THE GLORY OF WAR.

Greymouth Evening Star, Volume XXXI, 22 June 1901, Page 4

THE GLORY OF WAR.

Perhaps the most graphic describor of the horrors of war, since the death of the

late Mr Stevens, is Mr W. H. Anderson, Australian surgeon, who served as a "private trooper. The letter was sent to the London Times and attracted so much attention, that by permission of the editor it was reprinted in the London Daily Mail. For pioturesqueness of details it is almost Zolaresque. His description of a day’s march \yith Bundle’s column is almost unapproachable, and fully describes the horrors of a day’s march on the African Veldt The day’s march begins while the stars are still twinkling in a cool, keen sky, and with a white-faced moon doing sentry go in the cloud gaps. Clatter, clatter, clatter 1 and the Yeomen are moving through the camp to the front to take up their position as advance guard. Away over the Basuto mountains there are a few faint streaks of light in the sky, and then the blood-red sun swings up and the day dawns like the ripening of apples. With the dawn the advance guard up like a swarm of ants when the precocious schoolboy heaves a stone among them. Away they go, dotting the yellow veldt, skirling kopjes, and searching dongas; at any moment liable to bo swept into eternity by the spiteful bullet of the sniper. , “Up In the front the going is comparatively pleasant, for there you raiss-the convoy dnst, ant} you have in addition the musical tss, tsa, tss of the guns to » cheer you on your way. Down in the s* rear it is awful. It is Hades all the way to the rearguard; dust and the stench of dead bullocks! The heat is terrible.

The little ragged yellow men from Manchester look no longer to Heaven for help ; they hang their heads and drag their lagging feet across the dusty leagues of veldt. Itis like following a funeral in Inferno. Not one of these haggard men utter a word ; each is a machine a poor, worn-out, broken-down affair, trailing in the dust of 500 wagons and countless trek-oxen. They are creeping along at the rate of two miles an hour, and hope to catch De Wet. ■ Yesterday the mail arrived. It was full of legends about tons of clothing for ■■the troops and countless comfortable 1 boots.

The day’s march reveals the truth. Half the Manchester have no solos: dozens have no boots at all, and are limping along bare-footed, or with a puttee wrapped round the bleeding sole. Clothing ! Go and ask the Staffords ahum the clothing. Ask that man with the hole in his trousers large enough for a church window. There are seven devils in that man’s stomach, and they will answer for him and make his tongue reddiet with paths. Ask that man with the tattered sack round his loins. Clothing, forsooth ! Ask yet another I That poor devil trailing along in the dust, and the blinding glare of a noon-day sun. Ho is good, enough. Ho wears a thick Army cloak all the way, because ho has no trousos at all. Kind, gentle, pious, civilised British public ! Yours sons are down in Africa tramping the red leagues with bleeding feet, and clothed like an Italian organ grinder’s monkey in prehistoric times. Well might a great man sneer at your unctuous rectitude. But the little ragged yellow men are dumb and silent through in all. The men have had nothing to drink so far. Four hours’ marching and no water I Six hours, and still no water 1 Not because there was none in the land, Oh, no ! Two hours ago the convoy crossed a clear limpid stream ; but the commanding officer, crop fall with good breakfast, did not think it was wise to halt. No one was allowed to fall out. The officer had whiskey and water in his bottle. The privates tongue was dry and swollen, his lips cracked, too crooked for speech. And so he still tramps on, dumb and silent through it all. Then comes the halt, and the little ragged men drop down oa the burning veldt like weary cattle. By and by fifty yards away from the camp, the halting place is dotted with bare backs bent over blue shirts. Continuous inspection of one's garments on active service is the only way to keep them on your back. Biscuit and'water is the midday feast on the march, and the regular sacrament to the-war god. • But the Manchester man does not comK’ n: he is on quarter rations now. en he gets back to. the manufacturing City it will bo full rations. And then the Manchester man looks down into his canteen and its dirty, muddy water. Who knows but what he, too, may fall a victim this very, day to the spiteful Mauser. The brigade must be on the move again. On the . march, at two miles an hour, to catoh De Wet, slim Do Wot. How the wily Boor commandant must smile at the mighty tortoise creeping over the burning Vveldt, while ho himself is sleeping comfortably in a feather bed at a friendly farmhouse. And then to morrow the slumbering tortoise, will come down the. road to the farmhouse, and out of spite set fire to Tt; but not De Wot, And so the long convoy trails along like a serpent down the kopje side, its sinuous dusty course a splendid guide to the enemy. Here in a quiet little valley the convoy halts; darkness creeps over the land. Soon the veldt is lit up with countless little fires. Around these the

little ragged men are huddled in two and threes, cooking their pound of flour, ' thankful that there is no rain. Had there been rain the dung would not have burnt; there would have been no fire, and, consequently, m food. And so Tommy, ever thankful for small mercies, eats his ration and falls to sleep. Out on the kopje, weary, but faithful men oj his own race guard him, and will continue to guard Idm until the bullet of some hidden foe finds him out, and his eyes close in eternal rest. In the meantime * he will sleep little and march a great deal. He will starve and suffer many privations for his little village, for that was his vow when he left his Lancashire cottage.'^-,. And now the little camp fires are out, and night has fallen light as a rose leaf on the sleeping camp of the little ragged yellow won. Thu? ends the day’s march.