My War Experiences in Two Continents Part 10

To give up work seems to me a little like divorcing a husband. There is a feeling of failure about it, and the sense that one is giving up what one has undertaken to do. So, however dull or tiresome husband or work may be, one mustn't give them up.

[Page Heading: THE POWER OF THE BIBLE]

_6 March._--To-day I have been thinking, as I have often thought, that the real power of the Bible is that it is a Universal Human Doc.u.ment.

The world is based upon sentiment--_i.e._, the personality of man and his feelings brought to bear upon facts. It is also the world's dynamic force. Now, the books of the Bible--especially, perhaps, the magical, beautiful Psalms--are the most tender and sentimental (the word has been misused, of course) that were ever written. They express the thoughts and feelings of generations of men who always did express their thoughts and feelings, and thought no shame of it. And so we northern people, with our pa.s.sionate inarticulateness, love to find ourselves expressed in the old pages.

I find in the Gospels one of the few complaints of Christ. "Have I been so long time with you and yet hast thou not known me, Philip?" All one has ever felt is said for one in a phrase, all that one finds most isolating in the world is put into one sentence. There is a wan feeling of wonder in it; "so long," and yet you think that of me! "so long," and yet such absolute inability to read my character! "so long," and yet still quite unaware of my message! The humour of it (to us) lies in the little side of it! The dear people who "thought you would like this or dislike that"--the kind givers of presents even--the little people who shop for one! The friends who invite one to their queer, soulless, thin entertainments, with their garish lights; the people who choose a book for one, who counsel one, even with importunity, to go to some play which they are "sure we shall like." "So long"--they are old friends, and yet they thought we should like that play or that book! "So long"--and yet they think one capable of certain acts or feelings which do not remotely seem to belong to one! "So long"--and yet they can't even touch one chord that responds!

We are always quite alone. The communal life is the loneliest of all, because "yet thou hast not known me." The world comes next in loneliness, but it is _big_, and with a big soul of its own. The family life is almost nave in its misunderstanding--no one listens, they just wait for pauses....

... The worship of the "sane mind" has been a little overdone, I think.

The men who are p.r.o.ne to say of everyone that they "exaggerate a little," or "are morbid," are like weights in a scale--just, but oh, how heavy!...

... This war is fine, _fine_, FINE! I know it, and yet I don't get near the fineness except in the pages of _Punch_! I see streams of men whose language (Flemish) I don't speak, holding up protecting hands to keep people from jostling a poor wounded limb, and I watch them sleeping heavily, or eating oranges and smoking cigarettes down to the last hot stump, but I don't hear of the heroic stands which I know are made, or catch the volition of it all. Perhaps only in a voluntary army is such a thing possible. Our own boys make one's heart beat, but these poor, dumb, sodden little men, coming in caked with mud--to be patched up and sent into a hole in the ground again, are simply tragic.

[Page Heading: "THE WOMAN'S TOUCH"]

_7 March._--"The woman's touch." When a woman has been down on her knees scrubbing for a week, and washing for another week, a man, returning and finding his house in order, and vaguely conscious of a newer and fresher smell about it, talks quite tenderly of "a woman's touch."...

... There are some people who never care to enter a door unless it has "pa.s.sage interdite" upon it....

... The guns are booming heavily this morning. Nothing seems to correspond. Are men really falling and dying in agonies quite close to us? I believe we ought to see less or more--be nearer the front or further from it. Or is it that nothing really changes us? Only war pictures and war letters remain as a fixed blazing standard. The soldiers in the trenches are quite as keen about sugar in their coffee as we are about tea. No wonder men have decided that one day we must put off flesh. It is far too obstrusive....

... To comfort myself I try to remember that Wellington took his old nurse with him on all his campaigns because she was the only person who washed his stocks properly....

... Surely the expense of the thing will one day put a stop to war. We are spending two million sterling per day, the French certainly as much, the Germans probably more, and Austria and Russia much more, in order to keep men most uncomfortably in unroofed graves, and to send high explosives into the air, most of which don't hit anything. Surely, if fighting was (as it is) impossible in this flooded country in winter, we might have called a truce and gone home for three months, and trained and drilled like Christians on Salisbury Plain!...

... Health--_i.e._, bad health--obtrudes itself tiresomely. I am ill again, and, fortunately, few people notice it, so I am able to keep on.

A festered hand makes me awkward; and as I wind a bandage round it and tie it with my teeth, I once more wish I was a Belgian refugee, as I am sure I would be interesting, and would get things done for me!

A sick Belgian artist, M. Rotsartz{3}, is doing a drawing of me. I go to Lady Bagot's hospital, where he is laid up, and sit to him in the intervals of soup. That little wooden hospital is the best place I have known so far. Lady Bagot is never bustled or fussy, nor even "busy," and her staff are excellent men, with the "Mark of the Lamb" on them.

I gave away a lot of things to-day to a regiment going into the trenches. The soldiers were delighted with them.

_11 March._--There was a lot of firing near La Panne to-day, and a British warship was repeatedly sh.e.l.led by the Germans from Nieuport. I went into Dunkirk with Mr. Clegg, and got the usual hasty shopping done.

No one can ever wait a minute. If one has time to buy a newspaper one is lucky. The difficulty of communicating with anyone is great--no telephone--no letters--no motor-car. I am stranded.

[Page Heading: FRENCH MARINES]

I generally go in the train to Ad.i.n.kerke with the French Marines, nice little fellows, with labels attached to them stating their "case"--not knowing where they are going or anything else--just human lives battered about and carted off. I don't even know where they get the little bit of money which they always seem able to spend on loud-smelling oranges and cigarettes. The place is littered with orange-skins--to-day I saw a long piece lying in the form of an "S" amid the mud; and, like a story of a century old, I thought of ourselves as children throwing orange-skins round our heads and on to the floor to read the initial of our future husband, and I seemed to hear mother say, "'S' for Sammy--Sammy C----,"

a boy with thick legs whom we secretly despised!

I have found a whole new household of "eclopes" at Ad.i.n.kerke, who want cigarettes, socks, and shoes all the time. They are a pitiful lot, with earache, toothache, and all the minor complaints which I myself find so trying, and they lie about on straw till they are able to go back to the trenches again.

The pollard willows between here and Ad.i.n.kerke are all being cut down to build trenches. They were big with buds and the promise of spring.

_14 March._--I went to the station yesterday, as usual. Suddenly I couldn't stand it any more. Everyone was cleaning. I was getting swept up with straw and mopped up with dirty cloths. The kitchen work was done. I ate my lunch in a filthy little out-building and then I fled. I had to get into the open air, and I hopped on to an ambulance and drove to Dunkirk. I had a good deal to do there getting vegetables, cigarettes, etc., and we got back late to the station, where I heard the Queen had paid a visit. Rather bad luck on almost the only day I have been away.

I am waiting anxiously to hear if the report of the new British advance yesterday is true. When fighting really begins we are going to be in for a big thing; one dreads it for the sake of the boys we are going to lose. I want things to start now just to get them over, but I rather envy the people who died before this unspeakable war began.

_To Mrs. Keays-Young._

CARE OF FIELD POST OFFICE, DUNKIRK, _17 March._

MY DEAREST BABY,

[Page Heading: CAPTAIN L. M. B. SALMON]

I have (of course) been getting letters and parcels very badly lately. I am sending this home by hand, which is not allowed except on Red Cross business, but this is to ask how Lionel is, so I think I may send it. My poor Bet! What anxiety for her! This spring weather is making me long to be at home, and when people tell me the crocuses are up in the park!--well, you know London and the park belong to me! Are the catkins out? We can get flowers at Dunkirk, but not here.

Not a word of war news, because that wouldn't be fair. A shilling wire about Lionel would satisfy me--just "Better, and Bet well," or something of that sort.

Always, my dear, Your loving, S. MACNAUGHTAN.

P.S.--Your two letters and Bet's have just come. To be in touch with you again is _very_ pleasant. I can't tell you what it was like to sit down to a pretty, clean breakfast to-day with my letters beside me. Someone brought them here early.

I heard to-day that I am going to be decorated by the King of the Belgians, but don't spread this broadcast, as anything might happen in war.

_20 March._--I met an Englishman belonging to an armoured car in Dunkirk a couple of days ago. He told me that the last four days' fighting at La Ba.s.see has cost the British 13,000 casualties. Three lines of holes in the ground, and fighting only just beginning again! Bet's fiance has been shot through the head, but is still alive. My G.o.d, the horror of it all! And England is still cheerful, I hear, and is going to hold race-meetings as usual.

At the station to-day I saw a mad man, who fought and struggled. I thought madmen raved. This one fought silently, like a man one sees in a dream. Another soldier shook all over like an old man. Many were blind.

"On the whole," someone said to me in England, "I suppose you are having a good time."

There is a snowstorm to-day, and it is bitterly cold. It is very odd how many small "complaints" seem to attack one. I can't remember the day out here when I felt well all over.

Last night some Belgians came in to dinner. It was like old times trying to get things nice. I had some flowers and a tablecloth. I believe in making a contrast with the discomfort I see out here. We forced open a piano, and had some perfect music.

_21 March._--The weather is brighter to-day; the sound of firing is more distant; it is possible to think of other things besides the war.

Mrs. ---- came to the station this morning. I think she has the most untidy mind I have ever met with.

With all our faults, I often wish that there were more Macnaughtans in the world. Their simple and plain intelligence gives one something to work upon. Mrs. ---- came and told me to-day that last night "they laughed till they cried" over her attempt at making a pudding. I should have cried, only, over a woman of fifty who wasn't able to make a pudding. She and ---- are twin nebulae who think themselves constellations.

_To Miss Mary King._

CARE OF FIELD POST OFFICE, DUNKIRK, _22 March._

DEAR MARY,

My plans, like those of everybody else, are undecided because of the war. If it is going to stop in May I should like to stay till the end, but if it is likely to go on for a long time, I shall come home. I don't think hot soup (which is my business) can be wanted much longer, as the warm weather will be coming.

I have been asked to take over full charge of a hospital here. It is a great compliment, but I have almost decided to refuse. I have other duties, and I have some important writing to do, as I am busy with a book on the war. I begin work as early as ever, and then go to my kitchen.