Home Again.

Waimate Daily Advertiser, Volume IV, Issue 260, 25 September 1902, Page 1

Home Again.

(By Edgar Wallace in the London Daily Mail.) Even as unrelenting fate, >o does Smithy dog ray footsteps. I lea''e him at Heilbron -guaiding stores, and two days later his strident voice hails me somewhere lerween Potchefstroom and Klerksdorp, with a demand, for pipers.' I was not surprised, therefor-, on boarding the good ship Dum-trar Castle io discover the pensive Smithy —no longer a common soidier but ollicer’s servant, with

right to wnar mufti—holding forth to a confrere on the blessings of home life as compared with life on the veldt, Kitchener as a strategist, a id Do \\ et as a lighter. •’Ome; think of it cocky,’ said Smithy ecstatically, * nc more trek, no more biscuit and h“ef. no moie De Weltin’, but breakfast in bed, and a pub at every corner ! ’ There ate 380 irmi hies on board, not all as eloquent as my friend but every man as happy. I watched them troop inboard from the ’vantage place of the upper deck. Tanned, hardened, wiry little men, released from work—that hard school where the art of talcing cover and s.’e3ping comfortably in the rain is taught in the kindergarten stage. And they were going hack to England. ‘ Tnink of u! ’ To England, where you people live and work and play without ever thinking you are doing wonderful things in a wonderful country. It was their reward, that they might be allowed.to do and be what you are doing and what you have beeu unconscious of—your blessed privileges. . There was a man on the quarterdeck in khaki, with heavy gold lacing on the peak of his cap. A nice, comfoi table, handsome gentleman, a little inclined to stoutness. The Tommies on board did not know him because they had never served under him. Smithy knew him, and communicated the news to the troop deck, and four days out tSrnithy, acting as a sort of deputation from ‘ forrard,’ wailed on me with the question, ‘ls Charley Knox goin’ to get a big reception at Southampton ?’ I opined not, and Smithy was bitter. ‘ ’Cos. ’e ain’t made a song about what Vs done like- ’ said Smithy. The general officer he mentioned I would not tor the world name.

'Gan t you put someth! ip in the paper about ’im 'i asked S.nithy, a. most teanully, Ur the men who s vtd under K tox are very jealous f r iheir general. i promised. ‘ i I you kindly insert this ?' ‘ General S r Cbas.Knox, KGB, us ilnj best of oar younger g o.iais. iiu has wm bis way t> ibe honours that have been bastoWtd n n bun b> coma.e, < 1.1 anc , a u high military qualities. He cl.) sa’t care .nr iue b .uiering of m wspaper correspon'i"‘ s, and as he truth would sdiukl k iilsouje flattery, I will refrain, in . ear Smithy, from pursuing tue S ct. Suffice that ne tapiu.ed m ■ o guns than any o her general, and never got his poitiuu into a b graph scries.’ There were othn- men of the Kun\ siamp on board, and their oc.mpaiious wire various. Clapper, for in tauce. You know Capper, who flogged the reU-.s back lroni .ne edge of Cap t.wu. (dip, . r ■pi nt his time in takii g the .'in witu a sextant and working out impossible longitudes. Once, off Sun a leone, be made the alarmi.ig discovery that we Were ninety miles in.mid !

Then there was Ewa t—coh nel in the army and kimily g ml.email wherever he be. r.uait in c.iiivas shippers, duing nothing m purlieu.ar; leading u ; 111 .•, la.king a little, is not she Ewar, i saw in December, 189 ! d, urmg hue a im* batieied ranks of the 11 g.ound Br.gade from Magerslontciu, the man who that early m ruing groped blindly forward m the dark, lit only by the threads of - Are that darted from the Bo rfront trenches and the fitful summer lightnings behind the summer kopjes. Not the 1 w.ut that stumbled in the’treodn s s eking his dying chief that time Waucbope fell among his liigblanders. A strange change this four that horrible field—blea' - , sidden, carpeted with writhing meu, stinking with cordite and bumming wi h bullets—to this graceful sh;p slipping so easily over ti e sum y seas. H re is a man in pince-nez gravely bending over a cueo.sboiro. He was with Methuen at 1 wee bosch, and could tell you lungs about irregular cavalry. His opponent was a prisomr of Do Wet, and lived on mealie pip for two months. He, at any rate, is not an enthusiastic pro-Boer. Burly and bluff, a typical country gentleman, Bpens revives the glory of Hampshire cricket with au oakum bail and a 20ft pi oh. Private soldier and general officer, company oSicer a.M junior : übaltern, their work is duae, a .d bow well done!

It is boms ! A chilly enough j morning, with lov,'-lying land on the port bow ana a yellow light I glaring intermittently from a slip of land to starboard. 4. hundred snowy seagulls sailing placidly in the wake of the ship, a feathery Jescort for the homeward-hound jwarriors who flock to the sides and II to the fo’c’sle head for a glimpse of j the green. The engines slow ai d | stop—a dead stillness, and then a !shiver from bow to stern as they are reversed. A little boat dunces over the grey waters, a little boat [With a yellow light, and a rope , ladder drops ever our side. A silence, and then again the beat of : the propeller—the pilot is aboard. jAnd so past the Needles, white and tsolemn in the early light. The channel narrows and half speed becomes quarter speed. Houses on both banks and tiny yachas lying at anchor, till a bend brings into view a dozen si earn yachts lying bow to stern, and in the centre a two-funnelled vessel of peculiar shape—a man o’ war squat and aloof. A black, flat mass of metal brooding on waters. In her shadow another ship—a large yacht—black too, with three masts. Three masts that fly three flags. Ae move abreast and swing round to port. Down comes our ensign slowly. We are dipping a salute to the black yacht. Through your glasses you see the flag she flies. It is the Royal Standard, and Atkins gazes with reverence. Smithy touches my elbow. ‘ This is something like home,’ he whispers, huskily. ‘ Good old England! I—l wonder how the King is.’