As Cool as on the Parade Ground.

Huntly Press and District Gazette, Volume 4, 15 January 1915, Page 3

As Cool as on the Parade Ground.

One of the bravest men in the Peninsular war Rilfleman Harris tells the following story. In his first engagement Harris' front rank man man, a tall fellow named Johnson, was visibly shaken by the rolling volleys of the enemy. He hung back and twice turned round, with his back to the hostile lines as though dispoted to bolt. “ I was a rear rank man,” says Harris, “ and porting my piece in the excitement of the moment, I swore that if he did not keep his ground I would shoot him dead on the spot.” Under such compulsion Johnson not only kept his ground, but in this and in later battles performed Such prodigies of valour as won for him the reputation of the bravest man in his regiment. “In along experience of war,’’ Gene.ral Buffer once said, “ I have found that the besi fighters have often been the nffist nervous before and at the commencement of a battle. Some of men I know have confessed to me that they never went into action without literally trembling all over; and yet in every case when the need came they piffled themselves together and fought like heroes. On the other hand I have known many men who have gon6 into battle as unconcernedly as they would go to their dinner, and they have distinguished themselves chiefly by the care they took of her precious skins !’’ But probably soldiers first sensations in battle vary as widely as the men themselves. “ It is strange,” a French soldier wrote to a friend of his sensations during his baptism of fire, “ but in in the face of death and destruction I catch myself trying to make out where a shell has fallen, as if I were an interested spectator at a rifle competition. And I was not, the only one. I saw many curious faces around me, bearing expressions full of interest, just as if their owners formed the auditorium of a. highly fascinating theatrical performance, without having anything to do with the play itself.