R. Hugh Knyvett

“ Every man had to be up on deck to see this sight. There were men there paralyzed, who had never moved during the whole long journey, but the saddest sight was to see the blind turning their sightless eyes in its direction and smiling with ecstasy, and maybe it looked more fair to these than to us who could see. How those boys cheered and cheered again! What a new spirit pervaded the ship! All day laughter and singing rang out, for there are no more patriotic troops in the world than the Australian soldiers, and, East, West, Hame's best. ”

“ In camp the boys stroll over to their tents, exchanging an occasional word with pals, but for the most part silent, and turn in, tired also, and a little thoughtful. In an hour all the stars shine brightly from the velvety, blue-black sky, the soft-scented air wafts in through open tent-flaps, lights are out, and all is quiet in the camp, except for the periodical changing of pickets and the occasional roar of a passing train in the distance. ”

“ Many have been in those trenches more than three years. Consider their sufferings! The unnatural life, like rats in a hole, the nerve-strain, the insufficient food, the scanty clothing. What we have paid, Canada has paid, South Africa has paid, but Britain and France, how much more! And Belgium, and Serbia, and Poland, and Rumania, and Italy. What a price to pay for an insecure peace, an enemy still with power to harm. ”

“ I had but gone a few yards when I expected the next instant to bump into the enemy trenches.
There are strange sounds in No Man's Land; not human sounds, for such carry far—the beat of a hammer on a post, the sharp twang of unrolling barbed wire as it catches, and then springs away—voices even come as through a megaphone in the eerie silence—but these are long-drawn sighs that penetrate the inner consciousness and hushed murmurs that fall on the ear of the soul. ”

“ The English port we entered was shrouded in fog, and wharf buildings never at any time look inviting, but we could nevertheless understand the excitement of our English companions, for it was Home to them, and to us "dear old England," the brave heart of the freest empire this earth has seen, and after all where is the Britisher who does not thrill with pride at landing on the soil of those little islands which have produced a race so great, and foot for foot of soil there is no land on the earth that has produced so much wealth. ”

“ He knew the place to train us—where the weaklings would fall and only the very fit survive. Any soldier who passed through his grades in the "academy of the desert" might not shine in a guard of honor to a princess; his skin would be blistered, his clothes would be stained, but he'd be the equal in strength of any man on earth, and would have fought the attacks of every known disease. It was Egypt and the desert that made Gallipoli possible, and the Australian army owes much to the astuteness of Kitchener, who knew the ideal training-ground for the daredevil freeman from "down under." ”

“ The gods love romance, else why was the youngest nation of earth tried out on the oldest battlefield of history? How those young men from the continent whose soil had never been stained with blood thrilled to hear their padres tell them as they gathered on the decks of the troop-ships in the harbor of Lemnos, that to-morrow they would set foot almost on the site of the ancient battlefield of Troy, where the early Greeks shed their blood, as sung in the oldest battle-song in the world. ”

“ Up the line ran the rumor of a battle intenser than any yet fought—more guns being massed in a few miles than the world had ever seen before. Into every heart crept the dread of what might await us down there, and to every mind came the question: "When are we going?"
Close behind rumor came marching orders, and as we left our old trenches south of Armentières we said good-bye to scenes that had become homelike, and turned our faces south to make that "rendezvous with death" in the dread unknown to which duty called us. ”

“ In the New World that shall be born after the birth-pangs of the present days, we shall realize that we have no place, our souls shall shrink and shrivel as we gaze on the honor scars of those who have paid, and we shall be elbowed to the outskirts of the crowd, as the people bow before the men whom the President and people delight to honor—the men sightless, the men limbless, the memory of the men lifeless. ”

“ When peace shall dawn and the Turk shall heed the voice of United Democracy as it proclaims with force, "Thou shall not oppress, nor shalt thou close the gates of these straits again!" then shall visitors from many lands wander through these trenches and marvel what kind of men were they that held them for so long against such odds, and gaze at the honeycombed cliff where twentieth-century men lived like cave-dwellers, and sang and joked more than the abiders in halls of luxury. ”

“ But there were weeks of peaceful scenes that seemed to us like a forgotten melody of love and home and peace, and the train that bore us out of the war zone seemed to carry us into another world, but though the feast to our eyes was pleasant and like "far-off forgotten things and pleasures long ago," we were not borne thither on downy couches. Never were there seats more uncomfortable than the floors of those French trucks, and we occupied them for days. ”

“ This war is one of the greatest blessings this world has ever known, for it has brought to us fear of selfish force, fear of the engines of our own construction, fear of isolation in world politics, fear of secret diplomacy, fear of an unguarded peace, fear of an unprepared future, fear of an undisciplined people, fear of an irresponsible government, and, above all THE FEAR OF FORGETTING! ”

“ Just where the white man's continent pushes the tip of its horn among the eastern lands there is a black man's land half as large as Mexico that is administered by the government of Australia. New Guinea has all the romance and lure of unexplored regions. It is a country of nature's wonders, a treasure-chest with the lid yet to be raised by some intrepid discoverer. There are tree-climbing fish, and pygmy men, mountains higher and rivers greater than any yet discovered. To the north of Australia's slice of this wonderland the Kaiser was squeezing a hunk of the same island in his mailed fist. ”

“ Well, then, the man who talks of forgiveness to Germany before she is on her knees begging for forgiveness is an enemy of peace and a condoner of crime.
It is so easy for those who have not suffered to tell the victims "to forgive." We do not go in nightly dread lest in the morning we should have to rake among the ruins of our homes for the mangled body of our baby! We do not have to work in daily fear lest we should have to return to an empty house whence wife or daughter have been dragged by brutal hands! ”

“ While here and there politicians grow faint-hearted, the army fights on with cheerfulness. It would be a cure for pessimism of the deepest black to go to the trenches for a while. There all is cheery optimism, no doubt at all about the final outcome, and no talk of peace. I have never heard one man in the army talk or hint of peace or dream of it, for they know that it cannot be yet. ”

“ A German sentry would reply to him, more of our men would fire back, more Germans join in, star-shells make the night as bright as day; then Fritz would "get the wind up" thoroughly and call for artillery support—our guns would blaze into reply and there would be many casualties just because one man lost his nerve and "saw things."
Nerves are queer things, for frequently the man of a nervous, highly strung temperament is the coolest in action. Some men, too, get shell-shock a hundred yards from a bursting shell, while others are knocked down and buried and never even tremble. ”

“ We never had a chance up till now to prove who were our real, our best people, and we have been accustomed to measure our citizens by the false and small standards of wealth, birth, and intellect. Well! There has been given to us to-day a new standard whereby we can measure ourselves, the standard of courage, sacrifice, and service. Nobody in England cares to-day whether you are descended from William the Conqueror or not! ”

“ Any one who knows Cairo knows that there is a part of it that is not mentionable at dinner-table. It is the sink of the world. Every large city has its sore, but Cairo has an ulcer. This vile spot made the clean lads from the wind-swept plains and scented bush of Australia absolutely sick. The Australian is a practical idealist, and for him to see dirt is to want to remove it. ”

“ Only the eye of God Almighty could see that beneath the dust and rags there were hearts beating with love for country, and spirits exulting in the opportunity offering in the undertaking of a man-size job. Perhaps a Kitchener would have seen that the slouch was but habit and the nonchalance merely a cloak for enthusiasm, but even he would hardly have guessed that these were the men who would win on Gallipoli the praise of the greatest British generals, who called them "the greatest fighters in the world." ”

“ Probably the greater number of our aeroplanes on the battle-front are engaged in ranging for the artillery, and in actual offensive warfare, but their greatest value is in reconnoissance, and so it will always be.
"Airman" and "scout"—one flies, the other crawls, yet both seek information from the enemy, and are the twin eyes of the army. There is a romance about the work of both that attracts adventurous youth, and neither is as dangerous as it appears to a layman. ”

“ In this war we are not only fighting to free millions who are held in a far worse slavery than ever the negro was in, but we are fighting for our own liberty and that of our children, which has been directly attacked. Not all Germans are bestial and cruel, with no regard for honor, but just how many of them are not remains for the American and Australian citizens of German descent to prove. ”

“ The man who got wounded in those days was a lucky dog, all right; in fact, he mostly is at all times, and about the silliest thing the War Office ever did was to issue an honor stripe for wounds. The man deserving of the greatest credit is not the man who gets wounded, but the man who stays on in the trenches week after week, and month after month enduring the nervous strain and unnatural conditions, living like a rat in a hole in the ground. There are none who have been there for any length of time who do not welcome the sharp pain of a wound as a relief. ”

“ No Man's Land is a place of surprises where death plucks its victims without warning. There have been some strange deaths there when bodies lay with unbroken skin, having neither mark of bullet nor shell. Times when the spirit laid the body down, fair and unmarred human flesh, but other times when the flesh was rent to ribbons and the bones smashed to splinters by the force imprisoned in a shell.
Such was the death meted out by justice to six Germans in a listening post fifty yards in advance of their trench. This party was in the way of our raid. ”

“ By hospital-train, the most comfortable ever devised, did we run into Waterloo Station—doors were opened, and men in gorgeous uniforms—much gold braid and silver buttons—came aboard. We thought that they were admirals and field-marshals at the very least, but it turned out they were only members of the Volunteer Ambulance Corps, men unfit for military service, who had provided their own cars and received not a penny of pay. With the tenderness of women they put us on stretchers and carried us out to their luxurious ambulances. With each four men went a lady to attend to all their wants. ”

“ There were more cases of frost-bite than there were of wounds in the whole campaign. More had their toes and fingers eaten off by Jack Frost than shells had amputated. In those open, unprotected trenches, in misery such as they had never dreamed could be, the lads from sunny Australia stood to their posts. When the snow melted the trenches fell in and Turk and Anzac stood exposed to each other's fire, but both were fighting a common enemy and so hard went this battle with them as to compel a truce in the fight of man against man. ”