MISSING THE WAR.

Press, Volume LV, Issue 16432, 28 January 1919, Page 8

MISSING THE WAR.

« The old man stood smoking his pipe outside his little liat-faced iiouse . in Dunkirk—"the City •, of Dreadful Night," so called from the fact of its having been bombed and bombarded nearly 500 times during the war—and gave me a paternal'greeting as i passed. ; "Ulad the ; Bodies have left the coast, I Bupposei'" I .said. "Glad that the war is over for Dunkirk?" "Aye," he said, "I was, but it is getting a bit duli. I liked it at first, it was nice to be sleeping in the bedroom upstairs instead of in the cellar. It was nice to have a whole week on end without one disturbed night. It •wfis nice to walk about without having my ears pricked to catch the warning of 'La Vache' ('The Cow'). But it's dull now. We're missing the war 1 "It was a bit of an excitement for an old man. I'd be sitting in. my cellar having some wine and a bit of cheese, and the old 'cow' would blow. Once it would • go! 'Destroyer 1' said I. Twice it would go! 'Shells from Ostend!' said L Three times it would go! 'No, drat it; Gothasl' I'd say. "Lucille would go into the street and fetch in the children, and we'd wait. Then we'd hear the noise of the cannon down at La Panne. Then the cannon near Malo terminus. _ Then we'd hear the noise of the machine and the thud of the guns around the town at Petite Synthe and Coudequerquc and St. Pol. "We'd wait a little, and we'd hear the crash of the bombs dropping down by the docks, and the cellar would shake. Pierre would count—'One, two, three,, four, five, six—seven— eight. That's one machine finished, gran'dad!' he'd say. "Oh, yes, it was dangerous! Some poor people got killed. Sales Boches! But it's dull! You never knew what was going to happen in the old days. But wo carried on! Market every Thursday. Tramways still _ running. They could not break our spirit. We got'the Legion of Honour, you know, in Dunkirk. . "Of course we are glad it is all .oter. Nobody likeß _ big shells ana bombs and shrapnel—but we miss the war we miss the war!" I 'walked on thinking. It is going to be hard to get used to peace. In spite of war's horrors and danger, peace is soing to seem veiy dull for a little Prolonged excitement always has a disturbing and uncomfortable e- ; action. —(By Paul Bewsher in "Daily MaiiL'V,