves. My father hoped that when I was recovered I +would go to Egypt, perhaps in the consular service, where the family +influence would be of great service to me, and there get over my +revolutionary idealism. Socialism with Nancy was rather a means to +a single end. The most important thing to her was judicial equality +of the sexes; she held that all the wrong in the world was caused by +male domination and narrowness. She refused to see my experiences in +the war as in any way comparable with the sufferings that millions of +married women of the working-class went through. This at least had the +effect of putting the war into the background for me; I was devoted to +Nancy and respected her views in so far as they were impersonal. Male +stupidity and callousness became an obsession with her and she found +it difficult not to include me in her universal condemnation of men. +It came to the point later when she could not bear a newspaper in the +house. She was afraid of coming across something that would horrify +her, some paragraph about the necessity of keeping up the population, +or about women’s intelligence, or about the modern girl, or anything +at all about women written by clergymen. We became members of the +newly formed Constructive Birth Control Society and distributed its +literature among the village women, to the scandal of my family. + +It was a great grief to my parents that Jenny was not baptized. +My father wrote to Nancy’s godfather, who also happened to be my +publisher, asking him to use his influence with Nancy, for whose +religion he had promised at the font to be responsible, to make her +give the child Christian baptism. They were scandalized too that Nancy, +finding that it was legal to keep her own name for all purposes, +refused to allow herself to be called Mrs. Graves in any circumstances. +At first I had been doubtful about this, thinking that perhaps it +was not worth the trouble and suspicion that it caused; but when I +saw that Nancy was now treated as being without personal validity I +was converted. At that time there was no equal guardianship and the +children were the sole property of the father; the mother was not +legally a parent. We worked it out later that our children were to be +thought of as solely hers, but that since I looked after them so much +the boys should take the name of Graves—the girls taking Nicholson. +This of course has always baffled my parents. Nor could they understand +then the intimacy of our relations with the nurse and the maid. They +were both women to whom we had given a job because they were in bad +luck. One of them was a girl who had had a child during the war by +a soldier to whom she was engaged, who got killed in France shortly +afterwards. Generosity to a woman like this was Christian, but intimacy +seemed merely eccentric. + + + + + XXVII + + +In October 1919 I went up to Oxford at last. The lease of the Harlech +house was ended and Nicholson gave us the furniture to take with us. +The city was overcrowded; the lodging-house keepers, some of whom had +nearly starved during the war, now had their rooms booked up terms +ahead and charged accordingly. Keble College had put up army huts +for its surplus students. There was not an unfurnished house to be +had anywhere within the three-mile radius. I solved the difficulty +by getting permission from my college authorities to live five miles +out, on Boar’s Hill; I pleaded my lungs. John Masefield, who liked my +poetry, offered to rent us a cottage at the bottom of his garden. + +The University was very quiet. The returned soldiers had little +temptation to rag about, break windows, get drunk, or have tussles with +the police and races with the bulldogs as before the war. The boys +straight from the public schools were quiet too. They had had the war +preached at them continually for four years, had been told that they +must carry on loyally at home while their brothers were serving in the +trenches, and must make themselves worthy of such sacrifices. The boys +had been leaving for the cadet-battalions at the age of seventeen, so +that the masters had it all their own way; trouble at public schools +nearly always comes from the eighteen-year-olds. G. N. Clarke, a +history don at Oriel, who had been up at Oxford just before the war and +had meanwhile been an infantryman in France and a prisoner in Germany, +told me: ‘I can’t make out my pupils at all. They are all “Yes, sir” +and “No, sir.” They seem positively to thirst for knowledge and they +scribble away in their notebooks like lunatics. I can’t remember a +single instance of such stern endeavour in pre-war days.’ The +ex-service men—they included scores of captains, majors, colonels, and +even a one-armed twenty-five-year-old brigadier—though not rowdy, were +insistent on their rights. At St. John’s they formed what they called +a Soviet, demanding an entire revision of the college catering system; +they won their point and an undergraduate representative was chosen +to sit on the kitchen-committee. The elder dons whom I had often seen +during the war trembling in fear of an invasion of Oxford, with the +sacking and firing of the colleges and the rape of the Woodstock and +Banbury Roads, and who had regarded all soldiers, myself included, as +their noble saviours, now recovered their pre-war self-possession. I +was amused at the difference in manner to me that some of them showed. +My moral tutor, however, though he no longer saluted me when we met, +remained a friend; he prevailed on the college to allow me to change my +course from Classics to English Language and Literature and to take up +my £60 Classical Exhibition notwithstanding. I was glad now that it was +an exhibition, though in 1913 I had been disappointed that it was not a +scholarship: college regulations permitted exhibitioners to be married, +scholars had to remain single. + +I used to bicycle down from Boar’s Hill every morning to my lectures. +On the way down I would collect Edmund Blunden, who was attending the +same course. He too had permission to live on the hill, on account of +gassed lungs. I had been in correspondence with Edmund some time before +he came to Oxford. Siegfried, when literary editor of the _Herald_, had +been among the first to recognize him as a poet, and now I was helping +him get his _Waggoner_ through the press. Edmund had war-shock as badly +as myself, and we would talk each other into an almost hysterical state +about the trenches. We agreed that we would not be right until we +got all that talk on to paper. He was first with _Undertones of War_, +published in 1928. + +Edmund and Mary his wife rented two rooms of a cottage belonging to +Mrs. Delilah Becker, locally known as the Jubilee Murderess. She was a +fine-looking old lady and used to read her prayer-book and Bible aloud +to herself every night, sitting at the open window. The prayer-book was +out of date: she used to pray for the Prince Consort and Adelaide, the +Queen Dowager. She was said to have murdered her husband. In Jubilee +year she had gone away for a holiday, leaving her husband in the +cottage with a half-witted servant-girl. News came to her that he had +got the servant-girl into trouble. She wrote to him: ‘Dear husband, if +I find you in my cottage when I come back you shall be no more.’ He did +not believe her and she found him in the cottage, and sure enough he +was no more. She told the police that he had gone away when he saw how +angry with him she was; but no one had seen him go. He had even left +his silver watch behind, ticking on a nail on the bedroom wall. The +neighbours swore that she had buried him in the garden. Mary Blunden +said that it was more probable that he was buried somewhere in their +part of the cottage, which was semi-detached. ‘There’s an awfully funny +smell about here sometimes,’ she said. Old Delilah said to Mary once: +‘I have often wondered what has happened to the old pepper-and-salt +suit he had on when he was—when he went away.’ Whenever she went +out she took the carving-knife out of the drawer and laid it on the +kitchen-table, where it could be seen by them when they went past her +window. I liked Delilah very much and sent her a pound of tea every +year until her death. Her comment on life in general was: ‘Fair +play’s good sport, and we’re all mortal worms.’ She also used to say: +‘While there’s wind and water a man’s all right.’ + +I found the English Literature course tedious, especially +eighteenth-century poets. My tutor, Mr. Percy Simpson, the editor of +Ben Jonson’s plays, sympathized. He said that he had once suffered for +his preference for the Romantic revivalists. He had been beaten by his +schoolmaster for having a Shelley in his possession. He had protested +between the blows: ‘Shelley is beautiful! Shelley is beautiful!’ But he +warned me that I must on no account disparage the eighteenth century +when I sat for my final examination. It was also difficult for me, too, +to concentrate on cases and genders and irregular verbs in Anglo-Saxon +grammar. The Anglo-Saxon lecturer was candid about his subject. He said +that it was of purely linguistic interest, that there was hardly a line +of Anglo-Saxon extant of the slightest literary merit. I disagreed; +_Beowulf_ and _Judith_ seemed good poems to me. Beowulf lying wrapped +in a blanket among his platoon of drunken thanes in the Gothland +billet; Judith going for a _promenade_ to Holofernes’s staff-tent; and +_Brunanburgh_ with its bayonet-and-cosh fighting—all this was closer to +most of us at the time than the drawing-room and deer-park atmosphere +of the eighteenth century. Edmund and I found ourselves translating +everything into trench-warfare terms. The war was not yet over for us. +In the middle of a lecture I would have a sudden very clear experience +of men on the march up the Béthune-La Bassée road; the men would be +singing and French children would be running along beside them, calling +out: ‘Tommee, Tommee, give me bullee beef’; and I would smell the +stench of the knacker’s yard just outside the town. Or I would be in +Laventie High Street, passing a company billet; an N.C.O. would +roar out, ‘Party, ’shun!’ and the Second Battalion men in shorts, with +brown knees and brown expressionless faces, would spring to their feet +from the broken steps where they were sitting. Or I would be in a barn +with my first platoon of the Welsh Regiment, watching them play nap +by the light of dirty candle stumps. Or it would be a deep dug-out at +Cambrin, where I was talking to a signaller; I would look up the shaft +and see somebody’s muddy legs coming down the steps, and there would +be a crash and the tobacco-smoke in the dug-out would shake with the +concussion and twist about in patterns like the marbling on books. +These day-dreams persisted like an alternate life. Indeed they did not +leave me until well on in 1928. I noticed that the scenes were nearly +always recollections of my first four months in France; it seemed as +though the emotion-recording apparatus had failed after Loos. + +The eighteenth century was unpopular because it was French. Anti-French +feeling among most ex-soldiers amounted almost to an obsession. Edmund, +shaking with nerves, used to say at this time: ‘No more wars for me at +any price. Except against the French. If there’s ever a war with them +I’ll go like a shot.’ Pro-German feeling was increasing. Now that the +war was over and the German armies had been beaten, it was possible +to give the German soldier credit for being the best fighting-man in +Europe. I often heard it said that it was only the blockade that had +beaten them; that in Haig’s last push they never really broke, and that +their machine-gun sections had held us up for as long as was needed +to cover the withdrawal of the main forces. And even that we had been +fighting on the wrong side; our natural enemies were the French. + +At the end of my first term’s work I attended the usual college +board to give an account of myself. The spokesman coughed and said a +little stiffly: ‘I understand, Mr. Graves, that the essays that you +write for your English tutor are, shall I say, a trifle temperamental. +It appears, indeed, that you prefer some authors to others.’ + +There were a number of poets living on Boar’s Hill; too many, Edmund +and I agreed. It had become almost a tourist centre. There was the Poet +Laureate, with his bright eye, abrupt challenging manner, a flower in +his buttonhole; he was one of the first men of letters to sign the +Oxford recantation of war-time hatred against the Germans—indeed it +was for the most part written by him. There was Gilbert Murray, too, +gentle-voiced and with the spiritual look of the strict vegetarian, +doing preliminary propaganda work for the League of Nations. Once, +while I was sitting talking to him in his study about Aristotle’s +_Poetics_, and he was walking up and down the room, I suddenly asked +him: ‘Exactly what is the principle of that walk of yours? Are you +trying to avoid the flowers on the rug or are you trying to keep to +the squares?’ I had compulsion-neuroses of this sort myself so it was +easy to notice one in him. He wheeled round sharply: ‘You’re the first +person who has caught me out,’ he said. ‘No, it’s not the flowers or +the squares; it’s a habit that I have got into of doing things in +sevens. I take seven steps, you see, then I change direction and go +another seven steps, than I turn round. I asked Browne, the professor +of Psychology, about it the other day, but he assured me it wasn’t a +dangerous habit. He said: “When you find it getting into multiples of +seven, come to me again.”’ + +I saw most of John Masefield, a nervous, generous person, very +sensitive to criticism, who seemed to have suffered greatly in +the war, when an orderly in a Red Cross unit; he was now working at +_Reynard the Fox_. He wrote in a hut in his garden surrounded by tall +gorse-bushes and only appeared at meal-times. In the evening he used to +read his day’s work over to Mrs. Masefield and they would correct it +together. Masefield was at the height of his reputation at the time, +and there was a constant flow of American visitors to his door. Mrs. +Masefield protected Jan. She was from the North of Ireland, a careful +manager, and put a necessary brake on Jan’s generosity and sociability. +We admired the way that she stood up for her rights where less resolute +people would have shrunk back. The tale of Mrs. Masefield and the +rabbit. Some neighbours of ours had a particularly stupid Airedale; +they were taking it for a walk past the Masefields’ house when a wild +rabbit ran across the road from the Masefields’ gorse plantation. The +Airedale dashed at it and missed as usual. The rabbit, not giving it +sufficient credit for stupidity and slowness, doubled back; but found +the dog had not yet recovered from its mistake and ran right into its +jaws. The dog’s owners were delighted at the brilliance performance of +their pet, recovered the rabbit, which was a small and inexperienced +one, and took it home for the pot. Mrs. Masefield had seen the business +through the plantation fence. It was not, strictly, a public road and +the rabbit was, therefore, legally hers. That evening there came a +knock at the door. ‘Come in, oh, do come in, Mrs. Masefield.’ It was +Mrs. Masefield coming for the skin of her rabbit. Rabbit-skins were +worth a lot in 1920. Mrs. Masefield’s one extravagance was bridge; she +used to play at a halfpenny a hundred, to steady her play, she told us. +She kept goats which used to be tethered near our cottage and which +bleated. She was a good landlord to us, and advised Nancy to keep +up with me intellectually if she wished to hold my affections. + +Another poet on Boar’s Hill was Robert Nichols, still another +neurasthenic ex-soldier, with his flame-opal ring, his wide-brimmed +hat, his flapping arms and ‘mournful grandeur’ in repose (the phrase is +from a review by Sir Edmund Gosse). Nichols served only three weeks in +France, in the gunners, and was in no show; but he was highly strung +and the three weeks affected him more than twelve months affected +some people. He was invalided out of the army and went to lecture in +America for the Ministry of Information on British war-poets. He read +Siegfried’s and my poetry, and apparently gave some account of us. A +legend was started of Siegfried, Robert and myself as the new Three +Musketeers. Not only was Robert not in the Royal Welch Fusiliers with +Siegfried and myself, but the three of us have never been together in +the same room in our lives. + +[Illustration: 1929 THE SECOND BATTALION, THE ROYAL WELCH FUSILIERS] + +That winter George and Ruth Mallory invited Nancy and myself to go +climbing with them. But Nancy could not stand heights and was having +another baby; and, for myself, I realized that my climbing days were +over. My nerves were bad, though possibly still good enough for an +emergency, and beyond improvement. I was, however, drawn into one +foolhardy experience at this time. Nancy and I were visiting my parents +at Harlech. My two younger brothers were at the house. They played +golf and mixed with local society. One evening they arranged a four at +bridge with a young ex-airman and a Canadian colonel who was living +in a house on the plain between Harlech Castle and the sea. The elder +of my brothers got toothache; I said that I would take his place. The +younger, still at Charterhouse, demurred. He was rather ashamed of +me now as a non-golfer, a socialist, and not quite a gentleman. +And my bridge might discredit him. I insisted, because at that time +Canadian colonels interested me, and he made the best of it. I assured +him that I would try not to wound his feelings. The colonel was about +forty-five—tough, nervous, whisky-drinking, a killer. He was out of +sorts; he said that his missus was upstairs with a headache and could +not come down. We played three or four rubbers; I was playing steadily +and not disgracing my brother. The colonel was drinking, the airman +was competing. Finally the colonel said in a temper: ‘By God, this +is the rottenest bridge I’ve ever sat down to. Let’s go bathing!’ +It was half-past ten and not warm for January, but we went bathing +and afterwards dried ourselves on pocket handkerchiefs. ‘We’ was the +colonel, myself and my brother. The airman excused himself. The bathe +put the colonel in better humour. ‘Let’s go up to the village now and +raid the concert. Let’s pull some of the girls out and have a bit of +fun.’ The airman gigglingly agreed. My brother seemed embarrassed. The +colonel said: ‘And you, you bloody poet, are you on?’ I said angrily: +‘Not yet. You’ve had your treat, colonel. I went bathing with you and +it was cold. Now it’s my treat. I’m going to take you climbing and make +you warm. I want to see whether you Canucks are all B.S. or not.’ That +diverted him. + +I took them up the castle rock from the railway station in the dark. +After the first piece, which was tricky, there would have been little +climbing necessary if I had followed a zig-zag path; but I preferred to +lead the colonel up several fairly stiff pitches. The others kept to +the path. When we reached the top he was out of breath, a bit shaky, +and most affable—almost affectionate. ‘That was a damn good climb you +showed us.’ So I said: ‘We’ve not reached the top yet.’ ‘Where +are we going now?’ he asked. I said: ‘Up that turret.’ We climbed into +the castle and walked through the chapel into the north-western tower. +It was pitch dark. I took them left into the turret which adjoined the +tower but rose some twenty feet higher. The sky showed above, about +the size of an orange. The turret had once had a spiral staircase, but +the central core had been broken down after the Cromwellian siege; +only an edging of stones remained on the walls. This edging did not +become continuous until about the second spiral. We struck matches and +I started up. The colonel swore and sweated, but followed. I showed him +the trick of getting over the worst gap in the stones, which was too +wide to bridge with one’s stride, by crouching, throwing one’s body +forward and catching the next stone with one’s hands; a scramble and he +was there. The airman and my brother remained below. I was glad when we +reached the second spiral. We climbed perhaps a hundred and twenty feet +to the top. + +When we were safely down again most of the whisky was gone. So I +said: ‘Now let’s visit the concert party.’ I had heard the audience +dispersing, from the top of the turret. We visited the artistes. +The colonel was most courteous to the women, especially the blonde +soprano, but he took a great dislike to the tenor, a Welshman, and +told him that he was no bloody good as a singer. He cross-examined +him on his military service and was delighted to find that he had +been for some reason or other exempted. He called him a louse and a +bloody skrim-shanker and a lot more until the blonde soprano, who was +his wife, came to the rescue and threatened to chuck the colonel out. +He went out grinning, kissing his hand to the soprano and telling +the tenor to kiss the place where he wore no hat. The tenor turned +courageous and shouted out something about reading the Scriptures +and how morally unjustifiable it was to fight. We all laughed till +we wheezed. Then the colonel said we must get a drink; he knocked up +a hotel barman and even got inside the bar, but the barman refused +to serve him and threatened to call the police. The colonel did not +raid the shelves as he would have done half an hour before when the +whisky was fiercer in him; he merely told the barman what he thought +of the Welsh, broke a glass or two and walked out. ‘Let’s go home and +have some more bridge.’ He walked arm-in-arm with me down the hill +and confided as one family man to another that his nerves were all in +pieces because his missus was in the family way. That was why he had +broken up the bridge-party. He had wanted her to have a good sleep. ‘If +we go back quietly now, she’ll not wake up; we can bid in whispers.’ +So we went back and he drank silently and the airman drank silently +and we played silently. I had three or four glasses myself; my brother +abstained. We stopped at three-thirty in the morning. The colonel +paid up and went to sleep on the sofa. I was eighteen shillings and +my brother twelve shillings up at sixpence a hundred. I was sick and +shaking for weeks after this. + +In March the second baby was born and we called him David. My mother +was overjoyed. It was the first Graves grandson; my elder brothers had +had only girls; here, at last, was an heir for the Graves family silver +and documents. When Jenny was born my mother had condoled with Nancy: +‘Perhaps it is as well to have a girl first to practise on.’ Nancy had +from the first decided to have four children; they were to be like +the children in her drawings and were to be girl, boy, girl, boy, in +that order. She was going to get it all over quickly; she believed in +young parents and families of three or four children fairly close +together in age. She had the children in the order she intended and +they were all like her drawings. She began to regret our marriage, as +I also did. We wanted somehow to be dis-married—not by divorce, which +was as bad as marriage—and able to live together without any legal or +religious obligation to live together. It was about this time that I +met Dick again, for the last time; I found him merely pleasant and +disagreeable. He was at the university, about to enter the diplomatic +service, and had changed so much that it seemed absurd to have ever +suffered on his account. Yet the caricature likeness remained. + + + + + XXVIII + + +I met T. E. Lawrence first at a guest-night at All Souls’. +Lawrence had just been given a college fellowship, and it was the first +time for many years that he had worn evening dress. The restlessness +of his eyes was the first thing about him I noticed. He told me that +he had read my poems in Egypt during one of his flying visits from +Arabia; he and my brother Philip had been together in the Intelligence +Department at Cairo, before his part in the Arab revolt had begun, +working out the Turkish order of battle. I knew nothing about his +organization of the Arab revolt, his exploits and sufferings in the +desert, and his final entry into Damascus. He was merely, to me, a +fellow-soldier who had come back to Oxford for a rest after the war. +But I felt a sudden extraordinary sympathy with him. Later, when I was +told that every one was fascinated by Lawrence, I tried to dismiss this +feeling as extravagant. But it remained. Between lectures at Oxford +I now often visited Lawrence at All Souls’. Though he never drank +himself, he used always to send his scout for a silver goblet of audit +ale for me. Audit ale was brewed in the college; it was as soft as +barley-water but of great strength. (A prince once came down to Oxford +to open a new museum and lunched at All Souls’ before the ceremony; +the mildness of the audit ale deceived him—he took it for lager—and he +had to be taken back to the station in a cab with the blinds drawn.) +Nancy and I lunched in Lawrence’s rooms once with Vachel Lindsay, the +American poet, and his mother. Mrs. Lindsay was from Springfield, +Illinois, and, like her son, a prominent member of the Illinois +Anti-Saloon League. When Lawrence told his scout that Mr. Lindsay, +though a poet, was an Anti-Saloon Leaguer, he was scandalized and +asked Lawrence’s permission to lay on Lindsay’s place a copy of verses +composed in 1661 by a fellow of the college. One stanza was: + + The poet divine that cannot reach wine, + Because that his money doth many times faile, + Will hit on the vein to make a good strain, + If he be but inspired with a pot of good ale. + +Mrs. Lindsay had been warned by friends to comment on nothing unusual +that she met at Oxford. Lawrence had brought out the college gold +service in her honour and this she took to be the ordinary thing at a +university luncheon-party. + +His rooms were dark and oak-panelled. A large table and a desk were the +principal furniture. And there were two heavy leather chairs, simply +acquired. An American oil-financier had come in suddenly one day when +I was visiting T. E. and said: ‘I am here from the States, Colonel +Lawrence, to ask you a single question. You are the only man who will +answer it honestly. Do Middle-Eastern conditions justify my putting +any money in South Arabian oil?’ Lawrence, without rising, simply +answered:‘No.’ ‘That’s all I wanted to know; it was worth coming for +that. Thank you, and good day!’ In his brief glance about the room he +had found something missing; on his way home through London he chose +the chairs and had them sent to Lawrence with his card. Other things in +the room were pictures, including Augustus John’s portrait of Feisul, +which Lawrence, I believe, bought from John with the diamond which +he had worn as a mark of honour in his Arab headdress; his books, +including a Kelmscott _Chaucer_, three prayer-rugs, the gift of Arab +leaders who had fought with him, one of them with the sheen on +the nap made with crushed lapis-lazuli; a station bell from the Hedjaz +railway; and on the mantelpiece a four-thousand-year-old toy, a clay +soldier on horseback from a child’s grave at Carchemish, where Lawrence +was digging before the war. + +We talked most about poetry. I was working at a book of poems which +appeared later under the title of _The Pier-Glass_. They were poems +that reflected my haunted condition; the _Country Sentiment_ mood was +breaking down. Lawrence made a number of suggestions for improving +these poems and I adopted most of them. He told me of two or three +of his schemes for brightening All Souls’ and Oxford generally. One +was for improving the turf in the quadrangle, which he said was in +a disgraceful condition, nearly rotting away; he had suggested at a +college meeting that it should be manured or treated in some way or +other, but no action had been taken. He now said that he was going +to plant mushrooms on it, so that they would have to re-turf it +altogether. He consulted a mushroom expert in town, but found that it +was difficult to make spawn grow. He would have persisted if he had +not been called away about this time to help Winston Churchill with +the Middle-Eastern settlement. Another scheme, in which I was to have +helped, was to steal the Magdalen College deer. He was going to drive +them into the small inner quadrangle of All Souls’, having persuaded +the college to reply, when Magdalen protested and asked for its deer +back, that it was the All Souls’ herd and had been pastured there from +time immemorial. Great things were expected of this raid. It fell +through for the same reason as the other. But a successful strike +of college-servants for better pay and hours was said to have been +engineered by Lawrence. + +I took no part in undergraduate life, seldom visiting my college +except to draw my Government grant and exhibition money; I refused to +pay the college games’ subscription, having little interest in St. +John’s and being unfit for games myself. Most of my friends were at +Balliol and Queen’s, and in any case Wadham had a prior claim on my +loyalty. I spent as little time as possible away from Boar’s Hill. +At this time I had little to do with the children; they were in the +hands of Nancy and the nurse—the nurse now also did the cooking and +housework for us. Nancy felt that she wanted some activity besides +drawing, though she could not decide what. One evening in the middle of +the long vacation she suddenly said: ‘I must get away somewhere out of +this for a change. Let’s go off on bicycles somewhere.’ We packed a few +things and rode off in the general direction of Devonshire. The nights +were coldish and we had not brought blankets. We found that the best +way was to bicycle by night and sleep by day. We went over Salisbury +Plain past several deserted army camps; they had a ghostly look. There +was accommodation in these camps for a million men, the number of men +killed in the Imperial Forces during the war. We found ourselves near +Dorchester, so we turned in there to visit Thomas Hardy, whom we had +met not long before when he came up to Oxford to get his honorary +doctor’s degree. We found him active and gay, with none of the aphasia +and wandering of attention that we had noticed in him at Oxford. + +I wrote out a record of the conversation we had with him. He welcomed +us as representatives of the post-war generation. He said that he lived +such a quiet life at Dorchester that he feared he was altogether behind +the times. He wanted, for instance, to know whether we had any sympathy +with the Bolshevik regime, and whether he could trust the _Morning +Post’s_ account of the Red Terror. Then he was interested in Nancy’s +hair, which she wore short, in advance of the fashion, and in her +keeping her own name. His comment on the name question was: ‘Why, you +_are_ old-fashioned. I knew an old couple here sixty years ago that did +the same. The woman was called Nanny Priddle (descendant of an ancient +family, the Paradelies, long decayed into peasantry), and she would +never change her name either.’ Then he wanted to know why I no longer +used my army rank. I said it was because I was no longer soldiering. +‘But you have a right to it; I would certainly keep my rank if I had +one. I should be very proud to be called Captain Hardy.’ + +He told us that he was now engaged in restoring a Norman font in a +church near by. He had only the bowl to work upon, but enjoyed doing +a bit of his old work again. Nancy mentioned that we had not baptized +our children. He was interested, but not scandalized, remarking that +his old mother had always said of baptism that at any rate there was +no harm in it, and that she would not like her children to blame her +in after-life for leaving any duty to them undone. ‘I have usually +found that what my old mother said was right.’ He said that to his +mind the new generation of clergymen were very much better men than +the last.... Though he now only went to church three times a year—one +visit to each of the three neighbouring churches—he could not forget +that the church was in the old days the centre of all the musical, +literary and artistic education in the country village. He talked +about the old string orchestras in Wessex churches, in one of which +his father, grandfather, and he himself had taken part; he regretted +their disappearance. He told us that the clergyman who appears as +old St. Clair in _Tess of the D’Urbervilles_ was the man who protested +to the War Office about the Sunday brass-band performances at the +Dorchester Barracks, and was the cause of headquarters no longer being +sent to this once very popular station. + +We had tea in the drawing-room, which, like the rest of the house, +was crowded with furniture and ornaments. Hardy had an affection for +old possessions, and Mrs. Hardy was too fond to suggest that anything +at all should be removed. Hardy, his cup of tea in hand, began making +jokes about bishops at the Athenæum Club and imitating their episcopal +tones when they ordered: ‘China tea and a little bread and butter (Yes, +my lord!).’ Apparently he considered bishops were fair game. He was +soon censuring Sir Edmund Gosse, who had recently stayed with them, for +a breach of good taste in imitating his old friend, Henry James, eating +soup. Loyalty to his friends was always a passion with Hardy. + +After tea we went into the garden, and Hardy asked to see some of my +recent poems. I showed him one, and he asked if he might make some +suggestions. He objected to the phrase the ‘scent of thyme,’ which he +said was one of the _clichés_ which the poets of his generation studied +to avoid. I replied that they had avoided it so well that it could be +used again now without offence, and he withdrew the objection. He asked +whether I wrote easily, and I said that this poem was in its sixth +draft and would probably be finished in two more. ‘Why!’ he said, ‘I +have never in my life taken more than three, or perhaps four, drafts +for a poem. I am afraid of it losing its freshness.’ He said that he +had been able to sit down and write novels by time-table, but that +poetry was always accidental, and perhaps it was for that reason +that he prized it more highly. + +He spoke disparagingly of his novels, though admitting that there were +chapters in them that he had enjoyed writing. We were walking round the +garden, and Hardy paused at a spot near the greenhouse. He said that he +had once been pruning a tree here when an idea suddenly had come into +his head for a story, the best story that he had ever thought of. It +came complete with characters, setting, and even some of the dialogue. +But as he had no pencil and paper with him, and was anxious to finish +pruning the tree before it rained, he had let it go. By the time he sat +down to recall it, all was utterly gone. ‘Always carry a pencil and +paper,’ he said. He added: ‘Of course, even if I could remember that +story now, I couldn’t write it. I am past novel-writing. But I often +wonder what it was.’ + +At dinner that night he grew enthusiastic in praise of cider, which +he had drunk since a boy, and which, he said, was the finest medicine +he knew. I suggested that in the _Message to the American People_, +which he had been asked to write, he might take the opportunity of +recommending cider. + +He began complaining of autograph-hunters and their persistence. He +disliked leaving letters unanswered, and yet if he did not write these +people pestered him the more; he had been upset that morning by a +letter from an autograph-fiend which began: + + Dear Mr. Hardy,—I am interested to know why the devil you + don’t reply to my request.... + +He asked me for my advice, and was grateful for the suggestion that a +mythical secretary should reply offering his autograph at one or +two guineas, the amount to be sent to a hospital (‘Swanage Children’s +Hospital,’ put in Hardy), which would forward a receipt. + +He said that he regarded professional critics as parasites no less +noxious than autograph-hunters, and wished the world rid of them. He +also wished that he had not listened to them when he was a young man; +on their advice he had cut out dialect-words from his early poems, +though they had no exact synonyms to fit the context. And still the +critics were plaguing him. One of them recently complained of a poem +of his where he had written ‘his shape _smalled_ in the distance.’ +Now what in the world else could he have written? Hardy then laughed +a little and said that once or twice recently he had looked up a word +in the dictionary for fear of being again accused of coining, and had +found it there right enough—only to read on and find that the sole +authority quoted was himself in a half-forgotten novel! He talked of +early literary influences, and said that he had none at all, for he +did not come of literary stock. Then he corrected himself and said +that a friend, a fellow-apprentice in the architect’s office where he +worked as a young man, used to lend him books. (His taste in literature +was certainly most unexpected. Once when Lawrence had ventured to say +something disparaging against Homer’s _Iliad_, he protested: ‘Oh, but I +admire the _Iliad_ greatly. Why, it’s in the _Marmion_ class!’ Lawrence +could not at first believe that Hardy was not making a little joke.) + +We went off the next day, but there was more talk at breakfast before +we went. Hardy was at the critics again. He was complaining that they +accused him of pessimism. One man had recently singled out as an +example of gloom a poem he had written about a woman whose house was +burned down on her wedding-night. ‘Of course it is a humorous +piece,’ said Hardy, ‘and the man must have been thick-witted not to see +that. When I read his criticism I went through my last collection of +poems with a pencil, marking them S, N, and C, according as they were +sad, neutral or cheerful. I found them as nearly as possible in equal +proportions; which nobody could call pessimism.’ In his opinion _vers +libre_ could come to nothing in England. ‘All we can do is to write on +the old themes in the old styles, but try to do a little better than +those who went before us.’ About his own poems he said that once they +were written he cared very little what happened to them. + +He told us of his work during the war, and said that he was glad to +have been chairman of the Anti-Profiteering Committee, and to have +succeeded in bringing a number of rascally Dorchester tradesmen to +book. ‘It made me unpopular, of course,’ he said, ‘but it was a hundred +times better than sitting on a military tribunal and sending young men +to the war who did not want to go.’ + +This was the last time we saw Hardy, though we had a standing +invitation to come and visit him. + +From Dorchester we bicycled to Tiverton in Devonshire, where Nancy’s +old nurse kept a fancy-goods shop. Nancy helped her dress the +shop-window and advised her about framing the prints that she was +selling. She also gave the shop a good turn-out, dusted the stock, +and took her turn behind the counter. As a result of Nancy’s work the +week’s receipts went up several shillings and continued at the improved +figure for a week or two after we were gone. This gave Nancy the idea +of starting a shop herself on Boar’s Hill. It was a large residential +district with no shop nearer than three miles away. She said that we +should buy a second-hand army-hut, stock it with confectionery, +groceries, tobacco, hardware, medicines, and all the other things +that one finds in a village shop, run it tidily and economically and +make our fortune. I undertook to help her while the vacation lasted +and became quite excited about the idea myself. She decided to take +a neighbour, the Hon. Mrs. Michael Howard, into partnership. Neither +Nancy nor Mrs. Howard had any experience of shop-management or +commercial book-keeping. But Mrs. Howard undertook to keep the books +while Nancy did most of the other work. Nancy was anxious to start the +shop six weeks after the original decision, but army huts were not +obtainable at any reasonable price (the timber-merchants were in a +ring); so it was decided to employ a local carpenter to build a shop +to Nancy’s design. A neighbour rented us a corner of his field close +to the Masefields’ house. The work was finished in time and the stock +bought. The _Daily Mirror_ advertised the opening on its front page +with the heading ‘Shop-Keeping on Parnassus,’ and crowds came +up from Oxford to look at us. We soon realized that it had either to be +a big general shop which made Boar’s Hill more or less independent of +Oxford (and of the unsatisfactory system of vans calling at the door +and bringing stuff of inferior quality with ‘take it or leave it’) +or it had to be a small sweet and tobacco shop making no challenge +to the Oxford tradesmen. We decided on the challenge. The building +had to be enlarged and two or three hundred pounds’ worth of stock +purchased. Mrs. Howard was not able to give much of her time to the +work, having children to look after and no nurse; most of it fell on +Nancy and myself. I used to serve in the shop several hours of the +day while she went round to the big houses for the daily orders. The +term had now begun and I was supposed to be attending lectures in +Oxford. Another caricature scene: myself, wearing a green-baize apron +this time, with flushed face and disordered hair, selling a packet of +Bird’s Eye tobacco to the Poet Laureate with one hand and with the +other weighing out half a pound of brown sugar for Sir Arthur Evans’ +gardener’s wife. + +The gross weekly takings were now £60 a week and Nancy, though she had +given up her drawing, still had the house and children to consider. +We had no car, and constant emergency bicycle-rides had to be made to +Oxford to get new stock from the wholesalers; we made a point of always +being able to supply whatever was asked for. We engaged a shop-boy to +call for orders, but the work was still too heavy. Mrs. Howard went out +of partnership and Nancy and I found great difficulty in understanding +her accounts. I was fairly good at conventional book-keeping; the +keeping of company accounts had been part of my lecture-syllabus when I +was instructing cadets. But that did not help me with these, which were +on a novel system. + +The shop business finally ousted everything, not only Nancy’s painting, +but my writing, my university work, and Nancy’s proper supervision of +the house and children. We had the custom of every resident of Boar’s +Hill but two or three. One of those whom we courted unsuccessfully was +Mrs. Masefield. The proximity of the shop to her house did not please +her. And her housekeeper, she said, preferred to deal with a provision +merchant in Oxford and she could not override this arrangement. +However, to show that there was no ill-feeling, she used to come once +a week to the shop and buy a tin of Vim and a packet of Lux, for which +she paid money down from a cash-box which she carried with her. The +moral problems of trade interested me. Nancy and I both found that +it was very difficult at this time of fluctuating prices to be really +honest; we could not resist the temptation of undercharging the poor +villagers of Wootton, who were frequent customers, and recovering our +money from the richer residents. Playing at Robin Hood came easily to +me. Nobody ever caught us out; it was as easy as shelling peas, the +shop-boy said, who also took his turn behind the counter. We found that +most people bought tea by price and not by quality. If we happened to +be out of the tea selling at ninepence a quarter which Mrs. So-and-so +always bought, refusing the eightpenny tea, and Mrs. So-and-so asked +for it in a hurry, the only thing to do was to make up a pound of the +sevenpenny, which was the same colour as the ninepenny, and charge it +at ninepence; the difference would not be noticed. We were sorry for +the commercial travellers who came sweating up the hill with their +heavy bags of samples, usually on foot, and had to be sent away without +any orders. They would pitch a hard-luck tale and often we would relent +and get in more stock than we needed. In gratitude they would tell us +some of the tricks of the trade, advising us, for instance, never to +cut cheese or bacon exactly to weight, but to make it an ounce or two +more and overcharge for this extra piece. ‘There’s few can do the sum +before you take the stuff off the scales and there’s fewer still who +will take the trouble to weigh up again when they get back home.’ + +The shop lasted six months. Nancy suddenly dismissed the nurse. Nancy +had always practised the most up-to-date methods of training and +feeding children, and the nurse, over-devoted to the children, had +recently disobeyed her instructions. Nancy put the children before +everything. She decided that there was nothing to be done but to take +them and the house over herself, and to find a manager for the +shop. At this point I caught influenza and took a long time to recover +from it. + +War horror overcame me again. The political situation in Europe seemed +to be going from bad to worse. There was already trouble in Ireland, +Russia and the Near East. The papers promised new and deadlier poison +gases for the next war. There was a rumour that Lord Berkeley’s house +on Boar’s Hill was to become an experimental laboratory for making +them. I had bad nights. I thought that perhaps I owed it to Nancy to go +to a psychiatrist to be cured; yet I was not sure. Somehow I thought +that the power of writing poetry, which was more important to me than +anything else I did, would disappear if I allowed myself to get cured; +my _Pier-Glass_ haunting would end and I would become merely a dull +easy writer. It seemed to me less important to be well than to be a +good poet. I also had a strong repugnance against allowing anyone to +have the power over me that psychiatrists always seemed to win over +their patients. I had always refused to allow myself to be hypnotized +by anyone in any way. + +I decided to see as few people as possible, stop all outside work, and +cure myself. I would read the modern psychological books and apply them +to my case. I had already learned the rudiments of morbid psychology +from talks with Rivers, and from his colleague, Dr. Henry Head, the +neurologist, under whose care Robert Nichols had been. I liked Head’s +scientific integrity. Once when he was testing a man whom he suspected +of homicidal mania he had made some suggestion to him which came within +the danger-area of his insanity; the man picked up a heavy knife from +his consulting table and rushed threateningly at Head. Head, not +at all quick on his legs and dodging round the table, exclaimed: +‘Typical, typical! Capital, capital!’ and, only as an afterthought: +‘Help! Help!’ He had great knowledge of the geography of the brain and +the peculiar delusions and maladjustments that followed lesions in +the different parts. He told me, at different times, exactly what was +wrong with Mr. Jingle in _Pickwick Papers_, why some otherwise literate +people found it impossible to spell, and why some others saw ghosts +standing by their bedside. He said about the bedside ghosts: ‘They +always come to the same side of the bed, and if you turn the bed round +you turn the ghost round with it. They come to the contrary side of the +lesion.’ + +A manager was found for the shop. But as soon as it was known that +Nancy and I were no longer behind the counter the weekly receipts +immediately began to fall; they were soon down to £20, and still +falling steadily. The manager’s salary was more than our profits. +Prices were now falling, too, at the rate of about five per cent, +every week, so that the stock on our shelves had depreciated greatly +in value. And we had let one or two of the Wootton villagers run up +bad debts. When we came to reckon things up we realized that it was +wisest to cut the losses and sell out. We hoped to recoup our original +expenditure and even to be in pocket on the whole transaction by +selling the shop and the goodwill to a big firm of Oxford grocers that +wished to buy it as a branch establishment. Unfortunately, the site was +not ours and the landlord was prevailed upon by an interested neighbour +not to let any ordinary business firm take over the shop from us and +spoil the local amenities. No other site was available, so there was +nothing to do but sell off what stock remained at bankrupt prices +to the wholesalers and find a buyer for the building. Unfortunately +again, the building was not made in bolted sections, and could not +be sold to be put up again elsewhere; its only value was as timber, and +in these six months the corner in timber had also been broken and the +prices fallen to very little. We recovered twenty pounds of the two +hundred that had been spent on it. Nancy and I were so disgusted that +we decided to leave Boar’s Hill. We were about five hundred pounds in +debt to the wholesalers and others. A lawyer took the whole matter in +hand, disposed of our assets for us, and the debt was finally reduced +to about three hundred pounds. Nancy’s father sent her a hundred-pound +note (in a match-box) as his contribution, and the remainder was +unexpectedly contributed by Lawrence. He gave me four chapters of +_Seven Pillars of Wisdom_, his history of the Arab revolt, to sell for +serial publication in the United States. It was a point of honour with +him not to make any money out of the revolt even in the most indirect +way; but if it could help a poet in difficulties, there seemed no harm +in that. + +We gave the Masefields notice that we were leaving the cottage at the +end of the June quarter 1921. We had no idea where we were going or +what we were going to do. We decided that we must get another cottage +somewhere and live very quietly, looking after the children ourselves, +and that we must try to make what money we needed by writing and +drawing. Nancy, who had taken charge of everything when I was ill, now +gave me the task of finding a cottage. It had to be found in about +three weeks’ time. I said: ‘But you know that there are no cottages +anywhere to be had.’ She said: ‘I know, but we are going to get one.’ +I said ironically: ‘Describe it in detail; since there are no cottages +we might as well have a no-cottage that we really like.’ She said: +‘Well, it must have six rooms, water in the house, a beamed +attic, a walled-in garden, and it must be near the river. It must be +in a village with shops and yet a little removed from the village. The +village must be five or six miles from Oxford in the opposite direction +from Boar’s Hill. The church must have a tower and not a spire. And we +can only afford ten shillings a week unfurnished.’ There were other +details that I took down about soil, sanitation, windows, stairs and +kitchen sinks, and then I went off on my bicycle. I had first laid a +ruler across the Oxford ordnance-map and found four or five villages +that corresponded in general direction and distance and were on the +river. By inquiry I found that two had shops; that, of these two, one +had a towered church and the other a spired church. I therefore +went to a firm of house-agents in Oxford and said: ‘Have you +any cottages to let unfurnished?’ The house-agent laughed politely. +So I said: ‘What I want is a cottage at Islip with a walled garden, +six rooms, water in the house, just outside the village, with a beamed +attic, and rent ten shillings a week.’ The house-agent said: ‘Oh, you +mean the World’s End Cottage? But that is for sale, not for renting. +It has failed to find a purchaser for two years, and I think that the +owner will let it go now at five hundred pounds, which is only half +what he originally asked.’ So I went back and next day Nancy came with +me; she looked round and said: ‘Yes, this is the cottage all right, +but I shall have to cut down those cypress trees and change those +window-panes. We’ll move in on quarter-day.’ I said: ‘But the money! We +haven’t the money.’ Nancy answered: ‘If we could find the exact house, +surely to goodness we can find a mere lump sum of money.’ She was +right, for my mother was good enough to buy the cottage and rent it to +us at the rate of ten shillings a week. + +Islip was a name of good omen to me: it was associated with Abbot +Islip, a poor boy of the village who had become Abbot of Westminster +and befriended John Skelton when he took sanctuary in the Abbey from +the anger of Wolsey. I had come more and more to associate myself with +Skelton, discovering a curious affinity. Whenever I wanted a motto for +a new book I always found exactly the right one somewhere or other in +Skelton’s poems. We moved into the Islip cottage and a new chapter +started. I did not sit for my finals. + + + + + XXIX + + +We were at Islip from 1921 until 1925. My mother in renting us the +house had put a clause in the agreement that it was to be used only as +a residence and not for the carrying on of any trade or business. She +wanted to guard against any further commercial enterprise on our part; +she need not have worried. Islip was an agricultural village, and far +enough from Oxford not to be contaminated with the roguery for which +the outskirts of a university town are usually well known. The village +policeman led an easy life. During the whole time we were living there +we never had a thing stolen or ever had a complaint to make against a +native Islip cottager. Once by mistake I left my bicycle at the station +for two days, and, when I recovered it, not only were both lamps, the +pump and the repair outfit still in place, but an anonymous friend had +even cleaned it. + +Every Saturday in the winter months, as long as I was at Islip, I +played football for the village team. There had been no football in +Islip for some eighty years; the ex-soldiers had reintroduced it. The +village nonogenarian complained that the game was not what it had been +when he was a boy; he called it unmanly. He pointed across the fields +to two aged willow trees: ‘They used to be our home goals,’ he said. +‘T’other pair was half a mile upstream. Constable stopped our play in +the end. Three men were killed in one game; one was kicked to death, +t’other two drowned each other in a scrimmage. Her was a grand game.’ +Islip football, though not unmanly, was ladylike by comparison with the +game as I had played it at Charterhouse. When playing centre-forward I +was often booed now for charging the goalkeeper while he was fumbling +with the shot he had saved. The cheers were reserved for my +inside-left, who spent most of his time stylishly dribbling the ball in +circles round and round the field until he was robbed; he seldom went +anywhere near the goal-mouth. The football club was democratic. The +cricket club was not. I played cricket the first season but left the +club because the selection of the team was not always a selection of +the best eleven men; regular players would be dropped to make room for +visitors to the village who were friends of a club official, one of the +gentry. + +At first we had so little money that we did all the work in the house +ourselves, including the washing. I did the cooking, Nancy did the +mending and making the children’s clothes; we shared the rest of the +work. Later money improved: we found it more economical to send the +washing out and get a neighbour in to do some of the heavier cleaning +and scrubbing. In our last year at Islip we even had a decrepit car +which Nancy drove. My part was to wind it up; the energy that I put +into winding was almost equivalent to pushing it for a mile or two. The +friends who gave it to us told us that its name was ‘Dr. Marie,’ and +when we asked ‘Why?’ we were told ‘Because it’s all right in theory.’ +One day when Nancy was driving down Foxcombe Hill, the steepest hill +near Oxford, there was a slight jar. Nancy thought it advisable to +stop; when we got out we found that there were only three wheels on the +car. The other, with part of the axle, was retrieved nearly a mile back. + +These four years I spent chiefly on housework and being nurse to the +children. Catherine was born in 1922 and Sam in 1924. By the end +of 1925 we had lived for eight successive years in an atmosphere +of teething, minor accidents, epidemics, and perpetual washing of +children’s napkins. I did not dislike this sort of life except +for the money difficulties, I liked my life with the children. But the +strain told on Nancy. She was constantly ill, and often I had to take +charge of everything. She tried occasionally to draw; but by the time +she had got her materials together some alarm from the nursery would +always disturb her. She said at last that she would not start again +until all the children were house-trained and old enough for school. +I kept on writing because the responsibility for making money rested +chiefly on me, and because nothing has ever stopped me writing when I +have had something to write. We kept the cottage cleaned and polished +in a routine that left us little time for anything else. We had +accumulated a number of brass ornaments and utensils and allowed them +to become a tyranny, and our children wore five times as many clean +dresses as our neighbours’ children did. + +I found that I had the faculty of working through constant +interruptions. I could recognize the principal varieties of babies’ +screams—hunger, indigestion, wetness, pins, boredom, wanting to be +played with—and learned to disregard all but the more important ones. +But most of the books that I wrote in these years betray the conditions +under which I worked; they are scrappy, not properly considered and +obviously written out of reach of a proper reference-library. Only +poetry did not suffer. When I was working at a poem nothing else +mattered; I went on doing my mechanical tasks in a trance until I had +time to sit down to write it out. At one period I only allowed myself +half an hour’s writing a day, but once I did write I always had too +much to put down; I never sat chewing my pen. My poetry-writing has +always been a painful process of continual corrections and corrections +on top of corrections and persistent dissatisfaction. I have never +written a poem in less than three drafts; the greatest number I recall +is thirty-five (_The Troll’s Nosegay_). The average at this time was +eight; it is now six or seven. + +The children were all healthy and gave us little trouble. Nancy had +strong views about giving them no meat or tea, putting them to bed +early, making them rest in the afternoon and giving them as much fruit +as they wanted. We did our best to keep them from the mistakes of our +own childhood. But it was impossible for them when they went to the +village school to avoid formal religion, class snobbery, political +prejudice, and mystifying fairy stories about the facts of sex. I never +felt any possessive feeling about them as Nancy did. To me they were +close friends with the claims of friendship and liable to the accidents +of friendship. We both made a point of punishing them in a disciplinary +way as little as possible. If we lost our temper with them it was +a different matter. Islip was as good a place as any for the happy +childhood that we wanted to give them. The river was close and we had +the loan of a canoe. There were fields to play about in, and animals, +and plenty of children of their own age. They liked school. + +After so much shifting about during the war I disliked leaving home, +except to visit some well-ordered house where I could expect reasonable +comfort. But Nancy was always proposing sudden ‘bursts for freedom,’ +and I used to come with her and usually enjoy them. In 1922 we used a +derelict baker’s van for a caravan ride down to the south-coast. We had +three children with us, Catherine as a four-months-old baby. It rained +every single day for the month we were away—and the problem of washing +and drying the baby’s napkins whenever we camped for the night—and the +problem of finding a farmer who would not mistake us for gypsies +and would be willing to let us pull into his field—and then the shaft +that twice dropped off when we were on hills—and twice the back of the +cart flew open and a child fell out on the road—and the difficulty of +getting oats for the horse (which had been five years on grass as being +too old for work) on country roads organized for motor traffic—and +cooking to be done in the open with usually a high wind and always rain +and the primus stove sputtering and flaring up. It was near Lewes that +we drew up on a strip of public land alongside the horse and van of a +Mr. Hicks, a travelling showman from Brighton. He told us many tricks +of the road and also the story of his life: ‘Yes, I saw the Reverend +Powers, Cantab, of Rodmell last week, and he, knowing my history, said: +“Well, Mr. Hicks, I suppose that in addressing you I should be right in +putting the letters b.a. after your name?” I said: “I have the +right to it certainly, but when a man’s down, you know how it is, he +does not like attaching a handle to his name.” For you must know, I was +once a master at Ardingly College.’ + +‘Indeed, Mr. Hicks, and where were you b.a.?’ + +‘Didn’t I just tell you, at Ardingly? I won a scholarship at the +beginning and they gave me the choice of going to Oxford or Winchester +or Cambridge or Eton. And I chose Winchester. But I was only there +a twelvemonth. No, I couldn’t stand it any longer owing to the +disgraceful corruption of the junior clergy and the undergraduates—you +understand, of course. I rub up a bit of the classic now and then, but +I like to forget those times. The other day, though, me and a young +Jew-boy who had cleaned up seventy-five pounds at the race meeting with +photographing and one thing and another, had a fine lark. I got out two +old mortarboards and a couple of gowns from the box in the van +where I keep them, and you should have seen us swaggering down Brighton +Pier, my boy.’ A few days later we stopped at a large mansion in +Hampshire, rented by Sir Lionel Philips, the South African financier, +whom Nancy knew. I found myself in an argument with him about socialist +economics, and he told me a story which I liked even better than Mr. +Hicks’. ‘I visited Kimberley recently and realized what a deep hole I +had made. Where, as a young man, I tore the first turf off with my bare +hands, they were now mining down half a mile.’ + +In the end we got back safely. + +I was so busy that I had no time to be ill myself. Nancy begged me +not to talk about the war in her hearing, and I was ready to forget +about it. The villagers called me ‘The Captain,’ otherwise I had +few reminders except my yearly visit to the standing medical board. +The board continued for some years to recommend me for a disability +pension. The particular disability was neurasthenia; the train journey +and the army railway-warrant filled out with my rank and regiment +usually produced reminiscential neurasthenia by the time I reached the +board. The award was at last made permanent at forty-two pounds a year. +Ex-service men were continually coming to the door selling boot-laces +and asking for cast-off shirts and socks. We always gave them a cup of +tea and money. Islip was a convenient halt between the Chipping Norton +and the Oxford workhouses. One day an out-of-work ex-service man, a +steam-roller driver by trade, came calling with his three children, +one of them a baby. Their mother had recently died in childbirth. We +felt very sorry for them and Nancy offered to adopt the eldest child, +Daisy, who was about thirteen years old and her father’s greatest +anxiety. She undertook to train Daisy in housework so that she would +be able later to go into service. Daisy was still of school age. Her +father shed tears of gratitude, and Daisy seemed happy enough to be a +member of the family. Nancy made her new clothes—we cleaned her, bought +In shoes, and gave her a bedroom to herself. Daisy was not a success. +She was a big ugly girl, strong as a horse and toughened by her three +years on the roads. Her father was most anxious for her to continue her +education, which had been interrupted by their wanderings. But Daisy +hated school; she was put in the baby class and the girls of her own +age used to tease her. In return she pulled their hair and thumped +them, so they sent her to Coventry. After a while she grew homesick +for the road. ‘That was a good life,’ she used to say. ‘Dad and me and +my brother and the baby. The baby was a blessing. When I fetched him +along to the back doors I nearly always won something. ’Course, I was +artful. If they tried to slam the door in my face I used to put my +foot in it and say: “This is my little orphan brother.” Then I used to +look round and anything I seen I used to ast for. I used to ast for +a pram for the baby, if I seen an old one in a shed; and I’d get it, +too. Of course we had a pram really, a good one, and then we’d sell +the pram I’d won, in the next town we come to. Good beggars always ast +for something particlar, something they seen lying about. It’s no good +asking for food or money. I used to pick up a lot for my dad. I was a +better beggar nor he was, he said. We used to go along together singing +_On the Road to Anywhere_. And there was always the Spikes to go to +when the weather was bad. The Spike at Chippy Norton was our winter +home. They was very good to us there. We used to go to the movies once +a week. The grub was good at Chippy Norton. We been all over the +country, Wales and Devonshire, right up to Scotland, but we always come +back to Chippy.’ Nancy and I were shocked one day when a tramp came +to the door and Daisy slammed the door in his face and told him to +clear out of it, Nosey, and not to poke his ugly mug into respectable +people’s houses. ‘I know you, Nosey Williams,’ she said, ‘you and your +ex-service papers what you pinched from a bloke down in Salisbury, +and the bigamy charge against you a-waiting down at Plymouth. Hop it +now, quick, or I’ll run for the cop.’ Daisy told us the true histories +of many of the beggars we had befriended. She said: ‘There’s not +one decent man in ten among them bums. My dad’s the only decent one +of the lot. The reason most of them is on the road is the cops have +something against them, so they has to keep moving. Of course my dad +don’t like the life; he took to it too late in life. And my mother was +very respectable too. She kept us clean. Most of those bums is lousy, +with nasty diseases, and they keeps out of the Spike as much as they +can ’cause they don’t like the carbolic baths.’ Daisy was with us for +a whole winter. When the spring came and the roads dried her father +called for her again. He couldn’t manage the little ones without her he +said. That was the last we saw of Daisy, though she wrote to us once +from Chipping Norton asking us for money. + +My pension was our only certain source of income, neither of us +having any private means of our own. The Government grant and college +exhibition had ended at the time we moved to Islip. I never made +more at this time than thirty pounds a year from my books of poetry +and anthology fees, with an occasional couple of guineas for poems +contributed to periodicals. There was another sixteen pounds a year +from the rent of the Harlech cottage and an odd guinea or two from +reviewing. My volumes of poetry did not sell. _Fairies and Fusiliers_ +had gone into two editions because it was published in the war-years +when people were reading poetry as they had not done for many years. +The inclusion of my work in Edward Marsh’s _Georgian Poetry_ had +made my name well known, but after 1919, when the series ended, it +was forgotten again. _Country Sentiment_ was hardly noticed; the +_Pier-Glass_ was also a failure. They were published by Martin Seeker, +not by Heinemann who had published _Fairies and Fusiliers_—William +Heinemann, just before he died, had tried to teach me how poetry should +be written and I resented it. These three books had been published in +America, where my name was known since John Masefield, Robert Nichols +and, finally, Siegfried Sassoon had gone to lecture about modern +English poetry. But English poets slumped, and it was eight years +before another book of my poems could find a publisher in America. In +these days I used to take the reviews of my poetry-books seriously. I +reckoned their effect on sales and so on the grocery bills. I still +believed that it was possible to write poetry that was true poetry +and yet could reach, say, a three or four thousand-copy sale. I +expected some such success. I consorted with other poets and had a +fellow-feeling for them. Beside Hardy, Siegfried, and the Boar’s Hill +residents, I knew Delamare, W. H. Davies, T. S. Eliot, the Sitwells +and many more. I liked W. H. Davies because he was from South Wales +and afraid of the dark, and because once, I heard, he made out a list +of poets and crossed them off one by one as he decided that they were +not true poets—until only two names were left. I approved the final +choice. Delamare I liked too. He was gentle and I could see how hard he +worked at his poems—I was always interested in the writing-technique +of my contemporaries. I once told him what hours of worry he must +have had over the lines: + + Ah, no man knows + Through what wild centuries + Roves back the rose; + +and how, in the end, he had been dissatisfied. He admitted that he had +been forced to leave the assonance ‘Roves and rose,’ because no synonym +for ‘roves’ was strong enough. I seldom saw Osbert and Sacheverell +Sitwell after the war-years. When I did I always felt uncomfortably +rustic in their society. Once Osbert sent me a present of a brace of +grouse. They came from his country residence in Derbyshire in a bag +labelled: ‘With Captain Sitwell’s compliments to Captain Graves.’ Nancy +and I could neither of us face the task of plucking and gutting and +roasting the birds, so we gave them to a neighbour. I thanked Osbert: +‘Captain Graves acknowledges with thanks Captain Sitwell’s gift of +Captain Grouse.’ + +Our total income, counting birthday and Christmas cheques from +relatives, was about one hundred and thirty pounds a year. As Nancy +reminded me, this was about fifty shillings a week and there were +farm labourers at Islip, with more children than we had, who only +got thirty shillings a week. They had a much harder time than we did +earning it and had no one to fall back on, as we had, in case of +sudden illness or other emergency. We used to get free holidays, too, +at Harlech, when my mother would insist on paying the train-fare as +well as giving us our board free. We really had nothing to complain +about. Thinking how difficult life was for the labourers’ wives kept +Nancy permanently depressed. I have omitted to mention a further +source of income—the Rupert Brooke Fund, of which Edward Marsh was the +administrator. Rupert Brooke had stated in his will that all royalties +accruing from any published work of his should be divided among needy +poets with families to support. When money was very short we would dip +into this bag. + +We still called ourselves socialists, but had become dissatisfied +with Parliamentary socialism. We had greater sympathy with communism, +though not members of the Communist Party. None the less, when a branch +of the Parliamentary Labour Party was formed in the village, we gave +the use of the cottage for its weekly meetings throughout the winter +months. Islip was a rich agricultural area; but with a reputation for +slut-farming. It did not pay the tenant farmers to farm too well. Mr. +Wise, one of our members, once heckled a speaker in the Conservative +interest about a protective duty imposed by the Conservative Government +on dried currants. The speaker answered patronizingly: ‘Well, surely a +duty on Greek currants won’t hurt you working men here at Islip? You +don’t grow currants in these parts, do you?’ ‘No, sir,’ replied Mr +Wise, ‘the farmers main crop hereabouts is squitch.’ + +I was persuaded to stand for the parish council, and was a member +for a year. I wish I had taken records of the smothered antagonism +of the council meetings. There were seven members of the council, +with three representatives of labour and three representatives of +the farmers and gentry; the chairman was a farmer, a Liberal who had +Labour support as being a generous employer and the only farmer in +the neighbourhood who had had a training at an agricultural college. +He held the balance very fairly. We contended over a proposed +application to the district council for the building of new cottages. +Many returned ex-soldiers who wished to marry had nowhere to live with +their wives. The Conservative members opposed this because it would +mean a penny on the rates. Then there was the question of procuring a +recreation ground for the village. The football team did not wish to +be dependent on the generosity of one of the big farmers who rented it +to us at a nominal rate. The Conservatives opposed this again in the +interest of the rates, and pointed out that shortly after the Armistice +the village had turned down a recreation ground scheme, preferring +to spend the memorial subscription money on a cenotaph. The Labour +members pointed out that the vote was taken, as at the 1918 General +Election, before the soldiers had returned to express their view. Nasty +innuendoes were made about farmers who had stayed at home and made +their pile, while their labourers fought and bled. The chairman calmed +the antagonists. Another caricature scene: myself in corduroys and a +rough frieze coat, sitting in the village schoolroom (this time with +no ‘evils of alcoholism’ around the wall, but with nature-drawings +and mounted natural history specimens to take their place), debating +as an Oxfordshire village elder whether or not Farmer So-and-so was +justified in using a footpath across the allotments as a bridle-path, +disregarding the decayed stile which, I urged, disproved his right. + +My association with the Labour Party severed my relations with the +village gentry with whom, when I first came to the village, I had +been on friendly terms. My mother had been to the trouble of calling +on the rector when she viewed the property. I had even been asked by +the rector to speak from the chancel steps of the village church at a +war memorial service. He suggested that I should read poems about the +war. Instead of Rupert Brooke on the glorious dead, I read some +of the more painful poems of Sassoon and Wilfred Owen about men dying +of gas-poisoning and about buttocks of corpses bulging from the mud. +And I suggested that the men who had fallen, destroyed as it were by +the fall of the Tower of Siloam, had not been particularly virtuous or +particularly wicked, but just average soldiers, and that the survivors +should thank God that they were alive and do their best to avoid wars +in the future. The church-party, with the exception of the rector, an +intelligent man, was scandalized. But the ex-service men had not been +too well treated on their return and it pleased them to be reminded +that they were on equal terms with the glorious dead. They were modest +men: I noticed that though obeying the King’s desire to wear their +campaigning medals, they kept them buttoned up inside their coats. + +The leading Labour man of the village was William Beckley, senior. +He had an inherited title dating from the time of Cromwell: he was +known as ‘Fisher’ Beckley. A direct ancestor had been fishing on the +Cherwell during the siege of Oxford, and had ferried Cromwell himself +and a body of Parliamentary troops over the river. In return Cromwell +had given him perpetual fishing-rights from Islip to the stretch of +river where the Cherwell Hotel now stands. The cavalry skirmish at +Islip bridge still remained in local tradition, and a cottager at the +top of the hill showed me a small stone cannon-ball, fired on that +occasion, that he had found sticking in his chimney-stack. But even +Cromwell came late in the history of the Beckley family; the Beckleys +were watermen on the river long before the seventeenth century. Indeed +Fisher Beckley knew, by family tradition, the exact spot where a barge +was sunk conveying stone for the building of Westminster Abbey. +Islip was the birthplace of Edward the Confessor, and the Islip lands +had been given by him to the Abbey; it was still Abbey property after +a thousand years. The Abbey stone had been quarried from the side of +the hill close to the river; our cottage was on the old slip-way down +which the stone-barges had been launched. Some time in the ’seventies +American weed was introduced into the river and made netting difficult; +fishing finally became unprofitable. Fisher Beckley had been for many +years now an agricultural labourer. His socialist views prevented him +from getting employment in the village, so he had to trudge to work to +a farm some miles out. But he was still Fisher Beckley and, among us +cottagers, the most respected man in Islip. + + + + + XXX + + +My parents were most disappointed when I failed to sit for my Oxford +finals. But through the kindness of Sir Walter Raleigh, the head of the +English School, I was excused finals as I had been excused everything +else, and allowed to proceed to the later degree of Bachelor of +Letters. Instead of estimating, at the examiners’ request, the effect +of the influence of Dryden on pastoral poets of the early eighteenth +century, or tracing the development of the sub-plot in Elizabethan +comedies between the years 1583 and 1594, I was allowed to offer a +written thesis on a subject of my own choice. Sir Walter Raleigh was a +good friend to me. He agreed to be my tutor on condition that he should +not be expected to tutor me. He liked my poetry, and suggested that we +should only meet as friends. He was engaged at the time on the official +history of the war in the air and found it necessary to have practical +flying experience for the task. The R.A.F. took him up as often as he +needed. It was on a flight out East that he got typhoid fever and died. +I was so saddened by his death that it was some time before I thought +again about my thesis, and I did not apply for another tutor. The +subject I had offered was _The Illogical Element in English Poetry_. +I had already written a prose book, _On English Poetry_, a series of +‘workshop notes’ about the writing of poetry. It contained much trivial +but also much practical material, and emphasized the impossibility of +writing poetry of ‘universal appeal.’ I regarded poetry as, first, a +personal cathartic for the poet suffering from some inner conflict, +and then as a cathartic for readers in a similar conflict. I made a +tentative connection between poetry and dream in the light of the +dream-psychology in which I was then interested as a means of +curing myself. + +The thesis did not work out like a thesis. I found it difficult to keep +to an academic style and decided to write it as if it were an ordinary +book. Anyhow, I could expect no knowledge of or sympathy with modern +psychology from the literature committee that would read it. I rewrote +it in all nine times, and it was unsatisfactory when finished. I was +trying to show the nature of the supra-logical element in poetry. It +was only, I wrote, to be fully understood by close analysis of the +latent associations of the words used; the obvious prose meaning was +often in direct opposition to the latent content. The weakness of the +book lay in its not clearly distinguishing between the supra-logical +thought-processes of poetry and of pathology. Before it appeared I +had published _The Meaning of Dreams_, which was intended to be a +popular shillingsworth for the railway bookstall; but I went to the +wrong publisher and he issued it at five shillings. Being too simply +written for the informed public, and too expensive for the ignorant +public to which it was addressed, it fell flat; as indeed it deserved. +I published a volume of poems every year between 1920 and 1925; after +_The Pier-Glass_, published in 1921, I made no attempt to write for +the ordinary reading public, and no longer regarded my work as being +of public utility. I did not even flatter myself that I was conferring +benefits on posterity; there was no reason to suppose that posterity +would be more appreciative than my contemporaries. I only wrote when +and because there was a poem pressing to be written. Though I assumed +a reader of intelligence and sensibility and considered his possible +reactions to what I wrote, I no longer identified him with contemporary +readers or critics of poetry. He was no more real a person than +the conventional figure put in the foreground of an architectural +design to indicate the size of the building. As a result of this +greater strictness of writing I was soon accused of trying to get +publicity and increase my sales by a wilful clowning modernism. Of +these books, _Whipperginny_, published in 1923, showed the first signs +of my new psychological studies. + +_Mock-Beggar Hall_, published in 1924, was almost wholly philosophical. +As Lawrence wrote to me when I sent it to him, it was ‘not the sort of +book that one would put under one’s pillow at night.’ This philosophic +interest was a result of my meeting with Basanta Mallik, when I was +reading a paper to an undergraduate society. One of the results of +my education was a strong prejudice, amounting to contempt, against +anyone of non-European race; the Jews, though with certain exceptions +such as Siegfried, were included in this prejudice. But I had none +of my usual feelings with Basanta. He did not behave as a member of +a subject-race—neither with excessive admiration nor with excessive +hatred of all things English. Though he was a Bengali he was not given +to flattery or insolence. I found on inquiry that he belonged to a +family of high caste. His father had become converted to Christianity +and signalized his freedom from Hindu superstition by changing his +diet; meat and alcohol, untouched by his ancestors for some two +thousand years, soon brought about his death. Basanta had been brought +up in the care of a still unconverted grandmother, but did not have +the strict Hindu education that the boy of caste is given by his male +relatives. He was sent to Calcutta University and, some years before +the war, after taking a law degree, was given the post of assistant +tutor to the children of the Maharajah of Nepal. In Nepal he came to +the notice of the Maharajah as one of the few members of the Court +not concerned in a plot against his life, and was promoted to chief +tutor. + +The relations between Nepal and India were strained at this time. +Basanta was the only man in Nepal with an up-to-date knowledge of +international law. His advice ultimately enabled the Maharajah to +induce the British to sign the 1923 treaty recognizing the complete +independence of the country, which had for many years been threatened +with British protection. Under the terms of this treaty, no foreigners +might enter Nepal except at the personal invitation of the Maharajah. +The Maharajah had sent Basanta over to England to study British +political psychology; this knowledge might be useful in the event of +future misunderstandings between Nepal and India. He had now been some +eleven years in Oxford but, becoming a philosopher and making many +friends, had overcome his long-standing grudge against the British. + +Basanta used to come out to Islip frequently to talk philosophy +with us. With him came Sam Harries, a young Balliol scholar, who +soon became our closest friend. Metaphysics soon made psychology of +secondary interest for me: it threatened almost to displace poetry. +Basanta’s philosophy was a development of formal metaphysics, but +with characteristically Indian insistence on ethics. He believed in +no hierarchy of ultimate values or the possibility of any unifying +religion or ideology. But at the same time he insisted on the necessity +of strict self-discipline in the individual in meeting every possible +demand made upon him from whatever quarter, and he recommended constant +self-watchfulness against either dominating or being dominated by any +other individual. This view of strict personal morality consistent +with scepticism of social morality agreed very well with my +practice. He returned to India in 1923 and considered taking an +appointment in Nepal, but decided that to do so would put him in a +position incompatible with his philosophy. He would have returned +to Oxford but a friend had died, leaving him to support a typical +large Hindu family of aunts and cousins remotely related. We missed +Basanta’s visits, but Sam Harries used to come out regularly. Sam was +a communist, an atheist, enthusiastic about professional football +(Aston Villa was his favourite team) and experimental films, and most +puritanical in matters of sex. + +Other friends were not numerous. Edith Sitwell was one of them. +It was a surprise, after reading her poems, to find her gentle, +domesticated, and even devout. When she came to stay with us she spent +her time sitting on the sofa and hemming handkerchiefs. She used to +write to Nancy and me frequently, but 1926 ended the friendship. 1926 +was yesterday, when the autobiographical part of my life was fast +approaching its end. I saw no more of any of my army friends, with the +exception of Siegfried, and meetings with him were now only about once +a year. Edmund Blunden had gone as professor of English Literature +to Tokyo. Lawrence was now in the Royal Tank Corps. He had enlisted +in the Royal Air Force when he came to the end of things after the +Middle-Eastern settlement of 1921, but had been forced to leave it +when a notice was given of a question in the House about his presence +there under an assumed name. When Sir Walter Raleigh died I felt my +connection with Oxford University was broken, and when Rivers died, +and George Mallory on Everest, it seemed as though the death of my +friends was following me in peace-time as relentlessly as in war. +Basanta had spoken of getting an invitation from the Maharajah for us +to visit Nepal with him but, when he found it impossible to resume his +work there, the idea lapsed. Sam went to visit him in India in 1924; +his reputation as a communist followed him there. He wrote that he +was tagged by policemen wherever he went in Calcutta; but they need +not have worried. A week or two after his arrival he died of cerebral +malaria. After Sam’s death our friendship with Basanta gradually +failed. India re-absorbed him and we changed. + +There came one more death among our friends; a girl who had been a +friend of Sam’s at Oxford and had married another friend at Balliol. +They used to come out together to Islip with Basanta and talk +philosophy. She died in childbirth. There had been insufficient care +in the pre-natal period and a midwife attended the case without having +sterilized her hands after attending an infectious case. Deaths in +childbirth had as particular horror for me now as they had for Nancy. +I had assisted the midwife at the birth of Sam, our fourth child, and +could not have believed that a natural process like birth could be so +abominable in its pain and extravagant messiness. Many deaths and a +feeling of bad luck clouded these years. Islip was no longer a country +refuge. I found myself resorting to my war-time technique of getting +through things somehow, anyhow, in the hope that they would mend. Nancy +was in poor health and able to do less and less work. Our finances had +been improved by an allowance from Nancy’s father that covered the +extra expense of the new children—we now had about two hundred pounds +a year—but I decided that cottage life with four of them under six +years old, and Nancy ill, was not good enough. I would have, after all, +to take a job. Nancy and I had always sworn that we would manage +somehow so that this would not be necessary. + +The only possible job that I could undertake was teaching. But I +needed a degree, so I completed my thesis, which I published under +the title of _Poetic Unreason_ and handed in, when in print, to the +examining board. I was most surprized when they accepted it and I had +my bachelor’s degree. But the problem of an appointment remained, I +did not want a preparatory or secondary-school job which would keep me +away from home all day. Nancy did not want anyone else but myself and +her looking after the children, so there seemed no solution. And then +the doctor told Nancy that if she wished to regain her health she must +spend the winter in Egypt. In fact, the only appointment that would +be at all suitable would be a teaching job in Egypt, at a very high +salary, where there was little work to do. And a week or two later +(for this is the way things have always happened to me in emergencies) +I was asked to offer myself as a candidate for the post of professor +of English Literature at the newly-founded Egyptian University at +Cairo. I had been recommended, I found out later, by two or three +influential friends, among them Arnold Bennett, who has always been a +good friend to me, and Lawrence, who had served in the war with Lord +Lloyd, the then High Commissioner of Egypt. The salary amounted, with +the passage money, to fourteen hundred pounds a year. I fortified these +recommendations with others, from my neighbour, Colonel John Buchan, +and from the Earl of Oxford, who had taken a fatherly interest in me +and often visited Islip. And so was given the appointment. + +Among other books written in the Islip period were two essays on +contemporary poetry. I then held the view that there was not such +a thing as poetry of constant value; I regarded it as a product of +its period only having relevance in a limited context. I regarded all +poetry, in a philosophic sense, as of equal merit, though admitting +that at any given time pragmatic distinctions could be drawn between +such poems as embodied the conflicts and syntheses of the time and were +therefore charged with contemporary sagacity, and such as were literary +hang-overs from a preceding period and were therefore inept. I was, in +fact, finding only extrinsic values for poetry. I found psychological +reasons why poems of a particular sort appealed to a particular class +of reader, surviving even political, economic, and religious change. I +published two other books. One was waste—a ballad-opera called _John +Kemp’s Wager_. It marked the end of what I may call the folk-song +period of my life. It was an artificial simple play for performance +by village societies and has been once performed, in California. The +newspaper cuttings that I was sent described it as delightfully English +and quaint. A better book was _My Head, My Head_, a romance on the +story of Elijah and the Shunamite woman. It was an ingenious attempt +to repair the important omissions in the biblical story; but like all +the other prose-books that I had written up to this time it failed in +its chief object, which was to sell. During this period I was willing +to undertake almost any writing job to bring in money. I wrote a series +of rhymes for a big map-advertisement for Huntley & Palmer’s biscuits +(I was paid, but the rhymes never appeared); and silly lyrics for a +light opera, _Lord Clancarty_, for which I was not paid, because the +opera was never staged; and translations from Dutch and German carols; +and rhymes for children’s Christmas annuals; and edited three sixpenny +pamphlets of verse for Benn’s popular series—selections from +Skelton’s poems, and from my own, and a collection of the less +familiar nursery rhymes. I did some verse-reviewing for the _Nation_ +and _Athenæum_, but by 1925 I found it more and more difficult to be +patient with dud books of poetry. And they all seemed to be dud now. I +had agreed to collaborate with T. S. Eliot in a book about modernist +poetry to which we were each to contribute essays, but the plan fell +through; and later I was glad that it had. + +I also made several attempts during these years to rid myself of the +poison of war-memories by finishing my novel, but I had to abandon +them. It was not only that they brought back neurasthenia, but that +I was ashamed at having distorted my material with a plot, and yet +not sure enough of myself to retranslate it into undisguised history. +If my scruples had been literary and not moral I could easily have +compromised, as many writers have since done, with a pretended diary +stylistically disguising characters, times, and dates. I had found the +same difficulty in my last year at Charterhouse with a projected novel +of public-school life. + + + + + XXXI + + +So, second-class, by P. & O. to Egypt, with a nurse for the children, +a new wardrobe in the new cabin-trunks and a good-looking motor-car in +the hold. Lawrence had written to me: + + Egypt, being so near Europe, is not a savage country. The Egyptians + ... you need not dwell among. Indeed, it will be a miracle if an + Englishman can get to know them. The bureaucrat society is exclusive, + and lives smilingly unaware of the people. Partly because so many + foreigners come there for pleasure, in the winter; and the other + women, who live there, must be butterflies too, if they would consort + with the visitors. + + I thought the salary attractive. It has just been raised. The work + may be interesting, or may be terrible, according to whether you get + keen on it, like Hearn, or hate it, like Nichols. Even if you hate + it, there will be no harm done. The climate is good, the country + beautiful, the things admirable, the beings curious and disgusting; + and you are stable enough not to be caught broadside by a mere + dislike for your job. Execute it decently, as long as you draw the + pay, and enjoy your free hours (plentiful in Egypt) more freely. + Lloyd will be a good friend. + + Roam about—Palestine. The Sahara oases. The Red Sea province. Sinai + (a jolly desert). The Delta Swamps. Wilfred Jennings Bramly’s + buildings in the Western Desert. The divine mosque architecture of + Cairo town. + + Yet, possibly, you will not dislike the job. I think the coin spins + evenly. The harm to you is little, for the family will benefit by + a stay in the warm (Cairo isn’t warm, in winter) and the job won’t + drive you into frantic excesses of rage. And the money will be + useful. You should save a good bit of your pay after the expense of + the first six months. I recommend the iced coffee at Groppi’s. + + And so, my blessing. + +I had a married half-brother and half-sister in Cairo who had both +been there since I was a little boy. My brother, a leading Government +official (at a salary less than my own), and his wife viewed my +coming to Egypt, I heard, with justifiable alarm. They had heard of +my political opinions. My sister, to whom I was devoted, had no such +suspicions and wrote a letter of most affectionate welcome. Siegfried +came to see me off. He said: ‘Do you know who’s on board? “The +Image!” He’s still in the regiment, going to join the battalion in +India. Last time I saw him he was sitting in the bottom of a dug-out +gnawing a chunk of bully-beef like a rat.’ The Image had been at my +last preparatory school and had won a scholarship at the same time as +myself; and we had been at Wrexham and Liverpool together; and he had +been wounded with the Second Battalion at High Wood at the same time +as myself; and now we were travelling out East together. A man with +whom I had nothing in common; there was no natural reason why we should +have been thrown so often in each other’s company. The ship touched +at Gibraltar, where we disembarked and bought figs and rode round the +town. I remembered the cancelled War Office telegram and thought what +a fool I had been to prefer Rhyl. At Port Said a friend of my sister’s +helped us through the Customs; I was feeling very sea-sick, but I knew +that I was in the East because he began talking about Kipling and +Kipling’s wattles of Lichtenburg, and whether they were really wattles +or some allied plant. And so to Cairo, looking out of the windows +all the way, delighted at summer fields in January. + +My sister-in-law advised us against the more exclusive residential +suburb of Gizereh, where she had just taken a flat herself, so with +her help we found one at Heliopolis, a few miles east of Cairo. We +found the cost of living very high, for this was the tourist season. +But I was able to reduce the grocery bill by taking advantage of the +more reasonable prices of the British army canteen; I presented myself +as an officer on the pension list. We had two Sudanese servants, and, +contrary to all that we had been warned about native servants, they +were temperate, punctual, respectful, and never, to my knowledge, stole +a thing beyond the remains of a single joint of mutton. It seemed queer +to me not to look after the children or do housework, and almost too +good to be true to have as much time as I needed for my writing. + +The University was an invention of King Fuad’s, who had always been +anxious to be known as a patron of the arts and sciences. There had +been a Cairo University before this one, but it had been nationalistic +in its policy and, not being directed by European experts or supported +by the Government, had soon come to an end. The new University had +been planned ambitiously. There were faculties of science, medicine +and letters, with a full complement of highly-paid professors; +only one or two of these were Egyptian, the rest being English, +Swedish, French and Belgian. The medicine and science faculties were +predominantly English, but the appointments to the faculty of letters +were predominantly French. They had been made in the summer months +when the British High Commissioner was out of Egypt, or he would no +doubt have discountenanced them. Only one of the French and Belgian +professors had any knowledge of English, and none of them had +any knowledge of Arabic. Of the two hundred Egyptian students, who +were mostly the sons of rich merchants and landowners, fewer than +twenty had more than a smattering of French—just enough for shopping +purposes—though they had all learned English in the secondary schools. +All official university correspondence was in Arabic. I was told +that it was classical Arabic, in which no word is admitted that is +of later date than Mohammed, but I could not tell the difference. +The ‘very learned Sheikh’ Graves had to take his letters to the post +office for interpretation. My twelve or thirteen French colleagues +were men of the highest academic distinction. But two or three English +village-schoolmasters would have been glad to have undertaken their +work at one-third of their salaries and done it far better. The +University building had been a harem-palace of the Khedive. It was +French in style, with mirrors and gilding. + +British officials at the Ministry of Education told me that I must keep +the British flag flying in the faculty of letters. This embarrassed +me. I had not come to Egypt as an ambassador of Empire, and yet I did +not intend to let the French indulge in semi-political activities at +my expense. The dean, M. Grégoire, was a Belgian, an authority on +Slav poetry. He was tough, witty, and ran his show very plausibly. He +had acquired a certain slyness and adaptability during the war when, +as a civilian in Belgium under German occupation, he had edited an +underground anti-German publication. The professor of French Literature +had lost a leg in France. He greeted me at first in a patronizing way: +I was his young friend rather than his dear colleague. But as soon +as he learned that I also had bled in the cause of civilization +and France I became his most esteemed chum. The Frenchmen lectured, +but with the help of Arabic interpreters, which did not make either +for speed or accuracy. I found that I was expected to give two +lectures a week, but the dean soon decided that if the students were +ever to dispense with the interpreters they must be given special +instruction in French—which reduced the time for lectures, so that I +had only one a week to give. This one was pandemonium. The students +were not hostile, merely excitable and anxious to show their regard +for me and liberty and Zaghlul Pasha and the well-being of Egypt, +all at the same time. I often had to shout at the top of my loudest +barrack-square voice to restore order. They had no textbooks of any +sort; there were no English books in the University library, and it +took months to get any through the French librarian. This was January +and they were due for an examination in May. They were most anxious +to master Shakespeare, Byron, and Wordsworth in that time. I had no +desire to teach Wordsworth and Byron to anyone, and I wished to protect +Shakespeare from them. I decided to lecture on the most rudimentary +forms of literature possible. I chose the primitive ballad and its +development into epic and the drama. I thought that this would at least +teach them the meaning of the simpler literary terms. But English was +not easy for them, though they had learned it for eight years or so +in the schools. Nobody, for instance, when I spoke of a ballad-maker +singing to his harp, knew what a harp was. I told them it was what +King David played upon, and drew a picture of it on the blackboard; +at which they shouted out: ‘O, _anur_.’ But they thought it beneath +their dignity to admit the existence of ballads in Egypt; though I had +myself seen the communal ballad-group in action at the hind legs of +the Sphinx, where a gang of fellaheen was clearing away the sand. +One of the gang was a chanty-man: his whole job was to keep the others +moving. The fellaheen did not exist for the students; they thought of +them as animals. They were most anxious to be given printed notes of my +lectures with which to prepare themselves for the examinations. I tried +to make the clerical staff of the faculty duplicate some for me, but in +spite of promises I never got them done. My lectures in the end became +a dictation of lecture-notes for lectures that could not be given—this, +at any rate, kept the students busy. + +They were interested in my clothes. My trousers were the first Oxford +trousers that they had seen in Egypt; their own were narrow at the +ankles. So I set a new fashion. One evening I went to dine with the +rector of the University. Two of my students, sons of Ministers, +happened also to be invited. They noticed that I was wearing white silk +socks with my evening dress. Later I heard from the vice-rector, Ali +Bey Omar, whom I liked best of the University officials, that a day +or two later he had seen the same students at a Government banquet, +wearing white silk socks. When they looked round on the distinguished +assembly they found that they were the only white socks present. Ali +Bey Omar gave a pantomime account of how they tried to loosen their +braces surreptitiously and stroke down their trousers to hide their +shame. + +For some weeks I missed even my single hour a week, because the +students went on strike. It was Ramadan, and they had to fast for a +month between sunrise and sunset. Between sunset and sunrise they +ate rather more than usual in compensation, and this dislocation of +their digestive processes had a bad effect on their nerves. I have +forgotten the pretext for the strike: it was some trouble about +the intensive French instruction. The fact was that they wanted leisure +at home to read up their notes of the earlier work of the term in +preparation for the examination. The Professor of Arabic, who was one +of the few Egyptians with a reputation as an orientalist, published +a book calling attention to pre-Islamic sources of the Koran. His +lectures, delivered in Arabic, demanded more exertion from them than +any of the others, so when the examination came round most of them +absented themselves from the Arabic paper on religious grounds. To +an orthodox Mohammedan the Koran, being dictated by God, can have no +pre-Islamic sources. + +I came to know only two of my students fairly well; one was a Greek, +the other a Turk. The Turk was an intelligent, good-natured young +man, perhaps twenty years old. He was very rich, and had a motor-car +in which he twice took me for a drive to the Pyramids. He talked both +French and English fluently, being about the only one (except for +twelve who had attended a French Jesuit college) who could do so. He +told me one day that he would not be able to attend my next lecture as +he was going to be married. I asked him whether this was the first or +second part of the ceremony; he said it was the first. When he returned +he told me that he had not yet been allowed to see the face of his +wife, because her family was orthodox; he would only see it at the +second ceremony. But his sister had been at school with her and said +that she was pretty and a good sort; and her father was a friend of +his father’s. Later, the second ceremony took place, and he confessed +himself perfectly satisfied. I learned that it seldom happened that +when the veil was lifted the bridegroom refused the bride, though he +had the right to do so; she had a similar right. Usually the +couple contrived to meet before even the first ceremony, The girl +would slip the man a note saying: ‘I shall be at Maison Cicurel at the +hat-counter at three-thirty to-morrow I afternoon if you want to see +me. It will be quite in order for me to lift my veil to try on a hat. +You will recognize me by my purple parasol.’ + +I inquired about the rights of Mohammedan women in Egypt. Apparently +divorce was simple; the man only had to say in the presence of a +witness: ‘I divorce you, I divorce you, I divorce you,’ and she was +divorced. On the other hand she was entitled to take her original +dowry back with her, with the interest that had accrued on it during +her married life. Dowries were always heavy and divorces comparatively +rare. It was considered very low-class to have more than one wife; +that was a fellaheen habit. I was told a story of an Egyptian who +was angry with his wife one morning because the breakfast-coffee was +badly made. He shouted out: ‘I divorce you, I divorce you, I divorce +you.’ ‘Oh, my dear,’ she said, ‘now you’ve done it. The servants have +heard what you said. I must go back to my father with my ten thousand +pounds and my sixty camels.’ He apologized for his hasty temper. ‘We +must be remarried,’ he said, ‘as soon as possible.’ She reminded him +that the law prevented them from marrying again unless there were an +intermediate marriage. So he called in a very old man who was watering +the lawn and ordered him to marry her. He was to understand that it +was a marriage of form only. So the gardener married the woman and, +immediately after the ceremony, returned to his watering-pot. Two days +later the woman died, and the gardener inherited the money and the +camels. + +The Greek invited me to tea once. He had three beautiful sisters +named Pallas, Aphrodite, and Artemis. They gave me tea in the garden +with European cakes that they had learned to make at the American +college. Next door a pale-faced man stood on a third-floor balcony +addressing the world. I asked Pallas what he was saying: ‘Oh,’ she +said, ‘don’t mind him; he’s a millionaire, so the police leave him +alone. He’s quite mad. He lived ten years in England. He’s saying now +that they’re burning him up with electricity, and he’s telling the +birds all his troubles. He says that his secretary accuses him of +stealing five piastres from him, and it isn’t true. Now he’s saying +that there can’t be a God because God wouldn’t allow the English to +steal the fellaheen’s camels for the war and not return them. Now he’s +saying that all religions are very much the same, and that Buddha is +as good as Mohammed. But really,’ she said, ‘he’s quite mad. He keeps +a little dog in his house, actually in his very room, and plays with +it and talks to it as though it were a human being.’ (Dogs are unclean +in Egypt.) She told me that in another twenty years the women of Egypt +would be in control of everything. The feminist movement had just +started, and as the women of Egypt were by far the most active and +intelligent part of the population, great changes were to be expected. +She said that neither she nor her sisters would stand her father’s +attempts to keep them in their places. Her brother showed me his +library. He was doing the arts-course as a preliminary to law. Besides +his legal textbooks he had Voltaire, Rousseau, a number of saucy French +novels in paper covers, Shakespeare’s works and Samuel Smiles’ _Self +Help_, a book which I had never met before. He asked my advice about +his career, and I advised him to go to a European university because an +arts degree at Cairo would be of little advantage to him. + +I did not pay an official call at the Residency at first, though +my brother urged it as etiquette; I decided not to until I had seen +how things were at the University. I had not realized before to what +extent the British were in power in Egypt. I had been told that Egypt +was an independent kingdom, but it seemed that my principal allegiance +was not to the King who had given me my appointment and paid me my +salary, but to the British High Commissioner. Infantry, cavalry, and +air squadrons were a reminder of his power. The British officials could +not understand the Egyptians’ desire to be rid of them. They considered +Egypt most ungrateful for all the painful and difficult administrative +work that they had put into it since the ’eighties, raising it from +a bankrupt country to one of the richest in the world. None of them +took Egyptian nationalism seriously; there was no Egyptian nation they +said. The Greeks, Turks, Syrians, and Armenians who called themselves +Egyptians had no more right in the country than the British. Before the +British occupation they had bled the fellaheen white. The fellaheen +were the only true Egyptians, and it was not they who called for +freedom. Freedom was mere politics, a symptom of the growing riches +of the country and the smatterings of Western education that they had +brought with them. The reduction of the British official class in the +last few years was viewed with disgust. ‘We did all the hard work and +when we go everything will run down; it’s running down already. And +they’ll have to call us back, or if not us, the dagoes, and we don’t +see why they should benefit.’ They did not realize how much the vanity +of the Egyptians—probably the vainest people in the world—was hurt by +the constant sight of British uniform. + +Egypt now considered itself a European nation. At the same time +it attempted to take the place of Turkey as the leading power of +Islam. This led to many anomalies. On the same day that the University +students made the protest against the professor of Arabic’s irreligious +views, the students of El Azhar, the great Cairo theological college, +struck against having to wear the Arab dress of kaftan and silk +headdress and appeared in European dress and tarbouche. The tarbouche +was the national hat; even British officials wore it. I myself had +a tarbouche. Being red it attracted the heat of the sun; and it was +stuffy inside and did not protect the back of the head. It would have +been difficult to find a hat more unsuitable for the climate. + + + + + XXXII + + +I did two useful pieces of educational work in Egypt. I ordered a +library of standard textbooks of English literature for the Faculty +Library at the University (from which I hope Mr. Bonamy Dobrée, my +successor, profited). And I acted as examiner to the diploma class +of the Higher Training College which provided English teachers for +the primary and secondary schools. The following is the substance of +a letter handed to me for information as a member of the Board of +Examiners concerned: + + To The Principal, + Higher Training College, Cairo. + + Sir, + + In accordance with your instructions, I beg to submit the following + statement of the works read by the Diploma Class for the forthcoming + examination in English Literature (1580 to 1788) and in Science: + + ENGLISH LITERATURE + + 1. Shakespeare’s _Macbeth_. + + 2. Lobban’s _The Spectator Club_, p. 39, and _Sir Roger and the + Widow_, p. 51; (111) 5 Essays of Addison, _Fans_, p. 64; _The + Vision of Mirza_, p. 72; _Sir Roger at the Assizes_, p. 68; _Sir + Roger at the Abbey_, p. 81; _Sir Roger at the Play_, p. 86. + + 3. Galsworthy’s _Justice_. + + 4. Dryden: + + (_a_) With Class 4A, the following poems in Hales’ _Longer English + Poems_: + + (_i_) _Mac Flecknoe_ (omitting lines 76–77; 83–86; 142–145; + 154–155; 160–165; 170–181; 192–197). + + (_ii_) _The Song for St. Cecilia’s Day_ (Hales’, p. 32). + + (_iii_) _Alexander’s Feast_ (Hales’, p. 34). + + (_b_) With Class 4b, the extracts from _Absolam and + Achitophel_, in Gwynn’s _Masters of English Literature_, + p. 144–145 (characters of Shaftesbury and Buckingham). + + 5. Pope: + + (_a_) With 4a, in Hales’ Longer English Poems: The Rape of the + Lock (omitting lines 27–104; 221–282; 449–466; 483 to the end). + + (_b_) With 4b, the character of ‘Atticus,’ in Gwynn’s Masters + of Eng. Lit., p. 181. + + 6. Johnson’s _Vanity of Human Wishes_, in Hales’, p. 65 (omitting + lines 241–343). + + 7. Goldsmith’s _Vicar of Wakefield_. (All done by 4a; but + only to the end of chap. 19 in 4b.) + + 8. Goldsmith’s _The Traveller_, in Hales’, p. 91. + + 9. Gray’s _Elegy_, in Hales’, p. 79. + + I regret that lack of time has prevented us from studying the works + of Milton and Spenser or the prose works of Dr. Johnson. + + SCIENCE + + 1. Episodes 1, 2, 3 and 6 of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s _Memoirs of + Sherlock Holmes_. + + 2. The first seven chapters of Sir Ray Lankester’s Science from an + Easy Chair. + + I have the honour to be, Sir, Your obedient servant, etc. + +These are my contemporary comments, pinned to the letter: + +‘When some forty years ago England superseded France as the controlling +European Power in Egypt, English was at first taught in the schools +as an alternative to French, but gradually became dominant as the +European administrative language, though French remained the chief +language of commerce and culture. As a result, the young Egyptian, +who now definitely claims himself a European and denies his African +inheritance, has come to have two distinct minds (switched off and on +casually)—the irresponsible hedonistic café and cinema mind, which +leans towards French, and the grave moralizing bureaucratic mind, which +leans towards English. Early English educationalists in Egypt shrewdly +decided to give their students a moralistic character-forming view of +English literature; and this tradition continues as a counterpoise +to the boulevard view of life absorbed from translations of French +yellow-back novels. But the student of 1926 is not so well-instructed +in English as his predecessor of ten years ago, because the English +educational staff has gradually been liquidated, and the teaching of +English is now principally in the hands of Egyptians, former students, +who are not born teachers or disciplinarians. The Western spirit of +freedom as naively interpreted by the Egyptian student greatly hinders +Egyptian education. The primary and secondary schools, not to mention +the University, are always either on strike, threatening a strike, or +prevented from striking by being given a holiday. So work gets more +and more behindhand. Even the Higher Training College is not free from +such disturbances, which possibly account for the regretted neglect of +Milton, Spenser, and the prose works of Dr. Johnson. This Diploma +Class consists of students who, after some twelve years’ study of +English, the last four or five years under English instructors, are now +qualifying to teach the language and literature to their compatriots. + +‘The Egyptian student is embarrassingly friendly, very quick at +learning by heart, disorderly, lazy, rhetorical, slow to reason, and +absolutely without any curiosity for general knowledge. The most +satisfactory way to treat him is with a good-humoured sarcasm, which he +respects; but if he once gets politically excited nothing is any use +but an affected violent loss of temper. When introduced to the simpler +regions of English literature he finds himself most in sympathy with +the eighteenth century; and the English instructor, if he wishes to get +any results at all, must be ready to regard Shakespeare, Galsworthy and +Conan Doyle as either immature or decadent figures in relation to the +classical period. The _Science_ referred to in the attached letter is +supposed to educate the student in twentieth-century rationalism, to +which he gives an eighteenth-century cast. The following essay is the +work of one Mahmoud Mohammed Mahmoud of the Diploma Class, and refers +principally to two chapters of Sir Ray Lankester’s _Science from an +Easy Chair_: + + Environment as a Factor in Evolution + + This is the theory of evolutions. Once it was thought that the + earth’s crust was caused by catastrophes, but when Darwin came + into the world and had a good deal of philosophy, he said: ‘All + different kinds of species differ gradually as we go backwards and + there is no catastrophes, and if we apply the fact upon previous + predecessors we reach simpler and simpler predecessors, until we + reach the Nature.’ Man, also, is under the evolutions. None can deny + this if he could deny the sun in daylight. A child from the beginning + of his birthday possesses instincts like to suckle his food from the + mamel of his mother and many others. But he is free of habits and he + is weak as anything. Then he is introduced into a house and usually + finds himself among parents, and his body is either cleansed or left + to the dirts. This shows his environment. Superficial thinkers are + apt to look on environment as (at best) a trifle motive in bringing + up, but learned men believe that a child born in the presence of some + women who say a bad word, this word, as believed by them, remains in + the brain of the child until it ejects. + + Environment quickly supplies modification. The life of mountainous + goats leads them to train themselves on jumping. The camel is + flat-footed with hoofs for the sand. Some kind of cattle were wild in + the past but lived in plain lands and changed into gentle sheep. The + frog when young has her tail and nostrils like the fish, suitable for + life at sea, but changing her environment, the tail decreased. The + sea is broad and changeable, so those who live at sea are changeable + and mysterious. Put a cow in a dirty damp place and she will become + more and more slender until she die. Also horses; horse had five + fingers on his legs but now one only from running for water in the + draught. Climate also affects bodily habits of the dear Europeans + who live in Egypt. They who were smart and patient and strong with a + skin worth the name of weatherproof become also fatigable and fond + of leisure.... From the theory we learn that human beings should be + improved like the beasts by creating healthy youngs and by good + Freubel education. + +‘The next short specimen essay by Mohammed Mahmoud Mohammed is in +answer to the question: “What impression do you get from Shakespeare of +the character of Lady Macbeth?”: + + The Character of Lady Macbeth + + Sir, to write shortly, Lady Macbeth was brave and venturesome; but + she had no tact. She says to Macbeth: ‘Now the opportunity creates + itself, lose it not. Where is your manlihood in these suitable + circumstances? I have children and I know the love of a mother’s + heart. But you must know I would dash the child’s head and drive away + the boneless teeth which are milking me rather than to give a promise + and then leave it.’ + + Macbeth says: ‘But we may fail.’ + + ‘Fail?’ says L. M. ‘But stick to the point and we will not fail. + Leave the rest to me. I shall put drugs in the grooms’ drink and we + shall ascuse them.’ + + Macbeth says: ‘You are fit to lay men-children only.’ + + The impression on the reader becomes very great and feels with anger. + +‘And this from the hand of Mahmoud Mahmoud Mohammed, offered as a +formal exercise in English composition: + + The Best Use of Leisure Time + + Leisure time is a variety to tireful affairs. God Almighty created + the Universe in six days and took a rest in the seventh. He + wished to teach us the necessity of leisure time. Man soon discovered + by experience that ‘All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy.’ But + this leisure time may be dangerous and ill-used if the mind will not + take its handle and move it wisely to different directions. Many + people love idleness. It is a great prodigality which leads to ruin. + Many Egyptians spend their times in cafés longing for women and + tracking them with their eyes, which corrupts and pollutes manners. + They are perplexed and annoyed by the length of daytime. Others try + to have rest through gumbling, which is the scourge of society and + individual. But let _us_ rather enjoy external nature, the beautiful + leavy trees, the flourishing fields, and the vast lawns of green + grass starred with myriads of flowers of greater or small size. There + the birds sing and build their nests, the meandering canals flow with + fresh water, and the happy peasants, toiling afar from the multitude + of town life, purify the human wishes from personal stain. Also + museums are instructive. It is quite wrong to keep to usual work and + fatigable studies, but quite right to free our minds from the web of + wordly affairs in which they are entangled. + + Yes, let us with the lark leave our beds to enjoy the cool breeze + before sunrise. Let us when the lasy or luxurious are snoring or sunk + in their debaucheries sit under the shady trees and meditate. We + can think of God, the river and the moon, and enjoy the reading of + Gray’s _Elegy_ to perfection. We shall brush the dues on the lawn at + sunrise, for, + + A country life is sweat + In moderate cold and heat. + + Or we may read the Best Companions, books full of honourable + passions, wise moral and good pathos: reading maketh a full man, + nobody will deny Bacon. Or we may easily get a musical instrument + at little price. ‘Every schoolboy knows’ that music is a moral law + which gives a soul to the universe. Criminals can be cured by the + sweet power of music. The whale came up from the dark depths of + the sea to carry the Greek musician because it was affected by the + sweet harmonies which hold a mirror up to nature. Are we not better + than the whale? Also gymnastic clubs are spread everywhere. Why do + a youth not pass his leisure time in widdening his chest? Because a + sound mind is in a sound body. Yet it is a physiological fact that + the blacksmith cannot spend his leisure time in striking iron or + the soldier in military exercises. The blacksmith may go to see the + Egyptian Exhibition, and the soldier may go to the sea to practice + swimming or to the mountains to know its caves in order that he may + take shelter in time of war. + + Milton knew the best uses of leisure time. He used to sit to his + books reading, and to his music playing, and so put his name among + the immortals. That was the case of Byron, Napoleon, Addison, and + Palmerstone. And if a man is unhappy, says an ancient philosopher, it + is his own fault. He _can_ be happy if his leisure time brings profit + and not disgrace. + +‘The Diploma Class students are supposed to be four years in advance +of my own, and, not being of the moneyed class, are more interested +in passing their examinations with distinction. Also, since their +careers as teachers of English depend on the continuance of the +British military occupation, they take the morality of this +regime more seriously than the University students, who are mostly +the sons of pashas. These, with few exceptions, suffer from the +bankruptcy of modern Egyptian life; they are able to take neither +European culture nor their own Islamic traditions seriously. So far +as I can make out from talking with the more intelligent of them, +what Egypt asks for is a European government and education free of +European political domination, but with a European technical personnel +in the key positions, which it cannot do without and will pay highly +for. Egypt can never be a great independent spiritual or political +force in the Near East, but because of its wealth it can become at +least the commercial centre of Islamic orthodoxy. Turkey is already +a modern European country; Egypt will remain for some time yet +eighteenth-century in spirit—a compromise between political romanticism +and religious classicism. For a generation or two yet the descendants +of the landowners enriched by European administration will continue to +“spend their times in cafés longing for women,” and to be “perplexed +and annoyed by the length of daytime,” while “the happy peasants” go +on “toiling afar from the multitude of town life.” And my professional +successors will continue to become “fatigable and fond of leisure.”’ + + * * * * * + +For I had already decided to resign. So had the professor of Latin, +my only English colleague. And the one-legged professor of French +Literature, who was an honest man. The others stayed on. + +The Egyptians were most hospitable. I attended one heavy banquet, +at the Semiramis Hotel, given by the Minister of Education. Tall +Sudanese waiters dressed in red robes served a succession of the most +magnificent dishes that I have seen anywhere, even on the films. +I remember particularly a great model of the Cairo Citadel in ice, +with the doors and windows filled with caviare which one scooped out +with a golden Moorish spoon. I heard recently that this banquet, which +must have cost thousands, has not yet been paid for. I found little +to do in Egypt (since I had no intention of mixing with the British +official class, joining the golf club, or paying official calls) but +eat coffee-ices at Groppi’s, visit the open-air cinemas and sit at home +in our flat at Heliopolis and get on with writing. My sister, who lived +near, continued sisterly. During the season of the Khamsin, a hot wind +which sent the temperature up on one occasion to 113 degrees in the +shade, I put the finishing touches to a book called _Lars Porsena, or +The Future of Swearing and Improper Language_. I also worked on a study +of the English ballad. + +The best thing that I saw in Egypt was the noble face of old King Seti +the Good unwrapped of its mummy-cloths in the Cairo Museum. Nearly all +the best things in Egypt were dead. The funniest thing was a French +bedroom farce played in Arabic by Syrian actors in a native theatre. +The men and women of the cast had, for religious reasons, to keep on +opposite sides of the stage. They sang French songs (in translation), +varying the tunes with the quarter-tones and shrieks and trills of +their own music. The audience talked all the time and ate peanuts, +oranges, sunflower-seeds and heads of lettuces. + +I went to call on Lord Lloyd just before the close of the academic +year, which was at the end of May. Soon after I was invited to dine at +the Residency. I won twenty piastres off him at bridge and was told to +collect it from his A.D.C. He asked me how I found Egypt and I said: +‘All right,’ with an intonation that made him catch me up quickly. +‘Only all right?’ That was all that passed between us. He believed +in his job more than I did in mine. He used to drive through Cairo in +a powerful car, with a Union Jack flying from it, at about sixty miles +an hour. He had motor-cyclist outriders to clear the way—Sir Lee Stack, +the Sirdar, had been killed the year before while driving through +Cairo and a traffic jam had materially helped his assassins. One day I +was shown the spot near the Ministry of Education where it happened; +there was a crowd at the spot which I at first took for a party of +sightseers, but the attraction proved to be a naked woman lying on +the pavement, laughing wildly and waving her arms. She was one of the +_hashish_ dope-cases that were very common in Egypt. The crowd was +jeering at her; the policeman a few yards off paid no attention. + +I attended a levee at the Abdin Palace, King Fuad’s Cairo residence. It +began early, at nine o’clock in the morning. The King gave honourable +precedence to the staff of the University; it came in soon after the +diplomatic corps and the Ministers of the Crown and some time before +the army. While still in England I had been warned to buy suitable +clothes—a morning coat and trousers—for this occasion. To be really +correct my coat should have had green facings, green being the national +colour of Egypt, but I was told that this would not be insisted upon. +Opinions differed greatly as to what was suitable Court-dress; most of +the French professors arrived in full evening dress with swallowtail +coats and white waistcoats, others wore ordinary dinner jackets. Most +of them had opera-hats; they all had decorations round their necks. +They looked like stragglers from an all-night fancy-dress ball. After +signing my name in the two large hotel registers, one belonging +to the King and the other to the Queen, I was given a refreshing +rice-drink, a courtesy of the Queen’s. I then went up the noble +marble staircase. On every other step stood an enormous black soldier, +royally uniformed, with a lance in his hand. My soldier’s eye commented +on their somewhat listless attitudes; but, no doubt, they pulled +themselves smartly to attention when the Egyptian army general staff +went past. I had been warned that when I met King Fuad I must not be +surprised at anything extraordinary I heard; a curious wheezing cry was +apt to burst from his throat occasionally when he was nervous. When +he was a child his family had been shot up by an assassin employed +by interested relatives; and Fuad had taken cover under a table and, +though wounded, had survived. We were moved from room to room. At last +a quiet Turkish-looking gentleman of middle age, wearing regulation +Court-dress, greeted us deferentially in French; I took him for the +Grand Chamberlain. I bowed and said the same thing in French as the +professor in front of me had said, and expected to be led next to the +Throne Room. But the next stage was the cloak-room once more. I had +already met King Fuad. And no Eastern magnificence or wheezing cry. + +I attended a royal soiree a few days later. The chief event was a +theatrical variety show. The performance was predominantly Italian. +King Fuad had been educated in Italy, where he attained the rank of +captain in the Italian cavalry, and had a great regard for Italian +culture. (He was ignorant of English, but was a good French scholar.) +The performance belonged to the 1870’s. There was a discreet blonde +shepherdess who did a hopping dance in ankle-length skirts, and a +discreet tenor who confined his passion to his top notes; and there +was a well-behaved comedian who made nice little jokes for the Queen. +I clapped him, because I liked him better than the others, and +everybody looked round at me; I realized that I had done the wrong +thing. An official whispered to me that it was a command performance +and that the actors were, therefore, entitled to no applause. Unless +His Majesty was himself amused the turns must be greeted in silence. I +was wearing Court-dress again but, not to be outdone by the Frenchmen, +I had put on my three campaigning medals—and wished that I had that St. +Anne of the Third Class with the Crossed Swords. And the refreshments! +I will not attempt to describe that Arabian Night buffet; it was so +splendid indeed that it has remained a mere blur in my memory. I +pocketed some particularly fantastic confections to bring home to the +children. + +What caused me most surprise in Egypt was the great number of camels +there. I had thought of them only as picture-postcard animals. I had +not expected to see thousands of them in the streets of Cairo, holding +up the motor traffic—in long trains, tied head to rump, with great +sacks of green fodder on their backs. + +Our children were a great anxiety. They had to drink boiled milk and +boiled water and be watched all the time to prevent them from taking +off their topees and blue veils. Then they all got measles and were +carried off to an isolation hospital, where they were fed on all the +things that we had been particular since their birth not to give them; +and the native nurses stole their toys. They returned very thin and +wretched-looking and we wondered if we should ever get them safely +home. We booked our passages some time at the end of May. We had only +just enough money for third-class on a small Italian boat with a cargo +of onions. We disembarked at Venice and stopped a day there. After +Egypt, Venice seemed like Heaven. It could never again be to me +what it was that day. I had a European egg in Venice. Egyptian eggs +were about the size of a pigeon’s egg and always tasted strongly of the +garlic which seemed to form a large part of the diet of the Egyptian +fowl. + +There are plenty of caricature scenes to look back on in Egypt. Among +them, for instance, myself dressed in my smart yellow gaberdine suit +and seated at a long, baize-covered table in the Faculty Conference +Room. In front of me is a cup of Turkish coffee, a sun helmet, and a +long record in French of the minutes of the last meeting. I am talking +angry bad French at my Belgian and French colleagues in support of the +young professor of Latin, who has just leaped to his feet, pale with +hatred. He is declaring in worse French that he positively refuses +to make a forced contribution of fifty piastres to a memorial wreath +for one of the Frenchmen (who had just died), since he was never +consulted. I am declaring that neither will I, blustering to him in +English that so far as I am concerned all dead Frenchmen can go bury +themselves at their own expense. The lofty, elegant room, once a harem +drawing-room—a portrait of the late Khedive, with a large rent in it, +hanging at a tipsy slant at one end of the room; at the other a large +glass showcase, full of Egypto-Roman brass coins, all muddled together, +their labels loose, in one corner. Through the window market-gardens, +buffaloes, camels, countrywomen in black. Around the table my +horrified, shrugging colleagues, turning to each other and saying: +‘Inoui.... Inoui....’ And outside the rebellious shouts of our students +working themselves up for another strike. + +The rest makes no more than conversation—of the Government clerk who +was so doubly unfortunate as to be run over by a racing-car and to find +that the driver was the eldest son of the Minister of Justice; +and of the rich girl in search of a husband who went as paying guest +at fifteen guineas a week to the senior Government official’s wife, +agreeing to pay for all wines and cigars and extras when society came +to dine, and who, meeting only senior Government officials and their +wives, complained that she did not get her money’s worth; and of my +night visit to the temple of a headless monkey-god, full of bats; +and of the English cotton manufacturer who defended the conditions +in his factory on the ground that the population of Egypt since the +British came had been increasing far too rapidly, and that pulmonary +consumption was one of the few checks on it; and of the student’s +mother who, at the sports, said how much she regretted having put +him on the mantelpiece when a baby and run off (being only twelve +years old) to play with her dolls; and of ‘The Limit,’ so named by +Australians during the war, who told my three years’ fortune by +moonlight under the long shadow of the pyramid of Cheops—told it truly +and phrased it falsely; and of the Arab cab-driver who was kind to his +horses; and of my visit to Chawki Bey, the national poet of Egypt, +in his Moorish mansion by the Nile, who was so like Thomas Hardy and +in whose presence his sons, like good Turks, sat dutifully silent; +and of the beggar in the bazaar with too many toes; and of the veiled +vengeance there who tried to touch us; and of the official who, during +the war, on a dream of dearth, had played Joseph, dumping half the +wheat of Australia in Egypt, where it found no buyers and was at last +eaten by donkeys and camels, and who told me that the whole secret of +vivid writing was to use the active rather than the passive voice—to +say ‘Amr-ibn-el-Ass conquered Egypt,’ rather than ‘Egypt was conquered +by Amr-ibn-el-Ass’; and of a visit to ancient dead Heliopolis +with its lovely landscape of green fields, its crooked palm trees, +its water-wheels turned by oxen, and its single obelisk; and of the +other Heliopolis, a brand-new dead town on the desert’s edge, built by +a Belgian company, complete with racecourse and Luna Park, where the +R.A.F. planes flew low at night among the houses, and where the bored +wives of disappointed officials wrote novels which they never finished, +and painted a little in water-colours; and of the little garden of +our flat where I went walking on the first day among the fruit-trees +and flowering shrubs, and how I came upon no less than eight lean and +mangy cats dozing in the beds, and never walked there again; and of +the numerous kites, their foul counterpart in the sky and in the palm +trees; and, lastly, of that fabulous cross-breed between kite and cat +which woke us every morning at dawn, a creature kept as a pet in a +neighbouring tenement inhabited by Syrians and Greeks, whose strangled +cock-a-doodle-doo was to me the dawn-cry of modern Egypt. (Empty +cigar-box—no applause—and I thank you.) + +So back to Islip; much to the disappointment of my parents, who thought +that I had at last seen reason and settled down to an appointment +suited equally to my needs and my talents; and to the undisguised +relief of my sister-in-law. + + * * * * * + +The story trails off here. But to end it with the return from +Egypt would be to round it off too bookishly, to finish on a note of +comfortable suspense, an anticipation of the endless human sequel. I +am taking care to rob you of this. It is not that sort of story. From +a historical point of view it must be read, rather, as one of gradual +disintegration. By the summer of 1926 the disintegration was already +well-advanced. Incidents of autobiographical pertinence became fewer +and fewer. + +When we came back Nancy’s health was very much better, but none of us +had any money left. There were a number of books to be sold, chiefly +autographed first editions of modern poets; and Lawrence came to the +rescue with a copy of his _Seven Pillars_ marked, ‘Please sell when +read,’ which fetched over three hundred pounds. + +In 1927 Jonathan Cape wrote to me suggesting that I should write a book +for boys about Lawrence. There was not much time to do it to have it +ready for autumn publication (about two months)—and Lawrence was in +India and I had to get his permission and send parts of the manuscript +there for him to read and pass. Lowell Thomas anticipated me with a +_Boy’s Book of Colonel Lawrence_; so I decided to make mine a general +book, three times the length of his, working eighteen hours a day at +it. Most of those to whom I wrote for information about Lawrence, +including His Majesty the King, gave me their help. The only rebuff I +got was from George Bernard Shaw, who wrote me the following postcard: + + Eyot St. Lawrence, + Welwyn, Herts. + 8_th June_ 1927. + + A great mistake. You might as well try to write a funny book about + Mark Twain. T. E. has got all out of himself that is to be got. His + name will rouse expectations which you will necessarily disappoint. + Cape will curse his folly for proposing such a thing, and never give + you another commission. Write a book (if you must) about the dullest + person you know; clerical if possible. Give yourself a chance. + + G. B. S. + +Just before Christmas the book was selling at the rate of ten thousand +copies a week. I heard later that Shaw had mistaken me for my _Daily +Mail_ brother. + +Shortly afterwards I had a reply, delayed for nine months, to an +application that I had made, when things were bad, for an appointment +as English lecturer in an Adult Education scheme. I was told that my +qualifications were not considered sufficient. By this time I had lost +all my academic manners and wrote wishing the entire committee in +Baluchistan, to be tickled to death by wild butterflies. + +In 1927, in a process of tidying-up, I published a collected book of my +poems. One of the later ones began: + + This, I admit, Death is terrible to me, + To no man more so, naturally. + And I have disenthralled my natural terror + Of every comfortable philosopher + Or tall dark doctor of divinity. + Death stands at last in his true rank and order. + +The book was selective rather than collective, intended as a +disavowal of over half the poetry that I had so far printed. As Skelton +told Fame, speaking of his regretted poem _Apollo Whirled up his +Chair_, I had done what I could to scrape out the scrolls, To erase it +for ever out of her ragman’s rolls. But I still permitted anthologists +to print some of the rejected pieces if they paid highly enough—if they +wanted them, that was their business and I was glad of the money. On +the other hand I stopped contributing new poems to English and American +periodicals. My critical writings I did not tidy up; but let them go +out of print. In 1927 I began learning to print on a hand-press. In +1928 I continued learning to print. + +On May 6th, 1929 Nancy and I suddenly parted company. I had already +finished with nearly all my other leading and subsidiary characters, +and dozens more whom I have not troubled to put in. I began to write +my autobiography on May 23rd and write these words on July 24th, my +thirty-fourth birthday; another month of final review and I shall have +parted with myself for good. I have been able to draw on contemporary +records for most of the facts, but in many passages memory has been +the only source. My memory is good but not perfect. For instance, I +can after two hearings remember the tune and words of any song that +I like, and never afterwards forget them; but there are always odd +discrepancies between my version and the original. So here, there +must be many slight errors of one sort or another. No incidents, +however, are invented or embellished. Some are, no doubt, in their +wrong order; I am uncertain, for example, of the exact date and place +of the megaphoned trench-conversation between the Royal Welch and the +Germans, though I have a contemporary record of it. I am not sure +of some of the less-important names (even of Lance-corporal Baxter’s, +but it was at least a name like Baxter). To avoid the suggestion of +libel I have disguised two names. Also, I make a general disclaimer +of such opinions as I have recorded myself as holding from chapter to +chapter, on education, nature, war, religion, literature, philosophy, +psychology, politics, and so on. This is a story of what I was, not +what I am. Wherever I have used autobiographical material in previous +books and it does not tally with what I have written here, this is the +story and that was literature. + +I find myself wondering whether it is justified as a story. Yet I seem +to have done most of the usual storybook things. I had, by the age of +twenty-three, been born, initiated into a formal religion, travelled, +learned to lie, loved unhappily, been married, gone to the war, taken +life, procreated my kind, rejected formal religion, won fame, and been +killed. At the age of thirty-four many things still remain undone. +For instance, I have never been on a journey of exploration, or in a +submarine, aeroplane or civil court of law (except a magistrate’s court +on the charge of ‘riding a vehicle, to wit a bicycle, without proper +illumination, to wit a rear lamp’). I have never mastered any musical +instrument, starved, committed civil murder, found buried treasure, +engaged in unnatural vice, slept with a prostitute, or seen a corpse +that has died a natural death. On the other hand, I have ridden on a +locomotive, won a prize at the Olympic Games, become a member of the +senior common-room at one Oxford college before becoming a member of +the junior common-room at another, been examined by the police on +suspicion of attempted murder, passed at dusk in a hail-storm +within half a mile of Stromboli when it was in eruption, had a statue +of myself erected in my lifetime in a London park, and learned to tell +the truth—nearly. + + The End + + + + + Dedicatory Epilogue + to + Laura Riding + + +I have used your _World’s End_ as an introductory motto, but you +will be glad to find no reference at all to yourself in the body of +this book. I have not mentioned the _Survey of Modernist Poetry_ and +the _Pamphlet against Anthologies_ as works of collaboration between +you and me, though these books appear in publishers’ catalogues and +obviously put much of my own previous critical writing out of account. +And though I have mentioned printing, I have not given details of +it, or even said that it was with you, printing and publishing in +partnership as The Seizin Press. Because of you the last chapters have +a ghostly look. + +The reason of all this is, of course, that by mentioning you as a +character in my autobiography I would seem to be denying you in your +true quality of one living invisibly, against kind, as dead, beyond +event. And yet the silence is false if it makes the book seem to have +been written forward from where I was instead of backward from where +you are. If the direction of the book were forward I should still be +inside the body of it, arguing morals, literature, politics, suffering +violent physical experiences, falling in and out of love, making and +losing friends, enduring blindly in time; instead of here outside, +writing this letter to you, as one also living against kind—indeed, +rather against myself. + +You know the autobiography of that Lord Herbert of Cherbury whose son +founded the Royal Welch Fusiliers; how he was educated as a gentleman, +studied at Oxford, married young, travelled, played games, fought in +Northern France and wrote books; until at last his active life +ended with a sudden clap of thunder from the blue sky which did ‘so +comfort and cheer’ him that he resolved at last, at this sign, to print +his book _De Veritate_, concerning truth. If you were to appear in my +_De Veritate_ it could only be as ‘this loud though yet gentle noise +... one fair day in the summer, my casement being opened towards the +south, the sun shining clear, and no wind stirring.’ + +For could the story of your coming be told between an Islip Parish +Council Meeting and a conference of the professors of the Faculty +of Letters at Cairo University? How she and I happening by seeming +accident upon your teasing _Quids_, were drawn to write to you, who +were in America, asking you to come to us. How, though you knew no +more of us than we of you, and indeed less (for you knew me at a +disadvantage, by my poems of the war), you forthwith came. And how +there was thereupon a unity to which you and I pledged our faith and +she her pleasure. How we went together to the land where the dead +parade the streets and there met with demons and returned with the +demons still treading behind. And how they drove us up and down the +land. + +That was the beginning of the end, and the end and after is yours. +Yet I must relieve your parable of all anecdote of mine. I must tell, +for instance, that in its extreme course in April last I re-lived +the changes of many past years. That when I must suddenly hurry off +to Ireland I found myself on the very boat, from Fishguard, that had +been my hospital-boat twelve years before. That at Limerick I met Old +Ireland herself sitting black-shawled and mourning on the station +bench and telling of the Fall. And so to the beautiful city of Sligo +celebrated in song by my father. And the next train back, this time +by the Wales of the Royal Welch Fusiliers. And the next day to Rouen +with you and her, to recollect the hill-top where you seemed to die as +the one on which I had seemed to die thirteen years before. And then +immediately back. And then, later in the same month, my sudden journey +to Hilton in Huntingdon, to a farm with memories of her as I first knew +her, to burst in upon—as it happened—David Garnett (whom I had never +met before), gulping his vintage port and scandalizing him with my +soldier’s oaths as I denied him a speaking part in your parable. + +After which. + +After which, anecdotes of yours, travesties of the parable and so +precious to me as vulgar glosses on it. How on April 27th, 1929 it was +a fourth-storey window and a stone area and you were dying. And how it +was a joke between Harold the stretcher-bearer and myself that you did +not die, but survived your dying, lucid interval. + +After which. + +After which, may I recall, since you would not care to do so yourself, +with what professional appreciation (on May 16th) Mr. Lake is reported +to have observed to those that stood by him in the operating theatre: +‘It is rarely that one sees the spinal-cord exposed to view—especially +at right-angles to itself.’ + +After which. + +After which, let me also recall on my own account my story _The Shout_, +which, though written two years ago, belongs here; blind and slow like +all prophecies—it has left you out entirely. And, because you are left +out, it is an anecdote of mine. + +After which. + +After which, even anecdotes fail. No more anecdotes. And, of course, +no more politics, religion, conversations, literature, arguments, +dances, drunks, time, crowds, games, fun, unhappiness. I no longer +repeat to myself: ‘He who shall endure to the end, shall be saved.’ It +is enough now to say that I have endured. My lung, still barometric of +foul weather, speaks of endurance, as your spine, barometric of fair +weather, speaks of salvation. + + +[1] ‘Why,’ said the cobbler, ‘what should I do? Will you have me to +go in the King’s wars and to be killed for my labour?’ ‘What, knave,’ +said Skelton, ‘art thou a coward, having so great bones?’ ‘No,’ +said the cobbler, ‘I am not afeared: it is good to sleep in a whole +skin.’—Merry Tales of Skelton (_Early sixteenth century_). + +[2] I do not know what happened to Miller. This was written in the +summer of 1916. + +[3] Jenkins was killed not long after. + +[4] The quartermaster excepted. + +[5] The gas-cylinders had by this time been put into position on the +front line. A special order came round imposing severe penalties on +anyone who used any word but ‘accessory’ in speaking of the gas. This +was to keep it secret, but the French civilians knew all about it long +before this. + +[6] Major Swainson recovered quickly and was back at the Middlesex +Depot after a few weeks. On the other hand, Lawrie, a Royal Welch +company quartermaster-sergeant back at Cambrin, was hit in the neck +that day by a spent machine-gun bullet which just pierced the skin, and +died of shock a few hours later. + +[7] He was recommended for a Victoria Cross but got nothing because no +officer evidence, which is a condition of award, was available. + +[8] I cannot explain the discrepancy between his dating of my death and +that of the published casualty list. + + + + +ERRATUM + + +_p. ♦396, line 1, et seq._ + +♦ “398” replaced with “396” + +Since this paragraph was printed, I have heard from Mr. Marsh that the +facts are not quite as I have stated them, and that there is not really +any “Rupert Brooke Fund” administered by Mr. Marsh. I much regret this +error which arose from an imperfect recollection. R. G. + + + + + Transcriber’s Notes + + + 1. Italicised words are indicated by _underscores_. + + 2. Footnotes have been renumbered and moved to the end of the + book. + + 3. Illustrations are indicated by “[Illustration: caption-text]” and + have been moved to before or after an enclosing paragraph. + + 4. Misspelled words have been corrected (see below). Archaic, + inconsistent and alternative spellings have been left unchanged. + Spelling and other typos (e.g. duplicate words) in direct quotes + from other sources were left unchanged. Hyphenation has not been + standardised. + + 5. “Edit Distance” in Corrections table below refers to the + Levenshtein Distance. + + Corrections: + + Page Source Correction Edit distance + + 62 among the the five among the five 4 + 95 Crib-y-ddysgel Crib-y-ddysgl 1 + 175 opponets opponents 1 + 202 and the the brigadier and the brigadier 4 + 301 impossiblity impossibility 1 + Erratum 398 396 1 + + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 76911 *** diff --git a/76911-h/76911-h.htm b/76911-h/76911-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..eb522bb --- /dev/null +++ b/76911-h/76911-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,13108 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html> +<html lang="en"> +<head> + <meta charset="UTF-8"> + <meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1"> + <title> + Good-bye to all that | Project Gutenberg + </title> + <link rel="icon" href="images/cover.jpg" type="image/x-cover"> + <style> + +body { + margin-left: 10%; + margin-right: 10%; +} + + h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6 { + text-align: center; /* all headings centered */ + clear: both; 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+} + +figcaption p {margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: .2em; text-align: inherit;} + +/* Images */ + +img { + max-width: 100%; + height: auto; +} +img.w100 {width: 100%;} + +.figcenter { + margin: auto; + text-align: center; + page-break-inside: avoid; + max-width: 100%; +} + +.illowe5 {width: 5em;} + +/* Footnotes */ +.footnote {margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; font-size: 0.9em;} + +.fnanchor { + vertical-align: super; + font-size: .8em; + text-decoration: + none; +} + +/* Poetry */ +/* uncomment the next line for centered poetry */ +.poetry-container {display: flex; justify-content: center;} +.poetry-container {text-align: center;} +.poetry {text-align: left; margin-left: 5%; margin-right: 5%;} +.poetry .stanza {margin: 1em auto;} +.poetry .stanza1 {margin: 0.5em auto;} +.poetry .verse {text-indent: -3em; padding-left: 3em;} + +.poetry .indent0 { + text-indent: -3em + } + +.poetry .indent4 { + text-indent: -1em + } + +/* Transcriber's notes */ +.transnote {background-color: #E6E6FA; + color: black; + font-size:small; + padding:0.5em; + margin-bottom:5em; + font-family:sans-serif, serif; +} + +/* Poetry indents */ +.poetry .indent0 {text-indent: -3.0em;} +.poetry .indent1 {text-indent: -2.0em;} + + </style> +</head> +<body> +<div style='text-align:center'>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 76911 ***</div> + + +<figure class="figcenter hide" style="max-width: 25em;"> + <img class="w100 mt2" src="images/cover.jpg" alt=""> +</figure> +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> + + +<p class="half_title">GOOD-BYE TO ALL THAT</p> + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> + +<p class="center mt2">BY THE SAME AUTHOR</p> + +<table class="small90 autotable" role="presentation"> +<tbody> +<tr><td><cite class="smcap">POEMS (1914–1927)</cite></td><td><b class="italic">William Heinemann</b></td></tr> +<tr><td><cite class="smcap">POEMS (1929)</cite></td><td><b class="italic">The Seizin Press</b></td></tr> +<tr><td><cite class="smcap">MY HEAD, MY HEAD</cite></td><td><b class="italic">Marlin Seeker</b></td></tr> +<tr><td><cite class="smcap">LAWRENCE AND THE ARABS</cite></td><td><b class="italic">Jonathan Cape</b></td></tr> +<tr><td><cite class="smcap">LARS PORSENAZ OR THE FUTURE OF SWEARING</cite></td><td><b class="italic">Kegan Paul</b></td></tr> +<tr><td><cite class="smcap">THE SHOUT</cite></td><td><b class="italic">Elkin, Mathews and Marrot</b></td></tr> +</tbodY> +</table> + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> +<div class="chapter"> +<figure id="frontis" class="figcenter" style="max-width: 22em;"> + <img class="w100 mt2" src="images/frontis.jpg" alt=""> + <figcaption>ROBERT GRAVES</figcaption> +</figure> +</div> +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> + +<figure class="figcenter hide" style="max-width: 30em;"> + <img class="w100 mt2" src="images/title.png" alt="original title page"> +</figure> +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> + +<h1 class="mono">GOOD-BYE TO ALL THAT</h1> + +<p class="center larger110">An Autobiography</p> + +<p class="center allsmcap">BY</p> + +<p class="center mono larger150 bold">ROBERT GRAVES</p> + +<figure class="figcenter"> + <img class="illowe5 mt2" src="images/logo.png" alt="logo"> +</figure> + + +<p class="center mono larger110 bold p6">JONATHAN CAPE<br>THIRTY BEDFORD SQUARE<br>LONDON</p> +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> +<p class="center small80">FIRST PUBLISHED 1929<br>SECOND IMPRESSION NOVEMBER 1929</p> +<p class="center small80 p6">PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAIN BY <abbr>J.</abbr> AND <abbr>J.</abbr> GRAY<br>EDINBURGH</p> +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> +<p class="center">MY DEDICATION IS<br>AN EPILOGUE</p> + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> +<div class="chapter"> +<div class="pagenum" id="Page_7" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 7</div> + <h2 class="nobreak" id="LIST_OF_ILLUSTRATIONS"> + LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS + </h2> +</div> + +<table class="autotable" role="presentation"> + <tbody> + <tr><td class="tdlt hang1" colspan="2"><b class="smcap">Robert Graves</b>, 1929</td><td class="tdrb padl1"><a href="#frontis"><b class="italic">Frontispiece</b></a></td></tr> + + <tr><td class="tdlt hang1" colspan="2"> + <b class="smcap">Cuinchy Brick-stacks</b> seen from a British trench on the Givenchy + canal-bank. The white placarded brick-stack is in the British support + line; the ones beyond are held by the Germans. The village of Auchy is + seen in the distance. (<b class="italic">By courtesy of the Imperial War Museum.</b>)</td> + <td class="tdrb padl1"><b class="italic">To face page</b> <a href="#i152">152</a></td> + </tr> + + <tr><td class="tdlt hang1" colspan="2"> + <b class="smcap">Trench Map showing the Cambrin-Cuinchy-Vermelles Trench Sector in the + summer of</b>, 1915. Each square-side measures 500 yards and is ticked off + into 50-yard units. Only the German trench-system is shown in detail; + a broken pencil-line marks the approximate course of the British + front trench. The minecraters appear as stars in No Man’s Land. The + brick-stacks in the German line appear as minute squares; those held by + the British are not marked. The intended line of advance of the 19th + Brigade on September 25th is shown in pencil on this map, which is the + one that I carried on that day</td> + <td class="tdrb padl1"><a href="#i190">190</a></td> + </tr> + + <tr><td class="tdlt hang1" colspan="3"> + <b class="smcap">Maps.</b> (_Reproduced by the courtesy of the Imperial War Museum._)</td> + </tr> + + <tr><td> </td><td class="tdlt hang1"> + <b class="smcap">Somme Trench Map—The Fricourt Sector</b>, 1916. This map fits against the + map facing page 262</td> + <td class="tdrb padl1"><a href="#i246">246</a></td> + </tr> + + <tr><td> </td><td class="tdlt hang1"> + <b class="smcap"><span class="pagenum" id="Page_8" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 8</span>Somme Trench Map—Mametz Wood</b> and <b class="smcap">High Wood</b>, 1916. This map fits against the + map facing page 246</td> + <td class="tdrb padl1"><a href="#i262">262</a></td> + </tr> + + <tr><td class="tdlt hang1" colspan="2"> + <b class="smcap">Robert Graves</b>, from a pastel by Eric Kennington</td> + <td class="tdrb padl1"><a href="#i296">296</a></td> + </tr> + + <tr><td class="tdlt hang1" colspan="2"> + <b class="smcap">Various Records, mostly self-explanatory.</b> The Court of Inquiry + mentioned in the bottom left-hand message was to decide whether the + wound of a man in the Public Schools Battalion—a rifle-shot through + his foot—was self-inflicted or accidental. It was self-inflicted. B. + Echelon meant the part of the battalion not in the trenches. Idol was + the code-name for the Second Battalion the Royal Welch Fusiliers. The + notebook leaf is the end of my 1915 diary only three weeks after I + began it; I used my letters home as a diary after that. The message + about Sergeant Varcoe was from Captain Samson shortly before his death; + I was temporarily attached to his company</td> + <td class="tdrb padl1"><a href="#i322">322</a></td> + </tr> + + <tr><td class="tdlt hang1" colspan="2"> + 1929, <b class="smcap">The Second Battalion the Royal Welch Fusiliers</b> back to pre-war + soldiering. The regimental Royal goat, the regimental goat-major and + the regimental pioneers (wearing white leather aprons and gauntlets—a + special regimental <span class="pagenum" id="Page_9" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 9</span>privilege) on church parade at Wiesbaden on the + Rhine. The band follows, regimentally. The goat has a regimental number + and draws rations like a private soldier. ‘Some speak of Alexander, and + some of Hercules....’</td> + <td class="tdrb padl1"><b class="italic">To face page</b> <a href="#i364">364</a></td> + </tr> + + </tbody> +</table> + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> +<div class="chapter"> + <h2 class="nobreak" id="WORLDS_END"> + WORLD’S END + </h2> +</div> + +<div class="poetry-container"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">The tympanum is worn thin.</div> + <div class="verse indent0">The iris is become transparent.</div> + <div class="verse indent0">The sense has overlasted.</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Sense itself is transparent.</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Speed has caught up with speed.</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Earth rounds out earth.</div> + <div class="verse indent0">The mind puts the mind by.</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Clear spectacle: where is the eye?</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">All is lost, no danger</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Forces the heroic hand.</div> + <div class="verse indent0">No bodies in bodies stand</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Oppositely. The complete world</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Is likeness in every corner.</div> + <div class="verse indent0">The names of contrast fall</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Into the widening centre.</div> + <div class="verse indent0">A dry sea extends the universal.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">No suit and no denial</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Disturb the general proof.</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Logic has logic, they remain</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Quiet in each other’s arms,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Or were otherwise insane,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">With all lost and nothing to prove</div> + <div class="verse indent0">That even nothing can be through love.</div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + +<p class="right padr2 small90">LAURA RIDING</p> +<p class="right">(From <cite>Love as Love, Death as Death</cite>)</p> + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> + <p class="center">GOOD-BYE TO ALL THAT</p> +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> + +<section role="doc-chapter" aria-labelledby="c01-hd"> +<div class="chapter"> +<div class="pagenum" id="Page_13" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 13</div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="c01-hd">I</h2> +</div> + +<p class="chap_start"><b class="smcap">The</b> objects of this autobiography, written at the age of thirty-three, +are simple enough: an opportunity for a formal good-bye to you and to +you and to you and to me and to all that; forgetfulness, because once +all this has been settled in my mind and written down and published it +need never be thought about again; money. Mr. Bentley once wrote:</p> + +<blockquote> +<div class="poetry-container"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza1"> + <div class="verse indent0">The science of geography</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Is different from biography:</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Geography is about maps,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Biography is about chaps.</div> + </div> + </div> +</div> +</blockquote> + +<p class="noindent">The rhyme might have been taken further to show how closely, +nevertheless, these things are linked. For while maps are the +biographical treatment of geography, biography is the geographical +treatment of chaps. Chaps who are made the subjects of biography have +by effort, or by accident, put themselves on the contemporary map +as geographical features; but seldom have reality by themselves as +proper chaps. So that <cite>Who’s Who?</cite> though claiming to be a dictionary +of biography, is hardly less of a geographical gazetteer than <cite>Burke’s +Peerage</cite>.... One of the few simple people I have known who have +had a philosophic contempt for such gazetteering was Old Joe, a +battalion quartermaster in France. He was a proper chap. When he +had won his <abbr title="Distinguished Service Order" class="smcap">d.s.o.</abbr> for being the only quartermaster in the +Seventh Division to get up rations to his battalion in the firing line +at, I think, the Passchendaele show, he was sent a slip to complete +with biographical details for the appropriate directory. He looked +contemptuously at the <span class="pagenum" id="Page_14" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 14</span>various headings. Disregarding ‘date and +place of birth,’ and even ‘military campaigns,’ he filled in two items +only:</p> + +<blockquote> +<table class="autotable" role="presentation"> +<tbody> + <tr><td>Issue</td><td class="tdr">. .</td><td>Rum, rifles, etc.</td></tr> + <tr><td>Family seat</td><td class="tdr">.</td><td>My khaki pants.</td></tr> +</tbody> +</table> +</blockquote> + +<p>And yet even proper chaps have their formal geography, however +little it may mean to them. They have birth certificates, passports, +relatives, earliest recollections, and even, sometimes, degrees and +publications and campaigns to itemize, like all the irrelevant people, +the people with only geographical reality. And the less that all these +biographical items mean to them the more particularly and faithfully +can they fill them in, if ever they feel so inclined. When loyalties +have become negligible and friends have all either deserted in alarm +or died, or been dismissed, or happen to be chaps to whom geography is +also without significance, the task is easy for them. They do not have +to wait until they are at least ninety before publishing, and even then +only tell the truth about characters long dead and without influential +descendants.</p> + +<hr class="invisible"> + +<p>As a proof of my readiness to accept biographical convention, let +me at once record my two earliest recollections. The first is being +held up to the window to watch a carnival procession for the Diamond +Jubilee in 1897 (this was at Wimbledon, where I had been born on 24th +July 1895). The second, an earlier recollection still, is looking up +with a sort of despondent terror at a cupboard in the nursery, which +stood accidentally open and which was filled to the ceiling with octavo +volumes of Shakespeare. My father was organiser of a Shakespeare +reading circle. I did not know <span class="pagenum" id="Page_15" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 15</span>until long afterwards that it +was the Shakespeare cupboard, but I, apparently, had then a strong +instinct against drawing-room activities. It is only recently that I +have overcome my education and gone back to this early intuitional +spontaneousness.</p> + +<p>When distinguished visitors came to the house, like Sir Sidney Lee +with his Shakespearean scholarship, and Lord Ashbourne, not yet a +peer, with his loud talk of ‘Ireland for the Irish,’ and his saffron +kilt, and Mr. Eustace Miles with his samples of edible nuts, I knew +all about them in my way. I had summed up correctly and finally my +Uncle Charles of the <cite>Spectator</cite> and <cite>Punch</cite>, and my Aunt Grace, who +came in a carriage and pair, and whose arrival always caused a flutter +because she was Lady Pontifex, and all the rest of my relations. And +I had no illusions about Algernon Charles Swinburne, who often used +to stop my perambulator when he met it on Nurses’ Walk, at the edge +of Wimbledon Common, and pat me on the head and kiss me; he was an +inveterate pram-stopper and patter and kisser. Nurses’ Walk lay between +‘The Pines,’ Putney (where he lived with Watts-Dunton) and the Rose +and Crown public-house, where he went for his daily pint of beer; +Watts-Dunton allowed him twopence for that and no more. I did not know +that Swinburne was a poet, but I knew that he was no good. Swinburne, +by the way, when a very young man, went to Walter Savage Landor, then a +very old man, and asked for and was given a poet’s blessing; and Landor +when a child had been patted on the head by Dr. Samuel Johnson; and +Johnson when a child had been taken to London to be touched by Queen +Anne for scrofula, the King’s evil; and Queen Anne when a child....</p> + +<p>But I mentioned the Shakespeare reading circle. It went on for years, +and when I was sixteen curiosity finally sent <span class="pagenum" id="Page_16" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 16</span>me to one of the +meetings. I remember the vivacity with which my mother read the part +of Katherine in the <cite>Taming of the Shrew</cite> to my father’s Petruchio, +and the compliments on their performance which the other members gave +me. Mr. and Mrs. Maurice Hill were two of the most popular members of +the circle. This meeting took place some years before they became Mr. +Justice Hill and Lady Hill, and some years, too, before I looked into +<cite>The Shrew</cite>. I remember the lemonade glasses, the cucumber sandwiches, +the <i>petits fours</i>, the drawing-room knick-knacks, the chrysanthemums +in bowls, and the semi-circle of easy chairs around the fire. The +gentle voice of Mr. Maurice Hill as Hortentio was admonishing my +father: ‘Thou go thy ways, thou hast tamed a cursed shrew.’ I myself +as Lucio was ending the performance with: ‘’Tis a wonder by your leave +she will be tamed so.’ I must go one day to hear him speak his lines as +Judge of the Divorce Courts; his admonishments have become famous.</p> + +<p>After earliest recollections I should perhaps give a passport +description of myself and let the items enlarge themselves. Date of +birth.... Place of birth.... I have given those. Profession. In my +passport I am down as ‘university professor.’ That was a convenience +for 1926, when I first took it out. I thought of putting ‘writer,’ but +people who are concerned with passports have complicated reactions to +the word. ‘University professor’ wins a simple reaction—dull respect. +No questions asked. So also with ‘army captain (pensioned list).’</p> + +<p>My height is given as six feet two inches, my eyes as grey, and my hair +as black. To ‘black’ should be added ‘thick and curly.’ I am described +as having no special peculiarity. This is untrue. For a start, there +is my big, once aquiline, now crooked nose. I broke it at Charterhouse +<span class="pagenum" id="Page_17" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 17</span>playing Rugger with Soccer players. (I broke another player’s nose +myself in the same game.) That unsteadied it, and boxing sent it askew. +Finally, it was operated on. It is very crooked. It was once useful +as a vertical line of demarcation between the left and right sides of +my face, which are naturally unassorted—my eyes, eyebrows, and ears +being all set noticeably crooked and my cheek-bones, which are rather +high, being on different levels. My mouth is what is known as ‘full’ +and my smile is crooked; when I was thirteen I broke two front teeth +and became sensitive about showing them. My hands and feet are large. I +weigh about twelve-stone four. My best comic turn is a double-jointed +pelvis; I can sit on a table and rap like the Fox sisters with it. +One shoulder is distinctly lower than the other, but that is because +of a lung wound in the war. I do not carry a watch because I always +magnetize the main-spring; during the war, when there was an army order +that officers should carry watches and synchronize them daily, I had to +buy two new ones every month. Medically, I am a thoroughly ‘good life.’</p> + +<p>My passport gives my nationality as ‘British subject.’ Here I might +parody Marcus Aurelius, who begins his Golden Book with the various +ancestors and relations to whom he owes the virtues of a worthy +Roman Emperor. Something of the sort about myself, and why I am not +a Roman Emperor or even, except on occasions, an English gentleman. +My mother’s father’s family, the von Ranke’s, was a family of Saxon +country pastors, not anciently noble. Leopold von Ranke, the first +modern historian, my great-uncle, brought the ‘von’ into the family. +To him I owe my historical method. It was he who wrote, to the scandal +of his contemporaries: ‘I am a historian before I am a Christian; my +object is simply to find out how the things actually <span class="pagenum" id="Page_18" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 18</span>occurred,’ +and of Michelet the French historian: ‘He wrote history in a style +in which the truth could not be told.’ Thomas Carlyle decried him as +‘Dry-as-Dust’; to his credit. To Heinrich von Ranke, my grandfather, +I owe my clumsy largeness, my endurance, energy, seriousness, and my +thick hair. He was rebellious and even atheistic in his youth. As +a medical student at a Prussian university he was involved in the +political disturbances of 1848. He and a number of student friends +demonstrated in favour of Karl Marx at the time of his trial for high +treason. Like Marx, they had to leave the country. He came to London +and finished his medical course there. In 1859 he went to the Crimea +with the British forces as a regimental surgeon. All I know about this +is a chance remark that he made to me as a child: ‘It is not always +the big bodies that are the strongest. When I was at Sevastopol in the +trenches I saw the great British Guards crack up and die by the score, +while the little sappers took no harm.’ Still, his big body carried him +very well.</p> + +<p>He married, in London, my grandmother, a Schleswig-Dane. She was +the daughter of Tiarks, the Greenwich astronomer. She was tiny, +saintly, frightened. Before her father took to astronomy the Tiarks +family had, it seems, followed the Danish country system, not at +all a bad one, of alternate professions for father and son. The odd +generations were tinsmiths and the even generations were pastors. My +gentler characteristics trace back to my grandmother. She had ten +children; the eldest of these was my mother, who was born in London. +My grandfather’s atheism and radicalism sobered down. He eventually +returned to Germany, where he became a well-known children’s doctor at +Munich. He was about the first doctor in Europe to insist on clean milk +for his child patients. When he found that he could not <span class="pagenum" id="Page_19" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 19</span>get clean +milk to the hospitals by ordinary means he started a model dairy-farm +himself. His agnosticism grieved my grandmother; she never ceased to +pray for him, but concentrated more particularly on saving the next +generation. She was a Lutheran. My grandfather did not die entirely +unregenerate; his last words were: ‘The God of my fathers, to Him at +least I hold.’ I do not know exactly what he meant by that, but it +was a statement consistent with his angry patriarchal moods, with his +acceptance of a prominent place in Bavarian society as Herr Geheimrat +Ritter von Ranke, and with his loyalty to the Kaiser, with whom once +or twice he went deer-shooting. It meant, practically, that he was +a good Liberal in religion as in politics, and that my grandmother +need not have worried. I prefer my German relations to my Irish +relations; they have high principles, are easy, generous, and serious. +The men have fought duels not for cheap personal honour, but in the +public interest—called out, for example, because they have protested +publicly against the scandalous behaviour of some superior officer +or official. One of them who was in the German consular service lost +seniority, just before the war, I was told, because he refused to use +the consulate as a clearing-place for secret-service reports. They are +not heavy drinkers either. My grandfather, as a student at the regular +university ‘drunks,’ was in the habit of pouring his beer down into his +eighteen-fortyish riding-boots. His children were brought up to speak +English in their home, and always looked to England as the home of +culture and progress. The women were noble and patient, and kept their +eyes on the ground when they went out walking.</p> + +<p>At the age of eighteen my mother was sent to England as companion to +a lonely old woman who had befriended my <span class="pagenum" id="Page_20" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 20</span>grandmother when she was +an orphan. For seventeen years she waited hand and foot on this old +lady, who for the last few years was perfectly senile. When she finally +died, my mother determined to go to India, after a short training as a +medical missionary. This ambition was baulked by her meeting my father, +a widower with five children; it was plain to her that she could do as +good work on the home-mission field.</p> + +<p>About the other side of my family. The Graves’ have a pedigree that +dates back to the Conquest, but is good as far as the reign of Henry +VII. Colonel Graves, the regicide, who was Ireton’s chief of horse, is +claimed as the founder of the Irish branch of the family. Limerick was +its centre. There were occasional soldiers and doctors in it, but they +were collaterals; in the direct male line was a sequence of rectors, +deans, and bishops. The Limerick Graves’ have no ‘hands’ or mechanical +sense; instead they have a wide reputation as conversationalists. In +those of my relatives who have the family characteristics most strongly +marked, unnecessary talk is a nervous disorder. Not bad talk as talk +goes; usually informative, often witty, but it goes on and on and +on and on and on. The von Ranke’s have, I think, little mechanical +aptitude either. It is most inconvenient to have been born into the +age of the internal-combustion engine and the electric dynamo and to +have no sympathy with them; a push bicycle, a primus stove, and an army +rifle mark the bounds of my mechanical capacity.</p> + +<p>My grandfather, on this side, was Protestant Bishop of Limerick. He had +eight, or was it ten, children. He was a little man and a remarkable +mathematician; he first formulated some theory or other of spherical +conics. He was also an antiquary, and discovered the key to ancient +Irish Ogham <span class="pagenum" id="Page_21" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 21</span>script. He was hard and, by reputation, far from +generous. A gentleman and a scholar, and respected throughout the +countryside on that account. He and the Catholic Bishop were on the +very best terms. They cracked Latin jokes at each other, discussed fine +points of scholarship, and were unclerical enough not to take their +religious differences too seriously.</p> + +<p>When I was in Limerick as a soldier of the garrison some twenty-five +years after my grandfather’s death, I heard a lot about Bishop Graves +from the townsfolk. The Catholic Bishop had once joked him about the +size of his family, and my grandfather had retorted warmly with the +text about the blessedness of the man who has his quiver full of +arrows, to which the Catholic answered briefly and severely: ‘The +ancient Jewish quiver only held six.’ My grandfather’s wake, they said, +was the longest ever seen in the town of Limerick; it stretched from +the cathedral right down O’Connell Street and over Sarsfield Bridge, +and I do not know how many miles Irish beyond. He blessed me when I was +a child, but I do not remember that.</p> + +<p>Of my father’s mother, who was a Scotswoman, a Cheyne from Aberdeen, I +have been able to get no information at all beyond the fact that she +was ‘a very beautiful woman.’ I can only conclude that most of what she +said or did passed unnoticed in the rivalry of family conversations. +The Cheyne pedigree was better than the Graves’; it was flawless right +back to the medieval Scottish kings, to the two Balliols, the first +and second Davids, and the Bruce. In later times the Cheynes had been +doctors and physicians. But my father is engaged at the same time as +myself on his autobiography, and no doubt he will write at length about +all this.</p> + +<p>My father, then, met my mother some time in the early <span class="pagenum" id="Page_22" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 22</span>’nineties. He +had previously been married to one of the Irish Coopers, of Cooper’s +Hill, near Limerick. The Coopers were an even more Irish family than +the Graves’. The story is that when Cromwell came to Ireland and +ravaged the country, Moira O’Brien, the last surviving member of the +great clan O’Brien, who were the paramount chiefs of the country round +Limerick, came to him one day and said: ‘General, you have killed my +father and my uncles, my husband and my brothers. I am left as the sole +heiress of these lands. Do you intend to confiscate them?’ Cromwell +is said to have been struck by her magnificent presence and to have +answered that that certainly had been his intention. But that she could +keep her lands, or a part of them, on condition that she married one +of his officers. And so the officers of the regiment which had taken a +leading part in hunting down the O’Briens were invited to take a pack +of cards and cut for the privilege of marrying Moira and succeeding to +the estate. The winner was one Ensign Cooper. Moira, a few weeks after +her marriage, found herself pregnant. Convinced that it was a male +heir, as indeed it proved, she kicked her husband to death. It is said +that she kicked him in the pit of the stomach after making him drunk. +The Coopers have always been a haunted family and <i lang="la">Hibernicis ipsis +Hibernicores</i>. Jane Cooper, whom my father married, died of consumption.</p> + +<p>The Graves family was thin-nosed and inclined to petulance, but never +depraved, cruel, or hysterical. A persistent literary tradition; of +Richard, a minor poet and a friend of Shenstone; and John Thomas, +who was a mathematician and jurist and contributed to Sir William +Hamilton’s discovery of quaternions; and Richard, a divine and regius +professor of Greek; and James, an archaeologist; and Robert, who +<span class="pagenum" id="Page_23" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 23</span>invented the disease called after him and was a friend of Turner’s; +and Robert, who was a classicist and theologian and a friend of +Wordsworth’s; and Richard, another divine; and Robert, another divine; +and other Robert’s, James’s, Thomas’s and Richard’s, and Clarissa, one +of the toasts of Ireland, who married Leopold von Ranke (at Windermere +Church) and linked the Graves and von Ranke families a couple of +generations before my father and mother married. See the British Museum +catalogue for an eighteenth and nineteenth-century record of Graves’ +literary history.</p> + +<p>It was through this Clarissa-Leopold relationship that my father met my +mother. My mother told him at once that she liked <cite>Father O’Flynn</cite>, for +writing which my father will be chiefly remembered. He put the words +to a traditional jig tune, <cite>The Top of Cork Road</cite>, which he remembered +from his boyhood. Sir Charles Stanford supplied a few chords for the +setting. My father sold the complete rights for a guinea. The publisher +made thousands. Sir Charles Stanford, who drew a royalty as the +composer, also made a very large sum. Recently my father has made a few +pounds from gramophone rights. He has never been bitter about all this, +but he has more than once impressed on me almost religiously never to +sell for a sum down the complete rights of any work of mine whatsoever.</p> + +<p>I am glad in a way that my father was a poet. This at least saved me +from any false reverence of poets, and his work was never an oppression +to me. I am even very pleased when I meet people who know his work and +not mine. Some of his songs I sing without prejudice; when washing up +after meals or shelling peas or on similar occasions. He never once +tried to teach me how to write, or showed any understanding of my +serious work; he was <span class="pagenum" id="Page_24" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 24</span>always more ready to ask advice about his own +work than to offer it for mine. He never tried to stop me writing and +was glad of my first successes. His light-hearted early work is the +best. His <cite>Invention of Wine</cite>, for instance, which begins:</p> + +<blockquote> +<div class="poetry-container"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza1"> + <div class="verse indent0">Ere Bacchus could talk</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Or dacently walk,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Down Olympus he jumped</div> + <div class="verse indent0">From the arms of his nurse,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And though ten years in all</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Were consumed by the fall</div> + <div class="verse indent0">He might have fallen further</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And fared a dale worse.</div> + </div> + </div> +</div> +</blockquote> + +<p class="noindent">After he married my mother and became a convinced teetotaller he lost +something of this easy playfulness.</p> + +<p>He broke the ecclesiastical sequence. His great-grandfather had been a +dean, his grandfather a rector, his father a bishop, but he himself was +never more than a lay-reader. And he broke the geographical connection +with Ireland, for which I cannot be too grateful to him. I am much +harder on my relations and much more careful of associating with them +than I am with strangers. But I can in certain respects admire my +father and mother. My father for his simplicity and persistence and my +mother for her seriousness and strength. Both for their generosity. +They never bullied me or in any way exceeded their ordinary parental +rights, and were grieved rather than angered by my default from formal +religion. In physique and general characteristics my mother’s side is +stronger in me on the whole. But I am subject to many habits of speech +and movement characteristic of the Graves’, most of them eccentric. +Such as finding it <span class="pagenum" id="Page_25" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 25</span>difficult to walk straight down a street, +getting tired of sentences when half-way through and leaving them in +the air, walking with the hands folded in a particular way behind the +back, and being subject to sudden and most disconcerting spells of +complete amnesia. These fits, so far as I can discover, serve no useful +purpose, and the worst about them is that they tend to produce in the +subject the same sort of dishonesty that deaf people have when they +miss the thread of conversation. They dare not be left behind and rely +on their intuition and bluff to get them through. This disability is +most marked in very cold weather. I do not now talk too much except +when I have been drinking or when I meet someone who was with me in +France. The Graves’ have good minds for purposes like examinations, +writing graceful Latin verse, filling in forms, and solving puzzles +(when we children were invited to parties where guessing games and +brain-tests were played we never failed to win). They have a good eye +for ball games, and a graceful style. I inherited the eye, but not +the style; my mother’s family are entirely without style and I went +that way. I have an ugly but fairly secure seat on a horse. There +is a coldness in the Graves’ which is anti-sentimental to the point +of insolence, a necessary check to the goodness of heart from which +my mother’s family suffers. The Graves’, it is fair to generalize, +though loyal to the British governing class to which they belong, and +so to the Constitution, are individualists; the von Ranke’s regard +their membership of the corresponding class in Germany as a sacred +trust enabling them to do the more responsible work in the service of +humanity. Recently, when a von Ranke entered a film studio, the family +felt itself disgraced.</p> + +<p>The most useful and at the same time most dangerous <span class="pagenum" id="Page_26" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 26</span>gift that I owe +to my father’s side of the family—probably more to the Cheynes than the +Graves’—is that I am always able, when it is a question of dealing with +officials or getting privileges from public institutions which grudge +them, to masquerade as a gentleman. Whatever I happen to be wearing; +and because the clothes I wear are not what gentlemen usually wear, +and yet I do not seem to be an artist or effeminate, and my accent and +gestures are irreproachable, I have even been ‘placed’ as the heir to +a dukedom, whose perfect confidence in his rank would explain all such +eccentricity. In this way I have been told that I seem, paradoxically, +to be more of a gentleman even than one of my elder brothers who +spent a number of years as a consular official in the Near East. His +wardrobe is almost too carefully a gentleman’s, and he does not allow +himself the pseudo-ducal privilege of having disreputable acquaintances +and saying on all occasions what he really means. About this being a +gentleman business: I paid so heavily for the fourteen years of my +gentleman’s education that I feel entitled occasionally to get some +sort of return.</p> +</section> + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> + +<section role="doc-chapter" aria-labelledby="c02-hd"> +<div class="chapter"> +<div class="pagenum" id="Page_27" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 27</div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="c02-hd">II</h2> +</div> + +<p class="chap_start"><b class="smcap">My</b> mother married my father largely, it seems, to help him out with +his five motherless children. Having any herself was a secondary +consideration. But first she had a girl, then she had another girl, and +it was very nice of course to have them, but slightly disappointing, +because she belonged to the generation and the tradition that made a +son the really important event; then I came and I was a fine healthy +child. She was forty when I was born and my father was forty-nine. +Four years later she had another son and four years later she had +still another son. The desired preponderance of male over female +was established and twice five made ten. The gap of two generations +between my parents and me was easier in a way to bridge than a single +generation gap. Children seldom quarrel with their grandparents, and I +have been able to think of my mother and father as grandparents. Also, +a family of ten means a dilution of parental affection; the members +tend to become indistinct. I have often been called: ‘Philip, Richard, +Charles, I mean Robert.’</p> + +<p>My father was a very busy man, an inspector of schools for the +Southwark district of London, and we children saw practically nothing +of him except during the holidays. Then he was very sweet and playful +and told us stories with the formal beginning, not ‘once upon a time,’ +but always ‘and so the old gardener blew his nose on a red pocket +handkerchief.’ He occasionally played games with us, but for the most +part when he was not doing educational work he was doing literary work +or being president of literary or temperance societies. My mother was +so busy running the household and conscientiously carrying out her +social obligations <span class="pagenum" id="Page_28" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 28</span>as my father’s wife that we did not see her +continuously, unless on Sunday or when we happened to be ill. We had +a nurse and we had each other and that was companionship enough. My +father’s chief part in our education was to insist on our speaking +grammatically, pronouncing words correctly, and using no slang. He left +our religious instruction entirely to my mother, though he officiated +at family prayers, which the servants were expected to attend, every +morning before breakfast. Punishments, such as being sent to bed early +or being stood in the corner, were in the hands of my mother. Corporal +punishment, never severe and given with a slipper, was my father’s +business. We learned to be strong moralists and spent a great deal of +our time on self-examination and good resolutions. My sister Rosaleen +put up a printed notice in her corner of the nursery—it might just as +well have been put up by me: ‘I must not say bang bust or pig bucket, +for it is rude.’</p> + +<p>We were given very little pocket-money—a penny a week with a rise to +twopence at the age of twelve or so, and we were encouraged to give +part at least of any odd money that came to us from uncles or other +visitors to Dr. Barnardo’s Homes and (this frightened us a bit) to +beggars. There was one blind beggar at Wimbledon who used to sit on the +pavement reading the Bible aloud in Braille; he was not really blind, +but able to turn his eyes up and keep the pupils concealed for minutes +at a time under drooping lids which were artificially inflamed. We +often gave to him. He died a rich man and had been able to provide his +son with a college education. The first distinguished writer that I +remember meeting after Swinburne was <abbr>P. G.</abbr> Wodehouse, a friend of one +of my brothers; he was then in the early twenties, on the staff of the +<cite>Globe</cite>, and was writing school <span class="pagenum" id="Page_29" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 29</span>stories in <cite>The Captain</cite> magazine. +He gave me a penny, advising me to get marsh-mallows with it. I was too +shy to express my gratitude at the time; and have never since permitted +myself to be critical about his work.</p> + +<p>I had great religious fervour which persisted until shortly after my +confirmation at the age of sixteen. I remember the incredulity with +which I first heard that there actually were people, people baptized +like myself into the Church of England, who did not believe in Jesus. +I never met an unbeliever in all these years. As soon as I did, it +was all over with my simple, faith in the literal fundamentalist +interpretation of the Bible. This was bad luck on my parents, but +they were doomed to it. One married couple that I know, belonging to +the same generation, decided that the best way in the end to ensure a +proper religious attitude in their children, was not to teach them any +religion at all until they were able to understand it in some degree of +fulness. The children were sent to schools where no religious training +was given. At the age of thirteen the eldest boy came indignantly to +his father and said: ‘Look here, father, I think you’ve treated me very +badly. The other chaps laugh at me because I don’t know anything about +God. And who’s this chap Jesus? When I ask them they won’t tell me, +they think I am joking.’ So the long-hoped-for moment had arrived. The +father told the boy to call his sister, who was a year younger than +him, because he had something very important to tell them both. Then +very reverently and carefully he told them the Gospel story. He had +always planned to tell it to them in this way. The children did not +interrupt him. When finally he had finished there was a silence. Then +the girl said, rather embarrassed: ‘Really, father, I think that is the +silliest story I’ve heard since I <span class="pagenum" id="Page_30" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 30</span>was a kid.’ The boy said: ‘Poor +chap. But what about it, anyhow?’</p> + +<p>I have asked many of my acquaintances at what point in their childhood +or adolescence they became class-conscious, but have never been given a +satisfactory answer. I remember when it happened to me. When I was four +and a half I caught scarlet fever; my younger brother had just been +born, and it was impossible for me to have scarlet fever in the house, +so I was sent off to a public fever hospital. There was only one other +bourgeois child in the ward; the rest were all proletarians. I did +not notice particularly that the attitude of the nurses or the other +patients to me was different; I accepted the kindness and spoiling +easily, because I was accustomed to it. But I was astonished at the +respect and even reverence that this other little boy, a clergyman’s +child, was given. ‘Oh,’ the nurses would cry after he had gone; ‘Oh,’ +they cried, ‘he did look a little gentleman in his pretty white +pellisse when they came to take him away.’ ‘He was a fair toff,’ echoed +the little proletarians. When I came home from hospital, after being +there about two months, my accent was commented on and I was told that +the boys in the ward had been very vulgar. I did not know what ‘vulgar’ +meant; it had to be explained to me. About a year later I met Arthur, a +boy of about nine, who had been in the ward and taught me how to play +cricket when I was getting better; I was then at my first preparatory +school and he was a ragged errand-boy. In hospital we had all worn the +same hospital nightgown, and I had not realized that we came off such +different shelves. But now I suddenly recognized with my first shudder +of gentility that there were two sorts of people—ourselves and the +lower classes. The servants were trained to call us <span class="pagenum" id="Page_31" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 31</span>children, even +when we were tiny, Master Robert, Miss Rosaleen, and Miss Clarissa, but +I had not realized that these were titles of respect. I had thought of +‘Master’ and ‘Miss’ merely as vocative prefixes used when addressing +other people’s children. But now I realized that the servants were the +lower classes, and that we were ourselves.</p> + +<p>I accepted this class separation as naturally as I had accepted +religious dogma, and did not finally discard gentility until +nearly twenty years later. My mother and father were never of the +aggressive, shoot-’em-down type. They were Liberals or, more strictly, +Liberal-Unionists. In religious theory, at least, they treated their +employees as fellow-creatures. But social distinctions remained clearly +defined. That was religion too:</p> + +<div class="poetry-container"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">He made them high or lowly,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And ordered their estates.</div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + +<p class="noindent">I can well recall the tone of my mother’s voice when she informed the +maids that they could have what was left of the pudding, or scolded +the cook for some carelessness. It was a forced hardness, made almost +harsh by embarrassment. My mother was <i lang="de">gemütlich</i> by nature. She would, +I believe, have given a lot to be able to dispense with servants +altogether. They were a foreign body in the house. I remember what the +servants’ bedrooms used to look like. By a convention of the times they +were the only rooms in the house that had no carpet or linoleum; they +were on the top landing on the dullest side of the house. The gaunt, +unfriendly-looking beds, and the hanging-cupboards with faded cotton +curtains, instead of wardrobes with glass doors <span class="pagenum" id="Page_32" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 32</span>as in the other +rooms. All this uncouthness made me think of the servants as somehow +not quite human. The type of servant that came was not very good; only +those with not particularly good references would apply for a situation +where there were ten in the family. And because it was such a large +house, and there was hardly a single tidy person in the household, they +were constantly giving notice. There was too much work they said. So +that the tendency to think of them as only half human was increased; +they never had time to get fixed as human beings.</p> + +<p>The bridge between the servants and ourselves was our nurse. She gave +us her own passport on the first day she came: ‘Emily Dykes is my name; +England is my nation; Netheravon is my dwelling-place, and Christ is +my salvation.’ Though she called us Miss and Master she spoke it in no +servant tone. In a practical way she came to be more to us than our +mother. I began to despise her at about the age of twelve—she was then +nurse to my younger brothers—when I found that my education was now in +advance of hers, and that if I struggled with her I was able to trip +her up and bruise her quite easily. Besides, she was a Baptist and went +to chapel; I realized by that time that the Baptists were, like the +Wesleyans and Methodists, the social inferiors of the members of the +Church of England.</p> + +<p>I was brought up with a horror of Catholicism and this remained with +me for a very long time. It was not a case of once a Protestant always +a Protestant, but rather that when I ceased to be Protestant I was +further off than ever from being Catholic. I discarded Protestantism +in horror of its Catholic element. My religious training developed in +me a great capacity for fear (I was perpetually tortured by the fear +of hell), a superstitious conscience and a sexual embarrassment. <span class="pagenum" id="Page_33" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 33</span>I +was very long indeed in getting rid of all this. Nancy Nicholson and +I (later on in this story) were most careful not to give our four +children an early religious training. They were not even baptized.</p> + +<p>The last thing that is discarded by Protestants when they reject +religion altogether is a vision of Christ as the perfect man. That +persisted with me, sentimentally, for years. At the age of nineteen I +wrote a poem called ‘<cite class="normal">In the Wilderness</cite>.’ It was about Christ meeting +the scapegoat—a silly, quaint poem-and has appeared in at least seventy +anthologies. Its perpetual recurrence. Strangers are always writing to +me to say what a beautiful poem it is, and how much strength it has +given them, and would I, etc.? Here, for instance, is a letter that +came yesterday:</p> + +<blockquote> +<p><span class="smcap">Sir</span>,—I heard with great delight your beautiful poem ‘<cite class="normal">In the +Wilderness</cite>,’ broadcast from 2LO last night, and am writing to you +because your poem has given me strength and hope. I am a gentlelady +in need—in great need—not of a gift, but of a <em>loan</em>, on interest of +5 per cent. I also need a kind friend to show me human sympathy and +to help me if possible by an introduction to a really upright and +conscientious London solicitor who will fight my cause, not primarily +for the filthy lucre, but because it is waging the the battle of +Right against the most infamous Wrong. First of all I ask you to +believe that I am writing you the simple truth. I also am gifted as a +writer, but as my physical health has always been a great struggle, +and poverty from my childhood has been my lot, and I will not stoop +to write down to the popular taste, and perhaps, also, because I +have no influential friends to give me a helping hand, I earn very +little by my pen. But I know how to wield a pen, and I am <span class="pagenum" id="Page_34" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 34</span>going +to put myself into this letter just as I am—I am not apt to deceive, +I hate lies and every form of deception. This letter is ‘a bow sent +at a venture,’—to see if you would like to help a literary sister +who is being gravely wronged by her only near relative, an abnormal +woman, who has hated her for years without any cause. To be very +direct—I need £10 for one year at 5 per cent.—to be repaid £10, 10<abbr title="shillings">s.</abbr> +0<abbr title="pence">d.</abbr> I need it <em>at once, very urgently</em>—to pay arrears of furnished +digs—£3, 13<abbr>s.</abbr> 0<abbr>d.</abbr>—Milk Bill 16<abbr>s.</abbr> 8<abbr>d.</abbr>, Grocery Bill 10<abbr>s.</abbr> 6<abbr>d.</abbr> and coal +1<abbr>s.</abbr> 8<abbr>d.</abbr>—then to leave Bolton (the black town of mills which fogs +incessantly) and go for a change to Blackpool: then to go up to Town +to put my legal business into a London solicitor’s hands. I will +sign a Promissory Note for £10, 10<abbr>s.</abbr> 0<abbr>d.</abbr>, to repay a year hence. I +am cultured and and highly educated and well-born. I was trained +to teach on the higher schools and I hold high testimonials for +teaching. But I overworked and at last became consumptive, and had +tuberculosis of both lungs. It was taken early and I am relatively +cured. But my teaching career is broken, and I do so love teaching. +In consequence of this I have a monthly pension from a Philanthropic +Society of £2, 11<abbr>s.</abbr> 8<abbr>d.</abbr> But it is so tiny, I cannot possibly live on +it, squeeze as I may. But an inheritance of over £1000 is mine, which +is being wrongly withheld from me by the rogue of a solicitor in +whose hands it is. I had one brother and one sister. The brother had +saved money, and insured himself in many ways against his old age. +The sister was well married to a man in good position; heartless, +and hardened with her worldly life, and abnormally unnatural. She +was expelled from two schools. She contracted an insane hatred of +me, her little sister, and being full of cupidity, has tried to rob +me of the little I have. My brother intended me to be his <span class="pagenum" id="Page_35" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 35</span>heir +and inherit all his money. He wrote her this. But he was not a good +brother and I did not visit him. He was a widower without offspring. +Then he died suddenly in 1926, Xmas. She got to his house and wired +me the death. Afterwards she wrote a few lines <em>but never told me the +date of the funeral and has hid everything about his affairs from +me</em>—his declared heir! She declared there was no Will to be found, +and when I arrived in the Midlands from Yorkshire and got to his +Vicarage <em>she, with her woman friend, had locked me out of the house, +to prevent my search for the Will</em>! Upon advice I issued a Caveat +and they at once <em>violated the Caveat</em>, and began to arrange for the +sale of furniture! I heard of it by chance and stopped the sale. Then +I was taken ill with my lungs in Derbyshire, whither I had returned +after engaging a lawyer to safeguard my interests on the spot. They +then corrupted my solicitor, who let me down badly, and I was ill in +Derby. They warned the Caveat, and I could not enter an appearance, +so it became abortive. Then my sister got herself made sole +Administratrix. I had intended to apply to be joint Administratrix. +Then began a series of fraudulent acts and maladministration. Her +solicitor is a rogue and he is trying to force me to ‘<em>approve</em>’ +his unsatisfactory accounts by withholding my share until I sign an +undertaking not to proceed against them afterwards. <em>One</em> item in +accounts is falsified which I can prove, and other gross acts of +fraud can be proved. <em>Foul play</em> has been pursued throughout, and +they are now shadowing me everywhere by hired agents who find out +the solicitors I employ and buy them off, or otherwise prevent their +acting against them for me. It is the <em>grossest</em> case imaginable. I +hold all my documents and can prove everything. I have a clear and +strong case. But I need a <em>London</em> solicitor—away from the North +<span class="pagenum" id="Page_36" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 36</span>where my sister lives in Northumberland—and I will not sink my +moral principle to accept, not my lawful Half-Share, but what they +choose to offer me, namely £919, 13<abbr>s.</abbr> 3<abbr>d.</abbr> and 18 months’ interest. I +want the Court to take over the administration. I have applied to the +solicitor for an advance upon my share and he refuses again in order +to <em>compel</em> me to sign this infamous agreement. I had £50 in advance +in 1926 which is shown in accounts. I just need this £10 now so as to +pay up here and get to Blackpool—for I have been ill again with my +lungs, and I <em>badly</em> need a change.</p> + +<p>Will you help a stranger with this not very big loan, and on +interest? I would bring all the accounts and papers to show you +when I come to town. And if I have found a friend in you, I shall +indeed thank God. You can trust me. I <em>am</em> worthy, though I can give +no references, because the people are dead. But I think you do not +like being ‘bullied’ with such things. I am middle-aged, but a child +in heart—original—and just myself, and look rather ridiculously +young, without any artifice or makeup.</p> + +<p>But apart from the loan, I need a <em>friend</em>. The family used to sneer +at me that I ‘never made friends for what I could get out of them.’ +Truly I never did. I like rather to help others myself. I should +like to help <em>you</em> if I could in any way. I just love to serve. My +life has been lonely, and both parents are dead, and I don’t make +friends lightly. So that is all. But I won’t finish without telling +you that I love the Master, the Lord Jesus Christ, as you love Him, +and trust Him in all this darkness. I always like to bring His Name +in—and so good night—I would be thankful if you will write to me in a +<em>registered</em> letter. Some of my <span class="pagenum" id="Page_37" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 37</span>letters have gone astray, I fear +I do not trust the woman in these lodgings, and my letters are going +to a shop to be called for.</p> + +<p class="ml20p">I am, dear Sir,</p> + +<p class="ml30p">Yours very truly</p> + +<p class="right padr1">* * * * * (Miss).</p> + +<p><em><abbr>P.S.</abbr></em>—Do you think you could get a letter to me by <em>Saturday</em>? I do +so love your poems.</p> +</blockquote> + +<p>I put this in here because it is not a letter to answer, nor yet +somehow a letter to throw away. The style reminds me of one of my +Irish female cousins. And that again reminds me of the ancient Irish +triad—‘Three ugly sisters: Chatter, Poverty, and Chastity.’</p> +</section> + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> + +<section role="doc-chapter" aria-labelledby="c03-hd"> +<div class="chapter"> +<div class="pagenum" id="Page_38" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 38</div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="c03-hd">III</h2> +</div> + +<p class="chap_start"><b class="smcap">I went</b> to six preparatory schools. The first was a dame’s school at +Wimbledon. I went there at the age of six. My father, as an educational +expert, did not let me stay here long. He found me crying one day +at the difficulty of the twenty-three-times table, and there was a +Question and Answer History Book that we used which began:</p> + +<blockquote role="doc-qna"> + <b class="italic">Question</b>: Why were the Britons so called?<br> + <b class="italic">Answer</b>: Because they painted themselves blue. +</blockquote> + +<p>My father said it was out of date. Also I was made to do mental +arithmetic to a metronome. I once wet myself for nervousness at this +torture. So I went to the lowest class of King’s College School, +Wimbledon. I was just seven years old, the youngest boy there, and they +went up to nineteen. I was taken away after a couple of terms because +I was found to be using naughty words. I was glad to leave that school +because I did not understand a word of the lessons. I had started +Latin and I did not know what Latin was or meant; its declensions and +conjugations were pure incantations to me. For that matter so were +the strings of naughty words. And I was oppressed by the huge hall, +the enormous boys, the frightening rowdiness of the corridors, and +compulsory Rugby football of which nobody told me the rules. I went +from there to another preparatory school of the ordinary type, also at +Wimbledon, where I stayed for about three years. Here I began playing +games seriously, was quarrelsome, boastful, and talkative, won prizes, +and collected things. The only difference between me and the other +boys was that I collected coins instead of stamps. The value of coins +seemed less fictitious to me than stamp values. My first training as a +gentleman was here. I was only once <span class="pagenum" id="Page_39" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 39</span>caned, for forgetting to bring +my gymnastic shoes to school, and then I was only given two strokes +on the hand with the cane. Yet even now the memory makes me hot with +fury. The principal outrage was that it was on the hand. My hands have +a great importance for me and are unusually sensitive. I live a lot in +them; my visual imagery is defective and so I memorize largely by sense +of touch.</p> + +<p>I seem to have left out a school. It was in North Wales, right away in +the hills behind Llanbedr. It was the first time I had been away from +home. I went there just for a term, for my health. Here I had my first +beating. The headmaster was a parson, and he caned me on the bottom +because I learned the wrong collect one Sunday by mistake. This was +the first time that I had come upon forcible training in religion. (At +my dame’s school we learned collects too, but were not punished for +mistakes; we competed for prizes—ornamental texts to take home and hang +over our beds.) There was a boy at this school called Ronny, and he was +the greatest thing that I had ever met. He had a house at the top of +a pine tree that nobody else could climb, and a huge knife, made from +the top of a scythe that he had stolen; and he killed pigeons with a +catapult and cooked them up in the tree. He was very kind to me; he +went into the Navy afterwards and deserted on his first voyage and was +never heard of again. He used to steal rides on cows and horses that +he found in the fields. And I found a book that had the ballads of +‘Chevy Chace’ and ‘Sir Andrew Barton’ in it; they were the first two +real poems that I remember reading. I saw how good they were. But, on +the other hand, there was an open-air swimming bath where all the boys +bathed naked, and I was overcome by horror at the sight. There was one +boy there of nineteen with red hair, real bad, Irish, <span class="pagenum" id="Page_40" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 40</span>red hair +all over his body. I had not known that hair grew on bodies. And the +headmaster had a little daughter with a little girl friend, and I was +in a sweat of terror whenever I met them; because, having no brothers, +they once tried to find out about male anatomy from me by exploring +down my shirt-neck when we were digging up pig-nuts in the garden.</p> + +<p>Another frightening experience of this part of my life was when I had +once to wait in the school cloakroom for my sisters, who went to the +Wimbledon High School. We were going on to be photographed together. +I waited about a quarter of an hour in the corner of the cloakroom. I +suppose I was about ten years old, and hundreds and hundreds of girls +went to and fro, and they all looked at me and giggled and whispered +things to each other. I knew they hated me, because I was a boy sitting +in the cloakroom of a girls’ school, and when my sisters arrived they +looked ashamed of me and quite different from the sisters I knew at +home. I realized that I had blundered into a secret world, and for +months and even years afterwards my worst nightmares were of this +girls’ school, which was always filled with coloured toy balloons. +‘Very Freudian,’ as one says now. My normal impulses were set back for +years by these two experiences. When I was about seventeen we spent +our Christmas holidays in Brussels. An Irish girl staying at the same +<i lang="fr">pension</i> made love to me in a way that I see now was really very +sweet. I was so frightened I could have killed her.</p> + +<p>In English preparatory and public schools romance is necessarily +homo-sexual. The opposite sex is despised and hated, treated as +something obscene. Many boys never recover from this perversion. I +only recovered by a shock at the age of twenty-one. For every one born +homo-sexual <span class="pagenum" id="Page_41" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 41</span>there are at least ten permanent pseudo-homo-sexuals +made by the public school system. And nine of these ten are as +honourably chaste and sentimental as I was.</p> + +<p>I left that day-school at Wimbledon because my father decided that the +standard of work was not good enough to enable me to win a scholarship +at a public school. He sent me to another preparatory school in the +Midlands; because the headmaster’s wife was a sister of an old literary +friend of his. It proved later that these were inadequate grounds. +It was a queer place and I did not like it. There was a secret about +the headmaster which a few of the elder boys shared. It was somehow +sinister, but I never exactly knew what it was. All I knew was that +he came weeping into the class-room one day beating his head with his +fists and groaning: ‘Would to God I hadn’t done it! Would to God I +hadn’t done it!’ I was taken away suddenly a few days later, which +was the end of the school year. The headmaster was said to be ill. I +found out later that he had been given twenty-four hours to leave the +country. He was succeeded by the second master, a good man, who had +taught me how to write English by eliminating all phrases that could +be done without, and using verbs and nouns instead of adjectives and +adverbs wherever possible. And where to start new paragraphs, and +the difference between O and Oh. He was a very heavy man. He used to +stand at his desk and lean on his thumbs until they bent at right +angles. (The school he took over was now only half-strength because +of the scandal. A fortnight later he fell out of a train on to his +head and that was the end of him; but the school is apparently going +on still; I am occasionally asked to subscribe to Old Boys’ funds for +chapel windows and miniature rifle ranges and so on.) I first learned +rugger here. What surprised me most at this school <span class="pagenum" id="Page_42" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 42</span>was when a boy +of about twelve, whose father and mother were in India, was told by +cable that they had both suddenly died of cholera. We all watched him +sympathetically for weeks after, expecting him to die of grief or turn +black in the face, or do something to match the occasion. Yet he seemed +entirely unmoved, and since nobody dared discuss the tragedy with him +he seemed to forget what had happened; he played about and ragged as +he had done before. We found that rather monstrous. But he could not +have been expected to behave otherwise. He had not seen his parents +for two years. And preparatory schoolboys live in a world completely +dissociated from home life. They have a different vocabulary, different +moral system, different voice, and though on their return to school +from the holidays the change over from home-self to school-self is +almost instantaneous, the reverse process takes a fortnight at least. A +preparatory-school boy, when off his guard, will often call his mother, +‘Please, matron,’ and will always address any man relation or friend +of the family as ‘Sir,’ as though he were a master. I used to do it. +School life becomes the reality and home life the illusion. In England +parents of the governing classes virtually finish all intimate life +with their children from about the age of eight, and any attempt on +their part to insinuate home feeling into school life is resented.</p> + +<p>Next I went to a typically good school in Sussex. The headmaster was +chary of admitting me at my age, particularly from a school with such a +bad recent history. Family literary connections did the trick, however, +and the headmaster saw that I was advanced enough to win a scholarship +and do the school credit. The depressed state I had been in since the +last school ended the moment I arrived. My younger brother followed me +to this school, being taken <span class="pagenum" id="Page_43" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 43</span>away from the day-school at Wimbledon, +and, later, my youngest brother went there straight from home. How good +and typical the school was can best be seen in the case of my youngest +brother, who is a typical good, normal person, and, as I say, went +straight from home to the school without other school influences. He +spent five or six years there—and played in the elevens—and got the +top scholarship at a public school—and became head boy with athletic +distinctions—and won a scholarship at Oxford and further athletic +distinctions—and a degree—and then what did he do? Because he was such +a typically good normal person he naturally went back as a master to +his old typically good preparatory school, and now that he has been +there some years and wants a change he is applying for a mastership +at his old public school and, if he gets it and becomes a house-master +after a few years, he will at last, I suppose, become a headmaster and +eventually take the next step and become the head of his old college at +Oxford. That is the sort of typically good preparatory school it was. +At this school I learned to keep a straight bat at cricket and to have +a high moral sense, and my fifth different pronunciation of Latin, and +my fifth or sixth different way of doing simple arithmetic. But I did +not mind, and they put me in the top class and I got a scholarship—in +fact I got the first scholarship of the year. At Charterhouse. And why +Charterhouse? Because of ἴστημι and ἵημι. Charterhouse was the only +public school whose scholarship examination did not contain a Greek +grammar paper and, though I was good enough at Greek Unseen and Greek +Composition, I could not conjugate ἴστημι and ἵημι conventionally. If +it had not been for these two verbs I would almost certainly have gone +to the very different atmosphere of Winchester.</p> +</section> + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> + +<section role="doc-chapter" aria-labelledby="c04-hd"> +<div class="chapter"> +<div class="pagenum" id="Page_44" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 44</div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="c04-hd">IV</h2> +</div> + +<p class="chap_start"><b class="smcap">My</b> mother took us abroad to stay at my grandfather’s house in Germany +five times between my second and twelfth year. After this he died +and we never went again. He had a big old manor-house ten miles from +Munich; it was called ‘Laufzorn,’ which means ‘Begone, care!’ Our +summers there were easily the best things of my early childhood. Pine +forests and hot sun, red deer and black and red squirrels, acres of +blue-berries and wild strawberries; nine or ten different kinds of +edible mushrooms that we went into the forest to pick, and unfamiliar +flowers in the fields—Munich is high up and there are outcrops of +Alpine flowers here and there—and the farm with all the usual animals +except sheep, and drives through the countryside in a brake behind my +grandfather’s greys. And bathing in the Iser under a waterfall; the +Iser was bright green and said to be the fastest river in Europe. We +used to visit the uncles who had a peacock farm a few miles away, and +a granduncle, Johannes von Ranke, the ethnologist, who lived on the +lakeshore of Tegensee, where every one had buttercup-blonde hair. And +occasionally my Aunt Agnes, Baronin von Aufsess, who lived some hours +away by train, high up in the Bavarian Alps, in Aufsess Castle.</p> + +<p>This castle was a wonder; it was built in the ninth century and had +been in the von Aufsess family ever since. The original building was +a keep with only a ladder-entrance half-way up. A medieval castle had +been added. Aufsess was so remote that it had never been sacked, and +its treasures of plate and armour were amazing. Each baron added to the +treasure and none took away. My Uncle Siegfried was the heir. He showed +us children the chapel with its walls hung <span class="pagenum" id="Page_45" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 45</span>with enamelled shields +of each Aufsess baron, impaled with the arms of the family into which +he married. These families were always noble. He pointed to a stone +in the floor which pulled up by a ring and said: ‘That is the family +vault where all we Aufsesses go when we die. I’ll go there one day.’ He +scowled comically. (But he was killed in the war as an officer of the +Imperial German Staff and I believe that they never found his body.) He +had a peculiar sense of humour. One day we children found him on the +pebbled garden path, eating the pebbles. He told us to go away, but, of +course, we would not. We sat down and tried to eat pebbles too. He told +us very seriously that eating pebbles was not a thing for children to +do; we should break our teeth. We agreed after trying one or two; so +to get rid of us he found us each a pebble which looked just like all +the other pebbles, but which crushed easily and had a chocolate centre. +But this was only on condition that we went away and left him to his +picking and crunching. When we came back later in the day we searched +and searched, but only found the ordinary hard pebbles. He never once +let us down in a joke.</p> + +<p>Among the treasures of the castle were a baby’s lace cap that had +taken two years to make, and a wine glass that my uncle’s old father, +the reigning baron, had found in the Franco-Prussian War standing +upright in the middle of the square in an entirely ruined village. For +dinner when we were there we had enormous trout. My father, who was a +fisherman, was astonished and asked the baron how they came to be that +size. The baron said that there was an underground river that welled up +close to the castle and the fish that came out with it were quite white +from the darkness, of enormous size and stone-blind. They also gave us +<span class="pagenum" id="Page_46" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 46</span>jam, made of wild roseberries, which they called ‘Hetchi-Petch.’</p> + +<p>The most remarkable thing in the castle was an iron chest in a small +thick-walled white-washed room at the top of the keep. It was a huge +chest, twice the size of the door, and had obviously been made inside +the room—there were no windows but arrow-slits. It had two keys. +I could not say what its date was, but I recall it as twelfth or +thirteenth century work. There was a tradition that it should never be +opened unless the castle were in the most extreme danger. One key was +held by the baron and one by the steward; I believe the stewardship +was a hereditary office. The chest could only be opened by using both +keys, and nobody knew what was inside; it was even considered unlucky +to speculate. Of course we speculated. It might be gold, more likely it +was a store of corn in sealed jars, or even some sort of weapon—Greek +fire, perhaps. From what I know of the Aufsesses and their stewards, it +is inconceivable that the chest ever got the better of their curiosity. +The castle ghost was that of a former baron known as the Red Knight; +his terrifying portrait hung half-way up the turret staircase that took +us to our bedrooms. We slept for the first time in our lives on feather +beds.</p> + +<p>Laufzorn, which my grandfather had bought and restored from a ruinous +state, had nothing to compare with the Aufsess tradition, though it had +for a time been a shooting-lodge of the kings of Bavaria. Still, there +were two ghosts that went with the place; the farm labourers used to +see them frequently. One of them was a carriage which drove furiously +along without any horses, and before the days of motor-cars this was +frightening enough. And the banqueting hall was magnificent. I have +not been there since I was a <span class="pagenum" id="Page_47" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 47</span>child, so it is impossible for me to +recall its true dimensions. It seemed as big as a cathedral, and its +bare boards were only furnished at the four corners with little islands +of tables and chairs. The windows were of stained glass, and there were +swallows’ nests all along where the walls joined the ceiling. Roundels +of coloured light from the stained-glass windows, the many-tined +stags’ heads (that my grandfather had shot) mounted on the wall, +swallow-droppings on the floor under the nests and a little harmonium +in one corner where we sang German songs; these concentrate my memories +of Laufzorn. It was in three divisions. The bottom storey was part of +the farm. A carriage-drive went right through it, and there was also +a wide, covered courtyard—originally these had served for driving the +cattle to safety in times of baronial feud. On one side of the drive +was the estate steward’s quarters, on the other the farm servants’ inn +and kitchen. In the middle storey lived my grandfather and his family. +The top storey was a store-place for corn and apples and other farm +produce. It was up here that my cousin Wilhelm, who was killed in an +air-fight during the war, used to lie for hours shooting mice with an +air-gun. (I learned that he was shot down by a schoolfellow of mine.)</p> + +<p>The best part of Germany was the food. There was a richness and +spiciness about it that we missed in England. We liked the rye +bread, the black honey (black, I believe, because it came from the +combs of the previous year), the huge ice-cream puddings made with +fresh raspberry juice, and the venison, and the honey cakes, and the +pastries, and particularly the sauces made with different sorts of +mushrooms. And the bretzels, and carrots cooked with sugar, and summer +pudding of cranberries and blue-berries. There was an orchard close to +the house, and we could eat as many <span class="pagenum" id="Page_48" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 48</span>apples, pears, and greengages +as we liked. There were rows of blackcurrant and gooseberry bushes. The +estate, in spite of the recency of my grandfather’s tenure, and his +liberalism and experiments in modern agricultural methods, was still +feudalistic. The farm servants, because they talked a dialect that +we could not understand and because they were Catholics and poor and +sweaty and savage-looking, frightened us. They were lower even than the +servants at home; and as for the colony of Italians settled about half +a mile from the house, imported from Italy by my grandfather as cheap +labour for his brick-making factory, we associated them in our minds +with the ‘gypsies in the wood’ of the song. My grandfather took us over +the factory one day; he made me taste a lump of Italian <i>polenta</i>. My +mother told us afterwards (when a milk pudding at Wimbledon came to +table burnt and we complained about it), ‘Those poor Italians at the +factory used to burn their <i>polenta</i> on purpose sometimes just for a +change of flavour.’</p> + +<p>There were other unusual things at Laufzorn. There was a large pond +full of carp; it was netted every three or four years. The last year +we were there we were allowed to help. It was good to see the net +pulled closer and closer to the shallow landing corner. It bulged with +wriggling carp, and a big pike was threshing about among them. I was +allowed to wade in to help, and came out with six leeches, like black +rubber tubes, fastened to my legs; salt had to be put on them to make +them leave go. I do not remember that it hurt much. The farm labourers +were excited, and one of them, called The Jackal, gutted a fish with +his thumbs and ate it raw. And there was the truck line between the +railway station, two miles away, and the brick-yard. There was a fall +of perhaps one in a hundred from the factory to <span class="pagenum" id="Page_49" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 49</span>the station. The +Italians used to load up the trucks with bricks, and a squad of them +would give the trucks a hard push and run along the track pushing for +about twenty or thirty yards; and then the trucks used to sail off +all by themselves to the station. There was a big hay-barn where we +were allowed to climb up on the rafters and jump down into the springy +hay; we gradually increased the height of the jumps. It was exciting +to feel our insides left behind us in the air. Then the cellar, not +the ordinary beer cellar, but another that you went down into from the +courtyard. It was quite dark there except for a little slit-window; and +there was a heap of potatoes on the floor. To get to the light they had +put out long white feelers—a twisted mass. In one corner there was a +dark hole closed by a gate: it was a secret passage out of the house to +a ruined monastery, a mile or two away. My uncles had once been down +some way, but the air got bad and they had to come back. The gate had +been put up to prevent anyone else trying it and being overcome.</p> + +<p>When we drove out with my grandfather he was acclaimed by the principal +personages of every village we went through. At each village there +was a big inn with a rumbling skittle-alley and always a tall Maypole +banded like a barber’s pole with blue and white, the Bavarian national +colours. The roads were lined with fruit trees. The idea of these +unguarded public fruit trees astonished us. We could not understand +why there was any fruit left on them. Even the horse-chestnut trees on +Wimbledon Common were pelted with sticks and stones, long before the +chestnuts were ripe and in defiance of an energetic common keeper. The +only things that we could not quite get accustomed to in Bavaria were +the wayside crucifixes with the realistic blood and wounds, <span class="pagenum" id="Page_50" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 50</span>and +the <i>ex-voto</i> pictures, like sign-boards, of naked souls in purgatory, +grinning with anguish in the middle of high red and yellow flames. We +had been taught to believe in hell, but did not like to be reminded of +it. Munich we found sinister—disgusting fumes of beer and cigar smoke +and intense sounds of eating, the hotly dressed, enormously stout +population in the trams and trains, the ferocious officials, the wanton +crowds at the art shops and picture galleries. Then there was the +Morgue. We were not allowed inside because we were children, but it was +bad enough to be told about it. Any notable who died was taken to the +Morgue and put in a chair, sitting in state for a day or two, and if he +was a general he had his uniform on, or if she was a burgomaster’s wife +she had on her silks and jewels; and strings were tied to their fingers +and the slightest movement of one of the strings would ring a great +bell, in case there was any life left in the corpse after all. I have +never verified the truth of all this, but it was true enough to me. +When my grandfather died about a year after our last visit I thought +of him there in the Morgue with his bushy white hair, and his morning +coat and striped trousers and his decorations and his stethoscope, and +perhaps, I thought, his silk hat, gloves, and cane on a table beside +the chair. Trying, in a nightmare, to be alive but knowing himself dead.</p> + +<p>The headmaster who caned me on the hand was a lover of German culture, +and impressed this feeling on the school, so that it was to my credit +that I could speak German and had been to Germany. At my other +preparatory schools this German connection was regarded as something +at least excusable and perhaps even interesting. It was not until I +went to Charterhouse that I was made to see it as a social offence. My +history from the age of fourteen, when I went <span class="pagenum" id="Page_51" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 51</span>to Charterhouse, to +just before the end of the war, when I began to realize things better, +was a forced rejection of the German in me. In all that first period I +used to insist indignantly that I was Irish and deliberately cultivate +Irish sentiment. I took my self-protective stand on the technical point +that it was the father’s nationality that counted. Of course I also +accepted the whole patriarchal system of things. It is difficult now +to recall how completely I believed in the natural supremacy of male +over female. I never heard it even questioned until I met Nancy, when I +was about twenty-two, towards the end of the war. The surprising sense +of ease that I got from her frank statement of equality between the +sexes was among my chief reasons for liking her. My mother had always +taken the ‘love, honour, and obey’ contract literally; my sisters +were brought up to wish themselves boys, to be shocked at the idea of +woman’s suffrage, and not to expect as expensive an education as their +brothers. The final decision in any domestic matter always rested with +my father. My mother would say: ‘If two ride together one must ride +behind.’ Nancy’s crude summary, ‘God is a man, so it must be all rot,’ +took a load off my shoulders.</p> + +<p>We children did not talk German well; our genders and minor parts of +speech were shaky, and we never learned to read Gothic characters +or script. Yet we had the feel of German so strongly that I would +say now that I know German far better than French, though I can read +French almost as fast as I can read English and can only read a German +book very painfully and slowly, with the help of a dictionary. I use +different parts of my mind for the two languages. French is a surface +acquirement and I could forget it quite easily if I had no reason to +use it every now and then.</p> +</section> + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> + +<section role="doc-chapter" aria-labelledby="c05-hd"> +<div class="chapter"> +<div class="pagenum" id="Page_52" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 52</div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="c05-hd">V</h2> +</div> + +<p class="chap_start"><b class="smcap">I spent</b> a good part of my early life at Wimbledon. My mother and father +did not get rid of the house, a big one near the Common, until some +time about the end of the war; yet of all the time I spent in it I can +recall little or nothing of significance. But after the age of eleven +or twelve I was away at school, and in the spring and summer holidays +we were all in the country, so that I was only at Wimbledon in the +Christmas holidays and for a day or two at the beginning and end of +the other holidays. London was only a half-hour away and yet we seldom +went there. My mother and father never took us to the theatre, not even +to pantomimes, and until the middle of the war I had only been to the +theatre twice in my life, and then only to children’s plays, taken by +an aunt. My mother wished to bring us up to be serious and to benefit +humanity in some practical way. She allowed us no hint of its dirtiness +and intrigue and lustfulness, believing that innocence was the surest +protection against them. Our reading was carefully censored by her. +I was destined to be ‘if not a great man at least a good man.’ Our +treats were educational or æsthetic, to Kew Gardens, Hampton Court, +the Zoo, the British Museum, or the Natural History Museum. I remember +my mother, in the treasure room at the British Museum, telling us with +shining eyes that all these treasures were ours. We looked at her +astonished. She said: ‘Yes, they belong to us as members of the public. +We can look at them, admire them, and study them for as long as we +like. If we had them back at home we couldn’t do more.’</p> + +<p>We read more books than most children do. There must have been +four or five thousand books in the house. They <span class="pagenum" id="Page_53" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 53</span>consisted of an +old-fashioned scholar’s library bequeathed to my father by my namesake, +whom I have mentioned as a friend of Wordsworth, but who had a far more +tender friendship with Felicia Hemans; to this was added my father’s +own collection of books, mostly poetry, with a particular cupboard for +Anglo-Irish literature; devotional works contributed by my mother; +educational books sent to my father by their publishers in the hope +that he would recommend them for use in Government schools; and novels +and adventure books brought into the house by my elder brothers and +sisters.</p> + +<p>My mother used to tell us stories about inventors and doctors who gave +their lives for the suffering, and poor boys who struggled to the top +of the tree, and saintly men who made examples of themselves. There +was also the parable of the king who had a very beautiful garden which +he threw open to the public. Two students entered; and one, who was +the person of whom my mother spoke with a slight sneer in her voice, +noticed occasional weeds even in the tulip-beds, but the other, and +there she brightened up, found beautiful flowers growing even on +rubbish heaps. She kept off the subject of war as much as possible; she +always had difficulty in explaining to us how it was that God permitted +wars. The Boer War clouded my early childhood; Philip, my eldest +brother (who also called himself a Fenian), was a pro-Boer and there +was great tension at the breakfast-table between him and my father, +whose political views were always orthodox.</p> + +<p>The sale of the Wimbledon house solved a good many problems; it was +getting too full. My mother hated throwing away anything that could +possibly, in the most remote contingency, be of any service to anyone. +The medicine <span class="pagenum" id="Page_54" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 54</span>cupboard was perhaps the most significant corner +of the house. Nobody could say that it was untidy, exactly; all the +bottles had stoppers, but they were so crowded together that it was +impossible for anybody except my mother, who had a long memory, to +know what was at the back. Every few years, no doubt, she went through +this cupboard. If there was any doubtful bottle she would tentatively +re-label it. ‘This must be Alfred’s old bunion salve,’ and another, +‘Strychnine—query?’ Even special medicines prescribed for scarlet-fever +or whooping-cough were kept, in case of re-infection. She was always +an energetic labeller. She wrote in one of my school prizes: ‘Robert +Ranke Graves won this book as a prize for being first in his class +in the term’s work and second in examinations. He also won a special +prize for divinity, though the youngest boy in the class. Written by +his affectionate mother, Amy Graves. Summer, 1908.’ Home-made jam +used always to arrive at table well labelled; one small pot read: +‘Gooseberry, lemon and rhubarb—a little shop gooseberry added—Nelly +re-boiled.’</p> + +<p>In a recent book, <cite><abbr>Mrs.</abbr> Fisher</cite>, I moralized on three sayings and +a favourite story of my mother’s. I ascribed them there for the +argument’s sake to my Danish grandmother. They were these:</p> + +<blockquote> +<p>‘Children, I command you, as your mother, never to swing objects +around in your hands. The King of Hanover put out his eye by swinging +a bead purse.’</p> + +<p>‘Children, I command you, as your mother, to be careful when you +carry your candles up to bed. The candle is a little cup of grease.’</p> + +<p>‘There was a man once, a Frenchman, who died of grief because he +could never become a mother.’</p> +</blockquote> + +<p class="noindent"><span class="pagenum" id="Page_55" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 55</span>And the story told in candlelight:</p> + +<blockquote> +<p>‘There was once a peasant family living in Schleswig-Holstein, where +they all have crooked mouths, and one night they wished to blow out +the candle. The father’s mouth was twisted to the left, so! and he +tried to blow out the candle, so! but he was too proud to stand +anywhere but directly before the candle, and he puffed and he puffed, +but could not blow the candle out. And then the mother tried, but her +mouth was twisted to the right, so! and she tried to blow, so! and +she was too proud to stand anywhere but directly before the candle, +and she puffed and puffed, but could not blow the candle out. Then +there was the brother with mouth twisted outward, so! and the sister +with the mouth twisted downward, so! and they tried each in their +turn, so! and so! and the idiot baby with his mouth twisted in an +eternal grin tried, so! And at last the maid, a beautiful girl from +Copenhagen with a perfectly formed mouth, put it out with her shoe. +So! Flap!’</p> +</blockquote> + +<p>These quotations make it clear how much more I owe, as a writer, to +my mother than to my father. She also taught me to ‘speak the truth +and shame the devil!’ Her favourite biblical exhortation was ‘My son, +whatever thy hand findeth to do, do it with all thy might.’</p> + +<p>I always felt that Wimbledon was a wrong place, neither town nor +country. It was at its worst on Wednesdays, my mother’s ‘At Home’ day. +Tea was in the drawing-room. We were called down in our Sunday clothes +to eat cakes, be kissed, and be polite. My sisters were made to recite. +Around Christmas, celebrated in the German style, came a dozen or so +children’s parties; we used to make ourselves sick with <span class="pagenum" id="Page_56" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 56</span>excitement. +I do not like thinking of Wimbledon. Every spring and summer after my +third year, unless we happened to go to Germany, or to France as we did +once, we went to Harlech in North Wales. My mother had built a house +there.</p> + +<p>In the days before motor traffic began around the North Welsh coast, +Harlech was a very quiet place and little known, even as a golf centre. +It was in three parts. First, the village itself, five hundred feet +up on a steep range of hills; it had granite houses with slate roofs +and ugly windows and gables, chapels of seven or eight different +denominations, enough shops to make it the shopping centre of the +smaller villages around, and the castle, a favourite playground of +ours. Then there was the Morfa, a flat plain from which the sea +had receded; part of this was the golf links, but to the north was +a stretch of wild country which we used to visit in the spring in +search of plovers’ eggs. The sea was beyond the links—good hard sand +stretching for miles, safe bathing, and sandhills for hide and seek.</p> + +<p>The third part of Harlech, which became the most important to us, was +never visited by golfers or the few other summer visitors or by the +village people themselves; this was the desolate rocky hill-country at +the back of the village. As we grew older we spent more and more of +our time up there and less and less on the beach and the links, which +were the most obvious attractions of the place. There were occasional +farms, or rather crofts, in these hills, but one could easily walk +fifteen or twenty miles without crossing a road or passing close to a +farm. Originally we went up there with some practical excuse. For the +blue-berries on the hills near Maesygarnedd; or for the cranberries +at Gwlawllyn; or to find bits of Roman hypocaust tiling (with the +<span class="pagenum" id="Page_57" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 57</span>potter’s thumb-marks still on them) in the ruined Roman villas by +Castell Tomenymur; or for globe-flowers in the upper Artro; or to catch +a sight of the wild goats that lived at the back of Rhinog Fawr, the +biggest of the hills of the next range; or to get raspberries from the +thickets near Cwmbychan Lake; or to find white heather on a hill that +we did not know the name of away to the north of the Roman Steps. But +after a time we walked about those hills simply because they were good +to walk about on. They had a penny plain quality about them that was +even better that the twopence coloured quality of the Bavarian Alps. My +best friend at the time was my sister Rosaleen, who was one year older +than myself.</p> + +<p>I suppose what I liked about this country (and I know no country like +it) was its independence of formal nature. The passage of the seasons +was hardly noticed there; the wind always seemed to be blowing and the +grass always seemed to be withered and the small streams were always +cold and clear, running over black stones. Sheep were the only animals +about, but they were not nature, except in the lambing season; they +were too close to the granite boulders covered with grey lichen that +lay about everywhere. There were few trees except a few nut bushes, +rowans, stunted oaks and thorn bushes in the valleys. The winters were +always mild, so that last year’s bracken and last year’s heather lasted +in a faded way through to the next spring. There were almost no birds +except an occasional buzzard and curlews crying in the distance; and +wherever we went we felt that the rocky skeleton of the hill was only +an inch or two under the turf. Once, when I came home on leave from the +war, I spent about a week of my ten days walking about on these hills +to restore my sanity. I tried to do the same after <span class="pagenum" id="Page_58" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 58</span>I was wounded, +but by that time the immediate horror of death was too strong for the +indifference of the hills to relieve it.</p> + +<p>I am glad that it was Wales and not Ireland. We never went to Ireland, +except once when I was an infant in arms. We had no Welsh blood in us +and did not like the Harlech villagers much. We had no temptation to +learn Welsh or to pretend ourselves Welsh. We knew that country as a +quite ungeographical region; any stray sheep-farmers that we met who +belonged to the place we resented somehow as intruders on our privacy. +Clarissa, Rosaleen and I were once out on the remotest hills and had +not seen a soul all day. At last we came to a waterfall and two trout +lying on the bank beside it; ten yards away was the fisherman. He was +disentangling his line from a thorn-bush and had not seen us. So we +crept up quietly to the fish and put a sprig of white bell-heather +(which we had found that afternoon) in the mouth of each. We hurried +back to cover, and I said: ‘Shall we watch?’ but Clarissa said: ‘No, +don’t spoil it.’ So we came home and never spoke of it again even +to each other: and never knew the sequel.... If it had been Ireland +we would have self-consciously learned Irish and the local legends. +Instead we came to know the country more purely, as a place whose +history was too old for local legends; when we were up walking there +we made our own. We decided who was buried under the Standing Stone +and who had lived in the ruined round-hut encampment and in the caves +of the valley where the big rowans were. On our visits to Germany +I had felt a sense of home in my blood in a natural human way, but +on the hills behind Harlech I found a personal harmony independent +of history or geography. The first poem I wrote as myself concerned +that hill-country. <span class="pagenum" id="Page_59" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 59</span>(The first poem I wrote as a Graves was a free +translation of a satire by Catullus).</p> + +<p>My father was always too busy and absent-minded to worry much about us +children; my mother did worry. Yet she allowed us to go off immediately +after breakfast into the hills and did not complain much when we came +back long after supper-time. Though she had a terror of heights herself +she never restrained us from climbing about in dangerous places; so +we never got hurt. I had a bad head for heights and trained myself +deliberately and painfully to overcome it. We used to go climbing in +the turrets and towers of Harlech Castle. I have worked hard on myself +in defining and dispersing terrors. The simple fear of heights was the +most obvious to overcome. There was a quarry-face in the garden of +our Harlech house. It provided one or two easy climbs, but gradually +I invented more and more difficult ones for myself. After each new +success I had to lie down, shaking with nervousness, in the safe meadow +grass at the top. Once I lost my foothold on a ledge and should have +been killed; but it seemed as though I improvised a foothold in the +air and kicked myself up to safety from it. When I examined the place +afterwards it was almost as if the Devil had given me what he had +offered Christ in the Temptation, the freedom to cast myself down from +the rock and be restored to safety by the angels. Yet such events are +not uncommon in mountain climbing. George Mallory, for instance, did +an inexplicable climb on Snowdon once. He had left his pipe on a ledge +half-way down one of the precipices and scrambled back by a short cut +to retrieve it, then up again by the same way. No one saw just how +he did the climb, but when they came to examine it the next day for +official record, they found that it was an impossible overhang nearly +all the way. <span class="pagenum" id="Page_60" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 60</span>The rule of the Climbers’ Club was that climbs should +not be called after their inventors, but after natural features. An +exception was made in this case; the climb was recorded something +like this: ‘<b class="italic">Mallory’s Pipe</b>, a variation on Route 2; see adjoining +map. This climb is totally impossible. It has been performed once, in +failing light, by Mr. <abbr>G. H. L.</abbr> Mallory.’</p> +</section> + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> + +<section role="doc-chapter" aria-labelledby="c06-hd"> +<div class="chapter"> +<div class="pagenum" id="Page_61" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 61</div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="c06-hd">VI</h2> +</div> + +<p class="chap_start"><b class="smcap">About</b> Charterhouse. Let me begin by recalling my feelings on the day +that I left, about a week before the outbreak of war. I discussed them +with a friend who felt much as I did. First we said that there were +perhaps even more typical public schools than Charterhouse at the +time, but that this was difficult to believe. Next, that there was no +possible remedy, because tradition was so strong that if one wished +to break it one would have to dismiss the whole school and staff and +start all over again. But that even this would not be enough, for the +school buildings were so impregnated with what was called the public +school spirit, but what we felt as fundamental badness, that they +would have to be demolished and the school rebuilt elsewhere and its +name changed. Next, that our only regret at leaving the place was that +for the last year we had been in a position as members of Sixth Form +to do more or less what we pleased. Now we were both going on to St. +John’s College, Oxford, which seemed by reputation to be merely a more +boisterous repetition of Charterhouse. We would be freshmen there, and +would naturally refuse to be hearty and public school-ish, and there +would be all the stupidity of having our rooms raided and being forced +to lose our temper and hurt somebody and be hurt ourselves. And there +would be no peace probably until we got into our third year, when we +would be back again in the same sort of position as now, and in the +same sort of position as in our last year at our preparatory school. +‘In 1917,’ said Nevill, ‘the official seal will be out on all this +dreariness. We’ll get our degrees, and then we’ll have to start as new +boys again in some dreary profession. My God,’ he said, turning to +me suddenly, ‘I can’t stand <span class="pagenum" id="Page_62" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 62</span>the idea of it. I must put something +in between me and Oxford. I must at least go abroad for the whole +vacation.’ I did not feel that three months was long enough. I had a +vague intention of running away to sea. ‘Do you realize,’ he said to +me, ‘that we have spent fourteen years of our life principally at Latin +and Greek, not even competently taught, and that we are going to start +another three years of the same thing?’ But, when we had said our very +worst of Charterhouse, I said to him or he said to me, I forget which: +‘Of course, the trouble is that in the school at any given time there +are always at least two really decent masters among the forty or fifty, +and ten really decent fellows among <span class="corr" id="corr62" title="Source: the the">the</span> five or six hundred. We +will remember them, and have Lot’s feeling about not damning Sodom for +the sake of ten just persons. And in another twenty years’ time we’ll +forget this conversation and think that we were mistaken, and that +perhaps everybody, with a few criminal exceptions, was fairly average +decent, and we’ll say “I was a young fool then, insisting on impossible +perfection,” and we’ll send our sons to Charterhouse sentimentally, +and they’ll go through all we did.’ I do not wish this to be construed +as an attack on my old school, but merely as a record of my feelings +at the time. No doubt I was unappreciative of the hard knocks and +character-training that public schools are supposed to provide, and as +a typical Old Carthusian remarked to me recently: ‘The whole moral tone +of the school has improved out of all recognition since those days.’</p> + +<p>As a matter of fact I did not go up to Oxford until five years later, +in 1919, when my brother, four years younger than myself, was already +in residence, and I did not take my degree until 1926, at the same time +as the brother who was eight years younger than myself. Oxford was +extraordinarily <span class="pagenum" id="Page_63" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 63</span>kind to me. I did no Latin or Greek there, though +I had a Classical Exhibition. I did not sit for a single examination. +I never had rooms at St. John’s, though I used to go there to draw +a Government grant for tuition fees. I lived outside the University +three-mile radius. For my last two undergraduate years I did not even +have a tutor. I have a warm feeling for Oxford. Its rules and statutes, +though apparently cast-iron, are ready for emergencies. In my case, at +any rate, a poet was an emergency.</p> + +<p>Whenever I come to the word ‘Charterhouse’ in this story I find myself +escaping into digressions, but I suppose that I must get through with +it. From the moment I arrived at the school I suffered an oppression +of spirit that I hesitate now to recall in its full intensity. It +was something like being in that chilly cellar at Laufzorn among the +potatoes, but being a potato out of a different bag from the rest. +The school consisted of about six hundred boys. The chief interests +were games and romantic friendships. School-work was despised by every +one; the scholars, of whom there were about fifty in the school at +any given time, were not concentrated in a single dormitory-house as +at Winchester, but divided among ten. They were known as ‘pro’s,’ and +unless they were good at games and willing to pretend that they hated +work as much as or more than the non-scholars, and ready whenever +called on to help these with their work, they usually had a bad +time. I was a scholar and really liked work, and I was surprised and +disappointed at the apathy of the class-rooms. My first term I was +left alone more or less, it being a school convention that new boys +should be neither encouraged nor baited. The other boys seldom spoke +to them except to send them on errands, or to inform them of breaches +of school convention. But my second term the trouble began. There +<span class="pagenum" id="Page_64" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 64</span>were a number of things that naturally made for my unpopularity. +Besides being a scholar and not outstandingly good at games, I was +always short of pocket-money. I could not conform to the social custom +of treating my contemporaries to food at the school shop, and because +I could not treat them I could not accept their treating. My clothes +were all wrong; they conformed outwardly to the school pattern, but +they were ready-made and not of the best-quality cloth that the other +boys all wore. Even so, I had not been taught how to make the best of +them. Neither my mother nor my father had any regard for the niceties +of modern dress, and my elder brothers were abroad by this time. The +other boys in my house, except for five scholars, were nearly all the +sons of business men; it was a class of whose interests and prejudices +I knew nothing, having hitherto only met boys of the professional +class. And I talked too much for their liking. A further disability was +that I was as prudishly innocent as my mother had planned I should be. +I knew nothing about simple sex, let alone the many refinements of sex +constantly referred to in school conversation. My immediate reaction +was one of disgust. I wanted to run away.</p> + +<p>The most unfortunate disability of all was that my name appeared on the +school list as ‘<abbr>R.</abbr> von <abbr>R.</abbr> Graves.’ I had only known hitherto that my +second name was Ranke; the ‘von,’ discovered on my birth certificate, +was disconcerting. Carthusians were secretive about their second names; +if these were fancy ones they usually managed to conceal them. Ranke, +without the ‘von’ I could no doubt have passed off as monosyllabic and +English, but ‘von Ranke’ was glaring. The business class to which most +of the boys belonged was strongly feeling at this time the threat and +even the necessity of a trade war; ‘German’ meant ‘dirty German.’ It +meant <span class="pagenum" id="Page_65" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 65</span>‘cheap shoddy goods competing with our sterling industries,’ +and it also meant military menace, Prussianism, sabre-rattling. There +was another boy in my house with a German name, but English by birth +and upbringing. He was treated much as I was. On the other hand a +French boy in the house was very popular, though he was not much good +at games; King Edward VII had done his <i lang="fr">entente</i> work very thoroughly. +There was also considerable anti-Jewish feeling (the business prejudice +again) and the legend was put about that I was not only a German but a +German-Jew.</p> + +<p>Of course I always maintained that I was Irish. This claim was resented +by an Irish boy who had been in the house about a year and a half +longer than myself. He went out of his way to hurt me, not only by +physical acts of spite, like throwing ink over my school-books, hiding +my games-clothes, setting on me suddenly from behind corners, pouring +water over me at night, but by continually forcing his bawdy humour +on my prudishness and inviting everybody to laugh at my disgust; he +also built up a sort of humorous legend of my hypocrisy and concealed +depravity. I came near a nervous breakdown. School morality prevented +me from informing the house-master of my troubles. The house-monitors +were supposed to keep order and preserve the moral tone of the house, +but at this time they were not the sort to interfere in any case of +bullying among the juniors. I tried violent resistance, but as the odds +were always heavily against me this merely encouraged the ragging. +Complete passive resistance would probably have been better. I only got +accustomed to bawdy-talk in my last two years at Charterhouse, and it +was not until I had been some time in the army that I got hardened to +it and could reply in kind to insults.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_66" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 66</span>A former headmaster of Charterhouse, an innocent man, is reported +to have said at a Headmasters’ Conference: ‘My boys are amorous but +seldom erotic.’ Few cases of eroticism indeed ever came to his notice; +there were not more than five or six big rows all the time I was at +Charterhouse and expulsions were rare. But the house-masters knew +little about what went on in their houses; their living quarters +were removed from the boys’. There was a true distinction between +‘amorousness,’ by which the headmaster meant a sentimental falling +in love with younger boys, and eroticism, which was adolescent lust. +The intimacy, as the newspapers call it, that frequently took place +was practically never between an elder boy and the object of his +affection, for that would have spoilt the romantic illusion, which was +heterosexually cast. It was between boys of the same age who were not +in love, but used each other coldly as convenient sex-instruments. So +the atmosphere was always heavy with romance of a very conventional +early-Victorian type, yet complicated by cynicism and foulness.</p> +</section> + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> + +<section role="doc-chapter" aria-labelledby="c07-hd"> +<div class="chapter"> +<div class="pagenum" id="Page_67" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 67</div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="c07-hd">VII</h2> +</div> + +<p class="chap_start"><b class="smcap">Half-way</b> through my second year I wrote to my parents to tell them that +I must leave Charterhouse, because I could not stand life there any +longer. I told them that the house was making it plain that I did not +belong and that it did not want me. I gave them details, in confidence, +to make them take my demand seriously. They were unable to respect this +confidence, considering that it was their religious duty to inform +the house-master of all I had written them. They did not even tell me +what they were doing; they contented themselves with visiting me and +giving me assurances of the power of prayer and faith; telling me that +I must endure all for the sake of ... I have forgotten what exactly. +Fortunately I had not given them any account of sex-irregularities in +the house, so all that the house-master did was to make a speech that +night after prayers deterrent of bullying in general; he told us that +he had just had a complaint from a boy’s parents. He made it plain at +the same time how much he disliked informers and outside interference +in affairs of the house. My name was not mentioned, but the visit of +my parents on a day not a holiday had been noticed and commented on. +So I had to stay on and be treated as an informer. I was now in the +upper school and so had a study of my own. But this was no security; +studies had no locks. It was always being wrecked. After my parents’ +visit to the house-master it was not even possible for me to use the +ordinary house changing-room; I had to remove my games-clothes to a +disused shower-bath. My heart went wrong then; the school doctor said I +was not to play football. This was low water. My last resource was to +sham insanity. It succeeded unexpectedly well. Soon <span class="pagenum" id="Page_68" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 68</span>nobody troubled +about me except to avoid any contact with me.</p> + +<p>I must make clear that I am not charging my parents with treachery; +they were trying to help me. Their honour is beyond reproach.... One +day I went down to Charterhouse by the special train from Waterloo +to Godalming. I was too late to take a ticket; I just got into a +compartment before the train started. The railway company had not +provided enough coaches, so I had to stand up all the way. At Godalming +station the crowd of boys rushing out into the station-yard to secure +taxis swept me past the ticket collectors, so I had got my very +uncomfortable ride free. I mentioned this in my next letter home, just +for something to say, and my father sent me a letter of reproach. He +said that he had himself made a special visit to Waterloo Station, +bought a ticket to Godalming, and torn it up.... My mother was even +more scrupulous. A young couple on their honeymoon once happened to +stop the night with us at Wimbledon, and left behind them a packet of +sandwiches, some of which had already been eaten. My mother sent them +on.</p> + +<p>Being thrown entirely on myself I began to write poetry. This was +considered stronger proof of insanity than the formal straws I wore +in my hair. The poetry I wrote was not the easy showing-off witty +stuff that all the Graves’ write and have written for the last couple +of centuries. It was poetry that was dissatisfied with itself. When, +later, things went better with me at Charterhouse, I became literary +once more.</p> + +<p>I sent one of my poems to the school magazine, <cite>The Carthusian</cite>. On +the strength of it I was invited to join the school Poetry Society. +This was a most anomalous organization <span class="pagenum" id="Page_69" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 69</span>for Charterhouse. It consisted +of seven members. The meetings, for the reading and discussion of +poetry, were held once a month at the house of Guy Kendall, then +a form-master at the school, now headmaster of University College +School at Hampstead. The members were four sixth-form boys and two +boys a year and a half older than myself, one of whom was called +Raymond Rodakowski. None of them were in the same house as myself. At +Charterhouse no friendship was permitted between boys of different +houses or of different years beyond a formal acquaintance at work +or organized games like cricket and football. It was, for instance, +impossible for boys of different houses, though related or next-door +neighbours at home, even to play a friendly game of tennis or +squash-racquets together. They would never have heard the last of +it. So the friendship that began between me and Raymond was most +unconventional. Coming home one evening from a meeting of the society +I told Raymond about life in the house; I told him what had happened +a week or two before. My study had been raided and one of my more +personal poems had been discovered and pinned up on the public notice +board in ‘Writing School.’ This was the living-room of the members of +the lower school, into which, as a member of the upper school, I was +not allowed to go, and so could not rescue the poem. Raymond was the +first person I had been able to talk to humanly. He was indignant, and +took my arm in his in the gentlest way. ‘They are bloody barbarians,’ +he said. He told me that I must pull myself together and do something +about it, because I was a good poet, he said, and a good person. I +loved him for that. He said: ‘You’re not allowed to play football; why +don’t you box? It’s supposed to be good for the heart.’ So I laughed +and said I would. Then Raymond <span class="pagenum" id="Page_70" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 70</span>said: ‘I expect they rag you about +your initials.’ ‘Yes,’ I said, ‘they call me a dirty German.’ ‘I had +trouble, too,’ he said, ‘before I took up boxing.’ Raymond’s mother was +Scottish, his father was an Austrian Pole.</p> + +<p>Very few boys at Charterhouse boxed and the boxing-room, which was over +the school confectionery shop, was a good place to meet Raymond, whom, +otherwise, I would not have been able to see often. I began boxing +seriously and savagely. Raymond said to me: ‘You know these cricketers +and footballers are all afraid of boxers, almost superstitious. +They won’t box themselves for fear of losing their good looks—the +inter-house competitions every year are such bloody affairs. But do you +remember the Mansfield, Waller and Taylor show? That’s a good tradition +to keep up.’</p> + +<p>Of course I remembered. Two terms previously there had been a meeting +of the school debating society which I had attended. The committee +of the debating society was usually made up of sixth-form boys; the +debates were formal and usually dull, but in so far as there was any +intellectual life at Charterhouse, it was represented by the debating +society—and by <cite>The Carthusian</cite>, always edited by two members of this +committee; both institutions were free from influence of the masters. +Debates were always held in the school library on Saturday night. +One debate night the usual decorous conventions were broken by an +invasion of ‘the bloods.’ The bloods were the members of the cricket +and football elevens. They were the ruling caste at Charterhouse; +the eleventh man in the football eleven, though a member of the +under-fourth form, had a great deal more prestige than the most +brilliant classical scholar in the sixth. Even ‘Head of the School’ was +an empty title. There was not, <span class="pagenum" id="Page_71" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 71</span>however, an open warfare between +the sixth-form intellectuals and the bloods. The bloods were stupid +and knew it, and had nothing to gain by a clash; the intellectuals +were happy to be left alone. So this invasion of the bloods, who had +just returned from winning a match against the <i>Casuals</i>, and had +probably been drinking, caused the debating society a good deal of +embarrassment. The bloods disturbed the meeting by cheers and cat-cries +and slamming the library magazine-folders on the table. Mansfield, as +president of the society, called them to order, but they continued +the disturbance; so Mansfield closed the debate. The bloods thought +the incident finished, but it was not. A letter appeared in <cite>The +Carthusian</cite> a few days later protesting against the bad behaviour in +the debating society of ‘certain First Eleven babies.’ Three sets of +initials were signed and they were those of Mansfield, Waller and +Taylor. The school was astonished by this suicidally daring act; it +waited for Korah, Dathan and Abiram to be swallowed up. The captain of +football is said to have sworn that he’d chuck the three signatories +into the fountain in Founder’s Court. But somehow he did not. The fact +was that this happened early in the autumn term and there were only +two other First Eleven colours left over from the preceding year; new +colours were only given gradually as the football season advanced. The +other rowdies had only been embryo bloods. So it was a matter entirely +between these three sixth-form intellectuals and the three colours of +the First Eleven. And the First Eleven were uncomfortably aware that +Mansfield was the heavy-weight boxing champion of the school, Waller +the runner-up for the middle-weights, and that Taylor was also a person +to be reckoned with (a tough fellow, though not perhaps a boxer—I +forget). While the First Eleven were <span class="pagenum" id="Page_72" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 72</span>wondering what on earth to do +their three opponents decided to take the war into the enemy’s country.</p> + +<p>The social code of Charterhouse was based on a very strict caste +system; the caste-marks were slight distinctions in dress. A new +boy had no privileges at all; a boy in his second term might wear a +knitted tie instead of a plain one; a boy in his second year might +wear coloured socks; third year gave most of the privileges—turned +down collars, coloured handkerchiefs, a coat with a long roll, and so +on; fourth year, a few more, such as the right to get up raffles; but +very peculiar and unique distinctions were reserved for the bloods. +These included light grey flannel trousers, butterfly collars, coats +slit up the back, and the privilege of walking arm-in-arm. So the next +Sunday Mansfield, Waller and Taylor did the bravest thing that was ever +done at Charterhouse. The school chapel service was at eleven in the +morning, but the custom was for the school to be in its seats by five +minutes to eleven and to sit waiting there. At two minutes to eleven +the bloods used to stalk in; at one and a half minutes to came the +masters; at one minute to came the choir in its surplices; then the +headmaster arrived and the service started. If any boy was accidentally +late and sneaked in between five minutes to and two minutes to the +hour, he was followed by six hundred pairs of eyes; there was nudging +and giggling and he would not hear the last of it for a long time; it +was as though he were pretending to be a blood. On this Sunday, then, +when the bloods had come in with their usual swaggering assurance, an +extraordinary thing happened.</p> + +<p>The three sixth-formers slowly walked up the aisle magnificent in grey +flannel trousers, slit coats, First Eleven collars, and with pink +carnations in their buttonholes. It is <span class="pagenum" id="Page_73" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 73</span>impossible to describe the +astonishment and terror that this spectacle caused. Everyone looked at +the captain of the First Eleven; he had gone quite white. But by this +time the masters had come in, followed by the choir, and the opening +hymn, though raggedly sung, ended the tension. When chapel emptied +it always emptied according to ‘school order,’ that is, according to +position in work; the sixth form went out first. The bloods were not +high in school order, so Mansfield, Waller and Taylor had the start of +them. After chapel on Sunday the custom in the winter terms was for +people to meet and gossip in the school library; so it was here that +Mansfield, Waller and Taylor went. They had buttonholed a talkative +master and drawn him with them into the library, and there they kept +him talking until dinnertime. If the bloods had had courage to do +anything desperate they would have had to do it at once, but they +could not make a scene in the presence of a master. Mansfield, Waller +and Taylor went down to their houses for dinner still talking to the +master. After this they kept together as much as possible and the +school, particularly the lower school, which had always chafed under +the dress regulations, made heroes of them, and began scoffing at the +bloods as weak-kneed.</p> + +<p>Finally the captain of the eleven was stupid enough to complain to +the headmaster about this breach of school conventions, asking for +permission to enforce First Eleven rights by disciplinary measures. The +headmaster, who was a scholar and disliked the games tradition, refused +his request. He said that the sixth form deserved as distinctive +privileges as the First Eleven. The sixth form would therefore in +future be entitled to hold what they had assumed. After this the +prestige of the bloods declined greatly.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_74" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 74</span>At Raymond’s encouragement I pulled myself together and my third +year found things very much easier for me. My chief persecutor, +the Irishman, had left. It was said that he had had a bad nervous +breakdown. He wrote me a hysterical letter, demanding my forgiveness +for his treatment of me, saying at the same time that if I did not give +this forgiveness, one of his friends (whom he mentioned) was still in +the house to persecute me. I did not answer the letter. I do not know +what happened to him. The friend never bothered.</p> +</section> + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> + +<section role="doc-chapter" aria-labelledby="c08-hd"> +<div class="chapter"> +<div class="pagenum" id="Page_75" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 75</div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="c08-hd">VIII</h2> +</div> + +<p class="chap_start"><b class="smcap">I still</b> had no friends except among the junior members of the house, +to whom I did not disguise my dislike of the seniors; I found the +juniors were on the whole a decent lot of fellows. Towards the end of +this year, in the annual boxing and gymnastic display, I fought three +rounds with Raymond. There is a lot of sex feeling in boxing—the dual +play, the reciprocity, the pain not felt as pain. This exhibition match +to me had something of the quality that Dr. Marie Stopes would call +sacramental. We were out neither to hurt nor win though we hit each +other hard.</p> + +<p>This public appearance as a boxer improved my position in the house. +And the doctor now allowed me to play football again and I played +it fairly well. Then things started going wrong in a different way. +It began with confirmation, for which I was prepared by a zealous +evangelical master. For a whole term I concentrated all my thoughts on +religion, looking forward to the ceremony as a spiritual climax. When +it came, and the Holy Ghost did not descend in the form of a dove, and +I did not find myself gifted with tongues, and nothing spectacular +happened (except that the boy whom the Bishop of Zululand was blessing +at the same time as myself slipped off the narrow footstool on which +we were both kneeling), I was bound to feel a reaction. Raymond had +not been confirmed, and I was astonished to hear him admit and even +boast that he was an atheist. I argued with him about the existence of +God and the divinity of Christ and the necessity of the Trinity. He +said, of the Trinity, that anybody who could agree with the Athanasian +creed that ‘whoever will be saved must confess that there are not Three +Incomprehensibles but One Incomprehensible’ was saying <span class="pagenum" id="Page_76" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 76</span>that a man +must go to Hell if he does not believe something that is by definition +impossible to understand. He said that his respect for himself as a +reasonable being did not allow him to believe such things. He also +asked me a question: ‘What’s the good of having a soul if you have a +mind. What’s the function of the soul? It seems a mere pawn in the +game.’ I was shocked, but because I loved him and respected him I felt +bound to find an answer. The more I thought about it the less certain I +became that he was wrong. So in order not to prejudice religion (and I +put religion and my chances of salvation before human love) I at first +broke my friendship with Raymond entirely. Later I weakened, but he +would not even meet me, when I approached him, with any broad-church +compromise. He was a complete and ruthless atheist and I could not +appreciate his strength of spirit. For the rest of our time at +Charterhouse we were not as close as we should have been. I met Raymond +in France in 1917, when he was with the Irish Guards; I rode over to +see him one afternoon and felt as close to him as I had ever felt. He +was killed at Cambrai not long after.</p> + +<p>My feeling for Raymond was more comradely than amorous. In my fourth +year an even stronger relationship started. It was with a boy three +years younger than myself, who was exceptionally intelligent and +fine-spirited. Call him Dick, because his real name was the same as +that of another person in the story. He was not in my house, but +I had recently joined the school choir and so had he, and I had +opportunities for speaking to him occasionally after choir practice. +I was unconscious of sexual feeling for him. Our conversations were +always impersonal. Our acquaintance was commented on and I was warned +by one of the masters to end it. I replied that I would not have +my <span class="pagenum" id="Page_77" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 77</span>friendships in any way limited. I pointed out that this boy +was interested in the same things as myself, particularly in books; +that the disparity in our ages was unfortunate, but that a lack of +intelligence among the boys of my own age made it necessary for me to +find friends where I could. Finally the headmaster took me to task +about it. I lectured him on the advantage of friendship between elder +and younger boys, citing Plato, the Greek poets, Shakespeare, Michael +Angelo and others, who had felt the same way as I did. He let me go +without taking any action.</p> + +<p>In my fifth year I was in the sixth form and was made a house-monitor. +There were six house-monitors. One of them was the house games-captain, +a friendly, easy-going fellow. He said to me one day: ‘Look here, +Graves, I have been asked to send in a list of competitors for the +inter-house boxing competition; shall I put your name down?’ I had not +boxed for two terms. I had been busy with football and played for the +house-team now. And since my coolness with Raymond boxing had lost its +interest. I said: ‘I’m not boxing these days.’ ‘Well,’ he said, ‘young +Alan is entering for the welter-weights. He’s got a very good chance. +Why don’t you enter for the welter-weights too? You might be able to +damage one or two of the stronger men and make it easier for him.’ I +did not particularly like the idea of making things easier for Alan, +but I obviously had to enter the competition. I had a reputation to +keep up. I knew, however, that my wind, though all right for football, +was not equal to boxing round after round. I decided that my fights +must be short. The night before the competition I smuggled a bottle of +cherry-whisky into the house. I would shorten the fights on that.</p> + +<p>I had never drank anything alcoholic before in my life. <span class="pagenum" id="Page_78" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 78</span>When I was +seven years old I was prevailed on to sign the pledge. My pledge card +bound me to abstain by the grace of God from all spirituous liquors +so long as I retained it. But my mother took the card from me and put +it safely in the box-room with the Jacobean silver inherited from my +Cheyne grandmother, Bishop Graves’ diamond ring which Queen Victoria +gave him when he preached before her, our christening mugs, and the +heavy early-Victorian jewellery bequeathed to my mother by the old lady +whom she had looked after. And since box-room treasures never left the +box-room, I regarded myself as permanently parted from my pledge. I +liked the cherry-whisky a lot.</p> + +<p>The competitions started about one o’clock on a Saturday afternoon +and went on until seven. I was drawn for the very first fight and my +opponent by a piece of bad luck was Alan. Alan wanted me to scratch. +I said I thought that it would look bad to do that. We consulted the +house games-captain and he said: ‘No, the most sporting thing to do +is to box it out and let the decision be on points; but don’t either +of you hurt each other.’ So we boxed. Alan started showing off to +his friends, who were sitting in the front row. I said: ‘Stop that. +We’re boxing, not fighting,’ but a few seconds later he hit me again +unnecessarily hard. I got angry and knocked him out. This was the first +time I had ever knocked anyone out and I liked the feeling. I had drank +a lot of cherry-whisky. I rather muzzily realized that I had knocked +him out with a right swing on the side of the neck and that this blow +was not part of the ordinary school-boxing curriculum. Straight lefts; +lefts to body, rights to head; left and right hooks; all these were +known, but the swing was somehow neglected, probably because it was not +so ‘pretty.’</p> + +<p>I went to the changing-room for my coat, and stout <span class="pagenum" id="Page_79" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 79</span>Sergeant Harris, +the boxing instructor, said: ‘Look here, Mr. Graves, why don’t you put +down your name for the middle-weight competition too?’ I cheerfully +agreed. Then I went back to the house and had a cold bath and more +cherry-whisky. My next fight was to take place in about half an hour +for the first round of the middle-weights. This time my opponent, +who was a stone heavier than myself but had little science, bustled +me about for the first round, and I could see that he would tire me +out unless something was done. In the second round I knocked him down +with my right swing, but he got up again. I was feeling tired, so +hastened to knock him down again. I must have knocked him down four or +five times that round, but he refused to take the count. I found out +afterwards that he was, like myself, conscious that Dick was watching +the fight. He loved Dick too. Finally I said to myself as he lurched +towards me again: ‘If he doesn’t go down and stay down this time, I +won’t be able to hit him again at all.’ This time I just pushed at his +jaw as it offered itself to me, but that was enough. He did go down and +he did stay down. This second knock-out made quite a stir. Knock-outs +were rare in the inter-house boxing competition. As I went back to the +house for another cold bath and some more cherry-whisky I noticed the +fellows looking at me curiously.</p> + +<p>The later stages of the competition I do not remember well. The only +opponent that I was now at all concerned about was Raymond, who +was nearly a stone heavier than myself and was expected to win the +middle-weights; but he had also tried for two weights, the middle and +the heavy, and had just had such a tough fight with the eventual winner +of the heavy-weights that he was in no proper condition to fight. So he +scratched his fight with me. I believe that he <span class="pagenum" id="Page_80" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 80</span>would have fought +all the same if it had been against someone else; but he was still fond +of me and wanted me to win. His scratching would give me a rest between +my bouts. A semifinalist scratched against me in the welter-weights, so +I only had three more fights, and I let neither of these go beyond the +first round. The swing won me both weights, for which I was given two +silver cups. But it had also broken both my thumbs; I had not got my +elbow high enough over when I used it.</p> + +<p>The most important thing that happened to me in my last I two years, +apart from my attachment to Dick, was that I got to know George +Mallory. He was twenty-six or twenty-seven then, not long up from +Cambridge. He was so young looking that he was often mistaken for a +member of the school. From the first he treated me as an equal, and +I used to spend my spare time reading books in his room or going for +walks with him in the country. He told me of the existence of modern +authors. My father being two generations older than myself and my +only link with books, I had never heard of people like Shaw, Samuel +Butler, Rupert Brooke, Wells, Flecker, or Masefield, and I was greatly +interested in them. It was at George Mallory’s rooms that I first met +Edward Marsh, who has always been a good friend to me, and with whom, +though we seldom see each other now, I have never fallen out: in this +he is almost unique among my pre-war friends. Marsh said that he liked +my poems, which George had showed him, but pointed out that they were +written in the poetic vocabulary of fifty years ago and that, though +the quality of the poem was not necessarily impaired by this, there +would be a natural prejudice in my readers against work written in 1913 +in the fashions of 1863.</p> + +<p>George Mallory, Cyril Hartmann, Raymond, and I published <span class="pagenum" id="Page_81" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 81</span>a +magazine in the summer of 1913 called <cite>Green Chartreuse</cite>. It was only +intended to have one number; new magazines at a public school always +sell out the first number and lose heavily on the second. From <cite>Green +Chartreuse</cite> I quote one of my own contributions, of autobiographical +interest, written in the school dialect:</p> + +<blockquote> +<p class="smcap center">My New-Bug’s Exam.</p> + +<p>When lights went out at half-past nine in the evening of the second +Friday in the Quarter, and the faint footfalls of the departing +House-Master were heard no more, the fun began.</p> + +<p>The Plead of Under Cubicles constituted himself examiner +and executioner, and was ably assisted by a timekeeper, a +question-recorder, and a staff of his disreputable friends. I +was a timorous ‘new-bug’ then, and my pyjamas were damp with the +perspiration of fear. Three of my fellows had been examined and +sentenced before the inquisition was directed against me.</p> + +<p>‘It’s Jones’ turn now,’ said a voice. ‘He’s the little brute that +hacked me in run-about to-day. We must set him some tight questions!’</p> + +<p>‘I say, Jones, what’s the colour of the House-Master—I mean what’s +the name of the House-Master of the House, whose colours are black +and white? One, two, three....’</p> + +<p>‘Mr. Girdlestone,’ my voice quivered in the darkness.</p> + +<p>‘He evidently knows the simpler colours. We’ll muddle him. What are +the colours of the Clubs to which Block Houses belong? One, two, +three, four....’</p> + +<p>I had been slaving at getting up these questions for days, and just +managed to blurt out the answer before being counted out.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_82" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 82</span>‘Two questions. No misses. We must buck up,’ said someone.</p> + +<p>‘I say, Jones, how do you get to Farncombe from Weekites? One, two, +three....’</p> + +<p>I had only issued directions as far as Bridge before being counted +out.</p> + +<p>‘Three questions. One miss. You’re allowed three misses out of ten.’</p> + +<p>‘Where is Charterhouse Magazine? One, two, three, four....’</p> + +<p>‘Do you mean <cite>The Carthusian</cite> office?’ I asked.</p> + +<p>Everyone laughed.</p> + +<p>‘Four questions. Two misses. I say, Robinson, he’s answered far too +many. We’ll set him a couple of stingers.’</p> + +<p>Much whispering.</p> + +<p>‘What is the age of the horse that rolls Under Green? One, two, +three....’</p> + +<p>‘Six!’ I said, at a venture.</p> + +<p>‘Wrong; thirty-eight. Six questions. Three misses! Think yourself +lucky you weren’t asked its pedigree.’</p> + +<p>‘What are canoeing colours? One, two, thr ...’</p> + +<p>‘There aren’t any!’</p> + +<p>‘You’ll get cocked-up for festivity; but you can count it. Seven +questions. Three misses. Jones?’</p> + +<p>‘Yes!’</p> + +<p>‘What was the name of the girl to whom rumour stated that last year’s +football secretary was violently attached? One, two, three, four....’</p> + +<p>‘Daisy!’ (It sounded a likely name.)</p> + +<p>‘Oh really! Well, I happen to know last year’s football secretary; +and he’ll simply kill you for spreading scandal. You’re wrong anyhow. +Eight questions. Four misses!’</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_83" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 83</span>‘You’ll come to my “cube” at seven to-morrow morning. See? Good +night!’</p> + +<p>Here he waved his hair-brush over the candle, and a colossal shadow +appeared on the ceiling.</p> +</blockquote> + +<p>The Poetry Society died about this time—and this is how it died. Two +of its sixth-form members came to a meeting and each read a rather +dull and formal poem about love and nature; none of us paid much +attention to them. But the following week they were published in <cite>The +Carthusian</cite>, and soon every one was pointing and giggling. Both poems, +which were signed with pseudonyms, were acrostics, the initial letters +spelling out a ‘case.’ ‘Case’ meant ‘romance,’ a formal coupling of two +boys’ names, with the name of the elder boy first. In these two cases +both the first names mentioned were those of bloods. It was a foolish +act of aggression in the feud between sixth form and the bloods. But +nothing much would have come of it had not another of the sixth-form +members of the Poetry Society been in love with one of the smaller +boys whose names appeared in the acrostics. In rage and jealousy he +went to the headmaster and called his attention to the acrostic—which +otherwise neither he nor any other of the masters would have noticed. +He pretended that he did not know the authors; but though he had not +been at the particular meeting where the poems were read, he could +easily have guessed them from the styles. Before things had taken this +turn I had incautiously told someone who the authors were; so I was +now dragged into the row as a witness against them. The headmaster +took a very serious view of the case. The two poets were deprived of +their monitorial privileges; the editor of <cite>The Carthusian</cite>, who, +though aware of the acrostics, had <span class="pagenum" id="Page_84" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 84</span>accepted the poems, was deprived +of his editorship and of his position as head of the school. The +informer, who happened to be next in school order, succeeded him in +both capacities; he had not expected this development and it made him +most unpopular. His consolation was a real one, that he had done it +all for love, to avenge the public insult done to the boy. And he was +a decent fellow, really. The Poetry Society was dissolved in disgrace +by the headmaster’s orders. Guy Kendall was one of the few masters +who insisted on treating the boys better than they deserved, so I was +sorry for him when this happened; it was an ‘I told you so’ for the +other masters, who did not believe either in poetry or in school uplift +societies. I owe a great debt of gratitude to Kendall; the meetings of +the Poetry Society were all that I had to look forward to when things +were at their worst for me.</p> + +<p>My last year at Charterhouse I devoted myself to doing everything I +could to show how little respect I had for the school tradition. In +the winter of 1913 I won a classical exhibition at St. John’s College, +Oxford, so that I could go slow on school work. Nevill Barbour and +I were editing the <cite>Carthusian</cite>, and a good deal of my time went in +that. Nevill, who as a scholar had met the same sort of difficulties +as myself, also had a dislike of most Charterhouse traditions. We +decided that the most objectionable tradition of all was compulsory +games. Of these cricket was the most objectionable, because it wasted +most time in the best part of the year. We began a campaign in favour +of tennis. We were not seriously devoted to tennis, but it was the +best weapon we had against cricket—the game, we wrote, in which the +selfishness of the few was supposed to excuse the boredom of the +many. Tennis was quick and busy. We asked Old Carthusian <span class="pagenum" id="Page_85" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 85</span>tennis +internationalists to contribute letters proposing tennis as the manlier +and more vigorous game. We even got the famous Anthony Wilding to +write. The games-masters were scandalized at this assault on cricket; +to them tennis was ‘pat ball,’ a game for girls. But the result of our +campaign was surprising. Not only did we double our sales, but a fund +was started for providing the school with a number of tennis-courts and +making Charterhouse the cradle of public-school tennis. Though delayed +by the war, these courts actually appeared. I noticed them recently as +I went past the school in a car; there seemed to be plenty of them. I +wonder, are there tennis-bloods at Charterhouse now?</p> + +<p>Poetry and Dick were now the only two things that really mattered. My +life with my fellow house-monitors was one of perpetual discord. I had +grudges against them all except the house-captain and the head-monitor. +The house-captain, the only blood in the house, spent most of his time +with his fellow bloods in other houses. The head-monitor was a scholar +who, though naturally a decent fellow, had been embittered by his first +three years in the house and was much on his dignity. He did more or +less what the other monitors wanted him to do, and I was sorry that I +had to lump him in with the rest. My love for Dick provoked a constant +facetiousness, but they never dared to go too far. I once caught one +of them in the bathroom scratching up a pair of hearts conjoined, with +Dick’s initials and mine on them. I pushed him into the bath and turned +the taps on. The next day he got hold of a manuscript note-book of mine +that I had left on the table in the monitors’ room with some other +books. It had poems and essay notes in it. He and the other monitors, +except the house-captain, annotated it critically in blue chalk and all +signed their initials. The <span class="pagenum" id="Page_86" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 86</span>house-captain would have nothing to do +with this: he thought it ungentlemanly. I was furious when I found what +had been done. I made a speech. I demanded a signed apology. I said +that if I were not given it within an hour I would choose one of them +as solely responsible and punish him. I said that I would now have a +bath and that the first monitor that I met after my bath I would knock +down.</p> + +<p>Whether by accident or whether it was that he thought his position +made him secure, the first monitor I met in the corridor was the +head-monitor. I knocked him down. It was the time of evening +preparation, which only the monitors were free not to attend. But a fag +happened to pass on an errand and saw the blow and the blood; so it +could not be hushed up. The head-monitor went to the house-master and +the house-master sent for me. He was an excitable, elderly man who had +some difficulty in controlling his spittle when angry. He made me sit +down in a chair in his study, then stood over me, clenching his fists +and crying in his high falsetto voice: ‘Do you realize you have done a +very brutal action?’ His mouth was bubbling. I was as angry as he was. +I jumped up and clenched my fists too. Then I said that I would do the +same thing to anyone who, after scribbling impertinent remarks on my +private papers, refused to apologize. ‘Private papers. Filthy poems,’ +said the house-master.</p> + +<p>I had another difficult interview with the headmaster over this. But +it was my last term, so he allowed me to finish my five years without +ignominy. He was puzzled by the frankness of my statement of love +for Dick. He reopened the question. I refused to be ashamed. I heard +afterwards that he had said that this was one of the rare cases of a +friendship between boys of unequal ages which he felt was essentially +<span class="pagenum" id="Page_87" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 87</span>moral. I went through one of the worst quarters of an hour of my +life on Dick’s account in this last term. When the master had warned +me about exchanging glances with Dick in chapel I had been infuriated. +But when I was told by one of the boys that he had seen the master +surreptitiously kissing Dick once, on a choir-treat or some such +occasion, I went quite mad. I asked for no details or confirmation. I +went to the master and told him he must resign or I would report the +case to the headmaster. He already had a reputation in the school for +this sort of thing, I said. Kissing boys was a criminal offence. I was +morally outraged. Probably my sense of outrage concealed a murderous +jealousy. I was surprised when he vigorously denied the charge; I could +not guess what was going to happen next. But I said: ‘Well, come to +the headmaster and deny it to him.’ He asked: ‘Did the boy tell you +this himself?’ I said ‘No.’ ‘Well then,’ he said, ‘I’ll send for him +here and he shall tell us the truth.’ So Dick was sent for and arrived +looking very frightened, and the house-master said menacingly: ‘Graves +tells me that I once kissed you. Is that true?’ Dick said: ‘Yes, it +is true.’ So Dick was dismissed and the master collapsed, and I felt +miserable. He said he would resign at the end of the term, which was +quite near, on grounds of ill-health. He even thanked me for speaking +directly to him and not going to the headmaster. That was in the summer +of 1914; he went into the army and was killed the next year. I found +out much later from Dick that he had not been kissed at all. It may +have been some other boy.</p> + +<p>One of the last events that I remember at Charterhouse was a debate +with the motion that ‘this House is in favour of compulsory military +service.’ The Empire Service League, or whatever it was called, of +which Earl Roberts of Kandahar, <span class="pagenum" id="Page_88" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 88</span><abbr title="Victoria Cross">V.C.</abbr>, was the President, sent +down a propagandist to support the motion. There were only six votes +out of one hundred and nineteen cast against it. I was the principal +speaker against the motion, a strong anti-militarist. I had recently +resigned from the Officers’ Training Corps, having revolted against the +theory of implicit obedience to orders. And during a fortnight spent +the previous summer at the <abbr>O.T.C.</abbr> camp at Tidworth on Salisbury Plain, +I had been frightened by a special display of the latest military +fortifications, barbed-wire entanglements, machine-guns, and field +artillery in action. General, now Field-Marshal Sir William Robertson, +whose son was a member of the school, had visited the camp and +impressed upon us that war against Germany was inevitable within two +or three years, and that we must be prepared to take our part in it as +leaders of the new forces that would assuredly be called into being. Of +the six voters against the motion Nevill Barbour and I are, I believe, +the only ones who survived the war.</p> + +<p>My last memory was the headmaster’s good-bye. It was this: ‘Well, +good-bye, Graves, and remember this, that your best friend is the +waste-paper basket.’</p> + +<p>I used to speculate on which of my contemporaries would distinguish +themselves after they left school. The war upset my calculations. +Many dull boys had brief brilliant military careers, particularly as +air-fighters, becoming squadron and flight commanders. ‘Fuzzy’ McNair, +the head of the school, won the <abbr>V.C.</abbr> as a Rifleman; young Sturgess, +who had been my study fag, distinguished himself more unfortunately +by flying the first heavy bombing machine of a new pattern across the +Channel on his first trip to France and making a beautiful landing +(having mistaken the landmarks) at an aerodrome behind the German +lines. A boy whom I admired <span class="pagenum" id="Page_89" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 89</span>very much during my first year at +Charterhouse was the Hon. Desmond O’Brien. He was the only Carthusian +in my time who cheerfully disregarded all school rules. He had skeleton +keys for the school library, chapel and science laboratories and used +to break out of his house at night and carefully disarrange things +there. The then headmaster was fond of O’Brien and forgave him much. +O’Brien had the key of the headmaster’s study too and, going there one +night with an electric torch, carried off a memorandum which he showed +me—‘Must expel O’Brien.’ He had a wireless receiving-station in one +of the out-of-bounds copses on the school grounds, and he discovered +a ventilator shaft down which he could hoot into the school library +from outside and create great disturbance without detection. One day +we were threatened with the loss of a Saturday half-holiday because +some member of the school had killed a cow with a catapult, and nobody +would own up. O’Brien had fired the shot; he was away at the time on +special leave for a sister’s wedding. A friend wrote to him about the +half-holiday. He sent the headmaster a telegram: ‘Killed cow sorry +coming O’Brien.’ At last, having absented himself from every lesson and +chapel for three whole days, he was expelled. He was killed early in +the war while bombing Bruges.</p> + +<p>At least one in three of my generation at school was killed. This was +because they all took commissions as soon as they could, most of them +in the infantry and flying corps. The average life of the infantry +subaltern on the Western front was, at some stages of the war, only +about three months; that is to say that at the end of three months he +was either wounded or killed. The proportions worked out at about four +wounded to every one killed. Of the four one was wounded seriously and +the remaining three more or less lightly. The three <span class="pagenum" id="Page_90" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 90</span>lightly wounded +returned to the front after a few weeks or months of absence and were +again subject to the same odds. The flying casualties were even higher. +Since the war lasted for four and a half years, it is easy to see why +the mortality was so high among my contemporaries, and why most of the +survivors, if not permanently disabled, were wounded at least two or +three times.</p> + +<p>Two well-known sportsmen were contemporaries of mine: <abbr class="letters">A. G.</abbr> Bower, +captain of England at soccer, who was only an average player at +Charterhouse, and Woolf Barnato, the Surrey cricketer (and millionaire +racing motorist), who also was only an average player. Barnato was in +the same house as myself and we had not a word to say to each other +for the four years we were together. Five scholars have made names for +themselves: Richard Hughes as a <abbr>B.B.C.</abbr> playwright; Richard Goolden as +an actor of old-man parts; Vincent Seligman as author of a propagandist +life of Venizelos; Cyril Hartmann as an authority on historical French +scandals; and my brother Charles as society gossip-writer on the middle +page of <cite>The Daily Mail</cite>. Occasionally I see another name or two in the +newspapers. There was one the other day—M ... who was in the news for +escaping from a private lunatic asylum. I remembered that he had once +offered a boy ten shillings to hold his hand in a thunderstorm and that +he had frequently threatened to run away from Charterhouse.</p> +</section> + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> + +<section role="doc-chapter" aria-labelledby="c09-hd"> +<div class="chapter"> +<div class="pagenum" id="Page_91" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 91</div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="c09-hd">IX</h2> +</div> + +<p class="chap_start"><b class="smcap">George Mallory</b> did something better than lend me books, and that +was to take me climbing on Snowdon in the school vacations. I knew +Snowdon very well from a distance, from my bedroom window at Harlech. +In the spring its snow cap was the sentimental glory of the landscape. +The first time I went with George to Snowdon we stayed at the Snowdon +Ranger Hotel at Quellyn Lake. It was January and the mountain was +covered with snow. We did little rock-climbing, but went up some good +snow slopes with rope and ice-axe. I remember one climb the objective +of which was the summit; we found the hotel there with its roof blown +off in the blizzard of the previous night. We sat by the cairn and +ate Carlsbad plums and liver-sausage sandwiches. Geoffrey Keynes, the +editor of the <cite>Nonesuch Blake</cite>, was there; he and George, who used to +go drunk with excitement at the end of his climbs, picked stones off +the cairn and shied them at the chimney stack of the hotel until they +had sent it where the roof was.</p> + +<p>George was one of the three or four best climbers in climbing history. +His first season in the Alps had been spectacular; nobody had expected +him to survive it. He never lost his almost foolhardy daring; yet +he knew all that there was to be known about climbing technique. +One always felt absolutely safe with him on the rope. George went +through the war as a lieutenant in the artillery, but his nerves were +apparently unaffected—on his leaves he went rock-climbing.</p> + +<p>When the war ended he was more in love with the mountains than ever. +His death on Mount Everest came five years later. No one knows whether +he and Irvine <span class="pagenum" id="Page_92" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 92</span>actually made the last five hundred yards of the +climb or whether they turned back or what happened; but anyone who +had climbed with George felt convinced that he did get to the summit, +that he rejoiced in his accustomed way and had not sufficient reserve +of strength left for the descent. I do not think that it was ever +mentioned in the newspaper account of his death that George originally +took to climbing when he was a scholar at Winchester as a corrective to +his weak heart.</p> + +<p>George was wasted at Charterhouse, where, in my time at least, he was +generally despised by the boys because he was neither a disciplinarian +nor interested in cricket or football. He tried to treat his classes +in a friendly way and that puzzled and offended them. There was a +tradition in the school of concealed warfare between the boys and the +masters. It was considered no shame to cheat, to lie, or to deceive +where a master was concerned; yet to do the same to a member of the +school was immoral. George was also unpopular with the house-masters +because he refused to accept this state of war and fraternized with the +boys whenever he could. When two house-masters who had been unfriendly +to him happened to die within a short time of each other he joked to +me: ‘See, Robert, how mine enemies flee before my face.’ I always +called him by his Christian name, and so did three or four more of his +friends in the school. This lack of dignity in him put him beyond the +pale both with the boys and the masters. Eventually the falseness of +his position told on his temper; yet he always managed to find four +or five boys in the school who were, like him, out of their element, +and befriended them and made life tolerable for them. Before the final +Everest expedition he had decided to resign and do educational work at +Cambridge <span class="pagenum" id="Page_93" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 93</span>with, I believe, the Workers’ Educational Association. He +was tired of trying to teach gentlemen to be gentlemen.</p> + +<p>I spent a season with George and a large number of climbers at the +hotel at Pen-y-Pass on Snowdon in the spring of 1914. This time it +was real precipice-climbing, and I was lucky enough to climb with +George, with <abbr>H. E. L.</abbr> Porter, a renowned technician of climbing, with +Kitty O’Brien and with Conor O’Brien, her brother, who afterwards +made a famous voyage round the world in a twenty-ton or five-ton or +some even-less-ton boat. Conor climbed principally, he told us, as a +corrective to bad nerves. He used to get very excited when any slight +hitch occurred; his voice would rise to a scream. Kitty used to chide +him: ‘Ach, Conor, dear, have a bit of wit,’ and Conor would apologize. +Conor, being a sailor, used to climb in bare feet. Often in climbing +one has to support the entire weight of one’s body on a couple of +toes—but toes in stiff boots. Conor said that he could force his naked +toes farther into crevices than a boot would go.</p> + +<p>But the most honoured climber there was Geoffrey Young. Geoffrey had +been climbing for a number of years and was president of the Climbers’ +Club. I was told that his four closest friends had all at different +times been killed climbing; this was a comment on the extraordinary +care with which he always climbed. It was not merely shown in his +preparations for a climb—the careful examination, foot by foot, of the +alpine rope, the attention to his boot-nails and the balanced loading +of his knapsack—but also in his cautiousness in the climbing itself. +Before making any move he thought it out foot by foot, as though it +were a problem in chess. If the next handhold happened to be just a +little out of his reach or <span class="pagenum" id="Page_94" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 94</span>the next foothold seemed at all unsteady +he would stop and think of some way round the difficulty. George used +sometimes to get impatient, but Geoffrey refused to be hurried. He +was short, which put him at a disadvantage in the matter of reach. He +was not as double-jointed and prehensile as Porter or as magnificent +as George, but he was the perfect climber. And still remains so. This +in spite of having lost a leg while serving with a Red Cross unit on +the Italian front. He climbs with an artificial leg. He has recently +published the only satisfactory text-book on rock-climbing. I was very +proud to be on a rope with Geoffrey Young. He said once: ‘Robert, you +have the finest natural balance that I have ever seen in a climber.’ +This compliment pleased me far more than if the Poet Laureate had told +me that I had the finest sense of rhythm that he had ever met in a +young poet.</p> + +<p>It is quite true that I have a good balance; once, in Switzerland, it +saved me from a broken leg or legs. My mother took us there in the +Christmas holidays of 1913–14, ostensibly for winter sports, but really +because she thought that she owed it to my sisters to give them a +chance to meet nice young men of means. About the third day that I put +on skis I went up from Champéry, where we were staying and the snow was +too soft, to Morgins, a thousand feet higher, where it was like sugar. +Here I found an ice-run for skeleton-toboggans. Without considering +that skis have no purchase on ice at all, I launched myself down it. +After a few yards my speed increased alarmingly and I suddenly realized +what I was in for. There were several sharp turns in the run protected +by high banks, and I had to trust entirely to body-balance in swerving +round them. I reached the terminus still upright and had my eyes damned +by a <span class="pagenum" id="Page_95" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 95</span>frightened sports-club official for having endangered my life +on his territory.</p> + +<p>In an essay on climbing that I wrote at the time, I said it was a +sport that made all others seem trivial. ‘New climbs or new variations +of old climbs are not made in a competitive spirit, but only because +it is satisfactory to stand somewhere on the earth’s surface where +nobody else has stood before. And it is good to be alone with a +specially chosen band of people—people that one can trust completely. +Rock-climbing is one of the most dangerous sports possible, unless one +keeps to the rules; but if one does keep to the rules it is reasonably +safe. With physical fitness in every member of the climbing team, a +careful watch on the weather, proper overhauling of climbing apparatus, +and with no hurry, anxiety or stunting, climbing is much safer than +fox-hunting. In hunting there are uncontrollable factors, such as +hidden wire, holes in which a horse may stumble, caprice or vice in +the horse. The climber trusts entirely to his own feet, legs, hands, +shoulders, sense of balance, judgment of distance.’</p> + +<p>The first climb on which I was taken was up <span class="corr" id="corr95" title="Source: Crib-y-ddysgel">Crib-y-ddysgl</span>. It was a +test climb for beginners. About fifty feet up from the scree, a height +that is really more frightening than five hundred, because death is +almost as certain and much more immediate, there was a long sloping +shelf of rock, about the length of an ordinary room, to be crossed from +right to left. It was without handholds or footholds worth speaking of +and too steep to stand upright or kneel on without slipping. It shelved +at an angle of, I suppose, forty-five or fifty degrees. The accepted +way to cross it was by rolling in an upright position and trusting to +friction as a maintaining force. Once I got across this shelf without +<span class="pagenum" id="Page_96" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 96</span>disaster I felt that the rest of the climb was easy. The climb was +called The Gambit. Robert Trevelyan, the poet, was given this test in +the previous season, I was told, and had been unlucky enough to fall +off. He was pulled up short, of course, after a few feet by the rope +of the leader, who was well belayed; but the experience disgusted him +with climbing and he spent the rest of his time on the mountains just +walking about.</p> + +<p>Belaying means making fast on a projection of rock a loop of the rope +which is wound round one’s waist, and so disposing the weight of the +body that, if the climber above or below happens to slip and fall, the +belay will hold and the whole party will not go down together. Alpine +rope has a breaking point of a third its own length. Only one member of +the climbing team is moving at any given time, the others are belayed. +Sometimes on a precipice it is necessary to move up fifty or sixty +feet before finding a secure belay as a point from which to start the +next upward movement, so that if the leader falls and is unable to put +on a brake in any way he must fall more than twice that length before +being pulled up. On the same day I was taken on a spectacular though +not unusually difficult climb on Crib Goch. At one point we traversed +round a knife-edge buttress. From this knife-edge a pillar-like bit of +rock, technically known as a monolith, had split away. We scrambled up +the monolith, which overhung the valley with a clear five hundred feet +drop, and each in turn stood on the top and balanced. The next thing +was to make a long, careful stride from the top of the monolith to the +rock face; here there was a ledge just wide enough to take the toe of +a boot, and a handhold at convenient height to give an easy pull-up to +the next ledge. I remember George shouting down from above: ‘Be careful +<span class="pagenum" id="Page_97" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 97</span>of that foothold, Robert. Don’t chip the edge off or the climb will +be impossible for anyone who wants to do it again. It’s got to last +another five hundred years at least.’</p> + +<p>I was only in danger once. I was climbing with Porter on an +out-of-the-way part of the mountain. The climb, known as the Ribbon +Track and Girdle Traverse, had not been attempted for about ten years. +About half-way up we came to a chimney. A chimney is a vertical fissure +in the rock wide enough to admit the body; a crack is only wide enough +to admit the boot. One works up a chimney sideways with back and knees, +but up a crack with one’s face to the rock. Porter was leading and +fifty feet above me in the chimney. In making a spring to a handhold +slightly out of reach he dislodged a pile of stones that had been +wedged in the chimney. They rattled down and one rather bigger than a +cricket ball struck me on the head and knocked me out. Fortunately I +was well belayed and Porter was already in safety. The rope held me up; +I recovered my senses a few seconds later and was able to continue.</p> + +<p>The practice of Pen-y-Pass was to have a leisurely breakfast and lie in +the sun with a tankard of beer before starting for the precipice foot +in the late morning. Snowdon was a perfect mountain for climbing. The +rock was sound and not slippery. And once you came to the top of any +of the precipices, some of which were a thousand feet high, but all +just climbable one way or another, there was always an easy way to run +down. In the evening when we got back to the hotel we lay and stewed in +hot baths. I remember wondering at my body—the worn fingernails, the +bruised knees, and the lump of climbing muscle that had begun to bunch +above the arch of the foot, seeing it as beautiful in relation to this +new purpose. My worst climb was on <span class="pagenum" id="Page_98" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 98</span>Lliwedd, the most formidable of +the precipices, when at a point that needed most concentration a raven +circled round the party in great sweeps. This was curiously unsettling, +because one climbs only up and down, or left and right, and the raven +was suggesting all the diverse possibilities of movement, tempting us +to let go our hold and join him.</p> +</section> + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> + +<section role="doc-chapter" aria-labelledby="c10-hd"> +<div class="chapter"> +<div class="pagenum" id="Page_99" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 99</div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="c10-hd">X</h2> +</div> + +<p class="chap_start"><b class="smcap">I was</b> at Harlech when war was declared; I decided to enlist a day +or two later. In the first place, though only a very short war was +expected—two or three months at the very outside—I thought that it +might last just long enough to delay my going to Oxford in October, +which I dreaded. I did not work out the possibilities of being actively +engaged in the war. I thought that it would mean garrison service +at home while the regular forces were away. In the second place, I +entirely believed that France and England had been drawn into a war +which they had never contemplated and for which they were entirely +unprepared. It never occurred to me that newspapers and statesmen +could lie. I forgot my pacifism—I was ready to believe the worst +of the Germans. I was outraged to read of the cynical violation of +Belgian neutrality. I wrote a poem promising vengeance for Louvain. +I discounted perhaps twenty per cent, of the atrocity details as +war-time exaggeration. That was not, of course, enough. Recently I +saw the following contemporary newspaper cuttings quoted somewhere in +chronological sequence:</p> + +<blockquote> +<p>‘When the fall of Antwerp got known the church bells were rung’ +(<abbr class="italic">i.e.</abbr> at Cologne and elsewhere in Germany).—<cite lang="de">Kölnische Zeitung</cite>.</p> + +<p>‘According to the <cite lang="de">Kölnische Zeitung</cite>, the clergy of Antwerp were +compelled to ring the church bells when the fortress was taken.’—<cite lang="fr">Le +Matin</cite> (Paris.)</p> + +<p>‘According to what <cite>The Times</cite> has heard from Cologne, <span class="pagenum" id="Page_100" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 100</span>via +Paris, the unfortunate Belgian priests who refused to ring the +church bells when Antwerp was taken have been sentenced to hard +labour.’—<cite lang="it">Carriere della Sera</cite> (Milan.)</p> + +<p>‘According to information to the <cite lang="it">Carriere della Sera</cite> from Cologne, +via London, it is confirmed that the barbaric conquerors of Antwerp +punished the unfortunate Belgian priests for their heroic refusal to +ring the church bells by hanging them as living clappers to the bells +with their heads down.’—<cite lang="fr">Le Matin</cite> (Paris.)</p> +</blockquote> + +<p>When I was in the trenches a few months later I happened to belong to a +company mess in which four of us young officers out of five had, by a +coincidence, either German mothers or naturalized German fathers. One +of them said: ‘Of course I’m glad I joined when I did. If I’d put it +off for a month or two they’d have accused me of being a German spy. +As it is I have an uncle interned at Alexandra Palace, and my father’s +only been allowed to retain the membership of his golf club because +he has two sons in the trenches.’ I said: ‘Well, I have three or four +uncles sitting somewhere opposite, and a number of cousins too. One of +my uncles is a general. But that’s all right. I don’t brag about them. +I only advertise the uncle who is a British admiral commanding at the +Nore.’</p> + +<p>Among my enemy relatives was my cousin Conrad, who was the same age +as myself, and the son of the German consul at Zurich. In January +1914 I had gone ski-ing with him between the trees in the woods above +the city. We had tobogganed together down the Dolderstrasse in Zurich +itself, where the lampposts were all sandbagged and family toboggans, +skidding broadside on at the turns, were often <span class="pagenum" id="Page_101" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 101</span>crashed into by +single-seater skeletons; arms and legs were broken by the score and the +crowds thought it a great joke. Conrad served with a crack Bavarian +regiment all through the war, and won the ‘<i lang="fr" class="normal">Pour le Mérite</i>’ Order, which +was more rarely awarded than the British Victoria Cross. He was killed +by the Bolsheviks after the war in a village on the Baltic where he +had been sent to make requisitions. He was a gentle, proud creature, +whose chief interest was natural history. He used to spend hours in the +woods studying the habits of wild animals; he felt strongly against +shooting them. Perhaps the most outstanding military feat was that of +an uncle who was dug out at the age of sixty or so as a lieutenant in +the Bavarian artillery. My youngest brother met him a year or two ago +and happened to mention that he was going to visit Rheims. My uncle +nudged him: ‘Have a look at the cathedral. I was there with my battery +in the war. One day the divisional general came up to me and said: +“Lieutenant, I understand that you are a Lutheran, not a Catholic?” +I said that this was so. Then he said: “I have a very disagreeable +service for you to perform, Lieutenant. Those misbegotten swine, the +French, are using the cathedral for an observation post. They think +they can get away with it because it’s Rheims Cathedral, but this is +war and they have our trenches taped from there. So I call upon you +to dislodge them.” I only needed to fire two rounds and down came the +pinnacle and the Frenchmen with it. It was a very neat bit of shooting. +I was proud to have limited the damage like that. Really, you must go +and have a look at it.’</p> + +<p>The nearest regimental depot was at Wrexham: the Royal Welch Fusiliers. +The Harlech golf secretary suggested my taking a commission instead +of enlisting. He rang up the <span class="pagenum" id="Page_102" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 102</span>adjutant and said that I was a +public-school boy who had been in the Officers’ Training Corps at +Charterhouse. So the adjutant said: ‘Send him right along,’ and on 11th +August I started my training. I immediately became a hero to my family. +My mother, who said to me: ‘My race has gone mad,’ regarded my going as +a religious act; my father was proud that I had ‘done the right thing.’ +I even recovered, for a time, the respect of my uncle, <abbr>C. L.</abbr> Graves, of +<cite>The Spectator</cite> and <cite>Punch</cite>, with whom I had recently had a tiff. He +had given me a sovereign tip two terms previously and I had written my +thanks, saying that with it I had bought Samuel Butler’s <cite>Note Books</cite>, +<cite>The Way of All Flesh</cite> and the two <cite>Erewhons</cite>. To my surprise this had +infuriated him.</p> + +<p>The fellows who applied for commissions at the same time as myself +were for the most part boys who had recently failed to pass into the +Royal Military College at Sandhurst, and were trying to get into the +regular army by the old militia door—which was now known as the Special +Reserve. There were only one or two fellows who had gone into the army, +like myself, for the sake of the war and not for the sake of a career. +There were about a dozen of us recruit officers on the Square learning +to drill and be drilled. My Officers’ Training Corps experience made +this part easy, but I knew nothing about army traditions and made all +the worst mistakes; saluting the bandmaster, failing to recognize the +colonel when in mufti, walking in the street without a belt and talking +shop in the mess. But I soon learned to conform. My greatest difficulty +was to talk to men of the company to which I was posted with the +necessary air of authority. Many of them were old soldiers re-enlisted, +and I disliked bluffing that I knew more than they did. There were one +or two very old soldiers employed on the depot staff, <span class="pagenum" id="Page_103" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 103</span>wearing the +ribbon of Burma, 1885, and of even earlier campaigns, and usually also +the ribbon of the ‘Rooti’ or good service medal awarded for eighteen +years of undetected crime. There was one old fellow called Jackie +Barrett, a Kipling character, of whom it was said: ‘There goes Jackie +Barrett. He and his mucking-in chum deserted the regiment in Quetta and +went across the north-west frontier on foot. Three months later he gave +himself up as a deserter to the British consul at Jerusalem. He buried +his chum by the way.’</p> + +<p>I was on the square only about three weeks before being sent off on +detachment duty to Lancaster to a newly-formed internment camp for +enemy aliens. The camp was a disused wagon-works near the river, a +dirty, draughty place, littered with old scrap-metal and guarded with +high barbed-wire fences. There were about three thousand prisoners +already there and more and more piled in every day; seamen arrested on +German vessels in Liverpool harbour, waiters from big hotels in the +north, an odd German band or two, harmless German commercial travellers +and shopkeepers. The prisoners were resentful at being interned, +particularly those who were married and had families and had lived +peaceably in England for years. The only comfort that we could give was +that they were safer inside than out; anti-German feeling was running +high, shops with German names were continually being raided and even +German women were made to feel that they were personally responsible +for the Belgian atrocities. Besides, we said, if they were in Germany +they would be forced into the army. At this time we made a boast of +our voluntary system. We did not know that there would come a time +when these internees would be bitterly envied by forcibly-enlisted +Englishmen because they were safe until the war ended.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_104" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 104</span>In the summer of 1915 <cite>The Times</cite> reprinted in the daily column, +<cite>Through German Eyes</cite>, a German newspaper account by Herr Wolff, an +exchanged prisoner, of his experiences at Lancaster in 1914. <cite>The +Times</cite> found very amusing Herr Wolff’s allegations that he and forty +other waiters from the Midland Hotel, Manchester, had been arrested +and taken, handcuffed <em>and fettered</em>, in special railway carriages to +Lancaster under the escort of fifty Manchester policemen armed with +carbines. But it was true, because I was the officer who took them over +from the chief inspector. He was a fine figure in frogged uniform and +gave me a splendid salute. I signed him a receipt for his prisoners and +he gave me another salute. He had done his job well and was proud of +it. The only mishap was the accidental breaking of two carriage windows +by the slung carbines. Wolff also said that even children were interned +in the camp. This was true. There were a dozen or so little boys from +the German bands who had been interned because it seemed more humane to +keep them with their friends than to send them to a workhouse. Their +safety in the camp caused the commandant great concern.</p> + +<p>I had a detachment of fifty Special Reservists, most of them with only +about six weeks’ service. They had joined the army just before war +started as a cheap way of getting a holiday at the training camp; to +find themselves forced to continue beyond the usual fortnight annoyed +them. They were a rough lot, Welshmen from the border counties, and +were constantly deserting and having to be fetched back by the police. +They made nervous sentries, and were probably more frightened of the +prisoners than the prisoners were of them. Going the round of sentries +on a dark night about 2 a.m. was dangerous. Very often my lantern used +to blow <span class="pagenum" id="Page_105" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 105</span>out and I would fumble to light it again in the dark and +hear the frightened voice of a sentry roar out, ‘Halt! Who goes there?’ +and know that he was standing with his rifle aimed and his magazine +charged with five live rounds. I used to gasp out the password just +in time. Rifles were often being fired off at shadows. The prisoners +were a rowdy lot; the sailors particularly were always fighting. I saw +a prisoner spitting out teeth and blood one morning. I asked him what +was wrong. ‘Oh, sir, one no-good friend give me one clap on the chops.’ +Frequent deputations were sent to complain of the dullness of the food; +it was the same ration food that was served to the troops. But after +a while they realized the war and settled down to sullen docility; +they started hobbies and glee parties and games and plans for escape. +I had far more trouble with my men. They were always breaking out of +their quarters. I could never find out how they did it. I watched all +the possible exits, but caught no one. Finally I discovered that they +used to crawl out through a sewer. They boasted of their successes with +the women. Private Kirby said to me: ‘Do you know, sir? On the Sunday +after we arrived, all the preachers in Lancaster took as their text, +“Mothers, take care of your daughters; the Royal Welch have come to +town.”’</p> + +<p>The camp staff consisted of:</p> + +<p>A fatherly colonel of the Loyal North Lancashire Regiment, the +commandant.</p> + +<p>His secretary, by name <abbr>C. B.</abbr> Gull, one of the best-known pre-war +figures in Oxford, owner of the <i>Isis</i>, and combined divinity, +athletics and boxing coach. We used to box together to keep fit. He +also sponsored me as a candidate for the local lodge of The Royal +Antediluvian Order of Buffaloes. The Grand Marshal who officiated at +my initiation <span class="pagenum" id="Page_106" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 106</span>had drank four or five pints of ‘bitter-gatter’ and +a glass or two of ‘juniper’ (these were secret words) and continually +short-circuited in the ritual. He kept on returning to the part where +they intone:</p> + +<blockquote> +<p>Grand Marshal: Spirit of true Buffaloism hover around I us!</p> + +<p>Response: Benevolence and joy ever attend us!</p> +</blockquote> + +<p>The assistant-commandant, who alleged that he had ten years more +seniority than any other major in the British army and made wistful +jokes about his lost virility. His recurrent theme was: ‘If you only +knew how much that would mean to an old man like me.’</p> + +<p>The adjutant, an East Lancashire lieutenant, by name Deane. The day +after war was declared a German armed cruiser had held up the neutral +liner in which he was sailing home from the Cape and taken him off. He +was forced to give his parole not to fight against Germany in the war. +The cruiser was subsequently sunk by a British ship, the <i>Highflyer</i>, +and Deane was rescued; but the signed parole was saved by the German +captain, who escaped in a boat and gave it in charge of the German +consul at Las Palmas. So Deane was forbidden the trenches, and when I +met him in 1917 he was a staff-colonel.</p> + +<p>A doctor who was the mess buffoon. I broke the scabbard of my sword on +his back one night.</p> + +<p>The interpreter, a Thomas Cook man who could speak every European +language but Basque. He admitted to a weakness in Lithuanian, and when +asked what his own nationality was would answer, ‘I am Wagon-Lits.’</p> + +<p>I had an inconvenient accident. The telephone bell was constantly going +from Western Command Headquarters; it was installed in an office-room +where I slept on a sloping <span class="pagenum" id="Page_107" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 107</span>desk. One night Pack-Saddle (the +code-name for the Chief Supply Officer of the Western Command) rang +up shortly after midnight with orders for the commandant. They were +about the rationing of a batch of four hundred prisoners who were +being sent up to him from Chester and North Wales. I was half asleep +and not clever at the use of the telephone. In the middle of the +conversation, which was difficult because a storm was going on at the +time and Pack-Saddle was irritable, the line was, I suppose, struck by +lightning somewhere. I got a bad electric shock, and was unable to use +a telephone properly again until some twelve years later.</p> + +<p>Guarding prisoners seemed an unheroic part to be playing in the +war, which had now reached a critical stage; I wanted to be abroad +fighting. My training had been interrupted, and I knew that even when +I was recalled from detachment duty I would have to wait a month or +two at least before being sent out. When I got back to the depot in +October I found myself stale. The adjutant, a keen soldier, decided +that there were two things wrong with me. First of all, I dressed +badly. I had apparently gone to the wrong tailor, and had also had a +soldier-servant palmed off on me who was no good. He did not polish +my buttons and shine my belt and boots as he should have done, and +neglected me generally; as I had never had a valet before I did not +know how to manage him or what to expect of him. The adjutant finally +summoned me to the Orderly Room and threatened that he would not send +me to France until I had entirely overhauled my wardrobe and looked +more like a soldier. My company commander, he said, had reported me to +him as ‘unsoldierlike and a nuisance.’ This put me in a fix, because my +pay only just covered the mess bills, and I knew that I could not ask +<span class="pagenum" id="Page_108" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 108</span>my parents to buy me another outfit so soon after I had assured +them that I had everything necessary. The adjutant next decided that +I was not a sportsman. This was because on the day that the Grand +National (I think) was run all the young officers applied for leave +to see the race except myself, and I volunteered to take the job of +Orderly Officer of the Day for someone who wanted to go.</p> + +<p>I saw my contemporaries one by one being sent out to France to take +the place of casualties in the First and Second Battalions, while I +remained despondently at the depot. But once more boxing was useful. +Johnny Basham, a sergeant in the regiment, was training at the time +for his fight (which he won) with Boswell for the Lonsdale Belt, +welter-weight. I went down to the training camp one evening, where +Basham was offering to fight three rounds with any member of the +regiment, the more the merrier. One of the officers put on the gloves +and Basham got roars of laughter from the crowd as soon as he had taken +his opponent’s measure, by dodging about and playing the fool with +him. I asked Basham’s manager if I could have a go. He gave me a pair +of shorts and I stepped into the ring. I pretended that I knew nothing +about boxing. I led off with my right and moved about clumsily. Basham +saw a chance of getting another laugh; he dropped his guard and danced +about with a you-can’t-hit-me challenge. I caught him off his balance +and knocked him across the ring. He recovered and went for me, but I +managed to keep on my feet; I laughed at him and he laughed too. We had +three very brisk rounds, and he was decent in making it seem that I +was a much better boxer than I was by accommodating his pace to mine. +As soon as the adjutant heard the story he rang me up at my billet +and told me that he was very pleased <span class="pagenum" id="Page_109" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 109</span>to hear of my performance, +that for an officer to box like that was a great encouragement to the +men, that he was mistaken about my sportsmanship, and that to show his +appreciation he had put me down for a draft to go to France in a week’s +time.</p> + +<p>Of the officers who had been sent out before me several had already +been killed or wounded. Among the killed was Second-Lieutenant <abbr>W. G.</abbr> +Gladstone, whom we called Glad Eyes. He was in his early thirties; a +grandson of old Gladstone, whom he resembled in feature, a Liberal +<abbr>M.P.</abbr>, and lord-lieutenant of his county. When war was hanging in the +balance he had declared himself against it. His Hawarden tenantry were +ashamed on his account, and threatened, he told us, to duck him in +the pond. Realizing, once war was declared, that further protest was +useless, he immediately joined the regiment as a second-lieutenant. His +political convictions remained. He was a man of great integrity and +refused to take the non-combative employment as a staff-colonel offered +him at Whitehall. When he went to France to the First Battalion he +took no care of himself. He was killed by a sniper when unnecessarily +exposing himself. His body was brought home for a military funeral at +Hawarden; I attended it.</p> + +<p>I have one or two random memories of this training period at Wrexham. +The landlord of my billet was a Welsh solicitor, who greatly +overcharged us while pretending amicability. He wore a wig—or, to +be more exact, he had three wigs, with hair of progressive lengths. +When he had worn the medium-sized hair for a few days he would put on +the wig with long hair, and say that, dear him, it was time to get a +hair-cut. Then he would go out of the house and in a public lavatory +perhaps or a wayside copse would change into the <span class="pagenum" id="Page_110" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 110</span>short-haired wig, +which he wore until it was time to change to the medium one again. +This deception was only discovered when one of the officers billeted +with me got drunk and raided his bedroom. This officer, whose name +was Williams, was an extreme example of the sly border Welshman. The +drunker he got the more shocking his confessions. He told me one day +about a girl he had got engaged to in Dublin, and even slept with +on the strength of a diamond engagement ring. ‘Only paste really,’ +he said. The day before the wedding she had had a foot cut off by a +Dalkey tram, and he had hurriedly left the city. ‘But, Graves, she was +a lovely, lovely girl before that happened.’ He had been a medical +student at Trinity College, Dublin. Whenever he went to Chester, the +nearest town, to pick up a prostitute, he not only used to appeal to +her patriotism to charge him nothing, but he always gave her my name. +I knew of this because these women used to write to me. One day I said +to him in mess: ‘In future you are going to be distinguished from all +the other Williams’ in the regiment by being called Dirty Williams.’ +The name stuck. By one shift or another he escaped all trench-service +except for a short spell in a quiet sector, and lasted the war out +safely.</p> + +<p>Private Robinson. He was from Anglesey, and had joined the Special +Reserve before the war for his health. In September the entire +battalion volunteered for service overseas except Robinson. He said he +would not go, and that he could be neither coaxed nor bullied. Finally +he was brought before the colonel, who was genuinely puzzled at his +obstinacy. Robinson explained that he was not afraid. ‘I have a wife +and pigs at home.’ The battalion was, in September, rigged out in a +temporary navy-blue uniform until khaki might be available. All but +Robinson. They decided <span class="pagenum" id="Page_111" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 111</span>to shame him. So he continued, by order, to +wear the peace-time scarlet tunic and blue trousers with a red stripe; +a very dirty scarlet tunic (they had put him on the kitchen staff). His +mates called him Cock Robin and sang a popular chorus at him:</p> + +<div class="poetry-container"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">And I never get a knock</div> + <div class="verse indent0">When the boys call Cock</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Cockity ock, cock,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Cock Robin!</div> + <div class="verse indent0">In my old red vest I mean to cut a shine....</div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + +<p class="noindent">But Robinson did not care:</p> + +<div class="poetry-container"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">For the more they call me Robin Redbreast</div> + <div class="verse indent0">I’ll wear it longer still.</div> + <div class="verse indent0">I will wear a red waistcoat, I will,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">I will, I will, I will, I will, I will!<a class="fnanchor" href="#Footnote1" role="doc-noteref" id="FNanchor1">1</a></div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + +<p class="noindent">So in October he was discharged as medically unfit: ‘Of under-developed +intelligence, unlikely to be of service in His Majesty’s Forces,’ +and went home to his wife and pigs. While, of the singers, those who +survived Festubert in the following May did not survive Loos in the +following September.</p> + +<p>Recruit officers spent a good deal of their time at Company and +Battalion Orderly Room, learning how to deal with <span class="pagenum" id="Page_112" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 112</span>crime. Crime, +of course, meant any breach of army regulations; and there was plenty +of it. In these days Battalion Orderly Room would last four or five +hours every day, at the rate of one crime dealt with every three or +four minutes.; This was apart from the scores of less serious offences +tried by company commanders. The usual Battalion Orderly Room crimes +were desertion, refusing to obey an order, using obscene language to a +non-commissioned officer, drunk and disorderly, robbing a comrade, and +so on. On pay-nights there was hardly a man sober; and no attention was +paid so long as there was silence as soon as the company officer came +on his rounds just before Lights Out. (Two years later serious crime +had diminished to a twentieth of that amount, though the battalion was +treble its original strength, and though many of the cases that the +company officers had dealt with summarily now came before the colonel; +and there was practically no drunkenness.)</p> + +<p>There was a boy called Taylor in my company. He had been at Lancaster, +and I had bought him a piccolo to play when the detachment went out +on route-marches; he would give us one tune after another for mile +after mile. The other fellows carried his pack and rifle. At Wrexham, +on pay-nights, he used to sit in the company billet, which was a +drill-hall near the station, and play jigs for the drunks to dance to. +He never drank himself. The music was slow at first, but he gradually +quickened it until he worked them into a frenzy. He would delay this +climax until my arrival with the company orderly-sergeant. The sergeant +would fling open the door and bellow: ‘F Company, Attention!’ Taylor +would break off, thrust the piccolo under his blankets, and spring to +his feet. The drunks were left frozen in the middle of their capers, +blinking stupidly.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_113" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 113</span>In the first Battalion Orderly Room that I attended I was +surprised to hear a private soldier charged with a nursery offence, +about the committal of which expert evidence was given and heard +without a smile. I have an accurate record of the trial but my +publishers advise me not to give it here.</p> + +<p>Orderly Room always embarrassed and dispirited me. I never got used to +it even after sentencing thousands of men myself. There was something +shameful about it. The only change that the introduction of the +civilian element into the army brought was that about half-way through +the war an army order came out that henceforth the word of command was +to be ‘Accused and escort, right turn, quick march,’ etc., instead of +‘Prisoner and escort, right turn, quick march, etc.’ It was only very +seldom that an interesting case came up. Even the obscene language, +always quoted verbatim, was drearily the same; the only variation I +remember from the four stock words was in the case of a man charged +with using threatening and obscene language to an <abbr title="non-commissioned officer">N.C.O.</abbr> The man had, +it appeared, said to a lance-corporal who had a down on him: ‘Corporal +Smith, two men shall meet before two mountains.’ Humour only came from +the very Welsh Welshmen from the hills who had an imperfect command of +English. One of them, charged with being absent off ceremonial parade +and using obscene language to the sergeant, became very indignant in +Orderly Room and cried out to the colonel: ‘Colonel, sir, sergeant tole +me wass I for guard; I axed him no, and now the bloody bastard says +wass I.’</p> + +<p>The greatest number of simultaneous charges that I ever heard preferred +against a soldier was in the case of Boy Jones at Liverpool in 1917. +He was charged with, first, using obscene language to the bandmaster; +the bandmaster, <span class="pagenum" id="Page_114" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 114</span>who was squeamish, reported it as: ‘Sir, he called +me a double effing c⁠—⁠—.’ Next, with breaking out of the detention that +was awarded for this crime. Third, with ‘absenting himself from the +regiment until apprehended in the Hindenburg Line, France.’ Fourth, +with resisting an escort. Fifth, with being found in possession of +regimental property of the Cheshire Regiment. Boy Jones, who was only +fourteen and looked thirteen, had wriggled through the bars of his +detention-cell and, after getting a few things together at his hut, had +gone to Liverpool Exchange Station to wait for a victim. The victim was +a private in a Bantam Battalion just returning to France from leave. +He treated the bantam to a lot of drink and robbed him of his rifle, +equipment, badges and papers. He then went off in his place. Arrived +in France he was posted to the Bantam Battalion; but this did not suit +him. He wanted to be with his own regiment. He deserted the Bantams, +who were somewhere north of Arras, and walked south along the trenches +looking for his regiment, having now resumed his proper badges. After a +couple of days’ walk he found the Second Battalion and reported and was +immediately sent home, though he had a struggle with the escort at the +railhead. The punishment for all these offences was ten days confined +to camp and a spanking from the bandmaster.</p> + +<p>The most unusual charge was against the regimental goat-major (a +corporal); it was first framed as <i>Lese majesty</i>, but this was later +reduced to ‘disrespect to an officer: in that he, at Wrexham—on such +and such a date—did prostitute the Royal Goat, being the gift of +His Majesty the Colonel-in-Chief from His royal herd at Windsor, by +offering his stud-services to ⁠—⁠—, Esq., farmer and goat breeder, of +Wrexham.’ The goat-major pleaded that he had done this <span class="pagenum" id="Page_115" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 115</span>out of +kindness to the goat, to which he was much attached. He was reduced to +the ranks and the charge of the goat given to another.</p> + +<p>The regular battalions of the regiment, though officered mainly by +Anglo-Welshmen of county families, did not normally contain more than +about one Welshman in fifty in the ranks. They were mainly recruited +in Birmingham. The only man at Harlech besides myself who had joined +the regiment at the start was a poor boy, a golf-caddie, who had got +into trouble a short time before for shoplifting. The chapels held +soldiering to be sinful, and in Merioneth the chapels were supreme. +Prayers were offered for me in the chapels, not because of the dangers +I ran in the war, but because I was in the army. Later, Lloyd George +persuaded the chapels that the war was a crusade. So there was a sudden +tremendous influx of Welshmen from North Wales. They were difficult +soldiers; they particularly resented having to stand still while the +<abbr>N.C.O.</abbr>’s swore at them. A deputation of North Welshmen came to me once +and said: ‘Captain Graves, sir, we do not like our sergeant-major; he +do curse and he do swear, and he do drink, and he is a maan of lowly +origin, too.’</p> + +<p>At Wrexham we learned regimental history, drill, musketry, Boer War +field-tactics, military law and organization, how to recognize bugle +calls, how to work a machine-gun, and how to conduct ourselves as +officers on formal occasions. We dug no trenches, handled no bombs and +came to think of the company, not of the platoon, still less of the +section, as the smallest independent tactical unit. There were only +two wounded officers back from the front at the time; both had left +the Second Battalion on the retreat from Mons. Neither would talk much +of his experiences. <span class="pagenum" id="Page_116" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 116</span>All that one of them, Emu Jones, would tell +us was: ‘The first queer sight I saw in France was three naked women +hanging by their feet in a butcher’s shop.’ The other would say: ‘The +shells knock hell out of a man, especially the big black ones. Just +hell. And that fellow Emu; he wasn’t any good. We marched and marched +and he had a weak heart and used to faint and expect his poor, bloody +platoon to carry him as well as the rest of their load. We used to +swear he was shamming. Don’t believe what old Emu tells you of the +retreat.’</p> +</section> + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> + +<section role="doc-chapter" aria-labelledby="c11-hd"> +<div class="chapter"> +<div class="pagenum" id="Page_117" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 117</div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="c11-hd">XI</h2> +</div> + +<p class="chap_start"><b class="smcap">I will</b> try to recall my war-time feelings about the Royal Welch +Fusiliers. I used to congratulate myself on having chosen, quite +blindly, this of all regiments. ‘Good God!’ I used to think, ‘suppose +that when the war broke out I had been living in Cheshire and had +applied for a commission in the Cheshire Regiment.’ I thought how +ashamed I should have been to find in the history of that regiment +(which was the old Twenty-second Foot, just senior in the line to the +Royal Welch, which was the Twenty-third) that it had been deprived +of its old title ‘The Royal Cheshires’ as a punishment for losing +a battle. Or how lucky not to have joined the Bedfords. Though the +Bedfords had made a name for themselves in this war, they were still +called ‘The Peacemakers.’ For they only had four battle-honours on +their colours and none of these more recent than the year 1711; it was +a sneer that their regimental motto was: ‘Thou shalt not kill.’ Even +the Black Watch, the best of the Highland regiments, had a stain on +its record; and everyone knew about it. If a Tommy of another regiment +went into a public bar where men of the Black Watch were drinking, and +felt brave enough to start a fight, he would ask the barmaid not for +‘pig’s ear,’ which is rhyming-slang for beer, but for a pint of ‘broken +square.’ Then belts would be unbuckled.</p> + +<p>The Royal Welch record was beyond reproach. There were twenty-nine +battle-honours on its colours, a number only equalled by two other +two-battalion regiments. And the Royal Welch had the advantage of these +since they were not single regiments, but recent combinations of two +regiments each with its separate history. The First Battalion <span class="pagenum" id="Page_118" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 118</span>of +the Royal Welch Fusiliers had twenty-six battle-honours of its own, the +remaining three having been won by the Second Battalion in its short +and interrupted existence. They were all good bloody battle-honours, +none of them like that battle of the Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders +into which, it was said, they had gone with nine hundred men and from +which they had come out with nine hundred and one—no casualties, and +a band-boy come of age and promoted a private. For many hard battles, +such as The Boyne and Aughrim and the capture of Lille, the Royal Welch +had never been honoured. The regiment had fought in each of the four +hardest fought victories of the British army, as listed by Sir John +Fortescue. My regimental history is rusty, but I believe that they +were The Boyne, Malplaquet, Albuhera and Inkerman. That is three out +of four. It may have been Salamanca or Waterloo instead of The Boyne. +It was also one of the six Minden regiments and one of the front-line +regiments at that. They performed the unprecedented feat of charging a +body of cavalry many times their own strength and driving it off the +field. The surrender at York Town in the American War of Independence +was the regiment’s single disaster, but even that was not a disgrace. +It was accorded the full honours of war. Its conduct in the hard +fighting at Lexington, at Guildford Court House, and in its suicidal +advance up Bunker’s Hill, had earned it them.</p> + +<p>I caught the sense of regimental tradition a day or two after I arrived +at the depot. In a cupboard in the junior anteroom at the mess, I +came across a big leather-bound ledger and pulled it out to see what +it was about. It was the Daily Order-book of the First Battalion in +the trenches before Sebastopol. I opened it at the page giving orders +for the <span class="pagenum" id="Page_119" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 119</span>attack on the Redan Fort. Such and such a company was +desired to supply volunteers for the storming party under Lieutenant +So-and-so. There followed details of their arms and equipment, the +number of ladders they were to carry, and the support to be afforded +by other companies. Then details of rations and supply of ammunition, +with an earnest Godspeed from the commanding officer. (A sketch of the +commanding officer was on the wall above my head, lying sick in his +tent at Scutari, wearing a cap-comforter for the cold.) And the next +entries were about clearing up after an unsuccessful attack—orders for +the burial of the dead, thanks from headquarters for the gallantry +vainly displayed, and a notice that the effects of the late Lieutenant +So-and-so, who had led the storming party, would be sold at public +auction in the trenches next day. In another day’s orders was the +notice of the Victoria Cross awarded to Sergeant Luke O’Connor. He had +lived to be Lieutenant-General Sir Luke O’Connor and was now colonel of +the regiment.</p> + +<p>The most immediate piece of regimental history that I met as a +recruit-officer was the flash. The flash is a fan-like bunch of five +black ribbons, each ribbon two inches wide and seven and a half inches +long; the angle at which the fan is spread is exactly regulated by +regimental convention. It is stitched to the back of the tunic collar. +Only the Royal Welch are privileged to wear it. The story is that the +Royal Welch were abroad on foreign service for several years in the +1830’s, and by some chance never received the army order abolishing +the queue. When the regiment returned and paraded at Plymouth the +inspecting general rated the commanding officer because his men were +still wearing their hair in the old fashion. The commanding officer, +angry with the slight, immediately rode up to London and won <span class="pagenum" id="Page_120" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 120</span>from +King William IV, through the intercession of some Court official, +the regimental privilege of continuing to wear the bunch of ribbons +in which the end of the queue was tied—the flash. It was to be a +distinctive badge worn by all ranks in reward for the regiment’s +exemplary service in the Napoleonic wars.</p> + +<p>The Army Council, which is usually composed of cavalry, engineer, and +artillery generals, with the infantry hardly represented, had never +encouraged regimental peculiarities, and perhaps could not easily +forget the irregularity of the colonel’s direct appeal to the Sovereign +in the matter of the flash. The flash was, at any rate, not sanctioned +by the Army Council on the new khaki service dress. None the less, +the officers and warrant-officers continued to wear it. There was a +correspondence in the early stages of the war, I was told, between the +regiment and the Army Council. The regiment maintained that since the +flash was a distinctive mark won in war it should be worn with service +dress and not merely with peace-time scarlet. The Army Council put +forward the objection that it was a distinctive mark for enemy marksmen +and particularly dangerous when worn only by officers. The regiment +retorted by inquiring on what occasion since the retreat from Corunna, +when the regiment was the last to leave Spain, with the key of the town +postern in the pocket of one of its officers, had any of His Majesty’s +enemies seen the back of a Royal Welch Fusilier? The Army Council was +firm, but the regiment was obstinate, and the matter was in abeyance +throughout the war. Once in 1917, when an officer of my company went to +Buckingham Palace to be decorated with the Military Cross, the King, +as colonel-in-chief of the regiment, showed a personal interest in the +matter. He asked: ‘You are serving in one of the line <span class="pagenum" id="Page_121" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 121</span>battalions?’ +‘The Second Battalion, Your Majesty.’ So the King gave him the order: +‘About turn,’ and looked at the flash, and then ‘About turn’ again. +‘Good,’ he said, ‘you’re still wearing it, I see,’ and then, in a stage +whisper: ‘Don’t ever let anyone take it from you.’ The regiment was +delighted. After the war, when scarlet was abandoned on the grounds +of expense, the Army Council saw that it could reasonably sanction +the flash on service dress for all ranks. As an additional favour +it consented to recognize another defiant regimental peculiarity, +the spelling of the word ‘Welch’ with a ‘c’. The permission was +published in a special Army Order in 1919. The <cite>Daily Herald</cite> commented +‘’Strewth!’ as if it were unimportant. That was ignorance. The spelling +with a ‘c’ was as important to us as the miniature cap-badge worn at +the back of the cap was to the Gloucesters (a commemoration of the time +when they fought back to back: was it at Quatre Bras?). I have seen a +young officer sent off battalion parade because his buttons read Welsh +instead of Welch. ‘Welch’ referred us somehow to the antique North +Wales of Henry Tudor and Owen Glendower and Lord Herbert of Cherbury, +the founder of the regiment; it dissociated us from the modern North +Wales of chapels, liberalism, the dairy and drapery business, Lloyd +George, and the tourist trade.</p> + +<p>The regiment was extremely strict on the standard measurements of the +flash. When new-army battalions were formed and rumours came to Wrexham +that in, I think, the Eighteenth Battalion officers were wearing +flashes nearly down to their waists, there was great consternation. The +adjutant sent off the youngest subaltern on a special mission to the +camp of the Eighteenth Battalion, the colonel of which was not a Royal +Welch Fusilier, but a loan from one of the <span class="pagenum" id="Page_122" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 122</span>Yorkshire regiments. He +was to present himself at the Battalion Orderly Room with a large pair +of shears.</p> + +<p>The new-army battalions were as anxious to be regimental as the line +battalions. It once happened in France that a major of the Royal +Fusiliers entered the mess of the Nineteenth (Bantam) Battalion of +the Royal Welch Fusiliers. He greeted the mess with ‘Good afternoon, +gentlemen,’ and called for a drink from the mess sergeant. After he +had talked for a bit he asked the senior officer present: ‘Do you know +why I ordered that drink from the mess sergeant?’ The Welch Fusilier +said: ‘Yes, you wanted to see if we remembered about Albuhera.’ The +Royal Fusilier answered: ‘Well, our mess is just along behind that wood +there. We haven’t forgotten either.’ After Albuhera the few survivors +of the Royal Welch Fusiliers and the Royal Fusiliers had messed +together on the captured hill. It was then decided that henceforth and +for ever the officers of each regiment were honorary members of the +other’s mess, and the <abbr>N.C.O.</abbr>’s the same.</p> + +<p>Perhaps the most legendary item was Thomas Atkins. He was a private +soldier in the First Battalion who had served under Wellington in the +Peninsular War. It is said that when, many years later, Wellington +at the War Office was asked to approve a specimen form for military +attestation, he had ordered it to be amended from: ‘I, Private John Doe +of the blank regiment, do hereby, etc.,’ to ‘I, Private Thomas Atkins +of the Twenty-third Foot, do hereby, etc.’ And now I am going to spoil +the story, because I cannot for the life of me remember what British +grenadierish conduct it was that made Wellington remember. And so here +ends my very creditable (after eleven years) lyrical passage.</p> + +<p>I was, as a matter of fact, going on to St. David’s Night. <span class="pagenum" id="Page_123" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 123</span>To +the raw leeks eaten to the roll of the drum with one foot on a chair +and one on the mess table enriched with spoils of the Summer Palace +at Pekin. (They are not at all bad to eat raw, despite Shakespeare.) +And to the Royal Goat with gilded horns that once leapt over the mess +table with the drummerboy on its back. And Major Toby Purcell’s Golden +Spurs. And Shenkin Ap Morgan, the First Gentleman of Wales. And ‘The +British Grenadiers,’ the regimental march-past. I was going to explain +that British grenadiers does not mean, as most people think, merely +the Grenadier Guards. It includes all regiments, the Royal Welch among +them, which wear a bursting grenade as a collar and cap-badge to recall +their early employment as storm troops armed with bombs.</p> + +<p>In the war the Royal Welch Fusiliers grew too big; this damaged +regimental <i>esprit de corps</i>. Before the war there were the two line +battalions and the depot; the affiliated and flash-less territorials, +four battalions recruited for home service, could be disregarded, in +spite of their regular adjutants. The Third Battalion, which trained at +the depot, was a poor relation. Now more and more new-army battalions +were added (even a Twenty-fifth Battalion was on service in 1917, and +was as good a battalion as the Eighth). So the regiment (that is, +consensus of opinion in the two line battalions) only tentatively +accepted the new-army battalions one by one as they proved themselves +worthy, by service in the field. The territorials it never accepted, +disowning them contemptuously as ‘dog-shooters.’ The fact was that +three of the four territorial battalions failed signally in the Suvla +Bay landing at Gallipoli. One battalion, it was known, had offered +violence to its officers; the commanding officer, a regular, had not +cared to survive that day. Even the good work that these battalions +did later in Palestine <span class="pagenum" id="Page_124" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 124</span>could not cancel this disgrace. The +remaining territorial battalion was attached to the First Division +in France early in 1915, where, at Givenchy, it quite unnecessarily +lost its machine-guns. Regimental machine-guns in 1915 were regarded +almost as sacred. To lose one’s machine-guns before the annihilation +of the entire battalion was considered as bad as losing the regimental +colours would have been in any eighteenth or nineteenth-century +battle. The machine-gun officer had congratulated himself on removing +the machine-gun bolts before abandoning the guns; it would make them +useless to the enemy. But he had forgotten to take away the boxes of +spare-parts. The Second Battalion made a raid in the same sector a year +and a half later and recaptured one of the guns, which had been busy +against the British trenches ever since.</p> + +<p>As soon as we arrived at the depot we Special Reserve officers were +reminded of our great good fortune. We were to have the privilege of +serving with one or the other of the line battalions. In peace-time a +candidate for a commission in the regiment had not only to distinguish +himself in the passing-out examination at the Royal Military College, +Sandhurst, and be strongly recommended by two officers of the regiment, +but he had to have a guaranteed independent income that enabled him to +play polo and hunt and keep up the social reputation of the regiment. +These requirements were not insisted on; but we were to understand that +we did not belong to the ‘regiment’ in the special sense. To be allowed +to serve with it in time of war should satisfy our ambitions. We were +not temporary officers, like those of the new army, but held permanent +commissions in the Special Reserve battalion. We were reminded that +the Royal Welch considered themselves second to none, even to the +Guards. <span class="pagenum" id="Page_125" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 125</span>Representations had been made to the regiment after the +South African War, inquiring whether it was willing to become the +Welsh Guards, and it had indignantly refused; such a change would have +made the regiment junior, in the Brigade of Guards, even to the Irish +Guards only so recently formed. We were warned that while serving with +a line battalion we were none of us to expect to be recommended for +orders or decorations. An ordinary campaigning medal inscribed with +a record of service with the battalion should be sufficient reward. +Decorations were not regarded in the regiment as personal awards, but +as representative awards for the whole battalion. They would therefore +be reserved for the professional soldiers, to whom they would be more +useful than to us as helps to extra-regimental promotion. And this +was what happened. There must have been something like two or three +hundred Special Reserve officers serving overseas. But except for three +or four who were not directly recommended by the battalion commander, +but distinguished themselves while attached to brigade or divisional +staffs, or those who happened to be sent to new-army battalions or +other regiments, we remained undecorated. I can only recall three +exceptions. The normal proportion of awards, considering the casualties +we suffered, which was about sixty or seventy killed, should have been +at least ten times that amount. I myself never performed any feat for +which I might conceivably have been decorated throughout my service in +France.</p> + +<p>The regimental spirit persistently survived all catastrophes. Our First +Battalion, for instance, was annihilated within two months of joining +the British Expeditionary Force. Young Orme, who joined straight from +Sandhurst, at the crisis of the first battle of Ypres, found himself +commanding a <span class="pagenum" id="Page_126" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 126</span>battalion reduced to only about forty rifles. With +these and another small force, the remnants of the Second Battalion of +the Queen’s Regiment, reduced to thirty men and two officers, he helped +to recapture three lines of lost trenches and was himself killed. +The reconstituted battalion, after heavy fighting at Bois Grenier +in December, was again all but annihilated at the Aubers Ridge and +Festubert in the following May, and again at Loos in September, when +the one officer-survivor of the attack was a machine-gun officer loaned +from the South Staffordshire Regiment. The same sort of thing happened +time after time in fighting at Fricourt, the Quadrangle, High Wood, +Delville Wood, and Ginchy on the Somme in 1916, and again at Puisieux +and Bullecourt in the spring fighting of 1917. In the course of the +war at least fifteen or twenty thousand men must have passed through +each of the two line battalions, whose fighting strength was never more +than eight hundred. After each catastrophe the ranks were filled up +with new drafts from home, with the lightly wounded from the previous +disaster returning after three or four months’ absence, and with the +more seriously wounded returning after nine months or a year.</p> + +<p>In the First and Second Battalions throughout the war it was not merely +the officers and non-commissioned officers who knew their regimental +history. The men knew far more about Minden and Albuhera and Waterloo +than they did about the fighting on the other fronts or the official +causes of the war.</p> +</section> + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> + +<section role="doc-chapter" aria-labelledby="c12-hd"> +<div class="chapter"> +<div class="pagenum" id="Page_127" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 127</div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="c12-hd">XII</h2> +</div> + +<p class="chap_start"><b class="smcap">In</b> 1916, when on leave in England after being wounded on the Somme, I +began an account of my first few months in France. Unfortunately, I +wrote it as a novel and I have now to retranslate it into history. I +will give one reconstituted chapter:</p> + +<p>On arrival in France we six Royal Welch Fusilier officers went +to the Harfleur base-camp near Havre. Later it was to become an +educational centre for trench-routine, use of bombs, trench-mortars, +rifle-grenades, gas-helmets, and similar technicalities. But now we did +a route-march or two through the French countryside and that was all, +except for fatigues in Havre at the docks, helping the Army Service +Corps unload stores from ships. The town was gay. As soon as we had +arrived we were accosted by numerous little boys pimping for their +sisters. ‘I take you to my sister. She very nice. Very good jig-a-jig. +Not much money. Very cheap. Very good. I take you now. Plenty champagne +for me?’ We were glad when we got orders to go up the line. But +disgusted to find ourselves attached not to the Royal Welch Fusiliers, +but to the Welsh Regiment.</p> + +<p>We had heard little about the Welsh Regiment except that it was +tough but rough, and that the Second Battalion, to which we were now +attached, had a peculiar regimental history as the old Sixty-ninth +Foot. It had originally been formed as an emergency force from +pensioners and boy-recruits and sent overseas to do the work of a +regular battalion—I forget in which eighteenth-century campaign. At one +time it had served as marines. The Ups and Downs was the battalion’s +army nick-name, partly because 69 is a number which makes the same +sense whichever way up it is <span class="pagenum" id="Page_128" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 128</span>written. The 69 was certainly +upside-down when we joined it. All the company officers except two boys +recently from Sandhurst and a Special Reserve captain were attached +from other regiments. There were now six Royal Welch Fusiliers, two +South Wales Borderers, two East Surreys, two Wiltshires, one from the +Border Regiment, one from the King’s Own Yorkshire Light Infantry. Even +the quartermaster was an alien from the Connaught Rangers. There were +perhaps four time-serving <abbr>N.C.O.</abbr>’s left in the battalion. Of the men, +not more than fifty or so had been given more than a couple of months’ +training before being sent out; some had only three weeks’ training; +a great many had never fired a musketry course. This was because the +First Division had been in constant hard fighting since the previous +August; the Second Welsh had in eight months lost its full fighting +strength five times over. The last occasion was the Richebourg fighting +of 9th May, one of the worst disasters of the early part of the war; +the division’s epitaph in the official <i>communiqué</i> read: ‘Meeting +with considerable opposition in the direction of the Rue du Bois, our +attacks were not pressed.’</p> + +<p>The Welsh ranks had been made up first with reservists of the later +categories, then with re-enlisted men, then with Special Reservists of +pre-war enlistment, then with 1914 recruits of three or four months’ +training; but each class had in turn been exhausted. Now nothing +was left to send but recruits of the spring 1915 class, and various +sweepings and scourings. The First Battalion had, meanwhile, had the +same heavy losses. In Cardiff they advertised: ‘Enlist at the depot and +get to France quick.’ The recruits were principally men either over-age +or under-age—a repetition of regimental history—or men who had some +slight physical disability <span class="pagenum" id="Page_129" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 129</span>which prevented them from enlisting +in regiments more particular than the Welsh. I still have the roll of +my first platoon of forty men. The figures given for their ages are +misleading. When they enlisted all the over-age men had put themselves +in the late thirties and all the under-age men had called themselves +eighteen. But once in France the over-age men did not mind adding on +a few genuine years. No less than fourteen in the roll give their age +as forty or over and these were not all. Fred Prosser, a painter in +civil life, who admitted to forty-eight, was really fifty-six. David +Davies, collier, who admitted to forty-two, and Thomas Clark, another +collier who admitted to forty-five, were only one or two years junior +to Prosser. James Burford, collier and fitter, was even older than +these. When I first spoke to him in the trenches, he said: ‘Excuse me, +sir, will you explain what this here arrangement is on the side of +my rifle?’ ‘That’s the safety-catch. Didn’t you do a musketry course +at the depot?’ ‘No, sir, I was a re-enlisted man and I had only a +fortnight there. The old Lee-Metford didn’t have no safety-catch.’ I +asked him when he had last fired a rifle. ‘In Egypt in 1882,’ he said. +‘Weren’t you in the South African War?’ ‘I tried to re-enlist but they +told me I was too old, sir. I had been an old soldier when I was in +Egypt. My real age is sixty-three.’ He spent all his summers as a tramp +and in the bad months of the year worked as a collier, choosing a new +pit every season. I heard him and David Davies one night in a dug-out +opposite mine talking about the different seams of coals in Wales +and tracing them from county to county and pit to pit with technical +comments. It was one of the most informative conversations I ever heard.</p> + +<p>The other half of the platoon contained the under-age <span class="pagenum" id="Page_130" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 130</span>section. +There were five of these boys; William Bumford, collier, for instance, +who gave his age as eighteen, was really only fifteen. He used to get +into trouble for falling asleep on sentry duty. The official penalty +for this was death, but I had observed that he could not help it. I had +seen him suddenly go to sleep, on his feet, while holding a sandbag +open for another fellow to fill. So we got him a job as orderly to a +chaplain for a while, and a few months later all men over fifty and all +boys under eighteen were combed out and sent to the base. Bumford and +Burford were both sent; but neither escaped the war. Bumford was old +enough to be sent back to the battalion in the later stages of the war, +and was killed; Burford was killed, too, in a bombing accident at the +base-camp. Or so I was told—the fate of many of my comrades in France +has come to me merely as hearsay.</p> + +<p>The troop-train consisted of forty-seven coaches and took twenty-five +hours to arrive at Béthune, the rail-head. We went via St. Omer. It was +about nine o’clock in the evening and we were hungry, cold and dirty. +We had expected a short journey and so allowed our baggage to be put +in a locked van. We played nap to keep our minds off the discomfort +and I lost sixty francs, which was over two pounds at the existing +rate of exchange. On the platform at Béthune a little man in filthy +khaki, wearing the Welsh cap-badge, came up with a friendly touch of +the cap most unlike a salute. He was to be our guide to the battalion, +which was in the Cambrin trenches about ten kilometres away. He asked +us to collect the draft of forty men we had with us and follow him. We +marched through the unlit suburbs of the town. We were all intensely +excited at the noise and flashes of the guns in the distance. The men +of the draft had none <span class="pagenum" id="Page_131" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 131</span>of them been out before, except the sergeant +in charge. They began singing. Instead of the usual music-hall songs +they sang Welsh hymns, each man taking a part. The Welsh always sang +when they were a bit frightened and pretending that they were not; it +kept them steady. They never sang out of tune.</p> + +<p>We marched towards the flashes and could soon see the flare-lights +curving over the trenches in the distance. The noise of the guns grew +louder and louder. Then we were among the batteries. From behind us +on the left of the road a salvo of four shells came suddenly over our +heads. The battery was only about two hundred yards away. This broke +up <cite>Aberystwyth</cite> in the middle of a verse and set us off our balance +for a few seconds; the column of fours tangled up. The shells went +hissing away eastward; we could see the red flash and hear the hollow +bang where they landed in German territory. The men picked up their +step again and began chaffing. A lance-corporal dictated a letter home: +‘Dear auntie, this leaves me in the pink. We are at present wading +in blood up to our necks. Send me fags and a lifebelt. This war is a +booger. Love and kisses.’</p> + +<p>The roadside cottages were now showing more and more +signs of dilapidation. A German shell came over and then +whoo—oo—ooooooOOO—bump—CRASH! twenty yards away from the party. We +threw ourselves flat on our faces. Presently we heard a curious +singing noise in the air, and then flop! flop! little pieces of +shell-casing came buzzing down all around. ‘They calls them the musical +instruments,’ said the sergeant. ‘Damn them,’ said Frank Jones-Bateman, +who had a cut in his hand from a jagged little piece, ‘the devils have +started on me early.’ ‘Aye, they’ll have a lot of fun with you before +they’re done, sir,’ grinned the sergeant. <span class="pagenum" id="Page_132" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 132</span>Another shell came over. +Every one threw himself down again, but it burst two hundred yards +behind us. Only Sergeant Jones had remained on his feet and laughed at +us. ‘You’re wasting yourselves, lads,’ he said to the draft. ‘Listen by +the noise they make coming where they’re going to burst.’</p> + +<p>At Cambrin village, which was about a mile from the front trenches, we +were taken into a ruined house. It had been a chemist’s shop and the +coloured glass lights were still in the window. It was the billet of +the Welsh company quartermaster-sergeants. Here we were issued with +gas-respirators and field dressings. This was the first respirator +issued in France. It was a gauze-pad filled with chemically-treated +cotton waste, to be tied across the mouth and nose. It seems it was +useless against German gas. I never put it to the test. A week or two +later came the ‘smoke-helmet,’ a greasy grey-felt bag with a talc +window to look through, but no mouthpiece. This also was probably +ineffective against gas. The talc was always cracking and there were +leaks where it was stitched into the helmet.</p> + +<p>These were early days of trench-warfare, the days of the jam-tin bomb +and the gas-pipe trench-mortar. It was before Lewis or Stokes guns, +steel helmets, telescopic rifle-sights, gas-shells, pill-boxes, tanks, +trench-raids, or any of the later improvements of trench-warfare.</p> + +<p>After a meal of bread, bacon, rum and bitter stewed tea sickly with +sugar, we went up through the broken trees to the east of the village +and up a long trench to battalion headquarters. The trench was cut +through red clay. I had a torch with me which I kept flashed on the +ground. Hundreds of field mice and frogs were in the trench. They had +fallen in and had no way out. The light dazzled them and <span class="pagenum" id="Page_133" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 133</span>we could +not help treading on them. So I put the torch back in my pocket. We had +no picture of what the trenches would be like, and were not far off the +state of mind in which one young soldier joined us a week or two later. +He called out very excitedly to old Burford who was cooking up a bit of +stew in a dixie, apart from the others: ‘Hi, mate, where’s the battle? +I want to do my bit.’</p> + +<p>The trench was wet and slippery. The guide was giving hoarse directions +all the time. ‘Hole right.’ ‘Wire high.’ ‘Wire low.’ ‘Deep place here, +sir.’ ‘Wire low.’ I had never been told about the field telephone +wires. They were fastened by staples to the side of the trench, and +when it rained the staples were always falling out and the wire falling +down and tripping people up. If it sagged too much one stretched it +across the top of the trench to the other side to correct the sag, and +then it would catch one’s head. The holes were the sump-pits used for +draining the trenches. We were now under rifle-fire. I always found +rifle-fire more trying than shell-fire. The gunner was usually, I +knew, firing not at people but at map-references—cross-roads, likely +artillery positions, houses that suggested billets for troops, and so +on. Even when an observation officer in an aeroplane or captive balloon +or on a church spire was directing the gun-fire it seemed unaimed, +somehow. But a rifle bullet even when fired blindly always had the +effect of seeming aimed. And we could hear a shell coming and take +some sort of cover, but the rifle bullet gave no warning. So though we +learned not to duck to a rifle bullet, because once it was heard it +must have missed, it gave us a worse feeling of danger. Rifle bullets +in the open went hissing into the grass without much noise, but when we +were in a trench the bullets, going over the hollow, made a tremendous +crack. <span class="pagenum" id="Page_134" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 134</span>Bullets often struck the barbed wire in front of the +trenches, which turned them and sent them spinning in a head-overheels +motion—ping! rockety-ockety-ockety-ockety into the woods behind.</p> + +<p>Battalion headquarters was a dug-out in the reserve line about +a quarter of a mile from the front companies. The colonel, a +twice-wounded regular, shook hands with us and offered us the whisky +bottle. He said that we were welcome, and hoped that we would soon +grow to like the regiment as much as our own. It was a cosy dug-out +for so early a stage of trench-warfare. (This sector had only recently +been taken over from the French, who knew how to make themselves +comfortable. It had been a territorial division of men in the forties +who had a local armistice with the Germans opposite; there was no +firing and apparently even civilian traffic through the lines.) There +was an ornamental lamp, a clean cloth, and polished silver on the +table. The colonel, adjutant, doctor, second-in-command, and signalling +officer were at dinner. It was civilized cooking, with fresh meat and +vegetables. Pictures were pasted on the walls, which were wall-papered; +there were beds with spring mattresses, a gramophone, easy chairs. It +was hard to reconcile this with accounts I had read of troops standing +waist-deep in mud and gnawing a biscuit while shells burst all around. +We were posted to our companies. I went to C Company. ‘Captain Dunn is +your company commander,’ said the adjutant. ‘The soundest officer in +the battalion. By the way, remind him that I want that list of <abbr title="Distinguished Conduct Medal">D.C.M.</abbr> +recommendations for the last show sent in at once, but not more than +two names, or else they won’t give us any. Four is about the ration for +the battalion in a dud show.’</p> + +<p>Our guide took us up to the front line. We passed a group <span class="pagenum" id="Page_135" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 135</span>of men +huddled over a brazier. They were wearing waterproof capes, for it +had now started to rain, and cap-comforters, because the weather was +cold. They were little men, daubed with mud, and they were talking +quietly together in Welsh. Although they could see we were officers, +they did not jump to their feet and salute. I thought that this was a +convention of the trenches, and indeed I knew that it was laid down +somewhere in the military textbooks that the courtesy of the salute was +to be dispensed with in battle. But I was wrong; it was just slackness. +We overtook a fatigue-party struggling up the trench loaded with +timber lengths and bundles of sandbags, cursing plaintively as they +slipped into sump-holes and entangled their burdens in the telephone +wire. Fatigue-parties were always encumbered by their rifles and +equipment, which it was a crime ever to have out of reach. When we had +squeezed past this party we had to stand aside to let a stretcher-case +past. ‘Who’s the poor bastard, Dai?’ the guide asked the leading +stretcher-bearer. ‘Sergeant Gallagher,’ Dai answered. ‘He thought he +saw a Fritz in No Man’s Land near our wire, so the silly b⁠—⁠—⁠r takes one +of them new issue percussion bombs and shoots it at ’im. Silly b⁠—⁠—⁠r aims +too low, it hits the top of the parapet and bursts back. Deoul! man, +it breaks his silly f⁠—⁠—⁠ing jaw and blows a great lump from his silly +f⁠—⁠—⁠ing face, whatever. Poor silly b⁠—⁠—r! Not worth sweating to get him +back! He’s put paid to, whatever.’ The wounded man had a sandbag over +his face. He was dead when they got him back to the dressing-station. +I was tired out by the time I got to company headquarters. I was +carrying a pack-valise like the men, and my belt was hung with all +the usual furnishings—revolver, field-glasses, compass, whisky-flask, +wire-cutters, periscope, and a lot more. A Christmas-tree that was +called. (These <span class="pagenum" id="Page_136" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 136</span>were the days in which officers went out to France +with swords and had them sharpened by the armourer before sailing. +But I had been advised to leave my sword back in the billet where +we had tea; I never saw it again or bothered about it.) I was hot +and sweaty; my hands were sticky with the clay from the side of the +trench. C Company headquarters was a two-roomed timber-built shelter +in the side of a trench connecting the front and support lines. Here +were tablecloth and lamp again, whisky-bottle and glasses, shelves +with books and magazines, a framed picture of General Joffre, a large +mirror, and bunks in the next room. I reported to the company commander.</p> + +<p>I had expected him to be a middle-aged man with a breastful of medals, +with whom I would have to be formal; but Dunn was actually two months +younger than myself. He was one of the fellowship of ‘only survivors.’ +Captain Miller of the Black Watch in the same division was another. +Miller had only escaped from the Rue du Bois massacre by swimming down +a flooded trench. He has carried on his surviving trade ever since.<a class="fnanchor" href="#Footnote2" role="doc-noteref" id="FNanchor2">2</a> +Only survivors have great reputations. Miller used to be pointed at in +the streets when the battalion was back in reserve billets. ‘See that +fellow. That’s Jock Miller. Out from the start and hasn’t got it yet.’ +Dunn had not let the war affect his morale at all. He greeted me very +easily with: ‘Well, what’s the news from England? Oh sorry, first I +must introduce you. This is Walker—clever chap, comes from Cambridge +and fancies himself as an athlete. This is Jenkins, one of those +patriotic chaps who chucked up his job to come here. This is Price, who +only joined us yesterday, but we like him; he brought <span class="pagenum" id="Page_137" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 137</span>some damn +good whisky with him. Well, how long is the war going to last and who’s +winning? We don’t know a thing out here. And what’s all this talk about +war-babies? Price pretends he knows nothing about them.’ I told them +about the war and asked them about the trenches.</p> + +<p>‘About trenches,’ said Dunn. ‘Well, we don’t know as much about +trenches as the French do and not near as much as Fritz does. We can’t +expect Fritz to help, but the French might do something. They are +greedy; they won’t let us have the benefit of their inventions. What +wouldn’t we give for parachute-lights and their aerial torpedoes! But +there’s no connection between the two armies except when there’s a +battle on, and then we generally let each other down.</p> + +<p>‘When I was out here first, all that we did in the trenches was to +paddle about in water and use our rifles. We didn’t think of them as +places to live in, they were just temporary inconveniences. Now we work +all the time we are here, not only for safety but for health. Night +and day. First, the fire-steps, then building traverses, improving +the communication trenches, and so on; lastly, on our personal +comfort—shelters and dug-outs. There was a territorial battalion that +used to relieve us. They were hopeless. They used to sit down in the +trench and say: “Oh my God, this is the limit.” They’d pull out pencil +and paper and write home about it. Did no work on the traverses or on +fire positions. Consequence—they lost half their men from frost-bite +and rheumatism, and one day the Germans broke in and scuppered a lot +more of them. They allowed the work we’d done in the trench to go to +ruin and left the whole place like a sewage-farm for us to take over +again. We were sick as muck. We reported them several times to brigade +headquarters, but they <span class="pagenum" id="Page_138" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 138</span>never got any better. Slack officers, of +course. Well, they got smashed, as I say, and were sent away to be +lines-of-communication troops. Now we work with the First South Wales +Borderers. They’re all right. Awful chaps those territorial swine. +Usen’t to trouble about latrines at all; left food about and that +encouraged rats; never filled a sandbag. I only once saw a job of work +that they did. That was a steel loop-hole they put in. But they put +it facing square to the front and quite unmasked, so they had two men +killed at it—absolute death-trap. About our chaps. They’re all right, +but not as right as they ought to be. The survivors of the show ten +days ago are feeling pretty low, and the big new draft doesn’t know +anything yet.’</p> + +<p>‘Listen,’ said Walker, ‘there’s too much firing going on. The men have +got the wind up over something. Waste of ammunition, and if Fritz knows +we’re jumpy he’ll give us an extra bad time. I’ll go up and stop them.’</p> + +<p>Dunn went on. ‘These Welshmen are peculiar. They won’t stand being +shouted at. They’ll do anything if you explain the reason for it. They +will do and die, but they have to know their reason why. The best way +to make them behave is not to give them too much time to think. Work +them off their feet. They are good workmen. Officers must work too, not +only direct the work. Our time-table is like this. Breakfast at eight +o’clock in the morning, clean trenches and inspect rifles, work all +morning; lunch at twelve, work again from one till about six, when the +men feed again. “Stand-to” at dusk for about an hour, work all night, +“stand-to” for an hour before dawn. That’s the general programme. Then +there’s sentry duty. The men do two-hour sentry spells, then work two +hours, then sleep two hours. At night sentries are doubled, so our +working parties are smaller. <span class="pagenum" id="Page_139" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 139</span>We officers are on duty all day and +divide up the night in three-hourly watches.’ He looked at his wrist +watch. ‘I say,’ he said, ‘that carrying-party must have got the <abbr title="Royal Engineers">R.E.</abbr> +stuff by now. Time we all got to work. Look here, Graves, you lie down +and have a doss on that bunk. I want you to take the watch before +“stand-to.” I’ll wake you up and show you round. Where the hell’s my +revolver? I don’t like to go out without that. Hello, Walker, what was +wrong?’</p> + +<p>Walker laughed. ‘A chap from the new draft. He had never fired his +musketry course at Cardiff, and to-night he fired ball for the first +time. It seemed to go to his head. He’d had a brother killed up at +Ypres and he said he was going to avenge him. So he blazed off all his +own ammunition at nothing, and two bandoliers out of the ammunition-box +besides. They call him the Human Maxim now. His foresight’s misty with +heat. Corporal Parry should have stopped him; but he was just leaning +up against the traverse and shrieking with laughter. I gave them both +a good cursing. Some other new chaps started blazing away, too. Fritz +retaliated with machine-guns and whizz-bangs. No casualties. I don’t +know why. It’s all quiet now. Everybody ready?’</p> + +<p>They went out and I rolled up in my blanket and fell asleep. Dunn woke +me about one o’clock. ‘Your watch,’ he said. I jumped out of the bunk +with a rustle of straw; my feet were sore and clammy in my boots. I was +cold, too. ‘Here’s the rocket-pistol and a few flares. Not a bad night. +It’s stopped raining. Put your equipment on over your raincoat or you +won’t be able to get at your revolver. Got a torch? Good. About this +flare business. Don’t use the pistol too much. We haven’t many flares, +and if there’s an attack we will want as many as we can get. But use +it if you think <span class="pagenum" id="Page_140" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 140</span>that there is something doing. Fritz is always +sending up flare lights, he’s got as many as he wants.’</p> + +<p>He showed me round the line. The battalion frontage was about eight +hundred yards. Each company held two hundred of these with two +platoons in the front line and two platoons in the support line about +a hundred yards back. Dunn introduced me to the platoon sergeants, +more particularly to Sergeant Eastmond of the platoon to which I was +posted. He asked Sergeant Eastmond to give me any information that I +wanted, then went back to sleep, telling me to wake him up at once if +anything was wrong. I was left in charge of the line. Sergeant Eastmond +was busy with a working-party, so I went round by myself. The men of +the working-party, who were building up the traverses with sandbags +(a traverse, I learned, was a safety-buttress in the trench), looked +curiously at me. They were filling sandbags with earth, piling them +up bricklayer fashion, with headers and stretchers alternating, then +patting them flat with spades. The sentries stood on the fire-step at +the corners of the traverses, stamping their feet and blowing on their +fingers. Every now and then they peered over the top for a few seconds. +Two parties, each of an <abbr>N.C.O.</abbr> and two men, were out in the company +listening-posts, connected with the front trench by a sap about fifty +yards long. The German front line was about three hundred yards beyond +them. From berths hollowed in the sides of the trench and curtained +with sandbags came the grunt of sleeping men.</p> + +<p>I jumped up on the fire-step beside the sentry and cautiously raising +my head stared over the parapet. I could see nothing except the wooden +pickets supporting our protecting barbed-wire entanglement and a +dark patch or two of bushes beyond. The darkness seemed to move and +<span class="pagenum" id="Page_141" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 141</span>shake about as I looked at it; the bushes started travelling, +singly at first, then both together. The pickets were doing the same. I +was glad of the sentry beside me; his name, he told me, was Beaumont. +‘They’re quiet to-night, sir,’ he said, ‘a relief going on; I think so, +surely.’ I said: ‘It’s funny how those bushes seem to move.’ ‘Aye, they +do play queer tricks. Is this your first spell in trenches, sir?’ A +German flare shot up, broke into bright flame, dropped slowly and went +hissing into the grass just behind our trench, showing up the bushes +and pickets. Instinctively I moved. ‘It’s bad to do that, sir,’ he +said, as a rifle bullet cracked and seemed to pass right between us. +‘Keep still, sir, and they can’t spot you. Not but what a flare is a +bad thing to have fall on you. I’ve seen them burn a hole in a man.’</p> + +<p>I spent the rest of my watch in acquainting myself with the geography +of the trench-section, finding how easy it was to get lost among <i>culs +de sac</i> and disused alleys. Twice I overshot the company frontage and +wandered among the Munsters on the left. Once I tripped and fell with a +splash into deep mud. At last my watch was ended with the first signs +of dawn. I passed the word along the line for the company to stand-to +arms. The <abbr>N.C.O</abbr>’s whispered hoarsely into the dug-outs: ‘Stand-to, +stand-to,’ and out the men tumbled with their rifles in their hands. +As I went towards company headquarters to wake the officers I saw a +man lying on his face in a machine-gun shelter. I stopped and said: +‘Stand-to, there.’ I flashed my torch on him and saw that his foot was +bare. The machine-gunner beside him said: ‘No good talking to him, +sir.’ I asked: ‘What’s wrong? What’s he taken his boot and sock off +for?’ I was ready for anything odd in the trenches. ‘Look for yourself, +sir,’ he <span class="pagenum" id="Page_142" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 142</span>said. I shook the man by the arm and noticed suddenly +that the back of his head was blown out. The first corpse that I saw in +France was this suicide. He had taken off his boot and sock to pull the +trigger of his rifle with his toe; the muzzle was in his mouth. ‘Why +did he do it?’ I said. ‘He was in the last push, sir, and that sent him +a bit queer, and on top of that he got bad news from Limerick about +his girl and another chap.’ He was not a Welshman, but belonged to the +Munsters; their machine-guns were at the extreme left of our company. +The suicide had already been reported and two Irish officers came up. +‘We’ve had two or three of these lately,’ one of them told me. Then he +said to the other: ‘While I remember, Callaghan, don’t forget to write +to his next-of-kin. Usual sort of letter, cheer them up, tell them he +died a soldier’s death, anything you like. I’m not going to report it +as suicide.’</p> + +<p>At stand-to rum and tea were served out. I had a look at the German +trenches through a periscope—a streak of sandbags four hundred yards +away. Some of these were made of coloured stuff, whether for camouflage +or from a shortage of plain canvas I do not know. There was no sign +of the enemy, except for a wisp or two of wood-smoke where they, too, +were boiling up a hot drink. Between us and them was a flat meadow +with cornflowers, marguerites and poppies growing in the long grass, a +few shell holes, the bushes I had seen the night before, the wreck of +an aeroplane, our barbed wire and theirs. A thousand yards away was a +big ruined house, behind that a red-brick village (Auchy), poplars and +haystacks, a tall chimney, another village (Haisnes). Half-right was a +pithead and smaller slag-heaps. La Bassée lay half-left; the sun caught +the weathervane of the church and made it twinkle.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_143" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 143</span>I went off for a sleep. The time between stand-to and breakfast +was the easy part of the day. The men who were not getting in a bit +of extra sleep sat about talking and smoking, writing letters home, +cleaning their rifles, running their thumb-nails up the seams of their +shirts to kill the lice, gambling. Lice were a standing joke. Young +Bumford handed me one like this. ‘We was just having an argument as to +whether it was best to kill the old ones or the young ones, sir. Morgan +here says that if you kill the old ones, the young ones will die of +grief, but Parry here, sir, he says that the young ones are easier to +kill and you can catch the old ones when they come to the funeral.’ He +appealed to me as an arbiter. ‘You’ve been to college, sir, haven’t +you?’ I said: ‘Yes, I had, but so had Crawshay Bailey’s brother +Norwich.’ This was held to be a wonderfully witty answer. <cite>Crawshay +Bailey</cite> is one of the idiotic songs of Wales. (Crawshay Bailey himself +‘had an engine and he couldn’t make it go,’ and all his relations in +the song had similar shortcomings. Crawshay Bailey’s brother Norwich, +for instance, was fond of oatmeal porridge, and was sent to Cardiff +College, for to get a bit of knowledge.) After that I had no trouble +with the platoon at all.</p> + +<p>Breakfast at company headquarters was bacon, eggs, coffee, toast and +marmalade. There were three chairs and two ammunition-boxes to sit on. +Accustomed to company commanders in England not taking their junior +officers into their confidence, I was struck by the way that questions +of the day were settled at meal-times by a sort of board-meeting with +Dunn as chairman. On this first morning there was a long debate as to +the best way of keeping sentries awake. Dunn finally decided to issue +a company order against sentries leaning up against the traverse; it +made them <span class="pagenum" id="Page_144" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 144</span>sleepy. Besides, when they fired their rifles the flash +would come always from the same place. The Germans might fix a rifle +on the spot after a time. I told Dunn of the bullet that came between +Beaumont and myself. ‘Sounds like a fixed rifle,’ he said, ‘because not +one aimed shot in a hundred comes as close as that at night. And we had +a chap killed in that very traverse the night we came in.’ The Bavarian +Guards Reserve were opposite us at the time and their shooting was +good. They had complete control of the sniping situation.</p> + +<p>Dunn began telling me the characters of the men in my platoon; also +which <abbr>N.C.O.</abbr>’s were trustworthy and which had to be watched. He +was going on to tell me just how much to expect from the men at my +platoon inspection of rifles and equipment, when there was a sudden +alarm. Dunn’s servant came rushing in, his eyes blank with horror +and excitement: ‘Gas, sir, gas! They’re using gas.’ ‘My God!’ said +Price. We all looked at Dunn. He said imperturbably: ‘Very well, +Kingdom, bring me my respirator from the other room, and another pot of +marmalade.’ This was only one of many gas alarms. It originated with +smoke from the German trenches where breakfast was also going on; we +knew the German meal-times by a slackening down of rifle-fire. Gas was +a nightmare. Nobody believed in the efficacy of the respirators, though +we were told that they were proof against any gas the enemy could send +over. Pink army forms marked ‘Urgent’ were constantly arriving from +headquarters to explain how to use these contrivances. They were all +contradictory. First the respirators were to be kept soaking wet, then +they were to be kept dry, then they were to be worn in a satchel, then, +again, the satchel was not to be used.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_145" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 145</span>Frank Jones-Bateman came to visit me from the company on our +right. He mentioned with a false ease that he had shot a man just +before breakfast: ‘Sights at four hundred,’ he said. He was a quiet boy +of nineteen. He had just left Rugby and had a scholarship waiting for +him at Clare, Cambridge. His nickname was ‘Silent Night.’</p> +</section> + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> + +<section role="doc-chapter" aria-labelledby="c13-hd"> +<div class="chapter"> +<div class="pagenum" id="Page_146" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 146</div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="c13-hd">XIII</h2> +</div> + +<p class="chap_start"><b class="smcap">Here</b> are extracts from letters that I wrote at this time:</p> + +<p>21<b class="italic">st May</b> 1915.—Back in billets again at a coal-mining village +called La Bourse. It is not more than three miles and a half from +the trenches, but the mines are still working. As we came out of +the trenches the Germans were shelling the wood by Cambrin village, +searching for one of our batteries. I don’t think they got it, but it +was fun to see the poplar trees being lopped down like tulips when the +whizz-bangs hit them square. When we marched along the <i>pavé</i> road from +Cambrin the men straggled about out of step and out of fours. Their +feet were sore from having had their boots on for a week—they only +have one spare pair of socks issued to them. I enclose a list of their +minimum load, which weighs about sixty pounds. A lot of extras get +put on top of this—rations, pick or shovel, periscope, and their own +souvenirs to take home on leave:</p> + +<table class="autotable" role="presentation"> +<tbody> +<tr><td>Greatcoat</td><td>1</td><td>Cardigan</td><td>1</td></tr> +<tr><td>Tin, mess</td><td>1</td><td>Cap, fatigue comforter</td><td>1</td></tr> +<tr><td>„ cover</td><td>1</td><td>Pay-book</td><td>1</td></tr> +<tr><td>Shirt</td><td>1</td><td>Disc, identity</td><td>1</td></tr> +<tr><td>Socks</td><td>1</td><td>Waterproof sheet</td><td>1</td></tr> +<tr><td>Soap</td><td>1</td><td>Tin of grease</td><td>1</td></tr> +<tr><td>Towel</td><td>1</td><td>Field-service dressing</td><td>1</td></tr> +<tr><td>Housewife</td><td>1</td><td>Respirator</td><td>1</td></tr> +<tr><td>Holdall</td><td>1</td><td>Spine protector</td><td>1</td></tr> +<tr><td>Razor</td><td>1</td><td>Jack knife</td><td>1</td></tr> +<tr><td>„ case</td><td>1</td><td>Set of equipment.</td><td></td></tr> +<tr><td><span class="pagenum" id="Page_147" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 147</span>Lather brush</td><td>1</td><td>Rounds ammunition</td><td>150</td></tr> +<tr><td>Comb</td><td>1</td><td>Rifle and bayonet.</td><td></td></tr> +<tr><td>Fork</td><td>1</td><td>Rifle cover</td><td>1</td></tr> +<tr><td>Knife</td><td>1</td><td>Oil bottle and pull-through.</td><td>1</td></tr> +<tr><td>Spoon</td><td>1</td><td>Entrenching tool</td><td>1</td></tr> +<tr><td>Tooth brush</td><td>1</td><td></td><td></td></tr> +<tr><td>Laces, pair</td><td>1</td><td></td><td></td></tr> +</tbody> +</table> + +<p>Well, anyhow, marching on cobbled roads is difficult, so when +a staff-officer came by in a Rolls-Royce and cursed us for bad +march-discipline I felt like throwing something at him. Trench soldiers +hate the staff and the staff know it. The principal disagreement +seems to be about the extent to which trench conditions should modify +discipline. The La Bourse miners are old men and boys dressed in sloppy +blue clothes with bulging pockets. There are shell craters all around +the pit-head. I am billeted with a fatherly old man called Monsieur +Hojdés, who has three marriageable daughters; one of them lifted up +her skirt to show me a shell-wound on her thigh that laid her up last +winter.</p> + +<p>22<b class="italic">nd May</b>.—A colossal bombardment by the French at Souchez, a few +miles away—continuous roar of artillery, coloured flares, shells +bursting all along the ridge by Notre Dame de Lorette. I couldn’t +sleep. It went on all night. Instead of dying away it grew and grew +till the whole air rocked and shook; the sky was lit up with huge +flashes. I lay in my feather bed and sweated. This morning they tell me +there was a big thunderstorm in the middle of the bombardment. But, as +Walker says: ‘Where the gunder ended and the thunder began was hard to +say.’ The men had hot <span class="pagenum" id="Page_148" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 148</span>baths at the mines and cleaned up generally. +Their rifles are all in an advanced state of disrepair and many of +their clothes are in rags, but neither can be replaced, we are told, +until they are much worse. The platoon is billeted in a barn full of +straw. Old Burford, who is so old that he refuses to sleep with the +other men of the platoon, has found a doss in an out-building among +some farm tools. In trenches he will sleep on the fire-step even in the +rain rather than in a warm dug-out with the other men. He says that he +remembers the <abbr title="commissioned officer">C.O.</abbr> when he was in long skirts. Young Bumford is the +only man he’ll talk to. The platoon is always ragging Bumford for his +childish simplicity. Bumford plays up to it and begs them not to be too +hard on ‘a lad from the hills.’</p> + +<p>23<b class="italic">rd May</b>.—We did company drill in the morning. Afterwards +Jones-Bateman and I lay on the warm grass and watched the aeroplanes +flying above the trenches pursued by a trail of white shrapnel puffs. +In the evening I was detailed to take out a working-party to Vermelles +les Noyelles to work on a second line of defence—trench digging and +putting up barbed wire under an <abbr>R.E.</abbr> officer. But the ground was hard +and the men were tired out when they got back about two o’clock in the +morning. They sang songs all the way home. They have one about Company +Quartermaster-Sergeant Finnigan:</p> + +<div class="poetry-container"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Coolness under fire,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Coolness under fire,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Mentioned in dispatches</div> + <div class="verse indent0">For pinching the company rations,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Coolness under fire.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0"><span class="pagenum" id="Page_149" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 149</span>Now he’s on the peg,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Now he’s on the peg,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Mentioned in dispatches</div> + <div class="verse indent0">For drinking the company rum,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Now he’s on the peg.</div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + +<p class="noindent">The chorus is:</p> + +<div class="poetry-container"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Whiter than the milky cokernuts,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Whiter than the milky cokernuts,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Wash me in the water</div> + <div class="verse indent0">That you washed your dirty daughter in</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And I shall be whiter than the milky cokernuts.</div> + <div class="verse indent1">Nuts,</div> + <div class="verse indent1">Nuts,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Oooooh nuts.</div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + +<p class="noindent">Finnigan doesn’t mind the libel at all.</p> + +<p>This is what happened the other day. Two young miners, in another +company, disliked their sergeant, who had a down on them and gave +them all the most dirty and dangerous jobs. When they were in billets +he crimed them for things they hadn’t done. So they decided to kill +him. Later they reported at Battalion Orderly Room and asked to see +the adjutant. This was irregular, because a private is not allowed to +speak to an officer without an <abbr>N.C.O.</abbr> of his own company to act as +go-between. The adjutant happened to see them and said: ‘Well, what is +it you want?’ Smartly slapping the small-of-the-butt of their sloped +rifles they said: ‘We’ve come to report, sir, that we are very sorry +but we’ve shot our company sergeant-major.’ The adjutant said: ‘Good +heavens, how did that happen?’ They answered: ‘It was an accident, +<span class="pagenum" id="Page_150" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 150</span>sir.’ ‘What do you mean? Did you mistake him for a German?’ ‘No, +sir, we mistook him for our platoon sergeant.’ So they were both shot +by a firing squad of their own company against the wall of a convent at +Béthune. Their last words were the battalion rallying-cry: ‘Stick it, +the Welsh!’ (They say that a certain Captain Haggard first used it in +the battle of Ypres when he was mortally wounded.) The French military +governor was present at the execution and made a little speech saying +how gloriously British soldiers can die.</p> + +<p>You would be surprised at the amount of waste that goes on in trenches. +Ration biscuits are in general use as fuel for boiling up dixies, +because fuel is scarce. Our machine-gun crews boil their hot water by +firing off belt after belt of machine-gun ammunition at no particular +target, just generally spraying the German line. After several pounds’ +worth of ammunition has been used, the water in the guns—they are +water-cooled—begins to boil. They say they make German ration and +carrying parties behind the line pay for their early-morning cup of +tea. But the real charge will be on income-tax after the war.</p> + +<p>24<b class="italic">th May</b>.—To-morrow we return to trenches. The men are pessimistic +but cheerful. They all talk about getting a ‘cushy’ one to send them +back to ‘Blitey.’ Blitey is, it seems, Hindustani for ‘home.’ My +servant, Fry, who works in a paper-bag factory at Cardiff in civil +life, has been telling me stories about cushy ones. Here are two of +them. ‘A bloke in the Munsters once wanted a cushy, so he waves his +hand above the parapet to catch Fritz’s attention. Nothing doing. He +waves his arms about for a couple of minutes. Nothing doing, not a +shot. He puts his elbows on the fire-step, hoists his body upside down +and waves his legs about till he get blood to the head. Not a shot +did old Fritz fire. “Oh,” says <span class="pagenum" id="Page_151" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 151</span>the Munster man, “I don’t believe +there’s a damn squarehead there. Where’s the German army to?” He has +a peek over the top—crack! he gets it in the head. Finee.’ Another +story: ‘Bloke in the Camerons wanted a cushy bad. Fed up and far from +home, he was. He puts his hand over the top and gets his trigger finger +taken off, and two more beside. That done the trick. He comes laughing +through our lines by the old boutillery. “See, lads,” he says, “I’m aff +to bony Scotland. Is it na a beauty?” But on the way down the trench to +the dressing-station he forgets to stoop low where the old sniper was +working. <em>He</em> gets it through the head too. Finee. We laugh fit to die.’</p> + +<p>To get a cushy one is all that the old hands think of. Only twelve +men have been with the battalion from the beginning and they are all +transport men except one, Beaumont, a man in my platoon. The few +old hands who went through the last fight infect the new men with +pessimism; they don’t believe in the war, they don’t believe in the +staff. But at least they would follow their officers anywhere, because +the officers happen to be a decent lot. They look forward to a battle +because a battle gives more chances of a cushy one, in the legs or +arms, than trench warfare. In trench warfare the proportion of head +wounds is much greater. Haking commands this division. He’s the man who +wrote the standard textbook, <cite>Company Training</cite>. The last shows have not +been suitable ones for company commanders to profit by his directions. +He’s a decent man; he came round this morning to an informal inspection +of the battalion and shook hands with the survivors. There were tears +in his eyes. Sergeant Smith swore half-aloud: ‘Bloody lot of use that +is, busts up his bloody division and then weeps over what’s bloody +left.’ Well, it was nothing to do with me; <span class="pagenum" id="Page_152" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 152</span>I didn’t allow myself +to feel either for the general or for the sergeant. It is said here +that Haking has told General French that the division’s <i>morale</i> has +gone completely. So far as I can see that is not accurate; the division +will fight all right but without any enthusiasm. It is said too that +when the new army comes out the division will be withdrawn and used on +lines of communication for some months at least. I don’t believe it. I +am sure no one will mind smashing up over and over again the divisions +that are used to being smashed up. The general impression here is that +the new-army divisions can’t be of much military use.</p> + +<p>28<b class="italic">th May</b>.—In trenches among the Cuinchy brick-stacks. Not my idea of +trenches. There has been a lot of fighting hereabouts. The trenches +have made themselves rather than been made, and run inconsequently +in and out of the big thirty-foot high stacks of brick; it is most +confusing. The parapet of one of the trenches which we do not occupy +is built up with ammunition-boxes and corpses. Everything here is +wet and smelly. The lines are very close. The Germans have half the +brick-stacks and we have the other half. Each side snipes down from the +top of its brick-stacks into the other’s trenches. This is also a great +place for rifle-grenades and trench-mortars. We can’t reply properly +to these; we have only a meagre supply of rifle-grenades and nothing +to equal the German sausage mortar bomb. This morning about breakfast +time, just as I came out of my dug-out, a rifle-grenade landed within +six feet of me. For some reason, instead of falling on its head and +exploding, it landed with its stick in the wet clay and stood there +looking at me. They are difficult to see coming; they are shot from +a rifle, with its butt on the ground, tilted, and go up a long way +before they turn over and come down. I can’t understand <span class="pagenum" id="Page_153" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 153</span>why this +particular rifle-grenade fell as it did; the chances were impossibly +against it.</p> + +<figure id="i152" class="figcenter" style="max-width: 35em;"> + <img class="w100 mt1" src="images/i152.jpg" alt=""> + <figcaption>THE BRICKSTACKS AT GIVENCHY<br><b class="italic small80">Copyright Imperial War Museum.</b></figcaption> +</figure> + +<p>Sausages are easy to see and dodge, but they make a terrible noise when +they drop. We have had about ten casualties in our company to-day from +them. I find that I have extraordinarily quick reactions to danger; but +every one gets like that. We can sort out all the different explosions +and disregard all the ones that don’t concern us—the artillery duel, +machine-gun fire at the next company to us, desultory rifle-fire. But +the faint plop! of the mortar that sends off the sausage or the muffled +rifle noise when a grenade is fired, we pick out at once. The men are +much afraid, yet always joking. The company sergeant-major stands +behind Number Eleven brick-stack and shoots at the sausages with a +rifle as they come over; trying to explode them in the air. He says +that it’s better than pigeon-shooting. He hasn’t hit one yet. Last +night a lot of stuff was flying about, including shrapnel. I heard one +shell whish-whishing towards me. I dropped flat. It burst just over the +trench. My ears sang as though there were gnats in them and a bright +scarlet light shone over everything. My shoulder was twisted in falling +and I thought I had been hit, but I hadn’t been. The vibration made my +chest sing, too, in a curious way, and I lost my sense of equilibrium. +I was much ashamed when the sergeant-major came along the trench and +found me on all fours, because I couldn’t stand up straight. It was at +a place where ‘Petticoat Lane’ runs into ‘Lowndes Square.’</p> + +<p>There has been a dead man lying on the fire-step waiting to be taken +down to the cemetery to-night. He was a sanitary-man, killed last night +in the open while burying lavatory stuff between our front and support +lines. His arm was stretched out and, when he was got in, it was still +<span class="pagenum" id="Page_154" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 154</span>stiff, so that when they put him on the fire-step his stiff arm +stretched right across the trench. His comrades joke as they push it +out of the way to get by. ‘Out of the light, you old bastard. Do you +own this bloody trench?’ Or they shake hands with him familiarly. ‘Put +it there, Billy Boy.’ Of course, they’re miners and accustomed to +death. They have a very limited morality, but they keep to it. They +will, for instance, rob anyone, of anything, except a man in their own +platoon; they will treat every stranger as an enemy until he is proved +their friend, and then there is nothing they won’t do for him. They +are lecherous, the young ones at least, but without the false shame of +the English lecher. I had a letter to censor the other day written by +a lance-corporal to his wife. He said that the French girls were nice +to sleep with, so she mustn’t worry on his account, but that he far +preferred sleeping with her and missed her a great deal.</p> + +<p>6<b class="italic">th June</b>.—We have been billeted in Béthune, a fair-sized town about +seven miles or so behind the front line. There is everything one wants, +a swimming bath, all sorts of shops, especially a cake-shop, the best +I’ve ever met, a hotel where you can get a really good dinner, and a +theatre where we have brigade ‘gaffs.’ I saw a notice this morning on +a building by the Béthune-La Bassée canal—‘Troops are forbidden to +bomb fish. By order of the Town Major.’ Béthune is very little knocked +about, except a part called Faubourg d’Arras, near the station. I am +billeted with a family called Averlant Paul, in the Avenue de Bruay, +people of the official class. They are refugees from Poimbert. There +are two little boys and an elder sister, who is in what corresponds +with the under-fifth of the local high-school. She was worried last +night over her lessons and asked me to help her write out the theory of +decimal division. She showed me the notes <span class="pagenum" id="Page_155" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 155</span>she had taken; they were +full of abbreviations. I asked why she’d used abbreviations. She said: +‘The lady professor talked very fast because we were much hurried.’ +‘Why were you hurried?’ ‘Oh, because part of the school is used as a +billet for the troops and the Germans were shelling it, and we were +always having to take shelter in the cellar, and when we came back each +time there was less and less time left.’</p> + +<p>9<b class="italic">th June</b>.—I am beginning to realize how lucky I was in my gentle +introduction to the trenches at Cambrin. We are now in a nasty salient +a little to the south of the brick-stacks, where casualities are always +heavy. The company had seventeen casualities yesterday from bombs and +grenades. The front trench averages thirty yards from the Germans. +To-day, at one part, which is only twenty yards away from an occupied +German sap, I came along whistling <cite>The Farmer’s Boy</cite>, to keep up +my spirits, when suddenly I saw a group bending over a man lying at +the bottom of the trench. He was making a snoring noise mixed with +animal groans. At my feet was the cap he had worn, splashed with his +brains. I had never seen human brains before; I had somehow regarded +them as a poetical figment. One can joke with a badly-wounded man and +congratulate him on being out of it. One can disregard a dead man. +But even a miner can’t make a joke that sounds like a joke over a man +who takes three hours to die after the top part of his head has been +taken off by a bullet fired at twenty yards range. Beaumont, of whom I +told you in my last letter, was also killed. He was the last unwounded +survivor of the original battalion, except for the transport men. He +had his legs blown against his back. Every one was swearing angrily, +then an <abbr>R.E.</abbr> officer came up and told me that there was a tunnel +<span class="pagenum" id="Page_156" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 156</span>driven under the German front line and that if we wanted to do a +bit of bombing, now was the time. So he sent the mine up—it was not a +big one, he said, but it made a tremendous noise and covered us with +dirt—and the chaps waited for a few seconds for the other Germans to +rush up to help the wounded away and then they chucked all the bombs +they had.</p> + +<p>Beaumont had been telling me how he had won about five pounds in the +sweepstake after the Rue du Bois show. It was a sweepstake of the sort +that leaves no bitterness behind it. Before a show the platoon pools +all its available cash and the winners, who are the survivors, divide +it up afterwards. Those who are killed can’t complain, the wounded +would have given far more than that to escape as they have, and the +unwounded regard the money as a consolation prize for still being here.</p> + +<p>24<b class="italic">th June</b>. —We are billeted in the cellars of Vermelles, which was +taken and re-taken eight times last October. There is not a single +house undamaged in the place. I suppose it once had two or three +thousand inhabitants. It is beautiful now in a fantastic way. We came +up two nights ago; there was a moon shining behind the houses and the +shells had broken up all the hard lines. Next morning we found the +deserted gardens of the town very pleasant to walk about in; they are +quite overgrown and flowers have seeded themselves about wildly. Red +cabbages and roses and madonna lilies are the chief ornaments. There is +one garden with currant bushes in it. I and the company sergeant-major +started eating along the line towards each other without noticing +each other. When we did, we both remembered our dignity, he as a +company sergeant-major and I as an officer. He saluted, I asknowledged +the salute, we both <span class="pagenum" id="Page_157" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 157</span>walked away. After a minute or two we both +came back hoping the coast was clear and again, after an exchange of +salutes, had to leave the currants and pretend that we were merely +admiring the flowers. I don’t quite know why I was feeling like that. +The company sergeant-major was a regular and it was natural in him, +and I suppose that it was courtesy to his scruples that made me stop. +Anyhow, along came a couple of privates and stripped the bushes clean.</p> + +<p>This afternoon we had a cricket match, officers versus sergeants, in an +enclosure between some houses out of observation from the enemy. The +front line is perhaps three quarters of a mile away. I made top score, +twenty-four; the bat was a bit of a rafter, the ball was a piece of +rag tied round with string, and the wicket was a parrot cage with the +grisly remains of a parrot inside. It had evidently died of starvation +when the French evacuated the town. The corpse was perfectly clean and +dry and I recalled a verse of Skelton’s:</p> + +<div class="poetry-container"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Parrot is a fair bird for a ladie.</div> + <div class="verse indent0">God of His goodness him framed and wrought.</div> + <div class="verse indent0">When parrot is dead he doth not putrify,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Yea, all things mortal shall turn unto nought</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Save mannës soul which Christ so dear bought,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">That never can die, nor never die shall.</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Make much of parrot, that popajay royal.</div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + +<p>The match was broken up suddenly by machine-gun fire. It was not +aimed at us; the Germans were shooting at one of our aeroplanes and +the bullets falling down from a great height had a penetrative power +greater than an ordinary spent bullet.</p> + +<p>This is a very idle life except for night-digging on the <span class="pagenum" id="Page_158" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 158</span>reserve +line. By day there is nothing to do. We can’t drill because it is +too near the German lines, and there is no fortification work to be +done in the village. To-day two spies were shot. A civilian who had +hung on in a cellar and had, apparently, been flashing news, and a +German soldier disguised as an <abbr>R.E.</abbr> corporal who was found tampering +with the telephone wires. We officers spend a lot of time practising +revolver-shooting. Jenkins brought out a beautiful target from the only +undestroyed living-room in our billet area. It was a glass case full of +artificial fruit and flowers, so we put it up on a post at fifty yards +range. He said: ‘I’ve always wanted to smash one of these damn things. +My aunt had one. It’s the sort of thing that <em>would</em> survive an intense +bombardment.’ For a moment I felt a tender impulse to rescue it. But I +smothered it. So we had five shots each, in turn. Nobody could hit it. +So at last we went up to within twenty yards of it and fired a volley. +Someone hit the post and that knocked it off into the grass. Jenkins +said: ‘Damn the thing, it must be bewitched. Let’s take it back.’ The +glass was unbroken, but some of the fruit had come loose. Walker said: +‘No, it’s in pain; we must put it out of its suffering.’ He gave it the +<i>coup de grâce</i> from close quarters.</p> + +<p>There is an old Norman church here, very much broken. What is left +of the tower is used as a forward observation post by the artillery. +I counted eight unexploded shells sticking into it. I went in with +Jenkins; the floor was littered with rubbish, broken masonry, smashed +chairs, ripped canvas pictures (some of them look several hundreds of +years old), bits of images and crucifixes, muddied church vestments +rotting in what was once the vestry. Only a few pieces of stained +glass remained fixed in the edges of the windows. I climbed up by way +of the altar to the east window and <span class="pagenum" id="Page_159" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 159</span>found a piece about the size +of a plate. I gave it to Jenkins. ‘Souvenir,’ I said. When he held +it up to the light it was St. Peter’s hand with the keys of heaven; +medieval glass. ‘I’m sending this home,’ he said. As we went out we met +two men of the Munsters. They were Irish Catholics. They thought it +sacrilegious for Jenkins to be taking the glass away. One of them said: +‘Shouldn’t take that, sir; it will bring you no luck.’<a class="fnanchor" href="#Footnote3" role="doc-noteref" id="FNanchor3">3</a></p> + +<p>Walker was ragging Dunn this evening. ‘I believe you’ll be sorry when +the war’s over, skipper. Your occupation will be gone and you’ll have +to go back on the square at the depot for six months and learn how to +form fours regimentally. You missed that little part of the show when +you left Sandhurst and came straight here. You’ll be a full colonel by +then, of course. I’ll give the sergeant-major half a crown to make you +really sweat. I’ll be standing in civvies at the barrack-gate laughing +at you.’</p> + +<p>There is a company commander here called Furber. His nerves are in +pieces, and somebody played a dirty joke on him the other day—rolling +a bomb, undetonated, of course, down the cellar steps to frighten him. +This was thought a great joke. Furber is the greatest pessimist out +here. He’s laid a bet with the adjutant that the trench lines will +not be more than a mile from where they are in this sector two years +hence. Every one laughs at Furber, but they like him because he sings +sentimental cockney songs at the brigade gaffs when we are back at +Béthune.</p> +</section> + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> + +<section role="doc-chapter" aria-labelledby="c14-hd"> +<div class="chapter"> +<div class="pagenum" id="Page_160" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 160</div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="c14-hd">XIV</h2> +</div> + +<p class="chap_start"><b class="smcap">Now</b> as the summer advanced there came new types of bombs and +trench-mortars, heavier shelling, improved gas-masks and a general +tightening up of discipline. We saw the first battalions of the new +army and felt like scarecrows by comparison. We went in and out of +the Cambrin and Cuinchy trenches, with billets in Béthune and the +neighbouring villages. By this time I had caught the pessimism of the +division. Its spirit in the trenches was largely defensive; the policy +was not to stir the Germans into more than their usual hostility. But +casualties were still very heavy for trench warfare. Pessimism made +everyone superstitious. I became superstitious too: I found myself +believing in signs of the most trivial nature. Sergeant Smith, my +second sergeant, told me of my predecessor in command of the platoon. +‘He was a nice gentleman, sir, but very wild. Just before the Rue du +Bois show he says to me: “By the way, sergeant, I’m going to get killed +to-morrow. I know that. And I know that you’re going to be all right. +So see that my kit goes back to my people. You’ll find their address in +my pocket-book. You’ll find five hundred francs there too. Now remember +this, Sergeant Smith, you keep a hundred francs yourself and divide +up the rest among the chaps left.” He says: “Send my pocket-book back +with my other stuff, Sergeant Smith, but for God’s sake burn my diary. +They mustn’t see that. I’m going to get it <em>here</em>!” He points to his +forehead. And that’s how it was. He got it through the forehead all +right. I sent the stuff back to his parents. I divided up the money and +I burnt the diary.’</p> + +<p>One day I was walking along a trench at Cambrin when I suddenly dropped +flat on my face; two seconds later a <span class="pagenum" id="Page_161" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 161</span>whizz-bang struck the back +of the trench exactly where I had been. The sergeant who was with me, +walking a few steps ahead, rushed back: ‘Are you killed, sir?’ The +shell was fired from a battery near Auchy only a thousand yards away, +so that it must have arrived before the sound of the gun. How did I +know that I should throw myself on my face?</p> + +<p>I saw a ghost at Béthune. He was a man called Private Challoner who +had been at Lancaster with me and again in F company at Wrexham. When +he went out with a draft to join the First Battalion he shook my hand +and said: ‘I’ll meet you again in France, sir.’ He had been killed at +Festubert in May and in June he passed by our C Company billet where +we were just having a special dinner to celebrate our safe return from +Cuinchy. There was fish, new potatoes, green peas, asparagus, mutton +chops, strawberries and cream, and three bottles of Pommard. Challoner +looked in at the window, saluted and passed on. There was no mistaking +him or the cap-badge he was wearing. There was no Royal Welch battalion +billeted within miles of Béthune at the time. I jumped up and looked +out of the window, but saw nothing except a fag-end smoking on the +pavement. Ghosts were numerous in France at the time.</p> + +<p>There was constant mining going on in this Cambrin-Cuinchy sector. We +had the prospect of being blown up at any moment. An officer of the +<abbr>R.E.</abbr> tunnelling company was awarded the Victoria Cross while we were +here. A duel of mining and counter-mining was going on. The Germans +began to undermine his original boring, so he rapidly tunnelled +underneath them. It was touch and go who would get the mine ready +first. He won. But when he detonated it from the trench by an electric +lead, nothing happened. He <span class="pagenum" id="Page_162" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 162</span>ran down again into the mine, retamped +the charge, and was just back in time to set it off before the Germans. +I had been into the upper boring on the previous day. It was about +twenty feet under the German lines. At the end of the gallery I found +a Welsh miner, one of our own men who had transferred to the Royal +Engineers, on listening duty. He cautioned me to silence. I could +distinctly hear the Germans working somewhere underneath. He whispered: +‘So long as they work, I don’t mind; it’s when they stop.’ He did his +two-hour spell by candle-light. It was very stuffy. He was reading a +book. The mining officer had told me that they were allowed to read; it +didn’t interfere with their listening. It was a paper-backed novelette +called <cite>From Mill Girl to Duchess</cite>. The men of the tunnelling companies +were notorious thieves, by the way. They would snatch things up from +the trench and scurry off with them into their borings; just like mice.</p> + +<p>After one particularly bad spell of trenches I got bad news in a +letter from Charterhouse. Bad news in the trenches might affect a man +in either of two ways. It might drive him to suicide (or recklessness +amounting to suicide), or it might seem trivial in comparison with +present expediences and be disregarded. But unless his leave was due +he was helpless. A year later, when I was in trenches in the same +sector, an officer of the North Staffordshire Regiment had news from +home that his wife was living with another man. He went out on a raid +the same night and was either killed or captured; so the men with him +said. There had been a fight and they had come back without him. Two +days later he was arrested at Béthune trying to board a leave-train +to go home; he had intended to shoot up the wife and her lover. He +was court-martialled for deserting in the face of the enemy, <span class="pagenum" id="Page_163" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 163</span>but +the court was content to cashier him. He went as a private soldier to +another regiment. I do not know what happened afterwards.</p> + +<p>The bad news was about Dick, saying that he was not at all the innocent +sort of fellow I took him for. He was as bad as anyone could be. The +letter was written by a cousin of mine who was still at Charterhouse. +I tried not to believe it. I remembered that he owed me a grudge and +decided that this was a very cruel act of spite. Dick’s letters had +been my greatest stand-by all these months when I was feeling low; +he wrote every week, mostly about poetry. They were something solid +and clean to set off against the impermanence of trench life and +the uncleanness of sex-life in billets. I was now back in Béthune. +Two officers of another company had just been telling me how they +had jslept, in the same room, one with the mother and one with the +daughter. They had tossed for the mother because the daughter was a +‘yellow-looking little thing like a lizard.’ And the Red Lamp, the army +brothel, was round the corner in the main street. I had seen a queue +of a hundred and fifty men waiting outside the door, each to have his +short turn with one or the other of the three women in the house. My +servant, who had been in the queue, told me that the charge was ten +francs a man—about eight shillings at that time. Each woman served +nearly a battalion of men every week for as long as she lasted. The +assistant provost-marshal had told me that three weeks was the usual +limit, ‘after which the woman retires on her earnings, pale but proud.’ +I was always being teased because I would not sleep even with the nicer +girls. And I excused myself, not on moral grounds or on grounds of +fastidiousness, but in the only way they could understand: I said that +I didn’t want a dose. A good deal <span class="pagenum" id="Page_164" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 164</span>of talk in billets was about +the peculiar bed-manners of the French women. ‘She was very nice and +full of games. I said to her: “<span lang="fr">S’il vous plaît, ôtes-toi la chemise, ma +chérie.</span>” But she wouldn’t. She said, “<span lang="fr">Oh no’-non, mon lieutenant. Ce +n’est pas convenable.</span>”’ I was glad when we were back in trenches. And +there I had a more or less reassuring letter from Dick. He told me that +I was right, that my cousin had a spite against him and me, that he had +been ragging about in a silly way, but that there was not much harm to +it; he was very sorry and would stop it for the sake of our friendship.</p> + +<p>At the end of July, I and Robertson, one of the other five Royal Welch +officers who had been attached to the Welsh, got orders to proceed to +the Laventie sector, some miles to the north. We were to report to the +Second Battalion of the Royal Welch Fusiliers. Frank Jones-Bateman +and Hanmer Jones, two more of us, went to the First Battalion. The +remaining two of the six had already gone back, McLellan sick and +Watkin with bomb wounds that have kept him limping ever since. We were +sorry to say good-bye to the men; they all crowded round to shake +hands and wish us luck. And we felt a little sorry too that we had to +start all over again getting to know a new company and new regimental +customs. But it would be worth it, to be with our own regiment. +Robertson and I agreed to take our journey as leisurely as possible. +Laventie was only seventeen miles away, but our orders were to go there +by train; so a mess-cart took us down to Béthune. We asked the railway +transport officer what trains he had to Laventie. He told us one was +going in a few minutes; we decided to miss it. There was no train after +that until the next day, so we stopped the night at the Hotel de la +France. (The Prince of Wales, who was a lieutenant in the Fortieth +Siege Battery, was billeted there <span class="pagenum" id="Page_165" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 165</span>sometimes. He was a familiar +figure in Béthune. I only spoke to him once; it was in the public bath, +where he and I were the only bathers one morning. He was graciously +pleased to remark how emphatically cold the water was and I loyally +assented that he was emphatically right. We were very pink and white +and did exercises on the horizontal bar afterwards. I joked to Frank +about it: ‘I have just met our future King in a bath.’ Frank said: ‘I +can trump that. Two days ago I had a friendly talk with him in the +<abbr>A.S.C.</abbr> latrines.’ The Prince’s favourite rendezvous was the <cite>Globe</cite>, +a café in the Béthune market square reserved for British officers and +French civilians; principally spies by the look of them. I once heard +him complaining indignantly that General French had refused to let him +go up into the line.)</p> + +<p>The next day we caught our train. It took us to a junction, the name +of which I forget. Here we spent a day walking about in the fields. +There was no train until next day, when one took us on to Berguette, +a railhead still a number of miles from Laventie, where a mess-cart +was waiting for us in answer to a telegram we had sent. We finally +rattled up to battalion headquarters in Laventie High Street. We had +taken fifty-two hours to come seventeen miles. We saluted the adjutant +smartly, gave our names, and said that we were Third Battalion officers +posted to the regiment. He did not shake hands with us, offer us a +drink, or give us a word of welcome. He said coldly: ‘I see. Well, +which of you is senior? Oh, never mind. Give your particulars to +the regimental sergeant-major. Tell him to post whoever is senior +to <span class="letters">A</span> Company and the other to B Company.’ The sergeant-major took +our particulars. He introduced me to a young second-lieutenant of A +Company, to which I was to go. He was a special reservist of the East +Surrey Regiment <span class="pagenum" id="Page_166" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 166</span>and was known as the Surrey-man. He took me along +to the company billet. As soon as we were out of earshot of battalion +headquarters I asked him: ‘What’s wrong with the adjutant? Why didn’t +he shake hands or give me any sort of decent welcome?’</p> + +<p>The Surrey-man said: ‘Well, it’s your regiment, not mine. They’re all +like that. You must realize that this is a regular battalion, one of +the only four infantry battalions in France that is still more or less +its old self. This is the Nineteenth Brigade, the luckiest in France. +It has not been permanently part of any division, but used as army +reserve to put in wherever a division has been badly knocked. So, +except for the retreat, where it lost about a company, and Fromelles, +where it lost half of what was left, it has been practically undamaged. +A lot of the wounded have rejoined since. All our company commanders +are regulars, and so are all our <abbr>N.C.O.</abbr>’s. The peace-time custom of +taking no notice of newly-joined officers is still more or less kept +up for the first six months. It’s bad enough for the Sandhurst chaps, +it’s worse for special reservists like you and Rugg and Robertson, it’s +worse still for outsiders like me from another regiment.’ We were going +down the village street. The men sitting about on the door-steps jumped +up smartly to attention as we passed and saluted with a fixed stony +glare. They were magnificent looking men. Their uniforms were spotless, +their equipment khaki-blancoed and their buttons and cap-badges +twinkling. We reached company headquarters, where I reported to my +company commander, Captain <abbr>G. O.</abbr> Thomas. He was a regular of seventeen +years’ service, a well-known polo-player, and a fine soldier. This is +the order that he would himself have preferred. He shook hands without +a word, waved me to a chair, offered a cigarette and <span class="pagenum" id="Page_167" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 167</span>continued +writing his letter. I found later that A was the best company I could +have struck.</p> + +<p>The Surrey-man asked me to help him censor some company letters before +going over to the battalion mess for lunch; they were more literate +than the ones in the Welsh regiment, but duller. On the way to the mess +he told me more about the battalion. He asked me whether it was my +first time out. ‘I was attached to the Second Welsh Regiment for three +months; I commanded a company there for a bit.’ ‘Oh, were you? Well, +I’d advise you to say nothing at all about it, then they’ll not expect +too much of you. They treat us like dirt; in a way it will be worse +for you than for me because you’re a full lieutenant. They’ll resent +that with your short service. There’s one lieutenant here of six years’ +service and second-lieutenants who have been out here since the autumn. +They have already had two Special Reserve captains foisted on them; +they’re planning to get rid of them somehow. In the mess, if you open +your mouth or make the slightest noise the senior officers jump down +your throat. Only officers of the rank of captain are allowed to drink +whisky or turn on the gramophone. We’ve got to jolly well keep still +and look like furniture. It’s just like peace time. Mess bills are very +high; the mess was in debt at Quetta last year and we are economising +now to pay that back. We get practically nothing for our money but +ordinary rations and the whisky we aren’t allowed to drink.</p> + +<p>‘We’ve even got a polo-ground here. There was a polo-match between the +First and Second Battalions the other day. The First Battalion had had +all their decent ponies pinched that time when they were sent up at +Ypres and the cooks and transport men had to come up into the line to +prevent a break through. So this battalion won easily. Can <span class="pagenum" id="Page_168" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 168</span>you +ride? No? Well, subalterns who can’t ride have to attend riding-school +every afternoon while we’re in billets. They give us hell, too. Two +of us have been at it for four months and haven’t passed off yet. +They keep us trotting round the field, with crossed stirrups most of +the time, and they give us pack-saddles instead of riding-saddles. +Yesterday they called us up suddenly without giving us time to change +into breeches. That reminds me, you notice everybody’s wearing shorts? +It’s a regimental order. The battalion thinks it’s still in India. +They treat the French civilians just like “niggers,” kick them about, +talk army Hindustani at them. It makes me laugh sometimes. Well, what +with a greasy pack-saddle, bare knees, crossed stirrups, and a wild +new transport pony that the transport men had pinched from the French, +I had a pretty thin time. The colonel, the adjutant, the senior major +and the transport officer stood at the four corners of the ring and +slogged at the ponies as they came round. I came off twice and got wild +with anger, and nearly decided to ride the senior major down. The funny +thing is that they don’t realize that they are treating us badly—it’s +such an honour to be serving with the regiment. So the best thing is to +pretend you don’t care what they do or say.’</p> + +<p>I protested: ‘But all this is childish. Is there a war on here or isn’t +there?’</p> + +<p>‘The battalion doesn’t recognize it socially,’ he answered. ‘Still, in +trenches I’d rather be with this battalion than in any other that I +have met. The senior officers do know their job, whatever else one says +about them, and the <abbr>N.C.O.</abbr>’s are absolutely trustworthy.’</p> + +<p>The Second Battalion was peculiar in having a battalion mess instead of +company messes. The Surrey-man said grimly: ‘It’s supposed to be more +sociable.’ This was another <span class="pagenum" id="Page_169" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 169</span>peace-time survival. We went together +into the big château near the church. About fifteen officers of various +ranks were sitting in chairs reading the week’s illustrated papers +or (the seniors at least) talking quietly. At the door I said: ‘Good +morning, gentlemen,’ the new officer’s customary greeting to the mess. +There was no answer. Everybody looked at me curiously. The silence that +my entry had caused was soon broken by the gramophone, which began +singing happily:</p> + +<div class="poetry-container"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">We’ve been married just one year,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And Oh, we’ve got the sweetest,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And Oh, we’ve got the neatest,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And Oh, we’ve got the cutest</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Little oil stove.</div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + +<p class="noindent">I found a chair in the background and picked up <cite>The Field</cite>. The door +burst open suddenly and a senior officer with a red face and angry +eye burst in. ‘Who the blazes put that record on?’ he shouted to the +room. ‘One of the bloody warts I expect. Take it off somebody. It +makes me sick. Let’s have some real music. Put on the <cite>Angelus</cite>.’ Two +subalterns (in the Royal Welch a subaltern had to answer to the name of +‘wart’) sprang up, stopped the gramophone, and put on <cite>When the Angelus +is ringing</cite>. The young captain who had put on <cite>We’ve been married</cite> +shrugged his shoulders and went on reading, the other faces in the room +were blank.</p> + +<p>‘Who was that?’ I whispered to the Surrey-man.</p> + +<p>He frowned. ‘That’s Buzz Off,’ he said.</p> + +<p>Before the record was finished the door opened and in came the +colonel; Buzz Off reappeared with him. Everybody jumped up and said +in unison: ‘Good morning, sir.’ It was <span class="pagenum" id="Page_170" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 170</span>his first appearance that +day. Before giving the customary greeting and asking us to sit down he +turned spitefully to the gramophone: ‘Who on earth puts this wretched +<cite>Angelus</cite> on every time I come into the mess? For heaven’s sake play +something cheery for a change.’ And with his own hands he took off the +<cite>Angelus</cite>, wound up the gramophone and put on <cite>We’ve been married just +one year</cite>. At that moment a gong rang for lunch and he abandoned it. +We filed into the next room, a ball-room with mirrors and a decorated +ceiling. We sat down at a long, polished table. The seniors sat at the +top, the juniors competed for seats as far away from them as possible. +I was unlucky enough to get a seat at the foot of the table facing the +commanding officer, the adjutant and Buzz Off. There was not a word +spoken down that end except for an occasional whisper for the salt +or for the beer—very thin French stuff. Robertson, who had not been +warned, asked the mess waiter for whisky. ‘Sorry, sir,’ said the mess +waiter, ‘it’s against orders for the young officers.’ Robertson was a +man of forty-two, a solicitor with a large practice, and had stood for +Parliament in the Yarmouth division at the previous election.</p> + +<p>I saw Buzz Off glaring at us and busied myself with my meat and +potatoes.</p> + +<p>He nudged the adjutant. ‘Who are those two funny ones down there, +Charley,’ he asked.</p> + +<p>‘New this morning from the militia. Answer to the names of Robertson +and Graves.’</p> + +<p>‘Which is which?’ asked the colonel.</p> + +<p>‘I’m Robertson, sir.’</p> + +<p>‘I wasn’t asking you.’</p> + +<p>Robertson winced, but said nothing. Then Buzz Off noticed something.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_171" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 171</span>‘T’other wart’s wearing a wind-up tunic.’ Then he bent forward and +asked me loudly. ‘You there, wart. Why the hell are you wearing your +stars on your shoulder instead of your sleeve?’</p> + +<p>My mouth was full and I was embarrassed. Everybody was looking at me. I +swallowed the lump of meat whole and said: ‘It was a regimental order +in the Welsh Regiment. I understood that it was the same everywhere in +France.’</p> + +<p>The colonel turned puzzled to the adjutant: ‘What on earth’s the man +talking about the Welsh Regiment for?’ And then to me: ‘As soon as you +have finished your lunch you will visit the master-tailor. Report at +the orderly room when you’re properly dressed.’</p> + +<p>There was a severe struggle in me between resentment and regimental +loyalty. Resentment for the moment had the better of it. I said under +my breath: ‘You damned snobs. I’ll survive you all. There’ll come a +time when there won’t be one of you left serving in the battalion to +remember battalion mess at Laventie.’ This time came, exactly a year +later.<a class="fnanchor" href="#Footnote4" role="doc-noteref" id="FNanchor4">4</a></p> + +<p>We went up to the trenches that night. They were high-command trenches; +because water was struck when one dug down three feet, the parapet and +parados were built up man-high. I found my platoon curt and reserved. +Even when on sentry-duty at night they would never talk confidentially +about themselves and their families like my platoon in the Welsh +Regiment. Townsend, the platoon-sergeant, was an ex-policeman who had +been on the reserve when war broke out. He used to drive his men rather +than lead them. ‘<span class="letters">A</span>’ company was at Red Lamp Corner; the front trench +broke off short here and started again further back on the right. +<span class="pagenum" id="Page_172" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 172</span>A red lamp was hung at the corner, invisible to the enemy, but a +warning after dark to the company on our right not to fire to the left +of it. Work and duties were done with a silent soldier-like efficiency +quite foreign to the Welsh.</p> + +<p>The first night I was in trenches my company commander asked me to +go out on patrol; it was the regimental custom to test new officers +in this way. All the time that I had been with the Welsh I had never +once been out in No Man’s Land, even to inspect the barbed wire. In +the Welsh Regiment the condition of the wire was, I believe, the +responsibility of the battalion intelligence officer. I never remember +any work done on it by C Company. I think we left it to the Royal +Engineers. When Hewitt, the machine-gun officer, used to go out on +patrol sometimes it was regarded as a mad escapade. But with both +battalions of the Royal Welch Fusiliers it was a point of honour to +be masters of No Man’s Land from dusk to dawn. There was not a night +at Laventie that a message did not come down the line from sentry to +sentry: ‘Pass the word; officer’s patrol going out.’ My orders for this +patrol were to see whether a German sap-head was occupied by night or +not.</p> + +<p>I went out from Red Lamp Corner with Sergeant Townsend at about ten +o’clock. We both had revolvers. We pulled socks, with the toes cut +off, over our bare knees, to prevent them showing up in the dark and +to make crawling easier. We went ten yards at a time, slowly, not on +all fours, but wriggling flat along the ground. After each movement +we lay and watched for about ten minutes. We crawled through our own +wire entanglements and along a dry ditch; ripping our clothes on more +barbed wire, glaring into the darkness till it began turning round and +round (once I snatched my fingers in horror from where I had planted +<span class="pagenum" id="Page_173" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 173</span>them on the slimy body of an old corpse), nudging each other with +rapidly beating hearts at the slightest noise or suspicion, crawling, +watching, crawling, shamming dead under the blinding light of enemy +flares and again crawling, watching, crawling. (A Second Battalion +officer who revisited these Laventie trenches after the war was over +told me of the ridiculously small area of No Man’s Land compared with +the size it seemed on the long, painful journeys that he made over it. +‘It was like the real size of the hollow in a tooth compared with the +size it feels to the tongue.’)</p> + +<p>We found a gap in the German wire and came at last to within five yards +of the sap-head that was our objective. We waited quite twenty minutes +listening for any signs of its occupation. Then I nudged Sergeant +Townsend and, revolvers in hand, we wriggled quickly forward and slid +into it. It was about three feet deep and unoccupied. On the floor +were a few empty cartridges and a wicker basket containing something +large and smooth and round, twice as large as a football. Very, very +carefully I groped and felt all around it in the dark. I couldn’t guess +what it was. I was afraid that it was some sort of infernal machine. +Eventually I dared to lift it out and carry it back. I had a suspicion +that it might be one of the German gas-cylinders that we had heard +so much about. We got back after making the journey of perhaps two +hundred yards in rather more than two hours. The sentries passed along +the word that we were in again. Our prize turned out to be a large +glass container quarter-filled with some pale yellow liquid. This was +sent down to battalion headquarters and from there sent along to the +divisional intelligence office. Everybody was very interested in it. +The theory was that the vessel contained a chemical for re-damping gas +masks. I now believe <span class="pagenum" id="Page_174" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 174</span>it was the dregs of country wine mixed with +rainwater. I never heard the official report. The colonel, however, +told my company commander in the hearing of the Surrey-man: ‘Your new +wart seems to have more guts than the others.’ After this I went out +fairly often. I found that the only thing that the regiment respected +in young officers was personal courage.</p> + +<p>Besides, I had worked it out like this. The best way of lasting the +war out was to get wounded. The best time to get wounded was at night +and in the open, because a wound in a vital spot was less likely. Fire +was more or less unaimed at night and the whole body was exposed. +It was also convenient to be wounded when there was no rush on the +dressing-station services, and when the back areas were not being +heavily shelled. It was most convenient to be wounded, therefore, on +a night patrol in a quiet sector. You could usually manage to crawl +into a shell-hole until somebody came to the rescue. Still, patrolling +had its peculiar risks. If you were wounded and a German patrol got +you, they were as likely as not to cut your throat. The bowie-knife +was a favourite German patrol weapon; it was silent. (At this time +the British inclined more to the ‘cosh,’ a loaded stick.) The most +important information that a patrol could bring back was to what +regiment and division the troops opposite belonged. So if a wounded +man was found and it was impossible to get him back without danger to +oneself, the thing to be done was to strip him of his badges. To do +that quickly and silently it might be necessary first to cut his throat +or beat in his skull.</p> + +<p>Sir <abbr>P.</abbr> Mostyn, a lieutenant who was often out patrolling at Laventie, +had a feud on with a German patrol on the left of the battalion +frontage. (Our patrols usually consisted of <span class="pagenum" id="Page_175" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 175</span>an officer and one +or, at the most, two men. German patrols were usually six or seven men +under an <abbr>N.C.O.</abbr> German officers left as much as they decently could to +their <abbr>N.C.O.</abbr>’s. They did not, as one of our sergeant-majors put it, +believe in ‘keeping a dog and barking themselves.’) One night Mostyn +caught sight of his <span class="corr" id="corr175" title="Source: opponets">opponents</span>; he had raised himself on one knee to +throw a percussion bomb at them when they fired and wounded him in the +arm, which immediately went numb. He caught the bomb before it hit +the ground and threw it with his left hand, and in the confusion that +followed managed to return to the trench.</p> + +<p>Like every one else I had a carefully worked out formula for taking +risks. We would all take any risk, even the certainty of death, to save +life or to maintain an important position. To take life we would run, +say, a one-in-five risk, particularly if there was some wider object +than merely reducing the enemy’s man-power; for instance, picking off +a well-known sniper, or getting fire ascendancy in trenches where the +lines were dangerously close. I only once refrained from shooting a +German I saw, and that was at Cuinchy about three weeks after this. +When sniping from a knoll in the support line where we had a concealed +loop-hole I saw a German, about seven hundred yards away, through my +telescopic sights. He was having a bath in the German third line. I +somehow did not like the idea of shooting a naked man, so I handed +the rifle to the sergeant who was with me and said: ‘Here, take this. +You’re a better shot than me.’ He got him, he said; but I had not +stayed to watch.</p> + +<p>About saving the lives of enemy wounded there was disagreement; the +convention varied with the division. Some divisions, like the Canadians +and a division of Lowland territorials, who had, they claimed, +atrocities to avenge, <span class="pagenum" id="Page_176" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 176</span>would not only take no risks to rescue +enemy wounded, but would go out of their way to finish them off. The +Royal Welch Fusiliers were gentlemanly: perhaps a one-in-twenty risk +to get a wounded German to safety would be considered justifiable. An +important factor in taking risks was our own physical condition. When +exhausted and wanting to get quickly from one point in the trenches to +another without collapse, and if the enemy were not nearer than four or +five hundred yards, we would sometimes take a short cut over the top. +In a hurry we would take a one-in-two-hundred risk, when dead tired a +one-in-fifty risk. In some battalions where the <i>morale</i> was not high, +one-in-fifty risks were often taken in mere laziness or despair. The +Munsters in the First Division were said by the Welsh to ‘waste men +wicked’ by not keeping properly under cover when in the reserve lines. +In the Royal Welch there was no wastage of this sort. At no time in the +war did any of us allow ourselves to believe that hostilities could +possibly continue more than nine months or a year more, so it seemed +almost worth while taking care; there even seemed a chance of lasting +until the end absolutely unhurt.</p> + +<p>The Second Royal Welch, unlike the Second Welsh, believed themselves +better trench fighters than the Germans. With the Second Welsh it +was not cowardice but modesty. With the Second Royal Welch it was +not vainglory but courage: as soon as they arrived in a new sector +they insisted on getting fire ascendancy. Having found out from the +troops they relieved all possible information as to enemy snipers, +machine-guns, and patrols, they set themselves to deal with them one +by one. They began with machine-guns firing at night. As soon as one +started traversing down a trench the whole platoon farthest removed +from its fire would <span class="pagenum" id="Page_177" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 177</span>open five rounds rapid at it. The machine-gun +would usually stop suddenly but start again after a minute or two. +Again five rounds rapid. Then it usually gave up.</p> + +<p>The Welsh seldom answered a machine-gun. If they did, it was not with +local organized fire, beginning and ending in unison, but in ragged +confused protest all along the line. There was almost no firing at +night in the Royal Welch, except organized fire at a machine-gun or +a persistent enemy sentry, or fire at a patrol close enough to be +distinguished as a German one. With all other battalions I met in +France there was random popping off all the time; the sentries wanted +to show their spite against the war. Flares were rarely used in the +Royal Welch; most often as signals to our patrols that it was time to +come back.</p> + +<p>As soon as enemy machine-guns had been discouraged, our patrols would +go out with bombs to claim possession of No Man’s Land. At dawn next +morning came the struggle for sniping ascendancy. The Germans, we +were told, had special regimental snipers, trained in camouflaging +themselves. I saw one killed once at Cuinchy who had been firing all +day from a shell-hole between the lines. He had a sort of cape over his +shoulders of imitation grass, his face was painted green and brown, +and his rifle was also green fringed. A number of empty cartridges +were found by him, and his cap with the special oak-leaf badge. Few +battalions attempted to get control of the sniping situation. The +Germans had the advantage of having many times more telescopic sights +than we did, and steel loopholes that our bullets could not pierce. +Also a system by which the snipers were kept for months in the same +sector until they knew all the loopholes and shallow places in our +trenches, and the tracks that our ration-parties used above-ground by +night, and where our <span class="pagenum" id="Page_178" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 178</span>traverses came in the trench, and so on, +better than we did ourselves. British snipers changed their trenches, +with their battalions, every week or two, and never had time to learn +the German line thoroughly. But at least we counted on getting rid of +the unprofessional German sniper. Later we had an elephant-gun in the +battalion that would pierce the German loopholes, and if we could not +locate the loophole of a persistent sniper we did what we could to +dislodge him by a volley of rifle-grenades, or even by ringing up the +artillery.</p> + +<p>It puzzled us that if a sniper were spotted and killed, another sniper +would begin again next day from the same position. The Germans probably +underrated us and regarded it as an accident. The willingness of other +battalions to let the Germans have sniping ascendancy helped us; enemy +snipers often exposed themselves unnecessarily, even the professionals. +There was, of course, one advantage of which no advance or retreat of +the enemy could rob us, and that was that we were always facing more or +less East; dawn broke behind the German lines, and they seldom realized +that for several minutes every morning we could see them though still +invisible ourselves. German night wiring-parties often stayed out too +long, and we could get a man or two as they went back; sunsets were +against us, but sunset was a less critical time. Sentries at night were +made to stand with their head and shoulders above the trenches and +their rifles in position on the parapet. This surprised me at first. +But it meant greater vigilance and self-confidence in the sentry, +and it put the top of his head above the level of the parapet. Enemy +machine-guns were trained on this level, and it was safer to be hit in +the chest or shoulders than in the top of the head. The risk of unaimed +fire at night was negligible, <span class="pagenum" id="Page_179" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 179</span>so this was really the safest plan. +It often happened in battalions like the Second Welsh, where the +head-and-shoulder rule was not in force and the sentry just took a peep +now and then, that an enemy patrol would sneak up unseen to the British +wire, throw a few bombs and get safely back. In the Royal Welch the +barbed-wire entanglement was the responsibility of the company behind +it. One of our first acts on taking over trenches was to inspect and +repair it. We did a lot of work on the wire.</p> + +<p>Thomas was an extremely silent man; it was not sullenness but shyness. +‘Yes’ and ‘no’ was the limit of his usual conversation; it was +difficult for us subalterns. He never took us into his confidence about +company affairs, and we did not like asking him too much. His chief +interests seemed to be polo and the regiment. He was most conscientious +in taking his watch at night, a thing that the other company commanders +did not always do. We enjoyed his food-hampers sent every week from +Fortnum and Mason; we messed by companies when in the trenches. Our +only complaint was that Buzz Off, who had a good nose for a hamper, +used to spend more time than he would otherwise have done in the +company mess. This embarrassed us. Thomas went on leave to England +about this time. I heard about it accidentally. He walked about the +West End astonished at the amateur militariness that he met everywhere. +To be more in keeping with it he gave elaborate awkward salutes to +newly joined second-lieutenants and raised his cap to dug-out colonels +and generals. It was a private joke at the expense of the war.</p> + +<p>I used to look forward to our spells in trenches at Laventie. Billet +life meant battalion mess, also riding-school, which I found rather +worse than the Surrey-man had described it. <span class="pagenum" id="Page_180" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 180</span>Parades were carried +out with peace-time punctiliousness and smartness, especially the +daily battalion guard-changing which every now and then, when I was +orderly officer, it was my duty to supervise. On one occasion, after +the guard-changing ceremony and inspection were over and I was about +to dismiss the old guard, I saw Buzz Off cross the village street +from one company headquarters to another. As he crossed I called the +guard to attention and saluted. I waited for a few seconds and then +dismissed the guard, but he had not really gone into the biliet; he +had been waiting in the doorway. As soon as I dismissed the guard he +dashed out with a great show of anger. ‘As you were, as you were, stand +fast!’ he shouted to the guard. And then to me: ‘Why in hell’s name, +Mr. Graves, didn’t you ask my permission to dismiss the parade? You’ve +read the King’s Regulations, haven’t you? And where the devil are your +manners, anyhow?’ I apologized. I said that I thought he had gone into +the house. This made matters worse. He bellowed at me for arguing; +then he asked me where I had learned to salute. ‘At the depot, sir,’ I +answered. ‘Then, by heaven, Mr. Graves, you’ll have to learn to salute +as the battalion does. You will parade every morning before breakfast +for a month under Staff-sergeant Evans and do an hour’s saluting +drill.’ Then he turned to the guard and dismissed them himself. This +was not a particular act of spite against me but the general game of +‘chasing the warts,’ at which all the senior officers played. It was +honestly intended to make us better soldiers.</p> + +<p>I had been with the Royal Welch about three weeks when the Nineteenth +Brigade was moved down to the Béthune sector to fill a gap in the +Second Division; the gap was made by taking out the brigade of Guards +to go into the Guards <span class="pagenum" id="Page_181" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 181</span>Division which was then being formed. On +the way down we marched past Lord Kitchener. Kitchener, we were told, +commented to the brigadier on the soldier-like appearance of the +leading battalion—which was ourselves—but said cynically: ‘Wait until +they’ve been a week or two in the trenches; they will lose some of +that high polish.’ He apparently mistook us for one of the new-army +battalions.</p> + +<p>The first trenches we went into on our arrival were the Cuinchy +brick-stacks. The company I was with was on the canal-bank frontage, +a few hundred yards to the left of where I had been with the Welsh +Regiment at the end of May. The Germans opposite wished to be sociable. +They sent messages over to us in undetonated rifle-grenades. One of +these messages was evidently addressed to the Irish battalion we had +relieved:</p> + +<blockquote> +<p>We all German korporals wish you English korporals a good day and +invite you to a good German dinner to-night with beer (ale) and +cakes. You little dog ran over to us and we keep it safe; it became +no food with you so it run to us. Answer in the same way, if you +please.</p> +</blockquote> + +<p class="noindent">Another message was a copy of the <cite lang="de">Neueste Nachrichten</cite>, a German army +newspaper printed at Lille. It gave sensational details of Russian +defeats around Warsaw and immense captures of prisoners and guns. +But we were more interested in a full account in another column of +the destruction of a German submarine by British armed trawlers; no +details of the sinking of German submarines had been allowed to appear +in any English papers. The battalion cared no more about the successes +or reverses of our Allies than it did about <span class="pagenum" id="Page_182" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 182</span>the origins of the +war. It never allowed itself to have any political feelings about the +Germans. A professional soldier’s job was to fight whomsoever the +King ordered him to fight; it was as simple as that. With the King as +colonel-in-chief of the regiment it was even simpler. The Christmas +1914 fraternization, in which the battalion was among the first to +participate, was of the same professional simplicity; it was not an +emotional hiatus but a commonplace of military tradition—an exchange of +courtesies between officers of opposite armies.</p> + +<p>Cuinchy was one of the worst places for rats. They came up from the +canal and fed on the many corpses and multiplied. When I was here with +the Welsh a new officer came to the company, and, as a token of his +welcome, he was given a dug-out containing a spring-bed. When he turned +in that night he heard a scuffling, shone his torch on the bed, and +there were two rats on his blankets tussling for the possession of a +severed hand. This was thought a great joke.</p> + +<p>The colonel called for a patrol to go out along the side of the +tow-path, where we had heard suspicious sounds on the previous night, +to see whether a working-party was out. I volunteered to go when it +was dark. But there was a moon that night so bright and full that it +dazzled the eyes to look at it. Between us and the Germans was a flat +stretch of about two hundred yards, broken only by shell-craters and an +occasional patch of coarse grass. I was not with my own company, but +lent to B, which had two officers away on leave. Childe-Freeman, the +company commander, said: ‘You’re not going out on patrol to-night, are +you? It’s almost as bright as day.’ I said: ‘All the more reason for +going; they won’t be expecting me. Will you please have <span class="pagenum" id="Page_183" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 183</span>everything +as usual? Let the men fire an occasional rifle and send up a flare +every half hour. If I go carefully they’ll not see me.’ But I was +nervous, and while we were having supper I clumsily knocked over a +cup of tea, and after that a plate. Freeman said: ‘Look here, I’ll +’phone through to battalion and tell them it’s too bright for you to +go out.’ But I knew Buzz Off would accuse me of cold feet, so Sergeant +Williams and I put on our crawlers and went out by way of a mine-crater +at the side of the tow-path. There was no need that night for the +usual staring business. We could see only too clearly. All we had +to do was to wait for an opportunity to move quickly, stop dead and +trust to luck, then move on quickly again. We planned our rushes from +shell-hole to shell-hole; the opportunities were provided by artillery +or machine-gun fire which would distract the sentries. Many of the +craters contained corpses of men who had been wounded and crept in and +died. Some of them were skeletons, picked clean by the rats. We got to +within thirty yards of a big German working-party who were digging a +trench ahead of their front line. Between them and us we could count +a covering party of ten men lying on the grass in their great-coats. +We had gone far enough. There was a German lying on his back about +twelve yards away humming a tune. It was the ‘Merry Widow’ waltz. The +sergeant, who was behind me, pressed my foot with his hand and showed +me the revolver he was carrying. He raised his eyebrows inquiringly. +I gave him the signal for ‘no.’ We turned to go back; it was hard not +to go back too quickly. We had got about half-way back when a German +machine-gun opened traversing fire along the top of our trenches. We +immediately jumped to our feet; the bullets were brushing the grass, +so it was safer to be standing up. We walked the <span class="pagenum" id="Page_184" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 184</span>rest of the way +back, but moving irregularly to distract the aim of the covering party +if they saw us. Back in the trench I rang up the artillery and asked +them to fire as much shrapnel as they could spare fifty yards short of +where the German front trench touched the tow-path; I knew that one of +the night-lines of the battery supporting us was trained near enough +to this point. A minute and a quarter later the shells started coming +over. We heard the clash of downed tools and distant shouts and cries; +we reckoned the probable casualties. The next morning at stand-to Buzz +Off came up to me: ‘I hear you were on patrol last night?’ I said: +‘Yes, sir.’ He asked me for particulars. When I had told him about the +covering party he cursed me for ‘not scuppering them with that revolver +of yours. Cold feet,’ he snorted as he turned away.</p> + +<p>One day while we were here the Royal Welch were instructed to shout +across to the enemy and induce them to take part in a conversation. +The object was to find out how strongly the German front trenches were +manned at night. A German-speaking officer in the company among the +brick-stacks was provided with a megaphone. He shouted: ‘<span lang="de">Wie gehts +ihnen, kamaraden?</span>’ Somebody shouted back in delight: ‘<span lang="de">Ah, Tommee, hast +du den deutsch gelernt?</span>’ Firing stopped and a conversation began across +the fifty yards or so of No Man’s Land. The Germans refused to say +what regiment they were. They would not talk any military shop. One of +them shouted out: ‘<span lang="fr">Les sheunes madamoiselles de La Bassée bonnes pour +coucher avec. Les madamoiselles de Béthune bonnes aussi, hein?</span>’ Our +spokesman refused to discuss this. In the pause that followed he asked +how the Kaiser was. They replied respectfully that he was in excellent +health, thank you. ‘And how is the Crown Prince?’ he <span class="pagenum" id="Page_185" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 185</span>asked them. ‘Oh, +b——r the Crown Prince,’ shouted somebody in English, and was immediately +suppressed by his comrades. There was a confusion of angry voices and +laughter. Then they all began singing the ‘<span lang="de">Wacht am Rhein</span>.’ The trench +was evidently very well held indeed.</p> +</section> + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> + +<section role="doc-chapter" aria-labelledby="c15-hd"> +<div class="chapter"> +<div class="pagenum" id="Page_186" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 186</div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="c15-hd">XV</h2> +</div> + +<p class="chap_start"><b class="smcap">This</b> was the end of August 1915, and particulars of the coming +offensive against La Bassée were beginning to leak through the young +staff officers. The French civilians knew that it was coming and +so, naturally, did the Germans. Every night now new batteries and +lorry-trains of shells came rumbling up the Béthune-La Bassée road. +There were other signs of movement: sapping forward at Vermelles and +Cambrin, where the lines were too far apart for a quick rush across, +to make a new front line; orders for evacuation of hospitals; the +appearance of cavalry and new-army divisions. Then Royal Engineer +officers supervised the digging of pits at intervals in the front +line. They were sworn not to say what these were for, but we knew that +they were for gas-cylinders. Scaling ladders for climbing quickly out +of trenches were brought up by the lorry-load and dumped at Cambrin +village. As early as September 3rd I had a bet with Robertson that our +division would attack on this Cambrin-Cuinchy sector. When I went home +on leave on September 9th the sense of impending events was so great +that I almost wished I was not going.</p> + +<p>Leave came round for officers about every six or eight months in +ordinary times; heavy casualties shortened the period, general +offensives cut off leave altogether. There was only one officer in +France who was ever said to have refused to go on leave when his +turn came round—Cross of the Fifty-second Light Infantry (the Second +Battalion of the Oxford and Bucks Light Infantry, which insisted on +its original style as jealously as we kept our ‘c’ in ‘Welch’). Cross +is alleged to have refused leave on these grounds: ‘My father fought +with the regiment in the South African War <span class="pagenum" id="Page_187" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 187</span>and had no leave; my +grandfather fought in the Crimea with the regiment and had no leave. I +do not regard it in the regimental tradition to take home-leave when on +active service.’ Cross was a professional survivor and was commanding +the battalion in 1917 when I last heard of him.</p> + +<p>London seemed unreally itself. In spite of the number of men in uniform +in the streets, the general indifference to and ignorance about the +war was remarkable. Enlistment was still voluntary. The universal +catchword was ‘Business as usual.’ My family were living in London +now, at the house formerly occupied by my uncle, Robert von Ranke, the +German consul. He had been forced to leave in a hurry on August 4th, +1914, and my mother had undertaken to look after it for him while the +war lasted. So when Edward Marsh, then secretary to the Prime Minister, +rang me up from Downing Street to arrange a meal, someone intervened +and cut him off. The telephone of the German consul’s sister was, of +course, closely watched by the anti-espionage men of Scotland Yard. The +Zeppelin scare had just begun. Some friends of the family came in one +night. They knew I had been in the trenches, but were not interested. +They began telling me of the air-raids, of bombs dropped only three +streets off. So I said: ‘Well, do you know, the other day I was asleep +in a house and in the early morning an aeroplane dropped a bomb next +door and killed three soldiers who were billeted there, and a woman +and child.’ ‘Good gracious,’ they said, looking at me with sudden +interest, ‘what did you do then?’ I said: ‘I went to sleep again; I was +tired out. It was at a place called Beuvry, about four miles behind +the trenches.’ They said: ‘Oh, but that was in France,’ and the look +of interest faded from their faces, as <span class="pagenum" id="Page_188" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 188</span>though I had taken them in +with a stupid catch. I went up to Harlech for the rest of my leave, and +walked about on the hills in an old shirt and a pair of shorts. When I +got back, ‘The Actor,’ a regular officer in <span class="letters">A</span> Company, asked me: ‘Had +a good time on leave?’ I said ‘Yes.’ He said: ‘Go to many dances?’ +I said: ‘Not one.’ ‘What shows did you go to?’ ‘I didn’t go to any +shows.’ ‘Hunt?’ ‘No!’ ‘Slept with any nice girls?’ ‘No, I didn’t. Sorry +to disappoint you.’ ‘What the hell <em>did</em> you do, then?’ ‘Oh, I just +walked about on some hills.’ ‘Good God,’ he said, ‘chaps like you don’t +deserve to go on leave.’</p> + +<p>On September 19th we relieved the Middlesex at Cambrin, and it was +said that these were the trenches from which we were to attack. The +preliminary bombardment had already started, a week in advance. As I +led my platoon into the line I recognized with some disgust the same +machine-gun shelter where I had seen the suicide on my first night in +trenches. It seemed ominous. This was the first heavy bombardment that +I had yet seen from our own guns. The trenches shook properly and a +great cloud of drifting shell-smoke clouded the German trenches. The +shells went over our heads in a steady stream; we had to shout to make +our neighbours hear. Dying down a little at night, the noise began +again every morning at dawn, a little louder each time. We said: ‘Damn +it, there can’t be a living soul left in those trenches.’ And still +it went on. The Germans retaliated, though not very vigorously. Most +of their heavy artillery had been withdrawn from this sector, we were +told, and sent across to the Russian front. We had more casualties +from our own shorts and from blow-backs than from German shells. Much +of the ammunition that our batteries were using came from America and +contained a high percentage <span class="pagenum" id="Page_189" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 189</span>of duds; the driving-bands were always +coming off. We had fifty casualties in the ranks and three officer +casualties, including Buzz Off, who was badly wounded in the head. +This was before steel helmets were issued; we would not have lost +nearly so many if we had had them. I had two insignificant wounds on +the hand which I took as an omen on the right side. On the morning of +the 23rd Thomas came back from battalion headquarters with a notebook +in his hand and a map for each of us company officers. ‘Listen,’ he +said, ‘and copy out all this skite on the back of your maps. You’ll +have to explain it to your platoons this afternoon. To-morrow morning +we go back to Béthune to dump our blankets, packs, and greatcoats. On +the next day, that’s Saturday the 25th, we attack.’ It was the first +definite news we had been given and we looked up half startled, half +relieved. I still have the map and these are the orders as I copied +them down:</p> + +<blockquote> +<p class="hanging-indent"><span class="smcap">First Objective.</span>—<b class="italic">Les Briques Farm.</b>—The big house plainly +visible to our front, surrounded by trees. To get this it is +necessary to cross three lines of enemy trenches. The first is three +hundred yards distant, the second four hundred, and the third about +six hundred. We then cross two railways. Behind the second railway +line is a German trench called the Brick Trench. Then comes the Farm, +a strong place with moat and cellars and a kitchen garden strongly +staked and wired.</p> + +<p class="hanging-indent"><span class="smcap">Second Objective.</span>—<b class="italic">The Town of Auchy.</b>—This is also plainly +visible from our trenches. It is four hundred yards beyond the Farm +and defended by a first line of <span class="pagenum" id="Page_190" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 190</span>trench half way across, and a +second line immediately in front of the town. When we have occupied +the first line our direction is half-right, with the left of the +battalion directed on Tall Chimney.</p> + +<p class="hanging-indent"><span class="smcap">Third Objective.</span>—<b class="italic">Village of Haisnes.</b>—Conspicuous by +high-spired church. Our eventual line will be taken up on the railway +behind this village, where we will dig in and await reinforcements.</p> +</blockquote> + +<p class="noindent">When Thomas had reached this point the shoulders of The Actor were +shaking with laughter. ‘What’s up?’ asked Thomas irritably. The Actor +asked: ‘Who in God’s Name is originally responsible for this little +effort?’ Thomas said: ‘Don’t know. Probably Paul the Pimp or someone +like that.’ (Paul the Pimp was a captain on the divisional staff, +young, inexperienced and much disliked. He ‘wore red tabs upon his +chest, And even on his undervest.’) ‘Between you and me, but you +youngsters be careful not to let the men know, this is what they call +a subsidiary attack. We’ll have no supports. We’ve just got to go over +and keep the enemy busy while the folk on our right do the real work. +You notice that the bombardment is much heavier over there. They’ve +knocked the Hohenzollern Redoubt to bits. Personally, I don’t give a +damn either way. We’ll get killed anyhow.’ We all laughed. ‘All right, +laugh now, but by God on Saturday we’ve got to carry out this funny +scheme.’ I had never heard Thomas so talkative before. ‘Sorry,’ The +Actor apologized, ‘carry on with the dictation.’ Thomas went on:</p> + +<blockquote> +<p class="noindent">‘The attack will be preceded by forty minutes discharge <span class="pagenum" id="Page_191" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 191</span>of the +accessory,<a class="fnanchor" href="#Footnote5" role="doc-noteref" id="FNanchor5">5</a> which will clear the path for a thousand yards, so +that the two railway lines will be occupied without difficulty. Our +advance will follow closely behind the accessory. Behind us are three +fresh divisions and the Cavalry Corps. It is expected we shall have +no difficulty in breaking through. All men will parade with their +platoons; pioneers, servants, etc. to be warned. All platoons to be +properly told off under <abbr>N.C.O.</abbr>’s. Every <abbr>N.C.O.</abbr> is to know exactly +what is expected of him, and when to take over command in case of +casualties. Men who lose touch must join up with the nearest company +or regiment and push on. Owing to the strength of the accessory, men +should be warned against remaining too long in captured trenches +where the accessory is likely to collect, but to keep to the open and +above all to push on. It is important that if smoke-helmets have to +be pulled down they must be tucked in under the shirt.’</p> +</blockquote> + +<figure id="i190" class="figcenter" style="max-width: 24em;"> + <img class="w100 mt1" src="images/i190.jpg" alt="map"> + <figcaption>THE CAMBRIN—CUINCHY—VERMELLES TRENCH SECTOR</figcaption> +</figure> + +<p>The Actor interrupted again. ‘Tell me, Thomas, do you believe in this +funny accessory?’ Thomas said: ‘It’s damnable. It’s not soldiering +to use stuff like that even though the Germans did start it. It’s +dirty, and it’ll bring us bad luck. We’re sure to bungle it. Look +at those new gas-companies, (sorry, excuse me this once, I mean +accessory-companies). Their very look makes me tremble. Chemistry-dons +from London University, a few lads straight from school, one or two +<abbr>N.C.O.</abbr>’s of the old-soldier type, trained together for three weeks, +then given a job as responsible as this. Of <span class="pagenum" id="Page_192" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 192</span>course they’ll bungle +it. How could they do anything else? But let’s be merry. I’m going on +again:</p> + +<blockquote> +<p>‘Men of company: what they are to carry:</p> + +<ul class="carry_items"> +<li>Two hundred rounds of ammunition (bomb-throwers fifty, and signallers +one hundred and fifty rounds).</li> + +<li>Heavy tools carried in sling by the strongest men.</li> + +<li>Waterproof sheet in belt.</li> + +<li>Sandbag in right coat-pocket.</li> + +<li>Field dressing and iodine.</li> + +<li>Emergency ration, including biscuit.</li> + +<li>One tube-helmet, to be worn when we advance, foiled up on the head. +It must be quite secure and the top part turned down. If possible +each man will be provided with an elastic band.</li> + +<li>One smoke-helmet, old pattern, to be carried for preference behind +the back where it is least likely to be damaged by stray bullets, etc.</li> + +<li>Wire-cutters, as many as possible, by wiring party and others; +hedging-gloves by wire party.</li> + +<li>Platoon screens, for artillery observation, to be carried by a man in +each platoon who is not carrying a tool.</li> + +<li>Packs, capes, greatcoats, blankets will be dumped, not carried.</li> + +<li>No one is to carry sketches of our position or anything likely to be +of service to the enemy.’</li> +</ul> +</blockquote> + +<p>‘That’s all. I believe we’re going over first with the Middlesex in +support. If we get through the German wire I’ll be satisfied. Our guns +don’t seem to be cutting it. Perhaps they’re putting that off until the +intense bombardment. Any questions?’</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_193" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 193</span>That afternoon I repeated it all to the platoon and told them of +the inevitable success attending our assault. They seemed to believe +it. All except Sergeant Townsend. ‘Do you say, sir, that we have +three divisions and the Cavalry Corps behind us?’ he asked. ‘Yes,’ I +answered. ‘Well, excuse me, sir, I’m thinking it’s only those chaps on +the right that’ll get reinforcements. If we get half a platoon of Mons +Angels, that’s about all we will get.’ ‘Sergeant Townsend,’ I said, +‘you are a well-known pessimist. This is going to be a good show.’ The +next morning we were relieved by the Middlesex and marched back to +Béthune, where we dumped our spare kit at the Montmorency Barracks. The +battalion officers messed together in a big house near by. This billet +was claimed at the same time by the staff of a new-army division which +was to take part in the fighting next day. The argument was settled +in a friendly way by division and battalion messing together. It was, +someone pointed out, like a caricature of The Last Supper in duplicate. +In the middle of the long table sat the two pseudo-Christs, the +battalion colonel and the divisional general. Everybody was drinking a +lot; the subalterns were allowed whisky for a treat, and were getting +rowdy. They raised their glasses with: ‘Cheero, we will be messing +together to-morrow night in La Bassée.’ Only the company commanders +were looking worried. I remember C Company commander especially, +Captain <abbr class="letters">A. L.</abbr> Samson, biting his thumb and refusing to join in the +general excitement. I think it was Childe-Freeman of B company who said +that night: ‘The last time the regiment was in these parts it was under +decent generalship. Old Marlborough knew better than to attack the La +Bassée lines; he masked them and went round.’</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_194" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 194</span>The <abbr title="General Staff Officer">G.S.O.</abbr> 1 of the new-army division, a staff-colonel, knew the +adjutant well. They had played polo together in India. I happened to +be sitting next to them. The <abbr>G.S.O.</abbr> 1 said to the adjutant, rather +drunkenly: ‘Charley, do you see that silly old woman over there? Calls +himself General Commanding. Doesn’t know where he is; doesn’t know +where his division is; can’t read a map properly. He’s marched the poor +sods off their feet and left his supplies behind, God knows where. +They’ve had to use their iron rations and what they could pick up in +the villages. And to-morrow he’s going to fight a battle. Doesn’t know +anything about battles; the men have never been in trenches before, +and to-morrow’s going to be a glorious balls-up, and the day after +to-morrow he’ll be sent home.’ Then he said, quite seriously: ‘Really, +Charley, it’s just like that, you mark my words.’</p> + +<p>That night we marched back again to Cambrin. The men were singing. +Being mostly from the Midlands they sang comic songs instead of Welsh +hymns: <cite>Slippery Sam</cite>, <cite>When we’ve Wound up the Watch on the Rhine</cite>, +and <cite>I do like a S’nice S’mince Pie</cite>, to concertina accompaniment. The +tune of the <cite>S’nice S’mince Pie</cite> ran in my head all next day, and for +the week following I could not get rid of it. The Second Welsh would +never have sung a song like <cite>When we’ve Wound up the Watch on the +Rhine</cite>. Their only songs about the war were defeatist:</p> + +<div class="poetry-container"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">I want to go home,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">I want to go home,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">The coal-box and shrapnel they whistle and roar,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">I don’t want to go to the trenches no more,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">I want to go over the sea</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Where the Kayser can’t shoot bombs at me.</div> + <div class="verse indent0"><span class="pagenum" id="Page_195" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 195</span>Oh, I</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Don’t want to die,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">I want to go home.</div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + +<p class="noindent">There were several more verses in the same strain. Hewitt, the Welsh +machine-gun officer, had written one in a more offensive spirit:</p> + +<div class="poetry-container"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">I want to go home,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">I want to go home.</div> + <div class="verse indent0">One day at Givenchy the week before last</div> + <div class="verse indent0">The Allmands attacked and they nearly got past.</div> + <div class="verse indent0">They pushed their way up to the keep,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Through our maxim-gun sight we did peep,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Oh my!</div> + <div class="verse indent0">They let out a cry,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">They never got home.</div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + +<p class="noindent">But the men would not sing it, though they all admired Hewitt.</p> + +<p>The Béthune-La Bassée road was choked with troops, guns, and transport, +and we had to march miles north out of our way to get back to Cambrin. +As it was we were held up two or three times by massed cavalry. +Everything seemed in confusion. A casualty clearing-station had been +planted astride one of the principal crossroads and was already being +shelled. When we reached Cambrin we had marched about twenty miles in +all that day. We were told then that the Middlesex would go over first +with us in support, and to their left the Second Argyll and Sutherland +Highlanders, with the Cameronians in support; the junior officers +complained loudly at our not being given the honour of leading <span class="pagenum" id="Page_196" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 196</span>the +attack. We were the senior regiment, they protested, and entitled to +the ‘Right of the Line.’ We moved into trench sidings just in front +of the village. There was about half a mile of communication trench +between us and the trenches proper, known as Maison Rouge Alley. It +was an hour or so past midnight. At half-past five the gas was to +be discharged. We were cold, tired and sick, not at all in the mood +for a battle. We tried to snatch an hour or two of sleep squatting +in the trench. It had been raining for some time. Grey, watery dawn +broke at last behind the German lines; the bombardment, which had been +surprisingly slack all night, brisked up a little. ‘Why the devil don’t +they send them over quicker?’ asked The Actor. ‘This isn’t my idea of a +bombardment. We’re getting nothing opposite us. What little there is is +going into the Hohenzollern.’ ‘Shell shortage. Expected it,’ answered +Thomas. We were told afterwards that on the 23rd a German aeroplane had +bombed the Army Reserve shell-dump and sent it up. The bombardment on +the 24th and on the day of the battle itself was nothing compared with +that of the previous days. Thomas looked strained and ill. ‘It’s time +they were sending that damned accessory off. I wonder what’s doing.’</p> + +<p>What happened in the next few minutes is difficult for me now to sort +out. It was more difficult still at the time. All we heard back there +in the sidings was a distant cheer, confused crackle of rifle-fire, +yells, heavy shelling on our front line, more shouts and yells and a +continuous rattle of machine-guns. After a few minutes, lightly-wounded +men of the Middlesex came stumbling down Maison Rouge Alley to the +dressing-station. I was at the junction of the siding and the alley. +‘What’s happened? What’s happened?’ I asked. ‘Bloody balls-up’ was the +most detailed answer <span class="pagenum" id="Page_197" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 197</span>I could get. Among the wounded were a number +of men yellow-faced and choking, with their buttons tarnished green; +these were gas cases. Then came the stretcher cases. Maison Rouge Alley +was narrow and the stretchers had difficulty in getting down. The +Germans started shelling it with five-point-nines. Thomas went through +the shelling to battalion headquarters to ask for orders. It was the +same place that I had visited on my first night in the trenches. This +group of dug-outs in the reserve line showed very plainly from the +air as battalion headquarters, and should never have been occupied on +the day of a battle. Just before Thomas arrived the Germans put five +shells into it. The adjutant jumped one way, the colonel another, the +regimental sergeant-major a third. One shell went into the signals +dug-out and destroyed the telephone. The colonel had a slight wound on +his hand; he joined the stream of wounded and was carried as far as +the base with it. The adjutant took charge. All this time <span class="letters">A</span> Company +had been waiting in the siding for the rum to arrive; the tradition +of every attack was a double tot of rum beforehand. All the other +companies got it except ours. The Actor was cursing: ‘Where the bloody +hell’s that storeman gone?’ We fixed bayonets in readiness to go up to +the attack as soon as Thomas came back with orders. The Actor sent me +along the siding to the other end of the company. The stream of wounded +was continuous. At last Thomas’s orderly appeared, saying: ‘Captain’s +orders, sir: <span class="letters">A</span> Company to move up to the front line.’ It seems that +at that moment the storeman appeared with the rum. He was hugging the +rum-bottle, without rifle or equipment, red-faced and retching. He +staggered up to The Actor and said: ‘There you are, sir,’ then fell +on his face in the thick mud of a sump-pit at the junction of the +trench and the <span class="pagenum" id="Page_198" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 198</span>siding. The stopper of the bottle flew out and what +was left of the three gallons bubbled on the ground. The Actor said +nothing. It was a crime deserving the death-penalty. He put one foot +on the storeman’s neck, the other in the small of his back, and trod +him into the mud. Then he gave the order ‘Company forward.’ The company +went forward with a clatter of steel over the body, and that was the +last heard of the storeman.</p> + +<p>What had happened in the front line was this. At half-past four the +commander of the gas-company in the front line sent a telephone message +through to divisional headquarters: ‘Dead calm. Impossible discharge +accessory.’ The answer came back: ‘Accessory to be discharged at all +costs.’ Thomas’s estimate of the gas-company’s efficiency was right +enough. The spanners for unscrewing the cocks of the cylinders were +found, with two or three exceptions, to be misfits. The gas-men rushed +about shouting and asking each other for the loan of an adjustable +spanner. They discharged one or two cylinders with the spanners that +they had; the gas went whistling out, formed a thick cloud a few +yards away in No Man’s Land, and then gradually spread back into the +trenches. The Germans had been expecting the attack. They immediately +put their gas-helmets on, semi-rigid ones, better than ours. Bundles of +oily cotton-waste were strewn along the German parapet and set alight +as a barrier to the gas. Then their batteries opened on our lines. The +confusion in the front trench was great; the shelling broke several of +the gas-cylinders and the trench was soon full of gas. The gas-company +dispersed.</p> + +<p>No orders could come through because the shell in the signals dug-out +at battalion headquarters had cut communication <span class="pagenum" id="Page_199" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 199</span>both between +companies and battalion headquarters and between battalion headquarters +and division. The officers in the front trench had to decide on +immediate action. Two companies of the Middlesex, instead of waiting +for the intense bombardment which was to follow the forty minutes +of gas, charged at once and got as far as the German wire-which our +artillery had not yet attempted to cut. What shelling there had been +on it was shrapnel and not high explosive; shrapnel was no use against +barbed wire. The Germans shot the Middlesex men down. It is said that +one platoon found a gap and got into the German trench. But there +were no survivors of the platoon to confirm the story. The Argyll and +Sutherland Highlanders went over too, on their left. Two companies, +instead of charging at once, rushed back to the support line out of the +gas-filled front trench and attacked from there. It will be recalled +that the front line had been pushed forward in preparation for the +battle; these companies were therefore attacking from the old front +line. The barbed wire entanglements in front of this trench had not +been removed, so that they were caught and machine-gunned between +their own front and support lines. The leading companies were equally +unsuccessful. When the attack started, the German <abbr>N.C.O.</abbr>’s had jumped +up on the parapet to encourage their men. It was a Jaeger regiment and +their musketry was good.</p> + +<p>The survivors of the first two companies of the Middlesex were lying in +shell-craters close to the German wire, sniping and making the Germans +keep their heads down. They had bombs to throw, but these were nearly +all of a new type issued for the battle; the fuses were lit on the +match-and-matchbox principle and the rain had made them useless. The +other two companies of the Middlesex soon followed <span class="pagenum" id="Page_200" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 200</span>in support. +Machine-gun fire stopped them half-way. Only one German machine-gun +was now in action, the others had been knocked out by rifle or +trench-mortar fire. Why the single gun remained in action is a story in +itself.</p> + +<p>It starts like this. British colonial governors and high-commissioners +had the privilege of nominating one or two officers from their +countries to be attached in war-time to the regular British forces. +Under this scheme the officers appointed began as full lieutenants. +The Governor-General of Jamaica (or whatever his proper style may be) +nominated the eighteen-year-old son of a rich Jamaica planter. He was +sent straight from Jamaica to the First Middlesex. He was good-hearted +enough but of little use in the trenches. He had never been out of +the island in his life and, except for a short service with the West +Indian militia, knew nothing of soldiering. His company commander took +a fatherly interest in Young Jamaica, as he was called, and tried to +teach him his duties. This company commander was known as The Boy. +He had twenty years’ service in the Middlesex, and the unusual boast +of having held every rank from ‘boy’ to captain in the same company. +His father, I believe, had been the regimental sergeant-major. The +difficulty was that Jamaica was a full lieutenant and so senior +to the other experienced subalterns in the company, who were only +second-lieutenants. The colonel decided to shift Jamaica off on some +course or extra-regimental appointment at the earliest opportunity. +Somewhere about May or June he had been asked to supply an officer +for the brigade trench-mortar company, and he had sent Jamaica. +Trench-mortars at that time were dangerous and ineffective; so the +appointment seemed suitable. At the same time the Royal Welch Fusiliers +had also been asked to detail an officer, and the <span class="pagenum" id="Page_201" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 201</span>colonel had sent +Tiley, an ex-planter from Malay, who was what is called a fine natural +soldier. He had been chosen because he was attached from another +regiment and had showed his resentment at the manner of his welcome +somewhat too plainly. By September mortars had improved in design and +become an important infantry arm; Jamaica was senior to Tiley and was +therefore in the responsible position of commanding the company.</p> + +<p>When the Middlesex made the charge, The Boy was mortally wounded as +he climbed over the parapet. He fell back and began crawling down +the trench to the stretcher-bearers’ dug-out. He passed Jamaica’s +trench-mortar emplacement. Jamaica had lost his gun-team and was +serving the trench-mortars himself. When he saw The Boy he forgot about +his guns and ran off to get a stretcher-party. Tiley meanwhile, on the +other flank, opposite Mine Point, had knocked out the machine-guns +within range. He went on until his gun burst. The machine-gun in the +Pope’s Nose, a small salient opposite Jamaica, remained in action.</p> + +<p>It was at this point that the Royal Welch Fusiliers came up in support. +Maison Rouge Alley was a nightmare; the Germans were shelling it with +five-nines bursting with a black smoke and with lachrymatory shells. +This caused a continual scramble backwards and forwards. There were +cries and counter-cries: ‘Come on!’ ‘Get back, you bastards!’ ‘Gas +turning on us!’ ‘Keep your heads, you men!’ ‘Back like hell, boys.’ +‘Whose orders?’ ‘What’s happening?’ ‘Gas!’ ‘Back!’ ‘Come on!’ ‘Gas!’ +‘Back!’ Wounded men and stretcher-bearers were still trying to squeeze +past. We were alternately putting on and taking off our gas-helmets +and that made things worse. In many places the trench was filled in +and we had to scramble over the top. Childe-Freeman <span class="pagenum" id="Page_202" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 202</span>got up to +the front line with only fifty men of B Company; the rest had lost +their way in some abandoned trenches half-way up. The adjutant met +him in the support line. ‘You ready to go over, Freeman?’ he asked. +Freeman had to admit that he had lost most of his company. He felt +this keenly as a disgrace; it was the first time that he had commanded +a company in battle. He decided to go over with his fifty men in +support of the Middlesex. He blew his whistle and the company charged. +They were stopped by machine-gun fire before they had passed our own +entanglements. Freeman himself died, but of heart-failure, as he stood +on the parapet. After a few minutes C Company and the remainder of B +reached the front line. The gas-cylinders were still whistling and the +trench full of dying men. Samson decided to go over; he would not have +it said that the Royal Welch had let down the Middlesex. There was a +strong comradely feeling between the Middlesex and the Royal Welch. The +Royal Welch and Middlesex were drawn together in dislike of the Scots. +The other three battalions in the brigade were Scottish, and <span class="corr" id="corr202" title="Source: the the">the</span> +brigadier was a Scot and, unjustly no doubt, accused of favouring them. +Our adjutant voiced the general opinion: ‘The Jocks are all the same, +the trousered variety and the bare-backed variety. They’re dirty in +trenches, they skite too much, and they charge like hell—both ways.’ +The Middlesex, who were the original Diehard battalion, had more than +once, with the Royal Welch, considered themselves let down by the +Jocks. So Samson with C and the rest of B Company charged. One of the +officers told me later what happened to himself. It had been agreed +to advance by platoon rushes with supporting fire. When his platoon +had run about twenty yards he signalled them to lie down and <span class="pagenum" id="Page_203" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 203</span>open +covering fire. The din was tremendous. He saw the platoon on the left +flopping down too, so he whistled the advance again. Nobody seemed +to hear. He jumped up from his shell-hole and waved and signalled +‘Forward.’ Nobody stirred. He shouted: ‘You bloody cowards, are you +leaving me to go alone?’ His platoon sergeant, groaning with a broken +shoulder, gasped out: ‘Not cowards, sir. Willing enough. But they’re +all f⁠—⁠—⁠ing dead.’ A machine-gun traversing had caught them as they rose +to the whistle.</p> + +<p>Our company too had become separated by the shelling. The Surrey-man +got a touch of gas and went coughing back. The Actor said he was +skrim-shanking and didn’t want the battle. This was unfair. The +Surrey-man looked properly sick. I do not know what happened to him, +but I heard that the gas was not much and that he managed, a few months +later, to get back to his own regiment in France. I found myself with +The Actor in a narrow trench between the front and support lines. This +trench had not been built wide enough for a stretcher to pass the +bends. We came on The Boy lying on his stretcher wounded in the lungs +and the stomach. Jamaica was standing over him in tears, blubbering: +‘Poor old Boy, poor old Boy, he’s going to die; I’m sure he is. He’s +the only one who was decent to me.’ The Actor found we could not get +by. He said to Jamaica: ‘Take that poor sod out of the way, will you? +I’ve got to get my company up. Put him into a dug-out or somewhere.’ +Jamaica made no answer; he seemed paralysed by the horror of the +occasion. He could only repeat: ‘Poor old Boy, poor I old Boy.’ ‘Look +here,’ said The Actor, ‘if you can’t shift him into a dug-out we’ll +have to lift him on top of the trench. He can’t live now and we’re +late getting up.’ ‘No, no,’ Jamaica shouted wildly. The Actor lost his +temper <span class="pagenum" id="Page_204" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 204</span>and shook Jamaica roughly by the shoulders. ‘You’re the +bloody trench-mortar wallah, aren’t you?’ he asked fiercely. Jamaica +nodded miserably. ‘Well, your battery is a hundred yards from here. Why +the hell aren’t you using your gas-pipes on that machine-gun in the +Pope’s Nose? Buzz off back to them.’ And he kicked him down the trench. +Then he called over his shoulder: ‘Sergeant Rose and Corporal Jennings, +lift this stretcher up across the top of the trench. We’ve got to +pass.’ Jamaica leaned against a traverse. ‘I do think you’re the most +heartless beast I’ve ever met,’ he said weakly.</p> + +<p>We went on up to the front line. It was full of dead and dying. The +captain of the gas-company, who had kept his head and had a special +oxygen respirator, had by now turned off the gas. Vermorel-sprayers +had cleared out most of the gas, but we still had to wear our masks. +We climbed up and crouched on the fire-step, where the gas was not so +thick—gas was heavy stuff and kept low. Then Thomas arrived with the +remainder of <span class="letters">A</span> Company and, with D, we waited for the whistle to follow +the other two companies over. Fortunately at this moment the adjutant +appeared. He told Thomas that he was now in command of the battalion +and he didn’t care a damn about orders; he was going to cut his losses. +He said he would not send <span class="letters">A</span> and D over until he got definite orders +from brigade. He had sent a runner back because telephone communication +was cut, and we must wait. Meanwhile the intense bombardment that was +to follow the forty minutes’ discharge of gas began. It concentrated on +the German front trench and wire. A good deal of it was short and we +had further casualties in our trenches. The survivors of the Middlesex +and of our B and C Companies in craters in No Man’s Land suffered +heavily.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_205" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 205</span>My mouth was dry, my eyes out of focus, and my legs quaking under +me. I found a water-bottle full of rum and drank about half a pint; it +quieted me and my head remained clear. Samson was lying wounded about +twenty yards away from the front trench. Several attempts were made to +get him in. He was very badly hit and groaning. Three men were killed +in these attempts and two officers and two men wounded. Finally his own +orderly managed to crawl out to him. Samson ordered him back, saying +that he was riddled and not worth rescuing; he sent his apologies to +the company for making such a noise. We waited for about a couple of +hours for the order to charge. The men were silent and depressed. +Sergeant Townsend was making feeble, bitter jokes about the good old +British army muddling through and how he thanked God we still had a +navy. I shared the rest of the rum with him and he cheered up a little. +Finally a runner came with a message that the attack was off for the +present.</p> + +<p>Rumours came down the trenches of a disaster similar to our own in the +brick-stack area, where the Fifth Brigade had gone over, and again at +Givenchy, where it was said that men of the Sixth Brigade at the Duck’s +Bill salient had fought their way into the enemy trenches, but had been +bombed out, their own supply of bombs failing. It was said, however, +that things were better on the right, where there had been a slight +wind to take the gas over. There was a rumour that the First, Seventh, +and Forty-seventh Divisions had broken through. My memory of that day +is hazy. We spent it getting the wounded down to the dressing-station, +spraying the trenches and dug-outs to get rid of the gas, and clearing +away the earth where trenches were blocked. The trenches stank with a +gas-blood-lyddite-latrine smell. Late <span class="pagenum" id="Page_206" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 206</span>in the afternoon we watched +through our field-glasses the advance of the reserves towards Loos and +Hill 70; it looked like a real break through. They were being heavily +shelled. They were troops of the new-army division whose staff we had +messed with the night before. Immediately to the right of us was the +Highland Division, whose exploits on that day Ian Hay has celebrated in +<cite>The First Hundred Thousand</cite>; I suppose that we were ‘the flat caps on +the left’ who ‘let down’ his comrades-in-arms.</p> + +<p>As soon as it was dusk we all went out to get in the wounded. Only +sentries were left in the line. The first dead body I came upon was +Samson’s. I found that he had forced his knuckles into his mouth to +stop himself crying out and attracting any more men to their death. He +had been hit in seventeen places. Major Swainson, the second-in-command +of the Middlesex, came crawling in from the German wire. He seemed to +be wounded in the lungs, the stomach and a leg. Choate, a Middlesex +second-lieutenant, appeared; he was unhurt, and together we bandaged +Swainson and got him into the trench and on a stretcher. He begged me +to loosen his belt; I cut it with a bowie-knife that I had bought in +Béthune for use in the fighting. He said: ‘I’m about done for.’<a class="fnanchor" href="#Footnote6" role="doc-noteref" id="FNanchor6">6</a> We +spent all that night getting in the wounded of the Royal Welch, the +Middlesex and those of the Argyll and Sutherland who had attacked from +the front trench. The Germans behaved generously. I do not remember +hearing a shot fired that night, and we kept on <span class="pagenum" id="Page_207" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 207</span>until it was +nearly dawn and we could be plainly seen; then they fired a few shots +in warning and we gave it up. By this time we had got in all the +wounded and most of the Royal Welch dead. I was surprised at some of +the attitudes in which the dead had stiffened—in the act of bandaging +friends’ wounds, crawling, cutting wire. The Argyll and Sutherland +had seven hundred casualties, including fourteen officers killed out +of the sixteen that went over; the Middlesex five hundred and fifty +casualties, including eleven officers killed.</p> + +<p>Two other Middlesex officers besides Choate were unwounded; their names +were Henry and Hill, second-lieutenants who had recently come with +commissions from, I think, the Artists’ Rifles; their welcome in the +Middlesex had been something like mine in the Royal Welch. They had +been lying out in shell-holes in the rain all day, sniping and being +sniped at. Henry, according to Hill, had dragged five wounded men into +his shell-hole and thrown up a sort of parapet with his hands and a +bowie-knife that he was carrying. Hill had his platoon sergeant with +him, screaming for hours with a stomach wound, begging for morphia; he +was dying, so Hill gave him five pellets. We always carried morphia +with us for emergencies like this. When Choate, Henrv and Hill arrived +back in the trenches with a few stragglers they reported at the +Middlesex headquarters. Hill told me the story. The colonel and the +adjutant were sitting down to a meat pie when he and Henry arrived. +Henry said: ‘Come to report, sir. Ourselves and about ninety men of +all companies. Mr. Choate is back, unwounded, too.’ They looked up +dully. The colonel said: ‘So you’ve come back, have you? Well, all the +rest are dead. I suppose Mr. Choate had better command what’s left of +<span class="pagenum" id="Page_208" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 208</span><span class="letters">A</span> Company, the bombing officer will command what’s left of B (the +bombing officer had not gone over but remained with headquarters), Mr. +Henry goes to C Company, Mr. Hill to D. The Royal Welch are holding +the front line. We are here in support. Let me know where to find you +if I want you. Good night.’ There was no offer to have a piece of meat +pie or a drink of whisky, so they saluted and went miserably out. +They were called back by the adjutant. ‘Mr. Hill! Mr. Henry!’ ‘Sir?’ +Hill said that he expected a change of mind as to the propriety with +which hospitality could be offered by a regular colonel and adjutant +to temporary second-lieutenants in distress. But it was only to say: +‘Mr. Hill, Mr. Henry, I saw some men in the trench just now with their +shoulder-straps unbuttoned and their equipment fastened anyhow. See +that this practice does not occur in future. That’s all.’ Henry heard +the colonel from his bunk complaining that he had only two blankets and +that it was a deucedly cold night. Choate arrived a few minutes later +and reported; the others had told him of their reception. After he had +saluted and reported that Major Swainson, who had been thought killed, +was wounded and on the way down to the dressing-station, he leaned over +the table, cut a large piece of meat pie and began eating it. This +caused such surprise that nothing further was said. He finished his +meat pie and drank a glass of whisky, saluted, and joined the others.</p> + +<p>Meanwhile, I had been given command of the survivors of B Company. +There were only six company officers left in the Royal Welch. Next +morning there were only five. Thomas was killed by a sniper. He was +despondently watching the return of the new-army troops on the right. +They had been pushed blindly into the gap made by the <span class="pagenum" id="Page_209" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 209</span>advance of +the Seventh and Forty-seventh Divisions on the previous afternoon; they +did not know where they were or what they were supposed to do; their +ration supply had broken down. So they flocked back, not in a panic, +but stupidly, like a crowd coming back from a cup final. Shrapnel was +bursting above them. We noticed that the officers were in groups of +their own. We could scarcely believe our eyes, it was so odd. Thomas +need not have been killed; but he was in the sort of mood in which he +seemed not to care one way or the other. The Actor took command of <span class="letters">A</span>. +We lumped our companies together after a couple of days for the sake of +relieving each other on night watch and getting some sleep. The first +night I agreed to take the first watch, waking him up at midnight. When +I went to call him I could not wake him up; I tried everything. I shook +him, shouted in his ear, poured water over him, banged his head against +the side of the bed. Finally I threw him on the floor. I was desperate +for want of sleep myself, but he was in a depth of sleep from which +nothing could shake him, so I heaved him back on the bunk and had to +finish the night out myself. Even ‘Stand-to!’ failed to arouse him. I +woke him at last at nine o’clock in the morning and he was furious with +me for not having waked him at midnight.</p> + +<p>The day after the attack we spent carrying the dead down to burial +and cleaning the trench up as well as we could. That night the +Middlesex held the line while the Royal Welch carried all the unbroken +gas-cylinders along to a position on the left flank of the brigade, +where they were to be used on the following night, September 27th. +This was worse than carrying the dead; the cylinders were cast-iron +and very heavy and we hated them. The men cursed and sulked, but got +the carrying done. Orders came that we were <span class="pagenum" id="Page_210" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 210</span>to attack again. Only +the officers knew; the men were only to be told just beforehand. It +was difficult for me to keep up appearances with the men; I felt like +screaming. It was still raining, harder than ever. We knew definitely +this time that ours was only a subsidiary night attack, a diversion +to help a division on our right to make the real attack. The scheme +was the same as before. At four p.m.the gas was to be discharged again +for forty minutes, then came a quartet of an hour’s bombardment, and +then the attack. I broke the news to the men about three o’clock. They +took it very well. The relations of officers and men, and of senior +and junior officers, had been very different in the excitement of the +attack. There had been no insubordination, but a greater freedom, as +if everyone was drunk together. I found myself calling the adjutant +Charley on one occasion; he appeared not to mind it in the least. For +the next ten days my relations with my men were like those I had with +the Welsh Regiment; later discipline reasserted itself and it was only +occasionally that I found them intimate.</p> + +<p>At four p.m., then, the gas went off again. There was a strong wind +and it went over well; the gas-men had brought enough spanners this +time. The Germans were absolutely silent. Flares went up from the +reserve lines and it seemed as though all the men in the front line +were dead. The brigadier decided not to take too much for granted; +after the bombardment he sent out twenty-five men and an officer of +the Cameronians as a feeling-patrol. The patrol reached the German +wire; there was a burst of machine-gun and rifle fire and only two +wounded men regained the trench. We: waited on the fire-step from four +to nine o’clock, with fixed; bayonets, for the order to go over. My +mind was a blank except for the recurrence of ‘S’nice smince spie, +s’nice <span class="pagenum" id="Page_211" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 211</span>smince spie.... I don’t like ham, lamb or jam and I don’t +like roley-poley....’ The men laughed at my singing. The sergeant who +was acting company sergeant-major said to me: ‘It’s murder, sir.’ ‘Of +course it’s murder, you bloody fool,’ I agreed. ‘But there’s nothing +else for it, is there?’ It was still raining. ‘But when I see’s a +s’nice smince spie, I asks for a helping twice....’ At nine o’clock we +were told that the attack was put off; we were told to hold ourselves +in readiness to attack at dawn.</p> + +<p>No order came at dawn. And no more attacks were promised us after +this. From the morning of September 24th to the night of October 3rd +I had in all eight hours of sleep. I kept myself awake and alive by +drinking about a bottle of whisky a day. I had never drank it before +and have seldom drank it since; it certainly was good then. We had no +blankets, greatcoats, or waterproof sheets. We had no time or material +to build new shelters, and the rain continued. Every night we went out +to get in the dead of the other battalions. The Germans continued to +be indulgent and we had few casualties. After the first day or two the +bodies swelled and stank. I vomited more than once while superintending +the carrying. The ones that we could not get in from the German wire +continued to swell until the wall of the stomach collapsed, either +naturally or punctured by a bullet; a disgusting smell would float +across. The colour of the dead faces changed from white to yellow-grey, +to red, to purple, to green, to black, to slimy.</p> + +<p>On the morning of the 27th a cry was heard from No Man’s Land. It +was a wounded man of the Middlesex who had recovered consciousness +after two days. He was close to the German wire. Our men heard it and +looked at each other. We had a lance-corporal called Baxter and he +was <span class="pagenum" id="Page_212" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 212</span>tender-hearted. He was the man to boil up a special dixie of +tea for the sentries of his section when they came off duty. When he +heard the wounded man cry out he ran up and down the trench calling for +a volunteer to come out with him and bring the man in. Of course no +one would go; it was death to put one’s head over the trench. He came +running to ask me. I excused myself as the only officer in the company. +I said I would come out with him at dusk, but I would not go now. So +he went out himself. He jumped quickly over the parapet, then strolled +across waving a handkerchief; the Germans fired at him to frighten him, +but he came on, so they let him come up close. They must have heard the +Middlesex man themselves. Baxter continued towards them and, when he +got up to the Middlesex man, he stopped and pointed to show the Germans +what he was at. Then he dressed the man’s wounds, gave him a drink of +rum and some biscuit that he had with him, and told him that he would +come back again for him in the evening. He did come back for him with a +stretcher-party and the man eventually recovered. I recommended Baxter +for the Victoria Cross, being the only officer who had seen the thing +done; but he only got a Distinguished Conduct Medal.</p> + +<p>The Actor and I had decided to get into touch with the battalion on +our right. It was the Tenth Highland Light Infantry. I went down +their trench some time in the morning of the 26th. I walked nearly +a quarter of a mile before seeing either a sentry or an officer. +There were dead men, sleeping men, wounded men, gassed men, all lying +anyhow. The trench had been used as a latrine. Finally I met a Royal +Engineer officer. He said to me: ‘If the Boche knew what an easy job +it was, he’d just walk over and take this trench.’ So I came back and +told The Actor that we might expect <span class="pagenum" id="Page_213" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 213</span>to have our flank in the +air at any moment. We turned the communication trench that made the +boundary between the two battalions into a fire-trench facing right; a +machine-gun was mounted to put up a barrage in case they ran. On the +night of the 27th the Highlanders mistook some of our men, who were out +in No Man’s Land getting in the dead, for the enemy. They began firing +wildly. The Germans retaliated. Our men caught the infection, but were +at once told to cease fire. ‘Cease fire’ went along the trench until +it came to the <abbr title="Highland Light Infantry">H.L.I.</abbr>, who misheard it as ‘Retire.’ A panic seized +them and they came rushing back. Fortunately they came down the trench +instead of over the top. They were stopped by a sergeant of the Fifth +Scottish Rifles, a territorial battalion now in support to ourselves +and the Middlesex. He chased them back into their trench at the point +of the bayonet.</p> + +<p>On the 3rd of October we were relieved. The relieving troops were a +composite battalion consisting of about a hundred men of the Second +Royal Warwickshire Regiment and about seventy Royal Welch Fusiliers, +all that was left of our own First Battalion. Hanmer Jones and Frank +Jones-Bateman had both been wounded. Frank had his thigh broken with +a rifle-bullet while stripping the equipment off a wounded man in No +Man’s Land; the cartridges in the man’s pouches had been set on fire by +a shot and were exploding.<a class="fnanchor" href="#Footnote7" role="doc-noteref" id="FNanchor7">7</a> We went back to Sailly la Bourse for a +couple of days, where the colonel rejoined us with his bandaged hand, +and then further back to Annezin, a little village near Béthune, where +I lodged in a two-roomed cottage with an old woman called Adelphine Heu.</p> +</section> + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> + +<section role="doc-chapter" aria-labelledby="c16-hd"> +<div class="chapter"> +<div class="pagenum" id="Page_214" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 214</div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="c16-hd">XVI</h2> +</div> + +<p class="chap_start"><b class="smcap">At</b> Annezin we reorganized. Some of the lightly wounded rejoined for +duty and a big draft from the Third Battalion arrived, so that in a +week’s time we were nearly seven hundred strong, with a full complement +of officers. Old Adelphine made me comfortable. She used to come +into my room in the morning when I was shaving and tell me the local +gossip—how stingy her daughter-in-law was, and what a rogue the Maire +was, and about the woman at Fouquières who had just been delivered of +black twins. She said that the Kaiser was a bitch and spat on the floor +to confirm it. Her favourite subject was the shamelessness of modern +girls. Yet she herself had been gay and beautiful and much sought after +when she was young she said. She had been in service as lady’s maid +to a rich draper’s wife of Béthune, and had travelled widely with her +in the surrounding country, and even over the border into Belgium. +She asked me about the various villages in which I had recently been +billeted, and told me scandal about the important families who used +to live in each. She asked me if I had been in La Bassée; she did not +realize that it was in the hands of the enemy. I said no, but I had +tried to visit it recently and had been detained. ‘Do you know Auchy, +then?’ I said that I had seen it often from a distance. ‘Then perhaps +you know a big farm-house between Auchy and Cambrin called Les Briques +Farm?’ I said, startled, that I knew it very well, and that it was a +strong place with a moat and cellars and a kitchen garden now full of +barbed wire. She said: ‘Then I shall tell you. I was staying there in +1870. It was the year of the other war and there was at the house a +handsome young <i lang="fr">petit-caporal</i> who was fond of me. So because he was a +nice <span class="pagenum" id="Page_215" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 215</span>boy and because it was the war, we slept together and I had a +baby. But God punished me and the baby died. That’s a long time ago.’</p> + +<p>She told me that all the girls in Annezin prayed every night for the +war to end and for the English to go away as soon as their money was +spent. She said that the clause about the money was always repeated in +case God should miss it.</p> + +<p>Troops serving in the Pas de Calais loathed the French; except for +occasional members of the official class, we found them thoroughly +unlikeable people, and it was difficult to sympathize with their +misfortunes. They had all the shortcomings of a border people. I wrote +home about this time:</p> + +<p>‘I find it very difficult to love the French here. Even when we have +been billeted in villages where no troops have been before, I have not +met a single case of the hospitality that one meets among the peasants +of other countries. It is worse than inhospitality here, for after +all we are fighting for their dirty little lives. They suck enormous +quantities of money out of us too. Calculate how much has flowed into +the villages around Béthune, which for many months now have been +continuously housing about a hundred thousand men. Apart from the money +that they get paid directly as billeting allowance, there is the pay +that the troops spend. Every private soldier gets his five-franc note +(nearly four shillings) every ten days, and spends it on eggs, coffee, +and beer in the local <i>estaminets</i>; the prices are ridiculous and the +stuff bad. In the brewery at Béthune, the other day, I saw barrels +of already thin beer being watered from the canal with a hose-pipe. +The <i>estaminet</i>-keepers water it further.’ (The fortunes made in the +war were consolidated after the Versailles Treaty, when every peasant +in the devastated areas <span class="pagenum" id="Page_216" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 216</span>staked preposterous compensation claims +for the loss of possessions that he had never had.) It was surprising +that there were so few clashes between the British and French as there +were. The Pas de Calais French hated us and were convinced that when +the war was over we intended to stay and hold the Channel ports. It +was impossible for us at the time to realize that it was all the same +to the peasants whether they were on the German or the British side of +the line—it was a foreign military occupation anyhow. They were not +at all interested in the sacrifices that we were making for ‘their +dirty little lives.’ Also, we were shocked at the severity of French +national accountancy; when we were told, for instance, that every +British hospital train, the locomotive and carriages of which had been +imported from England, had to pay a £200 fee for use of the rails on +each journey they made from railhead to base.</p> + +<p>The fighting was still going on around Loos. We could hear the guns +in the distance, but it was clear that the thrust had failed and that +we were now skirmishing for local advantages. But on October 13th +there was a final flare-up; the noise of the guns was so great that +even the inhabitants of Annezin, accustomed to these alarms, were +properly frightened, and began packing up in case the Germans broke +through. Old Adelphine was in tears with fright. Early that afternoon +I was in Béthune at the <cite>Globe</cite> drinking champagne-cocktails with some +friends who had joined from the Third Battalion, when the assistant +provost-marshal put his head in the door and called out: ‘Any officers +of the Fifth, Sixth, or Nineteenth Brigades here?’ We jumped up. ‘You +are to return at once to your units.’ ‘Oh God,’ said Robertson, ‘that +means another show.’ Robertson had been in D Company and so escaped +the charge. ‘We’ll be pushed <span class="pagenum" id="Page_217" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 217</span>over the top to-night to reinforce +someone, and that’ll be the end of us.’</p> + +<p>We hurried back to Annezin and found everything in confusion. ‘We’re +standing-to—at half an hour’s notice for the trenches,’ we were told. +We packed up hastily and in a few minutes the whole battalion was out +in the road in fighting order. We were to go up to the Hohenzollern +Redoubt and were now issued with new trench maps of it. The men were in +high spirits, even the survivors of the show. They were singing songs +to the accompaniment of an accordion and a penny whistle. Only at one +time, when a ‘mad-minute’ of artillery noise was reached, they stopped +and looked at each other, and Sergeant Townsend said sententiously: +‘That’s the charge. Many good fellows going west at this moment; maybe +chums of ours.’ Gradually the noise died down, and a message came at +last from brigade that we would not be needed. It had been another +dud show, chiefly to be remembered for the death of Charles Sorley, a +captain in the Suffolks, one of the three poets of importance killed in +the war. (The other two were Isaac Rosenberg and Wilfred Owen.)</p> + +<p>This ended the operations for 1915. Tension was relaxed. We returned to +battalion mess, to company drill, and to riding-school for the young +officers. It was as though there had been no battle except that the +senior officers were fewer and the Special Reserve element larger. +Two or three days later we were back in trenches in the same sector. +In October I was gazetted a captain in the Third (Special Reserve) +Battalion. Promotion in the Third Battalion was rapid for subalterns +who had joined early, because the battalion had trebled its strength +and so was entitled to three times as many captains as before. It +was good to have my pay go up <span class="pagenum" id="Page_218" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 218</span>several shillings a day, with an +increase of war bonus and possible gratuity and pension if I were +wounded, but I did not consider that side of it much. It was rank that +was effective overseas. And here I was promoted captain over the heads +of officers who had longer trench service and were older and better +trained than myself. I went to the adjutant and offered not to wear the +badges of rank while serving with the battalion. He said not unkindly: +‘No, put your stars up. It can’t be helped.’ I knew that he and the +colonel had no use for Special Reserve captains unless they were +outstandingly good, and would not hesitate to get rid of them.</p> + +<p>A Special Reserve major and captain had been recently sent home from +the First Battalion, with a confidential report of inefficiency. I +was anxious to avoid any such disgrace. Nor was my anxiety unfounded; +shortly after I left the Second Battalion two other Special Reserve +captains, one of whom had been promoted at the same time as myself, +were sent back as ‘likely to be of more service in the training of +troops at home.’ One of them was, I know, more efficient than I was.</p> + +<p>I was in such a depressed state of nerves now that if I had gone into +the trenches as a company officer I should probably have modified my +formula for taking risks. Fortunately, I had a rest from the front +line, being attached to the brigade sappers. Hill of the Middlesex was +also having this relief. He told me that the Middlesex colonel had made +a speech to the survivors of the battalion as soon as they were back +in billets, telling them that the battalion had been unfortunate but +would soon be given an opportunity of avenging its dead and making a +fresh and, this time he hoped, successful attack upon La Bassée. ‘I +know you Diehards! You will <span class="pagenum" id="Page_219" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 219</span>go like lions over the top.’ Hill’s +servant had whispered confidentially to Hill: ‘Not on purpose I don’t, +sir!’ The sapping company specialized in maintaining communication +and reserve trenches in good repair. I was with it for a month before +being returned to ordinary company duty. My recall was a punishment for +failing, one day when we were in billets, to observe a paragraph in +battalion orders requiring my presence on battalion parade.</p> + +<p>My remaining trench service with the Second Battalion this autumn was +uneventful. There was no excitement left in patrolling, no horror in +the continual experience of death. The single recordable incident I +recall was one of purely technical interest, a new method that an +officer named Owen and myself invented for dealing with machine-guns +firing at night. The method was to give each sentry a piece of string +about a yard long, with a cartridge tied at each end; when the +machine-gun started firing, sentries who were furthest from the fire +would stretch the string in the direction of the machine-gun and peg +it down with the points of the cartridges. This gave a pretty accurate +line on the machine-gun. When we had about thirty or more of these +lines taken on a single machine-gun we fixed rifles as accurately +as possible along them and waited for it; as soon as it started we +opened five rounds rapid. This gave a close concentration of fire and +no element of nervousness could disturb the aim, the rifles being +secured between sandbags. Divisional headquarters asked us for a report +of the method. There was a daily exchange of courtesies between our +machine-guns and the Germans’ at stand-to; by removing cartridges +from the ammunition belt it was possible to rap out the rhythm of the +familiar call: ‘Me—et me do—wn in Pi—cca-di—ll—y,’ to which the Germans +would reply, though in <span class="pagenum" id="Page_220" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 220</span>slower tempo, because our guns were faster +than theirs: ‘Se—e you da—mned to He—ll first.’</p> + +<p>It was late in this October that I was sent a press-cutting from +<cite>John Bull</cite>. Horatio Bottomley, the editor, was protesting against +the unequal treatment for criminal offences meted out to commoners +and aristocrats. A young man, he said, convicted in the police-court +of a criminal offence was merely bound over and put in the care of +a physician—because he was the grandson of an earl! An offender not +belonging to the influential classes would have been given three +months without the option of a fine. The article described in some +detail how Dick, a sixteen-year old boy, had made ‘a certain proposal’ +to a corporal in a Canadian regiment stationed near ‘Charterhouse +College,’ and how the corporal had very properly given him in charge +of the police. This news was nearly the end of me. I decided that Dick +had been driven out of his mind by the war. There was madness in the +family, I knew; he had once shown me a letter from his grandfather +scrawled in circles all over the page. It would be easy to think of him +as dead.</p> + +<p>I had now been in the trenches for five months and was getting past +my prime. For the first three weeks an officer was not much good in +the trenches; he did not know his way about, had not learned the +rules of health and safety, and was not yet accustomed to recognizing +degrees of danger. Between three weeks and four months he was at +his best, unless he happened to have any particular bad shock or +sequence of shocks. Then he began gradually to decline in usefulness +as neurasthenia developed in him. At six months he was still more or +less all right; but by nine or ten months, unless he had a few weeks’ +rest on a technical course or in hospital, he began to be a drag on +the other members of the company. After a year or fifteen months he +was often worse <span class="pagenum" id="Page_221" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 221</span>than useless. Officers had a less laborious but +a more nervous time than the men. There were proportionately twice as +many neurasthenic cases among officers as among men, though the average +life of a man before getting killed or wounded was twice as long as an +officer’s. Officers between the ages of twenty-three and thirty-three +had a longer useful life than those older or younger. I was too young. +Men over forty, though they did not suffer from the want of sleep so +much as those under twenty, had less resistance to the sudden alarms +and shocks. Dr. <abbr>W. H. R.</abbr> Rivers told me later that the action of one +of the ductless glands—I think the thyroid—accounted for this decline +in military usefulness. It pumped its chemical into the blood as a +sedative for tortured nerves; this process went on until the condition +of the blood was permanently affected and a man went about his tasks in +a stupid and doped way, cheated into further endurance. It has taken +some ten years for my blood to run at all clean. The unfortunates were +the officers who had two years or more continuous trench service. In +many cases they became dipsomaniacs. I knew three or four officers +who had worked up to the point of two bottles of whisky a day before +they were lucky enough to get wounded or sent home in some other way. +A two-bottle company commander of one of our line battalions still +happens to be alive who, in three shows running, got his company +needlessly destroyed because he was no longer capable of taking clear +decisions.</p> + +<p>Aside from wounds, gas, and the accidents of war, the life of the +trench soldier was, for the most part, not unhealthy. Food was +plentiful and hard work in the open air made up for the discomfort +of wet feet and clothes and draughty billets. A continual need for +alertness discouraged minor illnesses; a cold was thrown off in a few +hours, an attack of <span class="pagenum" id="Page_222" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 222</span>indigestion was hardly noticed. This was +true, at least, in a good battalion, where the men were bent on going +home either with an honourable wound or not at all. In an inferior +battalion the men would prefer a wound to bronchitis, but would not +mind the bronchitis. In a bad battalion they did not care ‘whether,’ in +the trench phrase, ‘the cow calved or the bull broke its bloody neck.’ +In a really good battalion, as the Second Battalion was when I went +to it first, the question of getting wounded and going home was not +permitted to be raised. Such a battalion had a very small sick list. +In the 1914–15 winter there were no more than four or five casualties +from ‘trench feet’ in the Second, and the following winter no more than +eight or nine; the don’t-care battalions lost very heavily indeed. +Trench feet was almost entirely a matter of morale, in spite of the +lecture-formula that <abbr>N.C.O.</abbr>’s and officers used to repeat time after +time to the men: ‘Trench feet is caused by tight boots, tight puttees +or any other clothing calculated to interfere with the circulation of +blood in the legs.’ Trench feet was caused rather by going to sleep +with wet boots, cold feet, and depression. Wet boots, by themselves, +did not matter. If the man warmed his feet at a brazier or stamped +them until they were warm and then went off to sleep with a sandbag +tied round them he took no harm. He might even fall asleep with cold, +wet feet, and they might swell slightly owing to tightness of boots or +puttees; but trench feet only came if he did not mind getting trench +feet or anything else, because his battalion had lost the power of +sticking things out. At Bouchavesnes on the Somme in the winter of +1916–17 a battalion of dismounted cavalry lost half its strength in two +days from trench feet; our Second Battalion had just had ten days in +the same trenches with no cases at all.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_223" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 223</span>Autumn was melancholy in the La Bassée sector; in the big poplar +forests the leaves were French yellow and the dykes were overflowing +and the ground utterly sodden. Béthune was not the place it had been; +the Canadians billeted there drew two or three times as much pay as our +own troops and had sent the prices up. But it was still more or less +intact and one could still get cream buns and fish dinners.</p> + +<p>In November I had orders to join the First Battalion, which was +reorganizing after the Loos fighting. I was delighted. I found it in +billets at Locon, behind Festubert, which was only a mile or two to the +north of Cambrin. The difference between the two battalions continued +markedly throughout the war, however many times each battalion got +broken. The difference was that the Second Battalion at the outbreak of +war had just finished its eighteen years overseas tour, while the First +Battalion had not been out of England since the South African War. The +First Battalion was, therefore, less old-fashioned in its militarism +and more human; livers were better; the men had dealings with white +women and not with brown. It would have been impossible in the First +Battalion to see what I once saw in the Second—a senior officer +pursuing a private soldier down the street, kicking his bottom because +he had been slack in saluting. The First Battalion was as efficient and +as regimental, on the whole more successful in its fighting, and a much +easier battalion to live in.</p> + +<p>The battalion already had its new company commanders and I went as +second-captain to young Richardson of <span class="letters">A</span> Company. He was from Sandhurst, +and his company was one of the best that I was ever with. They were +largely Welshmen of 1915 enlistment. None of the officers in the +<span class="pagenum" id="Page_224" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 224</span>company were more than twenty-two or twenty-three years old. A +day or two after I arrived I went to visit C Company, where a Third +Battalion officer whom I knew was commanding. The C’s greeted me in a +friendly way. As we were talking I noticed a book lying on the table. +It was the first book (except my Keats and Blake) that I had seen since +I came to France that was not either a military text-book or a rubbish +novel. It was the <cite>Essays of Lionel Johnson</cite>. When I had a chance I +stole a look at the fly-leaf, and the name was Siegfried Sassoon. I +looked round to see who could possibly be called Siegfried Sassoon and +bring <cite>Lionel Johnson</cite> with him to the First Battalion. He was obvious, +so I got into conversation with him, and a few minutes later we were +walking to Béthune, being off duty until that night, and talking about +poetry. Siegfried had, at the time, published nothing except a few +privately-printed pastoral pieces of eighteen-ninetyish flavour and a +satire on Masefield which, about half-way through, had forgotten to +be a satire and was rather good Masefield. We went to the cake shop +and ate cream buns. At this time I was getting my first book of poems, +<cite>Over the Brazier</cite>, ready for the press; I had one or two drafts in my +pocket-book and showed them to Siegfried. He told me that they were too +realistic and that war should not be written about in a realistic way. +In return he showed me some of his own poems. One of them began:</p> + +<div class="poetry-container"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Return to greet me, colours that were my joy,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Not in the woeful crimson of men slain....</div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + +<p>This was before Siegfried had been in the trenches. I told him, in my +old-soldier manner, that he would soon change his style.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_225" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 225</span>That night the whole battalion went up to work at a new defence +scheme at Festubert. Festubert was nightmare, and had been so since the +first fighting there in 1914, when the inmates of its lunatic asylum +had been caught between two fires and broken out and run all over the +countryside. The British trench line went across a stretch of ground +marked on the map as ‘Marsh, sometimes dry in the summer.’ It consisted +of islands of high-command trench, with no communication between them +except at night, and was a murderous place for patrols. The battalion +had been nearly wiped out here six months previously. We were set to +build up a strong reserve line. It was freezing hard and we were unable +to make any progress on the frozen ground. We came here night after +night. We raised a couple of hundred yards of trench about two or +three feet high, at the cost of several men wounded from casual shots +skimming the trench in front of us. Work was resumed by other troops +when the thaw came and a thick seven foot-high ramp built. We were told +later that it gradually sank down into the marsh, and in the end was +completely engulfed.</p> + +<p>When I left the Second Battalion I was permitted to take my servant, +Private Fahy (known as Tottie Fay, after the actress), with me. Tottie +was a reservist from Birmingham who had been called up when war broke +out, and had been with the Second Battalion ever since. By trade he +was a silversmith and he had recently, when on leave, made a cigarette +case and engraved it with my name as a present. He worked well and +we liked each other. When he arrived at the First Battalion he met a +Sergeant Dickens who had been his boozing chum in India seven or eight +years back; so they celebrated it. The next morning I was surprised to +find my buttons not polished and no hot water for shaving. <span class="pagenum" id="Page_226" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 226</span>I was +annoyed; it made me late for breakfast. I could get no news of Tottie. +On my way to rifle inspection at nine o’clock at the company billet I +noticed something unusual at the corner of a farm-yard. It was Field +Punishment No. 1 being carried out—my first sight of it. Tottie was +the victim. He had been awarded twenty-eight days for ‘drunkenness in +the field.’ He was spread-eagled to the wheel of a company limber, +tied by the ankles and wrists in the form of an X. He remained in +this position—‘Crucifixion,’ they called it—for several hours a day; +I forget how many, but it was a good working-day. The sentence was to +be carried out for as long as the battalion remained in billets, and +was to be continued after the next spell of trenches. I shall never +forget the look that Tottie gave me. He was a quiet, respectful, +devoted servant, and he wanted to tell me that he was sorry for having +let me down. His immediate reaction was an attempt to salute; I could +see him try to lift his hand to his forehead, and bring his heels +together, but he could do nothing; his eyes filled with tears. The +battalion police-sergeant, a fierce-looking man, had just finished +knotting him up when I arrived. I told Tottie that I was sorry to see +him in trouble. That drink, as it proved, did him good in the end. I +had to find another servant. Old Joe, the quartermaster, knowing that +Tottie was the only trained officer’s servant in the battalion, took +him from me when his sentence expired; he even induced the colonel +to remit a few days of it. Tottie was safer in billets with Old Joe +than in trenches with me. Some time in the summer of the following +year his seven years’ contract as a reservist expired. When their +‘buckshee seven’ expired, reservists were sent home for a few days and +then ‘deemed to have re-enlisted under the Military Service Act,’ and +recalled to the battalion. But <span class="pagenum" id="Page_227" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 227</span>Tottie made good use of his leave. +His brother-in-law was director of a munitions factory and took Tottie +in as a skilled metal-worker. He was made a starred man—his work was so +important to industry that he could not be spared for military service, +so Tottie is, I hope, still alive. Good luck to him and to Birmingham. +Sergeant Dickens was a different case. He was a fighter, and one of +the best <abbr>N.C.O.</abbr>’s in either battalion of the regiment. He had been +awarded the <abbr class="smcap" title="Distinguished Conduct Medal">d.c.m.</abbr> and Bar, the Military Medal and the French +Médaille Militaire. Two or three times already he had been promoted to +sergeant’s rank and each time been reduced for drunkenness. He escaped +field-punishment because it was considered sufficient for him to lose +his stripes, and whenever there was a battle Dickens would distinguish +himself so conspicuously as a leader that he would be given his stripes +back again.</p> + +<p>Early in December the rumour came that we were going for divisional +training to the back areas. I would not believe it, having heard +stories of this kind too often, and was surprised when it turned out to +be true. Siegfried Sassoon, in his <cite>Memoirs of a Fox-hunting Man</cite>, has +described this battalion move. It was an even more laborious experience +for our <span class="letters">A</span> Company than for his C Company. We got up at five o’clock +one morning, breakfasted hastily, packed our kits, and marched down to +the railhead three miles away. Here we had the task of entraining all +the battalion stores, transport and transport-animals. This took us to +the middle of the morning. We then entrained ourselves for a ten-hour +journey to a junction on the Somme about twenty miles away from the +front line. The officers travelled in third-class apartments, the men +in closed trucks marked: ‘<span lang="fr">Hommes 40, chevaux 8’</span>—they were very stiff +when they arrived. ‘<span class="letters">A</span>’ <span class="pagenum" id="Page_228" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 228</span>Company was called on to do the detraining +job too. When we had finished, the dixies of tea prepared for us were +all cold. The other companies had been resting for a couple of hours; +we had only a few minutes. The march was along <i>pavé</i> roads and the +rough chalk tracks of the Picardy downland. It started about midnight +and finished about six o’clock next morning, the men carrying their +packs and rifles. There was a competition between the companies as +to which would have the fewest men falling out; <span class="letters">A</span> won. The village +we finally arrived at was called Montagne le Fayel. No troops had +been billeted here before, and its inhabitants were annoyed at being +knocked up in the middle of the night by our advance-guard to provide +accommodation for eight hundred men at two hours’ notice. We found +these Picard peasants much more likeable than the Pas de Calais people. +I was billeted with an old man called Monsieur Elie Caron, a retired +schoolmaster with a bright eye and white hair. He lived entirely on +vegetables, and gave me a vegetarian pamphlet entitled <cite lang="fr">Comment Vivre +Cent Ans</cite>. We already knew of the coming Somme offensive, so this was a +good joke. He also gave me Longfellow’s <cite>Evangeline</cite> in English. I have +always been sorry for English books stranded in France, whatever their +demerits; so I accepted it and later brought it home.</p> + +<p>We were at Montagne for six weeks. The colonel, who appears in +Siegfried’s book as Colonel Winchell, was known in the regiment as +Scatter, short for Scatter-cash, because when he first joined the +regiment he had been so lavish with his allowance. Scatter put the +battalion through its paces with peace-time severity. He asked us to +forget the trenches and to fit ourselves for the open warfare that +was bound to come once the Somme defences were pierced. Every other +<span class="pagenum" id="Page_229" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 229</span>day was a field-day; we were back again in spirit to General +Haking’s <cite>Company Training</cite>. Even those of us who did not believe in +the break-through thoroughly enjoyed these field-days. The guns could +only just be heard in the distance, it was quite unspoilt country, and +every man in the battalion was fit. Days that were not field-days were +given up to battalion drill and musketry. This training seemed entirely +unrelated to war as we had experienced it. We played a lot of games, +including inter-battalion rugger; I played full-back for the battalion. +Three other officers were in the team; Richardson as front-row +scrum-man; Pritchard, another Sandhurst boy, who was fly-half; and +David Thomas, a Third Battalion second-lieutenant, who was an inside +three-quarter. David Thomas and Siegfried were the closest friends I +made while in France. David was a simple, gentle fellow and fond of +reading. Siegfried, he, and I were together a lot.</p> + +<p>One day David met me in the village street. He said: ‘Did you hear +the bugle? There’s a hell of a row on about something. All officers +and warrant-officers are to meet in the village schoolroom at once. +Scatter’s looking as black as-thunder. No one knows yet what the axe +is about.’ We went along together and squeezed into one of the school +desk-benches. When the colonel entered and the room was called to +attention by the senior major, David and I hurt ourselves standing up, +bench and all. Scatter told us all to be seated. The officers were +in one class, the warrant-officers and non-commissioned officers in +another. The colonel glared at us from the teacher’s desk. He began his +lecture with general accusations. He said that he had lately noticed +many signs of slovenliness in the battalion—men with their pocket-flaps +undone, and actually walking down the village <span class="pagenum" id="Page_230" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 230</span>street with their +hands in their trousers-pockets—boots unpolished—sentries strolling +about on their beats at company billets instead of marching up and +down in a soldier-like way—rowdiness in the <i>estaminets</i>—slackness in +saluting—with many other grave indications of lowered discipline. He +threatened to stop all leave to the United Kingdom unless discipline +improved. He promised us a saluting parade every morning before +breakfast which he would attend in person. All this was general axe-ing +and we knew that he had not yet reached the particular axe. It was +this: ‘I have here principally to tell you of a very disagreeable +occurrence. As I was going out of my orderly room early this morning I +came upon a group of soldiers; I will not mention their company. One +of these soldiers was in conversation with a lance-corporal. You may +not believe it, but it was a fact that he addressed the corporal by his +Christian name; <em>he called him Jack</em>. The corporal made no protest. To +think that the First Battalion has sunk to a level where it is possible +for such familiarity to exist between <abbr>N.C.O.</abbr>’s and the men under their +command! Naturally, I put the corporal under arrest, and he appeared +before me at once on the charge of ‘conduct unbecoming to an <abbr>N.C.O.</abbr>’ +He was reduced to the ranks, and the man was given field-punishment +for using insubordinate language to an <abbr>N.C.O.</abbr> And, I warn you, if any +further case of the sort comes to my notice—and I expect you officers +to report the slightest instance to me at once instead of dealing +with it as a company matter....’ I tried to catch Siegfried’s eye, +but he was busy avoiding it, so I caught David’s instead. This is one +of those caricature scenes that now seem to sum up the various stages +of my life. There was a fresco around the walls of the class-room +illustrating the evils of alcoholism. It started with the <span class="pagenum" id="Page_231" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 231</span>innocent +boy being offered a drink by his mate, and then his downward path, +culminating in wife-beating, murder, and <i>delirium tremens</i>.</p> + +<p>The battalion’s only complaint against Montagne was that women were not +so easy to get hold of in that part of the country as around Béthune; +the officers had the unfair advantage of being able to borrow horses +and ride into Amiens. I remained puritanical. There was a Blue Lamp at +Amiens as there was at Abbéville, Havre, Rouen, and all the big towns +behind the lines. The Blue Lamp was for officers, as the Red Lamp was +for men. It was most important for discipline to be maintained in this +way.</p> + +<p>In January the Seventh Division sent two company officers from each +brigade to instruct troops at the base. I and a captain in the Queen’s +were the two who had been out longest, so we were chosen; it was a gift +of two months longer life to us.</p> +</section> + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> + +<section role="doc-chapter" aria-labelledby="c17-hd"> +<div class="chapter"> +<div class="pagenum" id="Page_232" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 232</div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="c17-hd">XVII</h2> +</div> + +<p class="chap_start"><b class="smcap">I was</b> one of about thirty instructors at the Havre ‘Bull Ring,’ where +newly-arrived drafts were sent for technical instruction before going +up the line. Most of my colleagues were specialists in musketry, +machine-gun, gas, or bombs. I had no specialist training, only general +experience. I was put on instructional work in trench relief and trench +discipline in a model set of trenches. My principal other business was +arms-drill. One day it rained, and the commandant of the Bull Ring +suddenly ordered me to lecture in the big concert hall. ‘There are +three thousand men there waiting for you, and you’re the only available +officer with a loud enough voice to make himself heard.’ They were +Canadians, so instead of giving my usual semi-facetious lecture on +‘How to be happy though in the trenches,’ I paid them the compliment +of telling them the story of Loos, and what a balls-up it was, and +why it was a balls-up. It was the only audience that I ever held for +an hour with real attention. I expected the commandant to be furious +with me because the principal object of the Bull Ring was to inculcate +the offensive spirit, but he took it well and I had several more +concert-hall lectures put on me after this.</p> + +<p>In the instructors’ mess the chief subjects of conversation besides +local and technical talk were <i>morale</i>, the reliability of various +divisions in battle, the value of different training methods, and +war-morality, with particular reference to atrocities. We talked more +freely there than would have been possible either in England or in the +trenches. We decided that about a third of the troops in the British +Expeditionary Force were dependable on all occasions; these were the +divisions that were always called on for the most <span class="pagenum" id="Page_233" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 233</span>important tasks. +About a third were variable, that is, where a division contained +one or two bad battalions, but could be more or less trusted. The +remainder were more or less untrustworthy; being put in positions of +comparative safety they had about a quarter of the casualties that the +best divisions had. It was a matter of pride to belong to one of the +recognized best divisions—the Seventh, the Twenty-ninth, Guards’, First +Canadian, for instance. They were not pampered when in reserve as the +German storm-troops were, but promotion, leave, and the chance of a +wound came quicker in them. The mess agreed that the most dependable +British troops were the Midland county regiments, industrial Yorkshire +and Lancashire troops, and the Londoners. The Ulsterman, Lowland Scots +and Northern English were pretty good. The Catholic Irish and the +Highland Scots were not considered so good—they took unnecessary risks +in trenches and had unnecessary casualties, and in battle, though +they usually made their objective, they too often lost it in the +counter-attack; without officers they were no good. English southern +county regiments varied from good to very bad. All overseas troops were +good. The dependability of divisions also varied with their seniority +in date of promotion. The latest formed regular divisions and the +second-line territorial divisions, whatever their recruiting area, were +usually inferior. Their senior officers and warrant-officers were not +good enough.</p> + +<p>We once discussed which were the cleanest troops in trenches, taken +in nationalities. We agreed on a list like this, in descending order: +English and German Protestants; Northern Irish, Welsh and Canadians; +Irish and German Catholics; Scottish; Mohammedan Indians; Algerians; +Portuguese; Belgians; French. The Belgians and French were <span class="pagenum" id="Page_234" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 234</span>put +there for spite; they were not really dirtier than the Algerians or +Portuguese.</p> + +<p>Atrocities. Propaganda reports of atrocities were, we agreed, +ridiculous. Atrocities against civilians were surely few. We remembered +that while the Germans were in a position to commit atrocities +against enemy civilians, Germany itself, except for the early Russian +cavalry raid, had never had the enemy on her soil. We no longer +believed accounts of unjustified German atrocities in Belgium; know +the Belgians now at first-hand. By atrocities we meant, specifically, +rape, mutilation and torture, not summary shootings of suspected spies, +harbourers of spies, <i lang="fr">francs-tireurs</i>, or disobedient local officials. +If the atrocity list was to include the accidental-on-purpose +bombing or machine-gunning of civilians from the air, the Allies +were now committing as many atrocities as the Germans. French and +Belgian civilians had often tried to win our sympathy and presents +by exhibiting mutilations of children—stumps of hands and feet, for +instance—representing them as deliberate, fiendish atrocities when they +were merely the result of shell-fire, British or French shell-fire as +likely as not. We did not believe that rape was any more common on the +German side of the line than on the Allied side. It was unnecessary. +Of course, a bully-beef diet, fear of death, and absence of wives made +ample provision of women necessary in the occupied areas. No doubt +the German army authorities provided brothels in the principal French +towns behind the line, as did the French on the Allied side. But the +voluntary system would suffice. We did not believe stories of forcible +enlistment of women.</p> + +<p>As for atrocities against soldiers. The difficulty was to say where +to draw the line. For instance, the British soldier <span class="pagenum" id="Page_235" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 235</span>at first +regarded as atrocious the use of bowie-knives by German patrols. After +a time he learned to use them himself; they were cleaner killing +weapons than revolvers or bombs. The Germans regarded as atrocious +the British Mark VII rifle bullet, which was more apt to turn on +striking than the German bullet. For true atrocities, that is, personal +rather than military violations of the code of war, there were few +opportunities. The most obvious opportunity was in the interval +between surrender of prisoners and their arrival (or non-arrival) at +headquarters. And it was an opportunity of which advantage was only +too often taken. Nearly every instructor in the mess knew of specific +cases when prisoners had been murdered on the way back. The commonest +motives were, it seems, revenge for the death of friends or relations, +jealousy of the prisoner’s pleasant trip to a comfortable prison camp +in England, military enthusiasm, fear of being suddenly overpowered +by the prisoners or, more simply, not wanting to be bothered with the +escorting job. In any of these cases the conductors would report on +arrival at headquarters that a German shell had killed the prisoners; +no questions would be asked. We had every reason to believe that the +same thing happened on the German side, where prisoners, as useless +mouths to feed in a country already on short rations, were even +less welcome. We had none of us heard of prisoners being more than +threatened at headquarters to get military information from them; +the sort of information that trench-prisoners could give was not of +sufficient importance to make torture worth while; in any case it was +found that when treated kindly prisoners were anxious, in gratitude, to +tell as much as they knew.</p> + +<p>The troops that had the worst reputation for acts of <span class="pagenum" id="Page_236" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 236</span>violence +against prisoners were the Canadians (and later the Australians). +With the Canadians the motive was said to be revenge for a Canadian +found crucified with bayonets through his hands and feet in a German +trench; this atrocity was never substantiated, nor did we believe the +story freely circulated that the Canadians crucified a German officer +in revenge shortly afterwards. (Of the Australians the only thing to +be said was that they were only two generations removed from the days +of Ralph Rashleigh and Marcus Clarke.) How far this reputation for +atrocities was deserved, and how far it was due to the overseas habit +of bragging and leg-pulling, we could not decide. We only knew that to +have committed atrocities against prisoners was, among the overseas +men, and even among some British troops, a boast, not a confession.</p> + +<p>I heard two first-hand accounts later in the war.</p> + +<p>A Canadian-Scot: ‘I was sent back with three bloody prisoners, you +see, and one was limping and groaning, so I had to keep on kicking the +sod down the trench. He was an officer. It was getting dark and I was +getting fed up, so I thought: “I’ll have a bit of a game.” I had them +covered with the officer’s revolver and I made ’em open their pockets. +Then I dropped a Mills’ bomb in each, with the pin out, and ducked +behind a traverse. Bang, bang, bang! No more bloody prisoners. No good +Fritzes but dead ’uns.’</p> + +<p>An Australian: ‘Well, the biggest lark I had was at Morlancourt when +we took it the first time. There were a lot of Jerries in a cellar and +I said to ’em: “Come out, you Camarades.” So out they came, a dozen of +’em, with their hands up. “Turn out your pockets,” I told ’em. They +turned ’em out. Watches and gold and stuff, all dinkum. Then I said: +“Now back into your cellar, you sons of <span class="pagenum" id="Page_237" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 237</span>bitches.” For I couldn’t +be bothered with ’em. When they were all down I threw half a dozen +Mills’ bombs in after ’em. I’d got the stuff all right, and we weren’t +taking prisoners that day.’</p> + +<p>The only first-hand account I heard of large-scale atrocities was from +an old woman at Cardonette on the Somme, with whom I was billeted in +July 1916. It was at Cardonette that a battalion of French Turcos +overtook the rear guard of a German division retreating from the Marne +in September 1914. The Turcos surprised the dead-weary Germans while +they were still marching in column. The old woman went, with gestures, +through a pantomime of slaughter, ending: ‘<span lang="fr">Et enfin, ces animaux leur +ont arraché les oreilles et les ont mis à la poche</span>.’ The presence +of coloured troops in Europe was, from the German point of view, we +knew, one of the chief Allied atrocities. We sympathized. Recently, +at Flixécourt, one of the instructors told us, the cook of a corps +headquarter-mess used to be visited at the château every morning by +a Turco; he was orderly to a French liaison officer. The Turco used +to say: ‘Tommy, give Johnny pozzy,’ and a tin of plum and apple jam +used to be given him. One afternoon the corps was due to shift, so +that morning the cook said to the Turco, giving him his farewell tin: +‘Oh, la, la, Johnny, napoo pozzy to-morrow.’ The Turco would not +believe it. ‘Yes, Tommy, mate,’ he said, ‘pozzy for Johnny to-morrow, +to-morrow, to-morrow.’ To get rid of him the cook said: ‘Fetch me the +head of a Fritz, Johnny, to-night. I’ll ask the general to give you +pozzy to-morrow, to-morrow, to-morrow.’ ‘All right, mate,’ said the +Turco, ‘me get Fritz head to-night, general give me pozzy to-morrow.’ +That evening the mess cook of the new corps that had taken over the +château was surprised to find a <span class="pagenum" id="Page_238" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 238</span>Turco asking for him and swinging +a bloody head in a sandbag. ‘Here’s Fritz head, mate,’ said the Turco, +‘general give me pozzy to-morrow, to-morrow, to-morrow.’ As Flixécourt +was twenty miles or more behind the line.... He did not need to end the +story, but swore it was true, because he had seen the head.</p> + +<p>We discussed the continuity of regimental <i>morale</i>. A captain in a +line battalion of one of the Surrey regiments said: ‘It all depends on +the reserve battalion at home.’ He had had a year’s service when the +war broke out; the battalion, which had been good, had never recovered +from the first battle of Ypres. He said: ‘What’s wrong with us is that +we have a rotten depot. The drafts are bad and so we get a constant +re-infection.’ He told me one night in our sleeping hut: ‘In both the +last two attacks that we made I had to shoot a man of my company to +get the rest out of the trench. It was so bloody awful that I couldn’t +stand it. It’s the reason why I applied to be sent down here.’ This +was not the usual loose talk that one heard at the base. He was a good +fellow and he was speaking the truth. I was sorrier for Phillips—that +was not his name—than for any other man I met in France. He deserved +a better regiment. There was never any trouble with the Royal Welch +like that. The boast of every good battalion in France was that it +had never lost a trench; both our battalions made it. This boast had +to be understood broadly; it meant never having been forced out of a +trench by an enemy attack without recapturing it before the action +ended. Capturing a German trench and being unable to hold it for lack +of reinforcements did not count, nor did retirement from a trench by +order or when the battalion of the left or right had broken and left a +flank in the air. And in the final stages of the war trenches could be +<span class="pagenum" id="Page_239" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 239</span>honourably abandoned as being entirely obliterated by bombardment, +or because not really trenches at all, but a line of selected +shell-craters.</p> + +<p>We all agreed on the value of arms-drill as a factor in <i>morale</i>. +‘Arms-drill as it should be done,’ someone said, ‘is beautiful, +especially when the company feels itself as a single being and each +movement is not a movement of every man together, but a single movement +of one large creature.’ I used to have big bunches of Canadians to +drill four or five hundred at a time. Spokesmen came forward once and +asked what sense there was in sloping and ordering arms and fixing and +unfixing bayonets. They said they had come to France to fight and not +to guard Buckingham Palace. I told them that in every division of the +four in which I had served there had been three different kinds of +troops. Those that had guts but were no good at drill; those that were +good at drill but had no guts; and those that had guts and were good at +drill. These last fellows were, for some reason or other, much the best +men in a show. I didn’t know why and I didn’t care. I told them that +when they were better at fighting than the Guards’ Division they could +perhaps afford to neglect their arms-drill.</p> + +<p>We often theorized in the mess about drill. We knew that the best drill +never came from being bawled at by a sergeant-major, that there must be +perfect respect between the man who gives the order and the men that +carry it through. The test of drill came, I said, when the officer gave +an incorrect word of command. If the company could carry through the +order intended without hesitation, or, suppose the order happened to be +impossible, could stand absolutely still or continue marching without +any disorder in the ranks, that was good drill. The corporate spirit +that <span class="pagenum" id="Page_240" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 240</span>came from drilling together was regarded by some instructors +as leading to loss of initiative in the men drilled. Others denied this +and said it acted just the other way round. ‘Suppose there is a section +of men with rifles, and they are isolated from the rest of the company +and have no <abbr>N.C.O.</abbr> in charge and meet a machine-gun. Under the stress +of danger that section will have that all-one-body feeling of drill and +will obey an imaginary word of command. There will be no communication +between its members, but there will be a drill movement. Two men will +quite naturally open fire on the machine-gun while the remainder +will work round, part on the left flank and part on the right, and +the final rush will be simultaneous. Leadership is supposed to be +the perfection for which drill has been instituted. That is wrong. +Leadership is only the first stage. Perfection of drill is communal +action. Drill may seem to be antiquated parade-ground stuff, but it is +the foundation of tactics and musketry. It was parade-ground musketry +that won all the battles in our regimental histories; this war will be +won by parade-ground tactics. The simple drill tactics of small units +fighting in limited spaces—fighting in noise and confusion so great +that leadership is quite impossible.’ In spite of variance on this +point we all agreed that regimental pride was the greatest moral force +that kept a battalion going as an effective fighting unit, contrasting +it particularly with patriotism and religion.</p> + +<p>Patriotism. There was no patriotism in the trenches. It was too remote +a sentiment, and rejected as fit only for civilians. A new arrival who +talked patriotism would soon be told to cut it out. As Blighty, Great +Britain was a quiet, easy place to get back to out of the present +foreign misery, but as a nation it was nothing. The nation included +not only the trench-soldiers themselves and those who had gone home +<span class="pagenum" id="Page_241" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 241</span>wounded, but the staff, Army Service Corps, lines of communication +troops, base units, home-service units, and then civilians down to the +detested grades of journalists, profiteers, ‘starred’ men exempted from +enlistment, conscientious objectors, members of the Government. The +trench-soldier, with this carefully graded caste-system of honour, did +not consider that the German trench-soldier might have exactly the same +system himself. He thought of Germany as a nation in arms, a unified +nation inspired with the sort of patriotism that he despised himself. +He believed most newspaper reports of conditions and sentiments in +Germany, though believing little or nothing of what he read about +conditions and sentiments in England. His cynicism, in fact, was not +confined to his own country. But he never underrated the German as +a soldier. Newspaper libels on Fritz’s courage and efficiency were +resented by all trench-soldiers of experience.</p> + +<p>Religion. It was said that not one soldier in a hundred was inspired +by religious feeling of even the crudest kind. It would have been +difficult to remain religious in the trenches though one had survived +the irreligion of the training battalion at home. A regular sergeant at +Montagne, a Second Battalion man, had recently told me that he did not +hold with religion in time of war. He said that the niggers (meaning +the Indians) were right in officially relaxing their religious rules +when they were fighting. ‘And all this damn nonsense, sir—excuse me, +sir—that we read in the papers, sir, about how miraculous it is that +the wayside crucifixes are always getting shot at but the figure of our +Lord Jesus somehow don’t get hurt, it fairly makes me sick, sir.’ This +was to explain why in giving practice fire-orders from the hill-top he +had shouted out: ‘Seven hundred, half <span class="pagenum" id="Page_242" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 242</span>left, bloke on cross, five +rounds consecrate, fire!’ His platoon, even the two men whose letters +home always had the same formal beginning: ‘Dear Sister in Christ,’ or +‘Dear Brother in Christ,’ blazed away.</p> + +<p>The troops, while ready to believe in the Kaiser as a comic personal +devil, were aware that the German soldier was, on the whole, more +devout than himself in the worship of God. In the instructors’ mess +we spoke freely of God and Gott as opposed tribal deities. For the +regimental chaplains as a body we had no respect. If the regimental +chaplains had shown one tenth the courage, endurance, and other human +qualities that the regimental doctors showed, we agreed, the British +Expeditionary Force might well have started a religious revival. But +they had not. The fact is that they were under orders not to get mixed +up with the fighting, to stay behind with the transport and not to +risk their lives. No soldier could have any respect for a chaplain +who obeyed these orders, and yet there was not in our experience one +chaplain in fifty who was not glad to obey them. Occasionally on a +quiet day in a quiet sector the chaplain would make a daring afternoon +visit to the support line and distribute a few cigarettes, and that was +all. But he was always in evidence back in rest-billets. Sometimes the +colonel would summon him to come up with the rations and bury the day’s +dead, and he would arrive, speak his lines, and hastily retire. The +position was made difficult by the respect that most of the commanding +officers had for the cloth, but it was a respect that they soon +outwore. The colonel in one battalion I served with got rid of four new +chaplains in as many months. Finally he applied for a Roman Catholic +chaplain, alleging a change of faith in the men under his command. For, +as I should have said before, <span class="pagenum" id="Page_243" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 243</span>the Roman Catholics were not only +permitted in posts of danger, but definitely enjoined to be wherever +fighting was so that they could give extreme unction to the dying. And +we had never heard of an <abbr title="Roman Catholic">R.C.</abbr> chaplain who was unwilling to do all that +was expected of him and more. It was recalled that Father Gleeson of +the Munsters, when all the officers were put out of action at the first +battle of Ypres, stripped off his black badges and, taking command of +the survivors, held the line.</p> + +<p>Anglican chaplains were remarkably out of touch with their troops. I +told how the Second Battalion chaplain just before the Loos fighting +had preached a violent sermon on the battle against sin, and how one +old soldier behind me had grumbled: ‘Christ, as if one bloody push +wasn’t enough to worry about at a time.’ The Catholic padre, on the +other hand, had given his men his blessing and told them that if they +died fighting for the good cause they would go straight to Heaven, or +at any rate would be excused a great many years in Purgatory. Someone +told us of the chaplain of his battalion when he was in Mesopotamia, +how on the eve of a big battle he had preached a sermon on the +commutation of tithes. This was much more sensible than the battle +against sin, he said; it was quite up in the air, and took the men’s +minds off the fighting.</p> + +<p>I was feeling a bit better after a few weeks at the base, though the +knowledge that this was only temporary relief was with me all the time. +One day I walked out of the mess to begin the afternoon’s work on the +drill ground. I had to pass by the place where bombing instruction was +given. A group of men was standing around the table where the various +types of bombs were set out for demonstration. There was a sudden +crash. An instructor of the Royal Irish <span class="pagenum" id="Page_244" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 244</span>Rifles had been giving a +little unofficial instruction before the proper instructor arrived. He +had picked up a No. 1 percussion grenade and said: ‘Now, lads, you’ve +got to be careful with this chap. Remember that if you touch anything +while you’re swinging it, it will go off.’ To illustrate the point he +rapped it against the edge of the table. It killed him and another man +and wounded twelve others more or less severely.</p> +</section> + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> + +<section role="doc-chapter" aria-labelledby="c18-hd"> +<div class="chapter"> +<div class="pagenum" id="Page_245" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 245</div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="c18-hd">XVIII</h2> +</div> + +<p class="chap_start"><b class="smcap">I rejoined</b> the First Battalion in March, finding it in the line again, +on the Somme. It was the primrose season. We went in and out of the +Fricourt trenches, with billets at Morlancourt, a country village at +that time untouched by shell-fire. (Later it was knocked to pieces; +the Australians and the Germans captured and recaptured it from each +other several times, until there was nothing left except the site.) +‘<span class="letters">A</span>’ Company headquarters were in a farmhouse kitchen. We slept in our +valises on the red-brick floor. The residents were an old lady and her +daughter. The old lady was senile and paralysed; about all she could +do was to shake her head and say: ‘Triste, la guerre.’ We called her +‘Triste la Guerre.’ Her daughter used to carry her about in her arms.</p> + +<p>The Fricourt trenches were cut in chalk, which was better in wet +weather than the La Bassée clay. We were unlucky in having a +battalion-frontage where the lines came closer to each other than at +any other point for miles. It was only recently that the British line +had been extended down to the Somme. The French had been content, as +they usually were, unless they definitely intended a battle, to be at +peace with the Germans and not dig in too near. But here there was +a slight ridge and neither side could afford to let the other hold +the crest, so they shared it, after a prolonged dispute. It was used +by both the Germans and ourselves as an experimental station for new +types of bombs and grenades. The trenches were wide and tumbledown, +too shallow in many places, and without sufficient traverses. The +French had left relics of their nonchalance—corpses buried too near +the surface; and of their love of security—a number of lousy but deep +dug-outs. We busied ourselves raising the front-line parapet <span class="pagenum" id="Page_246" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 246</span>and +building traverses to limit the damage of the trench-mortar shells +that were continually falling. Every night not only the companies in +the front line but both support companies were hard at work all the +time. It was even worse than Cuinchy for rats; they used to run about +<span class="letters">A</span> Company mess while we were at meals. We used to eat with revolvers +beside our plates and punctuate our conversation with sudden volleys +at a rat rummaging at somebody’s valise or crawling along the timber +support of the roof above our heads. <span class="letters">A</span> Company officers were gay. We +had all been in our school choirs except Edmund Dadd, who sang like a +crow, and we used to chant church anthems and bits of cantatas whenever +things were going well. Edmund insisted on joining in.</p> + +<p>We were at dinner one day when a Welsh boy came rushing in, hysterical +with terror. He shouted out to Richardson: ‘Sirr, sirr, there is a +trenss-mortar in my dug-out.’ This in sing-song Welsh made us all shout +with laughter. Richardson said: ‘Cheer up, 33 Williams, how did a +big thing like a trench-mortar happen to be in your dug-out?’ But 33 +Williams could not explain. He went on again and again: ‘Sirr, sirr, +there is a trenss-mortar in my dug-out!’ Edmund Dadd went out to +investigate. He found that a trench-mortar shell had fallen into the +trench, bounced down the dug-out steps, exploded and killed five men. +33 Williams had been lying asleep and had been protected by the body of +another man; he was the only one unhit.</p> + +<figure id="i246" class="figcenter" style="max-width: 24em;"> + <img class="w100 mt1" src="images/i246.jpg" alt=""> + <figcaption>SOMME TRENCH MAP<br> + <b class="smcap">Contalmaison—Fricour</b><br> + <b class="italic small80">Copyright Imperial War Museum.</b></figcaption> +</figure> + +<p>Our greatest trial was the canister. It was a two-gallon drum with a +cylinder inside containing about two pounds of an explosive called +ammonal that looked like salmon paste, smelt like marzipan, and when +it went off sounded like the day of judgment. The hollow around the +cylinder was <span class="pagenum" id="Page_247" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 247</span>filled with scrap metal apparently collected by the +French villagers behind the German line—rusty nails, fragments of +British and French shells, spent bullets, and the screws, nuts, and +bolts that heavy lorries leave behind on the road. We dissected one +canister that had not exploded and found in it, among other things, +the cog-wheels of a clock and half a set of false teeth. The canister +was easy to hear coming and looked harmless in the air, but its shock +was as shattering as the very heaviest shell. It would blow in any but +the deepest dug-outs; and the false teeth and cog-wheels and so on +would go flying all over the place. We could not agree how a thing of +that size was fired. The problem was not solved until 1st July, when +the battalion attacked from these same trenches and found one of the +canister-guns with its crew. It was a wooden cannon buried in the earth +and fired with a time-fuse. The crew offered to surrender, but our men +refused; they had sworn for months to get the crew of that gun.</p> + +<p>One evening I was in the trench with Richardson and David Thomas (near +‘Trafalgar Square,’ should anyone remember that trench-junction) when +we met Pritchard and the adjutant. We stopped to talk. Richardson +complained what a devil of a place it was for trench-mortars. Pritchard +said: ‘That is where I come in.’ He was the battalion trench-mortar +officer and had just been given the first two Stokes mortar-guns +that we had seen in France. Pritchard said: ‘They’re beauties. I’ve +been trying them out and to-morrow I’m going to get some of my own +back. I can put four or five shells in the air at the same time.’ The +adjutant said: ‘About time, too. We’ve had three hundred casualties +in the last month here. It doesn’t seem so many as that because we’ve +had no officer casualties. In fact we’ve had about five <span class="pagenum" id="Page_248" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 248</span>hundred +casualties in the ranks since Loos, and not a single officer.’ Then +he suddenly realized that he had said something unlucky. David said: +‘Touch wood.’ Everybody sprang to touch wood, but it was a French +trench and unriveted. I pulled a pencil out of my pocket; that was wood +enough for me. Richardson said: ‘I’m not superstitious, anyway.’</p> + +<p>The next evening I was leading up <span class="letters">A</span> Company for a working-party. B and +D Companies were in the line and we overtook C, which was also going up +to work. David was bringing up the rear of C. He was looking strange, +worried about something. I had never seen him anything but cheerful all +the time I had known him. I asked what was the matter. He said: ‘Oh, +I’m fed up and I’ve got a cold.’ C Company went along to the right of +the battalion frontage and we went along to the left. It was a weird +kind of night, with a bright moon. A German occupied sap was only +forty or fifty yards away. We were left standing on the parapet piling +up the sandbags, with the moon behind us, but the German sentries +ignored us—probably because they had work on hand themselves. It often +happened when both sides were busy putting up proper defences that +they turned a blind eye to each other’s work. Sometimes, it was said, +the rival wiring-parties ‘as good as borrowed each other’s mallets’ +for hammering in the pickets. The Germans were much more ready to live +and let live than we were. (The only time, so far as I know, besides +Christmas 1914, that both sides showed themselves in daylight without +firing at each other was once at Ypres when the trenches got so flooded +that there was nothing for it but for both sides to crawl out on top +to avoid drowning.) There was a continual exchange of grenades and +trench-mortars on our side; the canister was <span class="pagenum" id="Page_249" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 249</span>going over and the +men found it difficult to get out of its way in the dark. But for the +first time we were giving the enemy as good as they gave us. Pritchard +had been using his Stokes’ mortar all day and had sent over two or +three hundred rounds; twice they had located his emplacement and he had +had to shift hurriedly.</p> + +<p>‘<span class="letters">A</span>’ Company worked from seven in the evening until midnight. We must +have put thousands of sandbags into position, and fifty yards of front +trench were beginning to look presentable. About half-past ten there +was rifle-fire on the right and the sentries passed down the news +‘officer hit.’ Richardson at once went along to see who it was. He came +back to say: ‘It’s young Thomas. He got a bullet through the neck, +but I think he’s all right; it can’t have hit his spine or an artery +because he’s walking down to the dressing-station.’ I was pleased +at this news. I thought that David would be out of it long enough +perhaps to escape the coming offensive and perhaps even the rest of +the war. At twelve o’clock we had finished for the night. Richardson +said to me: ‘Von Ranke’ (only he pronounced it Von Runicke—it was my +regimental nickname), ‘take the company down for their rum and tea, +will you? They’ve certainly deserved it to-night. I’ll be along in +a few minutes. I’m going out with Corporal Chamberlen to see what +work the wiring-party’s been doing all this time.’ So I took the men +back. When we were well started I heard a couple of shells come over +somewhere behind us. I noticed them because they were the only shells +fired that night; five-nines they seemed by the noise. We were nearly +back at Maple Redoubt, which was the name of the support line on the +reverse side of the hill, when we heard the cry ‘Stretcher-bearers!’ +and after a while a man came running to say: ‘Captain Graves is hit.’ +There <span class="pagenum" id="Page_250" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 250</span>was a general laugh and we went on; but a stretcher-party +went up anyhow to see what was wrong. It was Richardson; the shells +had caught him and the corporal among the wire. The corporal had his +leg blown off, and died of wounds a day or two later. Richardson had +been blown into a shell-hole full of water and had lain there stunned +for some minutes before the sentries heard the corporal’s cries and +realized what had happened. He was brought down semi-conscious; he +recognized us, told us he wouldn’t be long away from the company, and +gave us instructions about it. The doctor said that he had no wound in +any vital spot, though the skin of his left side was riddled, as we had +seen, with the chalky soil blown up against him. We felt a relief in +his case, as in David’s, that he would be out of it for a while.</p> + +<p>Then news came that David had died. The regimental doctor, a throat +specialist in civil life, had told him at the dressing-station: ‘You’ll +be all right, only don’t raise your head for a bit.’ David had then, +it was said, taken a letter from his pocket, given it to an orderly, +and said: ‘Post that.’ It was a letter written to a girl in Glamorgan, +to be posted in case he got killed. Then the doctor saw that he was +choking; he tried trachotomy, but it was too late. Edmund and I were +talking together in the company headquarters at about one o’clock when +the adjutant came in. He looked ghastly. He told us that Richardson had +died at the dressing-station. His heart had been weakened by rowing +(he had been in the Eight at Radley) and the explosion and the cold +water had been too much for it. The adjutant said to me nervously: ‘You +know, somehow I feel, I—I feel responsible in a way for this; what +I said yesterday at ‘Trafalgar Square.’ Of course, really, I don’t +believe in superstition, but....’ Just at that moment there was a +<span class="pagenum" id="Page_251" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 251</span>noise of whizz-bang shells about twenty yards off; a cry of alarm, +followed by: ‘Stretcher-bearers!’ The adjutant turned quite white and +we knew without being told what it meant. We hurried out. Pritchard, +having fought his duel all night, and finally silenced the enemy, was +coming off duty. A whizz-bang had caught him at the point where the +communication trench reached Maple Redoubt; it was a direct hit. The +casualties of that night were three officers and one corporal.</p> + +<p>It seemed ridiculous when we returned without Richardson to <span class="letters">A</span> Company +billets to find ‘<span lang="fr">Triste La Guerre</span>’ still alive and to hear her once +more quaver out ‘<span lang="fr">Triste, la guerre</span>’ when her daughter explained that +the <i lang="fr">jeune capitaine</i> had been killed. The old woman had taken a fancy +to the <i lang="fr">jeune capitaine</i>; we used to chaff him about it. I felt David’s +death worse than any other death since I had been in France. It did not +anger me as it did Siegfried. He was acting transport-officer and every +night now, when he came up with the rations, he went out on patrol +looking for Germans. It just made me feel empty and lost.</p> + +<p>One of the anthems that we used to sing was: ‘He that shall endure to +the end, shall be saved.’ The words repeated themselves in my head +like a charm whenever things were bad. ‘Though thousands languish +and fall beside thee, And tens of thousands around thee perish, Yet +still it shall not come nigh thee.’ And there was another bit: ‘To an +inheritance incorruptible.... Through faith unto salvation, Ready to +be revealed at the last trump.’ For ‘trump’ we always used to sing +‘crump.’ ‘The last crump’ was the end of the war and would we ever +hear it burst safely behind us? I wondered whether I could endure to +the end with faith unto salvation. I knew that my breaking point was +<span class="pagenum" id="Page_252" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 252</span>near now, unless something happened to stave it off.... It was +not that I was frightened. Certainly I feared death; but I had never +yet lost my head through fright, and I knew that I never would. Nor +would the breakdown come as insanity; I did not have it in me. It would +be a general nervous collapse, with tears and twitchings and dirtied +trousers. I had seen cases like that.</p> + +<p>The battalion was issued with a new gas-helmet, popularly known as ‘the +goggle-eyed b⁠—⁠—⁠r with the tit.’ It differed from the previous models. +One breathed in through the nose from inside the helmet and breathed +out through a special valve held in the mouth. I found that I could not +manage this. Boxing with an already broken nose had recently displaced +the septum, so that I was forced to breathe through my mouth. In a +gas-attack I would be unable to use the helmet and it was the only type +claimed to be proof against the new German gas. The battalion doctor +advised me to have an operation done as soon as I could.</p> + +<p>These months with the First Battalion have already been twice recorded +in literary history; though in both cases in a disguise of names +and characters. The two books are Siegfried Sassoon’s <cite>Memoirs of a +Fox-hunting Man</cite>, and <cite>Nothing of Importance</cite>, by Bill Adams, the +battalion sniping and intelligence officer. Adam’s book did not +sell, but was as good a book as 1917 censorship allowed; it should +be re-printed. Adams was killed; in fact, three out of five of the +officers of the First Battalion at that time were killed in the Somme +fighting. Scatter’s dream of open warfare was not realized. He himself +was very seriously wounded. Of <span class="letters">A</span> Company choir there is one survivor +besides myself—<abbr>C. D.</abbr> Morgan, who had his thigh smashed, and was still +in hospital sometime after the war ended.</p> +</section> + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> + +<section role="doc-chapter" aria-labelledby="c19-hd"> +<div class="chapter"> +<div class="pagenum" id="Page_253" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 253</div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="c19-hd">XIX</h2> +</div> + +<p class="chap_start"><b class="smcap">When</b> I was given leave in April 1916 I went to a military hospital in +London and had my nose operated on. It was a painful operation, but +performed by a first-class surgeon and cost me nothing. In peace-time +it would have cost me sixty guineas, and another twenty guineas in +nursing-home fees. After hospital I went up to Harlech to walk on the +hills. I had in mind the verse of the psalm: ‘I will lift up mine eyes +unto the hills, from whence cometh my help.’ That was another charm +against trouble. I bought a small two-roomed cottage from my mother, +who owned considerable cottage property in the neighbourhood. I bought +it in defiance of the war, as something to look forward to when the +guns stopped (‘when the guns stop’ was how we always thought of the end +of the war). I whitewashed the cottage and put in a table, a chair, a +bed and a few dishes and cooking utensils. I had decided to live there +by myself on bread and butter, bacon and eggs, lettuce in season, +cabbage and coffee; and to write poetry. My war-bonus would keep me +for a year or two at least. The cottage was on the hillside away from +the village. I put in a big window to look out over the wood below +and across the Morfa to the sea. I wrote two or three poems here as a +foretaste of the good life coming after the war.</p> + +<p>It was about this time, but whether before or after my operation I +cannot remember, that I was taken by my father to a dinner of the +Honourable Cymmrodorion Society—a Welsh literary club—where Lloyd +George, then Prime Minister, and <abbr>W. M.</abbr> Hughes, the Australian Prime +Minister, were to speak. Hughes was perky, dry and to the point; +Lloyd George was up in the air on one of his ‘glory <span class="pagenum" id="Page_254" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 254</span>of the Welsh +hills’ speeches. The power of his rhetoric was uncanny. I knew that +the substance of what he was saying was commonplace, idle and false, +but I had to fight hard against abandoning myself with the rest of the +audience. The power I knew was not his; he sucked it from his hearers +and threw it back at them. Afterwards I was introduced to him, and when +I looked closely at his eyes they were like those of a sleep-walker.</p> + +<p>I rejoined the Third Battalion at Litherland, near Liverpool, where +it had been shifted from Wrexham as part of the Mersey defence force; +I liked the Third Battalion. The senior officers were generous in +not putting more work on me than I wished to undertake, and it was +good to meet again three of my Wrexham contemporaries who had been +severely wounded (all of them, by a coincidence, in the left thigh) +and seemed to be out of it for the rest of the war—Frank Jones-Bateman +and ‘Father’ Watkin, who had been in the Welsh Regiment with me, and +Aubrey Attwater, the assistant adjutant, who had gone to the Second +Battalion early in 1915 and had been hit when out on patrol. Attwater +had come from Cambridge, at the outbreak of war and was known as +‘Brains’ in the battalion. The militia majors, who were for the most +part country gentlemen with estates in Wales, and had no thoughts in +peace-time beyond hunting, shooting, fishing, and the control of their +tenantry, were delighted with Attwater’s informative talk over the +port at mess. Sergeant Malley, the mess-sergeant, would go round with +his ‘Light or vintage, sir?’ and the old majors would say to Attwater: +‘Now, Brains! Tell us about Shakespeare. Is it true that Bacon wrote +him?’ Or, ‘Well, Brains! What do you think about this chap Hilaire +Belloc? Does he really know when the war’s going to end?’ And Attwater +would <span class="pagenum" id="Page_255" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 255</span>humorously accept his position as combined encyclopaedia and +almanac. Sergeant Malley was another friend whom I was always pleased +to meet again. He could pour more wine into a glass than any other man +in the world; it bulged up over the top of a glass like a cap and he +was never known to spill a drop.</p> + +<p>Wednesdays were guest-nights in the mess, when the married officers who +usually dined at home were expected to attend. The band played Gilbert +and Sullivan music behind a curtain. In the intervals the regimental +harper gave solos—Welsh melodies picked out rather uncertainly on a +hand-harp. When the programme was over the bandmaster was invited to +the senior officers’ table for his complimentary glass of light or +vintage. When he was gone, and the junior officers had retired, the +port went round and round, and the conversation, at first very formal, +became rambling and intimate. Once, I remember, a senior major laid +it down axiomatically that every so-called sportsman had at one time +or another committed a sin against sportsmanship. When challenged, +he cross-examined each of his neighbours in turn, putting them on +their honour to tell the truth. One of them, blushing, admitted that +he had once shot grouse two days before the Twelfth: ‘It was my last +chance before I rejoined the battalion in India.’ Another said that +when a public-school boy, and old enough to know better, he had +killed a sitting pheasant with a stone. The next one had gone out +with a poacher—in his Sandhurst days—and crumbled poison-berry into a +trout-stream. An even more scandalous admission came from a new-army +major, a gentleman-farmer, that his estate had been overrun with +foxes one year and, the headquarters of the nearest hunt being thirty +miles away, he had given his bailiff <span class="pagenum" id="Page_256" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 256</span>permission to protect the +hen-roosts with a gun. Finally it was the turn of the medical officer +to be cross-examined. He said: ‘Well, once when I was a student at St. +Andrews a friend asked me to put ten bob for him on a horse in the +Lincolnshire. I couldn’t find my bookmaker in time. The horse lost and +I never returned the ten bob.’ At this one of the guests, an officer +in the King’s Own Scottish Borderers, became suddenly excited, jumped +up and leant over the table, doubling his fists. ‘And was not the name +of the horse Strathspey? And will you not pay me my ten shillings now +immediately?’</p> + +<p>The camp was only separated by the bombing-field from Brotherton’s, +where a specially sensitive explosive for detonators was made. The +munition makers had permanently yellow faces and hands and drew +appropriately high wages. Attwater used to argue at mess sometimes what +would happen if Brotherton’s blew up. Most of us held that the shock +would immediately kill all the three thousand men of the camp besides +destroying Litherland and a large part of Bootle. He maintained that +the very closeness of the camp would save it; that the vibrations would +go over and strike a big munition camp about a mile away and set that +off. One Sunday afternoon Attwater limped out of the mess and suddenly +saw smoke rising from Brotherton’s. Part of the factory was on fire. +The camp fire-brigade was immediately bugled for and managed to put +the fire out before it reached a vital spot. So the argument was never +decided. I was at Litherland only a few weeks. On 1st July 1916 the +Somme offensive started, and all available trained men and officers +were sent out to replace casualties. I was disappointed to be sent back +to the Second Battalion, not the First.</p> + +<p>It was in trenches at Givenchy, just the other side of the <span class="pagenum" id="Page_257" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 257</span>canal +from the Cuinchy brick-stacks. I arrived at the battalion on July +5th to find it in the middle of a raid. Prisoners were coming down +the trench, scared and chattering to each other. They were Saxons +just returned from a divisional rest and a week’s leave to Germany. +Their uniforms were new and their packs full of good stuff to loot. +One prisoner got a good talking-to from C Company sergeant-major, a +Birmingham man, who was shocked at a packet of indecent photographs +found in the man’s haversack. It had been a retaliatory raid. Only a +few days before, the Germans had sent up the biggest mine blown on the +Western front so far. It caught our B Company—the B’s were proverbially +unlucky. The crater, which was afterwards named Red Dragon Crater after +the Royal Welch regimental badge, must have been about thirty yards +across. There were few survivors of B Company. The Germans immediately +came over in force to catch the other companies in confusion. Stanway, +who had been a company sergeant-major on the retreat and was now an +acting-major, rallied some men on the flank and drove them back. Blair, +B Company commander, was buried by the mine up to his neck and for the +rest of the day was constantly under fire. Though an oldish man (he had +the South African ribbon), he survived this experience, recovered from +his wounds, and was back in the battalion a few months later.</p> + +<p>This raid was Stanway’s revenge. He organized it with the colonel; the +colonel was the Third Battalion adjutant who had originally sent me +out to France. The raid was elaborately planned, with bombardments and +smoke-screen diversions on the flanks. A barrage of shrapnel shifted +forward and back from the German front line to the supports. The +intention was that the Germans at the first bombardment <span class="pagenum" id="Page_258" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 258</span>should go +down into the shell-proof dug-outs, leaving only their sentries in the +trench, and reappear as soon as the barrage lifted. When it came down +again they would make another dash for the dug-outs. After this had +happened two or three times they would be slow in coming out at all. +Then, under cover of a smoke-screen, the raid would be made and the +barrage put down uninterruptedly on the support and reserve lines to +prevent reinforcements. My only part in the raid, which was successful, +was to write out a detailed record of it at the colonel’s request. It +was not the report for divisional headquarters but a page of regimental +history to be sent to the depot to be filed in regimental records. In +my account I noted that for the first time for two hundred years the +regiment had reverted to the pike. Instead of rifle and bayonet some of +the raiders had used butchers’ knives secured with medical plaster to +the end of broomsticks. This pike was a lighter weapon than rifle and +bayonet and was useful in conjunction with bombs and revolvers.</p> + +<p>An official journalist at headquarters also wrote an account of the +raid. The battalion enjoyed the bit about how they had gone over +shouting ‘Remember Kitchener!’ and ‘Avenge the <i>Lusitania</i>!’ ‘What a +damn silly thing to shout,’ said someone. ‘Old Kitchener was all right, +but nobody wants him back at the War Office, that I’ve heard. And as +for the <i>Lusitania</i>, the Germans gave her full warning, and if it +brings the States into the war, it’s all to the good.’</p> + +<p>There were not many officers in the Second who had been with it when +I left it a month after Loos, but at any rate I expected to have a +friendlier welcome than the first time I had come to the battalion at +Laventie. But, as one of them recorded in his diary: ‘Graves had a +chilly reception, which surprised me.’ The reason was simple. One of +the officers who had <span class="pagenum" id="Page_259" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 259</span>joined the Third Battalion in August 1914, +and had been on the Square with me, had achieved his ambition of a +regular commission in the Second Battalion. He was one of those who had +been sent out to France before me as being more efficient and had been +wounded before I came out. But now he was only a second-lieutenant in +the Second Battalion, where promotion was slow, and I was a captain +in the Third Battalion. Line-battalion feeling against the Special +Reserve was always strong, and jealousy of my extra stars made him +bitter. It amused him to revive the suspicion raised at Wrexham by my +German name that I was a German spy. Whether he was serious or not I +cannot say, probably he could not have said either; but the result was +that I found myself treated with great reserve by all the officers +who had not been with me in trenches before. It was unlucky that the +most notorious German spy caught in England had assumed the name +of Karl Graves. It was put about that he was a brother of mine. My +consolation was that there was obviously a battle due and that would +be the end either of me or of the suspicion. I thought to myself: ‘So +long as there isn’t an <abbr>N.C.O.</abbr> told off to watch me and shoot me on the +slightest appearance of treachery.’ Such things had been known. As a +matter of fact, though I had myself had no traffic with the enemy, +there was a desultory correspondence kept up between my mother and her +sisters in Germany; it came through her sister, Clara von Faber du +Faur, mother of my cousin Conrad, whose husband was German consul at +Zurich. It was not treasonable on either side, merely a register of the +deaths of relations and discreet references to the war service of the +survivors. The German aunts wrote, as the Government had ordered every +German with relations or friends in enemy or neutral countries to do, +pointing out the righteousness <span class="pagenum" id="Page_260" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 260</span>of the German cause and presenting +Germany as the innocent party in a war engineered by France and Russia. +My mother, equally strong for the Allied cause, wrote back that they +were deluded. The officers I liked in the battalion were the colonel +and Captain Dunn, the battalion doctor. Doctor Dunn was what they call +a hard-bitten man; he had served as a trooper in the South African War +and won the <abbr class="smcap">d.c.m.</abbr> He was far more than a doctor; living at +battalion headquarters he became the right-hand man of three or four +colonels in succession. When his advice was not taken this was usually +afterwards regretted. On one occasion, in the autumn fighting of 1917, +a shell burst among the headquarters staff, knocking out adjutant, +colonel, and signals officer. Dunn had no hesitation in pulling off the +red-cross armlets that he wore in a battle and becoming a temporary +combatant officer of the Royal Welch, resigning his duties to the +stretcher-bearer sergeant. He took command and kept things going. The +men were rather afraid of him, but had more respect for him than for +anyone else in the battalion.</p> +</section> + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> + +<section role="doc-chapter" aria-labelledby="c20-hd"> +<div class="chapter"> +<div class="pagenum" id="Page_261" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 261</div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="c20-hd">XX</h2> +</div> + +<p class="chap_start"><b class="smcap">Four</b> days after the raid we heard that we were due for the Somme. +We marched through Béthune, which had been much knocked about and +was nearly deserted, to Fouquières, and there entrained for the +Somme. The Somme railhead was near Amiens and we marched by easy +stages through Cardonette, Daours, and Buire, until we came to the +original front line, close to the place where David Thomas had +been killed. The fighting had moved two miles on. This was on the +afternoon of 14th July. At 4 a.m. on the 15th July we moved up the +Méaulte-Fricourt-Bazentin road which wound through ‘Happy Valley’ +and found ourselves in the more recent battle area. Wounded men and +prisoners came streaming past us. What struck me most was the number +of dead horses and mules lying about; human corpses I was accustomed +to, but it seemed wrong for animals to be dragged into the war like +this. We marched by platoons, at fifty yards distance. Just beyond +Fricourt we found a German shell-barrage across the road. So we left it +and moved over thickly shell-pitted ground until 8 a.m., when we found +ourselves on the fringe of Mametz Wood, among the dead of our new-army +battalions that had been attacking Mametz Wood. We halted in thick +mist. The Germans had been using lachrymatory shell and the mist held +the fumes; we coughed and swore. We tried to smoke, but the gas had got +into the cigarettes, so we threw them away. Later we wished we had not, +because it was not the cigarettes that had been affected so much as our +own throats. The colonel called up the officers and we pulled out our +maps. We were expecting orders for an attack. When the mist cleared +we saw a German gun with ‘First Battalion Royal Welch Fusiliers’ +<span class="pagenum" id="Page_262" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 262</span>chalked on it. It was evidently a trophy. I wondered what had +happened to Siegfried and my friends of <span class="letters">A</span> Company. We found the +battalion quite close in bivouacs; Siegfried was still alive, as were +Edmund Dadd and two other <span class="letters">A</span> Company officers. The battalion had been in +heavy fighting. In their first attack at Fricourt they had overrun our +opposite number in the German army, the Twenty-third Infantry Regiment, +who were undergoing a special disciplinary spell in the trenches +because an inspecting staff-officer, coming round, had found that all +the officers were back in Mametz village in a deep dug-out instead of +up in the trenches with their men. (It was said that throughout that +bad time in March in the German trenches opposite to us there had been +no officer of higher rank than corporal.) Their next objective had been +The Quadrangle, a small copse this side of Mametz Wood. I was told +that Siegfried had then distinguished himself by taking single-handed +a battalion frontage that the Royal Irish Regiment had failed to take +the day before. He had gone over with bombs in daylight, under covering +fire from a couple of rifles, and scared the occupants out. It was a +pointless feat; instead of reporting or signalling for reinforcements +he sat down in the German trench and began dozing over a book of poems +which he had brought with him. When he finally went back he did not +report. The colonel was furious. The attack on Mametz Wood had been +delayed for two hours because it was reported that British patrols were +still out. ‘British patrols’ were Siegfried and his book of poems. ‘It +would have got you a <abbr class="smcap">d.s.o.</abbr> if you’d only had more sense,’ +stormed the colonel. Siegfried had been doing heroic things ever since +I had left the battalion. His nickname in the Seventh Division was +‘Mad Jack.’ He was given a Military Cross for bringing in a wounded +<span class="pagenum" id="Page_263" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 263</span>lance-corporal from a mine-crater close to the German lines, under +heavy fire. He was one of the rare exceptions to the rule against the +decoration of Third Battalion officers. I did not see Siegfried this +time; he was down with the transport having a rest. So I sent him a +rhymed letter, by one of our own transport men, about the times that +we were going to have together when the war ended; how, after a rest +at Harlech, we were going for a visit to the Caucasus and Persia and +China; and what good poetry we would write. It was in answer to one +he had written to me from the army school at Flixécourt a few weeks +previously (which appears in <cite>The Old Huntsman</cite>).</p> + +<figure id="i262" class="figcenter" style="max-width: 24em;"> + <img class="w100 mt1" src="images/i262.jpg" alt=""> + <figcaption>SOMME TRENCH MAP<br> + <b class="smcap">Martinpuich Sector</b><br> + <b class="italic small80">Copyright Imperial War Museum.</b></figcaption> +</figure> + +<p>I went for a stroll with Edmund Dadd, who was now commanding <span class="letters">A</span> Company. +Edmund was cursing: ‘It’s not fair, Robert. You remember <span class="letters">A</span> Company +under Richardson was always the best company. Well, it’s kept up its +reputation, and the <abbr>C.O.</abbr> shoves us in as the leading company of every +show, and we get our objectives and hold them, and so we’ve got to do +the same again the next time. And he says that I’m indispensable in the +company, so he makes me go over every time instead of giving me a rest +and letting my second-in-command take his turn. I’ve had five shows +in just over a fortnight and I can’t go on being lucky every time. +The colonel’s about due for his <abbr class="smcap" title="Companion of the Order of the Bath">c.b.</abbr> Apparently <span class="letters">A</span> Company is +making sure of if for him.’</p> + +<p>For the next two days we were in bivouacs outside the wood. We were in +fighting kit and the nights were wet and cold. I went into the wood +to find German overcoats to use as blankets. Mametz Wood was full of +dead of the Prussian Guards Reserve, big men, and of Royal Welch and +South Wales Borderers of the new-army battalions, little men. There +was not a single tree in the wood unbroken. <span class="pagenum" id="Page_264" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 264</span>I got my greatcoats +and came away as quickly as I could, climbing over the wreckage of +green branches. Going and coming, by the only possible route, I had +to pass by the corpse of a German with his back propped against a +tree. He had a green face, spectacles, close shaven hair; black blood +was dripping from the nose and beard. He had been there for some days +and was bloated and stinking. There had been bayonet fighting in the +wood. There was a man of the South Wales Borderers and one of the Lehr +regiment who had succeeded in bayoneting each other simultaneously. A +survivor of the fighting told me later that he had seen a young soldier +of the Fourteenth Royal Welch bayoneting a German in parade-ground +style, automatically exclaiming as he had been taught: ‘In, out, on +guard.’ He said that it was the oddest thing he had heard in France.</p> + +<p>I found myself still superstitious about looting or collecting +souvenirs. The greatcoats were only a loan, I told myself. Almost the +only souvenir I had allowed myself to keep was a trench periscope, +a little rod-shaped metal one sent me from home; when I poked it up +above the parapet it offered only an inch-square target to the German +snipers. Yet a sniper at Cuinchy, in May, drilled it through, exactly +central, at four hundred yards range. I sent it home, but had no time +to write a note of explanation. My mother, misunderstanding, and +practical as usual, took it back to the makers and made them change it +for a new one.</p> + +<p>Our brigade, the Nineteenth, was the reserve brigade of the +Thirty-third Division; the other brigades, the Ninety-ninth and +Hundredth, had attacked Martinpuich two days previously and had been +stopped with heavy losses as soon as they started. Since then we had +had nothing to do but sit about in shell-holes and watch the artillery +duel going on. <span class="pagenum" id="Page_265" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 265</span>We had never seen artillery so thick. On the 18th +we moved up to a position just to the north of Bazentin le Petit to +relieve the Tyneside Irish. I was with D Company. The guide who was +taking us up was hysterical and had forgotten the way; we put him under +arrest and found it ourselves. As we went up through the ruins of the +village we were shelled. We were accustomed to that, but they were gas +shells. The standing order with regard to gas shells was not to put +on one’s respirator but hurry on. Up to that week there had been no +gas shells except lachrymatory ones; these were the first of the real +kind, so we lost about half a dozen men. When at last we arrived at +the trenches, which were scooped at a roadside and only about three +feet deep, the company we were relieving hurried out without any of the +usual formalities; they had been badly shaken. I asked their officer +where the Germans were. He said he didn’t know, but pointed vaguely +towards Martinpuich, a mile to our front. Then I asked him where and +what were the troops on our left. He didn’t know. I cursed him and he +went off. We got into touch with C Company behind us on the right and +with the Fourth Suffolks not far off on the left. We began deepening +the trenches and locating the Germans; they were in a trench-system +about five hundred yards away but keeping fairly quiet.</p> + +<p>The next day there was very heavy shelling at noon; shells were +bracketing along our trench about five yards short and five yards over, +but never quite getting it. We were having dinner and three times +running my cup of tea was spilt by the concussion and filled with dirt. +I was in a cheerful mood and only laughed. I had just had a parcel of +kippers from home; they were far more important than the bombardment—I +recalled with appreciation one of my <span class="pagenum" id="Page_266" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 266</span>mother’s sayings: ‘Children, +remember this when you eat your kippers; kippers cost little, yet if +they cost a hundred guineas a pair they would still find buyers among +the millionaires.’ Before the shelling had started a tame magpie had +come into the trench; it had apparently belonged to the Germans who +had been driven out of the village by the Gordon Highlanders a day or +two before. It was looking very draggled. ‘That’s one for sorrow,’ +I said. The men swore that it spoke something in German as it came +in, but I did not hear it. I was feeling tired and was off duty, so +without waiting for the bombardment to stop I went to sleep in the +trench. I decided that I would just as soon be killed asleep as awake. +There were no dug-outs, of course. I always found it easy now to sleep +through bombardments. I was conscious of the noise in my sleep, but I +let it go by. Yet if anybody came to wake me for my watch or shouted +‘Stand-to!’ I was alert in a second. I had learned to go to sleep +sitting down, standing up, marching, lying on a stone floor, or in any +other position, at a moment’s notice at any time of day or night. But +now I had a dreadful nightmare; it was as though somebody was handling +me secretly, choosing the place to drive a knife into me. Finally, he +gripped me in the small of the back. I woke up with a start, shouting, +and punched the small of my back where the hand was. I found that I had +killed a mouse that had been frightened by the bombardment and run down +my neck.</p> + +<p>That afternoon the company got an order through from the brigade to +build two cruciform strong-points at such-and-such a map reference. +Moodie, the company commander, and I looked at our map and laughed. +Moodie sent back a message that he would be glad to do so, but would +require an artillery bombardment and strong reinforcements because +<span class="pagenum" id="Page_267" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 267</span>the points selected, half way to Martinpuich, were occupied in +force by the enemy. The colonel came up and verified this. He said that +we should build the strong-point about three hundred yards forward and +two hundred yards apart. So one platoon stayed behind in the trench +and the other went out and started digging. A cruciform strong-point +consisted of two trenches, each some thirty yards long, crossing at +right angles to each other; it was wired all round, so that it looked, +in diagram, like a hot-cross bun. The defenders could bring fire to +bear against an attack from any direction. We were to hold each of +these points with a Lewis gun and a platoon of men.</p> + +<p>It was a bright moonlight night. My way to the strong-point on +the right took me along the Bazentin-High Wood road. A German +sergeant-major, wearing a pack and full equipment, was lying on his +back in the middle of the road, his arms stretched out wide. He was a +short, powerful man with a full black beard. He looked sinister in the +moonlight; I needed a charm to get myself past him. The simplest way, I +found, was to cross myself. Evidently a brigade of the Seventh Division +had captured the road and the Germans had been shelling it heavily. It +was a sunken road and the defenders had begun to scrape fire-positions +in the north bank, facing the Germans. The work had apparently been +interrupted by a counter-attack. They had done no more than scrape +hollows in the lower part of the bank. To a number of these little +hollows wounded men had crawled, put their heads and shoulders inside +and died there. They looked as if they had tried to hide from the black +beard. They were Gordon Highlanders.</p> + +<p>I was visiting the strong-point on the right. The trench had now been +dug two or three feet down and a party of <span class="pagenum" id="Page_268" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 268</span>Engineers had arrived +with coils of barbed wire for the entanglement. I found that work had +stopped. The whisper went round: ‘Get your rifles ready. Here comes +Fritz.’ I lay down flat to see better, and about seventy yards away in +the moonlight I could make out massed figures. I immediately sent a man +back to the company to find Moodie and ask him for a Lewis gun and a +flare-pistol. I restrained the men, who were itching to fire, telling +them to wait until they came closer. I said: ‘They probably don’t +know we’re here and we’ll get more of them if we let them come right +up close. They may even surrender.’ The Germans were wandering about +irresolutely and we wondered what the game was. There had been a number +of German surrenders at night recently, and this might be one on a big +scale. Then Moodie came running with a Lewis gun, the flare-pistol, +and a few more men with rifle-grenades. He decided to give the enemy a +chance. He sent up a flare and fired a Lewis gun over their heads. A +tall officer came running towards us with his hands up in surrender. +He was surprised to find that we were not Germans. He said that he +belonged to the Public Schools Battalion in our own brigade. Moodie +asked him what the hell he was doing. He said that he was in command of +a patrol. He was sent back for a few more of his men, to make sure it +was not a trick. The patrol was half a company of men wandering about +aimlessly between the lines, their rifles slung over their shoulders, +and, it seemed, without the faintest idea where they were or what +information they were supposed to bring back. This Public Schools +Battalion was one of four or five others which had been formed some +time in 1914. Their training had been continually interrupted by large +numbers of men being withdrawn as officers for other regiments. The +only men <span class="pagenum" id="Page_269" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 269</span>left, in fact, seemed to be those who were unfitted to +hold commissions; yet unfitted by their education to make good soldiers +in the ranks. The other battalions had been left behind in England as +training battalions; only this one had been sent out. It was a constant +embarrassment to the brigade.</p> + +<p>I picked up a souvenir that night. A German gun-team had been shelled +as it was galloping out of Bazentin towards Martinpuich. The horses and +the driver had been killed. At the back of the limber were the gunners’ +treasures. Among them was a large lump of chalk wrapped up in a piece +of cloth; it had been carved and decorated in colours with military +mottos, the flags of the Central Powers, and the names of the various +battles in which the gunner had served. I sent it as a present to Dr. +Dunn. I am glad to say that both he and it survived the war; he is in +practice at Glasgow, and the lump of chalk is under a glass case in +his consulting room. The evening of the next day, July 19th, we were +relieved. We were told that we would be attacking High Wood, which we +could see a thousand yards away to the right at the top of a slope. +High Wood was on the main German battle-line, which ran along the +ridge, with Delville Wood not far off on the German left. Two British +brigades had already attempted it; in both cases the counter-attack had +driven them out. Our battalion had had a large number of casualties and +was now only about four hundred strong.</p> + +<p>I have kept a battalion order issued at midnight:</p> + +<p class="center"><span class="pagenum" id="Page_270" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 270</span>To <abbr>O.C.</abbr> B <abbr>Co.</abbr> <span class="padl2">2nd <abbr title="Royal Welch Fusiliers">R.W.F.</abbr></span> <span class="padl2">20.7.16.</span></p> + +<div style="overflow-x:auto;"> +<table class="grid small90" role="presentation"> +<tbody> +<tr><td>Companies</td><td>will</td><td>move</td><td>as</td><td>under</td></tr> +<tr><td>to</td><td>same</td><td>positions</td><td>in</td><td>S14b</td></tr> +<tr><td>as</td><td>were</td><td>to</td><td>have</td><td>been</td></tr> +<tr><td>taken</td><td>over</td><td>from</td><td>Cameronians</td><td>aaa</td></tr> +<tr><td></td><td><span class="letters">A</span> Coy.</td><td>12.30 a.m.</td><td></td><td></td></tr> +<tr><td></td><td>B Coy.</td><td>12.45 a.m.</td><td></td><td></td></tr> +<tr><td></td><td>C Coy.</td><td>1 a.m.</td><td></td><td></td></tr> +<tr><td></td><td>D Coy.</td><td>1.15 a.m.</td><td>aaa</td><td></td></tr> +<tr><td></td><td>At</td><td>2 a.m.</td><td>Company</td><td>Commanders</td></tr> +<tr><td>will</td><td>meet</td><td><abbr>C.O.</abbr></td><td>at</td><td>X</td></tr> +<tr><td>Roads</td><td>S14b 99.</td><td>aaa</td><td></td><td></td></tr> +<tr><td>Men</td><td>will</td><td>lie</td><td>down</td><td>and</td></tr> +<tr><td>get</td><td>under</td><td>cover</td><td>but</td><td>equipment</td></tr> +<tr><td>will</td><td>not</td><td>be</td><td>taken</td><td>off aaa</td></tr> +</tbody> +</table> +</div> + +<p class="noindent">S14b 99 was a map reference for Bazentin churchyard. We lay here on +the reverse slope of a slight ridge about half a mile from the wood. +I attended the meeting of company commanders; the colonel told us the +plan. He said: ‘Look here, you fellows, we’re in reserve for this +attack. The Cameronians are going up to the wood first, then the Fifth +Scottish Rifles; that’s at five a.m. The Public Schools Battalion +are in support if anything goes wrong. I don’t <span class="pagenum" id="Page_271" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 271</span>know if we shall +be called on; if we are, it will mean that the Jocks have legged it. +As usual,’ he added. This was an appeal to prejudice. ‘The Public +Schools Battalion is, well, what we know, so if we are called for, that +means it will be the end of us.’ He said this with a laugh and we all +laughed. We were sitting on the ground protected by the road-bank; a +battery of French 75’s was firing rapid over our heads about twenty +yards away. There was a very great concentration of guns in Happy +Valley now. We could hardly hear what he was saying. He told us that +if we did get orders to reinforce, we were to shake out in artillery +formation; once in the wood we were to hang on like death. Then he said +good-bye and good luck and we rejoined our companies.</p> + +<p>At this juncture the usual inappropriate message came through from +Division. Division could always be trusted to send through a warning +about verdigris on vermorel-sprayers, or the keeping of pets in +trenches, or being polite to our allies, or some other triviality, when +an attack was in progress. This time it was an order for a private in C +Company to report immediately to the assistant provost-marshal back at +Albert, under escort of a lance-corporal. He was for a court-martial. +A sergeant of the company was also ordered to report as a witness in +the case. The private was charged with the murder of a French civilian +in an <i>estaminet</i> at Béthune about a month previously. Apparently there +had been a good deal of brandy going and the French civilian, who had +a grudge against the British (it was about his wife), started to tease +the private. He was reported, somewhat improbably, as having said: +‘<span lang="fr">English no bon, Allmand trés bon. War fineesh, napoo the English. +Allmand win.</span>’ The private had immediately drawn his bayonet and run the +man through. At the court-martial the private was exculpated; <span class="pagenum" id="Page_272" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 272</span>the +French civil representative commended him for having ‘energetically +repressed local defeatism.’ So he and the two <abbr>N.C.O.</abbr>’s missed the +battle.</p> + +<p>What the battle that they missed was like I pieced together afterwards. +The Jocks did get into the wood and the Royal Welch were not called +on to reinforce until eleven o’clock in the morning. The Germans put +down a barrage along the ridge where we were lying, and we lost about +a third of the battalion before our show started. I was one of the +casualties.</p> + +<p>It was heavy stuff, six and eight inch. There was so much of it that +we decided to move back fifty yards; it was when I was running that +an eight-inch shell burst about three paces behind me. I was able +to work that out afterwards by the line of my wounds. I heard the +explosion and felt as though I had been punched rather hard between +the shoulder-blades, but had no sensation of pain. I thought that +the punch was merely the shock of the explosion; then blood started +trickling into my eye and I felt faint and called to Moodie: ‘I’ve +been hit.’ Then I fell down. A minute or two before I had had two very +small wounds on my left hand; they were in exactly the same position +as the two, on my right hand, that I had got during the preliminary +bombardment at Loos. This I had taken as a sign that I would come +through all right. For further security I had repeated to myself a line +of Nietsche’s, whose poems, in French, I had with me:</p> + +<blockquote> +<p class="center" lang="fr">Non, tu ne peus pas me tuer.</p> +</blockquote> + +<p>It was the poem about a man on the scaffold with the red-bearded +executioner standing over him. (This copy of <span class="pagenum" id="Page_273" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 273</span>Nietsche, by the +way, had contributed to the suspicions about me as a spy. Nietsche was +execrated in the papers as the philosopher of German militarism; he +was more popularly interpreted as a William le Queux mystery-man—the +sinister figure behind the Kaiser.)</p> + +<p>One piece of shell went through my left thigh, high up near the groin; +I must have been at the full stretch of my stride to have escaped +emasculation. The wound over the eye was nothing; it was a little chip +of marble, possibly from one of the Bazentin cemetery headstones. This +and a finger wound, which split the bone, probably came from another +shell that burst in front of me. The main wound was made by a piece of +shell that went in two inches below the point of my right shoulder and +came out through my chest two inches above my right nipple, in a line +between it and the base of my neck.</p> + +<p>My memory of what happened then is vague. Apparently Doctor Dunn came +up through the barrage with a stretcher-party, dressed my wound, and +got me down to the old German dressing-station at the north end of +Mametz Wood. I just remember being put on the stretcher and winking at +the stretcher-bearer sergeant who was looking at me and saying: ‘Old +Gravy’s got it, all right.’ The dressing-station was overworked that +day; I was laid in a corner on a stretcher and remained unconscious for +more than twenty-four hours.</p> + +<p>It was about ten o’clock on the 20th that I was hit. Late that night +the colonel came to the dressing-station; he saw me lying in the corner +and was told that I was done for. The next morning, the 21st, when they +were clearing away the dead, I was found to be still breathing; so they +put me on an ambulance for Heilly, the nearest field-hospital. The pain +of being jolted down the Happy Valley, with a shell-hole at <span class="pagenum" id="Page_274" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 274</span>every +three or four yards of the roads, woke me for awhile. I remember +screaming. But once back on the better roads I became unconscious +again. That morning the colonel wrote the usual formal letters of +condolence to the next-of-kin of the six or seven officers who had been +killed. This was his letter to my mother:</p> + +<blockquote> +<p class="right padr1">22/7/16</p> + +<p class="noindent"><b class="smcap">Dear Mrs. Graves,</b></p> + +<p>I very much regret to have to write and tell you your son has died +of wounds. He was very gallant, and was doing so well and is a great +loss.</p> + +<p>He was hit by a shell and very badly wounded, and died on the way +down to the base I believe. He was not in bad pain, and our doctor +managed to get across and attend him at once.</p> + +<p>We have had a very hard time, and our casualties have been large. +Believe me you have all our sympathy in your loss, and we have lost a +very gallant soldier.</p> + +<p>Please write to me if I can tell you or do anything.</p> + +<p class="right padr2">Yours sincerely,</p> + +<p class="right padr1">* * *</p> +</blockquote> + +<p class="noindent">Later he made out the official casualty list and reported me died of +wounds. It was a long casualty list, because only eighty men were left +in the battalion.</p> + +<p>Heilly was on the railway; close to the station was the +hospital—marquee tents with the red cross painted prominently on the +roofs to discourage air-bombing. It was fine July weather and the +tents were insufferably hot. I was semi-conscious now, and realized +my lung-wound by the shortness of breath. I was amused to watch the +little <span class="pagenum" id="Page_275" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 275</span>bubbles of blood, like red soap-bubbles, that my breath +made when it escaped through the hole of the wound. The doctor came +over to me. I felt sorry for him; he looked as though he had not had +any sleep for days. I asked him for a drink. He said: ‘Would you like +some tea?’ I whispered: ‘Not with condensed milk in it.’ He said: ‘I’m +afraid there’s no fresh milk.’ Tears came to my eyes; I expected better +of a hospital behind the lines. He said: ‘Will you have some water?’ I +said: ‘Not if it’s boiled.’ He said: ‘It is boiled. And I’m afraid I +can’t give you anything with alcohol in it in your present condition.’ +I said: ‘Give me some fruit then.’ He said: ‘I have seen no fruit for +days.’ But a few minutes later he came back with two rather unripe +greengages. I felt so grateful that I promised him a whole orchard when +I recovered.</p> + +<p>The nights of the 22nd and 23rd were very bad. Early on the morning of +the 24th, when the doctor came to see how I was, I said: ‘You must send +me away from here. The heat will kill me.’ It was beating through the +canvas on my head. He said: ‘Stick it out. It’s your best chance to lie +here and not to be moved. You’d not reach the base alive.’ I said: ‘I’d +like to risk the move. I’ll be all right, you’ll see.’ Half an hour +later he came back. ‘Well, you’re having it your way. I’ve just got +orders to evacuate every case in the hospital. Apparently the Guards +have been in it up at Delville Wood and we’ll have them all coming in +to-night.’ I had no fears now about dying. I was content to be wounded +and on the way home.</p> + +<p>I had been given news of the battalion from a brigade-major, wounded in +the leg, who was in the next bed to me. He looked at my label and said: +‘I see you’re in the Second Royal Welch Fusiliers. Well, I saw your +High Wood show <span class="pagenum" id="Page_276" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 276</span>through field-glasses. The way your battalion shook +out into artillery formation, company by company-with each section of +four or five men in file at fifty yards interval and distance—going +down into the hollow and up the slope through the barrage, was the +most beautiful bit of parade-ground drill I’ve ever seen. Your company +officers must have been superb.’ I happened to know that one company at +least had started without a single officer. I asked him whether they +had held the wood. He said: ‘They hung on at the near end. I believe +what happened was that the Public Schools Battalion came away as soon +as it got dark; and so did the Scotsmen. Your chaps were left there +alone for some time. They steadied themselves by singing. Later, the +chaplain—<abbr>R.C.</abbr> of course—Father McCabe, brought the Scotsmen back. They +were Glasgow Catholics and would follow a priest where they wouldn’t +follow an officer. The middle of the wood was impossible for either the +Germans or your fellows to hold. There was a terrific concentration +of artillery on it. The trees were splintered to matchwood. Late that +night the survivors were relieved by a brigade of the Seventh Division; +your First Battalion was in it.’</p> + +<p>That evening I was put in the hospital train. They could not lift +me from the stretcher to put me on a bunk, for fear of starting +hæmorrhage in the lung; so they laid the stretcher on top of it, with +the handles resting on the head-rail and foot-rail. I had been on the +same stretcher since I was wounded. I remember the journey only as a +nightmare.</p> + +<p>My back was sagging, and I could not raise my knees to relieve the +cramp because the bunk above me was only a few inches away. A German +officer on the other side of the carriage groaned and wept unceasingly. +He had been in an aeroplane crash and had a compound fracture of the +<span class="pagenum" id="Page_277" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 277</span>leg. The other wounded men were cursing him and telling him to +stow it and be a man, but he went on, keeping every one awake. He was +not delirious, only frightened and in great pain. An orderly gave me +a pencil and paper and I wrote home to say that I was wounded but all +right. This was July 24th, my twenty-first birthday, and it was on +this day, when I arrived at Rouen, that my death officially occurred. +My parents got my letter two days after the letter from the colonel; +mine was dated July 23rd, because I had lost count of days when I was +unconscious; his was dated the 22nd.<a class="fnanchor" href="#Footnote8" role="doc-noteref" id="FNanchor8">8</a> They could not decide whether +my letter had been written just before I died and misdated, or whether +I had died just after writing it. ‘Died of wounds’ was, however, so +much more circumstantial than ‘killed’ that they gave me up. I was in +No. 8 Hospital at Rouen; an ex-château high above the town. The day +after I arrived a Cooper aunt of mine, who had married a Frenchman, +came up to the hospital to visit a nephew in the South Wales Borderers +who had just had a leg amputated. She happened to see my name in a list +on the door of the ward, so she wrote to my mother to reassure her. On +the 30th I had a letter from the colonel:</p> + +<blockquote> +<p class="right padr1">30/7/16</p> + +<p class="noindent"><b class="smcap">Dear von Runicke</b>,</p> + +<p>I cannot tell you how pleased I am you are alive. I was told your +number was up for certain, and a letter was supposed to have come in +from Field Ambulance saying you had gone under.</p> + +<p>Well, it’s good work. We had a rotten time, and after <span class="pagenum" id="Page_278" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 278</span>succeeding +in doing practically the impossible we collected that rotten crowd +and put them in their places, but directly dark came they legged it. +It was too sad.</p> + +<p>We lost heavily. It is not fair putting brave men like ours alongside +that crowd. I also wish to thank you for your good work and bravery, +and only wish you could have been with them. I have read of bravery +but I have never seen such magnificent and wonderful disregard for +death as I saw that day. It was almost uncanny—it was so great. I +once heard an old officer in the Royal Welch say the men would follow +you to Hell; but these chaps would bring you back and put you in a +dug-out in Heaven.</p> + +<p>Good luck and a quick recovery. I shall drink your health to-night.</p> + +<p class="right padr1">* *</p> +</blockquote> + +<p>I had little pain all this time, but much discomfort; the chief pain +came from my finger, which had turned septic because nobody had taken +the trouble to dress it, and was throbbing. And from the thigh, where +the sticky medical plaster, used to hold down the dressing, pulled +up the hair painfully when it was taken off each time the wound was +dressed. My breath was very short still. I contrasted the pain and +discomfort favourably with that of the operation on my nose of two +months back; for this I had won no sympathy at all from anyone, because +it was not an injury contracted in war. I was weak and petulant and +muddled. The <abbr title="Royal Army Medical Corps">R.A.M.C.</abbr> bugling outraged me. The ‘Rob All My Comrades,’ +I complained, had taken everything I had except a few papers in my +tunic-pocket and a ring which was too tight on my finger to be pulled +off; and now they mis-blew the Last Post flat and windily, and with the +pauses in the <span class="pagenum" id="Page_279" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 279</span>wrong places, just to annoy me. I remember that I +told an orderly to put the bugler under arrest and jump to it or I’d +report him to the senior medical officer.</p> + +<p>Next to me was a Welsh boy, named <abbr>O. M.</abbr> Roberts, who had joined us +only a few days before he was hit. He told me about High Wood; he had +reached the edge of the wood when he was wounded in the groin. He had +fallen into a shell-hole. Some time in the afternoon he had recovered +consciousness and seen a German officer working round the edge of the +wood, killing off the wounded with an automatic pistol. Some of our +lightly-wounded were, apparently, not behaving as wounded men should; +they were sniping. The German worked nearer. He saw Roberts move and +came towards him, fired and hit him in the arm. Roberts was very weak +and tugged at his Webley. He had great difficulty in getting it out +of the holster. The German fired again and missed. Roberts rested the +Webley against the lip of the shell-hole and tried to pull the trigger; +he was not strong enough. The German was quite close now and was going +to make certain of him this time. Roberts said that he just managed to +pull the trigger with the fingers of both hands when the German was +only about five yards away. The shot took the top of his head off. +Roberts fainted.</p> + +<p>The doctors had been anxiously watching my lung, which was gradually +filling with blood and pressing my heart too far away to the left of my +body; the railway journey had restarted the hæmorrhage. They marked the +gradual progress of my heart with an indelible pencil on my skin and +said that when it reached a certain point they would have to aspirate +me. This sounded a serious operation, but it only consisted of putting +a hollow needle into my lung through the back and drawing the blood off +into a vacuum flask <span class="pagenum" id="Page_280" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 280</span>through it. I had a local anæsthetic; it hurt +no more than a vaccination, and I was reading the <cite>Gazette de Rouen</cite> +as the blood hissed into the flask. It did not look much, perhaps half +a pint. That evening I heard a sudden burst of lovely singing in the +courtyard where the ambulances pulled up. I recognized the quality +of the voices. I said to Roberts: ‘The First Battalion have been in +it again,’ and asked a nurse to verify it; I was right. It was their +Delville Wood show, I think, but I am uncertain now of the date.</p> + +<p>A day or two later I was taken back to England by hospital ship.</p> +</section> + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> + +<section role="doc-chapter" aria-labelledby="c21-hd"> +<div class="chapter"> +<div class="pagenum" id="Page_281" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 281</div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="c21-hd">XXI</h2> +</div> + +<p class="chap_start"><b class="smcap">I had</b> sent my parents a wire that I would be arriving at Waterloo +Station the next morning. The way from the hospital train to the +waiting ambulances was roped off; as each stretcher case was lifted off +the train a huge hysterical crowd surged up to the barrier and uttered +a new roar. Flags were being waved. It seemed that the Somme battle +was regarded at home as the beginning of the end of the war. As I idly +looked at the crowd, one figure detached itself; it was my father, +hopping about on one leg, waving an umbrella and cheering with the best +of them. I was embarrassed, but was soon in the ambulance. I was on the +way to Queen Alexandra’s Hospital, Highgate. This was Sir Alfred Mond’s +big house, lent for the duration of the war, and a really good place to +be in; having a private room to myself was the most unexpected luxury.</p> + +<p>What I most disliked in the army was never being alone, forced to live +and sleep with men whose company in many cases I would have run miles +to avoid.</p> + +<p>I was not long at Highgate; the lung healed up easily and my finger +was saved for me. I heard here for the first time that I was supposed +to be dead; the joke contributed greatly to my recovery. The people +with whom I had been on the worst terms during my life wrote the most +enthusiastic condolences to my parents: my housemaster, for instance. +I have kept a letter dated the 5th August 1916 from <cite>The Times</cite> +advertisement department:</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_282" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 282</span><b class="italic">Captain Robert Graves.</b></p> + +<blockquote> +<p class="noindent"><b class="smcap">Dear Sir</b>,</p> + +<p>We have to acknowledge receipt of your letter with reference to the +announcement contradicting the report of your death from wounds. +Having regard, however, to the fact that we had previously published +some biographical details, we inserted your announcement in our issue +of to-day (Saturday) under ‘Court Circular’ without charge, and we +have much pleasure in enclosing herewith cutting of same.</p> + +<p class="right padr1">Yours, etc.</p> +</blockquote> + +<p>The cutting read:</p> + +<p>Captain Robert Graves, Royal Welch Fusiliers, officially reported died +of wounds, wishes to inform his friends that he is recovering from his +wounds at Queen Alexandra’s Hospital, Highgate, <abbr>N.</abbr></p> + +<p class="center">* * *</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lloyd George has left London for Criccieth.</p> + +<p class="center">* * *</p> + +<p>I never saw the biographical details supplied by my father; they might +have been helpful to me here. Some letters written to me in France +were returned to him as my next-of-kin. They were surcharged: ‘Died of +wounds—present location uncertain.—<abbr>P.</abbr> Down, post-corporal.’ The only +inconvenience that my death caused me was that Cox’s Bank stopped my +pay and I had difficulty in persuading it to honour my cheques. I had +a letter from Siegfried telling me that he was overjoyed to hear I was +alive again. (I wondered whether he had been avenging me.) He was now +back in England with <span class="pagenum" id="Page_283" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 283</span>suspected lung trouble. We agreed to take our +leave together at Harlech when I was better. Siegfried wrote that he +was nine parts dead from the horror of the Somme fighting.</p> + +<p>I was able to travel early in September. We met at Paddington. +Siegfried bought a copy of <cite>The Times</cite> at the bookstall. As usual +we turned to the casualty list first; and found there the names of +practically every officer in the First Battalion, either killed or +wounded. Edmund Dadd was killed. His brother Julian, in Siegfried’s +company, wounded. (Shot through the throat, as we learned later, only +able to talk in a whisper, and for months utterly prostrated. It +had been at Ale Alley at Ginchy, on 3rd September. A dud show; the +battalion had been outflanked in a counter-attack.) News like this in +England was far more upsetting than when one was in France. I was still +very weak and could not help crying all the way up to Wales. Siegfried +said bitterly: ‘Well, I expect the colonel got his <abbr class="smcap">c.b.</abbr> at +any rate.’ England was strange to the returned soldier. He could not +understand the war-madness that ran about everywhere looking for a +pseudo-military outlet. Every one talked a foreign language; it was +newspaper language. I found serious conversation with my parents all +but impossible. A single typical memorial of this time will be enough:</p> + +<p class="center">A MOTHER’S ANSWER TO<br>‘A COMMON SOLDIER’</p> + +<p class="center"><b class="smcap">By A Little Mother</b></p> + +<p class="center"><b class="allsmcap">A MESSAGE TO THE PACIFISTS. A MESSAGE TO THE BEREAVED. A MESSAGE TO THE +TRENCHES</b></p> + +<p><b class="italic">Owing to the immense demand from home and from the trenches for this +letter, which appeared in the ‘Morning Post,’ <span class="pagenum" id="Page_284" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 284</span>the Editor found it +necessary to place it in the hands of London publishers to be reprinted +in pamphlet form, seventy-five thousand copies of which were sold in +less than a week direct from the publishers.</b></p> + +<p class="center mt1"><b class="italic">Extract from a Letter from Her Majesty</b></p> + +<p>‘The Queen was deeply touched at the “Little Mother’s” beautiful +letter, and Her Majesty fully realizes what her words must mean to our +soldiers in the trenches and in hospitals.’</p> + +<hr class="r20"> + +<p class="center"><b class="italic">To the Editor of the ‘Morning Post’</b></p> + +<p>Sir,—As a mother of an only child—a son who was early and eager to do +his duty—may I be permitted to reply to Tommy Atkins, whose letter +appeared in your issue of the 9th inst.? Perhaps he will kindly convey +to his friends in the trenches, not what the Government thinks, not +what the Pacifists think, but what the mothers of the British race +think of our fighting men. It is a voice which demands to be heard, +seeing that we play the most important part in the history of the +world, for it is we who ‘mother the men’ who have to uphold the honour +and traditions not only of our Empire but of the whole civilized world.</p> + +<p>To the man who pathetically calls himself a ‘common soldier,’ may I say +that we women, who demand to be heard, will tolerate no such cry as +‘Peace! Peace!’ where there is no peace. The corn that will wave over +land watered by the blood of our brave lads shall testify to the future +that their blood was not spilt in vain. We need no marble monuments to +remind us. We only need that force of character behind all motives to +see this monstrous world <span class="pagenum" id="Page_285" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 285</span>tragedy brought to a victorious ending. +The blood of the dead and the dying, the blood of the ‘common soldier’ +from his ‘slight wounds’ will not cry to us in vain. They have all +done their share, and we, as women, will do ours without murmuring and +without complaint. Send the Pacifists to us and we shall very soon show +them, and show the world, that in our homes at least there shall be no +‘sitting at home warm and cosy in the winter, cool and “comfy” in the +summer.’ There is only one temperature for the women of the British +race, and that is white heat. With those who disgrace their sacred +trust of motherhood we have nothing in common. Our ears are not deaf to +the cry that is ever ascending from the battlefield from men of flesh +and blood whose indomitable courage is borne to us, so to speak, on +every blast of the wind. We women pass on the human ammunition of ‘only +sons’ to fill up the gaps, so that when the ‘common soldier’ looks back +before going ‘over the top’ he may see the women of the British race on +his heels, reliable, dependent, uncomplaining.</p> + +<p>The reinforcements of women are, therefore, behind the ‘common +soldier.’ We gentle-nurtured, timid sex did not want the war. It is no +pleasure to us to have our homes made desolate and the apple of our +eye taken away. We would sooner our lovable, promising, rollicking +boy stayed at school. We would have much preferred to have gone on +in a light-hearted way with our amusements and our hobbies. But the +bugle call came, and we have hung up the tennis racquet, we’ve fetched +our laddie from school, we’ve put his cap away, and we have glanced +lovingly over his last report which said ‘Excellent’—we’ve wrapped them +all in a Union Jack and locked them up, to be taken out only after the +war to be looked at. A ‘common soldier,’ perhaps, did <span class="pagenum" id="Page_286" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 286</span>not count on +the women, but they have their part to play, and we have risen to our +responsibility. We are proud of our men, and they in turn have to be +proud of us. If the men fail, Tommy Atkins, the women won’t.</p> + +<div class="poetry-container"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent4">Tommy Atkins to the front,</div> + <div class="verse indent4">He has gone to bear the brunt.</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Shall ‘stay-at-homes’ do naught but snivel and but sigh?</div> + <div class="verse indent4">No, while your eyes are filling</div> + <div class="verse indent4">We are up and doing, willing</div> + <div class="verse indent0">To face the music with you—or to die!</div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + +<p>Women are created for the purpose of giving life, and men to take it. +Now we are giving it in a double sense. It’s not likely we are going +to fail Tommy. We shall not flinch one iota, but when the war is over +he must not grudge us, when we hear the bugle call of ‘Lights out,’ +a brief, very brief, space of time to withdraw into our own secret +chambers and share with Rachel the Silent the lonely anguish of a +bereft heart, and to look once more on the college cap, before we +emerge stronger women to carry on the glorious work our men’s memories +have handed down to us for now and all eternity.</p> + +<p class="right padr6">Yours, etc.,</p> + +<p class="right padr1"><span class="smcap">A Little Mother.</span></p> + +<hr class="r20"> + +<p class="center">EXTRACTS AND PRESS CRITICISMS</p> + +<p class="mt1">‘The widest possible circulation is of the utmost importance.’—<cite>The +Morning Post</cite>.</p> + +<p>‘Deservedly attracting a great deal of attention, as expressing with +rare eloquence and force the feelings with <span class="pagenum" id="Page_287" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 287</span>which the British wives +and mothers have faced and are facing the supreme sacrifice.’—<cite>The +Morning Post</cite>.</p> + +<p>‘Excites widespread interest.’—<cite>The Gentlewoman</cite>.</p> + +<p>‘A letter which has become celebrated.’—<cite>The Star</cite>.</p> + +<p>‘We would like to see it hung up in our wards.’—<cite>Hospital Blue</cite>.</p> + +<p>‘One of the grandest things ever written, for it combines a height of +courage with a depth of tenderness which should be, and is, the stamp +of all that is noblest and best in human nature.’—<b class="italic">A Soldier in France</b>.</p> + +<p>‘Florence Nightingale did great and grand things for the soldiers of +her day, but no woman has done more than the “Little Mother,” whose now +famous letter in the Morning Post has spread like wild-fire from trench +to trench. I hope to God it will be handed down in history, for nothing +like it has ever made such an impression on our fighting men. I defy +any man to feel weak-hearted after reading it.... My God! she makes us +die happy.’—<b class="italic">One who has Fought and Bled</b>.</p> + +<p>‘Worthy of far more than a passing notice; it ought to be reprinted and +sent out to every man at the front. It is a masterpiece and fills one +with pride, noble, level-headed, and pathetic to a degree.’—<b class="italic">Severely +Wounded</b>.</p> + +<p>‘I have lost my two dear boys, but since I was shown the “Little +Mother’s” beautiful letter a resignation too perfect to describe has +calmed all my aching sorrow, and I would now gladly give my sons twice +over.’—<b class="italic">A Bereaved Mother</b>.</p> + +<p>‘The “Little Mother’s” letter should reach every corner of the earth—a +letter of the loftiest ideal, tempered with courage and the most +sublime sacrifice.’—<b class="italic">Percival <abbr>H.</abbr> Monkton</b>.</p> + +<p>‘The exquisite letter by a “Little Mother” is making us <span class="pagenum" id="Page_288" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 288</span>feel +prouder every day. We women desire to fan the flame which she has so +superbly kindled in our hearts.’—<b class="italic">A British Mother of an Only Son</b>.</p> + +<hr class="invisible"> + +<p>At Harlech, Siegfried and I spent the time getting our poems in order; +Siegfried was at work on his <cite>Old Huntsman</cite>. We made a number of +changes in each other’s verses; I remember that I proposed amendments +which he accepted in his obituary poem ‘To His Dead Body’—written +for me when he thought me dead. We were beginning to wonder whether +it was right for the war to be continued. It was said that Asquith +in the autumn of 1915 had been offered peace-terms on the basis of +<i>status quo ante</i> and that he had been willing to consider them; that +his colleagues had opposed him, and that this was the reason for the +fall of the Liberal Government, and for the ‘Win-the-War’ Coalition +Government of Lloyd George that superseded it. We both thought that +the terms should have been accepted, though Siegfried was more +vehement than I was on the subject. The view we had of the war was +now non-political. We no longer saw it as a war between trade-rivals; +its continuance seemed merely a sacrifice of the idealistic younger +generation to the stupidity and self-protective alarm of the elder. +I made a facetious marginal note on a poem I wrote about this time, +called <cite>Goliath and David</cite> (in which the biblical legend was reversed +and David was killed by Goliath):</p> + +<blockquote> +<p>‘War should be a sport for men above forty-five only, the Jesse’s, +not the David’s. “Well, dear father, how proud I am of you serving +your country as a very gallant gentleman prepared to make even the +supreme sacrifice. I only wish I were your age: how willingly would +I buckle on <span class="pagenum" id="Page_289" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 289</span>my armour and fight those unspeakable Philistines! As it +is, of course, I can’t be spared; I have to stay behind at the War +Office and administrate for you lucky old men.” “What sacrifices I +have made,” David would sigh when the old boys had gone off with a +draft to the front singing <cite>Tipperary</cite>. “There’s father and my Uncle +Salmon and both my grandfathers, all on active service. I must put a +card in the window about it.”’</p> +</blockquote> + +<p>We defined the war in our poems by making contrasted definitions of +peace. With Siegfried it was hunting and nature and music and pastoral +scenes; with me it was chiefly children. When I was in France I used +to spend much of my spare time playing with the French children of the +villages in which I was billeted. I put them into my poems, and my own +childhood at Harlech. I called my book <cite>Fairies and Fusiliers</cite>, and +dedicated it to the regiment.</p> + +<p>Siegfried stayed a few weeks. When he had gone I began the novel on +which my earlier war chapters are based, but it remained a rough draft.</p> + +<p>In September I went for a visit to Kent, to the house of a First +Battalion friend who had recently been wounded. His elder brother +had been killed in the Dardanelles, and his mother kept his bedroom +exactly as he had left it, with the sheets aired, his linen always +freshly laundered, and flowers and cigarettes by his bedside. She was +religious and went about with a vague bright look on her face. The +first night I spent there my friend and I sat up talking about the war +until after twelve o’clock. His mother had gone to bed early, after +urging us not to get too tired. The talk excited me but I managed to +fall asleep at about one o’clock. I was continually awakened by sudden +rapping noises which I at first <span class="pagenum" id="Page_290" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 290</span>tried to disregard but which grew +louder and louder. They seemed to come from everywhere. I lay in a cold +sweat. About three o’clock I heard a diabolic yell and a succession of +laughing, sobbing shrieks that sent me flying to the door. I collided +in the passage with the mother, who, to my surprise, was fully dressed. +She said: ‘It’s nothing. One of the maids has hysterics. I am so sorry +you have been disturbed.’ So I went back to bed, but I could not sleep +though the noises had stopped. In the morning I said to my friend: ‘I’m +leaving this place. It’s worse than France.’</p> + +<hr class="invisible"> + +<p>In November Siegfried and I rejoined the battalion at Litherland and +shared a hut together. We decided that it was no use making a protest +against the war. Every one was mad; we were hardly sane ourselves. +Siegfried said that we had to ‘keep up the good reputation of the +poets,’ as men of courage, he meant. The best place for us was back +in France away from the more shameful madness of home service. Our +function there was not to kill Germans, though that might happen, but +to make things easier for the men under our command. For them the +difference between being under someone whom they could count as a +friend, someone who protected them as much as he could from the grosser +indignities of the military system and having to study the whims of +any thoughtless, petty tyrant in an officer’s tunic, was all the +difference in the world. By this time the ranks of both line battalions +were filled with men who had enlisted for patriotic reasons and the +professional-soldier tradition was hard on them.... Siegfried, for +instance, on (I think) the day before the Fricourt attack. The attack +had been rehearsed for a week over dummy trenches in the back areas +until the whole performance was perfect, in fact <span class="pagenum" id="Page_291" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 291</span>almost stale. +Siegfried was told to rehearse once more. Instead, he led his platoon +into a wood and read to them—nothing military or literary, just the +<cite>London Mail</cite>. Though the <cite>London Mail</cite> was not in his line, Siegfried +thought that the men would enjoy the ‘Things We Want to Know’ column.</p> + +<p>Officers of the Royal Welch were honorary members of a neighbouring +golf club. Siegfried and I used to go there often. He played golf and +I hit a ball alongside him. I had once played at Harlech as a junior +member of the Royal St. David’s, but I had given it up before long +because it was bad for my temper. I was afraid of taking it up again +seriously, so now I limited myself to a single club. When I mishit it +did not matter. I played the fool and purposely put Siegfried off his +game; he was a serious golfer. It was the time of great food shortage; +the submarines sank about every fourth food ship, and there was a +strict meat, butter and sugar ration. But the war did not seem to have +reached the links. The principal business men of Liverpool were members +of the club and did not mean to go short while there was any food at +all coming in at the docks. Siegfried and I went to the club-house for +lunch on the day before Christmas; there was a cold buffet in the club +dining-room offering hams, barons of beef, jellied tongues, cold roast +turkey and chicken. A large, meaty-faced waiter presided. Siegfried +satirically asked him: ‘Is this all? There doesn’t seem to be quite +such a good spread as in previous years.’ The waiter apologized: ‘No, +sir, this isn’t quite up to the usual mark, sir, but we are expecting a +more satisfactory consignment of meat on Boxing Day.’ The dining-room +at the club-house was always full, the links were practically deserted.</p> + +<p>The favourite rendezvous of the officers of the Mersey <span class="pagenum" id="Page_292" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 292</span>garrison +was the Adelphi Hotel. It had a cocktail bar and a swimming bath. +The cocktail bar was generally crowded with Russian naval officers, +always very drunk. One day I met a major of the King’s Own Scottish +Borderers there. I saluted him. He told me confidentially, taking me +aside: ‘It’s nice of you to salute me, my boy, but I must confess +that I am not what I seem. I wear a crown on my sleeve and so does +a company sergeant-major; but then he’s not entitled to wear these +three cuff bands and the wavy border. Look at them, aren’t they +pretty? As I was saying, I’m not what I seem to be. I’m a sham. I’ve +got a sergeant-major’s stomach.’ I was quite accustomed to drunken +senior officers, so I answered respectfully: ‘Really, major, and how +did you come to get that?’ He said: ‘You think I’m drunk. Well, I am +if you like, but it’s true about my stomach. You see I was in that +Beaumont-Hamel show and I got shot in the guts. It hurt like hell, let +me tell you. They got me down to the field-hospital. I was busy dying; +there was a company sergeant-major in the hospital at the time and +he had got it through the head, and <em>he</em> was busy dying, too, and he +did die. Well, as soon as the sergeant-major died they took out that +long gut, whatever you call the thing, the thing that unwinds—they say +it’s as long as a cricket pitch—and they put it into me, grafted it on +somehow. Wonderful chaps these medicos. They can put in spare parts as +if one was a motor-car. Well, this sergeant-major seems to have been an +abstemious man; the lining of the new gut is much better than my old +one; so I’m celebrating it. I only wish I had his kidneys too.’</p> + +<p>An <abbr>R.A.M.C.</abbr> captain was sitting by. He broke into the conversation. +‘Yes, major, I know what a stomach wound’s like. It’s the worst of the +lot. You were lucky to reach the <span class="pagenum" id="Page_293" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 293</span>field-ambulance alive. The best +chance is to lie absolutely still. I got mine out between the lines, +bandaging a fellow. I flopped into a shell-hole. My stretcher-bearers +wanted to carry me back, but I wasn’t having any. I kept everyone off +with a revolver for forty-eight hours. That saved my life. I couldn’t +count on a spare gut waiting for me at the dressing-station. My only +chance was to lie still and let it heal.’</p> + +<p>In December I attended a medical board; they examined my wound and +asked me how I was feeling. The president wanted to know whether I +wanted a few months more home service. I said: ‘No, sir, I should be +much obliged if you would pass me fit for service overseas.’ In January +I went out again.</p> + +<p>I went back as an old soldier; my kit and baggage proved it. I had +reduced the Christmas tree that I first brought out to a pocket-torch +with a fourteen-day battery in it, and a pair of insulated wire-cutters +strong enough to cut German wire (the ordinary British army issue +would only cut British wire). Instead of a haversack I had a pack +like the ones the men carried, but lighter and waterproof. I had lost +my revolver when I was wounded and had not bought another; rifle and +bayonet could always be got from the battalion. (Not carrying rifle +and bayonet made officers conspicuous in an attack; in most divisions +now they carried them, and also wore trousers rolled down over their +puttees like the men, because the Germans had been taught to recognize +them by their thin knees.) Instead of the heavy blankets that I had +brought out before I now had an eiderdown sleeping-bag in an oiled-silk +cover. I also had Shakespeare and a Bible, both printed on india-paper, +a Catullus and a Lucretius in Latin, and two light weight, folding, +canvas arm-chairs, one as a present for <span class="pagenum" id="Page_294" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 294</span>Yates the quartermaster, +the other for myself. I was wearing a very thick whipcord tunic with a +neat patch above the second button and another between the shoulders; +it was my only salvage from the last time out except the pair of +ski-ing boots which I was wearing again, reasonably waterproof—my +breeches had been cut off me in hospital.</p> + +<p>There was a draft of ten young officers with me. As Captain Charles +Edmonds notes in his book <cite>A Subaltern’s War</cite>, young officers at this +time were expected to be ‘roistering blades with wine and women.’ These +ten did their best. Three of them got venereal disease at Rouen. In +each case, I believe, it was the first time that they had been with +women. They were strictly brought-up Welsh boys of the professional +classes and knew nothing about prophylactics. One of them was sharing +a hut with me. He came in very late and very drunk one night from the +<i lang="fr">Drapeau Blanc</i>, a well-known blue-lamp brothel, woke me up and began +telling me what a wonderful time he had. ‘He had never known before,’ +he said, ‘what a wonderful thing sex was.’ I said irritably and in some +disgust: ‘The <i lang="fr">Drapeau Blanc</i>? Then I hope to God you washed yourself.’ +He was very Welsh and on his dignity. ‘What do you mean, captain? I did +wass my fa-ace and ha-ands.’ There were no restraints in France as in +England; these boys had money to spend and knew that they had a good +chance of being killed within a few weeks anyhow. They did not want to +die virginal. So venereal hospitals at the base were always crowded. +(The troops took a lewd delight in exaggerating the proportion of army +chaplains to combatant officers treated there.) The <i lang="fr">Drapeau Blanc</i> +saved the life of scores of them by incapacitating them for future +trench service.</p> + +<p>The instructors at the Bull Ring were full of bullet-and-bayonet +<span class="pagenum" id="Page_295" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 295</span>enthusiasm which they tried to pass on to the drafts. The drafts +were now, for the most part, either forcibly enlisted men or wounded +men returning, and at this dead season of the year it was difficult +for anyone to feel enthusiastic on arrival in France. The training +principle had recently been revised. <cite>Infantry Training</cite>, 1914, had +laid it down politely that the soldier’s ultimate aim was to put out +of action or render ineffective the armed forces of the enemy. This +statement was now not considered direct enough for a war of attrition. +Troops were taught instead that their duty was to <span class="smcap">hate</span> +the Germans and <span class="smcap">kill</span> as many of them as possible. In +bayonet-practice the men were ordered to make horrible grimaces and +utter blood-curdling yells as they charged. The bayonet-fighting +instructors’ faces were permanently set in a ghastly grin. ‘Hurt him, +now! In at his belly! Tear his guts out!’ they would scream as the men +charged the dummies. ‘Now that upper swing at his privates with the +butt. Ruin his chances for life. No more little Fritzes! ... Naaaoh! +Anyone would think that you <em>loved</em> the bloody swine, patting and +stroking ’em like that. <span class="smcap">Bite him, I say! Stick your teeth in him +and worry him! Eat his heart out!’</span></p> + +<p>Once more I was glad to be sent up to the trenches.</p> +</section> + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> + +<section role="doc-chapter" aria-labelledby="c22-hd"> +<div class="chapter"> +<div class="pagenum" id="Page_296" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 296</div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="c22-hd">XXII</h2> +</div> + +<p class="chap_start"><b class="smcap">I was</b> posted to the Second Battalion again. I found it near +Bouchavesnes on the Somme. It was a very different Second Battalion. No +riding-school, no battalion-mess, no Quetta manners. I was more warmly +welcomed this time; my suspected spying activities were forgotten. +But the day before I arrived, the colonel had been wounded while out +in front of the battalion inspecting the wire. He had been shot in +the thigh by one of the ‘rotten crowd’ of his letter, who mistook him +for a German and fired without challenging; he has been in and out of +nursing homes ever since. Doctor Dunn asked me with kindly disapproval +what I meant by coming back so soon. I said that I could not stand +England any longer. He told the acting <abbr>C.O.</abbr> that I was, in his opinion, +unfit for trench service, so I was put in command of the headquarter +company. I went to live with the transport back at Frises, where the +Somme made a bend. My company consisted of regimental clerks, cooks, +tailors, shoemakers, pioneers, transport men, and so on, who in an +emergency could become riflemen and used as a combatant force. We were +in dug-outs close to the river, which was frozen completely over except +for a narrow stretch of fast water in the middle. I had never been so +cold in my life; it made me shudder to think what the trenches must +be like. I used to go up to them every night with the rations, the +quartermaster being sick; it was about a twelve-mile walk there and +back. The general commanding the Thirty-third Division had teetotal +convictions on behalf of his men and stopped their issue of rum except +for emergencies; the immediate result was a much heavier sick-list +than the battalion had ever had. The men had always looked forward to +their tot of rum at <span class="pagenum" id="Page_297" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 297</span>the dawn stand-to as the one bright moment +of the twenty-four hours. When this was denied them, their resistance +weakened. I took the rations up through Cléry, which had been a wattle +and daub village of some hundreds of inhabitants. The highest part +of it now standing was a short course of brick wall about three feet +high; the rest was enormous overlapping shell-craters. A broken-down +steam-roller by the roadside had the name of the village chalked on it +as a guide to travellers. We often lost a horse or two at Cléry, which +the Germans continued to shell from habit.</p> + +<figure id="i296" class="figcenter" style="max-width: 24em;"> + <img class="w100 mt1" src="images/i296.jpg" alt=""> + <figcaption>ROBERT GRAVES<br> + from a pastel by Eric Kennington</figcaption> +</figure> + +<p>Our reserve billets for these Bouchavesnes trenches were at Suzanne. +They were not really billets, but dug-outs and shelters. Suzanne was +also in ruins. The winter was the hardest since 1894–5. The men played +inter-company football matches on the river, which was now frozen two +feet thick. I remember a meal here in a shelter-billet; stew and tinned +tomato on metal plates. Though the food came in hot from the kitchen +next door, before we had finished it there was ice on the edge of the +plate. In all this area there were no French civilians, no unshelled +houses, no signs of cultivation. The only living creatures that I saw +except soldiers and horses and mules were a few moorhen and duck in +the narrow unfrozen part of the river. There was a shortage of fodder +for the horses, many of which were sick; the ration was down to three +pounds a day, and they had only open standings. I have kept few records +of this time, but the memory of its misery survives.</p> + +<p>Then I had bad toothache, and there was nothing for it but to take a +horse and ride twenty miles to the nearest army dental station. The +dentist who attended me was under the weather like everyone else. +He would do nothing at first but grumble what a fool he had been to +offer his services to <span class="pagenum" id="Page_298" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 298</span>his country at such a low salary. ‘When I +think,’ he said, ‘of the terrible destruction to the nation’s teeth +that is being done by unqualified men at home, and the huge fees that +they are exacting for their wicked work, it makes me boil with rage.’ +There followed further complaints against the way he was treated and +the unwillingness of the Royal Army Medical Corps to give dentists any +promotion beyond lieutenant’s rank. Later he began work on my tooth. +‘An abscess,’ he said, ‘no good tinkering about with this; must pull it +out.’ So he yanked at it irritably and the tooth broke off. He tried +again; there was very little purchase and it broke off again. He damned +the ineffective type of forceps that the Government supplied. After +about half an hour he got the tooth out in sections. I rode home with +lacerated gums.</p> + +<p>I was appointed a member of a field general court-martial on an Irish +sergeant charged with ‘shamefully casting away his arms in the presence +of the enemy.’ I had heard about the case unofficially. He had been +maddened by an intense bombardment, thrown down his rifle, and run with +the rest of his platoon. An army order, secret and confidential, had +recently instructed me that, in the case of men tried for their life +on other charges, sentence might be mitigated if conduct in the field +had been exemplary; but cowardice was only punishable with death and no +medical excuses could be accepted. But I knew that there was nothing +between sentencing the man to death and refusing to take part in the +proceedings. If I chose the second course I would be court-martialled +myself, and a reconstituted court would bring in the death verdict +anyhow. Yet I would not sentence a man to death for an offence which +I might have committed myself in the same circumstances. I was in a +dilemma. I met <span class="pagenum" id="Page_299" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 299</span>the situation by evading it. There was one other +officer in the battalion with the year’s service, as a captain, which +entitled him to sit on a field general court-martial. I found him +willing to take my place. He was hard-boiled and glad of a trip to +Amiens, and I took over his duties for him.</p> + +<p>Executions were frequent in France. My first direct experience of +official lying was when I was at the base at Havre in May 1915 and read +the back-files of army orders in the officers’ mess at the rest-camp. +There were something like twenty reports of men shot for cowardice or +desertion; yet not a week later the responsible Minister in the House +of Commons, answering a question from a pacifist member, had denied +that sentence of death for a military offence had been carried out in +France on any member of His Majesty’s forces.</p> + +<p>The acting commanding-officer was sick and irritable; he felt the +strain badly and took a lot of whisky. One spell he was too sick to be +in the trenches, and came down to Frises, where he shared a dug-out +with Yates the quartermaster and myself. I was sitting in my arm-chair +reading the Bible and came on the text: ‘The bed is too narrow to lie +down therein and the coverlet too small to wrap myself therewith.’ +‘I say, James,’ I said, ‘that’s pretty appropriate for this place.’ +He raised himself on an elbow, genuinely furious. ‘Look here, von +Runicke,’ he said, ‘I am not a religious man. I’ve cracked a good +many of the commandments since I’ve been in France; but while I am in +command here I refuse to hear you or anyone bloody else blaspheme Holy +Writ.’ I liked James a lot. I had met him first on the day I arrived +at Wrexham to join the regiment. He was just back from Canada and +hilariously throwing chairs about in the junior ante-room of the mess. +He had been driving <span class="pagenum" id="Page_300" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 300</span>a plough through virgin soil, he told us, and +reciting Kipling to the prairie-dogs. His favourite piece was (I may be +misquoting):</p> + +<div class="poetry-container"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Are ye there, are ye there, are ye there?</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Four points on a ninety-mile square.</div> + <div class="verse indent0">With a helio winking like fun in the sun,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Are ye there, are ye there, are ye there?</div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + +<p class="noindent">He had been with the Special Reserve a year or two before he emigrated. +He cared for nobody, was most courageous, inclined to be sentimental, +and probably saw longer service with the Second Battalion in the war +than any officer except Yates.</p> + +<p>A day or two later, because he was still sick and I was the senior +officer of the battalion, I attended the Commanding Officers’ +Conference at brigade headquarters. Opposite our trenches was a German +salient and the brigadier wanted to ‘bite it off’ as a proof of the +offensive spirit of his command. Trench soldiers could never understand +the Staff’s desire to bite off an enemy salient. It was not a desirable +thing to be exposed to fire from both flanks; if the Germans were in a +salient, our obvious duty was to keep them there as long as they could +be persuaded to stay. We concluded that it was the passion for straight +lines for which headquarters were well known, and that it had no +strategic or tactical significance. The attack had been twice proposed +and twice cancelled because of the weather. This was towards the end of +February, in the thaw. I have a field-message referring to it, dated +the 21st:</p> + +<div style="overflow-x:auto;"> +<table class="grid small90" role="presentation"> +<tbody> +<tr><td><span class="pagenum" id="Page_301" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 301</span>Please</td><td>cancel</td><td>Form 4</td><td>of</td><td>my</td></tr> +<tr><td>AA 202</td><td>units</td><td>will</td><td>draw</td><td>from</td></tr> +<tr><td>19th</td><td>brigade</td><td>B. Echelon</td><td>the</td><td>following</td></tr> +<tr><td>issue</td><td>of</td><td>rum</td><td>which</td><td>will</td></tr> +<tr><td>be</td><td>issued</td><td>to</td><td>troops</td><td>taking</td></tr> +<tr><td>part</td><td>in</td><td>the</td><td>forth</td><td>coming</td></tr> +<tr><td>operations</td><td>at</td><td>the</td><td>discretion</td><td>of</td></tr> +<tr><td><abbr title="Officer in Command">O.C.</abbr></td><td>units</td><td>2nd <abbr>R.W.F.</abbr></td><td>7½</td><td>gallons.</td></tr> +</tbody> +</table> +</div> + +<p class="noindent">Even this promise of special rum could not encourage the battalion. +Every one agreed that the attack was unnecessary, foolish, and +impossible. The company commanders assured me that to cross the three +hundred yards of No Man’s Land, which because of constant shelling +and the thaw was a morass of mud more than knee-deep, would take even +lightly-armed troops four or five minutes. It would be impossible for +anyone to reach the German lines while there was a single section +of Germans with rifles to defend them. The general, when I arrived, +inquired in a fatherly way how old I was, and whether I was not proud +to be attending a Commanding Officers’ Conference at the age of +twenty-one. I said that I had not examined my feelings, but that I was +an old enough soldier to realize the <span class="corr" id="corr301" title="Source: impossiblity">impossibility</span> of the attack. The +colonel of the Cameronians, who were also to be engaged, took the same +line. So the attack was finally called off. That night I went up with +rations as usual; the battalion was much relieved to hear the decision.</p> + +<p>We had been heavily shelled on the way up, and while <span class="pagenum" id="Page_302" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 302</span>I was at +battalion headquarters having a drink a message came to say that D +Company limber had been hit by a shell. As I went to inspect the damage +I passed the chaplain, who had come up with me from Frises bend, and a +group of three or four men. He was gabbling the burial service over a +dead man lying on the ground covered with a waterproof sheet. It was +a suicide case. The misery of the weather and the knowledge of the +impending attack had been too much for him. This was the last dead man +I was to see in France, and like the first, a suicide.</p> + +<p>I found that the limber, which contained petrol tins of water for +the company, had had a direct hit. There was no sign of the horses; +they were highly prized horses, having won a prize at a divisional +horse-show some months back for the best-matched pair of the division. +So the transport sergeant and I sent the transport back and went +looking for the horses in the dark. We stumbled through miles of +morass that night but could not find them or get any news of them. We +used to boast that our transport animals were the best in France. Our +transport men were famous horse-thieves, and no less than eighteen of +our stable had been stolen from other units at one time or another, +for their good looks. There were even two which we had ‘borrowed’ from +the Scots Greys. The horse I rode to the dentist came from the French +police; its only fault was that it was the left-hand horse of the +police squadron, and so had a tendency to pull to the wrong side of the +road. We had never lost a horse to any other battalion, so naturally +Sergeant Meredith and I, who had started out with the rations at about +four o’clock in the afternoon, kept on with the search until long after +midnight. When we reached Frises at about three o’clock in the morning +I was completely exhausted. I collapsed on my bunk.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_303" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 303</span>The next day it was found that I had bronchitis and I went back in +an ambulance to Rouen, once more to No. 8 Red Cross hospital. The major +of the <abbr>R.A.M.C.</abbr> recognized me and said: ‘What on earth are <em>you</em> doing +out in France, young man? If I find you in my hospital again with those +lungs of yours I’ll have you court-martialled.’</p> + +<p>The quartermaster wrote to me there that the horses had been found +shortly after I had gone; they were unhurt except for grazes on their +bellies and were in the possession of the machine-gun company of the +Fourth Division; the machine-gunners were found disguising them with +stain and trying to remove the regimental marks.</p> + +<p>At Rouen I was asked to say where in England I would like to go to +hospital. I said, at random, ‘Oxford.’</p> +</section> + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> + +<section role="doc-chapter" aria-labelledby="c23-hd"> +<div class="chapter"> +<div class="pagenum" id="Page_304" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 304</div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="c23-hd">XXIII</h2> +</div> + +<p class="chap_start"><b class="smcap">So</b> I was sent to Oxford, to Somerville College, which, like the +Examination Schools, had been converted into a hospital. It occurred to +me here that I was probably through with the war, for it could not last +long now. I both liked and disliked the idea. I disliked being away +from the regiment in France and I liked to think that I would probably +be alive when the war ended. As soon as I was passed fit Siegfried had +got boarded toe and tried to follow me to the Second Battalion. He was +disappointed to find me gone. I felt I had somehow let him down. But +he wrote that he was unspeakably relieved to know that I was back at +Oxford.</p> + +<p>I liked Oxford and wanted to stay there. I applied, on the strength of +a chit from the Bull Ring commandant at Havre, for an instructional +job in one of the Officer-Cadet Battalions quartered in the men’s +colleges. I was posted to the Wadham Company of No. 4 Battalion. +These battalions had not been formed long; they had grown out of +instructional schools for young officers. The cadet course was only +three months (later increased to four), but it was a severe one and +particularly intended to train platoon commanders in the handling of +the platoon as an independent unit. About two-thirds of the cadets were +men recommended for commissions by colonels in France, the remainder +were public-school boys from the officers’ training corps. Much of the +training was drill and musketry, but the important part was tactical +exercises with limited objectives. We used the army textbook <abbr title="Stationery Services">S.S.</abbr> 143, +or ‘<cite>Instructions for the training of platoons for offensive action</cite>, +1917,’ perhaps the most important War Office publication issued during +the war. The author is <span class="pagenum" id="Page_305" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 305</span>said to have been General Solly-Flood, +who wrote it after a visit to a French army school. From 1916 on the +largest unit possible to control in sustained action was the platoon. +Infantry training had hitherto treated the company as the chief +tactical unit.</p> + +<p>Though the quality of the officers had deteriorated from the regimental +point of view (in brief, few of the new officers were now gentlemen), +their deficiency in manners was amply compensated for by their greater +efficiency in action. The cadet-battalion system, in the next two +years, saved the army in France from becoming a mere rabble. We failed +about a sixth of the candidates for commissions; the failures were +sometimes public-school boys without the necessary toughness, but +usually men who had been recommended, from France, on compassionate +grounds—rather stupid platoon sergeants and machine-gun corporals +who had been out too long and were thought to need a rest. Our final +selection of the right men to be officers was made by watching them +play games, principally rugger and soccer. The ones who played rough +but not dirty and had quick reactions were the men we wanted. We spent +most of our spare time playing games with them. I had a platoon of New +Zealanders, Canadians, South Africans, two men from the Fiji Island +contingent, an English farm-labourer, a Welsh miner and two or three +public-school boys. They were a good lot and most of them were killed +later on in the war. The New Zealanders went in for rowing; the record +time for the river at Oxford was made by a New Zealand eight that year. +I found the work too much for my lungs, for which the climate of Oxford +was unsuitable. I kept myself going for two months on a strychnine +tonic and then collapsed again. I fainted and fell downstairs one +evening in the dark, cutting <span class="pagenum" id="Page_306" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 306</span>my head open; I was taken back to +Somerville. I had kept going as long as I could.</p> + +<p>I had liked Wadham, where I was a member of the senior common-room and +had access to the famous brown sherry of the college; it is specially +mentioned in a Latin grace among the blessings vouchsafed to the +fellows by their Creator. My commanding officer, Colonel Stenning, +in better times University Professor of Hebrew, was a fellow of the +college. The social system at Oxford was dislocated. The St. John’s +don destined to be my moral tutor when I came up was a corporal in +the General Reserve; he wore grey uniform, drilled in the parks, and +saluted me whenever we met. A college scout had a commission and was +instructing in the other cadet battalion. There were not, I suppose, +more than a hundred and fifty undergraduates at Oxford at this time; +these were Rhodes scholars, Indians, and men who were unfit. I saw +a good deal of Aldous Huxley, Wilfred Childe, and Thomas Earp, who +were running an undergraduates’ literary paper of necessarily limited +circulation called <cite>The Palatine Review</cite>, to which I contributed. Earp +had set himself the task of keeping the Oxford tradition alive through +the dead years; he was president and sole member, he said, of some +seventeen undergraduate social and literary societies. In 1919 he was +still in residence, and handed over the minute-books to the returning +university. Most of the societies were then reformed.</p> + +<p>I enjoyed being at Somerville. It was warm weather and the discipline +of the hospital was easy. We used to lounge about in the grounds in our +pyjamas and dressing-gowns, and even walk out into St. Giles’ and down +the Cornmarket (also in pyjamas and dressing-gowns) for a morning cup +of coffee at the Cadena. And there was a <abbr title="Voluntary Aid Detachment">V.A.D.</abbr> probationer <span class="pagenum" id="Page_307" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 307</span>with +whom I fell in love. I did not tell her so at the time. This was the +first time that I had fallen in love with a woman, and I had difficulty +in adjusting myself to the experience. I used to meet her when I +visited a friend in another ward, but we had little talk together. I +wrote to her after leaving hospital. When I found that she was engaged +to a subaltern in France I stopped writing. I had seen what it felt +like to be in France and have somebody else playing about with one’s +girl. Yet by the way she wrote reproving me for not writing she may +well have been as fond of me as she was of him. I did not press the +point. There was the end of it, almost before it started.</p> + +<p>While I was with the cadet battalion I used to go out to tea nearly +every Sunday to Garsington. Siegfried’s friends, Philip and Lady +Ottoline Morrell, lived at the manor house there. The Morrells were +pacifists and it was here that I first heard that there was another +side to the question of war guilt. Clive Bell was working on the manor +farm; he was a conscientious objector, and had been permitted to do +this, as work of national importance, instead of going into the army. +Aldous Huxley, Lytton Strachey and the Hon. Bertrand Russell were +frequent visitors. Aldous was unfit, otherwise he would certainly have +been in the army like Osbert and Sacheverell Sitwell, Herbert Read, +Siegfried, Wilfred Owen, myself and most other young writers of the +time, none of whom now believed in the war. Bertrand Russell, who was +beyond the age of liability for military service but an ardent pacifist +(a rare combination), turned sharply on me one afternoon and said: +‘Tell me, if a company of men of your regiment were brought along to +break a strike of munition makers and the munition makers refused to +submit, would you order the men to fire?’ I said: ‘Yes, if everything +<span class="pagenum" id="Page_308" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 308</span>else failed. It would be no worse than shooting Germans, really.’ +He was surprised and asked: ‘Would your men obey you?’ ‘Of course +they would,’ I said; ‘they loathe munition makers and would be only +too glad of a chance to shoot a few. They think that they’re all +skrim-shankers.’ ‘But they realize that the war’s all wicked nonsense?’ +‘Yes, as well as I do.’ He could not understand my attitude.</p> + +<p>Lytton Strachey was unfit, but instead of allowing himself to be +rejected by the doctors he preferred to appear before a military +tribunal as a conscientious objector. He told us of the extraordinary +impression that was caused by an air-cushion which he inflated during +the proceedings as a protest against the hardness of the benches. +Asked by the chairman the usual question: ‘I understand, Mr. Strachey, +that you have a conscientious objection to war?’ he replied (in his +curious falsetto voice), ‘Oh no, not at all, only to <em>this</em> war.’ +Better than this was his reply to the chairman’s other stock question, +which had previously never failed to embarrass the claimant: ‘Tell me, +Mr. Strachey, what would you do if you saw a German soldier trying to +violate your sister?’ With an air of noble virtue: ‘I would try to get +between them.’</p> + +<p>In 1916 I met more well-known writers than ever before or since. There +were two unsuccessful meetings. George Moore had just written <cite>The +Brook Kerith</cite> and my neurasthenic twitchings interrupted the calm, +easy flow of his conversational periods. He told me irritably not to +fidget; in return I taunted him with having introduced cactus into the +Holy Land some fifteen centuries before the discovery of America, its +land of origin. At the Reform Club, <abbr>H. G.</abbr> Wells, who was Mr. Britling +in those days and full of <span class="pagenum" id="Page_309" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 309</span>military optimism, talked without +listening. He had just been taken for a ‘Cook’s Tour’ to France and had +been shown the usual sights that royalty, prominent men of letters, and +influential neutrals were shown by staff-conductors. He described his +experiences at length and seemed unaware that I and the friend who was +with me had also seen the sights. But I liked Arnold Bennett for his +kindly unpretentiousness. And I liked Augustine Birrell. I happened to +correct him when he said that the Apocrypha was not read in the church +services; and again when he said that Elihu the Jebusite was one of +Job’s comforters. He tried to over-ride me in both points, but I called +for a Bible and proved them. He said, glowering very kindly at me: ‘I +will say to you what Thomas Carlyle once said to a young man who caught +him out in a misquotation, “Young man, you are heading straight for the +pit of Hell!”’</p> + +<p>And who else? John Galsworthy; or was my first meeting with him a year +or two later? He was editor of a magazine called <cite>Réveillé</cite>, published +under Government auspices (and was treated very ungenerously), the +proceeds of which were to go to a disabled-soldier fund. I contributed. +When I met him he asked me technical questions about soldier-slang—he +was writing a war-play and wanted it accurate. He seemed a humble man +and except for these questions listened without talking. This is, +apparently, his usual practice; which explains why he is a better +writer if a less forceful propagandist than Wells.... And Ivor Novello, +in 1918. Then aged about twenty and already world famous as the author +and composer of the patriotic song:</p> + +<div class="poetry-container"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Keep the home fires burning</div> + <div class="verse indent0">While the hearts are yearning....</div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + +<p class="noindent"><span class="pagenum" id="Page_310" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 310</span>There was some talk of his setting a song of mine. I found him, +wearing a silk dressing-gown, in a setting of incense, cocktails, many +cushions, and a Tree or two. I felt uncomfortably military. I removed +my spurs (I was a temporary field-officer at the time) out of courtesy +to the pouffes. He was in the Royal Naval Air Service, but his genius +was officially recognized and he was able to keep the home fires +burning until the boys came home.</p> + +<p>By this time the War Office had stopped the privilege that officers +had enjoyed, after coming out of hospital, of going to their own homes +for convalescence. It was found that many of them took no trouble to +get well quickly and return to duty, they kept late nights, drank, +and overtaxed their strength. So when I was somewhat recovered I was +sent to a convalescent home for officers in the Isle of Wight. It was +Osborne Palace; my bedroom had once been the royal night-nursery of +King Edward VII and his brothers and sisters. This was the strawberry +season and fine weather; the patients were able to take all Queen +Victoria’s favourite walks through the woods and along the quiet +sea-shore, play billiards in the royal billiard-room, sing bawdy songs +in the royal music-room, drink the Prince Consort’s favourite Rhine +wines among his Winterhalters, play golf-crocquet and go down to Cowes +when in need of adventure. We were made honorary members of the Royal +Yacht Squadron. This is another of the caricature scenes of my life; +sitting in a leather chair in the smoking-room of what had been and +is now again the most exclusive club in the world, drinking gin and +ginger, and sweeping the Solent with a powerful telescope.</p> + +<p>I made friends with the French Benedictine Fathers who lived near by; +they had been driven from Solesmes in France <span class="pagenum" id="Page_311" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 311</span>by the anti-clerical +laws of 1906, and had built themselves a new abbey at Quarr. The +abbey had a special commission from the Vatican to collect and edit +ancient church music. Hearing the fathers at their plain-song made us +for the moment forget the war completely. Many of them were ex-army +officers who had, I was told, turned to religion after the ardours of +their campaigns or after disappointments in love. They were greatly +interested in the war, which they saw as a dispensation of God for +restoring France to Catholicism. They told me that the freemason +element in the French army had been discredited and that the present +Supreme Command was predominantly Catholic—an augury, they said, of +Allied victory. The guest-master showed me the library of twenty +thousand volumes, hundreds of them blackletter. The librarian was an +old monk from Béthune and was interested to hear from me an accurate +account of the damage to his quarter of the town. The guest-master +asked me whether there were any books that I would like to read in +the library. He said that there were all kinds there—history, botany, +music, architecture, engineering, almost every other lay subject. I +asked him whether there was a poetry section. He smiled kindly and +said, no, poetry was not regarded as improving.</p> + +<p>The Father Superior asked me whether I was a <i lang="fr">bon catholique</i>. I +replied no, I did not belong to the true religion. To spare him a +confession of agnosticism I added that my parents were Protestants. +He said: ‘But if ours is the true religion why do you not become a +Catholic?’ He asked the question in such a simple way that I felt +ashamed. But I had to put him off somehow, so I said: ‘Reverend father, +we have a proverb in England never to swap horses while crossing a +stream. I am still in the war, you know.’ I offered: ‘<span lang="fr">Peut-être <span class="pagenum" id="Page_312" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 312</span>après +la guerre.</span>’ This was a joke with myself; it was the stock answer that +the Pas de Calais girls were ordered by their priests to give to Allied +soldiers who asked for a ‘Promenade, mademoiselle?’ It was seldom +given, I was told, except for the purpose of bargaining. All the same, +I half-envied the Fathers their abbey on the hill, finished with wars +and love affairs. I liked their kindness and seriousness; the clean +whitewashed cells and the meals eaten in silence at the long oaken +tables, while a novice read the <cite>Lives of the Saints</cite>; the food, mostly +cereals, vegetables and fruit, was the best I had tasted for years—I +was tired of ration beef, ration jam, ration bread and cheese. At +Quarr, Catholicism ceased to be repulsive to me.</p> + +<p>Osborne was gloomy. Many of the patients there were neurasthenic and +should have been in a special neurasthenic hospital. <abbr class="letters">A. A.</abbr> Milne was +there, as a subaltern in the Royal Warwickshire Regiment, and in the +least humorous vein. Vernon Bartlett, of the Hampshire Regiment, who +had introduced me to the Quarr Fathers, decided with me that something +must be started. So we founded the ‘Royal Albert Society’; its aim +was to revive interest in the life and times of the Prince Consort. +I was president and my regalia consisted of a Scottish dirk, Hessian +boots, and a pair of side-whiskers. Official business was not allowed +to proceed until the announcement had been duly made that the whiskers +were on the table. Membership was open only to those who professed +themselves students of the life and works of the Prince Consort, those +who had been born in the province of Alberta in Canada, those who had +resided for six months or upwards by the banks of the Albert Nyanza, +those who held the Albert Medal for saving life, or those who were +linked with the Prince Consort’s memory in any other <span class="pagenum" id="Page_313" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 313</span>signal way. +The members were expected to report at each meeting reminiscences that +they had collected from old palace-servants and Osborne cottagers, +throwing light on the human side of the Consort’s life. We had about +fifteen members and ate strawberries. On one occasion about a dozen +officers came in to join the society; they professed to have the +necessary qualifications. One said that he was the grandson of the +man who had built the Albert Memorial; one had worked at the Albert +Docks; and one actually did possess the Albert Medal for saving life; +the others were mere students. They submitted quietly at first to the +ceremonies and business, but it was soon apparent that they were not +serious and had come to break up the society; they were, in fact, most +of them drunk. They began giving indecent accounts of the private life +of the Prince Consort, alleging that they could substantiate them with +documentary evidence. Bartlett and I got worried; it was not that +sort of society. So, as president, I rose and told in an improved +version the story which had won the 1914 All-England Interregimental +Competition at Aldershot for the worst story of the year. I linked it +up with the Prince Consort by saying that he had been told it by John +Brown, the Balmoral ghillie, in whose pawky humour Queen Victoria used +to find such delight, and that it had prevented him from sleeping for +three days and nights, and was a contributory cause of his premature +death. The story had the intended effect; the interrupters threw up +their hands in surrender and walked out. It struck me suddenly how far +I had come since my first years at Charterhouse seven years back, and +what a pity it was that I had not used the same technique there.</p> + +<p>On the beach one day Bartlett and I saw an old ship’s <span class="pagenum" id="Page_314" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 314</span>fender; the +knotted ropes at the top had frayed into something that looked like +hair, so Bartlett said to me: ‘Poor fellow, I knew him well. He was +in my platoon in the Hampshire Regiment and jumped overboard from the +hospital ship.’ A little farther along we found an old pair of trousers +half in the water, and a coat, and then some socks and a boot. So we +dressed up Bartlett’s old comrade, draped sea-weed over him where +necessary, and walked on. Soon after we met a coastguard and turned +back with him. We said: ‘There’s a dead man on the beach.’ He stopped a +few yards off and said, holding his nose: ‘Pooh, don’t he ’alf stink!’ +We turned again, leaving him with the dead, and the next day read in +the Isle of Wight paper of a hoax that ‘certain convalescent officers +at Osborne’ had played on the coroner. Bartlett and I were nonsensical, +and changed the labels of all the pictures in the galleries. Anything +to make people laugh. But it was hard work.</p> +</section> + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> + +<section role="doc-chapter" aria-labelledby="c24-hd"> +<div class="chapter"> +<div class="pagenum" id="Page_315" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 315</div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="c24-hd">XXIV</h2> +</div> + +<p class="chap_start"><b class="smcap">I used</b> to hear from Siegfried regularly. He had written in March from +the Second Battalion asking me to pull myself together and send him +a letter because he was horribly low in spirits. He complained that +he had not been made at all welcome. A Special Reserve officer who +had transferred to the Second Battalion and was an acting-captain had +gone so far as to call him a bloody wart and allude to the bloody +First Battalion. He had swallowed the insult, but was trying to get +transferred to the First Battalion. The Second was resting until the +end of the month about two miles from Morlancourt (where we had been +together in the previous March), surrounded by billows of mud slopes +and muddy woods and aerodromes and fine new railroads, where he used +to lollop around on the black mare of an afternoon watching the shells +bursting away by the citadel. The black mare was a beautiful combative +creature with a homicidal kink, only ridden by Siegfried. David Thomas +and I once watched him breaking her in. His patience was wonderful. +He would put the mare at a jump and she would sulk; and he would not +force her but turn her around and then lead her back to it. Time after +time she refused, but could not provoke his ill-temper or make him +give up his intention. Finally she took the jump in mere boredom. It +was a six-footer, and she could manage higher than that. He was in C +Company now, he wrote, with a half-witted platoon awaiting his orders +to do or die, and a beast of a stiff arm where Dr. Dunn had inoculated +him, sticking his needle in and saying: ‘Toughest skin of the lot, but +you’re a tough character, I know.’ Siegfried protested that he was not +so tough as Dunn thought. He was hoping that the <span class="pagenum" id="Page_316" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 316</span>battalion would +get into some sort of show soon; it would be a relief after all these +weeks of irritation and discomfort and disappointment. (That was a +feeling that one usually had in the Second Battalion.) He supposed that +his <cite>Old Huntsman</cite> would not be published until the autumn. He had seen +the <cite>Nation</cite> that week, and commented how jolly it was for him and me +to appear as a military duet singing to a pacifist organ. ‘You and me, +the poets who mean to work together some day and scandalize the jolly +old Gosse’s and Strachey’s.’ (Re-reading this letter now I am reminded +that the occasion of the final end of our correspondence ten years +later was my failure to observe the proper literary punctilios towards +the late Sir Edmund Gosse, <abbr class="smcap">c.b.</abbr> And, by the way, when the <cite>Old +Huntsman</cite> appeared, Sir Edmund severely criticized some lines of an +allegorical poem in it:</p> + +<div class="poetry-container"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">... Rapture and pale Enchantment and Romance</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And many a slender sickly lord who’d filled</div> + <div class="verse indent0">My soul long since with lutanies of sin</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Went home because he could not stand the din.</div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + +<p class="noindent">This, he considered, might be read as a libel on the British House of +Lords. The peerage, he said, had proved itself splendidly heroic in the +war.)</p> + +<p>Siegfried had his wish; he was in heavy fighting with the battalion in +the Hindenburg Line soon after. His platoon was then lent as support +to the Cameronians, and when, in a counter-attack, the Cameronians +were driven out of some trenches that they had won, Siegfried, with a +bombing party of six men, regained them. He was shot through the throat +but continued bombing until he collapsed. The Cameronians rallied +and returned, and Siegfried’s name was sent in for a <span class="pagenum" id="Page_317" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 317</span>Victoria +Cross. The recommendation was refused, however, on the ground that the +operations had not been successful; for the Cameronians were later +driven out again by a bombing party under some German Siegfried.</p> + +<p>He was back in England and very ill. He told me that often when he went +out he saw corpses lying about on the pavement. He had written from +hospital, in April, how bloody it was about the Second Battalion. Yates +had sent him a note saying that four officers were killed and seven +wounded in the show at Fontaine-les-Croiselles, the same place that he +had been at, and it had been a ‘perfectly bloody battle.’ But there +had been an advance of about half a mile, which seemed to Siegfried +to be some consolation. Yet, in the very next sentence, he wrote how +mad it made him to think of all the good men being slaughtered that +summer, and all for nothing. The bloody politicians and ditto generals +with their cursed incompetent blundering and callous ideas would go +on until they were tired of it or had got all the kudos they wanted. +He wished he could do something to protest against it, but even if he +were to shoot the Premier or Sir Douglas Haig they could only shut him +up in a madhouse like Richard Dadd of glorious memory. (I recognized +the allusion. Dadd was an early nineteenth-century painter who made +out a list of people who deserved to be killed. The first on the list +was his father. He picked him up one day in Hyde Park and carried him +on his shoulders for nearly half a mile before publicly drowning him +in the Serpentine.) Siegfried went on to say that if he refused to go +out again as a protest they would only accuse him of being afraid of +shells. He asked me whether I thought we would be any better off by the +end of that summer of carnage. We would never break their line. So far, +in April, we had lost more <span class="pagenum" id="Page_318" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 318</span>men than the Germans. The Canadians at +Vimy had lost appallingly, yet the official <i>communiqués</i> were lying +unblushingly about the casualties. Julian Dadd had come to see him in +hospital and, like every one else, urged him not to go out again, to +take a safe job at home—but he knew that it was only a beautiful dream, +that he would be morally compelled to go on until he was killed. The +thought of going back now was agony, just when he had got back into +the light again—‘Oh life, oh sun.’ His wound was nearly healed and he +expected to be sent for three weeks to a convalescent home. He didn’t +like the idea, but <em>anywhere</em> would be good enough if he could only be +quiet and see no one, just watch the trees dressing up in green and +feel the same himself. He was beastly weak and in a rotten state of +nerves. The gramophone in the ward plagued him beyond endurance. The +<cite>Old Huntsman</cite> had come out that spring after all, and, for a joke, +he had sent a copy to Sir Douglas Haig. He couldn’t be stopped doing +<em>that</em> anyhow.</p> + +<p>In June he had gone to visit the Morrells just before I left hospital +at Oxford. He had no idea I was still there, but he wrote that perhaps +it was as well that we didn’t meet, neither of us being at our best; +at least one of us should be in a normal frame of mind when we were +together. I had asked what he had been writing since he came home, +and he answered that five poems of his had appeared in the <cite>Cambridge +Magazine</cite> (one of the few pacifist journals published in England +at the time, the offices of which were later raided by militarist +flying-cadets). He said that none of them were much good except as digs +at the complacent and perfectly —⁠— people who thought the war ought to +go on indefinitely until every one was killed except themselves. The +pacifists were urging him to produce something red hot in the style +<span class="pagenum" id="Page_319" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 319</span>of Barbusse’s <cite>Under Fire</cite> but he couldn’t do it; he had other +things in his head, <em>not poems</em>. I didn’t know what he meant by this +but hoped that it was not a programme of assassination. He wrote that +the thought of all that happened in France nearly drove him dotty +sometimes. He was down in Kent, where he could hear the guns thudding +all the time across the Channel, on and on, until he didn’t know +whether he wanted to rush back and die with the First Battalion or stay +in England and do what he could to prevent the war going on. But both +courses were hopeless. To go back and get killed would be only playing +to the gallery—and the wrong gallery—and he could think of no way of +doing any effective preventive work at home. His name had been sent +in for an officer-cadet battalion appointment in England, which would +keep him safe if he wanted to take it; but it seemed a dishonourable +way out. Now at the end of July another letter came: it felt rather +thin. I sat down to read it on the bench dedicated by Queen Victoria to +John Brown (‘a truer and more faithful heart never burned within human +breast’). When I opened the envelope a newspaper-cutting fluttered out; +it was marked in ink: ‘<b class="italic">Bradford Pioneer</b>, Friday, July 27, 1917.’ I +read the wrong side first:</p> + +<blockquote> +<p class="center"> +<span class="smcap">The <abbr title="Conscientious Objector">C.O.</abbr>’s must be Set Free</span><br> +<br> +<b class="italic">By Philip Frankford</b> +</p> + +<p>The conscientious objector is a brave man. He will be remembered as +one of the few noble actors in this world drama when the impartial +historian of the future sums up the history of this awful war.</p> + +<p>The <abbr>C.O.</abbr> is putting down militarism. He is fighting <span class="pagenum" id="Page_320" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 320</span>for freedom +and liberty. He is making a mighty onslaught upon despotism. And, +above all, he is preparing the way for the final abolition of war.</p> + +<p>But thanks to the lying, corrupt, and dastardly capitalist Press +these facts are not known to the general public, who have been taught +to look upon the conscientious objectors as skunks, cowards, and +shirkers.</p> + +<p>Lately a renewed persecution of <abbr>C.O.</abbr>’s has taken place. In spite of +the promises of ‘truthful’ Cabinet Ministers, some <abbr>C.O.</abbr>’s have been +sent to France, and there sentenced to death—a sentence afterwards +transferred to one of ‘crucifixion’ or five or ten years’ hard +labour. But even when allowed to remain in this country we have to +chronicle the most scandalous treatment of these men—the salt of +the earth. Saintly individuals like Clifford Allen, Scott Duckers, +and thousands of others, no less splendid enthusiasts in the cause +of anti-militarism, are in prison for no other reason than because +they refuse to take life; and because they will not throw away +their manhood by becoming slaves to the military machine. These men +<span class="smcap">must be freed</span>. The political ‘offenders’ of Ireland ...</p> +</blockquote> + +<p class="noindent">Then I turned over and read:</p> + +<blockquote> +<p class="center"> +<span class="smcap">Finished with the War</span><br> +<br> +<b class="italic">A Soldier’s Declaration</b> +</p> + +<p>(This statement was made to his commanding officer by +Second-Lieutenant <abbr>S. L.</abbr> Sassoon, Military Cross, recommended for +<abbr class="smcap">d.s.o.</abbr>, Third Battalion Royal Welch <span class="pagenum" id="Page_321" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 321</span>Fusiliers, as +explaining his grounds for refusing to serve further in the army. He +enlisted on 3rd August 1914, showed distinguished valour in France, +was badly wounded and would have been kept on home service if he had +stayed in the army.)</p> + +<p>I am making this statement as an act of wilful defiance of military +authority, because I believe that the war is being deliberately +prolonged by those who have the power to end it.</p> + +<p>I am a soldier, convinced that I am acting on behalf of soldiers. +I believe that this war, upon which I entered as a war of defence +and liberation, has now become a war of aggression and conquest. I +believe that the purposes for which I and my fellow-soldiers entered +upon this war should have been so clearly stated as to have made it +impossible to change them, and that, had this been done, the objects +which actuated us would now be attainable by negotiation.</p> + +<p>I have seen and endured the sufferings of the troops, and I can +no longer be a party to prolong these sufferings for ends which I +believe to be evil and unjust.</p> + +<p>I am not protesting against the conduct of the war, but against the +political errors and insincerities for which the fighting men are +being sacrificed.</p> + +<p>On behalf of those who are suffering now I make this protest aganst +the deception which is being practised on them; also I believe that I +may help to destroy the callous complacence with which the majority +of those at home regard the continuance of agonies which they do not +share, and which they have not sufficient imagination to realize.</p> + +<p><b class="italic">July</b> 1917.</p> + +<p class="right padr1"><abbr>S.</abbr> Sassoon.</p> +</blockquote> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_322" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 322</span>This filled me with anxiety and unhappiness. I entirely agreed +with Siegfried about the ‘political errors and insincerities’; I +thought his action magnificently courageous. But there were more +things to be considered than the strength of our case against the +politicians. In the first place, he was not in a proper physical +condition to suffer the penalty which he was inviting, which was to +be court-martialled, cashiered and imprisoned. I found myself most +bitter with the pacifists who had encouraged him to make this gesture. +I felt that, not being soldiers, they could not understand what it +would cost Siegfried emotionally. It was wicked that he should attempt +to face the consequences of his letter on top of his Quadrangle and +Fontaine-les-Croiselles experiences. I knew, too, that as a gesture it +was inadequate. Nobody would follow his example either in England or in +Germany. The war would obviously go on, and go on until one side or the +other cracked.</p> + +<p>I decided to intervene. I applied to appear before the medical board +that was sitting next day; and I asked the board to pass me fit for +home service. I was not fit and they knew it, but I asked it as a +favour. I had to get out of Osborne and attend to things. Next I +wrote to the Hon. Evan Morgan, with whom I had canoed at Oxford a +month or two previously. He was private secretary to one of the +Coalition Ministers. I asked him to do everything he could to prevent +republication of or comment on the letter in the newspapers, and to +arrange that a suitable answer should be given to Mr. Lees Smith, +then the leading pacifist <abbr>M.P</abbr>. and now Postmaster-General in the +Labour Cabinet, when he brought up a question in the House about it. +I explained to Morgan that I was on Siegfried’s side really, but +that he should not be allowed to become a martyr in his <span class="pagenum" id="Page_323" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 323</span>present +physical condition. Next I wrote to the Third Battalion. I knew that +the colonel, a South Welshman, was narrowly patriotic, had never been +to France, and could not possibly be expected to take a sympathetic +view. But the senior major, an Irishman, was humane, so I wrote to him +explaining the whole business, asking him to make the colonel see it +in a reasonable light. I told him of Siegfried’s recent experiences +in France. I suggested that he should be medically boarded and given +indefinite leave.</p> + +<figure id="i322" class="figcenter" style="max-width: 24em;"> + <img class="w100 mt1" src="images/i322.jpg" alt="collage of documents"> + <figcaption>VARIOUS RECORDS<br> + Mostly self-explanatory</figcaption> +</figure> + +<p>The next news I heard was from Siegfried, who wrote from the Exchange +Hotel, Liverpool, that no doubt I was worrying about him. He had come +up to Liverpool a day or two before and walked into the Third Battalion +orderly room at Litherland feeling like nothing on earth, but probably +looking fairly self-possessed. The senior-major was commanding, the +colonel being away on holiday. (I was much relieved at this bit of +luck.) The senior-major, who was nicer than anything I could imagine +and made him feel an utter brute, had consulted the general commanding +Mersey defences. And the general was consulting God ‘or someone like +that.’ Meanwhile, he was staying at the hotel, having sworn not to +run away to the Caucasus. He hoped, in time, to persuade them to be +nasty about it, and said that he did not think that they realized that +his performance would soon be given great publicity. He hated the +whole business more than ever, and knew more than ever that he was +right and would never repent of what he had done. He said that things +were looking better in Germany, but that Lloyd George would probably +say that it was a ‘plot.’ The politicians seemed to him incapable of +behaving like human beings.</p> + +<p>The general consulted not God but the War Office, and the War Office +was persuaded not to press the matter as a <span class="pagenum" id="Page_324" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 324</span>disciplinary case, +but to give Siegfried a medical board. Morgan had done his part of +the work well. The next task I set myself was to persuade Siegfried +to take the medical board. I rejoined the battalion and met him at +Liverpool. He looked very ill; he told me that he had just been down +to the Formby links and thrown his Military Cross into the sea. We +discussed the whole political situation; I told him that he was right +enough in theory; but that every one was mad except ourselves and one +or two others, and that it was hopeless to offer rightness of theory +to the insane. I said that the only possible course for us to take +was to keep on going out to France till we got killed. I now expected +myself before long to go back for the fourth time. I reminded him of +the regiment; what did he think that the First and Second Battalions +would think of him? How could they be expected to understand his point +of view? They would say that he was ratting, that he had cold feet, +and was letting the regiment down by not acting like a gentleman. How +would Old Joe, even, understand it (and he was the most understanding +man in the regiment)? To whom was his letter addressed? The army could, +I repeated, only understand it as cowardice, or at the best as a lapse +from good form. The civilians were more mad and hopeless than the army. +He would not accept this view, but I made it plain that his letter had +not been given and would not be given the publicity he intended; so, +because he was ill, and knew it, he consented to appear before the +medical board.</p> + +<p>So far, so good. The next thing was to rig the medical board. I applied +for permission to give evidence as a friend of the patient. There were +three doctors on the board—a regular <abbr>R.A.M.C.</abbr> colonel and major, and a +captain, who was obviously a ‘duration of the war’ man. <span class="pagenum" id="Page_325" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 325</span>I had not +been long in the room when I realized that the colonel was patriotic +and unsympathetic, that the major was reasonable but ignorant, and that +the captain was a nerve-specialist, right-minded, and my only hope. +I had to go through the whole story again. I was most deferential to +the colonel and major, but used the captain as an ally to break down +their scruples. I had to appear in the rôle of a patriot distressed +by the mental collapse of a brother-in-arms, a collapse directly due +to his magnificent exploits in the trenches. I mentioned Siegfried’s +‘hallucinations’ in the matter of corpses in Piccadilly. The irony of +having to argue to these mad old men that Siegfried was not sane! It +was a betrayal of truth, but I was jesuitical. I was in nearly as bad +a state of nerves as Siegfried myself and burst into tears three times +in the course of my statement. Captain McDowall, whom I learned later +to be a well-known morbid psychologist, played up well and the colonel +was at last persuaded. As I went out he said to me: ‘Young man, you +ought to be before this board yourself.’ I was most anxious that when +Siegfried went into the board-room after me he should not undo my work +by appearing too sane. But McDowall argued his seniors over.</p> + +<p>Siegfried was sent to a convalescent home for neurasthenics at +Craiglockhart, near Edinburgh. I was detailed as his escort. Siegfried +and I both thought this a great joke, especially when I missed the +train and he reported to ‘Dottyville,’ as he called it, without me. +At Craiglockhart, Siegfried was in the care of <abbr>W. H. R.</abbr> Rivers, +whom we now met for the first time, though we already knew of him +as a neurologist, ethnologist and psychologist. He was a Cambridge +professor and had made a point of taking up a new department of +research every few years and incorporating <span class="pagenum" id="Page_326" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 326</span>it in his comprehensive +anthropological scheme. He died shortly after the war when he was on +the point of contesting the London University parliamentary seat as +an independent Labour candidate; intending to round off his scheme +with a study of political psychology. He was busy at this time with +morbid psychology. He had over a hundred neurasthenic cases in his +care and diagnosed their condition largely through a study of their +dream-life; his posthumous book <cite>Conflict and Dream</cite> is a record of +this work at Craiglockhart. It was not the first time that I had heard +of Rivers in this capacity. Dick had come under his observation after +the police-court episode. Rivers had treated him, and after a time +pronounced him sufficiently cured to enlist in the army. Siegfried and +Rivers soon became close friends. Siegfried was interested in Rivers’ +diagnostic methods and Rivers in Siegfried’s poems. Before I returned +from Edinburgh I felt happier. Siegfried began to write the terrifying +sequence of poems that appeared next year as <cite>Counter-Attack</cite>. Another +patient at the hospital was Wilfred Owen, who had had a bad time with +the Manchester Regiment in France; and, further, it had preyed on his +mind that he had been accused of cowardice by his commanding officer. +He was in a very shaky condition. It was meeting Siegfried here that +set him writing his war-poems. He was a quiet, round-faced little man.</p> +</section> + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> + +<section role="doc-chapter" aria-labelledby="c25-hd"> +<div class="chapter"> +<div class="pagenum" id="Page_327" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 327</div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="c25-hd">XXV</h2> +</div> + +<p class="chap_start"><b class="smcap">I went</b> back to Liverpool. The president of the medical board had been +right: I should not have been back on duty. The training at the camp +was intensive and I was in command of a trained-men company and did +not allow myself sufficient rest. I realized how bad my nerves were +when one day, marching through the streets of Litherland on a battalion +route-march, I saw three men wearing gas-masks standing by an open +manhole in the road. They were bending over a dead man; his clothes +were sodden and stinking, and his face and hands were yellow. Waste +chemicals of the munitions factory had got into the sewage system and +he had been gassed when he went down to inspect. The men in masks had +been down to get him up. The company did not pause in its march so I +had only a glimpse of the group; but it was so like France that I all +but fainted. The band-music saved me.</p> + +<p>I was detailed as a member of a court-martial which sat in the camp. +The accused was a civilian alleged to have enlisted under the Derby +Scheme, but not to have presented himself when his class was called to +the colours. He was a rabbit, a nasty-looking little man. I tried to +feel sympathetic but found it difficult, even when he proved that he +had never enlisted. His solicitor handed us a letter from a corporal +serving in France, who explained that he had, while on leave, enlisted +in the rabbit’s name because he had heard that the rabbit had been +rabbiting with his wife. This rabbiting the rabbit denied; but he +showed that the colour of the eyes recorded on the enlistment-form was +blue while his own were brown, so it seemed that the story was true so +far. But a further question arose: why had he not enlisted <span class="pagenum" id="Page_328" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 328</span>under +the Military Service Act, if he was a fit man? He said that he was +starred, having done responsible work in a munitions factory for the +necessary length of time before the Military Service Act had become +law. However, we had police evidence on the table to show that his +protection certificates were forged, that he had not been working on +munitions before the Military Service Act, and that therefore he was in +the class of those ‘deemed to have enlisted,’ and so a deserter in any +case. There was nothing for it but to sentence him to the prescribed +two years’ imprisonment. He broke down and squealed rabbit-fashion, and +said that he had conscientious objections against war. It made me feel +contemptible, as part of the story.</p> + +<p>Large drafts were now constantly being sent off to the First, Second, +Ninth, and Tenth Battalions in France, and to the Eighth Battalion in +Mesopotamia. There were few absentees among the men warned for the +drafts. But it was noticeable that they were always more cheerful about +going in the spring and summer when there was heavy fighting on than +in the winter months when things were quiet. (The regiment kept up its +spirit even in the last year of the war. Attwater told me that big +drafts sent off in the critical weeks of the spring of 1918, when the +Germans had broken through the Fifth Army, went down to the station +singing and cheering enthusiastically. He said that they might have +been the reservists that he and I had seen assembling at Wrexham on +12th August 1914, to rejoin the Second Battalion just before it sailed +for France.) The colonel always made the same speech to the draft. The +day that I rejoined the battalion from the Isle of Wight I went via +Liverpool Exchange Station and the electric railway to Litherland. +Litherland station was crowded with troops. <span class="pagenum" id="Page_329" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 329</span>I heard a familiar +voice making a familiar speech; it was the colonel bidding Godspeed +to a small draft of men who were rejoining the First Battalion. ‘... +going cheerfully like British soldiers to fight the common foe ... +some of you perhaps may fall.... Upholding the magnificent traditions +of the Royal Welch Fusiliers....’ The draft cheered vigorously; rather +too vigorously, I told myself. When he had finished I went over and +greeted a few old friends: 79 Davies, 33 Williams, and the Davies who +was nicknamed ‘Dym Bacon,’ which was Welsh for ‘there isn’t any bacon.’ +(He had won the nickname in his recruit days. He was the son of a Welsh +farmer and accustomed to good food and so he complained about his +first morning’s breakfast, shouting out to the orderly-sergeant: ‘Do +you call this a bloody breakfast, man? Dym bacon, dym sausages, dym +herrings, dym bloody anything. Nothing but bloody bread and jaaam.’) +There was another well-remembered First Battalion man—<abbr class="smcap">d.c.m.</abbr> +and rosette, Médaille Militaire, Military Medal, no stripe. ‘Lost them +again, sergeant?’ I asked. He grinned: ‘Easy come, easy go, sir.’ Then +the train came in and I put out my hand with ‘Good luck!’ ‘You’ll +excuse us, sir,’ he said. The draft shouted with laughter and I saw +why my hand had not been wrung, and also why the cheers had been so +ironically vigorous. They were all in handcuffs. They had been detailed +a fortnight before for a draft to Mesopotamia; but they wanted to +go back to the First Battalion, so they overstayed their leave. The +colonel, not understanding, put them into the guardroom to make sure of +them for the next draft. So they were now going back in handcuffs under +an escort of military police to the battalion of their choice. The +colonel, as I have already said, had seen no active service himself; +but the <span class="pagenum" id="Page_330" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 330</span>men bore him no ill-will for the handcuffs. He was a +good-hearted man and took a personal interest in the camp kitchens, had +built a cinema-hut within the camp, been reasonably mild in orderly +room, and done his best not to drive returned soldiers too hard.</p> + +<p>I decided to leave Litherland somehow. I knew what the winter would be +like with the mist coming up from the Mersey and hanging about the camp +full of <abbr>T.N.T.</abbr> fumes. When I was there the winter before I used to sit +in my hut and cough and cough until I was sick. The fumes tarnished all +buttons and made our eyes smart. I considered going back to France but +I knew this was absurd as yet. Since 1916 the fear of gas had been an +obsession; in any unusual smell that I met I smelt gas—even a sudden +strong scent of flowers in a garden was enough to set me trembling. And +I knew that the noise of heavy shelling would be too much for me now. +The noise of a motor-tyre exploding behind me would send me flat on +my face or running for cover. So I decided to go to Palestine, where +gas was not known and shell-fire was said to be inconsiderable in +comparison with France. Siegfried wrote from Craiglockhart in August: +‘What do you think of the latest push? How splendid this attrition is! +As Lord Crewe says: “We are not the least depressed.”’ I matched this +with a remark of Lord Carson’s: ‘The necessary supply of heroes must +be maintained at all costs.’ At my next medical board I asked to be +passed in the category of B2. This meant: ‘Fit for garrison service at +home.’ I reckoned on being sent to the Third Garrison Battalion of the +regiment, now under canvas at Oswestry in Wales. From there, when I +felt a bit better, I would get myself passed B1, which meant: ‘Fit for +garrison service abroad,’ and would, in due course, go to a garrison +battalion <span class="pagenum" id="Page_331" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 331</span>of the regiment in Egypt. Once there it would be easy +to get passed A1 and join the Twenty-fourth or Twenty-fifth (new-army) +Battalion in Palestine.</p> + +<p>So presently I was sent to Oswestry. A good colonel, but the material +at his disposal was discouraging. The men were mostly compulsory +enlistments, and the officers, with few exceptions, useless. The first +task I was given was to superintend the entraining of battalion stores +and transport; we were moving to Kinmel Park Camp, near Rhyl. I was +given a company of one hundred and fifty men and allowed six hours for +the job. I chose fifty of the stronger men and three or four <abbr>N.C.O.</abbr>’s +who looked capable, and sent the rest away to play football. By +organizing the job in the way that I had learnt in the First Battalion +I got these fifty men to load the train in two hours less than the +scheduled time. The colonel congratulated me. At Rhyl he gave me the +job of giving ‘further instruction’ to the sixty or so young officers +who had been sent to him from the cadet-battalions. Few officers in the +battalion had seen any active service. Among the few was Howell Davies +(now literary editor of the <cite>Star</cite>), who had had a bullet through his +head and was in as nervous a condition as myself. We became friends, +and discussed the war and poetry late at night in the hut; we used to +argue furiously, shouting each other down.</p> + +<p>It was at this point that I remembered Nancy Nicholson. I had first +met her at Harlech, where the Nicholsons had a house, when I was on +leave in April 1916 after the operation on my nose. She was sixteen +then, on holiday from school. I had made friends with her brother +Ben, the painter, whose asthma had kept him out of the army. When I +went back to France in 1917 I had gone to say good-bye to Ben and the +rest of the family on the way to Victoria Station, and <span class="pagenum" id="Page_332" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 332</span>the last +person to say good-bye to me at that time was Nancy, I remembered her +standing in the doorway in her black velvet dress. She was ignorant +but independent-minded, good-natured, hard, and as sensible about the +war as anybody at home could be. In the summer of 1917 (shortly after +the episode with the Somerville nurse) I had seen her again and we had +gone together to a revue, the first revue I had been to in my life. It +was <cite>Cheep</cite>, Lee White was in it, singing of Black-eyed Susans, and how +‘Girls must all be Farmers’ Boys, off with skirts, wear corduroys,’ +and Nancy told me that she was now on the land herself. She showed +me her paintings, illustrations to Stevenson’s <cite>Child’s Garden of +Verses</cite>, my child-sentiment and hers—she had a happy childhood to look +back on—answered each other. I liked all her family, particularly her +mother, now dead, Mabel Nicholson, the painter, a beautiful wayward +Scotch-melancholy person. William Nicholson, again ‘the painter,’ is +still among my friends. Tony, a brother, just older than Nancy, was a +gunner, waiting to go to France.</p> + +<p>I began a correspondence with Nancy about some children’s rhymes of +mine which she was going to illustrate. Then I found that I was in love +with her, and on my next leave, in October 1917, I visited her at the +farm where she was working, at Hilton in Huntingdonshire. I helped her +to put mangolds through a slicer. She was alone, except for her black +poodle, among farmers, farm labourers, and wounded soldiers who had +been put on land-service. I was alone too in my Garrison Battalion. Our +letters became more intimate after this. She warned me that she was a +feminist and that I had to be very careful what I said about women; the +attitude of the Huntingdon farmers to their wives and daughters kept +her in a continual state of anger she said.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_333" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 333</span>I had been passed B1 now, but orders came for me to proceed to +Gibraltar. This was a disarrangement of my plans. Gibraltar was a +dead-end; it would be as difficult to get from there to Palestine +as it would be from England. A friend in the War Office undertook +to cancel the order for me until a vacancy could be found in the +battalion in Egypt. At Rhyl I was enjoying the first independent +command I had yet had in the army. I got it through a scare of an +invasion of the north-east coast, to follow a sortie of the German +Fleet. A number of battalions were sent across England for its defence. +All fit men of the Third Garrison Battalion were ordered to move at +twenty-four hours’ notice to York. (There was a slight error, however, +in the Morse message from War Office to Western Command. Instead of +dash-dot-dash-dash they sent dash-dot-dash-dot, so the battalion was +sent to Cork instead. Yet it was not recalled, being needed as much in +Cork as in York; Ireland was in great unrest since the Easter rising +in 1916, and Irish troops at the depots were giving away their rifles +to Sinn Feiners.) The colonel told me that I was the only officer he +could trust to look after the remainder of the battalion—thirty young +officers and four or five hundred men engaged in camp-duties. He left +me a competent adjutant and three officers’ chargers to ride. He also +asked me to keep an eye on his children, whom he had to leave behind +until a house was found for them at Cork; I used to play about a good +deal with them. There was also a draft of two hundred trained men under +orders for Gibraltar.</p> + +<p>I got the draft off all right, and the inspecting general was so +pleased with the soldier-like appearance that the adjutant and I had +given them that he sent them all to the camp cinema at his own expense. +This gave me a good mark <span class="pagenum" id="Page_334" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 334</span>with the colonel in Ireland. The climax +of my good services was when I checked an attempt on the part of the +camp quartermaster to make the battalion responsible for the loss of +five hundred blankets. It happened like this. Suddenly one night I had +three thousand three hundred leave-men from France thrown under my +command; they were Irishmen, from every regiment in the army, and had +been held up at Holyhead on the way home by the presence of submarines +in the Irish Sea. They were rowdy and insubordinate, and for the four +days that they were with me I had little rest. The five hundred missing +blankets were some of the six thousand six hundred that had been issued +to them, and had probably been sold in Rhyl to pay for cigarettes and +beer. I was able to prove at the Court of Inquiry that the men, though +attached to the battalion for purposes of discipline, had been issued +with blankets direct from the camp quartermaster’s stores before coming +to it. The loss of the blankets might be presumed to have taken place +between the time of issue and the time that the men arrived in the +battalion lines. I had given no receipt to the camp quartermaster for +the blankets. The Court of Inquiry was held in the camp quartermaster’s +private office; but I insisted that he should leave the room while +evidence was being taken, because it was now no longer his private +office but a Court of Inquiry. He had to go out, and his ignorance +of my line of defence saved the case. This success, and the evidence +that I was able to give the colonel of presents accepted by the +battalion mess-president when at Rhyl, from wholesale caterers (the +mess-president had tried to make me pay my mess-bill twice over and +this was my retaliation), so pleased the colonel that he recommended me +for the Russian Order of St. Anne, with Crossed Swords, of the Third +Class. <span class="pagenum" id="Page_335" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 335</span>So, after all, I would not have left the army undecorated +but for the October revolution, which cancelled the award-list.</p> + +<p>I saw Nancy again in December when I went to London, and we decided to +get married at once. We attached no importance to the ceremony. Nancy +said she did not want to disappoint her father, who liked weddings and +things. I was still expecting orders for Egypt and intending to go on +to Palestine. Nancy’s mother said that she would permit the marriage +on one condition: that I should go to a London lung specialist to see +whether I was fit for eventual service in Palestine. I went to Sir +James Fowler, who had visited me at Rouen when I was wounded. He told +me that my lungs were not so bad, though I had bronchial adhesions and +my wounded lung had only a third of its proper expansion; but that +my general nervous condition made it folly for me to think of active +service in any theatre of war.</p> + +<p>Nancy and I were married in January 1918 in St. James’ Church, +Piccadilly. She was just eighteen and I was twenty-two. George Mallory +was the best man. Nancy had read the marriage-service for the first +time that morning and had been horrified by it. She all but refused +to go through the ceremony at all, though I had arranged for it to be +modified and reduced to the shortest possible form. Another caricature +scene to look back on: myself striding up the red carpet wearing +field-boots, spurs, and sword; Nancy meeting me in a blue-check silk +wedding dress, utterly furious; packed benches on either side of the +church, full of relatives; aunts using handkerchiefs; the choir boys +out of tune; Nancy savagely muttering the responses, myself shouting +them out in a parade-ground voice. Then the reception. At this stage of +the war, sugar was practically unobtainable; the wedding cake was in +three tiers, but all the sugar icing was plaster. <span class="pagenum" id="Page_336" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 336</span>The Nicholsons +had had to save up their sugar and butter cards for a month to make +the cake taste anything like a cake at all. When the plaster case +was lifted off there was a sigh of disappointment from the guests. A +dozen of champagne had been got in. Champagne was another scarcity and +there was a rush towards the table. Nancy said: ‘Well, I’m going to +get something out of this wedding, at any rate,’ and grabbed a bottle. +After three or four glasses she went off and changed back into her +land-girl’s costume of breeches and smock. My mother, who had been +thoroughly enjoying the proceedings, caught hold of <abbr>E. V.</abbr> Lucas, who +was standing next to her, and exclaimed: ‘Oh dear, I wish she had not +done that.’ The embarrassments of our wedding night were somewhat eased +by an air-raid; bombs were dropping not far off and the hotel was in an +uproar.</p> + +<p>A week later she returned to her farm and I to my soldiers. It was an +idle life now. I had no men on parade; they were all employed on camp +duties. And I had found a lieutenant with enough experience to attend +to the ‘further instruction’ of the young officers. My orderly room +took about ten minutes a day; crime was rare, and the adjutant always +had ready and in order the few documents to be signed; and I was free +to ride my three chargers over the countryside for the rest of the +day. I used to visit the present Archbishop of Wales frequently at his +palace at St. Asaph; his son had been killed in the First Battalion. +We found that we had in common a taste for the curious. I have kept a +postcard from him which runs as follows:</p> + +<blockquote> +<p class="right padr1"><b class="smcap">The Palace, <abbr>St.</abbr> Asaph.</b></p> + +<p>Hippophagist banquet held at Langham’s Hotel, February 1868.</p> + +<p class="right padr1"><b class="smcap"><abbr>A. G.</abbr> Asaph.</b></p> +</blockquote> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_337" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 337</span>(I met numbers of bishops during the war but none since; except +the Bishop of Oxford, in a railway carriage in 1927, who was discussing +the beauties of Richardson. And the Bishop of Liverpool, at Harlech, in +1923. I was making tea on the sea-shore when he came out from the sea +in great pain, having been stung in the thigh by a jellyfish. He gladly +accepted a cup of tea, tut-tutting miserably to himself that he had +been under the impression that jellyfish only stung in foreign parts. +As a record of the occasion he gave me a silver pencil which he had +found in the sandhills while undressing.)</p> + +<p>I grew tired of this idleness and arranged to be transferred to +the Sixteenth Officer Cadet Battalion in another part of the same +camp. It was the same sort of work that I had done at Oxford, and I +was there from February 1918 until the Armistice in November. Rhyl +was much healthier than Oxford and I found that I could play games +without danger of another breakdown. A job was found for Nancy at a +market-gardener’s near the camp, so she came up to live with me. A +month or two later she found that she was to have a baby and had to +stop land work; she went back to her drawing.</p> + +<p>None of my friends had liked the idea of my marriage, particularly to +anyone as young as Nancy; one of them, Robbie Ross, Wilde’s literary +executor, whom I had met through Siegfried and who had been very good +to me, had gone so far as to try to discourage me by hinting that there +was negro blood in the Nicholson family, that it was possible that +one of Nancy’s and my children might revert to coal-black. Siegfried +found it difficult to accustom himself to the idea of Nancy, whom he +had not met, but he still wrote. After a few months at Craiglockhart, +though he in no way <span class="pagenum" id="Page_338" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 338</span>renounced his pacifist views, he decided that +the only possible thing to do was, after all, to go back to France. +He had written to me in the previous October that seeing me again had +made him more restless than ever. Hospital life was nearly unbearable; +the feeling of isolation was the worst. He had had a long letter from +Old Joe to say that the First Battalion had just got back to rest from +Polygon Wood; the conditions and general situation were more appalling +than anything he had yet seen—three miles of morasses, shell-holes and +dead men and horses through which to get the rations up. Siegfried +said that he would rather be anywhere than in hospital; he couldn’t +bear to think of poor Old Joe lying out all night in shell-holes and +being shelled (several of the ration party were killed, but at least, +according to Joe, ‘the battalion got its rations’). If only the people +who wrote leading articles for the <cite>Morning Post</cite> about victory could +read Joe’s letter!</p> + +<p>It was about this time that Siegfried wrote the poem <cite>When I’m asleep +dreaming and lulled and warm</cite>, about the ghosts of the soldiers who +had been killed, reproaching him in his dreams for his absence from +the trenches, saying that they had been looking for him in the line +from Ypres to Frise and had not found him. He told Rivers that he +would go back to France if they would send him, making it quite clear +that his views were exactly the same as they had been in July when he +had written the letter of protest—only more so. He demanded a written +guarantee that he would be sent back at once and not kept hanging about +in a training battalion. He wrote reprehending me for the attitude I +had taken in July, when I was reminding him that the regiment would +only understand his protest as a lapse from good form and a failure to +be a gentleman. It was suicidal stupidity <span class="pagenum" id="Page_339" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 339</span>and credulity, he said, +to identify oneself in any way with good form or gentlemanliness, and +if I had real courage I wouldn’t be acquiescing as I was. He pointed +out that I admitted that the people who sacrificed the troops were +callous b⁠—⁠—⁠s, and that the same thing was happening in all countries +except parts of Russia. I forget how I answered Siegfried. I might have +pointed out that when I was in France I was never such a fire-eater as +he was. The amount of Germans that I had killed or caused to be killed +was negligible compared with his wholesale slaughter. The fact was that +the direction of Siegfried’s unconquerable idealism changed with his +environment; he varied between happy warrior and bitter pacifist. His +poem:</p> + +<div class="poetry-container"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">To these I turn, in these I trust,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Brother Lead and Sister Steel;</div> + <div class="verse indent0">To his blind power I make appeal,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">I guard her beauty clean from rust....</div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + +<p class="noindent">was originally written seriously, inspired by Colonel Campbell, +<abbr class="smcap">v.c.</abbr>’s bloodthirsty ‘Spirit of the Bayonet’ address at an army +school. Later he offered it as a satire; and it is a poem that comes +off whichever way you read it. I was both more consistent and less +heroic than Siegfried.</p> + +<p>I have forgotten how it was worked and whether I had a hand in it, but +he was sent to Palestine this time. He seemed to like it there, and I +was distressed in April to have a letter from ‘somewhere in Ephraim,’ +that the division was moving to France. He wrote that he would be sorry +to be in trenches, going over the top to take Morlancourt or Méaulte. +Seeing that we had recaptured Morlancourt had brought it home to him. +He said that he expected that the First and Second <span class="pagenum" id="Page_340" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 340</span>Battalions had +about ceased to exist by now for the <b class="italic">n</b>th time. I heard again from +him at the end of May, from France. He quoted Duhamel. ‘It was written +that you should suffer without purpose and without hope, but I will +not let all your sufferings be lost in the abyss.’ Yet he wrote the +next paragraph in his happy-warrior vein, saying that his men were the +best that he’d ever served with. He wished I could see them. I mightn’t +believe it, but he was training them bloody well. He couldn’t imagine +whence his flamelike ardour had come, but it had come. His military +efficiency was derived from the admirable pamphlets that were now +issued, so different from the stuff we used to get two years before. +He said that when he read my letter he began to think, damn Robert, +damn every one except his company, which was the smartest turn-out ever +seen, and damn Wales and damn leave and damn being wounded and damn +everything except staying with his company until they were all melted +away. (Limping and crawling across the shell-holes, lying very still +in the afternoon sunshine in dignified desecrated attitudes.) I was to +remember this mood when I saw him (<em>if</em> I saw him) worn out and smashed +up again, querulous and nerve-ridden. Or when I read something in the +casualty list and got a polite letter from Mr. Lousada, his solicitor. +There never was such a battalion, he said, since 1916, but in six +months it would have ceased to exist.</p> + +<p>Nancy’s brother, Tony, was also in France now. Nancy’s mother made +herself ill with worrying about him. Early in July he was due to +come home on leave; I was on leave myself at the end of one of the +four-months’ cadet courses, staying with the rest of Nancy’s family +at a big Tudor house near Harlech. It was the most haunted house that +I have ever been in, though the ghosts were invisible except in the +<span class="pagenum" id="Page_341" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 341</span>mirrors. They would open and shut doors, rap on the oak panels, +knock the shades off lamps, and drink the wine from the glasses at our +elbows when we were not looking. The house belonged to an officer in +the Second Battalion whose ancestors had most of them died of drink. +There was only one visible ghost, a little yellow dog that appeared on +the lawn in the early morning to announce deaths. Nancy saw it one day.</p> + +<p>This was the time of the first Spanish influenza epidemic and Nancy’s +mother caught it, but she did not want to miss Tony when he came +on leave. She wanted to go to theatres with him in London; they +were devoted to each other. So when the doctor came she reduced her +temperature with aspirin and pretended that she was all right. But she +knew that the ghosts in the mirrors knew. She died in London on July +13th, a few days later. While she was dying her chief feeling was one +of pleasure that Tony had got his leave prolonged on her account. (Tony +was killed two months later.) Nancy’s mother was a far more important +person to her than I was, and I was alarmed of the effect that the +shock of her death might have on the baby. A week later I heard that +on the day that she had died Siegfried had been shot through the head +while making a daylight patrol through long grass in No Man’s Land. And +he wrote me a verse letter which I cannot quote, though I should like +to do so. It is the most terrible of his war-poems.</p> + +<p>And I went on mechanically at my cadet-battalion work. The candidates +for commissions we got were no longer gentlemen in the regimental +sense—mostly Manchester cotton clerks and Liverpool shipping clerks—but +they were all experienced men from France and were quiet and well +behaved. We failed about one in three. And the war went on and on. +I was then writing a book of poems called <span class="pagenum" id="Page_342" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 342</span><cite>Country Sentiment</cite>. +Instead of children as a way of forgetting the war, I used Nancy. +<cite>Country Sentiment</cite>, dedicated to her, was a collection of romantic +poems and ballads. At the end was a group of pacifist war-poems. It +contained one about the French civilians—I cannot think how I came to +put so many lies in it—I even said that old Adelphine Heu of Annezin +gave me a painted china plate, and that her pride was hurt when I +offered to pay her. The truth is that I bought the plate from her for +about fifteen shillings and that I never got it from her. Adelphine’s +daughter-in-law would not allow her to give it up, claiming it as her +own, and I never got my money back from Adelphine. This is only one of +many of my early poems that contain falsities for public delectation.</p> + +<p>In November came the Armistice. I heard at the same time news of the +death of Frank Jones-Bateman, who had gone back again just before the +end, and of Wilfred Owen, who often used to write to me from France, +sending me his poems. Armistice-night hysteria did not touch the camp +much, though some of the Canadians stationed there went down to Rhyl to +celebrate in true overseas style. The news sent me out walking alone +along the dyke above the marshes of Rhuddlan (an ancient battle-field, +the Flodden of Wales) cursing and sobbing and thinking of the dead.</p> +</section> + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> + +<section role="doc-chapter" aria-labelledby="c26-hd"> +<div class="chapter"> +<div class="pagenum" id="Page_343" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 343</div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="c26-hd">XXVI</h2> +</div> + +<p class="chap_start"><b class="smcap">In</b> the middle of December the cadet-battalions were wound up and the +officers, after a few days’ leave, were sent back to their units. The +Third Battalion of the Royal Welch was now at Limerick. I decided to +overstay my leave until Nancy’s baby was born. She was expecting it +early in January 1919, and her father had taken a house at Hove for the +occasion. Jenny was born on Twelfth Night. She was neither coal-black +nor affected by the shocks of the previous months. Nancy had had no +foreknowledge of the experience—I assumed that she knew—and it took her +years to recover from it. I went over to Limerick; the battalion was at +the Castle Barracks. I lied my way out of the over-staying of leave.</p> + +<p>Limerick was a Sinn Fein stronghold, and there were constant clashes +between the troops and the young men of the town, yet little +ill-feeling; Welsh and Irish got on well together, as inevitably as +Welsh and Scottish disagreed. The Royal Welch had the situation well +in hand; they made a joke of politics and used their entrenching-tool +handles as shillelaghs. It looked like a town that had been through +the war. The main streets had holes in them like shell-craters and +many of the bigger houses seemed on the point of collapse. I was told +by an old man at an antique shop that no new houses were now built +in Limerick, that when one house fell down the survivors moved into +another. He said too that everyone died of drink in Limerick except +the Plymouth Brethren, who died of religious melancholia. Life did not +start in the city before about a quarter past nine in the morning. At +nearly nine o’clock once I walked down O’Connell Street and found it +deserted. When the hour <span class="pagenum" id="Page_344" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 344</span>chimed, the door of a magnificent Georgian +house was flung open and out came, first a shower of slops, which just +missed me, then a dog, which lifted up its leg against a lamp-post, +then a nearly naked child, which sat down in the gutter and rummaged +in a heap of refuse for dirty pieces of bread; finally a donkey, which +began to bray. Ireland was exactly as I had pictured it. I felt its +charm as dangerous. Yet when I was detailed to take out a search-party +in a neighbouring village for concealed rifles I asked the adjutant to +find a substitute; I said that I was an Irishman and did not wish to be +mixed up in Irish politics.</p> + +<p>I realized too that I had a new loyalty, to Nancy and the baby, tending +to overshadow regimental loyalty now that the war was over. Once I was +writing a rhymed nonsense letter to Nancy and Jenny in my quarters +overlooking the barrack square:</p> + +<div class="poetry-container"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Is there any song sweet enough</div> + <div class="verse indent0">For Nancy or for Jenny?</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Said Simple Simon to the Pieman:</div> + <div class="verse indent0">‘Indeed, I know not any.’</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">I have counted the miles to Babylon,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">I have flown the earth like a bird,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">I have ridden cock-horse to Banbury Cross,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">But no such song have I heard.</div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + +<p class="noindent">At that moment some companies of the battalion returned to barracks +from a route-march; the drums and fifes drew up under my window, +making the panes rattle with <cite>The British Grenadiers</cite>. The insistent +repetition of the tune and the hoarse words of command as the parade +formed up in <span class="pagenum" id="Page_345" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 345</span>the square, company by company, challenged Banbury +Cross and Babylon. <cite>The British Grenadiers</cite> succeeded for a moment in +forcing their way into the poem:</p> + +<div class="poetry-container"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Some speak of Alexander,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And some of Hercules,</div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + +<p class="noindent">but were driven out:</p> + +<div class="poetry-container"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">But where are there any like Nancy and Jenny,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Where are there any like these?</div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + +<p class="noindent">I had ceased to be a British grenadier.</p> + +<p>So I decided to resign my commission at once. I consulted the priority +list of trades for demobilization and found that agricultural workers +and students were among the first classes to go. I did not particularly +want to be a student again. I would rather have been an agricultural +worker (Nancy and I spoke of farming when the war ended), but I had no +agricultural background. And I found that I could take a two years’ +course at Oxford with a Government grant of two hundred pounds a year, +and would be excused the intermediate examination (Mods.) on account of +war-service. The preliminary examination (Smalls) I had already been +excused because of a certificate examination that I had taken while +still at Charterhouse. So there only remained the finals. The grant +would be increased by a children’s allowance. This sounded good enough. +It seemed absurd at the time to suppose that university degrees would +count for anything in a regenerated post-war England; but Oxford was +a convenient place to mark time until I felt more like working for my +living. We were all so accustomed to the <span class="pagenum" id="Page_346" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 346</span>war-time view, that the +only possible qualification for peace-time employment would be a good +record of service in the field, that we took it for granted that our +scars and our commanding-officers’ testimonials would get us whatever +we wanted. A few of my fellow-officers did manage, as a matter of fact, +to take advantage of the patriotic spirit of employers before it cooled +again, sliding into jobs for which they were not properly qualified.</p> + +<p>I wrote to a friend in the Demobilization Department of the War Office +asking him to expedite my demobilization. He wrote back that he would +do his best, but that I must be certified not to have had charge of +Government moneys for the last six months; and I had not. But the +adjutant had just decided to put me in command of a company. He said +that he was short of officers whom he knew could be trusted with +company accounts. The latest arrivals from the new-army battalions +were a constant shame to the senior officers. Paternity-orders, +stumer cheques, and drunk on parade were frequent. Not to mention +table-manners, at which Sergeant Malley would stand aghast. There were +now two mess ante-rooms, the junior and the senior, yet if a junior +officer was regimentally a gentleman (belonged, that is, to the North +Wales landed gentry or had been to Sandhurst) he was invited to use the +senior ante-room and be among his own class. All this must have seemed +very strange to the three line-battalion second-lieutenants captured in +1914, now promoted captain by the death of most of their contemporaries +and set free by the terms of the Armistice.</p> + +<p>The adjutant cancelled the intended appointment only when I promised +to help him with the battalion theatricals that were being arranged +for St. David’s Day; I undertook to play Cinna in <cite>Julius Cæsar</cite>. His +change of mind saved me <span class="pagenum" id="Page_347" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 347</span>over two hundred pounds. Next day the +senior lieutenant in the company that I was to have taken over went off +with the company cash-box, and I would have been legally responsible. +Before the war he used to give displays at Blackpool Pier as <b class="italic">The +Handcuff King</b>; he got away safely to America.</p> + +<p>I went out a few miles from Limerick to visit my uncle, Robert Cooper, +at Cooper’s Hill. He was a farmer, a retired naval officer, and had +been having his ricks burnt and cattle driven. He was very despondent. +Through the window he showed me distant cattle grazing beside the +Shannon. ‘They have been out there all winter,’ he said, ‘and I haven’t +had the heart to go out and look at them these three months.’ I spent +the night at Cooper’s Hill and woke up with a chill. I knew that it +was the beginning of influenza. At the barracks I found that the War +Office telegram had come through for my demobilization, but that +all demobilization among troops in Ireland was to be stopped on the +following day for an indefinite period because of the troubles there. +The adjutant, showing me the telegram, said: ‘We’re not going to let +you go. You promised to help us with those theatricals.’ I protested, +but he was firm. I did not intend to have my influenza out in an Irish +military hospital with my lungs in their present state.</p> + +<p>I had to think quickly. I decided to make a run for it. The +orderly-room sergeant had made my papers out on receipt of the +telegram. I had all my kit ready packed. There only remained two things +to get: the colonel’s signature to the statement that I had handled +no company moneys, and the secret code-marks which only the battalion +demobilization officer could supply—but he was hand-in-glove with the +adjutant, so it was no use asking him for them. The last <span class="pagenum" id="Page_348" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 348</span>train +before demobilization ended was the six-fifteen from Limerick the +same evening, February 13th. I decided to wait until the adjutant had +left the orderly room and then casually ask the colonel to sign the +statement, without mentioning the adjutant’s objection to my going. The +adjutant remained in the orderly room until five minutes past six. As +soon as he was out of sight I hurried in, saluted, got the colonel’s +signature, saluted, hurried out to collect my baggage. I had counted +on a jaunting-car at the barrack gates but none was to be seen. I had +about five minutes left now and the station was a good distance away. I +saw a corporal who had been with me in the First Battalion. I shouted +to him: ‘Corporal Summers, quick! Get a squad of men. I’ve got <em>my +ticket</em> and I want to catch the last train back.’ Summers promptly +called four men; they picked up my stuff and doubled off with it, +left, right, left, to the station. I tumbled into the train as it was +moving out of the station and threw a pound-note to Corporal Summers. +‘Good-bye, corporal, drink my health.’</p> + +<p>But still I had not my demobilization code-marks and knew that when +I reached the demobilization centre at Wimbledon they would refuse +to pass me out. I did not care very much. Wimbledon was in England, +and I would at least have my influenza out in an English and not an +Irish hospital. My temperature was running high now and my mind was +working clearly as it always does in fever. My visual imagery, which is +cloudy and partial at ordinary times, becomes defined and complete. At +Fishguard I bought a copy of the <cite>South Wales Echo</cite> and read in it that +there would be a strike of London Electric Railways the next day, 14th +February, if the railway directors would not meet the men’s demands. +So when the train steamed into Paddington <span class="pagenum" id="Page_349" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 349</span>and while it was still +moving I jumped out, fell down, picked myself up and ran across to +the station entrance, where, in spite of competition from porters—a +feeble crew at this time—I caught the only taxi in the station as its +fare stepped out. I had foreseen the taxi-shortage and could afford +to waste no time getting to Wimbledon. I brought my taxi back to the +train, where scores of stranded officers looked at me with envy. One, +who had travelled down in my compartment, had been met by his wife. +I said: ‘Excuse me, but would you like to share my taxi anywhere? (I +have influenza, I warn you.) I’m going down to Wimbledon, so I only +need go as far as Waterloo; the steam-trains are still running.’ They +were delighted; they said that they lived out at Ealing and had no idea +how to get there except by taxi. On the way to Waterloo he said to me: +‘I wish there was some way of showing our gratitude. I wish there was +something we could do for you.’ I said: ‘Well, there is only one thing +in the world that I want at the moment. But you can’t give it to me, +I’m afraid. And that,’ I said, ‘is the proper code-marks to complete +my demobilization papers. I’ve bolted from Ireland without them, and +there’ll be hell to pay if the Wimbledon people send me back.’ He +rapped on the glass of the taxi and stopped it. Then he got down his +bag, opened it, and produced a satchel of army forms. He said: ‘Well, I +happen to be the Cork District Demobilization Officer and I’ve got the +whole bag of tricks here.’ So he filled my papers in.</p> + +<p>At Wimbledon, instead of having to wait in a queue for nine or ten +hours as I had expected, I was given priority and released at once; +Ireland was officially a ‘theatre of war’ and demobilization from +theatres of war had priority over home-service demobilization. So +after a hurried visit to my <span class="pagenum" id="Page_350" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 350</span>parents, who were living close by, I +continued to Hove, arriving at supper-time. When I came in, I had a +sudden terror that made me unable to speak. I seemed to see Nancy’s +mother. She was looking rather plump and staid and dressed unlike +herself, and did not appear to recognize me. She was sitting at the +table between Nancy and her father. It was like a bad dream; I did +not know what to say or do. I knew I was ill, but this was worse than +illness. Then Nicholson introduced me: ‘This is Nancy’s Aunt Dora, just +over from Canada.’</p> + +<p>I warned them all that I had influenza; and hurried off to bed. Within +a day or two everybody in the house had caught it except Nicholson +and the baby and one servant who kept it off by a gipsy’s charm. I +think it was the leg of a lizard tied in a bag round her neck. A new +epidemic as bad as the summer one had started; there was not a nurse +to be had in Brighton. Nicholson at last found two ex-nurses. One was +competent, but frequently drunk, and when drunk she would ransack all +the wardrobes and pile the contents into her own bags; the other, +sober but incompetent, would stand a dozen times a day in front of +the open window, spread out her arms, and cry in a stage-voice: ‘Sea, +sea, give my husband back to me.’ The husband, by the way, was not +drowned, merely unfaithful. A doctor, found with difficulty, said that +I had no chance of recovering; it was septic pneumonia now and both my +lungs were affected. But I had determined that, having come through +the war, I would not allow myself to succumb to Spanish influenza. +This, now, was the third time in my life that I had been given up as +dying, and each time because of my lungs. The first occasion was when +I was seven years old and had double-pneumonia following measles. Yet +my lungs are naturally <span class="pagenum" id="Page_351" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 351</span>very sound, possibly the strongest part +of me and, therefore, my danger mark. This time again I recovered and +was up a few weeks later in time to see the mutiny of the Guards, when +about a thousand men of all regiments marched out from Shoreham Camp +and paraded through the streets of Brighton in protest against camp +discipline.</p> + +<p>The reaction against military discipline between the Armistice and +the signing of peace delighted Siegfried and myself. Siegfried had +taken a prominent part in the General Election which Lloyd George +forced immediately after the Armistice, asking for a warrant for +hanging the Kaiser and making a stern peace. He had been supporting +Philip Snowden’s candidature on a pacifist platform and had faced a +threatening civilian crowd, trusting that his three wound stripes +and the mauve and white ribbon of his military cross would give him +a privileged hearing. Snowden and Ramsay McDonald were perhaps the +two most unpopular men in England at the end of the war. We now half +hoped that there would be a general rising of ex-service men against +the Coalition Government, but it was not to be. Once back in England +the men were content to have a roof over their heads, civilian food, +beer that was at least better than French beer, and enough blankets +at night. They might find overcrowding in their homes, but this could +be nothing to what they had been accustomed to; in France a derelict +four-roomed cottage would provide billets for sixty men. They had won +the war and they were satisfied. They left the rest to Lloyd George. +The only serious outbreak was at Rhyl, where there was a two days’ +mutiny of Canadians with much destruction and several deaths. The +signal for the outbreak was the cry: ‘Come on, the Bolsheviks.’</p> + +<p>When I was well enough to travel, Nancy, I and the baby <span class="pagenum" id="Page_352" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 352</span>went +up to Harlech, where Nicholson had lent us his house to live in. We +were there for a year. I discarded my uniform, having worn nothing +else for four and a half years, and looked into my school trunk to +see what I had to wear. There was only one suit that was not school +uniform and I had grown out of that. I found it difficult to believe +that the war was over. When I had last been a civilian I had been +still at school, so I had no experience of independent civilian +life. The Harlech villagers treated me with the greatest respect. At +the Peace Day celebrations in the castle I was asked, as the senior +of the officers present who had served overseas, to make a speech +about the glorious dead. I have forgotten what I said, but it was in +commendation of the Welshman as a fighting man and was loudly cheered. +I was still mentally and nervously organized for war; shells used to +come bursting on my bed at midnight even when Nancy was sharing it +with me; strangers in day-time would assume the faces of friends who +had been killed. When I was strong enough to climb the hill behind +Harlech and revisit my favourite country I found that I could only +see it as a prospective battlefield. I would find myself working out +tactical problems, planning how I would hold the Northern Artro valley +against an attack from the sea, or where I would put a Lewis-gun if I +were trying to rush Dolwreiddiog farm from the brow of the hill, and +what would be the best position for the rifle-grenade section. I still +had the army habit of commandeering anything of uncertain ownership +that I found lying about; also a difficulty in telling the truth—it +was always easier for me now when overtaken in any fault to lie my way +out. I applied the technique of taking over billets or trenches to a +review of my present situation. Food, water supply, possible dangers, +communication, sanitation, <span class="pagenum" id="Page_353" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 353</span>protection against the weather, fuel +and lighting—each item was ticked off as satisfactory. And other loose +habits of war-time survived, such as stopping passing motors for a +lift, talking without embarrassment to my fellow-travellers in railway +carriages, and unbuttoning by the roadside without shame, whoever was +about. And I retained the technique of endurance, a brutal persistence +in seeing things through, somehow, anyhow, without finesse, satisfied +with the main points of any situation. But I modified my language, +which had suddenly become foul on the day of Loos and had been foul +ever since. The chief difference between war and peace was money. I +had never had to worry about that since my first days at Wrexham; I +had even put by about £150 of my pay, invested in War Bonds. Neither +Nancy nor I knew the value of money and this £150 and my war-bonus of, +I think, £250 and a disability pension that I was now drawing of £60 a +year, and the occasional money that I got from poetry, seemed a great +deal altogether. We engaged a nurse and a general servant and lived as +though we had an income of about a thousand a year. Nancy spent much of +her time drawing (she was illustrating some poems of mine), and I was +busy getting <cite>Country Sentiment</cite> in order and writing reviews.</p> + +<p>I was very thin, very nervous, and had about four years’ loss of +sleep to make up. I found that I was suffering from a large sort of +intestinal worm which came from drinking bad water in France. I was +now waiting until I should be well enough to go to Oxford with the +Government educational grant; it seemed the easiest thing to do. I knew +that it would be years before I was fit for anything besides a quiet +country life. There was no profession that I wished to take up, though +for a while I considered school-mastering. My <span class="pagenum" id="Page_354" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 354</span>disabilities were +many; I could not use a telephone, I was sick every time I travelled +in a train, and if I saw more than two new people in a single day it +prevented me from sleeping. I was ashamed of myself as a drag on Nancy. +I had been much better when I was at Rhyl, but my recent pneumonia had +set me back to my condition of 1917.</p> + +<p>Siegfried had gone to live at Oxford as soon as he was demobilized, +expecting me to join him. But after being there for a term or so he +became literary editor of the newly-published <cite>Daily Herald</cite>. He gave +me books to review for it. In these days the <cite>Daily Herald</cite> was not +respectable. It was violent. It was anti-militarist. It was the only +daily paper that protested against the Versailles Treaty and the +blockade of Russia by the British Fleet. The Versailles Treaty shocked +me; it seemed to lead certainly to another war and yet nobody cared. +When the most critical decisions were being taken at Paris, public +interest was concentrated entirely on three home-news items: Hawker’s +Atlantic flight and rescue, the marriage of Lady Diana Manners, and +a marvellous horse called The Panther, which was the Derby favourite +and came in nowhere. The <cite>Herald</cite> spoilt our breakfast for us every +morning. We read in it of unemployment all over the country, due to the +closing of munition factories, of ex-service men refused re-instatement +in the jobs that they had left in the early stages of the war, of +market-rigging, lockouts, and abortive strikes. I began to hear news, +too, of my mother’s relatives in Germany and the penury to which +they had been reduced, particularly those who were retired officials +and whose pension, by the collapse of the mark, was reduced to a few +shillings a week. Nancy and I took all this to heart; we now called +ourselves socialists.</p> + +<p>The attitude of my family was doubtful. I had fought <span class="pagenum" id="Page_355" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 355</span>gallantly +for my country—indeed I was the only one of my father’s five sons of +military age who had seen active service—and was entitled to every +consideration because of my shell-shocked condition; but my socialism +and sympathy for the Bolsheviks outraged them. I once more forfeited +the goodwill of my Uncle Charles. My father tried to talk me over, +reminding me that my brother Philip had once been a pro-Boer and a +Fenian, but had recovered from his youthful revolutionary idealism and +come out all right in the end. Most of the elder members of my family +were in the Near East, either married to British officials or British +officials themselves. My father hoped that when I was recovered I +would go to Egypt, perhaps in the consular service, where the family +influence would be of great service to me, and there get over my +revolutionary idealism. Socialism with Nancy was rather a means to +a single end. The most important thing to her was judicial equality +of the sexes; she held that all the wrong in the world was caused by +male domination and narrowness. She refused to see my experiences in +the war as in any way comparable with the sufferings that millions of +married women of the working-class went through. This at least had the +effect of putting the war into the background for me; I was devoted to +Nancy and respected her views in so far as they were impersonal. Male +stupidity and callousness became an obsession with her and she found +it difficult not to include me in her universal condemnation of men. +It came to the point later when she could not bear a newspaper in the +house. She was afraid of coming across something that would horrify +her, some paragraph about the necessity of keeping up the population, +or about women’s intelligence, or about the modern girl, or anything +at all about women written by clergymen. We <span class="pagenum" id="Page_356" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 356</span>became members of the +newly formed Constructive Birth Control Society and distributed its +literature among the village women, to the scandal of my family.</p> + +<p>It was a great grief to my parents that Jenny was not baptized. +My father wrote to Nancy’s godfather, who also happened to be my +publisher, asking him to use his influence with Nancy, for whose +religion he had promised at the font to be responsible, to make her +give the child Christian baptism. They were scandalized too that Nancy, +finding that it was legal to keep her own name for all purposes, +refused to allow herself to be called Mrs. Graves in any circumstances. +At first I had been doubtful about this, thinking that perhaps it +was not worth the trouble and suspicion that it caused; but when I +saw that Nancy was now treated as being without personal validity I +was converted. At that time there was no equal guardianship and the +children were the sole property of the father; the mother was not +legally a parent. We worked it out later that our children were to be +thought of as solely hers, but that since I looked after them so much +the boys should take the name of Graves—the girls taking Nicholson. +This of course has always baffled my parents. Nor could they understand +then the intimacy of our relations with the nurse and the maid. They +were both women to whom we had given a job because they were in bad +luck. One of them was a girl who had had a child during the war by +a soldier to whom she was engaged, who got killed in France shortly +afterwards. Generosity to a woman like this was Christian, but intimacy +seemed merely eccentric.</p> +</section> + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> + +<section role="doc-chapter" aria-labelledby="c27-hd"> +<div class="chapter"> +<div class="pagenum" id="Page_357" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 357</div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="c27-hd">XXVII</h2> +</div> + +<p class="chap_start"><b class="smcap">In</b> October 1919 I went up to Oxford at last. The lease of the Harlech +house was ended and Nicholson gave us the furniture to take with us. +The city was overcrowded; the lodging-house keepers, some of whom had +nearly starved during the war, now had their rooms booked up terms +ahead and charged accordingly. Keble College had put up army huts +for its surplus students. There was not an unfurnished house to be +had anywhere within the three-mile radius. I solved the difficulty +by getting permission from my college authorities to live five miles +out, on Boar’s Hill; I pleaded my lungs. John Masefield, who liked my +poetry, offered to rent us a cottage at the bottom of his garden.</p> + +<p>The University was very quiet. The returned soldiers had little +temptation to rag about, break windows, get drunk, or have tussles with +the police and races with the bulldogs as before the war. The boys +straight from the public schools were quiet too. They had had the war +preached at them continually for four years, had been told that they +must carry on loyally at home while their brothers were serving in the +trenches, and must make themselves worthy of such sacrifices. The boys +had been leaving for the cadet-battalions at the age of seventeen, so +that the masters had it all their own way; trouble at public schools +nearly always comes from the eighteen-year-olds. <abbr>G. N.</abbr> Clarke, a +history don at Oriel, who had been up at Oxford just before the war and +had meanwhile been an infantryman in France and a prisoner in Germany, +told me: ‘I can’t make out my pupils at all. They are all “Yes, sir” +and “No, sir.” They seem positively to thirst for knowledge and they +scribble away in their notebooks like lunatics. I can’t remember a +single instance of <span class="pagenum" id="Page_358" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 358</span>such stern endeavour in pre-war days.’ The +ex-service men—they included scores of captains, majors, colonels, and +even a one-armed twenty-five-year-old brigadier—though not rowdy, were +insistent on their rights. At St. John’s they formed what they called +a Soviet, demanding an entire revision of the college catering system; +they won their point and an undergraduate representative was chosen +to sit on the kitchen-committee. The elder dons whom I had often seen +during the war trembling in fear of an invasion of Oxford, with the +sacking and firing of the colleges and the rape of the Woodstock and +Banbury Roads, and who had regarded all soldiers, myself included, as +their noble saviours, now recovered their pre-war self-possession. I +was amused at the difference in manner to me that some of them showed. +My moral tutor, however, though he no longer saluted me when we met, +remained a friend; he prevailed on the college to allow me to change my +course from Classics to English Language and Literature and to take up +my £60 Classical Exhibition notwithstanding. I was glad now that it was +an exhibition, though in 1913 I had been disappointed that it was not a +scholarship: college regulations permitted exhibitioners to be married, +scholars had to remain single.</p> + +<p>I used to bicycle down from Boar’s Hill every morning to my lectures. +On the way down I would collect Edmund Blunden, who was attending the +same course. He too had permission to live on the hill, on account of +gassed lungs. I had been in correspondence with Edmund some time before +he came to Oxford. Siegfried, when literary editor of the <cite>Herald</cite>, had +been among the first to recognize him as a poet, and now I was helping +him get his <cite>Waggoner</cite> through the press. Edmund had war-shock as badly +as myself, and we would talk each other into an almost hysterical state +about <span class="pagenum" id="Page_359" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 359</span>the trenches. We agreed that we would not be right until we +got all that talk on to paper. He was first with <cite>Undertones of War</cite>, +published in 1928.</p> + +<p>Edmund and Mary his wife rented two rooms of a cottage belonging to +Mrs. Delilah Becker, locally known as the Jubilee Murderess. She was a +fine-looking old lady and used to read her prayer-book and Bible aloud +to herself every night, sitting at the open window. The prayer-book was +out of date: she used to pray for the Prince Consort and Adelaide, the +Queen Dowager. She was said to have murdered her husband. In Jubilee +year she had gone away for a holiday, leaving her husband in the +cottage with a half-witted servant-girl. News came to her that he had +got the servant-girl into trouble. She wrote to him: ‘Dear husband, if +I find you in my cottage when I come back you shall be no more.’ He did +not believe her and she found him in the cottage, and sure enough he +was no more. She told the police that he had gone away when he saw how +angry with him she was; but no one had seen him go. He had even left +his silver watch behind, ticking on a nail on the bedroom wall. The +neighbours swore that she had buried him in the garden. Mary Blunden +said that it was more probable that he was buried somewhere in their +part of the cottage, which was semi-detached. ‘There’s an awfully funny +smell about here sometimes,’ she said. Old Delilah said to Mary once: +‘I have often wondered what has happened to the old pepper-and-salt +suit he had on when he was—when he went away.’ Whenever she went +out she took the carving-knife out of the drawer and laid it on the +kitchen-table, where it could be seen by them when they went past her +window. I liked Delilah very much and sent her a pound of tea every +year until her death. Her comment on life in <span class="pagenum" id="Page_360" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 360</span>general was: ‘Fair +play’s good sport, and we’re all mortal worms.’ She also used to say: +‘While there’s wind and water a man’s all right.’</p> + +<p>I found the English Literature course tedious, especially +eighteenth-century poets. My tutor, Mr. Percy Simpson, the editor of +Ben Jonson’s plays, sympathized. He said that he had once suffered for +his preference for the Romantic revivalists. He had been beaten by his +schoolmaster for having a Shelley in his possession. He had protested +between the blows: ‘Shelley is beautiful! Shelley is beautiful!’ But he +warned me that I must on no account disparage the eighteenth century +when I sat for my final examination. It was also difficult for me, too, +to concentrate on cases and genders and irregular verbs in Anglo-Saxon +grammar. The Anglo-Saxon lecturer was candid about his subject. He said +that it was of purely linguistic interest, that there was hardly a line +of Anglo-Saxon extant of the slightest literary merit. I disagreed; +<cite>Beowulf</cite> and <cite>Judith</cite> seemed good poems to me. Beowulf lying wrapped +in a blanket among his platoon of drunken thanes in the Gothland +billet; Judith going for a <i>promenade</i> to Holofernes’s staff-tent; and +<cite>Brunanburgh</cite> with its bayonet-and-cosh fighting—all this was closer to +most of us at the time than the drawing-room and deer-park atmosphere +of the eighteenth century. Edmund and I found ourselves translating +everything into trench-warfare terms. The war was not yet over for us. +In the middle of a lecture I would have a sudden very clear experience +of men on the march up the Béthune-La Bassée road; the men would be +singing and French children would be running along beside them, calling +out: ‘Tommee, Tommee, give me bullee beef’; and I would smell the +stench of the knacker’s yard just outside the town. Or I would be in +Laventie High Street, <span class="pagenum" id="Page_361" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 361</span>passing a company billet; an <abbr>N.C.O.</abbr> would +roar out, ‘Party, ’shun!’ and the Second Battalion men in shorts, with +brown knees and brown expressionless faces, would spring to their feet +from the broken steps where they were sitting. Or I would be in a barn +with my first platoon of the Welsh Regiment, watching them play nap +by the light of dirty candle stumps. Or it would be a deep dug-out at +Cambrin, where I was talking to a signaller; I would look up the shaft +and see somebody’s muddy legs coming down the steps, and there would +be a crash and the tobacco-smoke in the dug-out would shake with the +concussion and twist about in patterns like the marbling on books. +These day-dreams persisted like an alternate life. Indeed they did not +leave me until well on in 1928. I noticed that the scenes were nearly +always recollections of my first four months in France; it seemed as +though the emotion-recording apparatus had failed after Loos.</p> + +<p>The eighteenth century was unpopular because it was French. Anti-French +feeling among most ex-soldiers amounted almost to an obsession. Edmund, +shaking with nerves, used to say at this time: ‘No more wars for me at +any price. Except against the French. If there’s ever a war with them +I’ll go like a shot.’ Pro-German feeling was increasing. Now that the +war was over and the German armies had been beaten, it was possible +to give the German soldier credit for being the best fighting-man in +Europe. I often heard it said that it was only the blockade that had +beaten them; that in Haig’s last push they never really broke, and that +their machine-gun sections had held us up for as long as was needed +to cover the withdrawal of the main forces. And even that we had been +fighting on the wrong side; our natural enemies were the French.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_362" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 362</span>At the end of my first term’s work I attended the usual college +board to give an account of myself. The spokesman coughed and said a +little stiffly: ‘I understand, Mr. Graves, that the essays that you +write for your English tutor are, shall I say, a trifle temperamental. +It appears, indeed, that you prefer some authors to others.’</p> + +<p>There were a number of poets living on Boar’s Hill; too many, Edmund +and I agreed. It had become almost a tourist centre. There was the Poet +Laureate, with his bright eye, abrupt challenging manner, a flower in +his buttonhole; he was one of the first men of letters to sign the +Oxford recantation of war-time hatred against the Germans—indeed it +was for the most part written by him. There was Gilbert Murray, too, +gentle-voiced and with the spiritual look of the strict vegetarian, +doing preliminary propaganda work for the League of Nations. Once, +while I was sitting talking to him in his study about Aristotle’s +<cite>Poetics</cite>, and he was walking up and down the room, I suddenly asked +him: ‘Exactly what is the principle of that walk of yours? Are you +trying to avoid the flowers on the rug or are you trying to keep to +the squares?’ I had compulsion-neuroses of this sort myself so it was +easy to notice one in him. He wheeled round sharply: ‘You’re the first +person who has caught me out,’ he said. ‘No, it’s not the flowers or +the squares; it’s a habit that I have got into of doing things in +sevens. I take seven steps, you see, then I change direction and go +another seven steps, than I turn round. I asked Browne, the professor +of Psychology, about it the other day, but he assured me it wasn’t a +dangerous habit. He said: “When you find it getting into multiples of +seven, come to me again.”’</p> + +<p>I saw most of John Masefield, a nervous, generous person, very +sensitive to criticism, who seemed to have suffered <span class="pagenum" id="Page_363" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 363</span>greatly in +the war, when an orderly in a Red Cross unit; he was now working at +<cite>Reynard the Fox</cite>. He wrote in a hut in his garden surrounded by tall +gorse-bushes and only appeared at meal-times. In the evening he used to +read his day’s work over to Mrs. Masefield and they would correct it +together. Masefield was at the height of his reputation at the time, +and there was a constant flow of American visitors to his door. Mrs. +Masefield protected Jan. She was from the North of Ireland, a careful +manager, and put a necessary brake on Jan’s generosity and sociability. +We admired the way that she stood up for her rights where less resolute +people would have shrunk back. The tale of Mrs. Masefield and the +rabbit. Some neighbours of ours had a particularly stupid Airedale; +they were taking it for a walk past the Masefields’ house when a wild +rabbit ran across the road from the Masefields’ gorse plantation. The +Airedale dashed at it and missed as usual. The rabbit, not giving it +sufficient credit for stupidity and slowness, doubled back; but found +the dog had not yet recovered from its mistake and ran right into its +jaws. The dog’s owners were delighted at the brilliance performance of +their pet, recovered the rabbit, which was a small and inexperienced +one, and took it home for the pot. Mrs. Masefield had seen the business +through the plantation fence. It was not, strictly, a public road and +the rabbit was, therefore, legally hers. That evening there came a +knock at the door. ‘Come in, oh, do come in, Mrs. Masefield.’ It was +Mrs. Masefield coming for the skin of her rabbit. Rabbit-skins were +worth a lot in 1920. Mrs. Masefield’s one extravagance was bridge; she +used to play at a halfpenny a hundred, to steady her play, she told us. +She kept goats which used to be tethered near our cottage and which +bleated. She was a good landlord to us, <span class="pagenum" id="Page_364" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 364</span>and advised Nancy to keep +up with me intellectually if she wished to hold my affections.</p> + +<p>Another poet on Boar’s Hill was Robert Nichols, still another +neurasthenic ex-soldier, with his flame-opal ring, his wide-brimmed +hat, his flapping arms and ‘mournful grandeur’ in repose (the phrase is +from a review by Sir Edmund Gosse). Nichols served only three weeks in +France, in the gunners, and was in no show; but he was highly strung +and the three weeks affected him more than twelve months affected +some people. He was invalided out of the army and went to lecture in +America for the Ministry of Information on British war-poets. He read +Siegfried’s and my poetry, and apparently gave some account of us. A +legend was started of Siegfried, Robert and myself as the new Three +Musketeers. Not only was Robert not in the Royal Welch Fusiliers with +Siegfried and myself, but the three of us have never been together in +the same room in our lives.</p> + +<figure id="i364" class="figcenter" style="max-width: 35em;"> + <img class="w100 mt1" src="images/i364.jpg" alt="military parade marching on city cobblestone street"> + <figcaption>1929 THE SECOND BATTALION, THE ROYAL WELCH FUSILIERS</figcaption> +</figure> + +<p>That winter George and Ruth Mallory invited Nancy and myself to go +climbing with them. But Nancy could not stand heights and was having +another baby; and, for myself, I realized that my climbing days were +over. My nerves were bad, though possibly still good enough for an +emergency, and beyond improvement. I was, however, drawn into one +foolhardy experience at this time. Nancy and I were visiting my parents +at Harlech. My two younger brothers were at the house. They played +golf and mixed with local society. One evening they arranged a four at +bridge with a young ex-airman and a Canadian colonel who was living +in a house on the plain between Harlech Castle and the sea. The elder +of my brothers got toothache; I said that I would take his place. The +younger, still at Charterhouse, demurred. He was rather ashamed of +me now as a non-golfer, a socialist, <span class="pagenum" id="Page_365" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 365</span>and not quite a gentleman. +And my bridge might discredit him. I insisted, because at that time +Canadian colonels interested me, and he made the best of it. I assured +him that I would try not to wound his feelings. The colonel was about +forty-five—tough, nervous, whisky-drinking, a killer. He was out of +sorts; he said that his missus was upstairs with a headache and could +not come down. We played three or four rubbers; I was playing steadily +and not disgracing my brother. The colonel was drinking, the airman +was competing. Finally the colonel said in a temper: ‘By God, this +is the rottenest bridge I’ve ever sat down to. Let’s go bathing!’ +It was half-past ten and not warm for January, but we went bathing +and afterwards dried ourselves on pocket handkerchiefs. ‘We’ was the +colonel, myself and my brother. The airman excused himself. The bathe +put the colonel in better humour. ‘Let’s go up to the village now and +raid the concert. Let’s pull some of the girls out and have a bit of +fun.’ The airman gigglingly agreed. My brother seemed embarrassed. The +colonel said: ‘And you, you bloody poet, are you on?’ I said angrily: +‘Not yet. You’ve had your treat, colonel. I went bathing with you and +it was cold. Now it’s my treat. I’m going to take you climbing and make +you warm. I want to see whether you Canucks are all <abbr>B.S.</abbr> or not.’ That +diverted him.</p> + +<p>I took them up the castle rock from the railway station in the dark. +After the first piece, which was tricky, there would have been little +climbing necessary if I had followed a zig-zag path; but I preferred to +lead the colonel up several fairly stiff pitches. The others kept to +the path. When we reached the top he was out of breath, a bit shaky, +and most affable—almost affectionate. ‘That was a damn good climb you +showed us.’ So I said: ‘We’ve not reached the top yet.’ <span class="pagenum" id="Page_366" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 366</span>‘Where +are we going now?’ he asked. I said: ‘Up that turret.’ We climbed into +the castle and walked through the chapel into the north-western tower. +It was pitch dark. I took them left into the turret which adjoined the +tower but rose some twenty feet higher. The sky showed above, about +the size of an orange. The turret had once had a spiral staircase, but +the central core had been broken down after the Cromwellian siege; +only an edging of stones remained on the walls. This edging did not +become continuous until about the second spiral. We struck matches and +I started up. The colonel swore and sweated, but followed. I showed him +the trick of getting over the worst gap in the stones, which was too +wide to bridge with one’s stride, by crouching, throwing one’s body +forward and catching the next stone with one’s hands; a scramble and he +was there. The airman and my brother remained below. I was glad when we +reached the second spiral. We climbed perhaps a hundred and twenty feet +to the top.</p> + +<p>When we were safely down again most of the whisky was gone. So I +said: ‘Now let’s visit the concert party.’ I had heard the audience +dispersing, from the top of the turret. We visited the artistes. +The colonel was most courteous to the women, especially the blonde +soprano, but he took a great dislike to the tenor, a Welshman, and +told him that he was no bloody good as a singer. He cross-examined +him on his military service and was delighted to find that he had +been for some reason or other exempted. He called him a louse and a +bloody skrim-shanker and a lot more until the blonde soprano, who was +his wife, came to the rescue and threatened to chuck the colonel out. +He went out grinning, kissing his hand to the soprano and telling +the tenor to kiss the place where he wore no hat. The tenor turned +courageous <span class="pagenum" id="Page_367" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 367</span>and shouted out something about reading the Scriptures +and how morally unjustifiable it was to fight. We all laughed till +we wheezed. Then the colonel said we must get a drink; he knocked up +a hotel barman and even got inside the bar, but the barman refused +to serve him and threatened to call the police. The colonel did not +raid the shelves as he would have done half an hour before when the +whisky was fiercer in him; he merely told the barman what he thought +of the Welsh, broke a glass or two and walked out. ‘Let’s go home and +have some more bridge.’ He walked arm-in-arm with me down the hill +and confided as one family man to another that his nerves were all in +pieces because his missus was in the family way. That was why he had +broken up the bridge-party. He had wanted her to have a good sleep. ‘If +we go back quietly now, she’ll not wake up; we can bid in whispers.’ +So we went back and he drank silently and the airman drank silently +and we played silently. I had three or four glasses myself; my brother +abstained. We stopped at three-thirty in the morning. The colonel +paid up and went to sleep on the sofa. I was eighteen shillings and +my brother twelve shillings up at sixpence a hundred. I was sick and +shaking for weeks after this.</p> + +<p>In March the second baby was born and we called him David. My mother +was overjoyed. It was the first Graves grandson; my elder brothers had +had only girls; here, at last, was an heir for the Graves family silver +and documents. When Jenny was born my mother had condoled with Nancy: +‘Perhaps it is as well to have a girl first to practise on.’ Nancy had +from the first decided to have four children; they were to be like +the children in her drawings and were to be girl, boy, girl, boy, in +that order. She was going to get it all over quickly; she believed in +young parents and families <span class="pagenum" id="Page_368" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 368</span>of three or four children fairly close +together in age. She had the children in the order she intended and +they were all like her drawings. She began to regret our marriage, as +I also did. We wanted somehow to be dis-married—not by divorce, which +was as bad as marriage—and able to live together without any legal or +religious obligation to live together. It was about this time that I +met Dick again, for the last time; I found him merely pleasant and +disagreeable. He was at the university, about to enter the diplomatic +service, and had changed so much that it seemed absurd to have ever +suffered on his account. Yet the caricature likeness remained.</p> +</section> + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> + +<section role="doc-chapter" aria-labelledby="c28-hd"> +<div class="chapter"> +<div class="pagenum" id="Page_369" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 369</div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="c28-hd">XXVIII</h2> +</div> + +<p class="chap_start"><b class="smcap">I met</b> <abbr>T. E.</abbr> Lawrence first at a guest-night at All Souls’. +Lawrence had just been given a college fellowship, and it was the first +time for many years that he had worn evening dress. The restlessness +of his eyes was the first thing about him I noticed. He told me that +he had read my poems in Egypt during one of his flying visits from +Arabia; he and my brother Philip had been together in the Intelligence +Department at Cairo, before his part in the Arab revolt had begun, +working out the Turkish order of battle. I knew nothing about his +organization of the Arab revolt, his exploits and sufferings in the +desert, and his final entry into Damascus. He was merely, to me, a +fellow-soldier who had come back to Oxford for a rest after the war. +But I felt a sudden extraordinary sympathy with him. Later, when I was +told that every one was fascinated by Lawrence, I tried to dismiss this +feeling as extravagant. But it remained. Between lectures at Oxford +I now often visited Lawrence at All Souls’. Though he never drank +himself, he used always to send his scout for a silver goblet of audit +ale for me. Audit ale was brewed in the college; it was as soft as +barley-water but of great strength. (A prince once came down to Oxford +to open a new museum and lunched at All Souls’ before the ceremony; +the mildness of the audit ale deceived him—he took it for lager—and he +had to be taken back to the station in a cab with the blinds drawn.) +Nancy and I lunched in Lawrence’s rooms once with Vachel Lindsay, the +American poet, and his mother. Mrs. Lindsay was from Springfield, +Illinois, and, like her son, a prominent member of the Illinois +Anti-Saloon League. When Lawrence told his scout that Mr. Lindsay, +though a poet, was an <span class="pagenum" id="Page_370" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 370</span>Anti-Saloon Leaguer, he was scandalized and +asked Lawrence’s permission to lay on Lindsay’s place a copy of verses +composed in 1661 by a fellow of the college. One stanza was:</p> + +<div class="poetry-container"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">The poet divine that cannot reach wine,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Because that his money doth many times faile,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Will hit on the vein to make a good strain,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">If he be but inspired with a pot of good ale.</div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + +<p>Mrs. Lindsay had been warned by friends to comment on nothing unusual +that she met at Oxford. Lawrence had brought out the college gold +service in her honour and this she took to be the ordinary thing at a +university luncheon-party.</p> + +<p>His rooms were dark and oak-panelled. A large table and a desk were the +principal furniture. And there were two heavy leather chairs, simply +acquired. An American oil-financier had come in suddenly one day when +I was visiting <abbr>T. E.</abbr> and said: ‘I am here from the States, Colonel +Lawrence, to ask you a single question. You are the only man who will +answer it honestly. Do Middle-Eastern conditions justify my putting +any money in South Arabian oil?’ Lawrence, without rising, simply +answered:‘No.’ ‘That’s all I wanted to know; it was worth coming for +that. Thank you, and good day!’ In his brief glance about the room he +had found something missing; on his way home through London he chose +the chairs and had them sent to Lawrence with his card. Other things in +the room were pictures, including Augustus John’s portrait of Feisul, +which Lawrence, I believe, bought from John with the diamond which +he had worn as a mark of honour in his Arab headdress; his books, +including a Kelmscott <cite>Chaucer</cite>, three prayer-rugs, the gift of Arab +leaders who had fought with <span class="pagenum" id="Page_371" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 371</span>him, one of them with the sheen on +the nap made with crushed lapis-lazuli; a station bell from the Hedjaz +railway; and on the mantelpiece a four-thousand-year-old toy, a clay +soldier on horseback from a child’s grave at Carchemish, where Lawrence +was digging before the war.</p> + +<p>We talked most about poetry. I was working at a book of poems which +appeared later under the title of <cite>The Pier-Glass</cite>. They were poems +that reflected my haunted condition; the <cite>Country Sentiment</cite> mood was +breaking down. Lawrence made a number of suggestions for improving +these poems and I adopted most of them. He told me of two or three +of his schemes for brightening All Souls’ and Oxford generally. One +was for improving the turf in the quadrangle, which he said was in +a disgraceful condition, nearly rotting away; he had suggested at a +college meeting that it should be manured or treated in some way or +other, but no action had been taken. He now said that he was going +to plant mushrooms on it, so that they would have to re-turf it +altogether. He consulted a mushroom expert in town, but found that it +was difficult to make spawn grow. He would have persisted if he had +not been called away about this time to help Winston Churchill with +the Middle-Eastern settlement. Another scheme, in which I was to have +helped, was to steal the Magdalen College deer. He was going to drive +them into the small inner quadrangle of All Souls’, having persuaded +the college to reply, when Magdalen protested and asked for its deer +back, that it was the All Souls’ herd and had been pastured there from +time immemorial. Great things were expected of this raid. It fell +through for the same reason as the other. But a successful strike +of college-servants for better pay and hours was said to have been +engineered by Lawrence.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_372" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 372</span>I took no part in undergraduate life, seldom visiting my college +except to draw my Government grant and exhibition money; I refused to +pay the college games’ subscription, having little interest in St. +John’s and being unfit for games myself. Most of my friends were at +Balliol and Queen’s, and in any case Wadham had a prior claim on my +loyalty. I spent as little time as possible away from Boar’s Hill. +At this time I had little to do with the children; they were in the +hands of Nancy and the nurse—the nurse now also did the cooking and +housework for us. Nancy felt that she wanted some activity besides +drawing, though she could not decide what. One evening in the middle of +the long vacation she suddenly said: ‘I must get away somewhere out of +this for a change. Let’s go off on bicycles somewhere.’ We packed a few +things and rode off in the general direction of Devonshire. The nights +were coldish and we had not brought blankets. We found that the best +way was to bicycle by night and sleep by day. We went over Salisbury +Plain past several deserted army camps; they had a ghostly look. There +was accommodation in these camps for a million men, the number of men +killed in the Imperial Forces during the war. We found ourselves near +Dorchester, so we turned in there to visit Thomas Hardy, whom we had +met not long before when he came up to Oxford to get his honorary +doctor’s degree. We found him active and gay, with none of the aphasia +and wandering of attention that we had noticed in him at Oxford.</p> + +<p>I wrote out a record of the conversation we had with him. He welcomed +us as representatives of the post-war generation. He said that he lived +such a quiet life at Dorchester that he feared he was altogether behind +the times. He wanted, for instance, to know whether we had any sympathy +<span class="pagenum" id="Page_373" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 373</span>with the Bolshevik regime, and whether he could trust the <cite>Morning +Post’s</cite> account of the Red Terror. Then he was interested in Nancy’s +hair, which she wore short, in advance of the fashion, and in her +keeping her own name. His comment on the name question was: ‘Why, you +<em>are</em> old-fashioned. I knew an old couple here sixty years ago that did +the same. The woman was called Nanny Priddle (descendant of an ancient +family, the Paradelies, long decayed into peasantry), and she would +never change her name either.’ Then he wanted to know why I no longer +used my army rank. I said it was because I was no longer soldiering. +‘But you have a right to it; I would certainly keep my rank if I had +one. I should be very proud to be called Captain Hardy.’</p> + +<p>He told us that he was now engaged in restoring a Norman font in a +church near by. He had only the bowl to work upon, but enjoyed doing +a bit of his old work again. Nancy mentioned that we had not baptized +our children. He was interested, but not scandalized, remarking that +his old mother had always said of baptism that at any rate there was +no harm in it, and that she would not like her children to blame her +in after-life for leaving any duty to them undone. ‘I have usually +found that what my old mother said was right.’ He said that to his +mind the new generation of clergymen were very much better men than +the last.... Though he now only went to church three times a year—one +visit to each of the three neighbouring churches—he could not forget +that the church was in the old days the centre of all the musical, +literary and artistic education in the country village. He talked +about the old string orchestras in Wessex churches, in one of which +his father, grandfather, and he himself had taken part; he regretted +their disappearance. <span class="pagenum" id="Page_374" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 374</span>He told us that the clergyman who appears as +old St. Clair in <cite>Tess of the D’Urbervilles</cite> was the man who protested +to the War Office about the Sunday brass-band performances at the +Dorchester Barracks, and was the cause of headquarters no longer being +sent to this once very popular station.</p> + +<p>We had tea in the drawing-room, which, like the rest of the house, +was crowded with furniture and ornaments. Hardy had an affection for +old possessions, and Mrs. Hardy was too fond to suggest that anything +at all should be removed. Hardy, his cup of tea in hand, began making +jokes about bishops at the Athenæum Club and imitating their episcopal +tones when they ordered: ‘China tea and a little bread and butter (Yes, +my lord!).’ Apparently he considered bishops were fair game. He was +soon censuring Sir Edmund Gosse, who had recently stayed with them, for +a breach of good taste in imitating his old friend, Henry James, eating +soup. Loyalty to his friends was always a passion with Hardy.</p> + +<p>After tea we went into the garden, and Hardy asked to see some of my +recent poems. I showed him one, and he asked if he might make some +suggestions. He objected to the phrase the ‘scent of thyme,’ which he +said was one of the <i>clichés</i> which the poets of his generation studied +to avoid. I replied that they had avoided it so well that it could be +used again now without offence, and he withdrew the objection. He asked +whether I wrote easily, and I said that this poem was in its sixth +draft and would probably be finished in two more. ‘Why!’ he said, ‘I +have never in my life taken more than three, or perhaps four, drafts +for a poem. I am afraid of it losing its freshness.’ He said that he +had been able to sit down and write novels by time-table, but that +poetry was <span class="pagenum" id="Page_375" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 375</span>always accidental, and perhaps it was for that reason +that he prized it more highly.</p> + +<p>He spoke disparagingly of his novels, though admitting that there were +chapters in them that he had enjoyed writing. We were walking round the +garden, and Hardy paused at a spot near the greenhouse. He said that he +had once been pruning a tree here when an idea suddenly had come into +his head for a story, the best story that he had ever thought of. It +came complete with characters, setting, and even some of the dialogue. +But as he had no pencil and paper with him, and was anxious to finish +pruning the tree before it rained, he had let it go. By the time he sat +down to recall it, all was utterly gone. ‘Always carry a pencil and +paper,’ he said. He added: ‘Of course, even if I could remember that +story now, I couldn’t write it. I am past novel-writing. But I often +wonder what it was.’</p> + +<p>At dinner that night he grew enthusiastic in praise of cider, which +he had drunk since a boy, and which, he said, was the finest medicine +he knew. I suggested that in the <cite>Message to the American People</cite>, +which he had been asked to write, he might take the opportunity of +recommending cider.</p> + +<p>He began complaining of autograph-hunters and their persistence. He +disliked leaving letters unanswered, and yet if he did not write these +people pestered him the more; he had been upset that morning by a +letter from an autograph-fiend which began:</p> + +<blockquote> +<p><span class="smcap">Dear Mr. Hardy</span>,—I am interested to know why the devil you +don’t reply to my request ...</p> +</blockquote> + +<p class="noindent">He asked me for my advice, and was grateful for the suggestion that a +mythical secretary should reply offering <span class="pagenum" id="Page_376" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 376</span>his autograph at one or +two guineas, the amount to be sent to a hospital (‘Swanage Children’s +Hospital,’ put in Hardy), which would forward a receipt.</p> + +<p>He said that he regarded professional critics as parasites no less +noxious than autograph-hunters, and wished the world rid of them. He +also wished that he had not listened to them when he was a young man; +on their advice he had cut out dialect-words from his early poems, +though they had no exact synonyms to fit the context. And still the +critics were plaguing him. One of them recently complained of a poem +of his where he had written ‘his shape <em>smalled</em> in the distance.’ +Now what in the world else could he have written? Hardy then laughed +a little and said that once or twice recently he had looked up a word +in the dictionary for fear of being again accused of coining, and had +found it there right enough—only to read on and find that the sole +authority quoted was himself in a half-forgotten novel! He talked of +early literary influences, and said that he had none at all, for he +did not come of literary stock. Then he corrected himself and said +that a friend, a fellow-apprentice in the architect’s office where he +worked as a young man, used to lend him books. (His taste in literature +was certainly most unexpected. Once when Lawrence had ventured to say +something disparaging against Homer’s <cite>Iliad</cite>, he protested: ‘Oh, but I +admire the <cite>Iliad</cite> greatly. Why, it’s in the <cite>Marmion</cite> class!’ Lawrence +could not at first believe that Hardy was not making a little joke.)</p> + +<p>We went off the next day, but there was more talk at breakfast before +we went. Hardy was at the critics again. He was complaining that they +accused him of pessimism. One man had recently singled out as an +example of gloom a poem he had written about a woman whose house was +<span class="pagenum" id="Page_377" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 377</span>burned down on her wedding-night. ‘Of course it is a humorous +piece,’ said Hardy, ‘and the man must have been thick-witted not to see +that. When I read his criticism I went through my last collection of +poems with a pencil, marking them S, N, and C, according as they were +sad, neutral or cheerful. I found them as nearly as possible in equal +proportions; which nobody could call pessimism.’ In his opinion <i>vers +libre</i> could come to nothing in England. ‘All we can do is to write on +the old themes in the old styles, but try to do a little better than +those who went before us.’ About his own poems he said that once they +were written he cared very little what happened to them.</p> + +<p>He told us of his work during the war, and said that he was glad to +have been chairman of the Anti-Profiteering Committee, and to have +succeeded in bringing a number of rascally Dorchester tradesmen to +book. ‘It made me unpopular, of course,’ he said, ‘but it was a hundred +times better than sitting on a military tribunal and sending young men +to the war who did not want to go.’</p> + +<p>This was the last time we saw Hardy, though we had a standing +invitation to come and visit him.</p> + +<p>From Dorchester we bicycled to Tiverton in Devonshire, where Nancy’s +old nurse kept a fancy-goods shop. Nancy helped her dress the +shop-window and advised her about framing the prints that she was +selling. She also gave the shop a good turn-out, dusted the stock, +and took her turn behind the counter. As a result of Nancy’s work the +week’s receipts went up several shillings and continued at the improved +figure for a week or two after we were gone. This gave Nancy the idea +of starting a shop herself on Boar’s Hill. It was a large residential +district with no shop nearer than three miles away. She said that we +should buy a second-hand <span class="pagenum" id="Page_378" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 378</span>army-hut, stock it with confectionery, +groceries, tobacco, hardware, medicines, and all the other things +that one finds in a village shop, run it tidily and economically and +make our fortune. I undertook to help her while the vacation lasted +and became quite excited about the idea myself. She decided to take +a neighbour, the Hon. Mrs. Michael Howard, into partnership. Neither +Nancy nor Mrs. Howard had any experience of shop-management or +commercial book-keeping. But Mrs. Howard undertook to keep the books +while Nancy did most of the other work. Nancy was anxious to start the +shop six weeks after the original decision, but army huts were not +obtainable at any reasonable price (the timber-merchants were in a +ring); so it was decided to employ a local carpenter to build a shop +to Nancy’s design. A neighbour rented us a corner of his field close +to the Masefields’ house. The work was finished in time and the stock +bought. The <cite>Daily Mirror</cite> advertised the opening on its front page +with the heading ‘<span class="smcap">Shop-Keeping on Parnassus</span>,’ and crowds came +up from Oxford to look at us. We soon realized that it had either to be +a big general shop which made Boar’s Hill more or less independent of +Oxford (and of the unsatisfactory system of vans calling at the door +and bringing stuff of inferior quality with ‘take it or leave it’) +or it had to be a small sweet and tobacco shop making no challenge +to the Oxford tradesmen. We decided on the challenge. The building +had to be enlarged and two or three hundred pounds’ worth of stock +purchased. Mrs. Howard was not able to give much of her time to the +work, having children to look after and no nurse; most of it fell on +Nancy and myself. I used to serve in the shop several hours of the +day while she went round to the big houses for the daily orders. The +term had now begun and I was supposed <span class="pagenum" id="Page_379" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 379</span>to be attending lectures in +Oxford. Another caricature scene: myself, wearing a green-baize apron +this time, with flushed face and disordered hair, selling a packet of +Bird’s Eye tobacco to the Poet Laureate with one hand and with the +other weighing out half a pound of brown sugar for Sir Arthur Evans’ +gardener’s wife.</p> + +<p>The gross weekly takings were now £60 a week and Nancy, though she had +given up her drawing, still had the house and children to consider. +We had no car, and constant emergency bicycle-rides had to be made to +Oxford to get new stock from the wholesalers; we made a point of always +being able to supply whatever was asked for. We engaged a shop-boy to +call for orders, but the work was still too heavy. Mrs. Howard went out +of partnership and Nancy and I found great difficulty in understanding +her accounts. I was fairly good at conventional book-keeping; the +keeping of company accounts had been part of my lecture-syllabus when I +was instructing cadets. But that did not help me with these, which were +on a novel system.</p> + +<p>The shop business finally ousted everything, not only Nancy’s painting, +but my writing, my university work, and Nancy’s proper supervision of +the house and children. We had the custom of every resident of Boar’s +Hill but two or three. One of those whom we courted unsuccessfully was +Mrs. Masefield. The proximity of the shop to her house did not please +her. And her housekeeper, she said, preferred to deal with a provision +merchant in Oxford and she could not override this arrangement. +However, to show that there was no ill-feeling, she used to come once +a week to the shop and buy a tin of Vim and a packet of Lux, for which +she paid money down from a cash-box which she carried with her. The +moral problems of trade interested me. Nancy and I <span class="pagenum" id="Page_380" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 380</span>both found that +it was very difficult at this time of fluctuating prices to be really +honest; we could not resist the temptation of undercharging the poor +villagers of Wootton, who were frequent customers, and recovering our +money from the richer residents. Playing at Robin Hood came easily to +me. Nobody ever caught us out; it was as easy as shelling peas, the +shop-boy said, who also took his turn behind the counter. We found that +most people bought tea by price and not by quality. If we happened to +be out of the tea selling at ninepence a quarter which Mrs. So-and-so +always bought, refusing the eightpenny tea, and Mrs. So-and-so asked +for it in a hurry, the only thing to do was to make up a pound of the +sevenpenny, which was the same colour as the ninepenny, and charge it +at ninepence; the difference would not be noticed. We were sorry for +the commercial travellers who came sweating up the hill with their +heavy bags of samples, usually on foot, and had to be sent away without +any orders. They would pitch a hard-luck tale and often we would relent +and get in more stock than we needed. In gratitude they would tell us +some of the tricks of the trade, advising us, for instance, never to +cut cheese or bacon exactly to weight, but to make it an ounce or two +more and overcharge for this extra piece. ‘There’s few can do the sum +before you take the stuff off the scales and there’s fewer still who +will take the trouble to weigh up again when they get back home.’</p> + +<p>The shop lasted six months. Nancy suddenly dismissed the nurse. Nancy +had always practised the most up-to-date methods of training and +feeding children, and the nurse, over-devoted to the children, had +recently disobeyed her instructions. Nancy put the children before +everything. She decided that there was nothing to be done but to take +<span class="pagenum" id="Page_381" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 381</span>them and the house over herself, and to find a manager for the +shop. At this point I caught influenza and took a long time to recover +from it.</p> + +<p>War horror overcame me again. The political situation in Europe seemed +to be going from bad to worse. There was already trouble in Ireland, +Russia and the Near East. The papers promised new and deadlier poison +gases for the next war. There was a rumour that Lord Berkeley’s house +on Boar’s Hill was to become an experimental laboratory for making +them. I had bad nights. I thought that perhaps I owed it to Nancy to go +to a psychiatrist to be cured; yet I was not sure. Somehow I thought +that the power of writing poetry, which was more important to me than +anything else I did, would disappear if I allowed myself to get cured; +my <cite>Pier-Glass</cite> haunting would end and I would become merely a dull +easy writer. It seemed to me less important to be well than to be a +good poet. I also had a strong repugnance against allowing anyone to +have the power over me that psychiatrists always seemed to win over +their patients. I had always refused to allow myself to be hypnotized +by anyone in any way.</p> + +<p>I decided to see as few people as possible, stop all outside work, and +cure myself. I would read the modern psychological books and apply them +to my case. I had already learned the rudiments of morbid psychology +from talks with Rivers, and from his colleague, Dr. Henry Head, the +neurologist, under whose care Robert Nichols had been. I liked Head’s +scientific integrity. Once when he was testing a man whom he suspected +of homicidal mania he had made some suggestion to him which came within +the danger-area of his insanity; the man picked up a heavy knife from +his consulting table and rushed threateningly at Head. Head, <span class="pagenum" id="Page_382" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 382</span>not +at all quick on his legs and dodging round the table, exclaimed: +‘Typical, typical! Capital, capital!’ and, only as an afterthought: +‘Help! Help!’ He had great knowledge of the geography of the brain and +the peculiar delusions and maladjustments that followed lesions in +the different parts. He told me, at different times, exactly what was +wrong with Mr. Jingle in <cite>Pickwick Papers</cite>, why some otherwise literate +people found it impossible to spell, and why some others saw ghosts +standing by their bedside. He said about the bedside ghosts: ‘They +always come to the same side of the bed, and if you turn the bed round +you turn the ghost round with it. They come to the contrary side of the +lesion.’</p> + +<p>A manager was found for the shop. But as soon as it was known that +Nancy and I were no longer behind the counter the weekly receipts +immediately began to fall; they were soon down to £20, and still +falling steadily. The manager’s salary was more than our profits. +Prices were now falling, too, at the rate of about five per cent, +every week, so that the stock on our shelves had depreciated greatly +in value. And we had let one or two of the Wootton villagers run up +bad debts. When we came to reckon things up we realized that it was +wisest to cut the losses and sell out. We hoped to recoup our original +expenditure and even to be in pocket on the whole transaction by +selling the shop and the goodwill to a big firm of Oxford grocers that +wished to buy it as a branch establishment. Unfortunately, the site was +not ours and the landlord was prevailed upon by an interested neighbour +not to let any ordinary business firm take over the shop from us and +spoil the local amenities. No other site was available, so there was +nothing to do but sell off what stock remained at bankrupt prices +to the wholesalers and find a buyer for the building. Unfortunately +<span class="pagenum" id="Page_383" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 383</span>again, the building was not made in bolted sections, and could not +be sold to be put up again elsewhere; its only value was as timber, and +in these six months the corner in timber had also been broken and the +prices fallen to very little. We recovered twenty pounds of the two +hundred that had been spent on it. Nancy and I were so disgusted that +we decided to leave Boar’s Hill. We were about five hundred pounds in +debt to the wholesalers and others. A lawyer took the whole matter in +hand, disposed of our assets for us, and the debt was finally reduced +to about three hundred pounds. Nancy’s father sent her a hundred-pound +note (in a match-box) as his contribution, and the remainder was +unexpectedly contributed by Lawrence. He gave me four chapters of +<cite>Seven Pillars of Wisdom</cite>, his history of the Arab revolt, to sell for +serial publication in the United States. It was a point of honour with +him not to make any money out of the revolt even in the most indirect +way; but if it could help a poet in difficulties, there seemed no harm +in that.</p> + +<p>We gave the Masefields notice that we were leaving the cottage at the +end of the June quarter 1921. We had no idea where we were going or +what we were going to do. We decided that we must get another cottage +somewhere and live very quietly, looking after the children ourselves, +and that we must try to make what money we needed by writing and +drawing. Nancy, who had taken charge of everything when I was ill, now +gave me the task of finding a cottage. It had to be found in about +three weeks’ time. I said: ‘But you know that there are no cottages +anywhere to be had.’ She said: ‘I know, but we are going to get one.’ +I said ironically: ‘Describe it in detail; since there are no cottages +we might as well have a no-cottage that we really like.’ She said: +‘Well, it must have six rooms, water in the house, a <span class="pagenum" id="Page_384" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 384</span>beamed +attic, a walled-in garden, and it must be near the river. It must be +in a village with shops and yet a little removed from the village. The +village must be five or six miles from Oxford in the opposite direction +from Boar’s Hill. The church must have a tower and not a spire. And we +can only afford ten shillings a week unfurnished.’ There were other +details that I took down about soil, sanitation, windows, stairs and +kitchen sinks, and then I went off on my bicycle. I had first laid a +ruler across the Oxford ordnance-map and found four or five villages +that corresponded in general direction and distance and were on the +river. By inquiry I found that two had shops; that, of these two, one +had a towered church and the other a spired church. I therefore +went to a firm of house-agents in Oxford and said: ‘Have you +any cottages to let unfurnished?’ The house-agent laughed politely. +So I said: ‘What I want is a cottage at Islip with a walled garden, +six rooms, water in the house, just outside the village, with a beamed +attic, and rent ten shillings a week.’ The house-agent said: ‘Oh, you +mean the World’s End Cottage? But that is for sale, not for renting. +It has failed to find a purchaser for two years, and I think that the +owner will let it go now at five hundred pounds, which is only half +what he originally asked.’ So I went back and next day Nancy came with +me; she looked round and said: ‘Yes, this is the cottage all right, +but I shall have to cut down those cypress trees and change those +window-panes. We’ll move in on quarter-day.’ I said: ‘But the money! We +haven’t the money.’ Nancy answered: ‘If we could find the exact house, +surely to goodness we can find a mere lump sum of money.’ She was +right, for my mother was good enough to buy the cottage and rent it to +us at the rate of ten shillings a week.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_385" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 385</span>Islip was a name of good omen to me: it was associated with Abbot +Islip, a poor boy of the village who had become Abbot of Westminster +and befriended John Skelton when he took sanctuary in the Abbey from +the anger of Wolsey. I had come more and more to associate myself with +Skelton, discovering a curious affinity. Whenever I wanted a motto for +a new book I always found exactly the right one somewhere or other in +Skelton’s poems. We moved into the Islip cottage and a new chapter +started. I did not sit for my finals.</p> +</section> + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> + +<section role="doc-chapter" aria-labelledby="c29-hd"> +<div class="chapter"> +<div class="pagenum" id="Page_386" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 386</div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="c29-hd">XXIX</h2> +</div> + +<p class="chap_start"><b class="smcap">We</b> were at Islip from 1921 until 1925. My mother in renting us the +house had put a clause in the agreement that it was to be used only as +a residence and not for the carrying on of any trade or business. She +wanted to guard against any further commercial enterprise on our part; +she need not have worried. Islip was an agricultural village, and far +enough from Oxford not to be contaminated with the roguery for which +the outskirts of a university town are usually well known. The village +policeman led an easy life. During the whole time we were living there +we never had a thing stolen or ever had a complaint to make against a +native Islip cottager. Once by mistake I left my bicycle at the station +for two days, and, when I recovered it, not only were both lamps, the +pump and the repair outfit still in place, but an anonymous friend had +even cleaned it.</p> + +<p>Every Saturday in the winter months, as long as I was at Islip, I +played football for the village team. There had been no football in +Islip for some eighty years; the ex-soldiers had reintroduced it. The +village nonogenarian complained that the game was not what it had been +when he was a boy; he called it unmanly. He pointed across the fields +to two aged willow trees: ‘They used to be our home goals,’ he said. +‘T’other pair was half a mile upstream. Constable stopped our play in +the end. Three men were killed in one game; one was kicked to death, +t’other two drowned each other in a scrimmage. Her was a grand game.’ +Islip football, though not unmanly, was ladylike by comparison with the +game as I had played it at Charterhouse. When playing centre-forward I +was often booed now for charging the goalkeeper while he was fumbling +with the shot he had saved. The <span class="pagenum" id="Page_387" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 387</span>cheers were reserved for my +inside-left, who spent most of his time stylishly dribbling the ball in +circles round and round the field until he was robbed; he seldom went +anywhere near the goal-mouth. The football club was democratic. The +cricket club was not. I played cricket the first season but left the +club because the selection of the team was not always a selection of +the best eleven men; regular players would be dropped to make room for +visitors to the village who were friends of a club official, one of the +gentry.</p> + +<p>At first we had so little money that we did all the work in the house +ourselves, including the washing. I did the cooking, Nancy did the +mending and making the children’s clothes; we shared the rest of the +work. Later money improved: we found it more economical to send the +washing out and get a neighbour in to do some of the heavier cleaning +and scrubbing. In our last year at Islip we even had a decrepit car +which Nancy drove. My part was to wind it up; the energy that I put +into winding was almost equivalent to pushing it for a mile or two. The +friends who gave it to us told us that its name was ‘Dr. Marie,’ and +when we asked ‘Why?’ we were told ‘Because it’s all right in theory.’ +One day when Nancy was driving down Foxcombe Hill, the steepest hill +near Oxford, there was a slight jar. Nancy thought it advisable to +stop; when we got out we found that there were only three wheels on the +car. The other, with part of the axle, was retrieved nearly a mile back.</p> + +<p>These four years I spent chiefly on housework and being nurse to the +children. Catherine was born in 1922 and Sam in 1924. By the end +of 1925 we had lived for eight successive years in an atmosphere +of teething, minor accidents, epidemics, and perpetual washing of +children’s napkins. I did <span class="pagenum" id="Page_388" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 388</span>not dislike this sort of life except +for the money difficulties, I liked my life with the children. But the +strain told on Nancy. She was constantly ill, and often I had to take +charge of everything. She tried occasionally to draw; but by the time +she had got her materials together some alarm from the nursery would +always disturb her. She said at last that she would not start again +until all the children were house-trained and old enough for school. +I kept on writing because the responsibility for making money rested +chiefly on me, and because nothing has ever stopped me writing when I +have had something to write. We kept the cottage cleaned and polished +in a routine that left us little time for anything else. We had +accumulated a number of brass ornaments and utensils and allowed them +to become a tyranny, and our children wore five times as many clean +dresses as our neighbours’ children did.</p> + +<p>I found that I had the faculty of working through constant +interruptions. I could recognize the principal varieties of babies’ +screams—hunger, indigestion, wetness, pins, boredom, wanting to be +played with—and learned to disregard all but the more important ones. +But most of the books that I wrote in these years betray the conditions +under which I worked; they are scrappy, not properly considered and +obviously written out of reach of a proper reference-library. Only +poetry did not suffer. When I was working at a poem nothing else +mattered; I went on doing my mechanical tasks in a trance until I had +time to sit down to write it out. At one period I only allowed myself +half an hour’s writing a day, but once I did write I always had too +much to put down; I never sat chewing my pen. My poetry-writing has +always been a painful process of continual corrections and corrections +on top of corrections and persistent dissatisfaction. <span class="pagenum" id="Page_389" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 389</span>I have never +written a poem in less than three drafts; the greatest number I recall +is thirty-five (<cite>The Troll’s Nosegay</cite>). The average at this time was +eight; it is now six or seven.</p> + +<p>The children were all healthy and gave us little trouble. Nancy had +strong views about giving them no meat or tea, putting them to bed +early, making them rest in the afternoon and giving them as much fruit +as they wanted. We did our best to keep them from the mistakes of our +own childhood. But it was impossible for them when they went to the +village school to avoid formal religion, class snobbery, political +prejudice, and mystifying fairy stories about the facts of sex. I never +felt any possessive feeling about them as Nancy did. To me they were +close friends with the claims of friendship and liable to the accidents +of friendship. We both made a point of punishing them in a disciplinary +way as little as possible. If we lost our temper with them it was +a different matter. Islip was as good a place as any for the happy +childhood that we wanted to give them. The river was close and we had +the loan of a canoe. There were fields to play about in, and animals, +and plenty of children of their own age. They liked school.</p> + +<p>After so much shifting about during the war I disliked leaving home, +except to visit some well-ordered house where I could expect reasonable +comfort. But Nancy was always proposing sudden ‘bursts for freedom,’ +and I used to come with her and usually enjoy them. In 1922 we used a +derelict baker’s van for a caravan ride down to the south-coast. We had +three children with us, Catherine as a four-months-old baby. It rained +every single day for the month we were away—and the problem of washing +and drying the baby’s napkins whenever we camped for the night—and the +problem <span class="pagenum" id="Page_390" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 390</span>of finding a farmer who would not mistake us for gypsies +and would be willing to let us pull into his field—and then the shaft +that twice dropped off when we were on hills—and twice the back of the +cart flew open and a child fell out on the road—and the difficulty of +getting oats for the horse (which had been five years on grass as being +too old for work) on country roads organized for motor traffic—and +cooking to be done in the open with usually a high wind and always rain +and the primus stove sputtering and flaring up. It was near Lewes that +we drew up on a strip of public land alongside the horse and van of a +Mr. Hicks, a travelling showman from Brighton. He told us many tricks +of the road and also the story of his life: ‘Yes, I saw the Reverend +Powers, Cantab, of Rodmell last week, and he, knowing my history, said: +“Well, Mr. Hicks, I suppose that in addressing you I should be right in +putting the letters <abbr class="smcap">b.a.</abbr> after your name?” I said: “I have the +right to it certainly, but when a man’s down, you know how it is, he +does not like attaching a handle to his name.” For you must know, I was +once a master at Ardingly College.’</p> + +<p>‘Indeed, Mr. Hicks, and where were you <abbr class="smcap">b.a.</abbr>?’</p> + +<p>‘Didn’t I just tell you, at Ardingly? I won a scholarship at the +beginning and they gave me the choice of going to Oxford or Winchester +or Cambridge or Eton. And I chose Winchester. But I was only there +a twelvemonth. No, I couldn’t stand it any longer owing to the +disgraceful corruption of the junior clergy and the undergraduates—you +understand, of course. I rub up a bit of the classic now and then, but +I like to forget those times. The other day, though, me and a young +Jew-boy who had cleaned up seventy-five pounds at the race meeting with +photographing and one thing and another, had a fine lark. I got out two +old mortarboards <span class="pagenum" id="Page_391" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 391</span>and a couple of gowns from the box in the van +where I keep them, and you should have seen us swaggering down Brighton +Pier, my boy.’ A few days later we stopped at a large mansion in +Hampshire, rented by Sir Lionel Philips, the South African financier, +whom Nancy knew. I found myself in an argument with him about socialist +economics, and he told me a story which I liked even better than Mr. +Hicks’. ‘I visited Kimberley recently and realized what a deep hole I +had made. Where, as a young man, I tore the first turf off with my bare +hands, they were now mining down half a mile.’</p> + +<p>In the end we got back safely.</p> + +<p>I was so busy that I had no time to be ill myself. Nancy begged me +not to talk about the war in her hearing, and I was ready to forget +about it. The villagers called me ‘The Captain,’ otherwise I had +few reminders except my yearly visit to the standing medical board. +The board continued for some years to recommend me for a disability +pension. The particular disability was neurasthenia; the train journey +and the army railway-warrant filled out with my rank and regiment +usually produced reminiscential neurasthenia by the time I reached the +board. The award was at last made permanent at forty-two pounds a year. +Ex-service men were continually coming to the door selling boot-laces +and asking for cast-off shirts and socks. We always gave them a cup of +tea and money. Islip was a convenient halt between the Chipping Norton +and the Oxford workhouses. One day an out-of-work ex-service man, a +steam-roller driver by trade, came calling with his three children, +one of them a baby. Their mother had recently died in childbirth. We +felt very sorry for them and Nancy offered to adopt the eldest child, +Daisy, who was about thirteen years old and her father’s <span class="pagenum" id="Page_392" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 392</span>greatest +anxiety. She undertook to train Daisy in housework so that she would +be able later to go into service. Daisy was still of school age. Her +father shed tears of gratitude, and Daisy seemed happy enough to be a +member of the family. Nancy made her new clothes—we cleaned her, bought +In shoes, and gave her a bedroom to herself. Daisy was not a success. +She was a big ugly girl, strong as a horse and toughened by her three +years on the roads. Her father was most anxious for her to continue her +education, which had been interrupted by their wanderings. But Daisy +hated school; she was put in the baby class and the girls of her own +age used to tease her. In return she pulled their hair and thumped +them, so they sent her to Coventry. After a while she grew homesick +for the road. ‘That was a good life,’ she used to say. ‘Dad and me and +my brother and the baby. The baby was a blessing. When I fetched him +along to the back doors I nearly always won something. ’Course, I was +artful. If they tried to slam the door in my face I used to put my +foot in it and say: “This is my little orphan brother.” Then I used to +look round and anything I seen I used to ast for. I used to ast for +a pram for the baby, if I seen an old one in a shed; and I’d get it, +too. Of course we had a pram really, a good one, and then we’d sell +the pram I’d won, in the next town we come to. Good beggars always ast +for something particlar, something they seen lying about. It’s no good +asking for food or money. I used to pick up a lot for my dad. I was a +better beggar nor he was, he said. We used to go along together singing +<cite>On the Road to Anywhere</cite>. And there was always the Spikes to go to +when the weather was bad. The Spike at Chippy Norton was our winter +home. They was very good to us there. We used to go to the movies once +a week. The grub was good at Chippy Norton. We <span class="pagenum" id="Page_393" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 393</span>been all over the +country, Wales and Devonshire, right up to Scotland, but we always come +back to Chippy.’ Nancy and I were shocked one day when a tramp came +to the door and Daisy slammed the door in his face and told him to +clear out of it, Nosey, and not to poke his ugly mug into respectable +people’s houses. ‘I know you, Nosey Williams,’ she said, ‘you and your +ex-service papers what you pinched from a bloke down in Salisbury, +and the bigamy charge against you a-waiting down at Plymouth. Hop it +now, quick, or I’ll run for the cop.’ Daisy told us the true histories +of many of the beggars we had befriended. She said: ‘There’s not +one decent man in ten among them bums. My dad’s the only decent one +of the lot. The reason most of them is on the road is the cops have +something against them, so they has to keep moving. Of course my dad +don’t like the life; he took to it too late in life. And my mother was +very respectable too. She kept us clean. Most of those bums is lousy, +with nasty diseases, and they keeps out of the Spike as much as they +can ’cause they don’t like the carbolic baths.’ Daisy was with us for +a whole winter. When the spring came and the roads dried her father +called for her again. He couldn’t manage the little ones without her he +said. That was the last we saw of Daisy, though she wrote to us once +from Chipping Norton asking us for money.</p> + +<p>My pension was our only certain source of income, neither of us +having any private means of our own. The Government grant and college +exhibition had ended at the time we moved to Islip. I never made +more at this time than thirty pounds a year from my books of poetry +and anthology fees, with an occasional couple of guineas for poems +contributed to periodicals. There was another sixteen pounds a year +from the rent of the Harlech cottage and an odd guinea <span class="pagenum" id="Page_394" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 394</span>or two from +reviewing. My volumes of poetry did not sell. <cite>Fairies and Fusiliers</cite> +had gone into two editions because it was published in the war-years +when people were reading poetry as they had not done for many years. +The inclusion of my work in Edward Marsh’s <cite>Georgian Poetry</cite> had +made my name well known, but after 1919, when the series ended, it +was forgotten again. <cite>Country Sentiment</cite> was hardly noticed; the +<cite>Pier-Glass</cite> was also a failure. They were published by Martin Seeker, +not by Heinemann who had published <cite>Fairies and Fusiliers</cite>—William +Heinemann, just before he died, had tried to teach me how poetry should +be written and I resented it. These three books had been published in +America, where my name was known since John Masefield, Robert Nichols +and, finally, Siegfried Sassoon had gone to lecture about modern +English poetry. But English poets slumped, and it was eight years +before another book of my poems could find a publisher in America. In +these days I used to take the reviews of my poetry-books seriously. I +reckoned their effect on sales and so on the grocery bills. I still +believed that it was possible to write poetry that was true poetry +and yet could reach, say, a three or four thousand-copy sale. I +expected some such success. I consorted with other poets and had a +fellow-feeling for them. Beside Hardy, Siegfried, and the Boar’s Hill +residents, I knew Delamare, <abbr>W. H.</abbr> Davies, T. S. Eliot, the Sitwells +and many more. I liked <abbr>W. H.</abbr> Davies because he was from South Wales +and afraid of the dark, and because once, I heard, he made out a list +of poets and crossed them off one by one as he decided that they were +not true poets—until only two names were left. I approved the final +choice. Delamare I liked too. He was gentle and I could see how hard he +worked at his poems—I was always interested in the writing-technique +of <span class="pagenum" id="Page_395" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 395</span>my contemporaries. I once told him what hours of worry he must +have had over the lines:</p> + +<div class="poetry-container"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Ah, no man knows</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Through what wild centuries</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Roves back the rose;</div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + +<p class="noindent">and how, in the end, he had been dissatisfied. He admitted that he had +been forced to leave the assonance ‘Roves and rose,’ because no synonym +for ‘roves’ was strong enough. I seldom saw Osbert and Sacheverell +Sitwell after the war-years. When I did I always felt uncomfortably +rustic in their society. Once Osbert sent me a present of a brace of +grouse. They came from his country residence in Derbyshire in a bag +labelled: ‘With Captain Sitwell’s compliments to Captain Graves.’ Nancy +and I could neither of us face the task of plucking and gutting and +roasting the birds, so we gave them to a neighbour. I thanked Osbert: +‘Captain Graves acknowledges with thanks Captain Sitwell’s gift of +Captain Grouse.’</p> + +<p>Our total income, counting birthday and Christmas cheques from +relatives, was about one hundred and thirty pounds a year. As Nancy +reminded me, this was about fifty shillings a week and there were +farm labourers at Islip, with more children than we had, who only +got thirty shillings a week. They had a much harder time than we did +earning it and had no one to fall back on, as we had, in case of +sudden illness or other emergency. We used to get free holidays, too, +at Harlech, when my mother would insist on paying the train-fare as +well as giving us our board free. We really had nothing to complain +about. Thinking how difficult life was for the labourers’ wives kept +Nancy permanently <span class="pagenum" id="Page_396" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 396</span>depressed. I have omitted to mention a further +source of income—the Rupert Brooke Fund, of which Edward Marsh was the +administrator. Rupert Brooke had stated in his will that all royalties +accruing from any published work of his should be divided among needy +poets with families to support. When money was very short we would dip +into this bag.</p> + +<p>We still called ourselves socialists, but had become dissatisfied +with Parliamentary socialism. We had greater sympathy with communism, +though not members of the Communist Party. None the less, when a branch +of the Parliamentary Labour Party was formed in the village, we gave +the use of the cottage for its weekly meetings throughout the winter +months. Islip was a rich agricultural area; but with a reputation for +slut-farming. It did not pay the tenant farmers to farm too well. Mr. +Wise, one of our members, once heckled a speaker in the Conservative +interest about a protective duty imposed by the Conservative Government +on dried currants. The speaker answered patronizingly: ‘Well, surely a +duty on Greek currants won’t hurt you working men here at Islip? You +don’t grow currants in these parts, do you?’ ‘No, sir,’ replied Mr +Wise, ‘the farmers main crop hereabouts is squitch.’</p> + +<p>I was persuaded to stand for the parish council, and was a member +for a year. I wish I had taken records of the smothered antagonism +of the council meetings. There were seven members of the council, +with three representatives of labour and three representatives of +the farmers and gentry; the chairman was a farmer, a Liberal who had +Labour support as being a generous employer and the only farmer in +the neighbourhood who had had a training at an agricultural college. +He held the balance very fairly. We contended <span class="pagenum" id="Page_397" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 397</span>over a proposed +application to the district council for the building of new cottages. +Many returned ex-soldiers who wished to marry had nowhere to live with +their wives. The Conservative members opposed this because it would +mean a penny on the rates. Then there was the question of procuring a +recreation ground for the village. The football team did not wish to +be dependent on the generosity of one of the big farmers who rented it +to us at a nominal rate. The Conservatives opposed this again in the +interest of the rates, and pointed out that shortly after the Armistice +the village had turned down a recreation ground scheme, preferring +to spend the memorial subscription money on a cenotaph. The Labour +members pointed out that the vote was taken, as at the 1918 General +Election, before the soldiers had returned to express their view. Nasty +innuendoes were made about farmers who had stayed at home and made +their pile, while their labourers fought and bled. The chairman calmed +the antagonists. Another caricature scene: myself in corduroys and a +rough frieze coat, sitting in the village schoolroom (this time with +no ‘evils of alcoholism’ around the wall, but with nature-drawings +and mounted natural history specimens to take their place), debating +as an Oxfordshire village elder whether or not Farmer So-and-so was +justified in using a footpath across the allotments as a bridle-path, +disregarding the decayed stile which, I urged, disproved his right.</p> + +<p>My association with the Labour Party severed my relations with the +village gentry with whom, when I first came to the village, I had +been on friendly terms. My mother had been to the trouble of calling +on the rector when she viewed the property. I had even been asked by +the rector to speak from the chancel steps of the village church at a +war memorial service. He suggested that I should read poems about the +<span class="pagenum" id="Page_398" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 398</span>war. Instead of Rupert Brooke on the glorious dead, I read some +of the more painful poems of Sassoon and Wilfred Owen about men dying +of gas-poisoning and about buttocks of corpses bulging from the mud. +And I suggested that the men who had fallen, destroyed as it were by +the fall of the Tower of Siloam, had not been particularly virtuous or +particularly wicked, but just average soldiers, and that the survivors +should thank God that they were alive and do their best to avoid wars +in the future. The church-party, with the exception of the rector, an +intelligent man, was scandalized. But the ex-service men had not been +too well treated on their return and it pleased them to be reminded +that they were on equal terms with the glorious dead. They were modest +men: I noticed that though obeying the King’s desire to wear their +campaigning medals, they kept them buttoned up inside their coats.</p> + +<p>The leading Labour man of the village was William Beckley, senior. +He had an inherited title dating from the time of Cromwell: he was +known as ‘Fisher’ Beckley. A direct ancestor had been fishing on the +Cherwell during the siege of Oxford, and had ferried Cromwell himself +and a body of Parliamentary troops over the river. In return Cromwell +had given him perpetual fishing-rights from Islip to the stretch of +river where the Cherwell Hotel now stands. The cavalry skirmish at +Islip bridge still remained in local tradition, and a cottager at the +top of the hill showed me a small stone cannon-ball, fired on that +occasion, that he had found sticking in his chimney-stack. But even +Cromwell came late in the history of the Beckley family; the Beckleys +were watermen on the river long before the seventeenth century. Indeed +Fisher Beckley knew, by family tradition, the exact spot where a barge +was sunk conveying stone for <span class="pagenum" id="Page_399" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 399</span>the building of Westminster Abbey. +Islip was the birthplace of Edward the Confessor, and the Islip lands +had been given by him to the Abbey; it was still Abbey property after +a thousand years. The Abbey stone had been quarried from the side of +the hill close to the river; our cottage was on the old slip-way down +which the stone-barges had been launched. Some time in the ’seventies +American weed was introduced into the river and made netting difficult; +fishing finally became unprofitable. Fisher Beckley had been for many +years now an agricultural labourer. His socialist views prevented him +from getting employment in the village, so he had to trudge to work to +a farm some miles out. But he was still Fisher Beckley and, among us +cottagers, the most respected man in Islip.</p> +</section> + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> + +<section role="doc-chapter" aria-labelledby="c30-hd"> +<div class="chapter"> +<div class="pagenum" id="Page_400" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 400</div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="c30-hd">XXX</h2> +</div> + +<p class="chap_start"><b class="smcap">My</b> parents were most disappointed when I failed to sit for my Oxford +finals. But through the kindness of Sir Walter Raleigh, the head of the +English School, I was excused finals as I had been excused everything +else, and allowed to proceed to the later degree of Bachelor of +Letters. Instead of estimating, at the examiners’ request, the effect +of the influence of Dryden on pastoral poets of the early eighteenth +century, or tracing the development of the sub-plot in Elizabethan +comedies between the years 1583 and 1594, I was allowed to offer a +written thesis on a subject of my own choice. Sir Walter Raleigh was a +good friend to me. He agreed to be my tutor on condition that he should +not be expected to tutor me. He liked my poetry, and suggested that we +should only meet as friends. He was engaged at the time on the official +history of the war in the air and found it necessary to have practical +flying experience for the task. The <abbr title="Royal Air Force">R.A.F.</abbr> took him up as often as he +needed. It was on a flight out East that he got typhoid fever and died. +I was so saddened by his death that it was some time before I thought +again about my thesis, and I did not apply for another tutor. The +subject I had offered was <cite>The Illogical Element in English Poetry</cite>. +I had already written a prose book, <cite>On English Poetry</cite>, a series of +‘workshop notes’ about the writing of poetry. It contained much trivial +but also much practical material, and emphasized the impossibility of +writing poetry of ‘universal appeal.’ I regarded poetry as, first, a +personal cathartic for the poet suffering from some inner conflict, +and then as a cathartic for readers in a similar conflict. I made a +tentative connection between poetry and dream in the light of the +dream-psychology <span class="pagenum" id="Page_401" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 401</span>in which I was then interested as a means of +curing myself.</p> + +<p>The thesis did not work out like a thesis. I found it difficult to keep +to an academic style and decided to write it as if it were an ordinary +book. Anyhow, I could expect no knowledge of or sympathy with modern +psychology from the literature committee that would read it. I rewrote +it in all nine times, and it was unsatisfactory when finished. I was +trying to show the nature of the supra-logical element in poetry. It +was only, I wrote, to be fully understood by close analysis of the +latent associations of the words used; the obvious prose meaning was +often in direct opposition to the latent content. The weakness of the +book lay in its not clearly distinguishing between the supra-logical +thought-processes of poetry and of pathology. Before it appeared I +had published <cite>The Meaning of Dreams</cite>, which was intended to be a +popular shillingsworth for the railway bookstall; but I went to the +wrong publisher and he issued it at five shillings. Being too simply +written for the informed public, and too expensive for the ignorant +public to which it was addressed, it fell flat; as indeed it deserved. +I published a volume of poems every year between 1920 and 1925; after +<cite>The Pier-Glass</cite>, published in 1921, I made no attempt to write for +the ordinary reading public, and no longer regarded my work as being +of public utility. I did not even flatter myself that I was conferring +benefits on posterity; there was no reason to suppose that posterity +would be more appreciative than my contemporaries. I only wrote when +and because there was a poem pressing to be written. Though I assumed +a reader of intelligence and sensibility and considered his possible +reactions to what I wrote, I no longer identified him with contemporary +readers or critics of poetry. He was <span class="pagenum" id="Page_402" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 402</span>no more real a person than +the conventional figure put in the foreground of an architectural +design to indicate the size of the building. As a result of this +greater strictness of writing I was soon accused of trying to get +publicity and increase my sales by a wilful clowning modernism. Of +these books, <cite>Whipperginny</cite>, published in 1923, showed the first signs +of my new psychological studies.</p> + +<p><cite>Mock-Beggar Hall</cite>, published in 1924, was almost wholly philosophical. +As Lawrence wrote to me when I sent it to him, it was ‘not the sort of +book that one would put under one’s pillow at night.’ This philosophic +interest was a result of my meeting with Basanta Mallik, when I was +reading a paper to an undergraduate society. One of the results of +my education was a strong prejudice, amounting to contempt, against +anyone of non-European race; the Jews, though with certain exceptions +such as Siegfried, were included in this prejudice. But I had none +of my usual feelings with Basanta. He did not behave as a member of +a subject-race—neither with excessive admiration nor with excessive +hatred of all things English. Though he was a Bengali he was not given +to flattery or insolence. I found on inquiry that he belonged to a +family of high caste. His father had become converted to Christianity +and signalized his freedom from Hindu superstition by changing his +diet; meat and alcohol, untouched by his ancestors for some two +thousand years, soon brought about his death. Basanta had been brought +up in the care of a still unconverted grandmother, but did not have +the strict Hindu education that the boy of caste is given by his male +relatives. He was sent to Calcutta University and, some years before +the war, after taking a law degree, was given the post of assistant +tutor to the children of the Maharajah of Nepal. In Nepal he came to +the notice of the <span class="pagenum" id="Page_403" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 403</span>Maharajah as one of the few members of the Court +not concerned in a plot against his life, and was promoted to chief +tutor.</p> + +<p>The relations between Nepal and India were strained at this time. +Basanta was the only man in Nepal with an up-to-date knowledge of +international law. His advice ultimately enabled the Maharajah to +induce the British to sign the 1923 treaty recognizing the complete +independence of the country, which had for many years been threatened +with British protection. Under the terms of this treaty, no foreigners +might enter Nepal except at the personal invitation of the Maharajah. +The Maharajah had sent Basanta over to England to study British +political psychology; this knowledge might be useful in the event of +future misunderstandings between Nepal and India. He had now been some +eleven years in Oxford but, becoming a philosopher and making many +friends, had overcome his long-standing grudge against the British.</p> + +<p>Basanta used to come out to Islip frequently to talk philosophy +with us. With him came Sam Harries, a young Balliol scholar, who +soon became our closest friend. Metaphysics soon made psychology of +secondary interest for me: it threatened almost to displace poetry. +Basanta’s philosophy was a development of formal metaphysics, but +with characteristically Indian insistence on ethics. He believed in +no hierarchy of ultimate values or the possibility of any unifying +religion or ideology. But at the same time he insisted on the necessity +of strict self-discipline in the individual in meeting every possible +demand made upon him from whatever quarter, and he recommended constant +self-watchfulness against either dominating or being dominated by any +other individual. This view of strict personal morality consistent +<span class="pagenum" id="Page_404" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 404</span>with scepticism of social morality agreed very well with my +practice. He returned to India in 1923 and considered taking an +appointment in Nepal, but decided that to do so would put him in a +position incompatible with his philosophy. He would have returned +to Oxford but a friend had died, leaving him to support a typical +large Hindu family of aunts and cousins remotely related. We missed +Basanta’s visits, but Sam Harries used to come out regularly. Sam was +a communist, an atheist, enthusiastic about professional football +(Aston Villa was his favourite team) and experimental films, and most +puritanical in matters of sex.</p> + +<p>Other friends were not numerous. Edith Sitwell was one of them. +It was a surprise, after reading her poems, to find her gentle, +domesticated, and even devout. When she came to stay with us she spent +her time sitting on the sofa and hemming handkerchiefs. She used to +write to Nancy and me frequently, but 1926 ended the friendship. 1926 +was yesterday, when the autobiographical part of my life was fast +approaching its end. I saw no more of any of my army friends, with the +exception of Siegfried, and meetings with him were now only about once +a year. Edmund Blunden had gone as professor of English Literature +to Tokyo. Lawrence was now in the Royal Tank Corps. He had enlisted +in the Royal Air Force when he came to the end of things after the +Middle-Eastern settlement of 1921, but had been forced to leave it +when a notice was given of a question in the House about his presence +there under an assumed name. When Sir Walter Raleigh died I felt my +connection with Oxford University was broken, and when Rivers died, +and George Mallory on Everest, it seemed as though the death of my +friends was following me in peace-time as <span class="pagenum" id="Page_405" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 405</span>relentlessly as in war. +Basanta had spoken of getting an invitation from the Maharajah for us +to visit Nepal with him but, when he found it impossible to resume his +work there, the idea lapsed. Sam went to visit him in India in 1924; +his reputation as a communist followed him there. He wrote that he +was tagged by policemen wherever he went in Calcutta; but they need +not have worried. A week or two after his arrival he died of cerebral +malaria. After Sam’s death our friendship with Basanta gradually +failed. India re-absorbed him and we changed.</p> + +<p>There came one more death among our friends; a girl who had been a +friend of Sam’s at Oxford and had married another friend at Balliol. +They used to come out together to Islip with Basanta and talk +philosophy. She died in childbirth. There had been insufficient care +in the pre-natal period and a midwife attended the case without having +sterilized her hands after attending an infectious case. Deaths in +childbirth had as particular horror for me now as they had for Nancy. +I had assisted the midwife at the birth of Sam, our fourth child, and +could not have believed that a natural process like birth could be so +abominable in its pain and extravagant messiness. Many deaths and a +feeling of bad luck clouded these years. Islip was no longer a country +refuge. I found myself resorting to my war-time technique of getting +through things somehow, anyhow, in the hope that they would mend. Nancy +was in poor health and able to do less and less work. Our finances had +been improved by an allowance from Nancy’s father that covered the +extra expense of the new children—we now had about two hundred pounds +a year—but I decided that cottage life with four of them under six +years old, and Nancy ill, was not good enough. I would have, after all, +to take a job. Nancy <span class="pagenum" id="Page_406" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 406</span>and I had always sworn that we would manage +somehow so that this would not be necessary.</p> + +<p>The only possible job that I could undertake was teaching. But I +needed a degree, so I completed my thesis, which I published under +the title of <cite>Poetic Unreason</cite> and handed in, when in print, to the +examining board. I was most surprized when they accepted it and I had +my bachelor’s degree. But the problem of an appointment remained, I +did not want a preparatory or secondary-school job which would keep me +away from home all day. Nancy did not want anyone else but myself and +her looking after the children, so there seemed no solution. And then +the doctor told Nancy that if she wished to regain her health she must +spend the winter in Egypt. In fact, the only appointment that would +be at all suitable would be a teaching job in Egypt, at a very high +salary, where there was little work to do. And a week or two later +(for this is the way things have always happened to me in emergencies) +I was asked to offer myself as a candidate for the post of professor +of English Literature at the newly-founded Egyptian University at +Cairo. I had been recommended, I found out later, by two or three +influential friends, among them Arnold Bennett, who has always been a +good friend to me, and Lawrence, who had served in the war with Lord +Lloyd, the then High Commissioner of Egypt. The salary amounted, with +the passage money, to fourteen hundred pounds a year. I fortified these +recommendations with others, from my neighbour, Colonel John Buchan, +and from the Earl of Oxford, who had taken a fatherly interest in me +and often visited Islip. And so was given the appointment.</p> + +<p>Among other books written in the Islip period were two essays on +contemporary poetry. I then held the view that <span class="pagenum" id="Page_407" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 407</span>there was not such +a thing as poetry of constant value; I regarded it as a product of +its period only having relevance in a limited context. I regarded all +poetry, in a philosophic sense, as of equal merit, though admitting +that at any given time pragmatic distinctions could be drawn between +such poems as embodied the conflicts and syntheses of the time and were +therefore charged with contemporary sagacity, and such as were literary +hang-overs from a preceding period and were therefore inept. I was, in +fact, finding only extrinsic values for poetry. I found psychological +reasons why poems of a particular sort appealed to a particular class +of reader, surviving even political, economic, and religious change. I +published two other books. One was waste—a ballad-opera called <cite>John +Kemp’s Wager</cite>. It marked the end of what I may call the folk-song +period of my life. It was an artificial simple play for performance +by village societies and has been once performed, in California. The +newspaper cuttings that I was sent described it as delightfully English +and quaint. A better book was <cite>My Head, My Head</cite>, a romance on the +story of Elijah and the Shunamite woman. It was an ingenious attempt +to repair the important omissions in the biblical story; but like all +the other prose-books that I had written up to this time it failed in +its chief object, which was to sell. During this period I was willing +to undertake almost any writing job to bring in money. I wrote a series +of rhymes for a big map-advertisement for Huntley & Palmer’s biscuits +(I was paid, but the rhymes never appeared); and silly lyrics for a +light opera, <cite>Lord Clancarty</cite>, for which I was not paid, because the +opera was never staged; and translations from Dutch and German carols; +and rhymes for children’s Christmas annuals; and edited three sixpenny +pamphlets of verse for Benn’s popular series—selections <span class="pagenum" id="Page_408" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 408</span>from +Skelton’s poems, and from my own, and a collection of the less +familiar nursery rhymes. I did some verse-reviewing for the <cite>Nation</cite> +and <cite>Athenæum</cite>, but by 1925 I found it more and more difficult to be +patient with dud books of poetry. And they all seemed to be dud now. I +had agreed to collaborate with <abbr>T. S.</abbr> Eliot in a book about modernist +poetry to which we were each to contribute essays, but the plan fell +through; and later I was glad that it had.</p> + +<p>I also made several attempts during these years to rid myself of the +poison of war-memories by finishing my novel, but I had to abandon +them. It was not only that they brought back neurasthenia, but that +I was ashamed at having distorted my material with a plot, and yet +not sure enough of myself to retranslate it into undisguised history. +If my scruples had been literary and not moral I could easily have +compromised, as many writers have since done, with a pretended diary +stylistically disguising characters, times, and dates. I had found the +same difficulty in my last year at Charterhouse with a projected novel +of public-school life.</p> +</section> + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> + +<section role="doc-chapter" aria-labelledby="c31-hd"> +<div class="chapter"> +<div class="pagenum" id="Page_409" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 409</div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="c31-hd">XXXI</h2> +</div> + +<p class="chap_start"><b class="smcap">So</b>, second-class, by <abbr title="The Peninsular and Oriental Steam Navigation Company">P. & O.</abbr> to Egypt, with a nurse for the children, +a new wardrobe in the new cabin-trunks and a good-looking motor-car in +the hold. Lawrence had written to me:</p> + +<div class="blockquot"> +<p>Egypt, being so near Europe, is not a savage country. The Egyptians +... you need not dwell among. Indeed, it will be a miracle if an +Englishman can get to know them. The bureaucrat society is exclusive, +and lives smilingly unaware of the people. Partly because so many +foreigners come there for pleasure, in the winter; and the other +women, who live there, must be butterflies too, if they would consort +with the visitors.</p> + +<p>I thought the salary attractive. It has just been raised. The work +may be interesting, or may be terrible, according to whether you get +keen on it, like Hearn, or hate it, like Nichols. Even if you hate +it, there will be no harm done. The climate is good, the country +beautiful, the things admirable, the beings curious and disgusting; +and you are stable enough not to be caught broadside by a mere +dislike for your job. Execute it decently, as long as you draw the +pay, and enjoy your free hours (plentiful in Egypt) more freely. +Lloyd will be a good friend.</p> + +<p>Roam about—Palestine. The Sahara oases. The Red Sea province. Sinai +(a jolly desert). The Delta Swamps. Wilfred Jennings Bramly’s +buildings in the Western Desert. The divine mosque architecture of +Cairo town.</p> + +<p>Yet, possibly, you will not dislike the job. I think the coin spins +evenly. The harm to you is little, for the family will benefit by +a stay in the warm (Cairo isn’t warm, in winter) and the job won’t +drive you into frantic excesses <span class="pagenum" id="Page_410" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 410</span>of rage. And the money will be +useful. You should save a good bit of your pay after the expense of +the first six months. I recommend the iced coffee at Groppi’s.</p> + +<p>And so, my blessing.</p> +</div> + +<p>I had a married half-brother and half-sister in Cairo who had both +been there since I was a little boy. My brother, a leading Government +official (at a salary less than my own), and his wife viewed my +coming to Egypt, I heard, with justifiable alarm. They had heard of +my political opinions. My sister, to whom I was devoted, had no such +suspicions and wrote a letter of most affectionate welcome. Siegfried +came to see me off. He said: ‘Do you know who’s on board? “The +Image!” He’s still in the regiment, going to join the battalion in +India. Last time I saw him he was sitting in the bottom of a dug-out +gnawing a chunk of bully-beef like a rat.’ The Image had been at my +last preparatory school and had won a scholarship at the same time as +myself; and we had been at Wrexham and Liverpool together; and he had +been wounded with the Second Battalion at High Wood at the same time +as myself; and now we were travelling out East together. A man with +whom I had nothing in common; there was no natural reason why we should +have been thrown so often in each other’s company. The ship touched +at Gibraltar, where we disembarked and bought figs and rode round the +town. I remembered the cancelled War Office telegram and thought what +a fool I had been to prefer Rhyl. At Port Said a friend of my sister’s +helped us through the Customs; I was feeling very sea-sick, but I knew +that I was in the East because he began talking about Kipling and +Kipling’s wattles of Lichtenburg, and whether they were really wattles +or some allied plant. And so to Cairo, looking <span class="pagenum" id="Page_411" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 411</span>out of the windows +all the way, delighted at summer fields in January.</p> + +<p>My sister-in-law advised us against the more exclusive residential +suburb of Gizereh, where she had just taken a flat herself, so with +her help we found one at Heliopolis, a few miles east of Cairo. We +found the cost of living very high, for this was the tourist season. +But I was able to reduce the grocery bill by taking advantage of the +more reasonable prices of the British army canteen; I presented myself +as an officer on the pension list. We had two Sudanese servants, and, +contrary to all that we had been warned about native servants, they +were temperate, punctual, respectful, and never, to my knowledge, stole +a thing beyond the remains of a single joint of mutton. It seemed queer +to me not to look after the children or do housework, and almost too +good to be true to have as much time as I needed for my writing.</p> + +<p>The University was an invention of King Fuad’s, who had always been +anxious to be known as a patron of the arts and sciences. There had +been a Cairo University before this one, but it had been nationalistic +in its policy and, not being directed by European experts or supported +by the Government, had soon come to an end. The new University had +been planned ambitiously. There were faculties of science, medicine +and letters, with a full complement of highly-paid professors; +only one or two of these were Egyptian, the rest being English, +Swedish, French and Belgian. The medicine and science faculties were +predominantly English, but the appointments to the faculty of letters +were predominantly French. They had been made in the summer months +when the British High Commissioner was out of Egypt, or he would no +doubt have discountenanced them. Only one of the French and Belgian +<span class="pagenum" id="Page_412" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 412</span>professors had any knowledge of English, and none of them had +any knowledge of Arabic. Of the two hundred Egyptian students, who +were mostly the sons of rich merchants and landowners, fewer than +twenty had more than a smattering of French—just enough for shopping +purposes—though they had all learned English in the secondary schools. +All official university correspondence was in Arabic. I was told +that it was classical Arabic, in which no word is admitted that is +of later date than Mohammed, but I could not tell the difference. +The ‘very learned Sheikh’ Graves had to take his letters to the post +office for interpretation. My twelve or thirteen French colleagues +were men of the highest academic distinction. But two or three English +village-schoolmasters would have been glad to have undertaken their +work at one-third of their salaries and done it far better. The +University building had been a harem-palace of the Khedive. It was +French in style, with mirrors and gilding.</p> + +<p>British officials at the Ministry of Education told me that I must keep +the British flag flying in the faculty of letters. This embarrassed +me. I had not come to Egypt as an ambassador of Empire, and yet I did +not intend to let the French indulge in semi-political activities at +my expense. The dean, <abbr>M.</abbr> Grégoire, was a Belgian, an authority on +Slav poetry. He was tough, witty, and ran his show very plausibly. He +had acquired a certain slyness and adaptability during the war when, +as a civilian in Belgium under German occupation, he had edited an +underground anti-German publication. The professor of French Literature +had lost a leg in France. He greeted me at first in a patronizing way: +I was his young friend rather than his dear colleague. But as soon +as he learned that I also had bled in the cause of <span class="pagenum" id="Page_413" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 413</span>civilization +and France I became his most esteemed chum. The Frenchmen lectured, +but with the help of Arabic interpreters, which did not make either +for speed or accuracy. I found that I was expected to give two +lectures a week, but the dean soon decided that if the students were +ever to dispense with the interpreters they must be given special +instruction in French—which reduced the time for lectures, so that I +had only one a week to give. This one was pandemonium. The students +were not hostile, merely excitable and anxious to show their regard +for me and liberty and Zaghlul Pasha and the well-being of Egypt, +all at the same time. I often had to shout at the top of my loudest +barrack-square voice to restore order. They had no textbooks of any +sort; there were no English books in the University library, and it +took months to get any through the French librarian. This was January +and they were due for an examination in May. They were most anxious +to master Shakespeare, Byron, and Wordsworth in that time. I had no +desire to teach Wordsworth and Byron to anyone, and I wished to protect +Shakespeare from them. I decided to lecture on the most rudimentary +forms of literature possible. I chose the primitive ballad and its +development into epic and the drama. I thought that this would at least +teach them the meaning of the simpler literary terms. But English was +not easy for them, though they had learned it for eight years or so +in the schools. Nobody, for instance, when I spoke of a ballad-maker +singing to his harp, knew what a harp was. I told them it was what +King David played upon, and drew a picture of it on the blackboard; +at which they shouted out: ‘O, <i>anur</i>.’ But they thought it beneath +their dignity to admit the existence of ballads in Egypt; though I had +myself seen the communal ballad-group in action at the hind legs of +the <span class="pagenum" id="Page_414" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 414</span>Sphinx, where a gang of fellaheen was clearing away the sand. +One of the gang was a chanty-man: his whole job was to keep the others +moving. The fellaheen did not exist for the students; they thought of +them as animals. They were most anxious to be given printed notes of my +lectures with which to prepare themselves for the examinations. I tried +to make the clerical staff of the faculty duplicate some for me, but in +spite of promises I never got them done. My lectures in the end became +a dictation of lecture-notes for lectures that could not be given—this, +at any rate, kept the students busy.</p> + +<p>They were interested in my clothes. My trousers were the first Oxford +trousers that they had seen in Egypt; their own were narrow at the +ankles. So I set a new fashion. One evening I went to dine with the +rector of the University. Two of my students, sons of Ministers, +happened also to be invited. They noticed that I was wearing white silk +socks with my evening dress. Later I heard from the vice-rector, Ali +Bey Omar, whom I liked best of the University officials, that a day +or two later he had seen the same students at a Government banquet, +wearing white silk socks. When they looked round on the distinguished +assembly they found that they were the only white socks present. Ali +Bey Omar gave a pantomime account of how they tried to loosen their +braces surreptitiously and stroke down their trousers to hide their +shame.</p> + +<p>For some weeks I missed even my single hour a week, because the +students went on strike. It was Ramadan, and they had to fast for a +month between sunrise and sunset. Between sunset and sunrise they +ate rather more than usual in compensation, and this dislocation of +their digestive processes had a bad effect on their nerves. I have +forgotten <span class="pagenum" id="Page_415" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 415</span>the pretext for the strike: it was some trouble about +the intensive French instruction. The fact was that they wanted leisure +at home to read up their notes of the earlier work of the term in +preparation for the examination. The Professor of Arabic, who was one +of the few Egyptians with a reputation as an orientalist, published +a book calling attention to pre-Islamic sources of the Koran. His +lectures, delivered in Arabic, demanded more exertion from them than +any of the others, so when the examination came round most of them +absented themselves from the Arabic paper on religious grounds. To +an orthodox Mohammedan the Koran, being dictated by God, can have no +pre-Islamic sources.</p> + +<p>I came to know only two of my students fairly well; one was a Greek, +the other a Turk. The Turk was an intelligent, good-natured young +man, perhaps twenty years old. He was very rich, and had a motor-car +in which he twice took me for a drive to the Pyramids. He talked both +French and English fluently, being about the only one (except for +twelve who had attended a French Jesuit college) who could do so. He +told me one day that he would not be able to attend my next lecture as +he was going to be married. I asked him whether this was the first or +second part of the ceremony; he said it was the first. When he returned +he told me that he had not yet been allowed to see the face of his +wife, because her family was orthodox; he would only see it at the +second ceremony. But his sister had been at school with her and said +that she was pretty and a good sort; and her father was a friend of +his father’s. Later, the second ceremony took place, and he confessed +himself perfectly satisfied. I learned that it seldom happened that +when the veil was lifted the bridegroom refused the bride, though he +had the right to do so; she had a similar right. Usually <span class="pagenum" id="Page_416" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 416</span>the +couple contrived to meet before even the first ceremony, The girl +would slip the man a note saying: ‘I shall be at Maison Cicurel at the +hat-counter at three-thirty to-morrow I afternoon if you want to see +me. It will be quite in order for me to lift my veil to try on a hat. +You will recognize me by my purple parasol.’</p> + +<p>I inquired about the rights of Mohammedan women in Egypt. Apparently +divorce was simple; the man only had to say in the presence of a +witness: ‘I divorce you, I divorce you, I divorce you,’ and she was +divorced. On the other hand she was entitled to take her original +dowry back with her, with the interest that had accrued on it during +her married life. Dowries were always heavy and divorces comparatively +rare. It was considered very low-class to have more than one wife; +that was a fellaheen habit. I was told a story of an Egyptian who +was angry with his wife one morning because the breakfast-coffee was +badly made. He shouted out: ‘I divorce you, I divorce you, I divorce +you.’ ‘Oh, my dear,’ she said, ‘now you’ve done it. The servants have +heard what you said. I must go back to my father with my ten thousand +pounds and my sixty camels.’ He apologized for his hasty temper. ‘We +must be remarried,’ he said, ‘as soon as possible.’ She reminded him +that the law prevented them from marrying again unless there were an +intermediate marriage. So he called in a very old man who was watering +the lawn and ordered him to marry her. He was to understand that it +was a marriage of form only. So the gardener married the woman and, +immediately after the ceremony, returned to his watering-pot. Two days +later the woman died, and the gardener inherited the money and the +camels.</p> + +<p>The Greek invited me to tea once. He had three beautiful <span class="pagenum" id="Page_417" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 417</span>sisters +named Pallas, Aphrodite, and Artemis. They gave me tea in the garden +with European cakes that they had learned to make at the American +college. Next door a pale-faced man stood on a third-floor balcony +addressing the world. I asked Pallas what he was saying: ‘Oh,’ she +said, ‘don’t mind him; he’s a millionaire, so the police leave him +alone. He’s quite mad. He lived ten years in England. He’s saying now +that they’re burning him up with electricity, and he’s telling the +birds all his troubles. He says that his secretary accuses him of +stealing five piastres from him, and it isn’t true. Now he’s saying +that there can’t be a God because God wouldn’t allow the English to +steal the fellaheen’s camels for the war and not return them. Now he’s +saying that all religions are very much the same, and that Buddha is +as good as Mohammed. But really,’ she said, ‘he’s quite mad. He keeps +a little dog in his house, actually in his very room, and plays with +it and talks to it as though it were a human being.’ (Dogs are unclean +in Egypt.) She told me that in another twenty years the women of Egypt +would be in control of everything. The feminist movement had just +started, and as the women of Egypt were by far the most active and +intelligent part of the population, great changes were to be expected. +She said that neither she nor her sisters would stand her father’s +attempts to keep them in their places. Her brother showed me his +library. He was doing the arts-course as a preliminary to law. Besides +his legal textbooks he had Voltaire, Rousseau, a number of saucy French +novels in paper covers, Shakespeare’s works and Samuel Smiles’ <cite>Self +Help</cite>, a book which I had never met before. He asked my advice about +his career, and I advised him to go to a European university because an +arts degree at Cairo would be of little advantage to him.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_418" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 418</span>I did not pay an official call at the Residency at first, though +my brother urged it as etiquette; I decided not to until I had seen +how things were at the University. I had not realized before to what +extent the British were in power in Egypt. I had been told that Egypt +was an independent kingdom, but it seemed that my principal allegiance +was not to the King who had given me my appointment and paid me my +salary, but to the British High Commissioner. Infantry, cavalry, and +air squadrons were a reminder of his power. The British officials could +not understand the Egyptians’ desire to be rid of them. They considered +Egypt most ungrateful for all the painful and difficult administrative +work that they had put into it since the ’eighties, raising it from +a bankrupt country to one of the richest in the world. None of them +took Egyptian nationalism seriously; there was no Egyptian nation they +said. The Greeks, Turks, Syrians, and Armenians who called themselves +Egyptians had no more right in the country than the British. Before the +British occupation they had bled the fellaheen white. The fellaheen +were the only true Egyptians, and it was not they who called for +freedom. Freedom was mere politics, a symptom of the growing riches +of the country and the smatterings of Western education that they had +brought with them. The reduction of the British official class in the +last few years was viewed with disgust. ‘We did all the hard work and +when we go everything will run down; it’s running down already. And +they’ll have to call us back, or if not us, the dagoes, and we don’t +see why they should benefit.’ They did not realize how much the vanity +of the Egyptians—probably the vainest people in the world—was hurt by +the constant sight of British uniform.</p> + +<p>Egypt now considered itself a European nation. At the <span class="pagenum" id="Page_419" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 419</span>same time +it attempted to take the place of Turkey as the leading power of +Islam. This led to many anomalies. On the same day that the University +students made the protest against the professor of Arabic’s irreligious +views, the students of El Azhar, the great Cairo theological college, +struck against having to wear the Arab dress of kaftan and silk +headdress and appeared in European dress and tarbouche. The tarbouche +was the national hat; even British officials wore it. I myself had +a tarbouche. Being red it attracted the heat of the sun; and it was +stuffy inside and did not protect the back of the head. It would have +been difficult to find a hat more unsuitable for the climate.</p> +</section> + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> + +<section role="doc-chapter" aria-labelledby="c32-hd"> +<div class="chapter"> +<div class="pagenum" id="Page_420" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 420</div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="c32-hd">XXXII</h2> +</div> + +<p class="chap_start"><b class="smcap">I did</b> two useful pieces of educational work in Egypt. I ordered a +library of standard textbooks of English literature for the Faculty +Library at the University (from which I hope Mr. Bonamy Dobrée, my +successor, profited). And I acted as examiner to the diploma class +of the Higher Training College which provided English teachers for +the primary and secondary schools. The following is the substance of +a letter handed to me for information as a member of the Board of +Examiners concerned:</p> + +<blockquote> +<p class="hanging-indent"><b class="smcap">To The Principal,<br> +Higher Training College, Cairo.</b></p> + +<p class="noindent"><b class="smcap">Sir</b>,</p> + +<p>In accordance with your instructions, I beg to submit the following +statement of the works read by the Diploma Class for the forthcoming +examination in English Literature (1580 to 1788) and in Science:</p> + +<p class="center mt2">ENGLISH LITERATURE</p> + +<ol> + <li>Shakespeare’s <cite>Macbeth</cite>.</li> + <li>Lobban’s <cite>The Spectator Club</cite>, p. 39, and <cite>Sir Roger and the +Widow</cite>, p. 51; (111) 5 Essays of Addison, <cite>Fans</cite>, p. 64; <cite>The Vision +of Mirza</cite>, p. 72; <cite>Sir Roger at the Assizes</cite>, p. 68; <cite>Sir Roger at +the Abbey</cite>, p. 81; <cite>Sir Roger at the Play</cite>, p. 86.</li> + <li>Galsworthy’s <cite>Justice</cite>.</li> + <li>Dryden: + <ol class="low_alpha"> + <li class="italic"><span class="normal">With Class 4A, the following poems in Hales’ <cite>Longer English Poems</cite>:</span> + <ol class="low_roman"> + <li><span class="normal"><span class="pagenum" id="Page_421" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 421</span><cite>Mac Flecknoe</cite> (omitting lines 76–77; 83–86; 142–145; + 154–155; 160–165; 170–181; 192–197).</span></li> + <li><cite>The Song for St. Cecilia’s Day</cite> <span class="normal">(Hales’, p. 32).</span></li> + <li><cite>Alexander’s Feast</cite> <span class="normal">(Hales’, p. 34).</span></li> + </ol> + </li> + <li class="italic"><span class="normal">With Class 4<span class="smcap">b</span>, the extracts from <cite>Absolam and + Achitophel</cite>, in Gwynn’s <cite>Masters of English Literature</cite>, p. 144–145 + (characters of Shaftesbury and Buckingham).</span> + </li> + </ol> + </li> + <li>Pope: + <ol class="low_alpha"> + <li class="italic"><span class="normal">With 4<span class="smcap">a</span>, in Hales’ Longer English Poems: The Rape of the + Lock (omitting lines 27–104; 221–282; 449–466; 483 to the end).</span> + </li> + <li class="italic"><span class="normal">With 4<span class="smcap">b</span>, the character of ‘Atticus,’ in Gwynn’s Masters + of Eng. Lit., p. 181.</span> + </li> + </ol> + </li> + <li>Johnson’s <cite>Vanity of Human Wishes</cite>, in Hales’, p. 65 (omitting + lines 241–343). + </li> + <li>Goldsmith’s <cite>Vicar of Wakefield</cite>. (All done by 4<span class="smcap">a</span>; but + only to the end of chap. 19 in 4<span class="smcap">b</span>.) + </li> + <li>Goldsmith’s <cite>The Traveller</cite>, in Hales’, p. 91. + </li> + <li>Gray’s <cite>Elegy</cite>, in Hales’, p. 79. + </li> +</ol> + +<p>I regret that lack of time has prevented us from studying the works +of Milton and Spenser or the prose works of Dr. Johnson.</p> + +<p class="center">SCIENCE</p> +<ol> + <li>Episodes 1, 2, 3 and 6 of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s <cite>Memoirs of + Sherlock Holmes</cite>.</li> + <li>The first seven chapters of Sir Ray Lankester’s <cite>Science from an + Easy Chair</cite>.</li> +</ol> + +<div class="poetry-container"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza1"> + <div class="verse indent0">I have the honour to be, Sir,</div> + <div class="verse indent1">Your obedient servant, etc.</div> + + </div> + </div> +</div> + +</blockquote> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_422" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 422</span>These are my contemporary comments, pinned to the letter:</p> + +<p>‘When some forty years ago England superseded France as the controlling +European Power in Egypt, English was at first taught in the schools +as an alternative to French, but gradually became dominant as the +European administrative language, though French remained the chief +language of commerce and culture. As a result, the young Egyptian, +who now definitely claims himself a European and denies his African +inheritance, has come to have two distinct minds (switched off and on +casually)—the irresponsible hedonistic café and cinema mind, which +leans towards French, and the grave moralizing bureaucratic mind, which +leans towards English. Early English educationalists in Egypt shrewdly +decided to give their students a moralistic character-forming view of +English literature; and this tradition continues as a counterpoise +to the boulevard view of life absorbed from translations of French +yellow-back novels. But the student of 1926 is not so well-instructed +in English as his predecessor of ten years ago, because the English +educational staff has gradually been liquidated, and the teaching of +English is now principally in the hands of Egyptians, former students, +who are not born teachers or disciplinarians. The Western spirit of +freedom as naively interpreted by the Egyptian student greatly hinders +Egyptian education. The primary and secondary schools, not to mention +the University, are always either on strike, threatening a strike, or +prevented from striking by being given a holiday. So work gets more +and more behindhand. Even the Higher Training College is not free from +such disturbances, which possibly account for the regretted neglect of +<span class="pagenum" id="Page_423" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 423</span>Milton, Spenser, and the prose works of Dr. Johnson. This Diploma +Class consists of students who, after some twelve years’ study of +English, the last four or five years under English instructors, are now +qualifying to teach the language and literature to their compatriots.</p> + +<p>‘The Egyptian student is embarrassingly friendly, very quick at +learning by heart, disorderly, lazy, rhetorical, slow to reason, and +absolutely without any curiosity for general knowledge. The most +satisfactory way to treat him is with a good-humoured sarcasm, which he +respects; but if he once gets politically excited nothing is any use +but an affected violent loss of temper. When introduced to the simpler +regions of English literature he finds himself most in sympathy with +the eighteenth century; and the English instructor, if he wishes to get +any results at all, must be ready to regard Shakespeare, Galsworthy and +Conan Doyle as either immature or decadent figures in relation to the +classical period. The <em>Science</em> referred to in the attached letter is +supposed to educate the student in twentieth-century rationalism, to +which he gives an eighteenth-century cast. The following essay is the +work of one Mahmoud Mohammed Mahmoud of the Diploma Class, and refers +principally to two chapters of Sir Ray Lankester’s <cite>Science from an +Easy Chair</cite>:</p> + +<blockquote> +<p class="center"><b class="smcap">Environment as a Factor in Evolution</b></p> + +<p>This is the theory of evolutions. Once it was thought that the +earth’s crust was caused by catastrophes, but when Darwin came +into the world and had a good deal of philosophy, he said: ‘All +different kinds of species differ gradually as we go backwards and +there is no catastrophes, and if we apply the fact upon previous +<span class="pagenum" id="Page_424" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 424</span>predecessors we reach simpler and simpler predecessors, until we +reach the Nature.’ Man, also, is under the evolutions. None can deny +this if he could deny the sun in daylight. A child from the beginning +of his birthday possesses instincts like to suckle his food from the +mamel of his mother and many others. But he is free of habits and he +is weak as anything. Then he is introduced into a house and usually +finds himself among parents, and his body is either cleansed or left +to the dirts. This shows his environment. Superficial thinkers are +apt to look on environment as (at best) a trifle motive in bringing +up, but learned men believe that a child born in the presence of some +women who say a bad word, this word, as believed by them, remains in +the brain of the child until it ejects.</p> + +<p>Environment quickly supplies modification. The life of mountainous +goats leads them to train themselves on jumping. The camel is +flat-footed with hoofs for the sand. Some kind of cattle were wild in +the past but lived in plain lands and changed into gentle sheep. The +frog when young has her tail and nostrils like the fish, suitable for +life at sea, but changing her environment, the tail decreased. The +sea is broad and changeable, so those who live at sea are changeable +and mysterious. Put a cow in a dirty damp place and she will become +more and more slender until she die. Also horses; horse had five +fingers on his legs but now one only from running for water in the +draught. Climate also affects bodily habits of the dear Europeans +who live in Egypt. They who were smart and patient and strong with a +skin worth the name of weatherproof become also fatigable and fond +of leisure.... From the theory we learn that human beings should be +improved like the <span class="pagenum" id="Page_425" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 425</span>beasts by creating healthy youngs and by good +Freubel education.</p> +</blockquote> + +<p>‘The next short specimen essay by Mohammed Mahmoud Mohammed is in +answer to the question: “What impression do you get from Shakespeare of +the character of Lady Macbeth?”:</p> + +<blockquote> +<p class="center"><b class="smcap">The Character of Lady Macbeth</b></p> + +<p>Sir, to write shortly, Lady Macbeth was brave and venturesome; but +she had no tact. She says to Macbeth: ‘Now the opportunity creates +itself, lose it not. Where is your manlihood in these suitable +circumstances? I have children and I know the love of a mother’s +heart. But you must know I would dash the child’s head and drive away +the boneless teeth which are milking me rather than to give a promise +and then leave it.’</p> + +<p>Macbeth says: ‘But we may fail.’</p> + +<p>‘Fail?’ says <abbr>L. M.</abbr> ‘But stick to the point and we will not fail. +Leave the rest to me. I shall put drugs in the grooms’ drink and we +shall ascuse them.’</p> + +<p>Macbeth says: ‘You are fit to lay men-children only.’</p> + +<p>The impression on the reader becomes very great and feels with anger.</p> +</blockquote> + +<p>‘And this from the hand of Mahmoud Mahmoud Mohammed, offered as a +formal exercise in English composition:</p> + +<blockquote> +<p class="center"><b class="smcap">The Best Use of Leisure Time</b></p> + +<p>Leisure time is a variety to tireful affairs. God Almighty created +the Universe in six days and took a rest in the <span class="pagenum" id="Page_426" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 426</span>seventh. He +wished to teach us the necessity of leisure time. Man soon discovered +by experience that ‘All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy.’ But +this leisure time may be dangerous and ill-used if the mind will not +take its handle and move it wisely to different directions. Many +people love idleness. It is a great prodigality which leads to ruin. +Many Egyptians spend their times in cafés longing for women and +tracking them with their eyes, which corrupts and pollutes manners. +They are perplexed and annoyed by the length of daytime. Others try +to have rest through gumbling, which is the scourge of society and +individual. But let <em>us</em> rather enjoy external nature, the beautiful +leavy trees, the flourishing fields, and the vast lawns of green +grass starred with myriads of flowers of greater or small size. There +the birds sing and build their nests, the meandering canals flow with +fresh water, and the happy peasants, toiling afar from the multitude +of town life, purify the human wishes from personal stain. Also +museums are instructive. It is quite wrong to keep to usual work and +fatigable studies, but quite right to free our minds from the web of +wordly affairs in which they are entangled.</p> + +<p>Yes, let us with the lark leave our beds to enjoy the cool breeze +before sunrise. Let us when the lasy or luxurious are snoring or sunk +in their debaucheries sit under the shady trees and meditate. We +can think of God, the river and the moon, and enjoy the reading of +Gray’s <cite>Elegy</cite> to perfection. We shall brush the dues on the lawn at +sunrise, for,</p> + +<div class="poetry-container"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">A country life is sweat</div> + <div class="verse indent0">In moderate cold and heat.</div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_427" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 427</span>Or we may read the Best Companions, books full of honourable +passions, wise moral and good pathos: reading maketh a full man, +nobody will deny Bacon. Or we may easily get a musical instrument +at little price. ‘Every schoolboy knows’ that music is a moral law +which gives a soul to the universe. Criminals can be cured by the +sweet power of music. The whale came up from the dark depths of +the sea to carry the Greek musician because it was affected by the +sweet harmonies which hold a mirror up to nature. Are we not better +than the whale? Also gymnastic clubs are spread everywhere. Why do +a youth not pass his leisure time in widdening his chest? Because a +sound mind is in a sound body. Yet it is a physiological fact that +the blacksmith cannot spend his leisure time in striking iron or +the soldier in military exercises. The blacksmith may go to see the +Egyptian Exhibition, and the soldier may go to the sea to practice +swimming or to the mountains to know its caves in order that he may +take shelter in time of war.</p> + +<p>Milton knew the best uses of leisure time. He used to sit to his +books reading, and to his music playing, and so put his name among +the immortals. That was the case of Byron, Napoleon, Addison, and +Palmerstone. And if a man is unhappy, says an ancient philosopher, it +is his own fault. He <em>can</em> be happy if his leisure time brings profit +and not disgrace.</p> +</blockquote> + +<p>‘The Diploma Class students are supposed to be four years in advance +of my own, and, not being of the moneyed class, are more interested +in passing their examinations with distinction. Also, since their +careers as teachers of English depend on the continuance of the +British military occupation, <span class="pagenum" id="Page_428" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 428</span>they take the morality of this +regime more seriously than the University students, who are mostly +the sons of pashas. These, with few exceptions, suffer from the +bankruptcy of modern Egyptian life; they are able to take neither +European culture nor their own Islamic traditions seriously. So far +as I can make out from talking with the more intelligent of them, +what Egypt asks for is a European government and education free of +European political domination, but with a European technical personnel +in the key positions, which it cannot do without and will pay highly +for. Egypt can never be a great independent spiritual or political +force in the Near East, but because of its wealth it can become at +least the commercial centre of Islamic orthodoxy. Turkey is already +a modern European country; Egypt will remain for some time yet +eighteenth-century in spirit—a compromise between political romanticism +and religious classicism. For a generation or two yet the descendants +of the landowners enriched by European administration will continue to +“spend their times in cafés longing for women,” and to be “perplexed +and annoyed by the length of daytime,” while “the happy peasants” go +on “toiling afar from the multitude of town life.” And my professional +successors will continue to become “fatigable and fond of leisure.”’</p> + +<hr class="invisible"> + +<p>For I had already decided to resign. So had the professor of Latin, +my only English colleague. And the one-legged professor of French +Literature, who was an honest man. The others stayed on.</p> + +<p>The Egyptians were most hospitable. I attended one heavy banquet, +at the Semiramis Hotel, given by the Minister of Education. Tall +Sudanese waiters dressed in red robes served a succession of the most +magnificent dishes that I <span class="pagenum" id="Page_429" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 429</span>have seen anywhere, even on the films. +I remember particularly a great model of the Cairo Citadel in ice, +with the doors and windows filled with caviare which one scooped out +with a golden Moorish spoon. I heard recently that this banquet, which +must have cost thousands, has not yet been paid for. I found little +to do in Egypt (since I had no intention of mixing with the British +official class, joining the golf club, or paying official calls) but +eat coffee-ices at Groppi’s, visit the open-air cinemas and sit at home +in our flat at Heliopolis and get on with writing. My sister, who lived +near, continued sisterly. During the season of the Khamsin, a hot wind +which sent the temperature up on one occasion to 113 degrees in the +shade, I put the finishing touches to a book called <cite>Lars Porsena, or +The Future of Swearing and Improper Language</cite>. I also worked on a study +of the English ballad.</p> + +<p>The best thing that I saw in Egypt was the noble face of old King Seti +the Good unwrapped of its mummy-cloths in the Cairo Museum. Nearly all +the best things in Egypt were dead. The funniest thing was a French +bedroom farce played in Arabic by Syrian actors in a native theatre. +The men and women of the cast had, for religious reasons, to keep on +opposite sides of the stage. They sang French songs (in translation), +varying the tunes with the quarter-tones and shrieks and trills of +their own music. The audience talked all the time and ate peanuts, +oranges, sunflower-seeds and heads of lettuces.</p> + +<p>I went to call on Lord Lloyd just before the close of the academic +year, which was at the end of May. Soon after I was invited to dine at +the Residency. I won twenty piastres off him at bridge and was told to +collect it from his <abbr title="Aide-De-Camp">A.D.C.</abbr> He asked me how I found Egypt and I said: +‘All right,’ with an intonation that made him catch me up quickly. +‘Only all <span class="pagenum" id="Page_430" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 430</span>right?’ That was all that passed between us. He believed +in his job more than I did in mine. He used to drive through Cairo in +a powerful car, with a Union Jack flying from it, at about sixty miles +an hour. He had motor-cyclist outriders to clear the way—Sir Lee Stack, +the Sirdar, had been killed the year before while driving through +Cairo and a traffic jam had materially helped his assassins. One day I +was shown the spot near the Ministry of Education where it happened; +there was a crowd at the spot which I at first took for a party of +sightseers, but the attraction proved to be a naked woman lying on +the pavement, laughing wildly and waving her arms. She was one of the +<i>hashish</i> dope-cases that were very common in Egypt. The crowd was +jeering at her; the policeman a few yards off paid no attention.</p> + +<p>I attended a levee at the Abdin Palace, King Fuad’s Cairo residence. It +began early, at nine o’clock in the morning. The King gave honourable +precedence to the staff of the University; it came in soon after the +diplomatic corps and the Ministers of the Crown and some time before +the army. While still in England I had been warned to buy suitable +clothes—a morning coat and trousers—for this occasion. To be really +correct my coat should have had green facings, green being the national +colour of Egypt, but I was told that this would not be insisted upon. +Opinions differed greatly as to what was suitable Court-dress; most of +the French professors arrived in full evening dress with swallowtail +coats and white waistcoats, others wore ordinary dinner jackets. Most +of them had opera-hats; they all had decorations round their necks. +They looked like stragglers from an all-night fancy-dress ball. After +signing my name in the two large hotel registers, one belonging +to the King and the other to the Queen, I was given a refreshing +rice-drink, a <span class="pagenum" id="Page_431" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 431</span>courtesy of the Queen’s. I then went up the noble +marble staircase. On every other step stood an enormous black soldier, +royally uniformed, with a lance in his hand. My soldier’s eye commented +on their somewhat listless attitudes; but, no doubt, they pulled +themselves smartly to attention when the Egyptian army general staff +went past. I had been warned that when I met King Fuad I must not be +surprised at anything extraordinary I heard; a curious wheezing cry was +apt to burst from his throat occasionally when he was nervous. When +he was a child his family had been shot up by an assassin employed +by interested relatives; and Fuad had taken cover under a table and, +though wounded, had survived. We were moved from room to room. At last +a quiet Turkish-looking gentleman of middle age, wearing regulation +Court-dress, greeted us deferentially in French; I took him for the +Grand Chamberlain. I bowed and said the same thing in French as the +professor in front of me had said, and expected to be led next to the +Throne Room. But the next stage was the cloak-room once more. I had +already met King Fuad. And no Eastern magnificence or wheezing cry.</p> + +<p>I attended a royal soiree a few days later. The chief event was a +theatrical variety show. The performance was predominantly Italian. +King Fuad had been educated in Italy, where he attained the rank of +captain in the Italian cavalry, and had a great regard for Italian +culture. (He was ignorant of English, but was a good French scholar.) +The performance belonged to the 1870’s. There was a discreet blonde +shepherdess who did a hopping dance in ankle-length skirts, and a +discreet tenor who confined his passion to his top notes; and there +was a well-behaved comedian who made nice little jokes for the Queen. +I clapped him, because I liked him <span class="pagenum" id="Page_432" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 432</span>better than the others, and +everybody looked round at me; I realized that I had done the wrong +thing. An official whispered to me that it was a command performance +and that the actors were, therefore, entitled to no applause. Unless +His Majesty was himself amused the turns must be greeted in silence. I +was wearing Court-dress again but, not to be outdone by the Frenchmen, +I had put on my three campaigning medals—and wished that I had that St. +Anne of the Third Class with the Crossed Swords. And the refreshments! +I will not attempt to describe that Arabian Night buffet; it was so +splendid indeed that it has remained a mere blur in my memory. I +pocketed some particularly fantastic confections to bring home to the +children.</p> + +<p>What caused me most surprise in Egypt was the great number of camels +there. I had thought of them only as picture-postcard animals. I had +not expected to see thousands of them in the streets of Cairo, holding +up the motor traffic—in long trains, tied head to rump, with great +sacks of green fodder on their backs.</p> + +<p>Our children were a great anxiety. They had to drink boiled milk and +boiled water and be watched all the time to prevent them from taking +off their topees and blue veils. Then they all got measles and were +carried off to an isolation hospital, where they were fed on all the +things that we had been particular since their birth not to give them; +and the native nurses stole their toys. They returned very thin and +wretched-looking and we wondered if we should ever get them safely +home. We booked our passages some time at the end of May. We had only +just enough money for third-class on a small Italian boat with a cargo +of onions. We disembarked at Venice and stopped a day there. After +Egypt, Venice seemed like Heaven. It could never again be <span class="pagenum" id="Page_433" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 433</span>to me +what it was that day. I had a European egg in Venice. Egyptian eggs +were about the size of a pigeon’s egg and always tasted strongly of the +garlic which seemed to form a large part of the diet of the Egyptian +fowl.</p> + +<p>There are plenty of caricature scenes to look back on in Egypt. Among +them, for instance, myself dressed in my smart yellow gaberdine suit +and seated at a long, baize-covered table in the Faculty Conference +Room. In front of me is a cup of Turkish coffee, a sun helmet, and a +long record in French of the minutes of the last meeting. I am talking +angry bad French at my Belgian and French colleagues in support of the +young professor of Latin, who has just leaped to his feet, pale with +hatred. He is declaring in worse French that he positively refuses +to make a forced contribution of fifty piastres to a memorial wreath +for one of the Frenchmen (who had just died), since he was never +consulted. I am declaring that neither will I, blustering to him in +English that so far as I am concerned all dead Frenchmen can go bury +themselves at their own expense. The lofty, elegant room, once a harem +drawing-room—a portrait of the late Khedive, with a large rent in it, +hanging at a tipsy slant at one end of the room; at the other a large +glass showcase, full of Egypto-Roman brass coins, all muddled together, +their labels loose, in one corner. Through the window market-gardens, +buffaloes, camels, countrywomen in black. Around the table my +horrified, shrugging colleagues, turning to each other and saying: +‘Inoui.... Inoui....’ And outside the rebellious shouts of our students +working themselves up for another strike.</p> + +<p>The rest makes no more than conversation—of the Government clerk who +was so doubly unfortunate as to be run over by a racing-car and to find +that the driver was the <span class="pagenum" id="Page_434" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 434</span>eldest son of the Minister of Justice; +and of the rich girl in search of a husband who went as paying guest +at fifteen guineas a week to the senior Government official’s wife, +agreeing to pay for all wines and cigars and extras when society came +to dine, and who, meeting only senior Government officials and their +wives, complained that she did not get her money’s worth; and of my +night visit to the temple of a headless monkey-god, full of bats; +and of the English cotton manufacturer who defended the conditions +in his factory on the ground that the population of Egypt since the +British came had been increasing far too rapidly, and that pulmonary +consumption was one of the few checks on it; and of the student’s +mother who, at the sports, said how much she regretted having put +him on the mantelpiece when a baby and run off (being only twelve +years old) to play with her dolls; and of ‘The Limit,’ so named by +Australians during the war, who told my three years’ fortune by +moonlight under the long shadow of the pyramid of Cheops—told it truly +and phrased it falsely; and of the Arab cab-driver who was kind to his +horses; and of my visit to Chawki Bey, the national poet of Egypt, +in his Moorish mansion by the Nile, who was so like Thomas Hardy and +in whose presence his sons, like good Turks, sat dutifully silent; +and of the beggar in the bazaar with too many toes; and of the veiled +vengeance there who tried to touch us; and of the official who, during +the war, on a dream of dearth, had played Joseph, dumping half the +wheat of Australia in Egypt, where it found no buyers and was at last +eaten by donkeys and camels, and who told me that the whole secret of +vivid writing was to use the active rather than the passive voice—to +say ‘Amr-ibn-el-Ass conquered Egypt,’ rather than ‘Egypt was conquered +by <span class="pagenum" id="Page_435" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 435</span>Amr-ibn-el-Ass’; and of a visit to ancient dead Heliopolis +with its lovely landscape of green fields, its crooked palm trees, +its water-wheels turned by oxen, and its single obelisk; and of the +other Heliopolis, a brand-new dead town on the desert’s edge, built by +a Belgian company, complete with racecourse and Luna Park, where the +<abbr>R.A.F.</abbr> planes flew low at night among the houses, and where the bored +wives of disappointed officials wrote novels which they never finished, +and painted a little in water-colours; and of the little garden of +our flat where I went walking on the first day among the fruit-trees +and flowering shrubs, and how I came upon no less than eight lean and +mangy cats dozing in the beds, and never walked there again; and of +the numerous kites, their foul counterpart in the sky and in the palm +trees; and, lastly, of that fabulous cross-breed between kite and cat +which woke us every morning at dawn, a creature kept as a pet in a +neighbouring tenement inhabited by Syrians and Greeks, whose strangled +cock-a-doodle-doo was to me the dawn-cry of modern Egypt. (Empty +cigar-box—no applause—and I thank you.)</p> + +<p>So back to Islip; much to the disappointment of my parents, who thought +that I had at last seen reason and settled down to an appointment +suited equally to my needs and my talents; and to the undisguised +relief of my sister-in-law.</p> + +<hr class="invisible"> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_437" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 437</span><b class="smcap">The</b> story trails off here. But to end it with the return from +Egypt would be to round it off too bookishly, to finish on a note of +comfortable suspense, an anticipation of the endless human sequel. I +am taking care to rob you of this. It is not that sort of story. From +a historical point of view it must be read, rather, as one of gradual +disintegration. By the summer of 1926 the disintegration was already +well-advanced. Incidents of autobiographical pertinence became fewer +and fewer.</p> + +<p>When we came back Nancy’s health was very much better, but none of us +had any money left. There were a number of books to be sold, chiefly +autographed first editions of modern poets; and Lawrence came to the +rescue with a copy of his <cite>Seven Pillars</cite> marked, ‘Please sell when +read,’ which fetched over three hundred pounds.</p> + +<p>In 1927 Jonathan Cape wrote to me suggesting that I should write a book +for boys about Lawrence. There was not much time to do it to have it +ready for autumn publication (about two months)—and Lawrence was in +India and I had to get his permission and send parts of the manuscript +there for him to read and pass. Lowell Thomas anticipated me with a +<cite>Boy’s Book of Colonel Lawrence</cite>; so I decided to make mine a general +book, three times the length of his, working eighteen hours a day at +it. Most of those to whom I wrote for information about Lawrence, +including His Majesty the King, gave me their help. The only rebuff I +got was from George Bernard Shaw, who wrote me the following postcard:</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_438" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 438</span></p> + +<blockquote> +<p class="right"><b class="smcap"><span class="padr2">Eyot St. Lawrence,</span><br><span class="padr1">Welwyn, Herts.</span></b><br>8<b class="italic">th June</b> 1927.</p> + +<p>A great mistake. You might as well try to write a funny book about +Mark Twain. <abbr>T. E.</abbr> has got all out of himself that is to be got. His +name will rouse expectations which you will necessarily disappoint. +Cape will curse his folly for proposing such a thing, and never give +you another commission. Write a book (if you must) about the dullest +person you know; clerical if possible. Give yourself a chance.</p> + +<p class="right padr1"><abbr>G. B. S.</abbr></p> +</blockquote> + +<p class="noindent">Just before Christmas the book was selling at the rate of ten thousand +copies a week. I heard later that Shaw had mistaken me for my <cite>Daily +Mail</cite> brother.</p> + +<p>Shortly afterwards I had a reply, delayed for nine months, to an +application that I had made, when things were bad, for an appointment +as English lecturer in an Adult Education scheme. I was told that my +qualifications were not considered sufficient. By this time I had lost +all my academic manners and wrote wishing the entire committee in +Baluchistan, to be tickled to death by wild butterflies.</p> + +<p>In 1927, in a process of tidying-up, I published a collected book of my +poems. One of the later ones began:</p> + +<div class="poetry-container"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">This, I admit, Death is terrible to me,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">To no man more so, naturally.</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And I have disenthralled my natural terror</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Of every comfortable philosopher</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Or tall dark doctor of divinity.</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Death stands at last in his true rank and order.</div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + +<p class="noindent"><span class="pagenum" id="Page_439" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 439</span>The book was selective rather than collective, intended as a +disavowal of over half the poetry that I had so far printed. As Skelton +told Fame, speaking of his regretted poem <cite>Apollo Whirled up his +Chair</cite>, I had done what I could to scrape out the scrolls, To erase it +for ever out of her ragman’s rolls. But I still permitted anthologists +to print some of the rejected pieces if they paid highly enough—if they +wanted them, that was their business and I was glad of the money. On +the other hand I stopped contributing new poems to English and American +periodicals. My critical writings I did not tidy up; but let them go +out of print. In 1927 I began learning to print on a hand-press. In +1928 I continued learning to print.</p> + +<p>On May 6th, 1929 Nancy and I suddenly parted company. I had already +finished with nearly all my other leading and subsidiary characters, +and dozens more whom I have not troubled to put in. I began to write +my autobiography on May 23rd and write these words on July 24th, my +thirty-fourth birthday; another month of final review and I shall have +parted with myself for good. I have been able to draw on contemporary +records for most of the facts, but in many passages memory has been +the only source. My memory is good but not perfect. For instance, I +can after two hearings remember the tune and words of any song that +I like, and never afterwards forget them; but there are always odd +discrepancies between my version and the original. So here, there +must be many slight errors of one sort or another. No incidents, +however, are invented or embellished. Some are, no doubt, in their +wrong order; I am uncertain, for example, of the exact date and place +of the megaphoned trench-conversation between the Royal Welch and the +Germans, <span class="pagenum" id="Page_440" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 440</span>though I have a contemporary record of it. I am not sure +of some of the less-important names (even of Lance-corporal Baxter’s, +but it was at least a name like Baxter). To avoid the suggestion of +libel I have disguised two names. Also, I make a general disclaimer +of such opinions as I have recorded myself as holding from chapter to +chapter, on education, nature, war, religion, literature, philosophy, +psychology, politics, and so on. This is a story of what I was, not +what I am. Wherever I have used autobiographical material in previous +books and it does not tally with what I have written here, this is the +story and that was literature.</p> + +<p>I find myself wondering whether it is justified as a story. Yet I seem +to have done most of the usual storybook things. I had, by the age of +twenty-three, been born, initiated into a formal religion, travelled, +learned to lie, loved unhappily, been married, gone to the war, taken +life, procreated my kind, rejected formal religion, won fame, and been +killed. At the age of thirty-four many things still remain undone. +For instance, I have never been on a journey of exploration, or in a +submarine, aeroplane or civil court of law (except a magistrate’s court +on the charge of ‘riding a vehicle, to wit a bicycle, without proper +illumination, to wit a rear lamp’). I have never mastered any musical +instrument, starved, committed civil murder, found buried treasure, +engaged in unnatural vice, slept with a prostitute, or seen a corpse +that has died a natural death. On the other hand, I have ridden on a +locomotive, won a prize at the Olympic Games, become a member of the +senior common-room at one Oxford college before becoming a member of +the junior common-room at another, been examined by the police on +suspicion of attempted murder, passed at <span class="pagenum" id="Page_441" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 441</span>dusk in a hail-storm +within half a mile of Stromboli when it was in eruption, had a statue +of myself erected in my lifetime in a London park, and learned to tell +the truth—nearly.</p> + +<p class="center mt2"><b class="smcap">The End</b></p> +</section> + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> + +<section role="doc-epilogue" aria-labelledby="epi-hd"> +<div class="chapter"> +<div class="pagenum" id="Page_443" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 443</div> +<h2 class="nobreak smcap" id="epi-hd">Dedicatory Epilogue<br>To<br>Laura Riding</h2> +</div> + +<p class="chap_start"><b class="smcap">I have</b> used your <cite>World’s End</cite> as an introductory motto, but you +will be glad to find no reference at all to yourself in the body of +this book. I have not mentioned the <cite>Survey of Modernist Poetry</cite> and +the <cite>Pamphlet against Anthologies</cite> as works of collaboration between +you and me, though these books appear in publishers’ catalogues and +obviously put much of my own previous critical writing out of account. +And though I have mentioned printing, I have not given details of +it, or even said that it was with you, printing and publishing in +partnership as The Seizin Press. Because of you the last chapters have +a ghostly look.</p> + +<p>The reason of all this is, of course, that by mentioning you as a +character in my autobiography I would seem to be denying you in your +true quality of one living invisibly, against kind, as dead, beyond +event. And yet the silence is false if it makes the book seem to have +been written forward from where I was instead of backward from where +you are. If the direction of the book were forward I should still be +inside the body of it, arguing morals, literature, politics, suffering +violent physical experiences, falling in and out of love, making and +losing friends, enduring blindly in time; instead of here outside, +writing this letter to you, as one also living against kind—indeed, +rather against myself.</p> + +<p>You know the autobiography of that Lord Herbert of Cherbury whose son +founded the Royal Welch Fusiliers; how he was educated as a gentleman, +studied at Oxford, married young, travelled, played games, fought in +Northern <span class="pagenum" id="Page_444" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 444</span>France and wrote books; until at last his active life +ended with a sudden clap of thunder from the blue sky which did ‘so +comfort and cheer’ him that he resolved at last, at this sign, to print +his book <cite>De Veritate</cite>, concerning truth. If you were to appear in my +<cite>De Veritate</cite> it could only be as ‘this loud though yet gentle noise +... one fair day in the summer, my casement being opened towards the +south, the sun shining clear, and no wind stirring.’</p> + +<p>For could the story of your coming be told between an Islip Parish +Council Meeting and a conference of the professors of the Faculty +of Letters at Cairo University? How she and I happening by seeming +accident upon your teasing <cite>Quids</cite>, were drawn to write to you, who +were in America, asking you to come to us. How, though you knew no +more of us than we of you, and indeed less (for you knew me at a +disadvantage, by my poems of the war), you forthwith came. And how +there was thereupon a unity to which you and I pledged our faith and +she her pleasure. How we went together to the land where the dead +parade the streets and there met with demons and returned with the +demons still treading behind. And how they drove us up and down the +land.</p> + +<p>That was the beginning of the end, and the end and after is yours. +Yet I must relieve your parable of all anecdote of mine. I must tell, +for instance, that in its extreme course in April last I re-lived +the changes of many past years. That when I must suddenly hurry off +to Ireland I found myself on the very boat, from Fishguard, that had +been my hospital-boat twelve years before. That at Limerick I met Old +Ireland herself sitting black-shawled and mourning on the station +bench and telling of the Fall. And so to the beautiful city of Sligo +celebrated in song by my father. And the next <span class="pagenum" id="Page_445" role="doc-pagebreak">Pg 445</span>train back, this time +by the Wales of the Royal Welch Fusiliers. And the next day to Rouen +with you and her, to recollect the hill-top where you seemed to die as +the one on which I had seemed to die thirteen years before. And then +immediately back. And then, later in the same month, my sudden journey +to Hilton in Huntingdon, to a farm with memories of her as I first knew +her, to burst in upon—as it happened—David Garnett (whom I had never +met before), gulping his vintage port and scandalizing him with my +soldier’s oaths as I denied him a speaking part in your parable.</p> + +<p>After which.</p> + +<p>After which, anecdotes of yours, travesties of the parable and so +precious to me as vulgar glosses on it. How on April 27th, 1929 it was +a fourth-storey window and a stone area and you were dying. And how it +was a joke between Harold the stretcher-bearer and myself that you did +not die, but survived your dying, lucid interval.</p> + +<p>After which.</p> + +<p>After which, may I recall, since you would not care to do so yourself, +with what professional appreciation (on May 16th) Mr. Lake is reported +to have observed to those that stood by him in the operating theatre: +‘It is rarely that one sees the spinal-cord exposed to view—especially +at right-angles to itself.’</p> + +<p>After which.</p> + +<p>After which, let me also recall on my own account my story <cite>The Shout</cite>, +which, though written two years ago, belongs here; blind and slow like +all prophecies—it has left you out entirely. And, because you are left +out, it is an anecdote of mine.</p> + +<p>After which.</p> + +<p>After which, even anecdotes fail. No more anecdotes. And, of course, +no more politics, religion, conversations, literature, arguments, +dances, drunks, time, crowds, games, fun, unhappiness. I no longer +repeat to myself: ‘He who shall endure to the end, shall be saved.’ It +is enough now to say that I have endured. My lung, still barometric of +foul weather, speaks of endurance, as your spine, barometric of fair +weather, speaks of salvation.</p> +</section> + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> + +<section aria-labelledby="note-hd" class="footnote" role="doc-endnotes"> +<div class="chapter"> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="note-hd">Footnotes</h2> +</div> + +<ul class="footnote_items"> + +<li id="Footnote1"><a href="#FNanchor1" role="doc-backlink">[1]</a> ‘Why,’ said the cobbler, ‘what should I do? Will you have me to +go in the King’s wars and to be killed for my labour?’ ‘What, knave,’ +said Skelton, ‘art thou a coward, having so great bones?’ ‘No,’ +said the cobbler, ‘I am not afeared: it is good to sleep in a whole +skin.’—<cite class="smcap">Merry Tales of Skelton</cite> (<b class="italic">Early sixteenth century</b>).</li> + +<li id="Footnote2"><a href="#FNanchor2" role="doc-backlink">[2]</a> I do not know what happened to Miller. This was written in the +summer of 1916.</li> + +<li id="Footnote3"><a href="#FNanchor3" role="doc-backlink">[3]</a> Jenkins was killed not long after.</li> + +<li id="Footnote4"><a href="#FNanchor4" role="doc-backlink">[4]</a> The quartermaster excepted.</li> + +<li id="Footnote5"><a href="#FNanchor5" role="doc-backlink">[5]</a> The gas-cylinders had by this time been put into position on the +front line. A special order came round imposing severe penalties on +anyone who used any word but ‘accessory’ in speaking of the gas. This +was to keep it secret, but the French civilians knew all about it long +before this.</li> + +<li id="Footnote6"><a href="#FNanchor6" role="doc-backlink">[6]</a> Major Swainson recovered quickly and was back at the Middlesex +Depot after a few weeks. On the other hand, Lawrie, a Royal Welch +company quartermaster-sergeant back at Cambrin, was hit in the neck +that day by a spent machine-gun bullet which just pierced the skin, and +died of shock a few hours later.</li> + +<li id="Footnote7"><a href="#FNanchor7" role="doc-backlink">[7]</a> He was recommended for a Victoria Cross but got nothing because no +officer evidence, which is a condition of award, was available.</li> + +<li id="Footnote8"><a href="#FNanchor8" role="doc-backlink">[8]</a> I cannot explain the discrepancy between his dating of my death and +that of the published casualty list.</li> +</ul> +</section> + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> + +<section role="doc-errata" aria-labelledby="corr-hd"> +<div class="chapter"> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="corr-hd">ERRATUM</h2> +</div> +<p><b class="italic"> <a href="#Page_396">p. <span class="corr" id="correrrat" title="Source: 398">396</span></a>, line 1, et seq.</b></p> + +<p>Since this paragraph was printed, I have heard from Mr. Marsh that the +facts are not quite as I have stated them, and that there is not really +any “Rupert Brooke Fund” administered by Mr. Marsh. I much regret this +error which arose from an imperfect recollection. <abbr class="allsmcap padl1">R. G.</abbr></p> +</section> + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> + +<div class="chapter"> +<div class="transnote" id="Transcribers_Notes"> +<h2 class="nobreak">Transcriber’s Notes</h2> + +<p class="noindent">New original cover art included with this eBook is granted to the public domain.</p> + +<p class="noindent">In the HTML version of this text, original page numbers are +enclosed in a box and presented in the right margin.</p> + +<p class="noindent">Footnotes have been renumbered and moved to the end +of the book.</p> + +<p class="noindent">Illustrations have been moved to before or after an enclosing +paragraph. The page numbers given in the table of contents may not match the +actual locations</p> + +<p class="noindent">Misspelled words have been corrected (see below). Archaic, + inconsistent and alternative spellings have been left unchanged. Spelling + and other typos (e.g. duplicate words) in direct quotes from other sources were + left unchanged. Hyphenation has <span class="u">not</span> been standardised.</p> + +<p class="noindent">“Edit Distance” in Corrections table below refers to the +Levenshtein Distance.</p> + +<h3>Corrections:</h3> + +<div style="overflow-x:auto;"> +<table class="correctionTable"> +<tbody> + <tr> + <th class="tdl">Page</th> + <th class="tdl">Source</th> + <th class="tdl">Correction</th> + <th class="tdl">Edit distance</th> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="width20 tdl"><a href="#corr62">62</a></td> + <td class="width40 tdl bottom">among the the five</td> + <td class="width40 tdl bottom">among the five</td> + <td class="bottom tdl">4</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="width20 tdl"><a href="#corr95">95</a></td> + <td class="width40 tdl bottom">Crib-y-ddysgel</td> + <td class="width40 tdl bottom">Crib-y-ddysgl</td> + <td class="bottom tdl">1</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="width20 tdl"><a href="#corr175">175</a></td> + <td class="width40 tdl bottom">opponets</td> + <td class="width40 tdl bottom">opponents</td> + <td class="bottom tdl">1</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="width20 tdl"><a href="#corr202">202</a></td> + <td class="width40 tdl bottom">and the the brigadier</td> + <td class="width40 tdl bottom">and the brigadier</td> + <td class="bottom tdl">4</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="width20 tdl"><a href="#corr301">301</a></td> + <td class="width40 tdl bottom">impossiblity</td> + <td class="width40 tdl bottom">impossibility</td> + <td class="bottom tdl">1</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="width20 tdl"><a href="#correrrat">Erratum</a></td> + <td class="width40 tdl bottom">398</td> + <td class="width40 tdl bottom">396</td> + <td class="bottom tdl">1</td> + </tr> +</tbody> +</table> +</div> + +</div> +</div> + +<div style='text-align:center'>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 76911 ***</div> +</body> +</html> + diff --git a/76911-h/images/cover.jpg b/76911-h/images/cover.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..9a5eb0b --- /dev/null +++ b/76911-h/images/cover.jpg diff --git a/76911-h/images/frontis.jpg b/76911-h/images/frontis.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..eb3e515 --- /dev/null +++ b/76911-h/images/frontis.jpg diff --git a/76911-h/images/i152.jpg b/76911-h/images/i152.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..66ba1be --- /dev/null +++ b/76911-h/images/i152.jpg diff --git a/76911-h/images/i190.jpg b/76911-h/images/i190.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..831a5ea --- /dev/null +++ b/76911-h/images/i190.jpg diff --git a/76911-h/images/i246.jpg b/76911-h/images/i246.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..a562cb0 --- /dev/null +++ b/76911-h/images/i246.jpg diff --git a/76911-h/images/i262.jpg b/76911-h/images/i262.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..594fa86 --- /dev/null +++ b/76911-h/images/i262.jpg diff --git a/76911-h/images/i296.jpg b/76911-h/images/i296.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..d5e835d --- /dev/null +++ b/76911-h/images/i296.jpg diff --git a/76911-h/images/i322.jpg b/76911-h/images/i322.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..05775ee --- /dev/null +++ b/76911-h/images/i322.jpg diff --git a/76911-h/images/i364.jpg b/76911-h/images/i364.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..72fe71a --- /dev/null +++ b/76911-h/images/i364.jpg diff --git a/76911-h/images/logo.png b/76911-h/images/logo.png Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..6f851b2 --- /dev/null +++ b/76911-h/images/logo.png diff --git a/76911-h/images/title.png b/76911-h/images/title.png Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..719f726 --- /dev/null +++ b/76911-h/images/title.png diff --git a/LICENSE.txt b/LICENSE.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6312041 --- /dev/null +++ b/LICENSE.txt @@ -0,0 +1,11 @@ +This eBook, including all associated images, markup, improvements, +metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be +in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES. + +Procedures for determining public domain status are described in +the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org. + +No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in +jurisdictions other than the United States. 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