The First Canadians in France. F. McKelvey Bell
The signalling lieutenant leaned both elbows upon the rail and looked down in grinning amazement upon his intrepid interlocutor.
"What the d——l! I say, you're the sort of man we need at the front—one with plenty of nerve!"
"Be a sport and send it over!" Reggy coaxed.
"All right—I'll take a chance."
"Ask for Nursing Sister Marlow. Give her Captain Reggy's compliments and best wishes, and will she join him on board for dinner this evening, seven o'clock!"
There was a flutter of flags for several seconds, while the ridiculous message passed across from ship to ship. Reggy waited anxiously for a reply.
In less than ten minutes from across the deep came this very lucid answer: "Nursing Sister Marlow's compliments to Captain Reggy. Regrets must decline kind invitation to dinner. Mal de mer has rendered her hors de combat. Many thanks."
On the last day of our journey the speedy torpedo boat destroyers rushed out to meet us and whirled round and round us hour by hour as we entered the English Channel. Soon the welcome shores of England loomed through the haze, and the sight sent a thrill through all our hearts.
We had scarce dropped anchor when, from the training ship close by, a yawl pulled quickly toward us, "manned" by a dozen or more lads from a training ship. They rowed with the quick neat stroke of trained athletes, and as the boat came alongside ours they shipped their oars and raised their boyish voices in a welcoming cheer. We leaned over the side of our ship and returned their greeting with a stentorian heartiness that startled the sleeping town.
Showers of small coin and cigarettes were dropped into their boat, and the way in which they fought for position, scrambling over or under one another, upsetting this one or knocking down that, showed that these lads were quite capable of upholding all the old fighting traditions of the British Navy. A tug-boat soon steamed alongside, too, and down the accommodation-ladder scrambled those of us who were lucky enough to have permission to go ashore.
"Come along, Reggy," I shouted. But Reggy shook his head sorrowfully, and his handsome face was clouded.
"Just my rotten luck to be orderly officer on a day like this!" he replied. "To-day I guard the ship, but to-morrow—oh, to-morrow!" Reggy held out both hands in mock appeal to the shore: "Me for the red paint and city lights!"
Progress up the streets of Devonport was slow. Thousands of troops already landed were marching to the time of "The Maple Leaf Forever," and every foot of pavement or sidewalk was packed with struggling but enthusiastic humanity shouting itself hoarse in delirious welcome.
We were on the upper deck of a tram-car, leaning over the throng, and eagerly looking for the faces of friends in the ranks of a passing battalion. They swung along to the music of their band—a clean-cut, well-set-up, manly lot, who marched with the firm independent step of the free born. Suddenly our colonel discovered a familiar face among the khaki-clad below. There is no military precedent for what he did; years of training fell away on the instant. He leaned from the car and shouted:
"Hello, 'Foghorn'! What cheer?"
"Foghorn" looked up. His right arm was somewhat hampered, from a military point of view, by reason of being about the waist of a pretty girl, who accommodatingly marched along with the battalion in general, and "Foghorn" in particular.
"Hello, Jack," he bellowed in a voice which easily accounted for his nickname. "Lots of cheer. Can't salute. One arm busy! Other is glass arm from saluting the brass hats. See you later. Good luck!"
And thus our cosmopolitan and ultra-democratic battalion passed on.
Some one has said that the Englishman is temperamentally cold. It can't be proved by Devonport or Plymouth. His temperature in both towns registered ninety-eight degrees in the shadiest and most secluded spots. And the women and children! Banish all thought of British frigidity! The Canadians in England never discovered it.
The passion of the Devonport children for souvenirs in the shape of pennies and buttons became so violent in a few hours that our small coin was likely to become extinct and our buttons merely things that used to be. Every time a soldier appeared upon the street he was instantly surrounded by a bevy of insistent and persistent mendicants.
Once we sought refuge in a cooling spot where glasses tinkle and the beer foams high—and children might not follow there. The pretty barmaid smiled. The second in command twirled his long moustache and fixed the maiden with his martial eye.
"What will you have, sir?" she inquired sweetly.
The senior major was always gallant to a pretty girl. He drew himself up to his full six feet, two, and saluted. A mellow line from "Omar Khayyám" dropped from his thirsty lips:
"A jug of wine, a loaf of bread, and thou
Beside me singing in the wilderness."
How much further he might have gone one cannot say. The girl held up a reproving finger and exclaimed:
"Ah, I see it is black coffee the gentleman requires."
But the major's poetic spirit was aroused. "Avaunt coffee," he cried.
"Shall I distress my ruddy soul
With dusky dregs from coffee urn?
Far sweeter, sweet, to quench its fire
With wine for which the 'innards' yearn.
A glass of beer, please."
The adjutant leaned over toward me and hazarded, in a hoarse whisper:
"I presume they have no ice."
The barmaid's red cheeks dimpled and two straight rows of pearly teeth shone upon him, as she answered for me:
"Your presumption is ill-founded, young man. We have plenty of ice with which to temper the hot young blood of the Canadians."
The adjutant looked helplessly up, bereft of repartee; then apostrophised the ceiling:
"And these are the stupid Englishwomen we have been led to expect!"
Our education was going on apace.
A few moments later we emerged and discovered ourselves in a veritable whirlpool of young monetary gluttons.
"Penny, sir! penny! penny!" they shouted in staccato chorus. Our supply of pennies had long since been depleted. An idea struck me.
"See here," I said in serious tone. "We're only a lot of poor soldiers going to the war. We can't always be giving away pennies. We need pennies worse than you do."
A sudden hush fell upon the little circle. Some looked abashed, others curiously uncertain, a few sympathetic. The silence lasted a full minute. We all stood still looking at one another.
"Can any little boy or girl in this crowd give a poor soldier a penny to help him along to the war?" I asked quietly.
Again silence. Finally a little ragged tot of about eight years of age, carrying a baby in her arms, turned to her companions and said: "Here, hold the baby for me and I'll give the poor fellow a penny." She dived deep in the pocket of her frock, brought out a penny, ha'penny (her total wealth) and held it out to me.
Lieutenant Moe stepped forward. "Look here, major," he said sternly, "do you mean to say you'll take that money from a youngster?"
"I do," I replied, without a smile.
"I won't permit it," he cried.
Here was an embarrassing situation. I couldn't explain to him without confessing to the child as well. I wished to gauge how much patriotism beat in those little hearts, what sacrifice they were prepared to make for their country; and here was one measuring up to the highest ideals, I daren't either withdraw or explain.
"I must have the pennies, Moe, and I am going to take them," I replied firmly.