Chapter V: Stanimirovic

After the retreat of the Serbian Army across the mountains of
Albania in 1915, the survivors who reached the coast were shipped
to Corfu. Here, and in the neighboring island of Vido, many of them
died--to begin with, at the rate of hundreds a day. Some of them
were buried at sea. Others lie in common graves. In the midst of
the mounds which mark their resting-place, and which vary in size,
there stands a cross. On it is a Serbian inscription, written by
the poet, V. Stanimirovic, and translated for the London
Westminster Gazette by Mr. L. F. Waring:

Never a Serbian flower shall bloom
In exile on our far-off tomb.
Our little ones shall watch in vain:
Tell them we shall not come again.

Yet greet for us our fatherland,
And kiss for us her sacred strand.
These mounds shall tell the years to be
Of men who died to make her free.

THE NIGHTINGALES OF FLANDERS

GRACE HAZARD CONKLING

IN EVERYBODY’S MAGAZINE

Permission to reproduce in this book.

“Le rossignol n’est pas mobilise.”--A French Soldier

The nightingales of Flanders,
They had not gone to war;
A soldier heard them singing
Where they had sung before.

The earth was torn and quaking,
The sky about to fall;
The nightingales of Flanders,
They minded not at all.

At intervals we heard them
Between the guns, he said,
Making a thrilling music
Above the listening dead.

Of woodland and of orchard
And roadside tree bereft,
The nightingales of Flanders
Were singing “France is left!”

THE WIDOW

MISS C. M. MITCHELL

IN PUNCH

Reproduced by special permission of the Proprietors of “Punch”

My heart is numb with sorrow;
The long days dawn and wane;
To me no sweet tomorrow
Will bring my man again.

Yet must my grief be hidden--
Life makes insistent claim,
And women, anguish-ridden,
Their rebel hearts must tame.

For while, my vigil keeping,
I face the eternal law,
Here on my breast lies sleeping
The son he never saw.

PERSHING AT THE TOMB OF LAFAYETTE

AMELIA JOSEPHINE BURR

From Amelia Josephine Burr’s book of poems, “The Silver Trumpet.”
Published and copyright, 1918, by George H. Doran Company, New
York. Special permission to reproduce in this book.

They knew they were fighting our war. As the months grew to years
Their men and their women had watched through their blood and their tears
For a sign that we knew, we who could not have come to be free
Without France, long ago. And at last from the threatening sea
The stars of our strength on the eyes of their weariness rose
And he stood among them, the sorrow-strong hero we chose
To carry our flag to the tomb of that Frenchman whose name
A man of our country could once more pronounce without shame.
What crown of rich words would he set for all time on this day?
The past and the future were listening what he would say--
Only this, from the white-flaming heart of a passion austere,
Only this--ah, but France understood! “Lafayette, we are here.”

TRAINS

LIEUT. JOHN PIERRE ROCHE

From Lieutenant Roche’s book of poems, “Rimes in Olive Drab.”
Robert M. McBride & Company, Publishers, New York. Copyright, 1918.
Special permission to insert in this book.

Lieutenant Roche has deftly caught and preserved in words the
strange vision of unannounced trains that flashed now and then past
towns and villages bearing American troops from unknown camps to
unknown ports of embarkation--the flash of faces of men about whom
it was known only that they came from the shops and fields of home
and were going across the seas to fight somewhere, for those who
stood and gazed as they whirled by. The mystery, the roar of
wheels, the eddying dust and the silence that followed infuse these
lines with picture and sound that will stay in the minds of any who
saw such trains go hurrying away.

Over thousands of miles
Of shining steel rails,
Past green and red semaphores
And unheeding flagmen,
Trains are running,
Trains, trains, trains.

Rattling through tunnels
And clicking by way stations,
Curving through hills, past timber,
Out into the open places,
Flashing past silos and barns
And whole villages,
Until finally they echo
Against the squat factories
That line the approach to the cities.

Trains, trains, trains
With the fire boxes wide open,
Giant Moguls and old-time Baldwins
And oil-burners on the Southern Pacific,
Fire boxes wide open
Flaring against the night,
Like a tremendous watch fire
Where the sentries cluster at their post.
Trains, trains, trains
Serpentine strings of cars
Loaded with boys and men--
The legion of the ten-year span
To whom has been given the task
Of seeking the Great Adventure.

Swaying through the North and South,
And East and West,
Freighted with the Willing
And the Unwilling;
Packed with the Thinking
And the Unthinking,
Pushing on to the Unknown
Away from the shelter and security
Of the accustomed into the Great Adventure.

Trains, trains, trains
With their coach sides scrawled
With chalked bravado and, sometimes,
With their windows black
With yelling boys,
In open-mouthed exultation
That they do not feel,
Rushing farther and farther
From the known into the unseeable.

Trains, trains, trains
With sky-larking boys in khaki,
Munching sandwiches and drinking pop;
Or, tired and without their depot swagger,
Curled up on the red-plush seats;
Or asleep, with a stranger, in the Pullmans.

They rush past our camp,
Which lies against the railroad,
With the crossing alarm jangling caution,
And fade into the dust or night.
Leaving us to conjecture where,
As they have left others to wonder--
As they must wonder themselves
When they are done
With the shouting and hand-shaking
And kissing and hat-waving and singing.

Trains, trains, trains
Clicking on into unforecast days--
Away from the shelter and security
Of the accustomed into the Great Adventure.

CHRIST IN FLANDERS

L. W.

IN THE SPECTATOR

We had forgotten You, or very nearly--
You did not seem to touch us very nearly--
Of course we thought about You now and then;
Especially in any time of trouble--
We knew that You were good in time of trouble--
But we are very ordinary men.

And there were always other things to think of--
There’s lots of things a man has got to think of--
His work, his home, his pleasure, and his wife;
And so we only thought of You on Sunday--
Sometimes, perhaps, not even on a Sunday--
Because there’s always lots to fill one’s life.

And, all the while, in the street or lane or byway--
In country lane, in city street, or byway--
You walked among us, and we did not see.
Your feet were bleeding as You walked our pavements--
How _did_ we miss Your Footprints on our pavements?--
Can there be other folk as blind as we?

_Now_ we remember; over here in Flanders--
(It isn’t strange to think of You in Flanders)--
This hideous warfare seems to make things clear.
We never thought about You much in England--
But now that we are far away from England--
We have no doubts, we know that You are here.

You helped us pass the jest along the trenches--
Where, in cold blood, we waited in the trenches--
You touched its ribaldry and made it fine.
You stood beside us in our pain and weakness--
We’re glad to think You understand our weakness--
Somehow it seems to help us not to whine.

We think about You kneeling in the Garden--
Ah! God! the agony of that dread Garden--
We know You prayed for us upon the Cross.
If anything could make us glad to bear it--
’Twould be the knowledge that You willed to bear it--
Pain--death--the uttermost of human loss.

Though we forgot You--You will not forget us--
We feel so sure that You will not forget us--
But stay with us until this dream is past.
And so we ask for courage, strength, and pardon--
Especially, I think, we ask for pardon--
And that You’ll stand beside us to the last.

AN AMERICAN CREED

EVERARD JACK APPLETON

By permission of Stewart & Kidd Company, Cincinnati, Publishers of
“With the Colors,” by Everard Jack Appleton. Copyright, 1918.

Straight thinking,
Straight talking,
Straight doing,
And a firm belief in the might of right.

Patience linked with patriotism,
Justice added to kindliness,
Uncompromising devotion to this country,
And active, not passive, Americanism.

To talk less, to mean more,
To complain less, to accomplish more,
And to so live that every one of us is ready to look
Eternity in the face at any moment, and be unafraid!

RUNNER McGEE

(WHO HAD “RETURN IF POSSIBLE” ORDERS.)

EDGAR A. GUEST

From Edgar A. Guest’s book of war time rhymes, entitled “Over
Here.” Published and copyright, 1918, by The Reilly & Britton
Company, Chicago. Special permission to insert in this book.

“You’ve heard a good deal of the telephone wires,”
He said as we sat at our ease,
And talked of the struggle that’s taking men’s lives
In these terrible days o’er the seas,
“But I’ve been through the thick of the thing
And I know when a battle’s begun
It isn’t the ’phone you depend on for help.
It’s the legs of a boy who can run.

“It isn’t because of the ’phone that I’m here.
Today you are talking to me
Because of the grit and the pluck of a boy.
His title was Runner McGee.
We were up to our dead line an’ fighting alone;
Some plan had miscarried, I guess,
And the help we were promised had failed to arrive.
We were showing all signs of distress.

“Our curtain of fire was ahead of us still,
An’ theirs was behind us an’ thick,
An’ there wasn’t a thing we could do for ourselves--
The few of us left had to stick.
You haven’t much chance to get central an’ talk
On the ’phone to the music of guns;
Gettin’ word to the chief is a matter right then
That is up to the fellow who runs.

“I’d sent four of ’em back with the R. I. P. sign,
Which means to return if you can,
But none of ’em got through the curtain of fire;
My hurry call died with the man.
Then Runner McGee said he’d try to get through.
I hated to order the kid
On his mission of death; thought he’d never get by,
But somehow or other he did.

“Yes, he’s dead. Died an hour after bringing us word
That the chief was aware of our plight,
An’ for us to hang onto the ditch that we held;
The reserves would relieve us at night.
Then we stuck to our trench an’ we stuck to our guns;
You know how you’ll fight when you know
That new strength is coming to fill up the gaps.
There’s heart in the force of your blow.

“It wasn’t till later I got all the facts.
They wanted McGee to remain.
They begged him to stay. He had cheated death once,
An’ was foolish to try it again.
‘R. I. P. are my orders,’ he answered them all,
‘An’ back to the boys I must go;
Four of us died comin’ out with the news.
It will help them to know that you know.’”

THE SOLDIER’S FOLKS AT HOME

FROM THE CHRISTIAN HERALD

We often sit upon the porch on sultry August nights,
When fireflies out upon the lawn are soft enchanted lights
From Fairyland; when, far away, a vagrant nightingale
Is sobbing from a bursting heart his tragic untold tale.
We often sit upon the porch, quite silently, for we
Are seeing golden wonder-worlds that no one else may see.

My mother sighs; I feel her hand upon my ruffled hair,
The while I know she thinks of one, of one who is not there....
And grandma, with her down-bent head, is dreaming of the day
When to the strains of “Dixie Land” her sweetheart marched away.
And brother stares into the dusk, with vivid eyes aflame,
And hears the stirring call to arms, to battle and to fame!

My little sister, half asleep, holds tight against her breast
A battered doll with china eyes that she herself has dressed;
And baby brother holds my hand, and thinks of cakes and toys
That grow on trees in some fair land for perfect little boys.
And auntie holds her head erect, and seems to dare the fates
With eyes that hold the glowing look of one who hopes and waits.

We often sit upon the porch on sultry August nights
When fireflies out upon the lawn are vague enchanted lights,
And no one speaks, for each one dreams and plans, perhaps, and strays,
A wanderer through years to come, a ghost through bygone days,
And as the stars far in the sky come shining softly through,
My heart and soul are all one prayer--one silver prayer for you.

THREE HILLS

EVERARD OWEN

From Mr. Owen’s book, “Three Hills and Other Poems.” Sidgwick &
Jackson, Ltd., Publishers, London, England. Special permission to
insert in this book.

There is a hill in England,
Green fields and a school I know,
Where the balls fly fast in summer,
And the whispering elm-trees grow,
A little hill, a dear hill,
And the playing fields below.

There is a hill in Flanders,
Heaped with a thousand slain,
Where the shells fly night and noontide
And the ghosts that died in vain--
A little hill, a hard hill,
To the souls that died in pain.

There is a hill in Jewry,
Three crosses pierce the sky,
On the midmost He is dying
To save all those who die--
A little hill, a kind hill
To souls in jeopardy.

MIKE DILLON, DOUGHBOY

LIEUT. JOHN PIERRE ROCHE

From Lieutenant Roche’s book of poems, “Rimes in Olive Drab.”
Robert M. McBride & Company, Publishers, New York. Copyright, 1918.
Special permission to insert in this book.

“Doughboy” is an old nickname for a United States infantryman. When
our army went into what is now New Mexico, Arizona and California
to quiet the Mexicans hostilities that preceded the war of 1846,
the infantry fell into a way of camping in houses built by the
natives with sun-dried bricks of adobé mud. The cavalry, having to
lie in the open with the horses, were joked thereat and came back
by calling the infantry dobie boys. The name stuck and by an easy
slide arrived at the present form.

Mike Dillon was a doughboy
And wore the issue stuff;
He wasn’t much to look at--
In fact, was rather rough;
He served his time as rookie--
At drilling in the sun,
And cleared a lot of timber
And polished up his gun.

Mike Dillon was a private
With all the word entails;
He cussed and chewed tobacco
And overlooked his nails.
You never saw Mike Dillon
At dances ultra nice;
In fact, inspection found him
Enjoying body lice.

If Mike had married money
Or had a little drag,
He might have got a brevet
And missed a little “fag”;
But as a social figure
He simply wasn’t there--
So Mike continued drilling
And knifing up his fare.

In course of time they shipped ’em
And shipped ’em over where
A man like Mike can sidestep
The frigid social stare,
And do the job of soldier
Without the fancy frills,
And keep a steady footing
In the pace that really kills.

Now Mike did nothing special;
He only did his best:
He stuck and “went on over”--
And got it in the chest;
He played it fair and squarely
Without a social air,
And Mike is now in heaven
And at least a corporal there!

WHEN THE FRENCH BAND PLAYS

ANONYMOUS

IN THE STARS AND STRIPES, A.E.F., FRANCE

There’s a military band that plays, on Sunday afternoons,
In a certain nameless city’s quaint old square.
It can rouse the blood to battle with its patriotic tunes,
And still render hymns as gentle as a prayer.
When it starts “Ave Maria” there is no one in the throng
But would doff his cap, his heart to heaven raise;
And who would shrink from combat when, with brasses sounding strong,
There is flung out on the breeze “La Marseillaise”?

When it starts to render “Sambre et Meuse,” the march that won the day
At the battle of the Marne, one sees again
The grey-green hosts of Hundom melt before the stern array
Of our gallant sister-ally’s blue-clad men.
And when it plays our Anthem, with rendition bold and clear--
While the khaki lads stand steady--then we feel
That, though tongues and ways may vary, we’ve found brothers over here,
Tried in war, and in allegiance true as steel.

For it’s olive-drab, horizon-blue, packed closely side by side,
Till their colors set ablaze the grey old square;
And it’s olive-drab, horizon-blue, whatever may betide,
That will blaze the way to victory “up there.”
So, while standing thus together, let us pledge anew our troth
To the Cause--the world set free!--for which we fight.
As the evening twilight gilds the ranks of blue and khaki both,
And the bugles die away into the night.

THE OLD GANG ON THE CORNER

WILLIAM HERSCHELL

IN COLLIER’S WEEKLY

Permission to reproduce in this book

The Old Gang on the Corner! What an arrant tribe they were;
The Widow Kelly’s Connie--he had always worried her!
The Schultz boys, Jake and Rudy; the parson’s own, Chub Smith,
“Who,” sister told the neighbors, “they can’t do nothin’ with.”
Young Tony Boots, the Dago, and Scamp, the tinner’s son--
To them a mischief thought of was a mischief quickly done.

The Old Gang on the Corner! In the arc light’s friendly glow
They trooped each night till Tim the Cop came by and made them go.
But all that now is ended, for the Sword of Hate is drawn--
The Old Gang on the Corner from its happy haunt is gone.
The street lamp idly sputters; Tim, the lonely, walks his beat,
His good heart well ahunger for the Old Gang in the street.

The Old Gang on the Corner! Now each loyal mother brags
No other neighborhood can boast as many service flags.
Con Kelly’s won a sergeantcy; the parson’s black-sheep son
Has had his picture printed for heroic deeds he’s done.
The Schultz boys, in the navy, though they yet are in their teens,
Are mates with Scamp and Tony in the chase for submarines.

The Old Gang on the Corner! Yes, we’ve all forgotten now
The Hallowe’en they calcimined McDougall’s muley cow,
We’ve put aside the memories of cream and cake they stole
When our church had a festival to pay for last year’s coal.
All that is in the Yesterday--they’re now our fighting men--
And, God, won’t we be happy if they all come home again?

THE BATTLE-LINE

J. B. DOLLARD

IN THE GLOBE, TORONTO

Permission to reproduce in this book

Athwart that land of bloss’ming vine
Stretches the awful battle-line;
A lark hangs singing in the sky,
With sullen shrapnel bursting nigh!
Along the poplar-bordered road
The peasant trudges with his load,
While horsemen and artillery
Rush to red fields that are to be!
The plains for tillage furrowed well
Are now replowed with shot and shell!
The ditches, swollen by the rain,
Show bloated faces of the slain.
The hedge-rows sweet with leaf and flower
Now mask the cannon’s murderous power!
Small birds by household cares opprest
Beg truce and time to build their nest.
The sun sinks down--oh, blest release!
And the spent world cries out for peace,
In vain! In vain! Tho’ mild stars shine,
War wakes the thundering battle-line.

A CHANT OF ARMY COOKS

ANONYMOUS

IN THE STARS AND STRIPES, A.E.F., FRANCE

We never were made to be seen on parade
When sweethearts and such line the streets;
When the band starts to blare, look for us--we ain’t there--
We’re mussing around with the eats.
It’s fun to step out to the echoing shout
Of a crowd that forgets how you’re fed,
While we’re soiling our duds hacking eyes out of spuds--
You know what Napoleon said.

When the mess sergeant’s gay, you can bet hell’s to pay
For the boys who are standing in line;
When the boys get a square, then the sergeant is there
With your death warrant ready to sign.
If you’re long on the grub, then you’re damned for a dub,
If you’re short, you’re a miser instead,
But, however you feel, you must get the next meal--
You know what Napoleon said.

You think it’s a cinch when you come to the clinch
For the man who is grinding the meat;
In the heat of the fight, why the cook’s out of sight
With plenty of room to retreat.
But a plump of a shell in a kitchen is hell
When the roof scatters over your head,
And you crawl on your knees to pick up the K. P.’s--
You know what Napoleon said.

If the war ever ends, we’ll go back to our friends--
In the army we’ve nary a one;
We’ll list to the prattle of this or that battle,
And then, when the story is done,
We’ll say, when they ask, “Now what was your task,
And what is the glory you shed?”
“You see how they thrive--well, we kept ’em alive!
You know what Napoleon said.”

THE DRUM

JOSEPH LEE

“Come to me, and I will give you flesh.”--Old Pibrochadh.

Come!
Says the drum;
Though graves be hollow,
Yet follow, follow:
Come!
Says the drum.

Life!
Shrills the fife,
Is in strife--
Leave love and wife:
Come!
Says the drum.

Ripe!
Screams the pipe,
Is the field--
Swords and not sickles wield:
Come!
Says the drum.

The drum
Says, Come!
Though graves be hollow,
Yet follow, follow:
Come!
Says the drum.

THE GREAT ADVENTURE

MAJOR KENDALL BANNING

SIGNAL RESERVE CORPS, AVIATION SECTION, U. S. ARMY

God, the Master Pilot,
Or gods, if such there be--
Pour me no weakling’s measure
When ye pour the wine for me!
Of pain, of love, of pleasure,
I’ll drain the draught ye give;
Of good and ill, give me the fill
Of the life ye bade me live!

Spare me no tithe of favor,
With fortune pave my path,
Nor hold the hand of vengeance
When I deserve your wrath.
Whatever fates ye send me,
Whatever cast the sky,
Grant me the grace to live a man
And as a man to die!

Upon the good I render
Let shine your proudest sun:
And rest me in the valleys
When my last trick is done.
For these your utmost portions,
I’ll pay the utmost toll,
So this my life, become the great
Adventure of my soul!

TO THE WRITER OF “CHRIST IN FLANDERS”

E. M. V.

IN THE SPECTATOR

On the battlefields of Flanders men have blessed you in their pain;
For you told us Who was with us, and your words were not in vain.

All you said was very gentle, but we felt you knew our ways;
And we tried to find the Footprints we had missed in other days.

When we found Those blood-stained Footsteps, we have followed to the End;
For we know that only Death can show the features of our Friend.

In the Mansions of the Master, He will make the meaning plain
Of the battlefields of Flanders, of the Crucifix of Pain.

TO SOMEBODY

HAROLD SETON

IN MUNSEY’S MAGAZINE

Permission to reproduce in this book.

They’ve put us through our paces;
They say we’re doing fine;
We’ll soon go to our places
Upon the firing-line.
Some chaps will fight for mothers,
And some for wives so true;
For sweethearts many others,
And I will fight for you!

Through all these months of training
We’ve cherished hopeful thoughts
And drilled without complaining,
Like soldiers and good sports.
We’re warring for a reason,
We’ve sworn to see this through;
To falter would be treason,
And I will fight for you!

Your presence will be near me,
Your voice will call my name;
You’ll comfort me and cheer me,
Your love, behold, I claim!
’Twould take more than an ocean
To separate us two;
I’ll hold unto this notion,
And I will fight for you!

WAR

COL. WILLIAM LIGHTFOOT VISSCHER

IN THE SCOOP, THE CHICAGO PRESS CLUB’S MAGAZINE

By blazing homes, through forests torn
And blackened harvest fields,
The grim and drunken god of war
In frenzied fury reels.

His breath--the sulph’rous stench of guns--
That death and famine deals
And Pity, pleading, wounded falls
Beneath his steel-shod heels.

A MARCHING SOLILOQUY

BY A MEMBER OF THE S. A. T. C., NORTHWESTERN COLLEGE, NAPERVILLE, ILL.

“Left!
Left!”
Had a good girl when I
“Left!
Left!”
Mighty good pal when I
“Left!”
“One! Two! Three! Four!”
How
many
miles
more?
“Left!

“Left!
Left!”
Booked for a wife when I
“Left!
Left!”
That was my life when I
“Left!”
“One! Two! Three! Four!”
Hear
old
Lieutenant
roar
“Left!”

WHILE SUMMERS PASS

ALINE MICHAELIS

IN THE ENTERPRISE, BEAUMONT, TEXAS

Summer comes and summer goes,
Buds the primrose, fades the rose;
But his footfall on the grass,
Coming swiftly to my door,
I shall hear again no more,
Though a thousand summers pass.

Once he loved the clovers well,
Loved the larkspur and bluebell.
And the scent the plum-blooms yield;
But strange flowers his soul beguiled,
Pallid lilies, laurels wild,
Blooming in a crimson field.

So he plucked the laurels there,
And he found them sweet and fair
In that field of blood-red hue;
And, when on a summer night
Moonlight drenched my clovers white,
Lo! He plucked Death’s lilies, too.

It may be that e’en to-night,
In the Gardens of Delight,
Where his shining soul must dwell,
He has found some flowers more sweet
Than the clovers at my feet,
Some celestial asphodel.

But while summer comes and goes,
With the primrose and the rose
Comes his footfall on the grass--
Gladly, lightly to my door--
I shall hear it echo o’er,
Though a thousand summers pass.

THE MARINES

ADOLPHE E. SMYLIE

OF THE VIGILANTES

Permission to reproduce in this book

“Pardon! he has no Engleesh, heem,
Il ne parle que Française,
I spik it leetle some Monsieur,
Vaire bad, j’en suis fâché--
Marines? Mais oui! I fight wiz zem
At Château Thierry
An’ on ze Ourcq an’ Marne in grand
Bon camaraderie.
I see zem fight at bois Belleau,
Like sauvage make ze yell,--
Sacre nom de Dieu! zoze sailor man
Eez fightin’ like ze hell!
All time zey smile when make ze push,
Magnifique zaire élan,
Zey show ze heart of lion
For delight our brav Franchman.
An’ in ze tranch at rest, zoze troop
From ze Etats Unis
Queeck make ze good frien’ of poilu
Wiz beeg slap on ze knee!
Zey make ze song an’ joke, si drôle
An’ pass ze cigarette;
Zey call us goddam good ol’ scout
Like Marquis La Fayette.
Next day, mebbee, again ze taps--
Ze volley in ze air.--
Adieu! some fightin’ sailor man
Eez gone West. C’est la guerre!
No more ze smile, ze hug, ze hand
Queeck wiz ze cigarette;
C’est vrai, at funerall of _heem_
Ze poilu’s eye eez wet.
But, every day like tidal wave,--
Like human avalanche,--
Ze transport bring more Yankee troop,
To get ze beeg revanche!
Zen from ze heart Américaine
Come milliards of monnaie;
Eet eez ze end! Your country bring
Triomphant liberté.
So, au revoir! I mus’ go on
But first I tell to you
What some high Officier remark
Zat day at bois Belleau.
He says, our great Napoleon
Wiz envy would turn green
Eef he could see zoze sailor man,--
Zoze Uncle Sam Marines!”

AN AMBULANCE DRIVER’S PRAYER

LIEUT. CHAPLAIN THOMAS F. COAKLEY

IN THE STARS AND STRIPES, A.E.F., FRANCE

’Mid blinding rain this inky night,
Loud bursting shells each foot of road,
Thy Light, O Christ, will guide me right,
To save this gasping, dying load.

Their shattered limbs have followed Thee;
Their wounded hands have done Thy work.
They bled, O Lord, to make men free;
They fought the fight--they did not shirk.

NOT TOO OLD TO FIGHT

T. C. HARBAUGH

IN THE CHICAGO LEDGER

My name is Danny Bloomer and my age is eighty-three,
Years ago I went with Sherman to the ever sunny sea.
I stood my ground at Gettysburg, that bloody summer day,
When gallant Pickett rushed the hill and lost his boys in gray;
And now our starry banner is insulted and defied,
The kaiser tears it into shreds and glories in his pride;
Just pass the word across the sea to his stronghold of might,
And say that Danny Bloomer’s here and not too old to fight.

I gave my youth to Uncle Sam in years I’ll ne’er forget,
In mem’ry of those stirring times my old blood tingles yet.
With four score years upon me I can lift the same old gun,
And to face our Flag’s insulter will be everlasting fun.
Please say that Danny Bloomer is ready for the fray,
Cry “Forward, march!” and see him in the good old ranks today.
I love the flag of Washington because it stands for Right,
And that is why I tell you I am not too old to fight.

’Tis true I’m somewhat crippled, but I do not care for that,
I feel as young as when I saw the tilt of Sherman’s hat;
I want to do my duty again before I die,
And see Old Glory proudly in the streets of Berlin fly.
I do not know the kaiser, but I hope within a year
Amid the roar of cannon he will say, “Old Bloomer’s here!”
Yes, hand me down a rifle and I will use it right,
Your Uncle Danny Bloomer isn’t yet too old to fight.
We’ve borne their insults long enough--they make me long to go.
I want to squint along my gun and aim it at the foe;
I’ll eat the same old rations that I ate in ’64,
And feel the blood of youth again amid the battle’s roar.
I haven’t long to tarry here until my work is done,
But I want to show the kaiser we’re not in it for fun;
So give me marching orders and I’ll disappear from sight,
For I am Danny Bloomer, and I’m not too old to fight.

A WAYSIDE IN FRANCE

ADOLPHE E. SMYLIE

IN THE NEW YORK HERALD

Permission to reproduce in this book

“Come shake hands, my little peach blossom.
That’s right, dear, climb up on my knee.
This big Yankee soldier is lonesome--
Ah, now we’ll be friends, ma chérie.
We won’t understand one another,
Your round eyes are telling me so,
But the cling of your chubby fingers
Is a language that all daddies know.
When I caught a sight of your pigtails
And those eyes of violet blue,
It made me heart-hungry, ma petite,
For I’ve a wee girl just like you.
She lives ’way across the wide ocean,
Out where the bald eagles nest,
And she knows all the chipmunks and gophers
At my shack out in the West.”

“Tu dis l’ouest! Est-ce ton pays?
Veux-tu, quand tu iras chez-toi--
Maman est toujours à pleurer--
Me retrouver mon soldat Papa?
Il etait avec sa batterie
Près des Anglais la, en campagne,
Mais Papa est allé dans l’ouest,
Des Anglais disaient à Maman.
Alors, Maman sera heureuse
Et, tu vois elle ne pleurera plus;
Je veux te donner un baiser,--
Merci! Tu es si bon pour nous!”

There she goes! She told me her secret,
Kissed me and then flew away,--
Say, Poilu! You savez some English,
Now what did that little tot say?
“She say Engleeshman tol’ her Mama
Zat her soldat Papa eez gone West!
You said West, bien! Zen you live zaire,
So she make you her leetle request,
Zat you find heem in your countree
So her Mama no more she weel cry;
Zen she thank you an’ kees you, si joyeuse,--
Pauvre mignonne, she think you weel try!”

MISSING

“IRIS”

FROM B. L. T.’S COLUMN IN THE CHICAGO TRIBUNE

The soldier boys are marching, are marching past my door;
They’re off to fight for Freedom, to wage and win the war;
And yet I cannot cheer them, my eyes are full of tears--
My son, who should be with them, is dead these many years.

I’ve missed his boyish laughter, I’ve missed his sunny ways,
I’ve lived alone with sorrow through endless empty days.
But now my bitter longing dims all the grief before--
His boyhood friends are marching, without him, past my door.

I’ve envied happy mothers the children at their knee;
Their very joys seemed given to mock my grief and me.
Time healed those wounds, but this one will pain me while I live--
When Freedom called her warriors, I had no son to give.

And still the boys are marching, are marching toward the sea,
To suffer and to conquer, that all men may be free.
Be glad for them, O mothers! and leave to me the tears--
My son, who should be with them, is dead these many years.

THE RIVERS OF FRANCE

H. J. M.

IN THE ENGLISH REVIEW

The rivers of France are ten score and twain,
But five are the names that we know--
The Marne, the Vesle, the Ourcq, and the Aisne,
And the Somme of the swampy flow.

The rivers of France, from source to the sea,
Are nourished by many a rill,
But these five, if ever a drought there be,
The fountains of sorrow would fill.

The rivers of France shine silvery white,
But the waters of five are red
With the richest blood, in the fiercest fight
For Freedom, that ever was shed.

The rivers of France sing soft as they run,
But five have a song of their own,
That hymns the fall of the arrogant one
And the proud cast down from his throne.

The rivers of France all quietly take
To sleep in the house of their birth,
But the carnadined wave of five shall break
On the uttermost strands of Earth.

Five rivers of France, see their names are writ
On a banner of crimson and gold,
And the glory of those who fashioned it
Shall nevermore cease to be told.

JUST THINKING

HUDSON HAWLEY

IN THE STARS AND STRIPES, A. E. F., FRANCE

Standin’ up here on the fire-step,
Lookin’ ahead in the mist,
With a tin hat over your ivory
And a rifle clutched in your fist;
Waitin’ and watchin’ and wond’rin’
If the Hun’s comin’ over tonight--
Say, aren’t the things you think of
Enough to give you a fright?

Things you ain’t even thought of
For a couple o’ months or more;
Things that ’ull set you laughin’,
Things that ’ull make you sore;
Things that you saw in the movies,
Things that you saw on the street,
Things that you’re really proud of
Things that are--not so sweet;

Debts that are past collectin’,
Stories you hear and forget,
Ball games and birthday parties,
Hours of drill in the wet;
Headlines, recruitin’ posters,
Sunset ’way out at sea,
Evenings of pay-days--golly--
It’s a queer thing, this memory!

Faces of pals in Homeburg,
Voices of womenfolk,
Verses you learnt in schooldays
Pop up in the mist and smoke
As you stand there grippin’ that rifle,
A-starin’, and chilled to the bone,
Wonderin’ and wonderin’ and wonderin’,
Just thinkin’ there--all alone:

When will the war be over?
When will the gang break through?
What will the U. S. look like?
What will there be to do?
Where will the Boches be then?
Who will have married Nell?
When’s the relief a-comin’ up?--
Gosh! But this thinkin’s hell!

THE EVENING STAR

HAROLD SETON

IN THE CHICAGO EVENING POST

The evening star a child espied,
The one star in the sky.
“Is that God’s service flag?” he cried,
And waited for reply.

The mother paused a moment ere
She told the little one--
“Yes, that is why the star is there!
God gave His only Son!”

COLUMBIA’S PRAYER

THOMAS P. BASHAW

IN THE HERALD AND EXAMINER, CHICAGO

Permission to reproduce in this book

Boy in khaki, boy in blue,
I am watching over you,
Going forth amid the rattle
Of the drums that call to battle.

Oft have men waged fight for me,
Fought to make their brothers free;
God protect and succor you,
Boy in khaki, boy in blue.

God go with you on your mission,
And in His all-wise decision
Turn this tide of war to you,
Boy in khaki, boy in blue.

With the Stars and Stripes high o’er you,
Snatch the vic’try just before you,
Heaven keep, encompass you,
Boy in khaki, boy in blue.

When the foe is rent asunder,
And the world looks on in wonder,
Paying tribute rare to you,
Boy in khaki, boy in blue,

God return you safe to me;
To Columbia--Liberty;
’Tis my prayer, my hope for you,
Boy in khaki, boy in blue.

TWO VIEWPOINTS

AMELIA JOSEPHINE BURR

OF THE VIGILANTES

Permission to reproduce in this book.

A German soldier in his journal wrote:

He was a French Boy Scout--a little lad
No bigger than my Hansel. He refused
To tell if any of his countrymen
Were hidden thereabout. Fifty yards on
We ran into an ambush. Well, of course
We shot him--little fool! Poor little fool!
Thinking himself a hero as he stood
Facing our guns, so little and so young
Against the sunny vineyard-green, I thought
What wasted courage! for the child was brave,
Fool as he was. The pity ...

Here there came
A sudden shrapnel, and the writing stopped....

_Did I write that? O God--did I write that?
Mine--they were mine, the folly and the waste.
Now the keen edge of death has cut away
The eyelids of my soul and I must bear
The perfect understanding of the dead.
Now that I know myself as I am known,
How shall my soul endure Eternity?
God, God, if there be pity left for me,
Send to my son the child that I despised
A messenger to burn into his soul
While still he lives, the truth I died to learn!_

DESTROYERS

“KLAXON”

IN BLACKWOODS MAGAZINE

Through the dark night
And the fury of battle
Pass the destroyers in showers of spray.
As the Wolf-pack to the flank of the cattle,
We shall close in on them--shadows of gray.
In from ahead,
Through shell-flashes red,
We shall come down to them, after the Day,
Whistle and crash
Of salvo and volley
Round us and into us as we attack
Light on our target they’ll flash in their folly,
Splitting our ears with shrapnel-crack.
Fire as they will,
We’ll come to them still,
Roar as they may at us--Back--Go Back!
White though the sea
To the shell-splashes foaming,
We shall be there at the death of the Hun.
Only we pray for a star in the gloaming
(Light for torpedoes and none for a gun).
Lord--of Thy Grace
Make it a race,
Over the sea with the night to run.

NINETEEN-SEVENTEEN

SUSAN HOOKER WHITMAN

IN THE KANSAS CITY STAR

“It is long since knighthood was in flower,
There are no men today who tower
Above their kind--the knights are dust,
Their names forgot, their good swords rust,”
We idly say. And yet, in truth--
The brave soul has eternal youth,
Like the great lighthouse rising free,
Whose far-flung beams guide ships at sea,
God lifts above his fellow man
A steadfast soul to dare and plan,
A king of men, by right divine,
Who in his forehead bears the sign--
He walks along the city street;
Unknowing, in the fields we meet
A modern knight in whose hand lies
A mighty Nation’s destinies.

Then say no more, the knights are gone;
Honor and Truth and Right live on,
And men today would keep the bridge
Horatius kept--from rocky ridge
Heroic Youth would still fling down
His horse, himself, to save the town.
Columbia calls!
Off with your hats and lift them high,
Our own, our sons are passing by.

THE SILENT ARMY.

IAN ADANAC

IN THE MONTREAL DAILY STAR

No bugle is blown, no roll of drums,
No sound of an army marching.
No banners wave high, no battle-cry
Comes from the war-worn fields where they lie,
The blue sky overarching.
The call sounds clearer than the bugle call
From this silent, dreamless army.
“No cowards were we, when we heard the call,
For freedom we grudged not to give our all,”
Is the call from the silent army.

Hushed and quiet and still they lie,
This silent, dreamless army,
While living comrades spring to their side,
And the bugle-call and the battle-cry
Are heard as dreamer and dreamless lie
Under the stars of the arching sky,
The men who have heard from the men who have died
The call of the silent army.

THE SOURCE OF NEWS

FROM THE NEEDLE

Absolute knowledge I have none,
But my aunt’s washerwoman’s son
Heard a policeman on his beat
Say to a laborer in the street
That he had a letter just last week,
Written in the finest Greek,
From a Chinese coolie in Timbuctoo,
Who said the niggers in Cuba knew
Of a colored man in a Texas town
Who got it straight from a circus clown,
That a man in Klondike heard the news
From a gang of South American Jews,
About somebody in Bamboo
Who heard a man who claimed he knew
Of a swell society female rake
Whose mother-in-law will undertake
To prove that her husband’s sister’s niece
Has stated in a printed piece
That she has a son who has a friend
Who knows when the war is going to end.

TO MY SON

A poem, anonymous, sent to the Chicago Evening Post by one whose
son’s regiment was leaving for France.

My son, at last the fateful day has come
For us to part. The hours have nearly run.
May God return you safe to land and home;
Yet, what God wills, so may His will be done.

Draw tight the belt about your slender frame;
Flash blue your eyes! Hold high your proud young head!
Today you march in Liberty’s fair name,
To save the line enriched by France’s dead!

I would not it were otherwise. And yet
’Tis hard to speed your marching forth, my son!
’Tis doubly hard to live without regret
For love unsaid, and kindnesses undone.

But would the chance were mine with you to stand
Upon those shores and see our flag unfurled!
To fight on France’s brave, unconquered land
With Liberty’s great sword for all the world!

Beyond the waves, my son, the siren calls,
The sky is black and Fastnet lies abreast;
A signal rocket flings its stars and falls
Across the night to welcome England’s guest.

When mid the scud you see the Cornish lights,
And through the mist you hear faint Devon chimes,
Thank God for memories of those other nights
And days on other ships in happier times.

Perhaps you’ll stand within the pillared nave
And aisles where colored sundust falls, and see
Old Canterbury Church where Becket gave
His life’s best blood for England’s liberty!

Some night you’ll walk, perhaps, on Salisbury plain;
Above Stonehenge the Druid’s stars still sleep,
And on the turf within the circled fane
Beneath the autumn moon still lie the sheep.

And if you march beside some Kentish hedge,
And blackberries hang thick clustered o’er the ways,
Pluck down a branch! Rest by the road’s brown edge;
Eat! Nor forget our last vacation days!

And then the trench in battle-scarred Lorraine;
The town half burned but held in spite of hell;
The bridge twice taken, lost, and won again;
The cratered glacis ripped with mine and shell.

The leafless trees, bare-branched in spite of June;
The sodden road, the desolated plain;
The mateless birds, the season out of tune;
Fair France, at bay, is calling through her pain.

Oh, son! My son! God keep you safe and free--
Our flag and you! But if the hour must come
To choose at last ’twixt self and liberty--
We’ll close our eyes! So let God’s will be done!

EASTER-EGGS

REGINALD WRIGHT KAUFFMAN

From this author’s “Our Navy at Work,” published by the
Bobbs-Merrill Co. In 1917, our Government took over a large number
of pleasure-yachts, fitted them with a few light guns and
depth-charges and sent them into French waters to hunt submarines.
They were variously known as “The Suicide Fleet” and “Easter-Eggs.”
Mr. Kauffman spent some time at sea with them. Permission to
reproduce in this book.

Now, Mr. Wall of Wall St., he built himself a yacht,
And he built that yacht for comfort and for speed;
He didn’t mean that it should go
Beyond a hundred miles or so;
He wanted something made for show,
Where he could drink and feed.

Then Uncle Sam’l went to war and hadn’t any boats,
Or not enough to guard the stormy green,
And so he said to Mr. Wall:
“I’ll take your six-feet-over-all
And set it out to get the call
Upon the submarine.”

“A cruising-fighter? Never!” (The experts chorused that.)
“She’ll sink before she’s half-way out to France”;
But Sam cut out her bathtubs white,
He painted her a perfect fright
And loaded her with dynamite;
Says he: “I’ll take a chance.”

“Good-night!” said Wall of Wall St.; the experts said it, too;
But Uncle Sam was sot and sibylline;
His little plan, it warn’t a josh:
Wall’s boat ’s as dry ’s a mackintosh;
She fights, b’ gum; what’s more, b’ gosh,
She gits the submarine!

A DIRGE

VICTOR PEROWNE

IN THE LONDON TIMES

Thou art no longer here,
No longer shall we see thy face.
But, in that other place,
Where may be heard
The roar of the world rushing down the wantways of the stars;
And the silver bars
Of heaven’s gate
Shine soft and clear:
Thou mayest wait.

No longer shall we see
Thee walking in the crowded streets,
But where the ocean of the Future beats
Against the flood-gates of the Present, swirling to this earth,

Another birth
Thou mayest have;
Another Arcady
May thee receive.
Not here thou dost remain,
Thou art gone far away,
Where, at the portals of the day,
The hours ever dance in ring, a silvern-footed throng,

While time looks on,
And seraphs stand
Choiring an endless strain
On either hand.

Thou canst return no more;
Not as the happy time of spring
Comes after winter burgeoning
On wood and wold in folds of living green, for thou art dead.

Our tears we shed
In vain, for thou
Dost pace another shore,
Untroubled now.

THE WOMAN’S GAME

AUTHORSHIP NOT KNOWN

Was there ever a game we did not share,
Brother of mine?
Or a day when I did not play you fair,
Brother of mine?
“As good as a boy,” you used to say,
And I was as eager for the fray,
And as loath to cheat or to run away,
Brother of mine!

You are playing the game that is straight and true,
Brother of mine,
And I’d give my soul to stand next to you,
Brother of mine.
The spirit, indeed, is still the same;
I would not shrink from the battle’s flame,
Yet here I stay--at the woman’s game,
Brother of mine!

If the last price must needs be paid,
Brother of mine,
You will go forward, unafraid,
Brother of mine.
Death can so small a part destroy,
You will have known the fuller joy--
Ah! would that I had been born a boy,
Brother of mine!

A FLEMISH VILLAGE

H. A.

IN LONDON SPECTATOR

Gone is the spire that slept for centuries,
Whose image in the water, calm and low,
Was mingled with the lilies green and snow,
And lost itself in river mysteries.
The church lies broken near the fallen spire;
For here, among these old and human things
Death swept along the street with feet of fire,
And went upon his way with moaning wings.
Above the cluster of these homes forlorn,
Where giant fleeces of the shells are rolled,
O’er pavements by the kneeling herdsmen worn,
The wounded saints look out to see their fold.

And silence follows fast, no evening peace,
But leaden stillness, when the thunder wanes,
Haunting the slender branches of the trees,
And settling low upon the listless plains.

FRANCE

CAPT. JOSEPH MEDILL PATTERSON

IN THE CHICAGO TRIBUNE

From the French of Armentier Ohanian

Permission to reproduce in this book

I was an exile from my own country and wandered over the breast of the world seeking another country.

And I came into a land where there was only a long spring and a long autumn, where they did not know the deadly heats of our summers or the mortal colds of our mountains. Among the vines and sunny fields I saw the people of this land at work, ever young of soul, smiling, loving, and kindly.

I asked, “What is the name of this happy place?”

And the answer was, “France the voluptuous.”

I came to towns of splendid monuments, of harmonious buildings, of proud triumphal arches of the past, and above always I saw the spires of great cathedrals stretching toward the sky, as if to seize upon the feet of God.

I asked, “What is the name of this marvelous land?”

And the answer was, “France the glorious.”

I advanced again, when I was struck by the red color of a large river.... It was a river of warm blood that rolled down from afar in thick and heavy waves. I advanced again. Before me dark clouds of smoke hid the endless sky above huge fields of warriors in battle; when these died smiling at death others took their places, singing.

I asked, “What is the name of this chivalrous land?”

And the answer was, “France the courageous.”

At last I came to an immense city, of which I saw neither the beginning nor the end, a city full of sumptuous palaces, of parks, and fountains. The sun glistened on the marble of the streets and kissed the serene, resigned faces of women clothed in black. The chimes of churches filled the air with solemn sounds, and words, until then unknown to me, “Te Deum,” came from the throats of thousands of thousands.

With respect I asked, “What is the name of this land that mourns?”

And the answer was, “France the victorious.”

I kissed the earth of this land and said, “I have found my country, who was an exile.”

THE CLERK

B. H. M. HETHERINGTON

IN THE LONDON BOOKMAN

Perched upon an office stool, neatly adding figures,
With cuffs gone shiny and a pen behind his ear;
Deep in Liabilities, Goods and Double Entry,
So he worked from year to year.

Diligent and careful, hedged about with figures,
Given soul and body to discount and per cent;
Bounded by the columns of Purchase Book and Journal,
Soberly his moments went.

Now his pen has ceased from adding rows of figures,
Ceased from ruling ledgers and entering amounts:
Clad in sodden khaki, with a gun in Flanders
He is balancing accounts.

POILU

STEUART M. EMERY, A. E. F.

IN THE STARS AND STRIPES

The traditional friendship between the United States and France was
recemented under the fire of German guns. In France they celebrated
our Fourth of July; in this country, we celebrated the Fourteenth
of July, the anniversary of the fall of the Bastile. Yank and Poilu
are brothers in war, don’t mind the languages. The inextinguishable
humor of France never showed more quaintly than in that word,
“Poilu.” It means “unshaven.” More freely, “a man who needs a
shave.” A whimsical comment upon the French soldier’s way of
letting his beard grow while he is in the field. Those boys were
like the English and our own. They smiled at misery. They were good
old sports, bless ’em!

You’re a funny fellow, poilu, in your dinky little cap
And your war worn, faded uniform of blue,
With your multitude of haversacks abulge from heel to flap
And your rifle that is most as big as you.
You were made for love and laughter, for good wine and merry song,
Now your sunlit world has sadly gone astray,
And the road today you travel stretches rough and red and long,
Yet you make it, petit soldat, brave and gay.

Though you live within the shadow, fagged and hungry half the while,
And your days and nights are racking in the line,
There is nothing under heaven that can take away your smile,
Oh, so wistful, and so patient and so fine.
You are tender as a woman with the tiny ones who crowd
To upraise their lips and for your kisses pout,
Still, we’d hate to have to face you when the bugle’s sounding loud
And your slim, steel sweetheart Rosalie is out.

You’re devoted to mustaches which you twirl with such an air
O’er a cigarette with nigh an inch to run,
And quite often you are noticed in a beard that’s full of hair,
But that heart of yours is always twenty-one.
No, you do not “parlee English,” and you find it very hard,
For you want to chum with us and words you lack;
So you pat us on the shoulder and say, “Nous sommes camarades.”
We are that, my poilu pal, to hell and back!

AUSTRALIA’S MEN

DOROTHEA MACKELLAR

Miss Mackellar is the daughter of Sir Charles Mackellar, Chairman
of the Bank of New South Wales. Acknowledgment is due Dr. George
Cooke-Adams, formerly an officer in the Australian naval forces,
through whose courtesy her verses are presented here.

There are some that go for love of a fight
And some for love of a land,
And some for a dream of the world set free
Which they barely understand.

A dream of the world set free from Hate--
But splendidly, one and all,
Danger they drink as ’twere wine of Life
And jest as they reel and fall.

Clean aims, rare faculties, strength and youth,
They have poured them freely forth
For the sake of the sun-steeped land they left
And the far green isle in the north.

What can we do to be worthy of them,
Now hearts are breaking for pride?
Give comfort at least to the wounded men
And the kin of the man that died.

TANKS

O. C. A. CHILD

Yes, back at home I used to drive a tram;
And Sammy, there, he was a driver, too--
He used to ride his racer--did Sir Sam;
While pokey London streets was all I knew.

But now, His Nibs and I, of equal rank,
Are chummy as the paper and the wall,
Each tooling of a caterpillar tank,
Each waiting on the blest old bugle call.

Say! Tanks are sport--when you get used to them,
They’re like a blooming railroad, self-contained;
They lay their tracks, as you might say--pro tem,
And pick ’em up, and there’s good distance gained.

They roar across rough country like a gale,
They lean against a house and push it down,
They’re like a baby fortress under sail,
And antic as a three-ring circus clown.

Sam says they’re slow. They may seem so to him--
They can’t show fancy mile-a-minute stuff,
But when they charge, in armored fighting trim,
You bet the Germans find ’em fast enough!

Now Sam and I are waiting, side by side,
To steam across yon farm-land in the night;
We’ll take their blamed barbed wire in our strides
And stamp a German trench line out of sight.

A HYMN OF FREEDOM

MARY PERRY KING

IN COLLIER’S WEEKLY

Permission to reproduce in this book

“Unfurl the flag of Freedom,
Fling far the bugle blast!
There comes a sound of marching
From out the mighty past.
Let every peak and valley
Take up the valiant cry:
Where, beautiful as morning,
Our banner cuts the sky.

Free born to peace and justice,
We stand to guard and save
The liberty of manhood,
The faith our fathers gave.
Then soar aloft, Old Glory,
And tell the waiting breeze
No law but Right and Mercy
Shall rule the Seven Seas.

No hate is in our anger,
No vengeance in our wrath,
We hold the line of freedom
Across the tyrant’s path.
Where’er oppression vaunteth
We loose the sword once more
To stay the feet of conquest,
And pray an end of war.

SWAN SONGS

More than all the others put together, the war poems of Alan Seeger, Lieutenant Colonel McCrae, and Lieut. Rupert Brooke, have touched and thrilled the heart of America. They are quiet, earnest, yet more powerful than trumpet blasts, for they rise triumphant from great depths, and as they sing, exalt.

Most familiar is our own Alan Seeger’s “I Have a Rendezvous with Death.” He was studying in Paris when the war broke out. In the third week he enlisted in the Foreign Legion. Two arduous years later he was called on higher service. July 4, 1916, his squad was caught in an assault on the village of Belloy-en-Santerre, where the Germans received them with the fire of six machine guns. Seeger was severely wounded, but went forward with the others, and helped take the place. Next morning he died. He had kept the tryst.

* * * * *

Alan Seeger was a New York boy. He was born in that city June 22, 1888. In his short life he had written some twenty poems. This was his last. It was written in camp, shortly before his call came: