A MINSTREL IN FRANCE
BY
HARRY LAUDER
[ILLUSTRATION: _frontispiece_ Harry Lauder and his son, Captain John
Lauder. (see Lauder01.jpg)]
TO THE MEMORY OF MY BELOVED SON
CAPTAIN JOHN LAUDER
First 8th, Argyle and Sutherland Highlanders
Killed in France, December 28, 1916
Oh, there's sometimes I am lonely
And I'm weary a' the day
To see the face and clasp the hand
Of him who is away.
The only one God gave me,
My one and only joy,
My life and love were centered on
My one and only boy.
I saw him in his infant days
Grow up from year to year,
That he would some day be a man
I never had a fear.
His mother watched his every step,
'Twas our united joy
To think that he might be one day
My one and only boy.
When war broke out he buckled on
His sword, and said, "Good-bye.
For I must do my duty, Dad;
Tell Mother not to cry,
Tell her that I'll come back again."
What happiness and joy!
But no, he died for Liberty,
My one and only boy.
The days are long, the nights are drear,
The anguish breaks my heart,
But oh! I'm proud my one and only
Laddie played his part.
For God knows best, His will be done,
His grace does me employ.
I do believe I'll meet again
My one and only boy.
by Harry Lauder
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
Harry Lauder and His Son, Captain John Lauder
"I did not stop at sending out my recruiting band. I went out myself"
"'Carry On!' were the last words of my boy, Captain John Lauder, to
his men, but he would mean them for me, too"
"Bang! Went Sixpence"
"Harry Lauder preserves the bonnet of his son, brought to him from
where the lad fell, 'The memory of his boy, it is almost his
religion.'--A tatter of plaid of the Black Watch. on a wire of a
German entanglement barely suggests the hell the Scotch troops have
gone through"
"Captain John Lauder and Comrades Before the Trenches in France"
"Make us laugh again, Harry!' Though I remember my son and want to
join the ranks, I have obeyed"
"Harry Lauder, 'Laird of Dunoon.'"
--Medal struck off by Germany when _Lusitania_ was sunk"
CHAPTER I
Yon days! Yon palmy, peaceful days! I go back to them, and they are
as a dream. I go back to them again and again, and live them over.
Yon days of another age, the age of peace, when no man dared even to
dream of such times as have come upon us.
It was in November of 1913, and I was setting forth upon a great
journey, that was to take me to the other side of the world before I
came back again to my wee hoose amang the heather at Dunoon. My wife
was going with me, and my brother-in-law, Tom Valiance, for they go
everywhere with me. But my son John was coming with us only to
Glasgow, and then, when we set out for Liverpool and the steamer that
was to bring us to America he was to go back to Cambridge. He was
near done there, the bonnie laddie. He had taken his degree as
Bachelor of Arts, and was to set out soon upon a trip around the
world.
Was that no a fine plan I had made for my son? That great voyage he
was to have, to see the world and all its peoples! It was proud I was
that I could give it to him. He was--but it may be I'll tell you more
of John later in this book!
My pen runs awa' with me, and my tongue, too, when I think of my boy
John.
We came to the pier at Dunoon, and there she lay, the little ferry
steamer, the black smoke curling from her stack straight up to God.
Ah, the braw day it was! There was a frosty sheen upon the heather,
and the Clyde was calm as glass. The tops of the hills were coated
with snow, and they stood out against the horizon like great big
sugar loaves.
We were a' happy that day! There was a crowd to see us off. They had
come to bid me farewell and godspeed, all my friends and my
relations, and I went among them, shaking them by the hand and
thinking of the long whiles before I'd be seeing them again. And then
all my goodbys were said, and we went aboard, and my voyage had begun.
I looked back at the hills and the heather, and I thought of all I
was to do and see before I saw those hills again. I was going half
way round the world and back again. I was going to wonderful places
to see wonderful things and curious faces. But oftenest the thought
came to me, as I looked at my son, that him I would see again before
I saw the heather and the hills and all the friends and the relations
I was leaving behind me. For on his trip around the world he was to
meet us in Australia! It was easier to leave him, easier to set out,
knowing that, thinking of that!
Wonderful places I went to, surely. And wonderful things I saw and
heard. But the most wonderful thing of all that I was to see or hear
upon that voyage I did not dream of nor foresee. How was a mortal man
to foresee? How was he to dream of it?
Could I guess that the very next time I set out from Dunoon pier the
peaceful Clyde would be dotted with patrol boats, dashing hither and
thither! Could I guess that everywhere there would be boys in khaki,
and women weeping, and that my boy, John----! Ah, but I'll not tell
you of that now.
Peaceful the Clyde had been, and peaceful was the Mersey when we
sailed from Liverpool for New York. I look back on yon voyage--the
last I took that way in days of peace. Next time! Destroyers to guard
us from the Hun and his submarines, and to lay us a safe course
through the mines. And sailor boys, about their guns, watching,
sweeping the sea every minute for the flash of a sneaking pirate's
periscope showing for a second above a wave!
But then! It was a quiet trip, with none but the ups and doons of
every Atlantic crossing--more ups than doons, I'm telling you!
I was glad to be in America again, glad to see once more the friends
I'd made. They turned out to meet me and to greet me in New York, and
as I travelled across the continent to San Francisco it was the same.
Everywhere I had friends; everywhere they came crowding to shake me
by the hand with a "How are you the day, Harry?"
It was a long trip, but it was a happy one. How long ago it seems
now, as I write, in this new day of war! How far away are all the
common, kindly things that then I did not notice, and that now I
would give the world and a' to have back again!
Then, everywhere I went, they pressed their dainties upon me whenever
I sat down for a sup and a bite. The board groaned with plenty. I was
in a rich country, a country where there was enough for all, and to
spare. And now, as I am writing I am travelling again across America.
And there is not enough. When I sit down at table there is a card of
Herbert Hoover's, bidding me be careful how I eat and what I choose.
Ay, but he has no need to warn me! Well I know the truth, and how
America is helping to feed her allies over there, and so must be
sparing herself.
To think of it! In yon far day the world was all at peace. And now
that great America, that gave so little thought to armies and to
cannon, is fighting with my ain British against the Hun!
It was in March of 1914 that we sailed from San Francisco, on the
tenth of the month. It was a glorious day as we stood on the deck of
the old Pacific liner _Sonoma_. I was eager and glad to be off. To be
sure, America had been kinder to me than ever, and I was loath, in a
way, to be leaving her and all the friends of mine she held--old
friends of years, and new ones made on that trip. But I was coming
back. And then there was one great reason for my eagerness that few
folk knew--that my son John was coming to meet me in Australia. I was
missing him sore already.
They came aboard the old tubby liner to see us off, friends by the
score. They kept me busy shaking hands.
"Good-by, Harry," they said. And "Good luck, Harry," they cried. And
just before the bugles sounded all ashore I heard a few of them
crooning an old Scots song:
"Will ye no come back again?"
"Aye, I'll come back again!" I told them when I heard them.
"Good, Harry, good!" they cried back to me. "It's a promise! We'll be
waiting for you--waiting to welcome you!"
And so we sailed from San Francisco and from America, out through the
Golden Gate, toward the sunset. Here was beauty for me, who loved it
new beauty, such as I had not seen before. They were quiet days,
happy days, peaceful days. I was tired after my long tour, and the
days at sea rested me, with good talk when I craved it, and time to
sleep, and no need to give thought to trains, or to think, when I
went to bed, that in the night they'd rouse me from my sleep by
switching my car and giving me a bump.
We came first to Hawaii, and I fell in love with the harbor of
Honolulu as we sailed in. Here, at last, I began to see the strange
sights and hear the strange sounds I had been looking forward to ever
since I left my wee hoose at Dunoon. Here was something that was
different from anything that I had ever seen before.
We did not stay so long. On the way home I was to stay over and give
a performance in Honolulu, but not now. Our time was given up to
sight seeing, and to meeting some of the folk of the islands. They
ken hospitality! We made many new friends there, short as the time
was. And, man! The lassies! You want to cuddle the first lassie
you meet when you step ashore at Honolulu. But you don't--if the
wife is there!
It was only because I knew that we were to stop longer on the way
back that I was willing to leave Honolulu at all. So we sailed on,
toward Australia. And now I knew that my boy was about setting out on
his great voyage around the world. Day by day I would get out the map,
and try to prick the spot where he'd be.
And I'd think: "Aye! When I'm here John'll be there! Will he be
nearer to me than now?"
Thinking of the braw laddie, setting out, so proud and happy, made me
think of my ain young days. My father couldna' give me such a chance
as my boy was to have. I'd worked in the mines before I was John's
age. There'd been no Cambridge for me--no trip around the world as a
part of my education. And I thanked God that he was letting me do so
much for my boy.
Aye, and he deserved it, did John! He'd done well at Cambridge; he
had taken honors there. And soon he was to go up to London to read
for the Bar. He was to be a barrister, in wig and gown, my son, John!
It was of him, and of the meeting we were all to have in Australia,
that I thought, more than anything else, in the long, long days upon
the sea. We sailed on from Honolulu until we came to Paga-Paga. So it
is spelled, but all the natives call it Panga-Panga.
Here I saw more and yet more of the strange and wonderful things I
had thought upon so long back, in Dunoon. Here I saw mankind, for the
first time, in a natural state. I saw men who wore only the figleaf
of old Father Adam, and a people who lived from day to day, and whom
the kindly earth sustained.
They lived entirely from vegetables and from clear crystal streams
and upon marvelous fish from the sea. Ah, how I longed to stay in
Paga-Paga and be a natural man. But I must go on. Work called me back
to civilization and sorrow-fully I heeded its call and waved good-by
to the natural folk of Paga-Paga!
It was before I came to Paga-Paga that I wrote a little verse
inspired by Honolulu. Perhaps, if I had gone first to Paga-Paga--
don't forget to put in the n and call it Panga-Panga when you say it
to yourself!--I might have written it of that happy island of the
natural folk. But I did not, so here is the verse:
I love you, Honolulu, Honolulu I love you!
You are the Queen of the Sea!
Your valleys and mountains
Your palais and fountains
Forever and ever will be dear to me!
I wedded a simple melody to those simple, heart-felt lines, and since
then I have sung the song in pretty nearly every part of the world--
and in Honolulu itself.
Our journey was drawing to its end. We were coming to a strange land
indeed. And yet I knew there were Scots folk there--where in the
world are there not? I thought they would be glad to see me, but how
could I be sure? It was a far, far cry from Dunoon and the Clyde and
the frost upon the heather on the day I had set out.
We were to land at Sydney. I was a wee bit impatient after we had
made our landfall, while the old _Sonoma_ poked her way along. But
she would not be hurried by my impatience. And at last we came to the
Sydney Heads--the famous Harbor Heads. If you have never seen it I do
not know how better to tell you of it than to say that it makes me
think of the entrance to a great cave that has no roof. In we went--
and were within that great, nearly landlocked harbor.
And what goings on there were! The harbor was full of craft, both
great and sma'. And each had all her bunting flying. Oh, they were
braw in the sunlight, with the gay colors and the bits of flags, all
fluttering and waving in the breeze!
And what a din there was, with the shrieking of the whistle and the
foghorns and the sirens and the clamor of bells. It took my breath
away, and I wondered what was afoot. And on the shore I could see
that thousands of people waited, all crowded together by the water
side. There were flags flying, too, from all the buildings.
"It must be that the King is coming in on a visit--and I never to
have heard of it!" I thought.
And then they made me understand that it was all for me!
If there were tears in my eyes when they made me believe that, will
you blame me? There was that great harbor, all alive with the welcome
they made for me. And on the shore, they told me, a hundred thousand
were waiting to greet me and bid me:
"Welcome, Harry!"
The tramways had stopped running until they had done with their
welcome to inc. And all over the city, as we drove to our hotel, they
roared their welcome, and there were flags along the way.
That was the proudest day I ha d ever known. But one thing made me
wistful and wishful. I wanted my boy to be there with us. I wished he
had seen how they had greeted his Dad. Nothing pleased him more than
an honor that came to me. And here was an honor indeed--a reception
the like of which I had never seen.