Mr. Punch's History of the Great War Part 5

More agreeable is the sportsmans.h.i.+p of the trenches, where a correspondent tells of the shooting of a hare and the recovery of the corpse, by a reckless Tommy, from the turnip-field which separated our trenches from those of Fritz.

Amongst other signs of the times the emergence of the Spy Play is to be noted, in which the alien enemy within our gates is gloriously confounded.

Yet, if a certain section of the Press is to be believed, the dark and sinister operations of the Hidden Hand continue unchecked.

The Germans as unconscious humorists maintain their supremacy _hors concours_. A correspondent of the _Cologne Gazette_ was with other journalists recently entertained to dinner in a French villa by the Crown Prince Rupprecht of Bavaria. "The party, while dining," we are told, "talked of the defects of French taste, and Prince Rupprecht said that French houses were full of horrors." True, O Prince, but the French are determined to drive them out. Better still, in the month which witnessed the sinking of the _Lusitania_ we read this panegyric of the Teuton in _Die Welt_: "Clad in virtue and in peerless n.o.bility of character, una.s.sailed by insidious enemies either within or without, girded about by the benign influences of Kultur, the German, whether soldier or civilian, pursues his destined way, fearless and serene."

_June, 1915._

The weeks that have pa.s.sed since the sinking of the _Lusitania_ have left Germany not merely impenitent but glorying in her crime. "The destruction of the _Lusitania_," says Herr Baumgarten, Professor of Theology, "should be greeted with jubilation and enthusiastic cheering, and everybody who does not cheer is no real or true German." Many harsh things have been said of the Germans, but nothing quite so bitter as this suggestion for a test of nationality. But while Germany jubilates, her Government is painfully anxious to explain everything to the satisfaction of America. The conversations between the two Powers are continuous but abortive. President Wilson's dove has returned to him, with the report "Nothing doing," and the American eagle looks as if he would like to take on the job.

Germany has had her first taste of real retaliation in the bombardment of Karlsruhe by Allied airmen, and is furiously indignant at the attack on an "unfortified and peaceful" town--which happens to be the headquarters of the 14th German Army Corps and to contain an important a.r.s.enal as well as large chemical, engineering and railway works. Also she is very angry with Mr. Punch, and has honoured him and other British papers with a solemn warning. Our performances, it seems, are "diligently noted, so that when the day of reckoning arrives we shall know with whom we have to deal, and how to deal with them effectually." It is evident that in spite of Italy's entry into the war the ma.s.s of the Germans are still true to their old hate of England.

[Ill.u.s.tration: ON THE BLACK LIST

KAISER (as executioner): "I'm going to hang you."

PUNCH: "Oh, you are, are you? Well, you don't seem to know how the scene ends. It's the hangman that gets hanged."]

[Ill.u.s.tration: SOME BIRD

THE RETURNING DOVE (to President Woodrow Noah):

"Nothing doing."

THE EAGLE: "Say, Boss, what's the matter with trying me?"]

But Germany does not merely talk. She has been indulging in drastic reprisals in consequence of Mr. Winston Churchill's memorandum on the captured submarine crews. As a result 39 imprisoned British officers, carefully selected, have been subjected to solitary confinement under distressing conditions in return for Mr. Churchill's having hinted at possible severities which were never carried out. Moral: Do not threaten unless you mean to act. The retirement of Mr. Churchill to the seclusion of the Duchy of Lancaster and the appointment of Mr. Balfour to the First Lords.h.i.+p of the Admiralty afford hope that the release of the Thirty-Nine from their special hards.h.i.+p will not be unduly postponed. The Coalition Government is shaking down. A Ministry of Munitions has been created, with Mr. Lloyd George in charge; and members of the Cabinet have decided to pool their salaries with a view to their being divided equally. Mr. McKenna has made his first appearance as Chancellor of the Exchequer and introduced a Bill authorising the raising of a War Loan unlimited in extent, but, being a man of moderate views, will be satisfied if nine hundred millions are forthcoming. Lord Haldane has been succeeded in the Lord Chancellors.h.i.+p by Lord Buckmaster, having caused by one unfortunate phrase a complete oblivion of all the services rendered by his creation of the Territorial system. The cry for "more men" has now changed to one for "more sh.e.l.ls,"

and certain newspapers, always in search of a scapegoat, have entered on a campaign directed against Lord Kitchener, the very man whom a few short months ago they hailed as the saviour of the situation. Finding that the public cannot live on their hot air, they are doing their best to make our flesh creep and keep our feet cold. Let us hope that K. of K. will find the Garter some slight protection against this. .h.i.tting below the belt.

The Russian retreat continues, but there is no _debacle._ Greece shows signs of returning sanity in the restoration to power of her one strong man, M. Venizelos. If there were a few more like him then (to adapt Porson) "the Germanised Greek would be sadly to seek." As it is, he flourishes exceedingly, under the patronage of a Prussianised Court.

In Gallipoli the deadly struggle goes on; our foothold has been strengthened by bitter fighting and our lines pushed forward for three miles by a few hundred yards--a big advance in modern trench warfare.

Blazing heat and a plague of flies add to the discomforts of our men, but a new glory has been added to the ever growing vocabulary of the war in "Anzac." There is a lull on the Western front, if such a word properly can be applied to the ceaseless activities of the war of position, of daily _strafe_ and counter-_strafe_.

At home, khaki weddings are becoming common form. By an inversion of the old order the bride is now eclipsed by the bridegroom:

'Tis well: the lack of fine array Best fits a sacrificial altar; Her man to-morrow joins the fray, And yet she does not falter; Simple her gown, but still we see The bride in all her bravery.

Society is losing much of its snap through the political truce. It is all very well to talk of the lion lying down with the lamb, but of course it makes life a distinctly duller business both for the lion and the lamb when each has lost his or her dearest enemy. For the rest, there is a brisk trade in anti-gas respirators, "lonely soldiers" are becoming victimised by fair correspondents, and a new day has been added to the week--flag day.

Proverb for the month, suggested by the activities of the Imperial infanticide: "The hand that wrecks the cradle rules the world."

_July, 1915_.

The last month of the first year of the war brings no promise of a speedy end; it is not a month of great battles on land or sea, but rather of omens and foreshadowings, good and evil. To the omens of victory belongs the sinking of the _Pommern_, named after the great maritime province, so long coveted by the Brandenburgers, the makers of Prussia and the true begetters of Prussianism. Of good omen, too, has been the "clean sweep"

made by General Botha in German South-West Africa, where the enemy surrendered unconditionally on July 9. And though the menace of the U-boat grows daily, there _may_ be limits to America's seemingly inexhaustible forbearance. There are happily none to the fort.i.tude of our bluejackets and trawlers.

Pundits in the Press, fortified by warnings from generals in various Home Commands, display an increasing preoccupation with the likelihood of invasion by sea. Mr. Punch naturally inclines to a sceptical att.i.tude, swayed by long adherence to the views of the Blue Water School and the incredulousness of correspondents engaged in guarding likely spots on the East Coast. With runaway raids by sea we are already acquainted, and their growing frequency from the air is responsible for various suggested precautions, official and otherwise--pails of sand and masks and anti-asphyxiation mixtures--which are not viewed with much sympathy in the trenches. _There_ the men meet the most disconcerting situations--as, for example, the problem of spending a night in a flooded meadow occupied by a thunderstorm--with irrelevant songs or fantasias on the mouth-organ.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIRST TRAWLER SKIPPER (to friend who is due to sail by next tide): "Are ye takin' any precautions against these submarines, Jock?"

SECOND SKIPPER: "Ay! Although I've been in the habit o' carryin' my bits of bawbees wi' me, I went an' bankit them this mornin', an' I'm no taking ma best oilskins or ma new seaboots."

FIRST SKIPPER; "Oh, _you're_ a'richt then. Ye'll hae practically nothin' tae lose but yer life."]

Oh, there ain't no band to cheer us up, there ain't no Highland pipers To keep our warlike ardure warm round New Chapelle and Wipers, So--since there's nothing like a tune to glad the 'eart o' man, Why Billy with his mouth-organ 'e does the best 'e can.

Wet, 'ungry, thirsty, 'ot or cold, whatever may betide 'im, 'E'll play upon the 'ob of 'ell while the breath is left inside 'im; And when we march up Potsdam Street, and goose-step through Berlin, Why Billy with 'is mouth-organ 'e'll play the Army in!

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE OLD MAN OF THE SEA

SINBAD THE KAISER: "This submarine business is going to get me into trouble with America; but what can an All-Powerful do with a thing like this on his back?"]

When officers come home on leave and find England standing where she did, their views support the weather-beaten major who said that it was "worth going to a little trouble and expense to keep _that_ intact." But you can hardly expect people who live in trenches which have had to be rebuilt twice daily for the last few months and are sh.e.l.led at all hours of the day or night, to compa.s.sionate the occasional trials of the home-keeping bomb-dodger. The war, as it goes on, seems to bring out the best and the worst that is in us. South Wales responded loyally to the call for recruits, yet 200,000 miners are affected by the strike fever.

The House, where party strife for a brief s.p.a.ce was hushed by mutual consent, is now devastated by the energies of indiscreet, importunate, egotistic or frankly disloyal question-mongers. We want a censors.h.i.+p of Parliamentary Reports. The Press Bureau withholds records of s.h.i.+ning courage at the front lest they should enlighten the enemy, but gives full publicity to those

Who give us words in lieu of deeds, Content to blather while their country bleeds.

There is, however, some excuse for those importunates who wish to know on what authority the Premier declared at Newcastle that neither our Allies nor ourselves have been hampered by an insufficient supply of munitions. In two months' fighting in Gallipoli our casualties have largely exceeded those sustained by us during the whole of the Boer War. And financial purists may be pardoned for their protests against extravagant expenditure in view of the announcement that the war is now costing well over three millions daily. The idea of National Registration has taken shape in a Bill, which has pa.s.sed its second reading. The notion of finding out what everyone can do to help his country in her hour of need is excellent. But the Government do not seem to have realised that half a million volunteer soldiers have been waiting and ready for a job for the last six months:

And when at last you come and say "What can you do? We ask for light On any service you can pay,"

The answer is: "_You_ know all right, And all this weary while you knew it; The trouble was you wouldn't let us do it."

The German Press is not exactly the place where one expects to find occasion for merriment. Yet listen to this from the _Neueste Nachrichten_: "Our foes ask themselves continuously, How can we best get at Germany's vital parts? What are her most vulnerable points? The answer is, her humanity--her trustful honesty." Here, on the other hand, thousands of people, by knocking months and years off their real age, have been telling good straightforward lies for their country. At the Front euphemism in describing hards.h.i.+p is mingled with circ.u.mlocution in official terminology. Thus one C.O. is reported to refer to the enemy not as Germans but "militant bodies of composite Teutonic origin."

A new and effectual cure for the conversion of pessimists at home has been discovered. It is simply to out-do the prophets of ill at their own game.

The result is that they seek you out to tell you that an enemy submarine has been sunk off the Scillies or that the Crown Prince is in the Tower. It is the old story that optimists are those who have been a.s.sociating with pessimists and _vice versa_. But seriousness is spreading. We are told that even actresses are now being photographed with their mouths shut, though one would have thought that at such a time all British subjects--especially the "Odolisques" of the variety stage--ought to show their teeth.

_August_, 1915.

Ordinary anniversaries lead to retrospect: after a year of the greatest of all wars it is natural to indulge in a stock-taking of the national spirit, and comforting to find that, in spite of disillusions and disappointments, the alternation of exultations and agonies, the soul of the fighting men of England remains unshaken and unconquerable. Three of the Great Powers of Europe espoused the cause of Liberty a year ago; now there are four, and the aid of Italy in engaging and detaching large Austrian forces enables us to contemplate with greater equanimity a month of continuous Russian withdrawal, and the tragic loss of Warsaw and the great fortresses of Novo-Georgievsk and Brest-Litovsk. And if there is no outward sign of the awakening of Germany, no slackening in frightfulness, no abatement in the blasphemous and overweening confidence of her Ruler and his War-lords who can tell whether they have not moments of self-distrust?

THE WAYSIDE CALVARY. August 4th, 1915.

Now with the full year Memory holds her tryst, Heavy with such a tale of bitter loss As never Earth has suffered since the Christ Hung for us on the Cross.