XII

"FIX BAYONETS!"

"Oh, que j'aime le militaire!" sighed the old French song, no doubt with

a touch of frivolity; but the sentiment moves us all. Sages have thought

the army worth preserving for a dash of scarlet and a roll of the

kettledrum; in every State procession it is the implements of death and

the men of blood that we parade; and not to nursemaids only is the

soldier irresistible. The glamour of romance hangs round him. Terrible

with knife and spike and pellet he stalks through this puddle of a

world, disdainful of drab mankind. Multitudes may toil at keeping alive,

drudging through their scanty years for no hope but living and giving

life; he shares with very few the function of inflicting death, and

moves gaily clad and light of heart. "No doubt, some civilian

occupations are very useful," said the author of an old drill-book; I

think it was Lord Wolseley, and it was a large admission for any officer

to have made. It was certainly Lord Wolseley who wrote in his _Soldier's

Pocket-Book_ that the soldier "must believe his duties are the noblest

that fall to man's lot":

"He must be taught to despise all those of civil life. Soldiers,

like missionaries, must be fanatics. An army thoroughly imbued

with fanaticism can be killed, but never suffer disgrace;

Napoleon, in speaking of it, said, 'Il en faut pour se faire tuer.'"

And not only to get himself killed, but to kill must the soldier be

imbued with this fanaticism and self-glory. In the same spirit Mr.

Kipling and Mr. Fletcher have told us in their _History of England_ that

there is only one better trade than being a soldier, and that is being a

sailor:

"To serve King and country in the army is the second best

profession for Englishmen of all classes; to serve in the navy,

I suppose we all admit, is the best."

As we all admit it, certainly it does seem very hard on all classes that

there should be anything else to do in the world besides soldiering and

sailoring. It is most deplorable that, in Lord Wolseley's words, some

civilian occupations are very useful; for, if they were not, we might

all have a fine time playing at soldiers--real soldiers, with

guns!--from a tumultuous cradle to a bloody grave. If only we could

abolish the civilian and his ignoble toil, what a rollicking life we

should all enjoy upon this earthly field of glory!

Such was the fond dream of many an innocent heart, when in August of

1911 we saw the soldiers distributed among the city stations or posted

at peaceful junctions where suburb had met suburb for years in the

morning, and parted at evening without a blow. There the sentry stood,

let us say, at a gate of Euston station. There he stood, embodying

glory, enjoying the second best profession for Englishmen of all

classes. He was dressed in clean khaki and shiny boots. On his head he

bore a huge dome of fluffy bearskin, just the thing for a fashionable

muff; oppressive in the heat, no doubt, but imparting additional

grandeur to his mien. There he stood, emblematic of splendour, and on

each side of him were encamped distressful little families, grasping

spades and buckets and seated on their corded luggage, unable to move

because of the railway strike, while behind him flared a huge

advertisement that said, "The Sea is Calling you." Along the kerbstone a

few yards in front were ranged the children of the district, row upon

row, uncombed, in rags, filthy from head to foot, but silent with joy

and admiration as they gazed upon the face of war. For many a gentle

girl and boy that Friday and Saturday were the days of all their

lives--the days on which the pretty soldiers came.

Nor was it only the charm of nice clothes and personal appearance that

attracted them. Horror added its tremulous delight. There the sentry

stood, ready to kill people at a word. His right knee was slightly bent,

and against his right foot he propped the long wooden instrument that he

killed with. In little pouches round his belt he carried the pointed

bits of metal that the instrument shoots out quicker than arrows. It was

whispered that some of them were placed already inside the gun itself,

and could be fired as fast as a teacher could count, and each would kill

a man. And at the end of the gun gleamed a knife, about as long as a

butcher's carving-knife. It would go through a fattish person's body as

through butter, and the point would stick a little way through the

clothes at his back. Down each side of the knife ran a groove to let the

blood out, so that the man might die quicker. It was a pleasure to look

at such a thing. It was better than watching the sheep and oxen driven

into the Aldgate slaughter-houses. It was almost as good as the glimpse

of the executioner driving up to Pentonville in his dog-cart the evening

before an execution.

Few have given the Home Office credit for the amount of interesting and

cheap amusement it then afforded by parcelling out the country among the

military authorities. In a period of general lassitude and holiday, it

supplied the populace with a spectacle more widely distributed than the

Coronation, and equally encouraging to loyalty. For it is not only

pleasure that the sight of the soldiers in their midst provides: it

gives every man and woman and child an opportunity of realising the

significance of uniforms. Here are soldiers, men sprung from the working

classes, speaking the same language, and having the same thoughts; men

who have been brought up in poor homes, have known hunger, and have

nearly all joined the army because they were out of work. And now that

they are dressed in a particular way, they stand there with guns and

those beautiful gleaming knives, ready, at a word, to kill people--to

kill their own class, their own friends and relations, if it so happens.

The word of command from an officer is alone required, and they would do

it. People talk about the reading of the Riot Act and the sounding of

the bugles in warning before the shooting begins; but no such warning is

necessary. Lord Mansfield laid it down in 1780 that the Riot Act was but

"a step in terrorism and of gentleness." There is no need for such

gentleness. At an officer's bare word, a man in uniform must shoot. And

all for a shilling a day, with food and lodging! To the inexperienced

intelligence of men and women, the thing seems incredible, and the

country owes a debt of gratitude to the Home Office for showing the

whole working population that it is true. Certainly, the soldiers

themselves strongly object to being put to this use. Their Red Book of

instructions insists that the primary duty of keeping order rests with

the civil power. It lays it down that soldiers should never be required

to act except in cases where the riot cannot reasonably be expected to

be quelled without resorting to the risk of inflicting death. But the

Home Office, in requiring soldiers to act throughout the whole country

at points where no riot at all was reasonably expected, gave us all

during that railway strike an object-lesson in the meaning of uniform

more impressive than the pictures on a Board School wall. Mr. Brailsford

has well said, "the discovery of tyrants is that, for a soldier's

motive, a uniform will serve as well as an idea."

Not a century has passed since the days when, as the noblest mind of

those times wrote, a million of hungry operative men rose all up, came

all out into the streets, and--stood there. "Who shall compute," he

asked:

"Who shall compute the waste and loss, the destruction of

every sort, that was produced in the Manchester region by

Peterloo alone! Some thirteen unarmed men and women cut

down--the number of the slain and maimed is very countable;

but the treasury of rage, burning, hidden or visible, in all hearts

ever since, more or less perverting the effort and aim of all

hearts ever since, is of unknown extent. 'How came ye among

us, in your cruel armed blindness, ye unspeakable County

Yeomanry, sabres flourishing, hoofs prancing, and slashed us

down at your brute pleasure; deaf, blind to all _our_ claims and

woes and wrongs; of quick sight and sense to your own claims

only! There lie poor, sallow, work-worn weavers, and complain

no more now; women themselves are slashed and sabred;

howling terror fills the air; and ye ride prosperous, very

victorious--ye unspeakable: give _us_ sabres too, and then come

on a little!' Such are Peterloos."

The parallel, if not exact, is close enough. During popular movements

in Germany and Russia, the party of freedom has sometimes hoped that the

troops would come over to their side--would "fraternise," as the

expression goes. The soldiers in those countries are even more closely

connected with the people than our own, for about one in three of the

young men pass into the army, whether they like it or not, and in two or

three years return to ordinary life. Yet the hope of "fraternisation"

has nearly always been in vain. Half a dozen here and there may stand

out to defend their brothers and their homes. But the risk is too great,

the bonds of uniform and habit too strong. Hitherto in England, we have

jealously preserved our civil liberties from the dragooning of military

districts, and the few Peterloos of our history, compared with the

suppressions in other countries, prove how justified our jealousy has

been. It may be true--we wish it were always true, that, as Carlyle

says, "if your Woolwich grapeshot be but eclipsing Divine Justice, and

the God's radiance itself gleam recognisable athwart such grapeshot,

then, yes, then, is the time coming for fighting and attacking." We all

wish that were always true, and that the people of every country would

always act upon it. But for the moment, we are grateful for the reminder

that, whether it eclipses Divine Justice or not, the grapeshot is still

there, and that a man in uniform, at a word of command, will shoot his

mother.