A LITTLE BIT OF SHAMROCK
Although I had many letters to write, this did not keep me from having
a little enjoyment. We had not been very long in rest billets when it
was announced that the Sixteenth Canadian Battalion concert party was
to put on soon the play entitled “A Little Bit of Shamrock.” This was
the play the soldiers were practising while we were at Monchy Breton,
and because of the fact that one of the characters was a priest I was
very anxious to see the play.
The concert party was to be with us three nights, so I hoped to be
able to attend at least one performance. The company had been playing
for the large base hospitals while we were taking part in the recent
heavy fighting. I had met a Presbyterian chaplain in Arras who told me
that he had seen the play and that it was one of the finest in France.
They had been furnished with hundreds of dollars’ worth of scenery and
costumes. So we looked forward with pleasure to seeing it.
I noticed as I worked among the men that the rest was doing them very
much good. The village streets used to ring with laughter and merry
jokes, especially in the evening. It was wonderful how much like boys
those soldiers would become, given a few days’ rest.
I remember one day, while sitting in the mess waiting for lunch to be
served, listening to an animated conversation going on among a group
of soldiers, of which George was the dominating spirit. George held in
his hand a pair of German field-glasses which evidently he wished to
barter for something some other soldier had. The other soldier thought
George had placed a too high valuation on the glasses, and their voices
rose and fell in debate. Finally, all the voices were silent; then the
voice of George sounded clear and distinct, as he said impressively:
“Gentlemen, I tell you, these glasses are so powerful that they will
bring a church, miles distant, so near that you can actually hear the
church bells ringing in the tower!”
Although a few derisive groans greeted this statement, the great bursts
of merry laughter that accompanied them did my heart good and showed me
how light-hearted were the troops.
A day or two following the episode of the field-glasses, I was again
sitting in the mess waiting for lunch to be served. The transport
officer and quartermaster were with me. Suddenly the lieutenant who
had been billeting officer when we were at Ecoivres walked in and sat
down. He had a little business with the quartermaster, and as he stated
it his eyes turned towards the table, which was set for lunch, and
rested longingly on a dish of cold bread-pudding with raisins in it.
The pudding was cut in pieces resembling in size and shape an ordinary
helping of Washington pie; there were three slices in all. Now, I never
liked bread-pudding, not even in war time; neither did the other two
officers of the mess. So when the billeting officer made known to us
his weakness for bread-pudding we gave him a most pressing invitation
to have a piece. He took one piece, and as he ate it with great relish
we could not help smiling. He stopped for a second or two and looked
around on us. “My,” he said, “I like this! Our cook never thinks of
giving us anything like this.” Then he continued earnestly to devote
his attention to the pudding.
We offered him another piece, and with boyish delight he accepted it.
When he had finished this, I offered him the remaining slice. The other
two officers were now laughing.
“Ah, Padre!” he said reproachfully, but his eye wavered and his hand
without any apparent reluctance reached out and took the third piece.
He stayed for a little while longer, and I wondered if he could be
quite well after eating so great a quantity of such soggy food. I
began, indeed, to feel a slight twinge of conscience. Perhaps I should
not have offered him that last thick slice of heavy bread-pudding. He
was now quiet, and for a second or two a far-away look came into his
eyes. Then, suddenly, he seemed to recollect something. He stood up
quickly.
“Well,” he said, “I think it is about time for me to be going home to
lunch.”
“Will he be all right?” I asked the other officers, as he disappeared
on his way.
“Sure,” they both said, and then the quartermaster Continued: “Why,
Padre, that’s just a little _hors d’oeuvres_ for him, just a little
appetizer, just enough to convince him that it’s time to take a little
substantial food.” Then, as we lunched, they told me such wonderful
stories of this officer’s capacity for food that I laughed and laughed
all through the meal.
I could not attend the play till the third evening; George, who had
gone both nights, seemed very anxious that I should see it. I had tea
with the concert party the afternoon of the third day and in the
evening I went to the play, and was given a very good seat.
I shall never forget that play given by those splendid boys on the
Western Front. Even as I write these words the tears come to my
eyes as they did that night, but they are tears of joy. It was a
wonderful play--wonderful in its presentation, wonderful, especially,
in its beautiful interpretation of the character of the Catholic
priest--bubbling with gaiety and gladness, and spotless humor. I was
transported with joy and amazement.
The curtain rose, disclosing the library of an Irish priest’s house,
through the open window of which came in excellent harmony the sound of
male voices singing:
“Och, Father O’Flynn, you’ve a wonderful way wid you.
All ould sinners are wishful to pray wid you,
All the young children are wild for to play wid you,
You’ve such a way wid you, Father avick!
Still for all you’ve so gentle a soul,
Gad, you’ve your flock in the grandest control:
Checking the crazy ones, coaxing unaisy ones,
Lifting the lazy ones on with the stick.
Here’s a health for you, Father O’Flynn,
Slanté and slanté and slanté agin,
Pow’rfulest preacher and tindirest teacher
And kindliest creature in ould Donegal.”
As the last sounds of the chorus died away, a young Irish girl, attired
in typical colleen fashion, and a boy of about nineteen or twenty, in
knee-breeches, entered. The colleen was a perfect impersonation. The
young man, who carried a gun and an empty game-bag, had returned from
the chase. He was telling Molly how many birds he had seen and how many
he might have shot had it not been for--etc., etc. The more voluble
Shaun became, the more Molly shrugged her shoulders. It seemed Shaun
had often hunted before, and had often come “very near hitting a bird.”
Just as good-natured Shaun was becoming more eloquent and Molly more
disdainful, a stately old figure in cassock and cincture walked slowly
into the room, carrying his breviary and biretta. There was a look of
benign interest on his face as he regarded Shaun and Molly. The two
greeted the priest warmly, in true Irish fashion; yet the three actors
were non-Catholics.
I am certain I did not follow the plot of the play. I was too delighted
with Father O’Flynn. He was the ideal priest, genial, kind, grave.
He possessed all those lovable qualities that we Catholics always
associate with the priesthood. I was really delighted with the
impersonation of the character. Where had he, the actor, acquired his
wonderful knowledge of the priesthood? If it had been a play that the
lads had procured already written, I would not have been so surprised;
but they themselves had composed it.
There was one scene that was almost uncanny in its faithful
reproduction of one of the little dialogues that take place often in
the office of a country parish priest. Old Mrs. Nolan--off the stage
“she” was Private M. Dawes, No. 1 Platoon, Sixteenth Battalion, and in
civil life an actor who had taken parts with the great Du Maurier--had
come to call on Father O’Flynn concerning her husband, who was not
working, and who for reasons known only to himself had no inclination
to work. She spoke quietly at first, but gradually, animated by
righteous indignation, a certain piquancy and forcefulness colored her
words. She had just begun rightly to denounce “himself” when Father
O’Flynn, with a gentle raising of one hand from his knee, where it had
rested palm downwards, said softly: “There, now, Mrs. Nolan! There,
now! Don’t mind, it will be all right! It will be all right. In a
little while Timmy’ll be at work again.”
Then Mrs. Nolan, somewhat mollified, would concede: “Yis, Father! Yis,
Father! Perhaps you’re right, Father. Indade, he’s not so bad; if he
would stay away from that Dinny O’Shea, he might be better. And look,
Father dear, I wouldn’t be mindin’ what that Liz of his would ever be
saying. Look here, Father, if she’d stay at home and look after her man
and not go galavantin’ over the parish! Look here, Father, she’s one of
the worst--”
Then with a gentle smile Father O’Flynn would again quiet the indignant
Mrs. Nolan. But she was irrepressible. And as she continued her
rapid-fire talk, the house roared with laughter, so that we forgot that
we were in a building on the Western Front into which at any minute a
long-distance shell might fall, killing and wounding half the people
there. We forgot this completely as we continued to enjoy one of the
finest plays ever staged on the Western Front.
As I looked on, laughing heartily, another emotion began to manifest
itself; gradually, as I listened to the dialogue, the whole setting
before me took on a certain familiarity: it was a priest’s room, my own
language was being spoken, a scene was being enacted with which every
priest is familiar. I felt as if I saw my Catholic people at home; then
a kind of mist seemed to pass over me, and my eyes filled up--yes,
gentle reader, I was lonesome!
The old curé and his sister had waited up for me, to hear about
the play. I had told them before leaving that I was going to see a
non-Catholic take the part of a Catholic priest, and they had been very
interested. They were like two children in their delight when I came
bursting in on them with the news of the play. They rejoiced with me
when I told them how splendidly the part of Father O’Flynn had been
taken by one of the lads. The old lady seemed the more enthusiastic of
the two, until I told the story of Mrs. Nolan, then the curé broke into
rippling laughter; but Madame just smiled quietly. We talked for a long
time that evening for the three of us were very pleased. I had told
them before going that I had my fears lest the actor assigned the part
of the priest should not interpret it according to the best traditions
of the priesthood. But now they were quite relieved, and very joyful
when I told them that the play would be shown wherever there were
Canadian soldiers in France.