VII
SHOOTING STRAIGHT
"What for is the wee felly gaun' tae show us puctures?"
Second Lieutenant Bobby Little, assisted by a sergeant and two unhandy privates, is engaged in propping a large and highly-coloured work of art, mounted on a rough wooden frame and supported on two unsteady legs, against the wall of the barrack square. A half-platoon of A Company, seated upon an adjacent bank, chewing grass and enjoying the mellow autumn sunshine, regard the swaying masterpiece with frank curiosity. For the last fortnight they have been engaged in imbibing the science of musketry. They have learned to hold their rifles correctly, sitting, kneeling, standing, or lying; to bring their backsights and foresights into an undeviating straight line with the base of the bull's-eye; and to press the trigger in the manner laid down in the Musketry Regulations—without wriggling the body or "pulling-off."
They have also learned to adjust their sights, to perform the loading motions rapidly and correctly, and to obey such simple commands as—
"At them two, weemen"—officers' wives, probably—"proceeding from left tae right across the square, at five hundred yairds"
—they are really about fifteen yards away, covered with confusion—"five roonds, fire!"
But as yet they have discharged no shots from their rifles. It has all been make-believe, with dummy cartridges, and fictitious ranges, and snapping triggers. To be quite frank, they are getting just a little tired of musketry training—forgetting for the moment that a soldier who cannot use his rifle is merely an expense to his country and a free gift to the enemy. But the sight of Bobby Little's art gallery cheers them up. They contemplate the picture with childlike interest. It resembles nothing so much as one of those pleasing but imaginative posters by the display of which our Railway Companies seek to attract the tourist to the less remunerative portions of their systems.
"What for is the wee felly gaun' tae show us puctures?"
Thus Private Mucklewame. A pundit in the rear rank answers him.
"Yon's Gairmany."
"Gairmany ma auntie!" retorts Mucklewame. "There's no chumney-stalks in Gairmany."
"Maybe no; but there's wundmulls. See the wundmull there—on yon wee knowe!"
"There a pit-held!" exclaims another voice. This homely spectacle is received with an affectionate sigh. Until two months ago more than half the platoon had never been out of sight of at least half a dozen.
"See the kirk, in ablow the brae!" says some one else, in a pleased voice. "It has a nock in the steeple."
"I hear they Gairmans send signals wi' their kirk-nocks," remarks Private M'Micking, who, as one of the Battalion signallers—or "buzzers," as the vernacular has it, in imitation of the buzzing of the Morse instrument—regards himself as a sort of junior Staff Officer. "They jist semaphore with the haunds of the nock—"
"I wonder," remarks the dreamy voice of Private M'Leary, the humorist of the platoon, "did ever a Gairman buzzer pit the ba' through his ain goal in a fitba' match?"
This irrelevant reference to a regrettable incident of the previous Saturday afternoon is greeted with so much laughter that Bobby Little, who has at length fixed his picture in position, whips round.
"Less talking there!" he announces severely, "or I shall have to stand you all at attention!"
There is immediate silence—there is nothing the matter with Bobby's discipline—and the outraged M'Micking has to content himself with a homicidal glare in the direction of M'Leary, who is now hanging virtuously upon his officer's lips.
"This," proceeds Bobby Little, "is what is known as a landscape target."
He indicates the picture, which, apparently overcome by so much public notice, promptly falls flat upon its face. A fatigue party under the sergeant hurries to its assistance.
"It is intended," resumes Bobby presently, "to teach you—us—to become familiar with various kinds of country, and to get into the habit of picking out conspicuous features of the landscape, and getting them by heart, and—er—so on. I want you all to study this picture for three minutes. Then I shall face you about and ask you to describe it to me."
After three minutes of puckered brows and hard breathing the squad is turned to its rear and the examination proceeds.
"Lance-Corporal Ness, what did you notice in the foreground of the picture?"
Lance-Corporal Ness gazes fiercely before him. He has noticed a good deal, but can remember nothing. Moreover, he has no very clear idea what a foreground may be.
"Private Mucklewame?"
Again silence, while the rotund Mucklewame perspires in the throes of mental exertion.
"Private Wemyss?"
No answer.
"Private M'Micking!"
The "buzzer" smiles feebly, but says nothing.
"Well,"—desperately—"Sergeant Angus! Tell them what you noticed in the foreground."
Sergeant Angus (floruit A.D. 1895) springs smartly to attention, and replies, with the instant obedience of the old soldier—
"The sky, sirr."
"Not in the foreground, as a rule," replies Bobby Little gently.
"About turn again, all of you, and we'll have another try."
In his next attempt Bobby abandons individual catechism.
"Now," he begins, "what conspicuous objects do we notice on this target? In the foreground I can see a low knoll. To the left I see a windmill. In the distance is a tall chimney. Half-right is a church. How would that church be marked on a map?"
No reply.
"Well," explains Bobby, anxious to parade a piece of knowledge which he only acquired himself a day or two ago, "churches are denoted in maps by a cross, mounted on a square or circle, according as the church has a square tower or a steeple. What has this church got?"
"A nock!" bellow the platoon, with stunning enthusiasm. (All but
Private M'Micking, that is.)
"A clock, sir," translates the sergeant, sotto voce.
"A clock? All right: but what I wanted was a steeple. Then, farther away, we can see a mine, a winding brook, and a house, with a wall in front of it. Who can see them?"
To judge by the collective expression of the audience, no one does.
Bobby ploughs on.
"Upon the skyline we notice—Squad, 'shun!"
Captain Wagstaffe has strolled up. He is second in command of A
Company. Bobby explains to him modestly what he has been trying to do.
"Yes, I heard you," says Wagstaffe. "You take a breather, while I carry on for a bit. Squad, stand easy, and tell me what you can see on that target. Lance-Corporal Ness, show me a pit-head."
Lance-Corporal Ness steps briskly forward and lays a grubby forefinger on Bobby's "mine."
"Private Mucklewame, show me a burn."
The brook is at once identified.
"Private M'Leary, shut your eyes and tell me what there is just to the right of the windmill."
"A wee knowe, sirr," replies M'Leary at once. Bobby recognises his "low knoll"—also the fact that it is no use endeavouring to instruct the unlettered until you have learned their language.
"Very good!" says Captain Wagstaffe. "Now we will go on to what is known as Description and Recognition of Targets. Supposing I had sent one of you forward into that landscape as a scout.—By the way, what is a scout?"
Dead silence, as usual.
"Come along! Tell me, somebody! Private Mucklewame?"
"They gang oot in a procession on Setter-day efternoons, sirr, in short breeks," replies Mucklewame promptly.
"A procession is the very last thing a scout goes out in!" raps Wagstaffe. (It is plain to Mucklewame that the Captain has never been in Wishaw, but he does not argue the point.) "Private M'Micking, what is a scout?"
"A spy, sirr," replies the omniscient one.
"Well, that's better; but there's a big difference between the two.
What is it?"
This is a poser. Several men know the difference, but feel quite incapable of explaining it. The question runs down the front rank. Finally it is held up and disposed of by one Mearns (from Aberdeen).
"A spy, sirr, gets mair money than a scout."
"Does he?" asks Captain Wagstaffe, smiling. "Well, I am not in a position to say. But if he does, he earns it! Why?"
"Because if he gets catched he gets shot," volunteers a rear-rank man.
"Right. Why is he shot?"
This conundrum is too deep for the squad. The Captain has to answer it himself.
"Because he is not in uniform, and cannot therefore be treated as an ordinary prisoner of war. So never go scouting in your nightshirt, Mucklewame!"
The respectable Mucklewame blushes deeply at this outrageous suggestion, but Wagstaffe proceeds—
"Now, supposing I sent you out scouting, and you discovered that over there—somewhere in the middle of this field"—he lays a finger on the field in question—"there was a fold in the ground where a machine-gun section was concealed: what would you do when you got back?"
"I would tell you, sirr," replied Private M'Micking politely.
"Tell me what?"
"That they was there, sirr."
"Where?"
"In yon place."
"How would you indicate the position of the place?"
"I would pint it oot with ma finger, sirr."
"Invisible objects half a mile away are not easily pointed out with the finger," Captain Wagstaffe mentions. "Lance-Corporal Ness, how would you describe it?"
"I would tak' you there, sirr."
"Thanks! But I doubt if either of us would come back! Private Wemyss?"
"I would say, sirr, that the place was west of the mansion-hoose."
"There's a good deal of land west of that mansion-house, you know," expostulates the Captain gently; "but we are getting on. Thompson?"
"I would say, sir," replies Thompson, puckering his brow, "that it was in ablow they trees."
"It would be hard to indicate the exact trees you meant. Trees are too common. You try, Corporal King."
But Corporal King, who earned his stripes by reason of physical rather than intellectual attributes, can only contribute a lame reference to "a bit hedge by yon dyke, where there's a kin' o' hole in the tairget." Wagstaffe breaks in—
"Now, everybody, take some conspicuous and unmistakable object about the middle of that landscape—something which no one can mistake. The mansion-house will do—the near end. Now then—mansion-house, near end! Got that?"
There is a general chorus of assent.
"Very well. I want you to imagine that the base of the mansion-house is the centre of a great clock-face. Where would twelve o'clock be?"
The platoon are plainly tickled by this new round-game. They reply—
"Straught up!"
"Right. Where is nine o'clock?"
"Over tae the left."
"Very good. And so on with all the other hours. Now, supposing I were to say, End of mansion-house—six o'clock—white gate—you would carry your eye straight downward, through the garden, until it encountered the gate. I would thus have enabled you to recognise a very small object in a wide landscape in the quickest possible time. See the idea?"
"Yes, sirr."
"All right. Now for our fold in the ground. End of mansion-house—eight o'clock—got that?"
There is an interested murmur of assent.
"That gives you the direction from the house. Now for the distance! End of mansion-house—eight o 'clock—two finger-breadths—what does that give you, Lance-Corporal Ness?"
"The corrner of a field, sirr."
"Right. This is our field. We have picked it correctly out of about twenty fields, you see. Corner of field. In the middle of the field, a fold in the ground. At nine hundred—at the fold in the ground—five rounds—fire! You see the idea now?"
"Yes, sirr."
"Very good. Let the platoon practise describing targets to one another, Mr. Little. Don't be too elaborate. Never employ either the clock or finger method if you can describe your target without. For instance: Left of windmill—triangular cornfield. At the nearest corner—six hundred—rapid fire! is all you want. Carry on, Mr. Little."
And leaving Bobby and his infant class to practise this new and amusing pastime, Captain Wagstaffe strolls away across the square to where the painstaking Waddell is contending with another squad.
They, too, have a landscape target—a different one. Before it half a dozen rifles stand, set in rests. Waddell has given the order: Four hundred—at the road, where it passes under the viaduct—fire! and six privates have laid the six rifles upon the point indicated. Waddell and Captain Wagstaffe walk down the line, peering along the sights of the rifles. Five are correctly aligned: the sixth points to the spacious firmament above the viaduct.
"Hallo!" observes Wagstaffe.
"This is the man's third try, sir," explains the harassed Waddell. "He doesn't seem to be able to distinguish anything at all."
"Eyesight wrong?"
"So he says, sir."
"Been a long time finding out, hasn't he?"
"The sergeant told me, sir," confides Waddell, "that in his opinion the man is 'working for his ticket.'"
"Umph!"
"I did not quite understand the expression, sir," continues the honest youth, "so I thought I would consult you."
"It means that he is trying to get his discharge. Bring him along:
I'll soon find out whether he is skrim-shanking or not."
Private M'Sweir is introduced, and led off to the lair of that hardened cynic, the Medical Officer. Here he is put through some simple visual tests. He soon finds himself out of his depth. It is extremely difficult to feign either myopia, hypermetria, or astigmatism if you are not acquainted with the necessary symptoms, and have not decided beforehand which (if any) of these diseases you are suffering from. In five minutes the afflicted M'Sweir is informed, to his unutterable indignation, that he has passed a severe ocular examination with flying colours, and is forthwith marched back to his squad, with instructions to recognise all targets in future, under pain of special instruction in the laws of optics during his leisure hours. Verily, in K (1)—that is the tabloid title of the First Hundred Thousand—the way of the malingerer is hard.
Still, the seed does not always fall upon stony ground. On his way to inspect a third platoon Captain Wagstaffe passes Bobby Little and his merry men. They are in pairs, indicating targets to one another.
Says Private Walker (oblivious of Captain Wagstaffe's proximity) to his friend, Private M'Leary—in an affected parody of his instructor's staccato utterance—
"At yon three Gairman spies, gaun' up a close for tae despatch some wireless telegraphy—fufty roonds—fire!"
To which Private M'Leary, not to be outdone, responds—
"Public hoose—in the baur—back o' seeven o'clock—twa drams—fower fingers—rapid!"