The Red Horizon | Page 5

the poor man was having his first holiday on the Continent, and
alas!--perhaps his last; and like (p. 026) cattle new to the pasture fields
in Spring, we were surging full of life and animal gaiety.
We were out on a great adventure, full of thrill and excitement; the
curtain which surrounded our private life was being lifted; we stood on
the threshold of momentous events. The cottagers who laboured by
their humble homes stood for a moment and watched our train go by;
now and again a woman shouted out a blessing on our mission, and
ancient men seated by their doorsteps pointed in the direction our train
was going, and drew lean, skinny hands across their throats, and yelled
advice and imprecations in hoarse voices. We understood. The ancient
warriors ordered us to cut the Kaiser's throat and envied us the job.

The day wore on, the evening fell dark and stormy. A cold wind from
somewhere swept in through chinks in windows and door, and chilled
the compartment. The favourite song, Uncle Joe, with its catching
chorus,
When Uncle Joe plays a rag upon his old banjo, Eberybody starts
aswayin to and fro, Mummy waddles all around the cabin floor, Yellin'
"Uncle Joe, give us more! give us more!"
died away into a melancholy whimper. Sometimes one of the men
would rise, open the window and look out at a passing hamlet, where (p.
027) lights glimmered in the houses and heavy waggons lumbered
along the uneven streets, whistle an air into the darkness and close the
window again. My mate had an electric torch--by its light we opened
the biscuit box handed in when we left the station, and biscuits and
bully-beef served to make a rather comfortless supper. At ten o'clock,
when the torch refused to burn, and when we found ourselves short of
matches, we undid the bale, spread out the hay on the floor of the truck
and lay down, wearing our sheepskin tunics and placing our overcoats
over our legs.
We must have been asleep for some time. We were awakened by the
stopping of the train and the sound of many voices outside. The door
was opened and we looked out. An officer was hurrying by, shouting
loudly, calling on us to come out. On a level space bordering the line a
dozen or more fires were blazing merrily, and dixies with some boiling
liquid were being carried backwards and forwards. A sergeant with a
lantern, one of our own men, came to our truck and clambered inside.
"Every man get his mess tin," he shouted. "Hurry up, the train's not
stopping for long, and there's coffee and rum for us all." (p. 028)
"I wish they'd let us sleep," someone who was fumbling in his pack
remarked in a sleepy voice. "I'm not wantin' no rum and cawfee. Last
night almost choked in the bell-tent, the night before sea-sick, and now
wakened up for rum and cawfee. Blast it, I say!"
We lined up two deep on the six-foot way, shivering in the bitter cold,

our mess-tins in our hands. The fires by the railway threw a dim light
on the scene, officers paraded up and down issuing orders, everybody
seemed very excited, and nearly all were grumbling at being awakened
from their beds in the horse-trucks. Many of our mates were now
coming back with mess-tins steaming hot, and some would come to a
halt for a moment and sip from their rum and coffee. Chilled to the
bone we drew nearer to the coffee dixies. What a warm drink it would
be! I counted the men in front--there were no more than twelve or
thirteen before me. Ah! how cold! and hot coffee--suddenly a whistle
was blown, then another.
"Back to your places!" the order came, and never did a more unwilling
party go back to bed. We did not learn the reason for the order; (p. 029)
in the army few explanations are made. We shivered and slumbered till
dawn, and rose to greet a cheerless day that offered us biscuits and
bully-beef for breakfast and bully-beef and biscuits for dinner. At
half-past four in the afternoon we came to a village and formed into
column of route outside the railway station. Two hours march lay
before us we learned, but we did not know where we were bound. As
we waited ready to move off a sound, ominous and threatening,
rumbled in from the distance and quivered by our ears. We were
hearing the sound of guns!
CHAPTER III
(p. 030)
OUR FRENCH BILLETS
The fog is white on Glenties moors, The road is grey from Glenties
town, Oh! lone grey road and ghost-white fog, And ah! the homely
moors of brown.
The farmhouse where we were billeted