"I won't forget," I said, as I hurried away to join the others.
We were about half way to our dugouts when we passed a string of our men carrying about twenty mail bags. It was the second instalment of a lot of mail that had been landed the day before. We followed the sweating carriers up the road to the quarter-master sergeant's dugout, and waited around humbly while that autocrat leisurely sorted out the mail, making remarks about each letter and waiting after each remark for the applause he felt it deserved. With maddening deliberation he scanned each address. "Corporal W.P. Costello." "He's at the base," some one answered. Corporal Costello's letter was put aside. "Private George Butler." Private Butler, on the edge of the crowd, pushed and elbowed his way toward the quarter-master sergeant. "Here you are; letter for Butler." The august Q.M.S. placed the letter beside his elbow. "Wait till the lot's sorted, and you'll get them all together." Private Butler, with ill-restrained impatience, resumed his place on the outside. After the letters, the parcels had to be sorted. Some enterprising person at the base had opened a lot of them. One fellow received a large box of cigarettes that he would have enjoyed smoking if the man at the base had not seen them first. Art Pratt drew a lot of mail, including a parcel, intact except for the contents. A diligent search in a box a foot square failed to locate anything more than a pair of socks, which Art presented to me with his compliments. Some papers, two months old, with some casualty lists of the First Newfoundland Regiment, had no address; the wrapper had gone before, somewhere between Newfoundland and the Dardanelles. Everybody claimed the papers. Various proofs were offered to show the ownership. One fellow knew by the way they were rolled up that they were from his family. Another, more original than the rest, was certain they were his, because he had written for papers of those dates, in order to see the announcement of the casualty of a friend. It was pointed out derisively that a letter written after that casualty had occurred would only then have reached Newfoundland; and to get a lot of papers in reply would be a physical impossibility. The claimant, in no wise abashed, suggested that lots be drawn. This was pooh-poohed. At last, to avoid discussion, the quarter-master sergeant took the papers himself, and put them in his greatcoat. "I'll distribute them after I've read them," he announced, and pulled the rubber sheet across the top of his dugout, as a delicate hint that the interview was finished. The crowd slowly melted away. I received one letter, and was sitting on the edge of my dugout reading it when one of our men passing along, yelled to me. "Hey," he said, "you come from the United States, don't you?"
"Yes," I said; "what do you want to know that for?"
"I've got something here," he said, stopping, "that comes from there too." He dived into his pocket, and produced a medley of articles. From these he selected a small paper-wrapped parcel.
"What's that?" I said.
"It's chewing gum," he answered; "real American chewing gum like the girls chew in the subway in New York." He unwrapped it, selected a piece, placed it in his mouth, and began chewing it with elaborated enjoyment. After a few minutes, he came nearer. "By golly," he said, with an exaggerated nasal drawl, "it's good gum, I'll soon begin to feel like a blooming Yank. I'm talking like a Yank already. Don't you wish you had some of this?"
"I'll make you a sporting offer," I answered. "I'll fight you for the rest of what you've got."
"No, you won't," he answered nasally; "it's made me feel exactly like a Yank; I'm too proud to fight."