Never have I seen a kiltie platoon wading through the cold porridge
of snow and slush of which our front used to be composed, but I have
said, with my French friend, "_Mon Dieu les currents d'air!_" and
thank Fate that I belong to a race which reserves its national
costume for fancy-dress balls.
It is very well for MacAlpine of Ben Lomond, who has stalked his
haggis and devoured it raw, who beds down on thistles for preference
and grows his own fur; but it is very hard on Smith of Peckham, who
through no fault of his own finds himself in a Highland regiment,
trying to make his shirt-tails do where his trousers did before. But
the real heather-mixture, double-distilled Scot is a hardy bird with
different ideas from _nous autres_ as to what is cold: also as to
what is hot. Witness the trying experience of our Albert Edward.
Our Albert Edward and a Hun rifle grenade arrived at the same place
at the same time, intermingled and went down to the Base to be
sifted. In the course of time came a wire from our Albert Edward,
saying he had got the grenade out of his system and was at that
moment at the railhead; were we going to send him a horse or weren't
we?
Emma was detailed for the job, which was a mistake, because Emma was
not the mount for a man who had been softening for five months in
hospital. She had only two speeds in her rimg-cap-pertoire, a walk
which slung you up and down her back from her ears to her croup, and
a trot which jarred your teeth loose and rattled the buttons off your
tunic. However, she went to the railhead and Albert Edward mounted
her, threw the clutch into the first speed and hammered out the ten
miles to our camp, arriving smothered in snow and so stiff we had to
lift him down, so raw it was a mockery to offer him a chair, and
therefore he had to take his tea off the mantelpiece.
We advised a visit to Sandy. Sandy was the hot-bath merchant. He
lurked in a dark barn at the end of the village, and could be found
there at any time of any day, brooding over the black cauldrons in
which the baths were brewed, his Tam-o'shanter drooped over one eye,
steam condensing on his blue nose. Theoretically the hot baths were
free, but in practice a franc pressed into Sandy's forepaw was found
to have a strong calorific effect on the water.
So down the village on all fours, groaning like a Dutch brig in a
cross sea, went our Albert Edward. He crawled into the dark barn
and, having no smaller change, contributed a two-franc bill to the
forepaw and told Sandy about his awful stiffness. His eloquence and
the double fee broke Sandy's heart. With great tears in his eyes he
assured Albert Edward that the utmost resources of his experience and
establishment should be mobilised on his (Albert Edward's) behalf,
and ushered him tenderly into that hidden chamber, constructed of
sacking screens, which was reserved for officers. Albert Edward
peeled his clothes gingerly from him, and Sandy returned to his
cauldrons.
The peeling complete, Albert Edward sat in the draughts of the inner
chamber and waited for the bath. The outer chamber was filled with
smoke, and the flames were leaping six feet above the cauldrons; but
every time Albert Edward holloaed for his bath Sandy implored another
minute's grace.
Finally Albert Edward could stand the draughts no longer and ordered
Sandy, on pain of court martial and death, to bring the water, hot or
not.
Whereupon Sandy reluctantly brought his buckets along, and, grumbling
that neither his experience nor establishment had had a fair chance,
emptied them into the tub. Albert Edward stepped in without further
remark and sat down.
The rest of the story I had from my groom and countryman, who, along
with an odd hundred other people, happened to be patronising the
outer chamber tubs at the time. He told me that suddenly they heard
"a yowl like a man that's afther bein' bit be a mad dog," and over
the screen of the inner chamber came our Albert Edward in his
birthday dress. "Took it in his sthride, Sor, an' coursed three laps
round the bathhouse cursin' the way he'd wither the Divil," said my
groom and countryman; "then he ran out of the door into the snow an'
lay down in it." He likewise told me that Albert Edward's
performance had caused a profound sensation among the other bathers,
and they inquired of Sandy as to the cause thereof; but Sandy shook
his Tam-o'shanter and couldn't tell them; hadn't the vaguest idea.
The water he had given Albert Edward was hardly scalding, he said;
hardly scalding, with barely one packet of mustard dissolved in it.
Our Albert Edward is still taking his meals off the mantelpiece.
* * * * * * * *
I met my friend, the French battery commander, yesterday. He was
cantering a showy chestnut mare over the turf, humming a tune aloud.
He looked very fit and very much in love with the world. I asked him
what he meant by it. He replied that he couldn't help it; everybody
was combining to make him happy; his C.O. had fallen down a gun-pit
and broken a leg; he had won two hundred francs from his pet enemy;
he had discovered a jewel of a cook; and then there was always the
Boche, the perfectly priceless, absolutely ridiculous, screamingly
funny little Boche. The Boche, properly exploited, was a veritable
fount of joy. He dreaded the end of the War, he assured me, for a
world without Boches would be a salad sans the dressing.
I inquired as to how the arch-humorist had been excelling himself
lately.
The Captain passaged his chestnut alongside my bay, chuckled and told
me all about it. It appeared that one wet night he was rung up by
the Infantry to say that the neighbouring Hun was up to some funny
business, and would he stand by for a barrage, please?
What sort of funny business was the Hun putting up?
Oh, a rocket had gone up over the way and they thought it was a
signal for some frightfulness or other.
He stood by for half an hour, and then, as nothing happened, turned
in. Ten minutes later the Infantry rang up again. More funny
business; three rockets had gone up.
He stood by for an hour with no result, then sought his bunk once
more, cursing all men. Confound the Infantry getting the jumps over
a rocket or two! Confound them two times! Then a spark of
inspiration glowed within him, glowed and flamed brightly. If his
exalted poilus got the wind up over a handful of rockets, how much
more also would the deteriorating Boche?
Gurgling happily, he brushed the rats off his chest and the beetles
off his face, turned over and went to sleep. Next morning he wrote a
letter to his "god-mother" in Paris ("_une petite femme, très
intelligente, vous savez_"), and ten days later her parcels came
tumbling in. The first night (a Monday) he gave a modest display,
red and white rockets bursting into green stars every five minutes.
Tuesday night more rockets, with a few Catherine-wheels thrown in.
Wednesday night, Catherine-wheels and golden rain, and so on until
the end of the week, when they finished up with a grand special
attraction and all-star programme, squibs, Catherine-wheels, Roman
candles, Prince of Wales' feathers, terminating in a blinding,
fizzing barrage of coloured rockets, and "God bless our Home" in
golden stars.
"All very pretty," said I, "but what were the results?"
"Precisely what I anticipated. A deserter came over yesterday who
was through it all and didn't intend to go through it again. They
had got the wind up properly, he said, hadn't had a wink of sleep for
a week. His officers had scratched themselves bald-headed trying to
guess what it was all about. All ranks stood to continuously, up to
their waists in mud, frozen stiff and half drowned, while my brave
little rogues of _poilus_, mark you, slept in their dug-outs, and the
only man on duty was the lad who was touching the fireworks off. O
friend of mine, there is much innocent fun to be got out of the Boche
if you'll only give him a chance!"