THE FRONT LINE

Mount Ida Chronicle, Volume XLV, Issue XLV, 7 September 1917, Page 1

THE FRONT LINE

♦- In front, a ragged, shell-torn waste, barbed wire, and noisome weeds, The grave of many a gallant man who died for his country's needs; The bar between two mighty foes, alert, watchful, and still, Like savage beasts as they pause and waifr ere they spring to rend and kill. The rattle of the machine guns spraying l death along the line, The boom of a. distant held gun, then a shrill, increasing whine: A crash—an acrid, blinding smoke, a shower of stones and dirt— -.' Then, casually, someone asks: "Is anybody hurt?" ~ . ' * i •■ A dazzling streak of light shoots up and bursts, a pretty sight, v Transforming No Man's Land into a fairyland of light:

'Tis hard to think a thing so fair is but a means of death, Yet, as each .star-shell shoots aloft, we crouch aud hold our breath. And then a low-voiced call comes down- for "Stretcher-bearers here." Hen hurry-up, and soon a moan falls on tho listening ear. f ''Somebody hit!" you merely think-, and no one stops at all, Because out here one soon gets used to seeing comrades fall. Inside the dugout, damp and foul, a caudle's flickering light Shows sleeping forms, oblivious of the everceaseless fight; ..

Their pillow just a haversack, their bed is' only mud— Maybe a cast-off overcoat, damp with a comrade's blood. Day after day;' night after night, the same grim, wearing strife: Men come and go—some stay, those who for __ right gave up their- life: For, yes, we know the right is ours, our cause is just and true, And so we care not what'we bear or what we have to do. No matter what our task may be, what sacrifice we make, For Honor, our Religion, and our 1 Liberty's at stake. Our comrades, too, both dead and maimed, ■also demand that we Fight on until the very end, to Death or Victory. —By. E.R.B.', in '' The Brazier,' a Canadian trench journal.