“THE WOWSER.”

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXIX, Issue 1677, 20 February 1917, Page 3

“THE WOWSER.”

WHAT HE DID ON GALLIPOLI, The following little story from “The Y.M.C.A. Book/’ possesses some local interest. It is entitled “The Wowser.” He had just hooked his bed, and will) his head and the greater part of his body thrust through the office window, he waxed reminiscent. “At the lime I joined the North Auckland Mounted Rifles, another man, tall and weedy-looking (Dai Williams by name), tried to join, but was tunit'd down, being physically unlit. He happened to be a theological student and a Y.M.C.A. man, so he had a shot for a chaplain, hut still without success. Having means of Ids own, and being determined to join up somehow or other, he paid his passage to Egypt, and ultimately became attached to our unit. “While we were in Cairo he constituted himself a sort of guardian angel to the men of our battalion. Many a time he would he seen strolling into one or another of the dens of infamy in the Waya quarter fetching out, most unceremoniously, any of ours whom he might find. Physically inferior to any one of ns, he had a compelling manner, a magnetic personality that none of us could resist. How we hated and despised him—called him “The Wowser/ and many like terms —hut he persisted. “Later, when we moved to .Gallipoli, lie went with ns. He would fetch and carry for any one of us; many a helping of food and drink was brought to us in (he front-line trench by him. and sometimes a weary man on sentry-go would suddenly discover ‘The Wowser’ beside him, i'nitilling his self-appoinled role of guardian angel. “There came a day when we dashed from our trendies across to the enemy lines. Somehow or other ‘Tin* Wowser’ got mixed up with us, and when officers hud fallen, actually led the charge. By (his time our feelings towards him hud so changed that any one of ns would have willingly given our own life rather than he should he hurt, hut he slopped a few bullets, am! came down badly wounded. I think he still lives, but whet her or no, lie was a man. a Irue Christian, a damned hero."

The editor's eoinmeid on Ibis little sketch from life reads as follows: — “The foregoing is given pretty much ns it was told, although shorn of much of its adjectival language.”