Here in this little out-of-the-way corner of the globe, in a very insignificant work, we have buried all our youth and most of our vitality. God! but it is hard to relinquish the reaping to others! "To renounce without bitterness!"
A last glimpse of that City of Little White Crosses, where, past pain, past suffering, in rows of close formation—closer than they ever stood in lifetime shoulder to shoulder—lie those who are "for ever England."
Could they but see those dear shores of home they had so longed for with their dying breath, radiating their messages of pride and thankfulness across the Channel, how proud they would be!
A military cemetery "Somewhere in France" is a thing one does not forget. If, one day when peace reigns, we are once more growing slothful and negligent of the bigger issues of life, let us pay a yearly pilgrimage to one of these shrines of our honoured exiles.
True, the French gravediggers will no longer be shovelling the sandy soil over the newest comers, hiding the tier upon tier of plain deal coffins or the number-plates that are the only distinguishing marks; true, the unwonted odour of Death will no longer haunt our nostrils; mayhap we, too, shall be deaf to the sighing of the many souls in the wind. Yet surely the warrior spirits will arise and strengthen us, whispering: "Let us not have died in vain. We laid down our lives for the Old Country. For the love of God 'carry on,' as we had hoped to do."
A last look at the faces of those friends who for many months have formed my whole world.
Then "Cheer up, you have done your bit," they cry as we step aboard. As if any man, woman or child of Britain has done his bit until this thing is over, until there is some semblance of the crushing victory that shall lay our unscrupulous enemy low!
Then on to the boat.
One parting gift that was pressed into my hands on leaving will be treasured for all time. It is John Oxenham's little volume "All's Well," and to us out here it seems as if he has been divinely inspired to bear the message of hope to countless broken hearts.
"Is the pathway dark and dreary?
God's in His heaven!
Are you broken, heart-sick, weary?
God's in His heaven!
Dreariest roads shall have an ending,
Broken hearts are for God's mending,
All's well! All's well!
All's ... well!"