CHARLIE CHAPLIN'S WAR SONG

Dominion, Volume 9, Issue 2661, 5 January 1916, Page 3

CHARLIE CHAPLIN'S WAR SONG

_ : —efc INFECTIOUS, FATUOUS DITTY THAT J- IS ALL THE RAGE. J . The children of London have blessed ' tho Army with a new marching, song. Is is a masterpiece of infantile inanity set to the tune'of "Red" Wing." Any 1 street urchin will whistle it to you for ' a penny Every office boy has known ! it for weeks. Now every soldier and , sailor sings it. 1 _ , | No one, says the "Daily News," knows who wrote the. words. It appears to have sprung spontaneously out of the youthful adoration of our old friend Charlie Chaplin a few weeks ago. Then, as now, the children's ■ matinees at the picture theatres were 1 ringing with it.:. But somehow their •' elder brothers and fathers in khaki be--1 gan humming it uncoaeciously, and it ■ is now fast becomiug the favourite ■ marching song with the troops. We 1 may expect it any day on the recruit- ■ ing bands in Trafalgar Square or ■ Whitehall. Without the music the > words are puerile; without the words 1 the music is nothing but a pretty, lilt--1 ing air. But the combination of the > two is irresistibly magnetic, like Charlie i Chaplin himself. There is only one 1 verse: the world could not stand a second:— When the sun (or moon) shines bright on Charlie Chaplin, His boots are cracking For want of blacking, And his little baggy trousers they want mending, ■' Before we send him <. To the Dardanelles. The Germans don't know about it yet, but they will before Christma3. Already the new war song is in France. It is on'its way to the Dardanelles. Its infectious fatuousness is being wafted • from one camp to another. It has penetrated, to the officers' mess., It is tho pet-at the military concerts. Salisbury Plain echoes with it. You' can hear it in the country lanes round London when the troops come marching by. It is a song of greeting and farewell. The official visitor (Mrs. Schoch) for the Porirua Mental Hospital acknowledges with thanks gifts from the following Warehousemen's Aissociation, D.1.C., Abbott Oram, Economic, C. Smith, Kirkcaldie and Stains, S. Myers, Hayman and Co., Johnston and Co., Levin and Co., Te Aro House, "Anonymous." An Ep|.:.»\h lady, writing from Paris to her "lives -in 1 London, says: "I saw sucli a pretty scene in the Champs Elysees a few days ago. Two men, each shorn of a limb and bearing on their chests the War Cross, were sitting '<)'n a, bench under a gentle cascade of ■ golden leaves from the trees. • Two well-dressed children passed in charge of their governess.' The little girl, apparently about five or six, climbed on to - the knee of one of the warworn heroes and implanted a kiss upon his brow. The little boy took his hero for a walk np the avenue, and proudly held two fingers of the'right hand , that was guiding the crutch. When boy and soldier had returned to the "base" there was a solemn exchange of addresses. The little incident was the delight of a small crowd which gathered. The luxurious clothing of the children and the soiled appearance : of the two wounded men formed a striking contrast,- and a'charming illustration of the "6acred union" animating all classes in France.