I've talked a muckle i' this book aboot what I think. Do you know why?
It's because I'm a plain man, and I think the way plain men think all
ower this world. It was the war taught me that I could talk to folk as
well as sing tae them. If I've talked tae much in this book you maun
forgie me--and you maun think that it's e'en yor ain fault, in a way.
During the war, whiles I'd speak aboot this or that after my show,
people paid an attention tae me that wad have been flattering if I
hadn't known sae well that it was no to me they were listening. It
wasna old Harry Lauder who interested them--it was what he had to tell
them. It was a great thing to think that folk would tak' me seriously.
I've been amusing people for these many years. It seemed presumptuous,
at first, when I set out to talk to them of other and more serious
things.
"Hoots!" I said, at first, when they wanted me tae speak for the war
and the recruiting or a loan. "They'll no be wanting to listen tae me.
I'm just a comedian."
"You'll be a relief to them, Harry," I was told. "There's been too
much serious speaking already."
Weel, I ken what they meant. It's serious speaking I've done, and
serious thinking. But there's nae harm if I crack a bit joke noo and
again; it makes the medicine gae doon the easier. And noo the
medicine's swallowed. There's nae mair fichting tae be done, thank
God! We've saved the hoose our ancestors built.
But its walls are crackit here and there. The roof's leaking. There's
paint needed on all sides. There's muckle for us tae do before the'
hoose we've saved is set in order. It's like a hoose that's been
afire. The firemen come and play their hose upon it. They'll put oot
the fire, a' richt. But is it no a sair sicht, the hoose they leave
behind them when they gae awa'?
Ye'll see a wee bit o' smoke, an hour later, maybe, coming frae some
place where they thocht it was a' oot. And ye'll have tae be taking a
bucket of water and putting oot the bit o' fire that they left
smouldering there, lest the whole thing break oot again. And here and
there the water will ha' done a deal of damage. Things are better than
if the fire had just burnt itself oot, but you've no got the hoose you
had before the fire! 'Deed, and ye have not!
Nor have we. We had our fire--the fire the Kaiser lighted. It was
arson caused our fire--it was a firebug started it, no spontaneous
combustion, as some wad ha' us think. And we called the firemen--the
braw laddies frae all the world, who set to work and never stopped
till the fire was oot. Noo they've gaed hame aboot their other
business. We'll no be wanting to call them oot again. It was a cruel,
hard task they had; it was a terrible ficht they had tae make.
It's sma' wonder, after such a conflagration, that there's spots i'
the world where there's a bit of flame still smouldering. It's for us
tae see that they're a' stamped oot, those bits of fire that are still
burning. We can do that ourselves--no need to ca' the tired firemen
oot again. And then there's the hoose itself!
Puir hoose! But how should it have remained the same? Man, you'd no
expect to sleep in your ain hoose the same nicht there'd been a fire
to put out? You'd be waiting for the insurance folks. And you'd know
that the furniture was a' spoiled wi' water, and smoke. And there'll
be places where the firemen had to chop wi' their axes. They couldna
be carfu' wi' what was i' the hoose--had they been sae there'd be no a
hoose left at a' the noo.
Sae are they no foolish folk that were thinking that sae soon as peace
came a' would be as it was before yon days in August, 1914? Is it but
five years agane? It is--but it'll tak' us a lang time tae bring the
world back to where it was then. And it can't be the same again. It
can't. Things change.
Here's what there is for us tae do. It's tae see that the change is in
the richt direction. We canna stand still the noo. We'll move. We'll
move one way or the other--forward or back.
And I say we dare not move back. We dare not, because of the graves
that have been filled in France and Gallipoli and dear knows where
beside in these last five years. We maun move forward. They've left
sons behind them, many of the laddies that died to save us. Aye,
there's weans in Britain and America, and in many another land, that
will ne'er know a faither.
We owe something to those weans whose faithers deed for this world's
salvation. We owe it to them and to their faithers tae see that they
have a better world to grow up in than we and their faithers knew. It
can be a better world. It can be a bonnier world than any of us have
ever dreamed of. Dare I say that, ye'll be asking me, wi' the tears of
the widow and the orphan still flowing fresh, wi' the groans of those
that ha' suffered still i' our ears?
Aye, I dare say it. And I'll be proving it, tae, if ye'll ha' patience
wi' me. For it's in your heart and mine that we'll find the makings of
the bonnier world I can see, for a' the pain.
Let's stop together and think a bit. We were happy, many of us, in yon
days before the war. Our loved yins were wi' us. There was peace i' a'
the world. We had no thought that any wind could come blowing frae
ootside ourselves that would cast down the hoose of our happiness.
Wasna that sae? Weel, what was the result?
I think we were selfish folk, many, too many, of us. We had no
thought, or too little, for others. We were so used to a' we had and
were in the habit of enjoying that we forgot that we owed much of what
we had to others. We were becoming a very fierce sort of
individualists. Our life was to ourselves. We were self-sufficient.
One of the prime articles of our creed was Cain's auld question:
"Am I my brother's keeper?"
We answered that question wi' a ringing "No!" The day was enow for the
day. We'd but to gae aboot our business, and eat and drink, and maybe
be merry. Oh, aye--I ken fine it was sae wi' me. Did I have charity,
Weel, it may be that the wife and I did our wee bit tae be helping
some that was less fortunate than ourselves. But here I'll be
admitting why I did that. It was for my ain selfish satisfaction and
pleasure. It was for the sake of the glow of gude feeling, the warmth
o' heart, that came wi' the deed.
And in a' the affairs of life, it seems to me, we human folk were the
same. We took too little thought of God. Religion was a failing force
in the world. Hame ties were loosening; we'd no the appreciation of
what hame meant that our faithers had had. Not all of us, maybe, but
too many. And a' the time, God help us, we were like those folk that
dwell in their wee hooses on the slopes of Vesuvius--puir folk and wee
hooses that may be swept awa' any day by an eruption of the volcano.
All wasna sae richt and weel wi' the world as we thought it in you
days. We'd closed our een to much of bitterness and hatred and malice
that was loose and seeking victims in the hearts of men. Aye, it was
the Hun loosed the war upon us. It was he who was responsible for the
calamity that overtook the world--and that will mak' him suffer maist
of all in the end, as is but just and richt. But we'd ha' had trouble,
e'en gi'en there'd been no war.
It wouldna ha' been sae great, perhaps. There'd not be sae much grief
and sae much unhappiness i' the world today, save for him. But there
was something wrang wi' the world, and there had tae be a visitation
of some sort before the world could be made better.
There's few things that come to a man or a nation in the way of grief
and sorrow and trouble that are no punishments for some wickedness and
sin o' his ain. We dinna always ken what it is we ha' done. And whiles
the innocent maun suffer wi' the guilty--aye, that's a part of the
punishment of the guilty, when they come to realize hoo it is they've
carried others, maybe others they love, doon wi' them into the valley
of despair.
I love Britain. I think you'll all be knowing that I love my native
land better than anything i' the world. I'd ha' deed for her gladly--
aye, gladly. It was a sair grief tae me that they wadna tak' me. I
tried, ye ken? I tried even before the Huns killed my boy, John. And I
tried again after he'd been ta'en. Sae I had tae live for my country,
and tae do what I could to help her.
But that doesna mean that I think my country's always richt. Far frae
it. I ken only tae well that she's done wrang things. I'm minded of
one of them the noo.
I've talked before of history. There was 1870, when Prussia crushed
France. We micht ha' seen the Hun then, rearing himself up in Europe,
showing what was in his heart. But we raised no hand. We let France
fall and suffer. We saw her humbled. We saw her cast down. We'd fought
against France--aye. But we'd fought a nation that was generous and
fair; a nation that made an honorable foe, and that played its part
honorably and well afterward when we sent our soldiers to fight beside
hers in the Crimea.
France had clear een even then. She saw, when the Hun was in Paris,
wi' his hand at her throat and his heel pressed doon upon her, that he
meant to dominate all Europe, and, if he could, all the world. She
begged for help--not for her sake alone, but for humanity. Humanity
refused. And humanity paid for its refusal.
And there were other things that were wrang wi' Britain. Our cause was
holy, once we began to ficht. Oh, aye--never did a nation take up the
sword wi' a holier reason. We fought for humanity, for democracy, for
the triumph of the plain man, frae the first. There are those will
tell ye that Britain made war for selfish reasons. But it's no worth
my while tae answer them. The facts speak for themselves.
But here's what I'm meaning. We saw Belgium attacked. We saw France
threatened wi' a new disaster that would finish the murder her ain
courage and splendor had foiled in 1871. We sprang to the rescue this
time--oh, aye! The nation's leaders knew the path of honor--knew, too,
that it was Britain's only path of safety, as it chanced. They
declared war sae soon as it was plain how Germany meant to treat the
world.
Sae Britain was at war, and she called oot her young men. Auld
Britain--wi' sons and daughters roond a' the Seven Seas. I saw them
answering the call, mind you. I saw them in Australia and New Zealand.
I kissed my ain laddie gude bye doon there in Australia when he went
back--to dee.
Never was there a grander outpouring of heroic youth. We'd no
conscription in those first days. That didna come until much later.
Sae, at the very start, a' our best went forth to ficht and dee.
Thousands--hundreds of thousands--millions of them. And sae I come to
those wha were left.
It's sair I am to say it. But it was in the hearts of sae many of
those who stayed behind that we began tae be able tae see what had
been wrang wi' Britain--and what was, and remains, wrang wi' a' the
world to-day.
There were our boys, in France. We'd no been ready. We'd no spent
forty years preparing ourselves for murder. Sae our boys lacked guns
and shells, and aircraft, and a' the countless other things they maun
have in modern war. And at hame the men in the shops and factories
haggled and bargained, and thought, and talked. Not all o' them--oh,
understand that in a' this I say that is harsh and bears doon hard
upon this man and that, I'm only meaning a few each time! Maist of the
plain folk i' the world are honest and straight and upright in their
dealings.
But do you ken hoo, in a basket of apples, ane rotten one wi' corrupt
the rest? Weel, it's sae wi' men. Put ane who's disaffected, and
discontented, and nitter, in a shop and he'll mak' trouble wi' all the
rest that are but seeking the do their best.
"Ca' Canny!" Ha' ye no heard that phrase?
It's gude Scots. It's a gude Scots motto. It means to go slow--to be
sure before you leap. It sums up a' the caution and the findness for
feeling his way that's made the Scot what he is in the wide world
over. But it's a saying that's spread to England, and that's come to
have a special meaning of its own. As a certain sort of workingman
uses it it means this:
"I maun be carfu' lest I do too much. If I do as much as I can I'll
always have to do it, and I'll get no mair pay for doing better--the
maister'll mak' all the profit. I maun always do less than I could
easily manage--sae I'll no be asked to do mair than is easy and
comfortable in a day's work."
Restriction of output! Aye, you've heard those words. But do you ken
what they were meaning early i' the war in Britain? They were meaning
that we made fewer shells than we could ha' made. Men deed in France
and Flanders for lack of the shells that would ha' put our artillery
on even terms with that of the Germans.
It didna last, you'll be saying. Aye, I ken that. All the rules union
labor had made were lifted i' the end. Labor in Britain took its place
on the firing line, like the laddies that went oot there to ficht.
Mind you, I'm saying no word against a man because he stayed at hame
and didna ficht. There were reasons to mak' it richt for many a man
tae do that. I've no sympathy wi' those who went aboot giving a white
feather to every young man they saw who was no in uniform. There was
much cruel unfairness in a' that.
But I'm saying it was a dreadfu' thing that men didna see for
themselves, frae the very first, where their duty lay. I'm saying it
was a dreadfu' thing for a man to be thinking just of the profit he
could be making for himself oot of the war. And we had too many of
that ilk in Britain--in labor and in capital as well. Mind you there
were men i' London and elsewhere, rich men, who grew richer because of
their work as profiteers.
And do you see what I mean now? The war was a great calamity. It cost
us a great toll of grief and agony and suffering. But it showed us, a'
too plainly, where the bad, rotten spots had been. It showed us that
things hadna been sae richt as we'd supposed before. And are we no
going to mak' use of the lesson it has taught us?