BOWDY.

Levin Daily Chronicle, 29 September 1917, Page 4

BOWDY.

(By Patrick Mac Gill.)

Bowdy Benners was a very quiet man, slow of speech and not easily ■ruffled. Men who did not know him well treated him in rather a casual fashion. In some way they fancied themselves rather superior to him, and when, for instance, he entered a wrestling competition and beat the strong man of the battalion the onlookers did not give hixn due credit. "He's a sly dog, old Bowdy," they said, and wero in some way annoyed because Bowdy, up till then, had never openly avowed his physical prowess. Rumours about him were rife. There is a tenet of discipline which ordains that a soldier, whether he ro--1 quires it or not, shall go through the action of shaving daily, and it was said that the conscientious Bowdy, who in ordinary life shaved only twice a week, went through the action of shaving a hairless chin live mornings of the week. INow, Spudhole Bubb, who belonged to the same platoon as Bowdy, was a man of different metal. He had no great love of discipline, and vowed that men who obeyed military orders to the letter were humbugs.

''Fightin' is what I like," Spudholo often remarked. "No bloomin' rules about that. You see your man and you go for him, and no bloomin' sergeant behind your back shoutin', 'Left parry! Point!' But when you meet the sergeant on parade next day you'll bo damned lucky if he's not runnin' you into clink for a dirty bayonet.' >

That was Spudhole, a man poles apart from Bowdy. Spudhole could swear with inspired abandon, but Bowdy had only one oath to his credit. This was "Devil blow me blind! " How he managed to acquire this expressivo phrase is a mystery. When he gave vent to it he spoke in a hesitating voice, as if apologising for his moral depravity. But it came to pass that in spite of his slow and easy way and his indifference to the society of any ono the men of the platoon gradually came to like Bowdy. And once they came to like him they loved him for good, for the friend slow to make is a lasting friend.

But one day, with dramatic suddenness, Bowdy became everyone's friend. It almost seemed as if Tie had bided his time and waited for a fitting occasion to make Ms worth manifest. It happened in this way: He was billeted with his platoon in a village near the firing-line. The Germans shelled the place at intervals, and stray bullets were continually rapping on the cobblestones of the street. The platoon was billeted in a high barn over a stable, and tho only exit was through a door in the wall. From this door to tho ground stretched a ladder which the men had to make uso of when going out or coming in. ****** On this day the Gormans started shelling at 11 in the morning—an unusual hour, for the "strafe" generally started at noon. The first shell hit the ladder, and smashed it to smithereens. The men could not get out now. To add to the predicament a draft newly out was in the barn, and the "rookies" were not yet used to the ways of war. To make matters worse, one of them was hit on the leg with a splinter of wood. "I'll bind up your wound,'' said Spudhole Bubb, who was an adept in the art of bandaging. "The rest of you blokes keep quiet. The shells won't come this way no more. That one is all the Germans will send." As if to give the lie to his remark, a second shell burst on a house near at han,d and a thousand flying tiles rattled on the roof of the barn. It was a baa time for the men newly out, and even the older soldiers were discomforted. It was then that Bowdy Benners camo to the rescue. Rising from the floor, on which he was sitting cleaning his rifle with an oily rag, he stepped out into the middle of the apartment, lit a cigarette, puffed a wliiff of smoke into the air, and called out in a cool voice: "Come, boys, let's have a song!" He began the song in a deep baritone voice. None of the men had ever heard him sing before. "There was a man and he had two sons, and these two sons were brothers, John Andrew was the name of one, and Andrew John the other. Sing, bretSren, sing '' He repeated the first two lines. Spudhole and another man were the only ones who joined in. The '' rookies'' wore listening to the shell splinters striking on the roof. Bowdy continued: '' Now these two brothers had a coat. They bought it on a Monday; John Andrew wore it all the week, and and Andrew John on Sunday." Half a dozen other men joined in now, but the "rookies" were as yet silent. Their eyes were, however, fastened on Bowdy. "They'll forget the shells in a minute," the singer thought, and went on: "Now both these brothers bought a horse, and it was poor and thin; They took it to the riverside, and shoved the poor thing in. Sing, brethren, sing!" Some of the "rookies" joined in now, and one of them, the man who was wounded, laughed outright when Spudhole said "damned thing" for "poor thing." Bowdy took another puff from his cigraette and went on with increasing energy, moving just a trifle to one side as a broken tile fell on the floor near him. "Now both these brothers died one day through eating iish and jolly; Ja Andrew with a pain in his back, and Andrew John his —stomach. Sing, brethren, sing!" None could resist now. All joined in ! and got the correct rhyme. Spudhole jumped to his feet and started to dance a, jig, only stopping short when Bowdy burst into song again: "And both these brothers now are dead —I'm sure we wish them well— John Andrew, he has gone to heaven, and Andrew John—as well. Sing, brethren, sing!'' No stanza reached tho volume and intensity of the last. All were unanimous, even the "rookies," in asserting that the two brothers were separated in the life here,after. "Amen," sang Bowdy in a deep, solemn voice. "Amen," chanted the barn. "The shelling's at an end now," Bowdy remarked as he went back to his rifle and oily rag. "It's just the ordinary 'strafe!' " Bowdy's song is very popular now, and it is often sung by the men marching up and down the roads of France. But to the men who sing it the song is not half as wonderful as the story of the day on which it was first sung.