"At St. Mary Abbot's, in Kensington, the organist played hymns
for two hours during the Sunday raid, in which the congregation
joined."--_Daily Mirror_.
* * * * *
The rumour that in consequence of the recent invasion of a popular
sea-coast resort by denizens of the East End the local authorities
have decided to change its name to "Brightchapel" is at present
without foundation.
* * * * *
[Illustration: TRIALS OF A CAMOUFLAGE OFFICER.
_C. Officer_. "NOW THEN, WHAT'S THE MEANING OF THIS?"
_C. Painter_. "I WAS TELLING 'IM 'E DIDN'T KNOW NOTHING ABOUT
CAMERFLARGE, SIR, AND 'E SAYS, 'HO, DON'T I? I'LL SOON SHOW YER.
I'LL MAKE YER SO'S YER OWN MOTHER WON'T KNOW YER'; AN' 'E UPS WITH
THE PAINT-BUCKET ALL OVER ME, SIR."]
* * * * *
_L'AGENT PROVOCATEUR._
A short while ago the following advertisement appeared in the
"Personal" column of _The Times_:--
"Artist (33), literary, travelled, mentally isolated, would
appreciate brilliant, interesting correspondents; writers'
anonymity observed."
Now thereby hang many tales (none of them necessarily true). Here is
one of them.
The Colonel of the Blank-blank Blankshires exclaimed (as all proper
Colonels are expected to do), "Ha!" Carefully marking with a blue
pencil a small paragraph on the front page of _The Times_, he threw
it on the table among the attentive Mess and snorted.
"Ha! A Cuthbert--a genuine shirker! I think some of you might oblige
the gentleman."
Then he stepped outside and went into the seventh edition of his
impressionist sketch, "Farmyard of a French Farm," with lots of
BBB pencil for the manure heap. He was a young C.O. and new to
the regiment.
The Mess "carried on" the conversation.
"_I'll_ write to the blighter," shouted the Junior Sub. "I'll be an
awf'lly 'interesting correspondent.'"
"And a brilliant one?" queried the Major.
"A Verey brilliant one, Sir," asserted the Sub., giving a sample.
"This sort of slacker," said the Senior Captain bitterly, as with
infinite toil he scraped the last of the glaze from the inside of
the marmalade pot, "is the sort that doesn't realise that there's
a war on."
"Don't you make any mistake," said the Major, "_he_ knows, poor devil!
I'm going to write to him and say, 'When I think of the incessant
strain of the trench warfare carried on with inadequate support by
you civilians of military age against the repeated brutal attacks of
tribunals, I marvel at the indomitable pluck you display. In your
place I should simply jack it up, plead ill-health and get into
the Army."
"I've got an idea," said the Junior Sub., joyously.
"Consolidate it quickly," said the Adjutant, "and prepare to receive
counter-attacks. Yes?"
"I've never yet been allowed to explain _my_ side of that confounded
affair of the revetments. I'll tell it all to Cuthbert. _He_'ll
sympathise with me. I'll tell him all that the C.O. said and all that
I should have _liked_ to say to the C.O. To pour out one's troubles
into a travelled literary bosom--what a relief!"
"That's rather an idea," said the Senior Captain. "I nurse a private
grief of my own beneath a camouflage of--of persiflage. I think I
shall ask Cuthbert's opinion, as an artist, of a brother artist who
himself does perfectly unrecognisable sketches of farm-yards"--he
waved a golden-syrup spoon towards the Colonel and the
manure-heap--"and yet demands a finnicking and altogether contemptible
realism in the matter of trench maps. Pass the honey, please."
"It seems to me," said the Major reflectively as he rose from table,
"that 'Artist, 33, literary, travelled, mentally isolated' (one) is
going to be buried beneath the weight of the world's grievances--or
the grievances of this battalion, at any rate."
"It's the same thing," observed the Senior Captain gloomily. "Isn't
there any preserved ginger? Lord, what a Mess!"
Weary Williams, a time-expired Second Lieutenant--a ticket-of-leave
man, as it were, without a ticket-of-leave--who had once commanded the
remnants of two companies with honour but not with acknowledgment,
poised a fountain-pen, inquiring casually, "_What_ was it the C.O.
said about the destruction of Ypres? Ah, yes" (and he began to write),
"_a Brobdingnagian act of brachycephalic brutality_...."
* * * * *
At breakfast about a week later the Colonel seemed to be enjoying his
immense pile of correspondence so heartily that many of the Mess,
comparatively letterless as they were, directed glances of injured
interest towards him--of rather deeper interest than was warranted by
military discipline or civilian breeding (which are, of course, the
same virtue in different forms).
Then, presently, as he put down one letter and opened another, the
Major was seen to stiffen and the Junior Sub. to wilt. The attention
of the table became as fixed and frigid as that of the midnight sentry
at a loophole. The Colonel toyed happily with another letter (while
the Senior Captain made a careful census of the grounds at the bottom
of his coffee-cup), took the range of the manure-heap outside the
window from the angles of the table-legs, rose, and departed with his
correspondence, summoning Williams to follow him.
Outside the Weary One waited respectfully for the Colonel to speak.
"So you saw through my camouflage?" said the latter thoughtfully.
"Yes, Sir."
"How did you do it?"
"Well, Sir, to mention only the internal evidence--an
'Artist'"--Williams waved his hand expressively towards the
manure-heap; "'thirty-three'--one of the youngest C.O.'s in the Army,
I believe?" He bowed politely.
"Ha!" said the Colonel.
"'Literary'--I remember your stopping Captain Jones's leave for a
split infinitive in a ration return. 'Travelled'--you have travelled
in Turkey, I think, Sir?"
The Colonel, who had been blown out of a trench at Krithia, nodded
shortly.
"'Mentally isolated'--I'm afraid, Sir, our Mess doesn't afford very
much for a mind like yours to bite on. I'm afraid, too, that such
correspondence as--as mine, for instance--can hardly be called either
brilliant or interesting."
"I don't know," said the Colonel. "That was a very good bit about the
destruction of Ypres. What was it?--Ha, yes--_A Brobdingnagian act_--"
"--_of brachycephalic brutality_, Sir. But that was not original."
"If you can't be original yourself," said the Colonel kindly, "the
next best thing is to quote from those who can."
"That's what I thought, Sir."
"Ha! Well, of course the writers' anonymity must be observed--that's
a point of honour. Still, I think, Williams--I have been asked to
recommend an intelligent officer for a staff appointment--that if I
were to name _you_ I should not go far wrong. And--er--if you are ever
asked for an opinion of the destruction of Ypres--"
"I shall remember to give the reference, Sir. Thank you, Sir."