This is an account of how the Bishop, accompanied by the Lord Mayor of Birmingham, went to the fighting lines to visit the staff at headquarters. They were at times within thirty-five yards of the German trenches. His impressions have been recorded in a volume published by Longmans, Green and Company, from which the following incidents are taken.
[14] I—THE HUMOUR OF BRITISH "TOMMIES"
Whenever, in future, I am inclined towards a fit of pessimism, I shall shut my eyes in order to see once again, with the vision of the spirit, a stalwart Britisher of the Worcester Regiment, not very far from the German lines, on a certain afternoon, when a most appalling thunderstorm was raging and some German shells were falling. He was munching the thickest slice of bread and jam that I have ever seen, and looking with a mild contempt at the intruding figure of an unknown padre whom a considerable number of his comrades were greeting because they recognised in him their Bishop. He put down now and again his refreshment in order to do some bit of work, but he was just as calm and collected as if he had been in his Worcestershire village and not in the trenches.
That which carries our men through so many difficulties is another thing which impressed me—namely, their unfailing sense of humour; a humour which is never really hurtful even when exercised upon some one deserving of satire. When he christens a road along which there are a couple of miles of Army Service carts "Lorry Park," when he finds every kind of strange anglicising for Flemish or French words, we know that he is not only having some fun for himself, but also providing amusement for those who come after him. The same humour shines out when he is in hard case. A chaplain told me that he had been addressing informally some wounded men who had just arrived from the trenches. He was expatiating upon the glories of the Victoria Cross because he noticed some of the men came from a regiment one of whose number had recently received that coveted distinction. Suddenly his eloquence was disturbed by a voice proceeding from a man, both of whose feet were swathed in bandages, who remarked, "Never mind the Victoria Cross, give me the Victoria 'Bus!" Obviously the soldier's sense of humour was conquering his pain, and his remark made the rest of the party forget their sufferings for a short time....
II—FRANCE BLEEDS FOR CIVILIZATION
As one who saw the French during the war of 1870, when—being a boy—I was very susceptible to impressions, I can hardly express the difference I notice between the nation then and now. In the former war there was excitement, impulsiveness, overconfidence, want of ballast; to-day there is quietude, earnestness, and withal, assurance of eventual victory. More than once I journeyed through a considerable part of the French lines, and I assert with confidence that the Army of France at the present time is incomparably superior to that which she placed in the field in 1870. As to her civilians, I only saw women, children, and old men; I did not, in all my thousand miles of travel, discover a single able-bodied person of military age out of uniform.
The harvest, a very good one, was in full swing. Every family was out in the fields, all doing something towards the in-gathering. I have a picture now before my eyes of seven people, all undoubtedly coming from the same house, working away hard, whilst at the tail end of the procession appeared what might have been the great-grandpapa, no longer capable of bending down for harvesting, but who, nevertheless, had his piece of work in carrying about the baby, who, of course, could not be left behind alone in the house. The whole nation is doing its utmost.
III—"HOW I WENT TO THE TRENCHES"
On one occasion after motoring through towns that are a household word, both at home and with our Allies, towns which have seen the Germans in them and then driven out of them, places where the buildings are practically level with the ground, the limit for vehicular traffic is reached and one goes forward on foot. Soon you reach a cutting in the ground and you begin to walk along a trench. You turn now and again either to right or left, seeing sign-posts telling sometimes in comic language and sometimes only by number the name, as it were, of the underground street; you then rise a little and find yourself walking in the inside of houses so shattered that you cannot tell much about what they originally were until you are told that they formed a street in a little overgrown village of which nothing is left, and the last inhabitant of which was the station-master, who refused to leave though there was neither train, station nor house for himself left, because so long as he remained on the spot he could claim his pay. Forcible measures had at last to be used to secure his departure. Where you are walking you are yourself hidden from the enemy, but are within the range of their fire. You are taken up to an observation post, where one of your companions incautiously takes out a white pocket-handkerchief and is hurriedly told to put it back in his pocket.