WEATHER-VANES.
It was 2 A.M. The mosquitoes were singing their nightly chorus, and the situation reports were coming in from the battalions in the line. With his hair sizzling in the flame of the candle, the Brigade Orderly Officer who was on duty for the night tried to decipher the feathery scrawl on the pink form.
"Situation normal A-A-A wind moderate N.E.," it read.
"Great Scott!" said the O.O. "North-East!" (Hun gas waits upon a wind with East in it). "Give me the message book."
Laboriously he wrote out warnings to the battalions and machine gun sections, etc., under the Brigade's control. Then he turned to the next message.
"Situation normal A-A-A wind light S.W."
"South-West?" said the O.O. blankly, viewing his now useless handiwork. "Which way is the wind then?"
The orderly went out to see, and returned presently with a moistened forefinger and the information that it was "blowing acrossways, leastways it seemed like it." The O.O. got out of his little wire bed, searched in his pyjamas for the North Star, and, finally deciding that if there was any wind at all (which was doubtful) it was due South, reported it as such. The responsibility incurred kept him awake for some time, but when the Brigade on the right flank reported a totally different wind he concluded there must be a whirlwind in the line, and, putting up a barrage of bad language, went to sleep.
In due course the matter came to the ears of the Staff Captain, who broached the subject at breakfast as the General was probing his second poached egg.
"This," said the General, who is rather given to the vernacular, "is the limit. A North-South-East-West report is preposterous. Something must be done. Haven't we got a weather-vane of our own? Pass the marmalade, will you?"