To be led with a highly sensitised
wife
In a slightly rarefied air!

YET it's good to be back with
the old platoon —
"A man in a world of men"!
Each cheery dog is a henchman
boon —
Especially Sergeant Wren!
Ermyntrude couldn't endure his
name —
Considered bad language no lien
on fame,
Yet it's good to – hear it
again!

BETTER to feel the Ser-
geant's grip,
Though your fingers ache to
the bone!
Better to take the Sergeant's tip
Than to make up your mind
alone.
They can do things together, can
Wren and Joy —
The bristly bear and the beard-
less boy —
That neither could do on his
own.

BUT there's never a word
about Old Man Wren
In the screeds he scribbles
to-day —
Though he praises his N.C.O.'s
and men
In rather a pointed way.
And he rubs it in (with a knitted
brow)
That the war's as good as a pic-
nic now,
And better than any play!

HIS booby-hutch is "as safe
as the Throne,"
And he fares "like the C. – in-
Chief,"
But has purchased "a top-hole
gramophone
By way of comic relief."
(And he sighs as he hears the
men applaud,
While the Woodbine spices are
wafted abroad
With the odour of bully-beef.)

HE may touch on the latest
type of bomb,
But Ermyntrude needn't
blench,
For he never says where you hurl
it from,
And it might be from your
trench.
He never might lead a stealthy
band,
Or toe the horrors of No Man's
Land,
Or swim at the sickly stench..

HER letters came up by
ration-cart
As the men stood-to before
dawn:
He followed the chart of her
soaring heart
With face transfigured yet
drawn:
It filled him with pride, touched
with chivalrous shame.
But – it spoilt the war, as a first-
class game,
For this particular pawn.

THE Sergeant sees it, and
damns the cause
In a truly terrible flow;
But turns and trounces, without
a pause,
A junior N. C. O.
For the crime of agreeing that
Ensign Joy
Isn't altogether the officer boy
That he was four months ago!

AT length he's dumfounded
(the month being May)
By a sample of Ermyntrude's
fun!
"You will kindly get leave over
Christmas Day,
Or make haste and finish the
But Christmas means presents,
she bids him beware:
"So what do you say to a son and
heir?
I'm thinking of giving you
Hun!"

WHAT, indeed, does the
Ensign say?
What does he sit and write?
What do his heart-strings drone all day?
What do they throb all night?
What does he add to his piteous
prayers? —
"Not for my own sake, Lord, but
– theirs,
See me safe through …"

THEY talk – and he writhes
– "of our spirit out here,
Our valour and all the rest!
There's my poor, lonely, delicate
dear,
As brave as the very best!
We stand or fall in a cheery
crowd,
And yet how often we grouse
aloud!
She faces that with a jest!"

HE has had no sleep for a day
and a night;
He has written her half a
ream;
He has Iain him down to wait for
the light,
And at last come sleep – and a
dream.
He's hopping on sticks up the
studio stair:
A telegraph-boy is waiting there,
And – that is his darling's
scream!

HE picks her up in a tender
storm —
But how does it come to pass
That he cannot see his reflected
form
With hers in the studio glass?
"What's wrong with that mir-
ror?"' he cries.
But only the Sergeant's voice
replies:
"Wake up, Sir! The Gas —
the Gas!"

IS it a part of the dream of
dread?
What are the men about?
Each one sticking a haunted
head
Into a spectral clout!
Funny, the dearth of gibe and
joke,
When each one looks like a pig
in a poke,
Not omitting the snout!

THERE'S your mask, Sir! No
time to lose!"
Ugh, what a gallows shape!
Partly white cap, and partly
noose!
Somebody ties the tape.
Goggles of sorts, it seems, inset:
Cock them over the parapet,
Study the battlescape.

ENSIGN JOY'S in the second
line —
And more than a bit cut off;
A furlong or so down a green
incline
The fire-trench curls in the
trough.
Joy cannot see it – it's in the bed
Of a river of poison that brims
instead.
He can only hear – a cough!

NOTHING to do for the
Companies there —
Nothing but waiting now,
While the Gas rolls up on the
balmy air,
And a small bird cheeps on a
bough.
All of a sudden the sky seems full
Of trusses of lighted cotton-wool
And the enemy's big bow-
wow!

THE firmament cracks with
his airy mines,
And an interlacing hail
Threshes the clover between our
lines,
As a vile invisible flail.
And the trench has become a
mighty vice
That holds us, in skins of molten
ice,
For the vapors that fringe the
veil.

IT'S coming – in billowy swirls
– as smoke
From the roof a world on fire.
It – comes! And a lad with a
heart of oak
Knows only that heart's de-
sire!
His masked lips whimper but one
dear name —
And so is he lost to inward shame
That he thrills at the word:
"Re-tire!"

WHOSE is the order, thrice
renewed?
Ensign Joy cannot tell :
Only, that way lies Ermyntrude,
And the other way this hell!
Three men leap from the pois-
oned fosse,
Three men plunge from the para-
dos,
And – their – officer – as well!

NOW, as he flies at their fly-
ing heels,
He awakes to his deep dis-
grace,
But the yawning pit of his shame
reveals
A way of saving his face:
He twirls his stick to a shep-
herd's crook,
To trip and bring one of them
back to book,
As though he'd been giving
chase!

HE got back gasping —
"They'd too much start!"
"I'd've shot 'em instead!"
said Wren.
"That was your job, Sir, if you'd
the 'eart —
But it wouldn't 've been you,
then.
I pray my Lord I may live to see
A firing-party in front o' them
three!"
(That's what he said to the
men.)

NOW, Joy and Wren, of
Company B,
Are a favourite firm of mine;
And the way they reinforced A,
C, and D
Was, perhaps, not unduly fine;
But it meant a good deal both to
Wren and Joy —
That grim, gaunt man, but that
desperate boy! —
And it didn't weaken the Line.

NOT a bad effort of yours,
my lad,"
The Major deigned to declare.
"My Sergeant's plan, Sir" —
"And that's not bad —
But you've lost that ribbon
you wear?"
"It – must have been eaten away
by the Gas!"
"Well – ribbons are ribbons —
but don't be an ass!
It's better to do than dare."

DARE! He has dared to de-
sert his post —
But he daren't acknowledge
his sin!
He has dared to face Wren with
a lying boast —
But Wren is not taken in.
None sings his praises so long
and loud —
With look so loving and loyal
and proud!
But the boy sees under his
skin.

DAILY and gaily he wrote to
his wife,
Who had dropped the beati-
fied droll
And was writing to him on the
Meaning of Life
And the Bonds between Body
and Soul.
Her courage was high – though
she mentioned its height;
She was putting upon her the
Armour of Light —
Including her aureole!

BUT never a helm had the lad
we know,
As he went on his nightly raids
With a brace of his Blighters, an