Tommy Atkins at War | Page 8

the war," replied Mr. Ashton. "What!" exclaimed Tommy, "not a line about the Arsenal? Well, I'm blowed! This is a war!" "We are all in good spirits," writes a bombardier in the 44th Battery, Royal Artillery, "and mainly anxious to know how football is going on in Newcastle now." "I got this," said a Gordon Highlander, referring to his wound, "because I became excited in an argument with wee Geordie Ferris, of our company, about the chances of Queen's Park and Rangers this season."
An artilleryman sends a description of the fighting written in the jargon of the football field. He describes the war as "the great match for the European Cup, which is being played before a record gate, though you can't perhaps see the crowd." In spite of all their swank, he adds, "the Germans haven't scored a goal yet, and I wouldn't give a brass farthing for their chances of lifting the Cup." At the battle of Mons it was noticed that some soldiers even went into action with a football attached to their knapsacks!
But there is no end to the humor of Tommy Atkins. Mr. Hamilton Fyfe tells in the Daily Mail how he stopped to sympathize with a wounded soldier on the roadside near Mons. Asking if his injury was very painful he received the remarkable reply: "Oh, it's not that. I lost my pipe in the last blooming charge." In a letter from the front, published in the Glasgow Herald, this passage occurs: "Our fellows have signed the pledge because Kitchener wants them to. But they all say, 'God help the Germans, when we get hold of them for making us teetotal.'"
What a Frenchman describes as the "new British battle-cry" is another source of amusement. Whenever artillery or rifle fire sweeps over their trenches some facetious Tommy is sure to shout, "Are we downhearted?" and is met with a resounding "No!" and laughter all along the line.
To those at home all this fun may seem a little thoughtless, but to those in the fighting line it is perfectly natural and unforced. "Our men lie in the trenches and play marbles with the bullets from shrapnel shells," writes one of the Royal Engineers; "we have been in two countries and hope to tour a third," says a letter from a cheery artilleryman; and Mr. W.L. Pook (Godalming), who is with one of the field post-offices, declares that things are going so badly with "our dear old chum Wilhelm" that "I've bet X---- a new hat that I'll be home by Christmas."
Bets are common in the trenches. Gunners wager about the number of their hits, riflemen on the number of misses by the enemy. Daring spirits, before making an attack, have even been known to bet on the number of guns they would capture. "We have already picked up a good deal in the way of German souvenirs," says one wag; "enough, indeed, to set a decent-sized army up in business." The British Army, indeed, is an army of sportsmen. Every man must have his game, his friendly wager, his joke, and his song. As one officer told his men: "You are a lively lot of beggars. You don't seem to realize that we're at war."
But they do. That is just Tommy's way. It is how he wins through. He always feels fit, and he enjoys himself. Corporal Graham Hodson, Royal Engineers, provides a typical Atkins letter with which to conclude this chapter. "I am feeling awfully well," he writes, "and am enjoying myself no end. All lights are out at eight o'clock, so we lie in our blankets and tell each other lies about the number of Germans we have shot and the hairbreadth escapes we have had. Oh, it's a great life!"

IV
THE MAN WITH THE BAYONET
Some military writers have declared that with the increasing range of rifle and artillery fire the day of the bayonet is over. Battles, they say, must now be fought with the combatants miles apart. Bayonets are as obsolete as spears and battle axes. Evidently this theory had the full support of the German General Staff, whose military wisdom was in some quarters believed to be infallible--before the war.
As events have proved, however, there has been no more rude awakening for the German soldiery than the efficacy of the bayonet in the hands of Tommy Atkins. In spite of the employment of gigantic siege guns and their enormous superiority in strength, though not in handling, of artillery, the Germans have failed to keep the Allies at the theoretical safe distance. They have been forced to accept hand-to-hand fighting, and in every encounter at close quarters there has never been a moment's doubt as to the result. They have shriveled up in the presence of the bayonet, and fled in disorder at