THE LIGHT SIDE OF WAR.

Pukekohe & Waiuku Times, Volume 5, Issue 195, 28 July 1916, Page 1 (Supplement)

THE LIGHT SIDE OF WAR.

"With Botha's Army." By J. P. Kay Robinson. Allen and I nwin. M nt " Wo sat down in the sand and played auction bridge, and the people at homo called it 'war!' " So the war m German South West Africa was escribed by a man in Mr. Kay Robinson's squadron of tlie Impena Light Horse. Mr. Robinson denies that the expedition sudi good fun as that. Though his book is written with somethin" of the humour of the early Kiplin""he leaves one w'th an impression of "t'he horror rather than the gaiety of the sands. Theer is very little fighting in liis ho ik except with sandstorms. Theer are more false alarms than ba.-tlc-s Tho author and his comrades used tiie r bayonets not in killing Germans, but in opining tin- of milk. His principal iii'Tedients are such comic atta is a- tho bolting oC a chaplain from divine service at the approach ot a Gorman aeroplane, and the capture ot three camels and the attempt ot unaccustomed in n to master tiiem. All Robinson wriics in the sprit of a sportsman. He conlmses his human foci in gs in regard to hoer and loiK, _ and he does not make a pretence o» 1 < !inos-ioi he was a stranger to. I t.e sal donicalyl uav t:uie 01 his book may 1,., ji d"ed bv e."paragraph in which 110 (ie-a 1 ilii" MOW the South African forces steamed into th • German port oi Mideritzbiicht : From ono or two of the houses white flags that looked like table-doth-swore hy-te.rically waving. It was d'-tiiictl.v flattering, and 1 knowthat we IVIb immensely forbearing. The 11 someone -aw the Gorman (lag that flaunted its garish challenge to us from the lighthouse, and we bcgan to IV 1 then as a German must, 1 think, when lie ceases to be a German and berimes a Hun. " With Botha's Army" is a book of humour, and o> <.;O >d liimiour.