The Comrade in White | Page 2

Fidei Defensor.

CONTENTS
I. IN THE TRENCHES
II. THE MESSENGER
III. MAIMED OR PERFECTED?
IV. THE PRAYER CIRCLE

I

IN THE TRENCHES "And immediately He talked with them, and saith
unto them, 'Be of good cheer; it is I; be not afraid.'"
--THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO MAKK, chap, vi: 50.
"And His raiment was white as snow."
--THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO MATTHEW, chap. xvii: 2.
"The Battle of Mons, which saved the British Army from annihilation,
was, for the most of those who fought with the angels, a sepulchre.
They saved the British Army, but they saved it at fearful cost. No 'great
host' withdrew from that field of destruction; the great host strewed the
ground with their bodies. Only a remnant of those who stood in the
actual furnace of Mons escaped with their lives ... Let those who mourn,
take encouragement from these stories of visions on the battlefield,
quietly and with a child's confidence, cultivate within themselves a
waiting, receptive and desiring spirit. Let them empty themselves of
prejudice and self.... Let them detach themselves more and more from
the obsessions of worldly life. Serenity is the path by which the
thoughts of God travel to us; and Faith is the invitation which brings
them to the table of our souls."

--ON THE SIDE OF THE ANGELS.

I
IN THE TRENCHES
Strange tales reached us in the trenches. Rumours raced up and down
that three-hundred-mile line from Switzerland to the sea. We knew
neither the source of them nor the truth of them. They came quickly,
and they went quickly. Yet somehow I remember the very hour when
George Casey turned to me with a queer look in his blue eyes, and
asked if I had seen the Friend of the Wounded.

And then he told me all he knew. After many a hot engagement a man
in white had been seen bending over the wounded. Snipers sniped at
him. Shells fell all around. Nothing had power to touch him. He was
either heroic beyond all heroes, or he was something greater still. This
mysterious one, whom the French called The Comrade in White,
seemed to be everywhere at once. At Nancy, in the Argonne, at
Soissons and Ypres, everywhere men were talking of him with hushed
voices.
But some laughed and said the trenches were telling on men's nerves. I,
who was often reckless enough in my talk, exclaimed that for me
seeing was believing, and that I didn't expect any help but an enemy's
knife if I was found lying out there wounded.
It was the next day that things got lively on this bit of the front. Our big
guns roared from sunrise to sunset, and began again in the morning. At
noon we got word to take the trenches in front of us. They were two
hundred yards away, and we weren't well started till we knew that the
big guns had failed in their work of preparation. It needed a stout heart
to go on, but not a man wavered. We had advanced one hundred and
fifty yards when we found it was no good. Our Captain called to us to
take cover, and just then I was shot through both legs. By God's mercy
I fell into a hole of some sort. I suppose I fainted, for when I opened
my eyes I was all alone. The pain was horrible, but I didn't dare to
move lest the enemy should see me, for they were only fifty yards away,
and I did not expect mercy. I was glad when the twilight came. There
were men in my own company who would run any risk in the darkness
if they thought a comrade was still alive.
The night fell, and soon I heard a step, not stealthy, as I expected, but
quiet and firm, as if neither darkness nor death could check those
untroubled feet. So little did I guess what was coming that, even when I
saw the gleam of white in the darkness, I thought it was a peasant in a
white smock, or perhaps a woman deranged. Suddenly, with a little
shiver of joy or of fear, I don't know which, I guessed that it was The
Comrade in White. And at that very moment the enemy's rifles began to
shoot. The bullets could scarcely miss such a target, for he flung out his

arms as though in entreaty, and then drew them hack till he stood like
one of those wayside crosses that we saw so often as we marched
through France. And he spoke. The words sounded familiar, but all I
remember was the beginning. "If thou hadst known," and the ending,
"but now they are hid from thine eyes." And then he stooped and
gathered