English mothers who have lost their only sons cannot be expected to show sympathy for an Emperor who combines the professions of a Jekyll with the ferocity of a Hyde. Yet few of them would rewrite the record of these short lives; their pride is greater than their pain.
While the daily toll of life is heavy, War, shorn of its pomp and pageantry, drags wearily in the trenches. The Lovelace of to-day is a troglodyte, biding his time patiently, but often a prey to ennui. This is how he writes to Lucasta to correct the portrait painted by her fancy:
Above, the sky is very grey, the world is very damp.
His light the sun denies by day, the moon by night her lamp;
Across the landscape, soaked and sad, the dull guns answer back,
And through the twilight's futile hush spasmodic rifles crack.
The papers haven't come to-day to show how England feels;
The hours go lame and languidly between our Spartan meals;
We've written letters till we're tired, with not a thing to tell
Except that nothing's doing, weather beastly, writer well.
So when you feel for us out here--as well I know you will--
Then sympathise with thousands for their country sitting still;
Don't picture battle-pieces by the lurid Press adored,
But miles and miles of Britishers, in burrows, badly bored.
| FOR NEUTRALS | FOR NATIVES |
| "Why do we torpedo passenger ships? Because we are being starved by the infamous English." | "Who says we are in distress? Look what our splendid organisation is doing." |
Small wonder that Lovelace in the trenches envies the Flying Man:
He rides aloof on god-like wings,
Taking no thought of wire or mud,
Saps, smells, or bugs--the mundane things
That sour our lives and have our blood.
The roads we trudged with feet of lead,
The shadows of his pinions skim;
The river where we piled our dead
Is but a silver thread to him.
Lovelace in the air might tell another story; but both are at one with their prototype in the spirit which made him say: "I could not love thee, dear, so much, loved I not honour more," though neither of them would say it.
In this context one may add that the Flying Men are not alone in exciting envy. Bread is the staff of life, and in the view of certain officers in the trenches the life of the Staff is one long loaf.