CHAPTER VII

SALISBURY PLAIN

Midnight, and as dark as pitch found us shivering and blinking sleepily on the platform of a small railway station on the outskirts of Salisbury Plain. From here a truly murderous hike blistered our feet, spoiled our tempers and proved to us in no uncertain manner how stale we had become during our journey overseas. Just as day dawned we floundered wearily to a place where tents flapped sadly against tent poles as if sympathizing with our woeful plight. These tents had simply been erected and loosely staked out and were left for us to tighten and make habitable. We were too weary to bother with them; we simply dropped on the ground and slept the sleep of utter exhaustion.

When we awoke we found ourselves drenched to the skin, our tents still half erected, the commissariat all disorganized and the plain hidden in solid sheets of driving rain. This was just a prelude of the terrible days to come.

In a day or two we had shaken down, with seven men to each tent, and our training began. A brief spell of fine weather followed, with a visit from the late Lord Roberts to inspect us. This visit of our great Little General left me feeling very comfortable, as he was fully an inch shorter than myself, and it seemed to me very wonderful that that slight, courteous old man should be the hero of so many exploits in India, Afghanistan, South Africa, and other parts of the world. It will be remembered of him forever that a few years before he had given Great Britain a solemn warning of the intentions of Germany. With few exceptions the newspapers, the _London Times_ included, had branded him a scare-monger and jingo. Alas, how bitterly true was the great little man's prophecy!

He died a brief month afterwards, just as he would have wished, "in harness," and among his Indian comrades he loved so well.

Then the rains descended, the floods came, and the plain became one seething quagmire of mud. Words are powerless to describe our continual conflict with that mud; it was everywhere--in our eyes, our hair, our tents, our clothes, our grub; we often had to swallow it as well as wallow in it. Again our poet-wit got his work in and this was our universal lament:

Mud, mud, damnable mud, In mud we must wallow and mud we must swallow, Mud, mud, damnable mud, Oh say will we ever get out of the mud.

Our tents leaked incessantly, but with all our discomfort we were healthy and happy and, in consequence, were grumbling all the time. We roundly cursed our officers, anathematized the mud, swore we would mutiny--all done sotto voce. But we were very, very happy.

And now, to crown my happiness, I obtained leave to visit my people in the Midlands, about one hundred and thirty miles from the place. The only way I could curb my impatience was by cleaning and re-cleaning my buttons, badges and boots, and vainly endeavoring to read the newspaper. At last, I paraded before the Colonel and paymaster to receive my pass and money, and after satisfying the critical eye of my commander that I was clean enough to be a credit to the British Army, I was permitted to go.

I boarded a taxi and paid ten shillings for a three-mile ride to the railway station. Had the Shylock asked four times that amount I would have cheerfully given it to him.

Only a son who loves his father and mother can appreciate such a home coming as I got; I shall never forget it. Mother-like, the dear old lady was thoroughly dissatisfied because I hadn't the appetite of a dozen strong men. One of her remarks typified the English mother--the peer of any woman on God's earth today. I asked what she thought of my journey over to do my bit for the Empire and her reply was: "I knew you would come. I knew it. God bless you, my boy. I hate to think of where you are going, but I believe I would hate you more, my own son as you are, if you did not go."

Such a reply from a woman who had already given one son for the cause exemplifies the spirit of self-sacrifice which has so splendidly been evidenced by the women of the Allies today. These mothers deserve the V.C. as truly as any soldier.

My father's greeting was typical of the reserved Englishman. He looked up at me without a word and just at that moment my young sister walked in and stood beside him; the lassie was just as tall as I was short; and my father's first remark was, "If you had been as tall as this girl is, you might have called yourself a soldier." Such was the greeting after an absence of six years and thus does the Englishman cover up any signs of emotion.

The time was all too short to see everyone I wanted to see; my three days' leave passed like an hour; but practically all the friends and chums of my school days were either in France, on the sea, or in training. An athletic club to which I belonged before I left England for Canada had a total membership of two hundred, and of this number one hundred and eighty-eight were in khaki, and even at that early date eight of them had paid the supreme price.

Promising to come back as soon as possible before I left for France I said good-bye and commenced my return journey, feeling very homesick and miserable. But I found a very interesting companion on the way back, one of the gallant boys of French's "Contemptibles." He was one of the few survivors of a battalion of Gloucesters and was one of the twenty-four who held back about seventy times their number and covered the retreat of the remnant of their regiment. When history is written and the deeds of the different regiments recorded, the wonderful stand of the twenty-four will go down as an epoch of the Great Retirement.

Reticent as most British soldiers are, yet being a comrade, he told me enough to give me some idea of what we were going into. Parting from him at Bristol, by a strange coincidence I ran into a corporal of the Second Battalion of Gloucesters. This man had just completed his service with the army and had been about a month on reserve when again called out. He now lies somewhere in France, for within three weeks from this time his regiment was almost wiped out.

While sitting in the train I happened to put my head too far out of the car window and away went my cap. The corporal helped me out. He dug from his kit a cap of a wonderful checked pattern, big black and white squares, and gave it to me. It was staggering in its color scheme, but better than nothing. Next morning, judge of my consternation when I found it impossible to get a cap from the quartermaster in time to go on parade, and I was obliged, to go in my beautiful new headpiece. It seemed to shout its color scheme from end to end of the battalion. Particularly did Morgan make caustic comment on the queer ideas of some people as to the proper head-dress for a soldier, and everyone, from the corporal up wanted to know what in hell I meant by coming on parade with that awful thing on my head.

Finally the Colonel came and ran his eye over his pets. "Tshun," he roared, and everyone "tshuned." A moment of silence while the Old Man critically lamped his battalion; then it broke.

"Who is that man who thinks he may come on parade in his own ideas of fashion? Fall out, that man, I want to speak to him."

I sneaked guiltily up to him, mentally noting those of my pals who snickered loudest, and stood dutifully at attention. After informing me that in spite of my looks I was supposed to be a soldier, and that although it was the dearest wish of his heart to permit me to disgrace the battalion, yet he felt compelled to administer a little correction.

"How came you to be wearing that monstrous thing?"

I explained truthfully, but he insisted that I had been imbibing and had lost my cap as a consequence. That afternoon, when tottering under the weight of sides of beef and other heavy things, which I was obliged to carry, I resolved that if I ever again lost my cap, I would not be guilty of wearing an alibi.