The cross at the front; fragments from the trenches

Front matter

THOIAS TiPLADY

Class Book

The Cross at the Front

Preface

THE letters on life and thought at the Front contained in this volume were all written in tents and billets within range, or sound, of the guns. They were written quickly in odd moments and at the bidding of passing impulses. Under such circumstances literary finish was impossible, but it is hoped that they have captured something of the freshness of feeling which one has while passing through unusual experiences, and which is apt to evaporate with the lapse of time. I have attempted no battle picture nor description of military operations, well knowing that such things are beyond me. I have merely gathered up some of the fragments that remained — fragments which might have been lost if not picked up at once. These I have attempted to sketch for the benefit of those at home. I trust they will reveal something of the spirit in which our soldiers lived and fought, suffered and died. THOMAS TIPLADY.

Contents

CHAP. PAGE

I. THE LOST CHORD II

II. LILIES AND FORGET-ME-NOTS l8

II

IT was Sunday, but here everything happens on Sunday, and no one knows why. It just is so. After tea I had returned to my billet — a crazy attic at an estamiuet. On the bed I found a card-board box with crushedin sides. It had come by post, and it filled the little room with the fragrance of flowers. On opening it I found a black-bordered letter lying amid lilies and forget-me-nots. The letter was from a broken-hearted mother in London, and the flowers were for a grave at Ypres. She wanted me to put the flowers on her boy's grave, for it was his twenty-first birthday.

How I hated the War when I saw the flowers and the letter! If the monster would but discriminate! If it took the old and left the young, or If it slew the bad and spared the good, something might be said for it. But it does not even look into the eyes it is closing for ever. It is a soulless machine. It knows not whom it strikes, and cares not. The shell that I hear cracking as I write may be slaying a mother's only son and support, or it may be putting an end to a life of crime. It does not know. The War is like a plough running amuck in a field of daisies. Here was a lad of twenty, and his fate was the fate of the daisy in the path of a plough. His mother sent flowers for his grave.

In lilies and forget-me-nots

A woman's love is writ; And to the soil that wraps her son

A mother's heart is knit.

Flowers for his twenty-first birthday I How often she had dreamed of the feast she was to give him ! And even the flowers will not be his. The regiment had moved from Flanders, and now was deep in France. At 6.30, in the corner of a field behind my billet, I was conducting divine worship, and I told his old comrades the story of the flowers. Then I drew out my hymn-book and gave out, verse by verse, ' For all the saints.' The worshipful voices of his comrades were the equivalents of lilies and forget-me-nots. It was an impressive moment, for our minds were with the sleepers at Ypres.

Thou wast their Rock, their Fortress, and their Might; Thou, Lord, their Captain in the well-fought fight; Thou in the darkness drear their one true Light.

Alleluia !

Then thoughts of the immediate future followed fast, and we prayed for ourselves:

O may Thy soldiers, faithful, true, and bold, Fight as the saints who nobly fought of old, And win with them the victor's crown of gold.

Alleluia I

The glory of the dying sun gilded with its splendour the otherwise leaden clouds of the western sky, and we sang:

The golden evening brightens in the west, Soon, soon to faithful warriors cometh rest; Sweet is the calm of Paradise the blest !

Alleluia !

But what should I do with the flowers? Like the water from the well of Bethlehem which David poured out before the Lord, they were sacred. Two days before, I had visited a little cemetery where many a lad will sleep — not with his fathers, but with his comrades. There were five graves, and none was a week old. The lads who were lying there were from Bedfordshire, Hertford, and far-away Somerset. All had died of wounds. Could I, even in the agony of death, have shown them English lilies and forget-me-nots their eyes would have shone with joy and tears. I would take to them the flowers meant for the grave at Ypres.

Next morning, therefore, I cycled Into the village, and down the high street. Then I turned into a sweet little country lane. The Tommies had named It 'Lovers' Lane,' and painted the words on a small board at the turning. It Is not a lovers' lane, for there are no lovers. Ail have gone to the War. But Tommy knew what it ought to be, and it brought to him happy memories from over the sea. Had he not entered France singing 'It's a long, long way to . . . but my heart's right there'? The title 'Lovers' Lane' was not a joke of Tommy's, any more than the chorus of 'Tlpperary' was the light song some dull people imagined. There was more of tears than laughter in It. The sackcloth next the skin was visible through the clown's gay trappings. For if the soldier and traveller dreams more of one thing than another it is of some lovers' lane and some little cottage in Tlpperary, or otherwhere. He leaves the dear place to do his duty, and marches away with a smile on his face, but he leaves his heart behind him. His heart is ' right there.' Tommy always speaks of deep things with the halfrevealing, half-concealing reticence of poetry. Has a terrible shell fallen In his trench? It Is a 'Jack Johnson' — a lump of brutality with smiles In It. Has his comrade been killed? He has ' gone West.'

I went down Tommy's ' Lovers' Lane,' and I came to what every lover comes to, sooner or later. I came to a cemetery. There the lads lay, and somewhere else, equally hidden from view, are women's hearts breaking. Is it only English hearts that break? Nay, on the left-hand side, divided only by the road made by human intercourse, was a French cemetery. Is it only the lovers of soldiers who have their hearts broken? Nay, for the French cemetery was the last resting-place of civilians. Tommy is right. ' Lovers' Lane ' is a sweet road, ' dewy with nature's tear-drops'; but on this side and on that side is a cemetery, and neither soldier nor civilian, English nor French, may tread that enchanted lane without coming to the place of tears and the sundering of sweet fellowships. The toll-bar of the road is not at the entrance, but at the end. The lover pays with pain, but without repentance, for

'Tis better to have loved and lost Than never to have loved at all.

I left my bicycle at the gate and entered the enclosure. I entered in the name of mothers and wives and sweethearts. When I have gone, and the guns have gone, they will come themselves, and the place will be hallowed by their presence. The graves were neat and smooth, and a cross — the sacred symbol of suffering and sacrifice — stood at the head of each, and recorded the soldier's name and nobleness. He was lying there ' for his King and Country.' I laid a lily, all white and gold, on each bed, and thanked God that there was no red in a lily. White for purity of his patriotism; gold for his triumph over fear, and selfishness, and death. But no red, for the bitterness of war was past. Then I dug a few forget-me-not roots into the mould of each grave, that they may witness to the unforgetting love which will guard the sacred dead. As I dug them in I prayed that God would lead some one with English flowers to the grave at Ypres, that he who had missed his mother's flowers might not be left without fair tokens of remembrance.

My work done, I bade good-bye alike to lads and lilies, and stepped once more into ' Lovers' Lane.'

Ill

THE KITTEN IN THE CRATER

I CANNOT get it out of my mind — that kitten in tlie crater. I had just come up

with my men who had been in another part of the line, and a Comrade of the Cross was showing me the lay of the land. We passed the battered-down church from which soldiers were carting bricks to build incinerators — a good use of bricks from what had been a moral incinerator — and we entered the communication-trench from the village street. After a time we reached a support-trench, and looking over the parapet we could see our own front line. No Man's Land, the German trenches, and the village beyond, with the church pointing with unheeded finger to heaven. Then we came to some forsaken dugouts. They had been rendered untenable by the violence of shell-fire. The roofs were battered in, and the debris lay scattered about. 'Look,' said my comrade, and I looked. There, in a crater made by a large shell, was a pretty little kitten.

If anything speaks of home it is a kitten. It

The Kitten in the Crater 25

carries our memory back to the blazing fire and the cat sleeping within the fender. Yet here are thousands of lads who have not been home for months, and here are poor dug-outs — the crudest possible imitations of homes — that have been battered in. Day and night these soldiers dream of home. There is not a man In the army who dare sing ' Home, Sweet Home ' ; and not one who dare play it on a gramophone. The men could not stand it, and no one dare try them with it. Home is ever in their thoughts. But when they speak of it they veil the depth of their feelings by calling it * Blighty.' When a soldier gets his leave-warrant, whether he be old or young, officer or private, he behaves exactly like a schoolboy who has got a month's holiday. His joy bubbles over. In a trench a man is as much out of place as a kitten in a crater, and as surely will he leave the trench for the fireside. The home will triumph over the trench.

The crater belongs to war; the kitten to peace. The one speaks of death; the other of life. And it is life that will triumph and death that will be burled. As I entered the village that day I saw some gunners fly for their lives, for the German guns had located their battery. Shell after shell I watched as it fell near the guns and sent up its cloud of smoke and dust.

26 The Kitten in the Crater

And yet over the shells as they hurtled through the air were two skylarks singing as though their throats would burst with song. They were teaching the same lesson as the kitten in the crater.

When I look upon the horrors of war I do not despair, for in the toad's head there is ever to be found a precious jewel. Who that has seen it can ever forget the brave yet anxious smile of a lad as he stands listening to the shells passing ov^er his head and falling a little beyond him? Who that has seen a platoon entering a communication-trench, and shouting good-bye to the watching comrades, can ever forget it? The courage and cheerfulness of the men, their patience and self-denial, their devotion to the wounded and sick, are jewels which shine like stars in the black night of war, and make us almost love the night which reveals them to us. War is a horrible crater, but within it is the sweet kitten of human nobleness.

On my way home on leave I put up for the night at a casualty clearing-station. There I saw a horrible sight that did not seem horrible. A gunner had alone, and by the skin of his teeth, survived the destruction of his battery. In body he was but the fragment of a man, and was a sad sight, but in spirit he was ennobling. A comrade was shaving him, and it was a mov-

The Kitten in the Crater 27

ing sight to see the tenderness with which he did it. The cheerfulness and courage of the wounded man were superb. They made what might have been sordid, sublime. They were the kitten in the crater. 'I think,' said my comrade to one of the nurses, ' that his love for his sweetheart has pulled him through.' ' I don't,' replied the nurse. ' You think his nurse pulled him through?' he asked. 'Yes,' she replied; ' he was brought in unconscious, and remained so for two or three days, and his nurse held on to him night and day till she got him on the road to recovery. It wasn't his sweetheart but his nurse who saved him ! ' The speaker was pale and worn. She, too, had had many a wrestle with death for the life of a stranger lad. She is like the daisy I plucked near the ruined dug-outs and carried home. The guns cannot destroy her. She springs up in every war. We find her here as surely as our grandfathers found her in the Crimea. War is horrible, but there is a kitten in the crater and a woman in the hospital, and the kitten and the woman speak of home and love and gentleness. The love which brought the kitten to the crater and the woman to the hospital is the love that will conquer hate and put an end to war.

ly

IT was Thursday evening, In a little village behind the line, and the hour we had chosen for worship. Stepping off the road that threaded its way through the cluster of farmhouses, we passed through a field, in which some of our comrades were playing at football, and entered the field beyond. There we found a quiet corner where the trees stood round us like to the pillars in the aisles of our churches at home. There were about fifteen of us. Some were in the R.A.M.C, and had just come out. The others were in an infantry regiment which had served twelve months in Flanders, and had been but recently transferred to France. Quietly they formed themselves Into a semi-circle round me, and I asked them what they would like to sing.

'That will do nicely,' I said. 'Will you please give it out?'

At even ere the sun was set,

The sick, O Lord, around Thee lay;

O in what divers pains they met! O with what joy they went away !

Once more 'tis eventide, and we,

Oppressed with various ills, draw near;

What if Thy form we cannot see ?

We know and feel that Thou art here.

The evening was quite still. The voices of the men playing at football sounded sweetly distant, and the sound of the guns broke upon our ears like the thud of incoming waves falling on the sea-shore. We lifted up our voices and sang, with the subdued note of the birds in the neighboring hedges. To him who has only sung this hymn in a church much of its beauty must of necessity be hidden. It is revealed only in the light of the setting sun. The men were facing the Golden West. The pomp of the dying day lay upon the rustling leaves of the trees and upon the grass at our feet. It lit up with beauty the faces of the men as they sang. Soon it would be gone, and the shadows would wrap us round as with a mantle. We should feel the isolation of darkness, that which makes children afraid. A sense of loneliness would creep over us, and the coldness of nature would grip us.

' We would see Jesus ' — the Light that never fails. And our hearts cried out to Him, 'Abide with us, for the day is far spent.'

Thy touch hath still its ancient power, No •word from Thee can fruitles* fall;

Hear in this solemn evening hour, And in Thy mercy heal us all.

Then we bowed our heads, and I asked one or two of the men to lead in prayer — ^not knowing which would respond, but leaving them to the Spirit's promptings. Quietly, naturally, and with humility, they lifted up their voices in prayer. Two prayed; three prayed; and I asked for more. It was so sweet to hear them that I could not bring myself to stop the music of their prayers. Five or six prayed; then came a silence as thrilling as speech, and, after it, we joined in the Lord's Prayer. We knew that He who taught us the prayer was in the midst to hear it, and to present it to His Father and ours.

After the prayers, the men chose No. 14, with its fine opening line to each verse:

Fight the good fight with all thy might. Run the straight race through God's good grace. Cast care aside, lean on thy Guide. Faint not, nor fear, His arms are near.

Then I read to them the 91st Psalm:

' He that dwelleth in the secret place of the

Most High shall abide under the shadow of thei

Almighty. ... He shall cover thee with His

feathers, and under His wings shalt thou trust.

His truth shall be thy shield and buckler. Thou shalt not be afraid for the terror by night; nor for the arrow that flieth by day; nor for the pestilence that walketh in darkness; nor for the destruction that wasteth at noonday. . . . For He shall give His angels charge over thee, to keep thee in all thy ways. They shall bear thee up in their hands.'

A few weeks later many of the men were to see the arrow that flieth by day, for suddenly shells fell like thunder-bolts about their billets, killing and wounding many. They were also to feel the terror by night, for while out in front of their trenches, digging in darkness, the foe discovered their presence and searched their ranks with shot and shell. But the Wings were over the lads who had met for worship on that calm evening of which I write, and who, with faces lit by the setting sun, had listened to that psalm of confidence in God. They were saved from the arrow by day and the terror by night.

I asked them what they would sing next, and they chose No. 12:

Lead, kindly light, amid the encircling gloom,

Lead Thou me on; The night is dark, and I am far from home,

Lead Thou me on.

Keep Thou my feet; I do not ask to see The distant scene; one step enough for me. ;• t.: :.; . . •.. ;.; y «

So long Thy power hath blessed me, sure it still

Will lead me on, O'er moor and fen, o'er crag and torrent, till

The night is gone; And with the morn those angel faces smile Which I have loved long since, and lost awhile.

Ah, me I We did not know the meaning of hynms before. When you are far from home, with the darkness gathering round you, and the guns booming in your ears, you see again the angel faces you have left behind you, and wonder if the dawn will ever break through, for you, the long night of war, and restore them to you. Unutterable longings come to you, and at such times you know the meanings of hymns. As we sang Newman's hymn, and prayed for light, 'kindly' light, we knew something of Newman's secret. We understood something of his feelings as, with the shadows gathering over him, he sat alone on the deck of a wandering ship, far from England and home.

After the hymn, I spoke to the men of the forward look to be seen on every page of the Bible. I showed them how, in all ages, God's people have been journeying ' towards the sunrising'; how they have always refused to be content with things as they are, or have been, and, urged by a divine discontent, have pressed on to a ' better country,' and a ' New Jerusalem,'

* whose Builder and Maker is God'; how they have sought the path that ' shineth more and more unto the perfect day,' and, refusing to believe in the finality of either darkness or twilight, have sought the pure light. A night of barbarism had overwhelmed the world, but it would yield to the daylight of love and peace.

' The day must dawn, and darksome night be past' The land that was red with blood to-day would be red with roses to-morrow. A world for which the Son of God had died could not be lost, nor sink back into the abyss of barbarism out of which He had lifted it. Though humanity was being torn and cast upon the ground in the process, the devil was being cast out of the nations, and our children would not be thrown into the fire as we had been. Our feet were yet in the wasteful wilderness, but our eyes were towards the sunrising and the Land of Promise. And our feet would follow our eyes. So I spoke to the brave lads.

By now the night was on. We could scarcely see our books, but we turned to No. 51, and by the fast-failing light sang :

Abide with me; fast falls the eventide; The darkness deepens; Lord, with me abide; When other helpers fail, and comforts flee, Help of the helpless, O abide with me.

The lights along the Front were becoming visible, but the worshippers had seen Him who is invisible, and they were unafraid. The faith that was in them had found its expression :

I fear no foe with Thee at hand to bless; Ills have no weight, and tears no bitterness; Where is death's sting ? Where, grave, thy victory ? I triumph still, if Thou abide with me.

Hold Thou Thy Cross before my closing eyes, Shine through the gloom, and point me to the skies; Heaven's morning breaks, and earth's vain shadows flee; In life and death, O Lord, abide with me.

After the blessing the men quietly separated and walked to their billets. They walked in twos and threes, speaking softly as they went. As they walked I stood and watched them, for there was One with them whose form was like unto the form of the Son of God. He was abiding with them.

JHE WAYSIDE CALVARY

I AST Tuesday I had my first Communion Service out here in France. We could not get a room of any kind, so we held the service in the corner of a field behind some billets. I spread my mackintosh on the grass and it served for a table ; I used the Communion service which was given me when I left the old country. Twelve men formed a semi-circle round me, and the evening shadows were gathering over us when I began to read the words, ' Dearly beloved in the Lord.' Then in the twilight the twelve came one by one and knelt upon a corner of the mackintosh and received the broken bread and outpoured wine. As we knelt together in Holy Communion we could hear the voices of men returning from a game of football in a neighbouring field. As they passed through an opening in the hedge near us, they lowered their voices and passed quietly on to their billets in the village. When each of the twelve soldiers had partaken, and returned to his place, I gave out, verse by verse,

36 The Wayside Calvary

by the help of an electric torch, ' When I survey the wondrous cross.' In the utter stillness of the fields we sang, and, although between the verses we could hear the low booming of distant guns, we rejoiced in the love of God revealed in Christ Jesus. After the Benediction we went our several ways, but two of our lads walked with me to the crossroads. From there my way lay through a piece of open country for some two miles. The night was dark, and the wind wailed over the fields. On my right I could plainly see the flashes and flares that light up the battle-front at night. They held my eyes with a strange fascination as I took my solitary way. Suddenly I turned to a clump of trees on my left, and there saw what I had already seen by day — a tall, stone cross with a small bronze figure of Christ nailed upon it. There the cross stood in the gloom, with just sufl^icient light to show forth its solemn grandeur. I am a Protestant, but when I looked at the fitful lights on the French front and then turned again to the cross, I could not forbear to lift my hand to Him in salute. I know now why it is that on the French roads you see representations of the Crucifixion rather than the Ascension. It is that this weary, war-stricken world needs assurance of God's love rather than of His power. There on the right were our sons being sacri-

The Wayside Calvary 37

ficed, but there on the left the representation of the sacrifice of God's Son. The men I had knelt with at the Sacrament had been twelve months in the trenches. They knew the meaning of those lights on my right, but they knew also the meaning of that cross on my left, and standing between the two they can say, ' God is love.'

VI

WE knew the 'Big Push' was coming, but we did not know when. I therefore announced a service for Holy Communion to be held on the Monday evening. All day long the rain came down in torrents, and I watched It almost as anxiously as the people of old must have watched the beginning of the Deluge. We had no building, and the Lord's Supper was to be spread in a field. We were, therefore, dependent on the weather. Towards six o'clock the rain stopped. The field was sodden, but the men came to the service in larger numbers than I had ever seen. We had the same hymns and form of service as we should have had at home, except that before we partook of the bread and wine we sang:

Just as I am, without one plea, But that Thy blood was shed for me, And that Thou bidd'st me come to Thee, O Lamb of God, I come. 38

After the Benediction we sang:

God be with you till we meet again,

Keep love's banner floating o'er you ;

Smite death's threatening waves before you; God be with you till we meet again.

While I was packing the Communion-set the rain began again to fall, and I had to shelter under a tree. One or two lads joined me, and asked me to take their home addresses in case they 'went under.'

The Friday evening following, groups of soldiers loitered somewhat restlessly about the village. Others stood round the big guns, watching the firing. Many were gathered round little wood fires cooking. They did not know what might happen, they told me, and they Intended to prepare for It by having a good supper. I dined at the Regimental Head Quarters. The meal was hurried, and coming events cast their shadow over us. We had to open the window, for the vibration from the big gun opposite threatened to break the glass. The blinding flash and the horrible roar following produced feelings of irritation with each shot.

Dinner ended, the colonel, adjutant, and doctor buckled on their equipment. As we shook hands I wished them success and safe keeping. The men were already mustering in the village street, and a group of officers who had orders to remain behind, in reserve, were walking towards the church to watch the regiment pass. It was a fine evening. The sky, blue as the sea at Valparaiso, was flecked with clouds, white and beautiful as a n3.\y of becalmed sailing ships. Just as the golden glow of the sun began to burnish the western sky the men stood to attention. They were waiting on the sun, and the sun lingered in its setting. It was taking its last look of many a noble boy, and it seemed loth to go. At the first touch of twilight the men began to march, but, for fear of observation, a space was left between each company. By the church they halted. There we shook hands with the officers and shouted good-bye to the men. Then bravely, with laughter and song, they passed down the road. Other regiments followed, and soon the whole brigade had passed into the twilight.

About midnight a Roman Catholic chaplain and I, provided with steel helmet, gas helmet, water-bottle, and sandwiches, made our way to the Field Ambulance. There, after a short wait, we boarded an ambulance-car and rode through the gunlit darkness to the advanced dressing-station adjoining the communication-trenches in a village on the line. It looked like a few yard3 of an underground railway, and belonged to the