WHAT WE TALKED ABOUT.
No doubt our military dons believed that after drill we swotted Haking,
Needham, Infantry Training, and Stonewall Jackson, not forgetting
_Notes from the Front_, and all the pamphlets on soldiers’ bunions,
number nine pills, &c. We certainly did swot—when they were looking
or moving around. But a cadet’s day is a strenuous day. From 6 A.M.
to 4 P.M. running, drilling, lectures, and physical jerks feed up the
best of men, and we were glad to leave shop and gather together round
the fire. There we unbared our souls, and made no bones about it. Army
life is an open life, a much manlier life than even the public school.
There’s no beastly fagging, no ‘bloods,’ but a universal hate of the
prig and the prude. War is a wonderful leveller. And at this school
there was a regular mix up of breeds and classes.
These men were all tried men. They had fought the Boche. Some had
the M.M. or the D.C.M. There were butchers and bakers, jockeys,
bookies, honours men, and backwoods adventurers. They were the cream
of courage, but—excepting Billy Greens—not the soul of the Church.
Fighting–men are really primitive. They have seen life—and tasted it.
Women and wine had passed their way. For all that, they were not sickly
neurotics, revelling in literary slime. They could tell a yarn, of
course, but that was no evidence of decadence or softness. Men who can
beat the Boche are not soft–bottomed sultans. They were hard as flint,
yet as gentle as babes.
In my own hut there were many characters. Ginger Thomson, for
example—the queer beggar who wouldn’t wash. But he had the M.M., as
well as the French Military Medal, and a brilliant record at Oxford.
He entertained us when he dissected our professors, and it was good
to hear him cross swords with Billy Greens, the ex–parson. Greens
hadn’t the chest of a hen, but he was the Church militant. He was
a plucky little devil, and if any man interfered with his evening
devotions, Greens would get up and fight. Nobby Clarke was a howling
Radical lawyer, inclined to argue the point; while Tosher Johnson was
a Canadian cow–puncher. There were others, not forgetting Beefy Jones,
the lustiest beggar who ever carried a gun. So, when gathered round,
we were interesting. One night we discussed religion.
‘Men can’t be intellectual and godly, old chap,’ declared Ginger.
‘If you want us all to sing psalms and chant “Holy, Holy,” you’ll
have to close the schools and breed us like heifers and hogs. To be a
Rationalist, one need not be a morality–wrecker. Many unbelievers are
clean—cleaner than those who attend communion on Sunday and break all
the Commandments on Monday. Clean up the Church, and I’ll be a parson.’
‘How can we clean it up, when you’re destroying any little good we
can do?’ exclaimed Billy Greens. ‘We’re not supermen—we’re human. We
can’t perform miracles; and I’ll tell you this, old chap, religion is
a bulwark for the poor, the sick, and the blind. Destroy the Church
and you’ll destroy the last shreds of public decency and restraint.
Your doctrine will plunge us into the moral laxity of the Huns. We’re
fighting for God in this war, and that’s why I’m in. I loathe the whole
armour, but I won’t throw it off till we rid the world of this canker
and curse. This is a holy war.’
‘Well, Billy, I’m giving you a hand, although my views are not your
views. Personally, if all the padres were good fellows like you, I
would cut out my doubting and inquiring brain, and become a sidesman in
your parish church. Religion is all right; it’s the average parson who
is all wrong. Some are the fag–ends of humanity; others are ordained
Don Juans; many are mercenary adventurers; and only a few are like
you—real good men, who believe in what they preach. Hang it all, Billy!
half your parsons are not men; they’re women in breeks. You’re about
the only man I’ve seen fit to be Archbishop of Canterbury. When I’m
Premier, you’ll get the job.’
‘Hear, hear!’ echoed the boys, for Billy Greens was a popular chap.
‘Your flattery’s well meant, Ginger, but I’ve no need of it. I can
carry my own bat. You’re not morally bad. Indeed, you’re on a higher
plane than many. But, for all that, your intellect makes you dangerous.
And it’s up to me to keep you in order. In this hut I’m the Church
militant, and if you convert any of these boys to your doubting
Rationalist creed, I’ll take it out of your skin.’
‘By Gad, Billy! I _do_ like your pluck. You’re a white man, if you are
a parson. I’ll be a real good boy,’ murmured Ginger, who in his heart
had a swelling love for the plucky little padre.
‘I’ll vote you in as a bishop too, when I get into Parliament,’
interjected Nobby Clarke.
‘Thanks, Nobby; but you’re a rotten Radical. I’ve no use for your
Mumbo–Jumbo trickery and Manchester morality. Your crowd is a mixed
bunch of twisters and prudes. You sing the Auld Hundred on Sunday, and
pull down the Established Church on Monday.’
‘Good old Billy!’ shouted Ginger.
‘My dear old Pieface, your Church won’t be any good till you get
Disestablishment. As long as padres have got security of tenure, they
won’t work. They regard a living as an investment. All you can get them
to do is to play bowls, read Elinor Glyn, and drink whisky with the
squires. They’re the enemies of freedom, Free Trade’——
‘And Free Beer,’ piped Beefy.
‘Yes, they are political mandarins who want to keep the Old Country in
chains. The Liberal Party will save all you High Brows from revolution
and anarchy. Yet you won’t thank us. You gobble the _Morning Post_,
chew the _Spectator_, and lick the feet of Arthur Balfour. You Tories
are a damned lot of nose–wipers and job–seekers. You haven’t the
stomach of a fly.’
‘What about Haldane?’ roared Beefy, who got his politics from the
_Daily Mail_.
‘Well, what about him?’
‘The _Daily Mail_ says his soul is in Germany.’
‘If you read the _Daily News_ you would find that it was his
Expeditionary Force which landed in France in 1914, and his Territorial
Force which warded off invasion. All your Tory Government did when in
power was to change the design of Tommy’s shirt–tail and hand out caps
made in Germany. You’re great fellows for political swank and eye–wash,
but you haven’t the brains of a hen. And even in your Tory Coalition
Government you’ve got to get Lloyd George to pull you through.’
‘Nobby!’ cried Ginger.
‘What?’
‘I’m fighting your constituency at the next election. You’re a pest, a
peril, and a blighter. And if the Boche doesn’t kill you, I’ll smite
you dead on the platform as soon as you whisper Free Trade. Free Trade
will ruin the Empire. We’re going to have Protection, even if I’ve
got to lay you out on a shutter of the _Daily News_. And I’ll bribe
the hooligans to smash up the printing–machines of the _Manchester
Guardian_. You Radicals have got to be destroyed.’
‘Gentlemen,’ said Nobby, striking an oratorical pose, ‘look at this
unwashed pro–consul from Oxford. He’s really afraid of Advanced
Liberals passing a Utopian measure that every citizen must be washed.
And he, the product of culture, the flower of chivalry, the superman,
would bribe the toughs to smash up the _Manchester Guardian_! Oh
Ginger, thy name is Autocracy!’
‘Yours is Democracy, and it’s a pretty rotten creed. You’re rushing us
into a Republic, with a President in overalls, and Cabinet Ministers
who drop their h’s, and snore when they’re sucking their soup. You
won’t be happy till you see field–marshals as bus–conductors and
admirals as A.B.’s. You’ll cut off the Colonies and let us fizzle out
as the inglorious scrap–heap of a once glorious old Empire. Nobby,
you’re a politician and a public fraud.’
‘Is he?’ said Tosher Johnson, the Canadian.
We all looked up with a start. Tosher was a dark horse.
‘Yes,’ Ginger retorted with emphasis.
‘Well, I guess Nobby’s Free Trade is all bosh, but he’s a man of push
and go. You’re too durned slow for a funeral over here. Your hoofs are
sticking in the feudal mud. An earthquake’s the only thing to stop your
browsing on Homer and chewing the rag about “form.” This is the Dollar
Age. Make good or go under. You wowsers from Oxford and Cambridge want
your blinkers taken off. The classics cut no ice in this age. Homer,
Socrates, and Plato won’t sever the ham–strings of the Hun. When you
were pottering around on Shakespeare, Tennyson, golf, tennis, and
“Rugger,” the Hun was dumping his goods in Canada and every bush town
in the Empire. It makes me sick to hear all this gaw–damned talk in
your papers. You’re a fine people, but you only crawl. You won’t run.
If you don’t get a spark under your old machinery, this old scheme will
peter out like Spain and Rome.’
‘Rotten materialism,’ shouted Ginger. ‘Your philosophy is “guessing,”
your soul is “calculating,” and you’re clean gone on “results.” You’ve
been taught no history. Old things you don’t know or understand. And
when you land in the Old Country, you want to bring your commercial
morality into the only decent Government in the world. You’re all jolly
good fellows. Fine soldiers! Good citizens! But you’re dollar–mad, and
have no bottom in your politics or finance. Smuts is a Colonial, but he
doesn’t talk like you.’
‘He was at Cambridge. Good old Cambridge!’ shouted Beefy.
‘Yes,’ answered Ginger. ‘Smuts is about the only man you’ve produced at
Cambridge. He refused to play the giddy goat, and put his nose down on
the classics, logic, history, and law. That’s what you want, Johnson.’
‘Not for me, old chicken. Homer never built the C.P.R., Shakespeare
ain’t a bit of use on a Calgary beef–ranch, and Darwin’s theory won’t
milk a Holstein or a Jersey. A clear head, a strong back, and a good
riding–leg cut ice in these times. Business is business. And dollars
keep up men and munitions. You ain’t wise, Ginger.’
‘Well, boys,’ said I, butting in, ‘we’ve discussed everything from
bishops to Free Trade and the classics, but we are getting muddled and
fogged. This fellow Ginger from Oxford is paralysing our repartee and
logic, and old Tosher wants to make the Old Land into a dollar–factory.
It seems to me that the main issue raised by this howling Radical,
Nobby Clarke, is whether we shall vote for Bolsheviks or Imperialists.
I don’t quite agree with high–browed Ginger, nor do I support all the
materialism of Tosher. But the future is clearly a titanic contest
between Republicanism and Imperialism. I move we put it to the vote.’
‘Certainly,’ shouted Ginger.
Result:
Republicanism 1 (Tosher)
Imperialism 23
Imperialist Majority 22
‘Nobby!’ shouted Tosher, after the vote.
‘What?’
‘You’re a gaw–damned Tory, after all.’
‘No—I’m a lawyer.’
_Lights out!_