Sassoon

“ Stay by it; see the fellow ten times a day—that sometimes cures. Say, I'm going to hand you the truth like a Dutch uncle! You've got things going your way; you've got the whole game before you, cinched." He hesitated. "Sassoon, ready to back you to the limit, opportunity, money backing; you know the place."... He waved contemptuously at the warring world of the Rialto below—"And you know the game. Sassoon's good for thousands—in your hands. ”

“ In front of the door was an automobile that she recognized—in the heavy mediocrity of the parlor, Albert Edward Sassoon. He came languidly to meet her (since her first reproof he had given up his pasha pose) , unruffled and docile, assuming the rôle of good fellowship, despite the fretting of the spirit he had endured.
"Oh, is that you?" she remarked nonchalantly, and gave him a limp hand, arranging her toque in the mirror while listening to his Christmas greetings.
"The humblest and the most patient of your admirers, pretty tyrant!" he said, his tired eyes scanning her with mock humility. ”

“ De Spain, lying on his side, his head resting on his elbow, and his hands clasped at the back of his neck, meditated first on how he should capture Sassoon at daybreak, and then on Nan Morgan and her mountain home, into which he was about to break to drag out a criminal. Sassoon and his malice soon drifted out of his mind, but Nan remained. She stayed with him, it seemed, for hours––appearing and disappearing, in one aspect more alluring than another. ”

“ Sassoon did not rise. He shot a searching angry glance at Doré, closed one hand tightly over the other and raised his eyebrows in interrogation at the newcomer.
"Quarter of three," said Blood, standing, and barely nodding to Sassoon. "I've been waiting fifteen minutes—that's quite enough. Miss Baxter, you belong to me now!"
"Oh, is it as late as that?"
"Is Mr. Blood here on your invitation, Miss Baxter?" said Sassoon deliberately.
"Yes. We had an engagement for a ride up the river. I'm afraid I've kept him waiting."
"Turn about is fair play," said Harrigan Blood aggressively. ”

“ Sassoon has posted men at the neck of the Gap––that’s the first thing he would do. And if John heard my rifle when I first shot, he would be for breaking in here, and his men, if they’ve come up, would bump into 342 Sassoon’s. It would be insane for us to try to get out over the trail with Sassoon holding it against Lefever––we might easily be hit by our friends instead of our enemies. I’ll tell you what, Nan, suppose I scout down that way alone and see what I can find out? ”

“ He felt the fatality that waited in the intensity of her nature, the fatality that for a glance and a word had made enemies of Sassoon and Blood. The sight of her in the arms of other men was intolerable, and yet he could not avert his eyes. He was afraid to speak to her, but at the thought of her risking herself with Lindaberry, he had broken through all restraint. When she had gone, he had a feeling of thankfulness. He had done all he could to prevent it. After all, what did he know of her? If she could go thus with Lindaberry, what had she done with Sassoon, Harrigan Blood, others? ”

“ The poet who would convince us of the truth would need to be not only daring and honest as these boys, but wise and profoundly gentle.
A shirt was clinging to Nichols' image, but Sassoon appears in full uniform, equal to every claim made by a day of action. Or is his smartness rather intellectual than practical? Derision hardly consists with might and main. Scorn abstracts itself and stands aside. The dapper mind is exasperated by fatigue and danger, and ever tries to reserve for self-realisation a few crumbs of time and energy. ”

“ The poetry of Siegfried Sassoon divides itself into two rough classes—the idyllic and the satiric. War has defiled one to produce the other. At heart Siegfried Sassoon is an idealist.
Before the war he had hardly published a line. He spent his summers in the company of books, at the piano, on expeditions, and in playing tennis. During winter he hunted. Hunting was a greater passion with him than poetry. Much of his poetry celebrated the loveliness of the field as seen by the huntsman in the early morning light. ”

“ This word, which was afterward repeated, and reaching the ears of Harrigan Blood, made of him an overt enemy, made the Comte de Joncy smile.
"I see you, too, have your diplomacy," he said, studying Sassoon with more interest.
"Yes. Generalizations are blank cartridges: they can be aimed at any one," Sassoon said, without animation. He ran a thin forefinger over the scarce mustache that mounted in a W from the full upper lip. Then, raising his voice a little, he called Busby:
"I say, Buzzy, hurry things up a bit!" ”

“ All the trouble that ever come ’tween you and me come by an accident––come before you was born, and come through Dave Sassoon, and he’s held it over me ever since you come up into this country. I was a young fellow. Sassoon worked for my father. The cattle and sheep war was on, north of Medicine Bend. The Peace River sheepmen raided our place––your father was with them. He never did us no harm, but my brother, Bay Morgan, was shot in that raid by a man name of Jennings. My brother was fifteen years old, de Spain. I started out to get the man that shot him. ”

“ Like Captain Graves, he is haunted with the idea that there must be fox-hounds in Heaven. All Lieut. Sassoon's poems about horses and hunting and country life generally betray his tastes and habits. This particular poem hardly touches on the war, but those which follow are absorbed by the ugliness, lassitude, and horror of fighting. Lieut. Sassoon's verse has not yet secured the quality of perfection; he is not sufficiently alive to the importance of always hitting upon the best and only word. ”

“ De Spain, when he climbed into Sassoon’s saddle, was losing sight and consciousness. He knew he could no longer defend himself, and was so faint that only the determination of putting distance between him and any pursuers held him to the horse after he spurred away. With the instinct of the hunted, he fumbled with his right hand for his means of defense, and was relieved to find his revolver, after his panicky dash for safety, safe in its place. ”

“ Do you know, young mischief, that you have a great deal to answer for? Sassoon and Harrigan Blood are at each other's throats. Blood's been caught in the market, and is hammering the Sassoon interests like a wild one. ”

“ But this man, David Sassoon, the Calabasas gambler, quondam cowboy, and chronic brawler, stood in some way close to the different Morgans, and was reputed to have got each of them, at different times, out of more than one troublesome affair, either by sheer force of arms, or through his resourceful cunning.
These men were followed by a younger man riding with a very young woman. De Spain knew none of the front-rank men, but he knew well Nan Morgan and her dancing partner. ”

“ She smiled at this possibility, sure of herself, knowing well how weak the strongest man is before the weakest of her sex, when he comes with a certain challenge in his eyes.
"So Sassoon is coming, is he? Good!" she said musingly, a little far-off mockery in her smile; and to herself she rehearsed again the scene she had prepared, coddling her cheek against her bare soft arm, dreamily awake.
She would receive him with carefully simulated cordiality there below in the dusky boarding-house parlor; she could even lead him to believe that he might dare anything ”

“ That afternoon was like a phantasmagoria. Even he, at the end, noticed her mental numbness.
"What's the matter with you?" he asked.
She looked at him, smiling negation.
"You seem crushed, as if I could stick a pin in you! What's wrong? Has that beast Sassoon insulted—?"
She shook her head. Even this incongruity did not penetrate.
"Listen!" he went on, retaining her hand as she [Pg 191] started to descend. "I'm not a fool! I won't throw myself away on any woman! I'll play fair, too, and open. I don't want backing and pulling—I want things to be big, direct, honest! You know what I feel ”

“ But the country around there is too rough for a horse. Nobody even hides around Black Cap, except some tramp hold-up man that’s crowded in his get-away. Bob Scott says there are dozens of mountain-lions over there.”
But Sassoon had the unpleasant patience of a mountain-lion and its dogged persistence, and, 264 hiding himself on Black Cap, he made certain one day of what he had long been convinced––that Nan was meeting de Spain.
The day after she had mentioned Black Cap to her lover, Nan rode over to Calabasas to get a bridle mended. Galloping back, she encountered Sassoon just inside the Gap. ”

“ Another poet, Bernard Pitt, who went to war in the same fine spirit, is as idealistic in some of his letters and poems as Rupert Brooke or John Streets, yet at times he is almost as bitterly resentful as Siegfried Sassoon of the hideous realities of battle. ”

“ But many of these poems are dreamy! and was not our lad in a muse when he forgot to unbutton those wrist-bands, before pulling his shirt over his head? Look, the sky is grey, the water rough, the wind deafening; only those who swim for honour will not defer the race.
With Siegfried Sassoon we have "glad confident morning"; he does easily and well what he desires to do. His rhythms never hark back to Milton's youth as Robert Nichols' did; they stop short at John Masefield and Thomas Hardy. The longest poem [2] is a monologue. ”

“ Here both young scoffers are in earnest. And though Graves succeeds best, one doubts whether he will task himself enough for greater things, whereas throughout Sassoon's book, with its glib impressionism playing with worn themes in order to make something out of the wrong side of them, there is a touch of strength, a gift for succeeding to-day which will help him when he turns his mind to its true work. But on this theme also Nichols, in spite of his less steady hand, can match them both, perhaps surpass either.
OUR DEAD
They have gone from us. ”

“ While war is a possibility man is little better than a savage and civilisation the mere moments of rest between a succession of nightmares. It is to help to end this horror that Siegfried Sassoon and the many others who feel like him have continued to fight as after the publication of this book he fought in Palestine and in France. ”

“ These men had chosen their time and place. There was nothing for it but to meet them. Sassoon was stepping toward him, though very doubtfully. De Spain laughed again, dryly this time. “Go slow, Sassoon,” he said. “That gun is loaded.”
“If you want terms, hand over your gun to Sassoon,” cried Logan.
“Not till it’s empty,” returned de Spain. “Do you want to try taking it?” he demanded of Logan, his cheeks burning a little darker. 135
Hugging his shield, de Spain threw his second shot over Sandusky’s left shoulder. ”

“ She felt herself in her most effective theatrical mood, and she flung the reins to it, caring nothing where it led her. Now, at all costs, she was resolved to thaw out this glacial reserve of his, rouse him, teach him that she could not be held so cheap. "No wall in my life! No man to tell me: Do this—do that—come here—go there! Sacrifices? I shall never make them! I tell you, all I want is to live—to really live! A short life, but a free one! You think Sassoon tempts me ”

“ This book (in consequence almost wholly of these bitter poems) enjoyed a remarkable success with the soldiers fighting in France. One met it everywhere. "Hello, you know Siegfried Sassoon then, do you? Well, tell him from me that the more he lays it on thick to those who don't realize the war the better. That's the stuff we want. We're fed up with the old men's death-or-glory stunt." In 1918 appeared 'Countermans' Attack': here there is hardly a trace of the 'paradise' feeling. You can't even think of paradise when you're in hell. ”

“ A young fellow without an overcoat, stooping already, pinched by struggle, came and sat at her table, seeking an opportunity to offer her the sugar. But, seeing her so silent and inwardly tortured, he did not persist.
She did not notice him
[Pg 65]
She did not notice him. She was thinking always of Massingale, and a little of Lindaberry. Why had she succeeded with Sassoon and Blood only to fail where she wanted to win?
"He carries a coffin on his back!" she found herself repeating, in the cynical words of Harrigan Blood. He would not seek her out; nor would Massingale. ”

“ It was love, lawless and destructive, which she sought, not that quiet content that rises from the wells of peace and serenity. She was indeed a lawless waif of a law-defying generation, and her mind was set on great flaming sensations, hating conventions and resolved on rebellion. She saw her future in the hands of Massingale, Blainey—yes, possibly even Sassoon, if the others should fail; and conscious of the fierceness and selfishness of her desires, she judged herself unworthy of Lindaberry. Once or twice she had paused to consider such a marriage ”

“ I rode in last night from Thief River, and you are riding out with me to start me on to the Sleepy Cat trail. If you can remember that much–––”
While he spoke to Sassoon his eyes were fixed on the rider halted in their path. De Spain stopped half-way through his sentence. The figure revealed in the half-light puzzled him at first. Then it confused and startled him. He saw it was not a man at all, but a woman––and a woman 74 than whom he would rather have seen six men. It was Nan Morgan. ”

“ We stroll along the boulevard and it is growing light. I am recognised and we are being followed. We are passing a church. There is an old woman asleep on the steps, but she does not seem worn and haggard. There is almost a smile on her face as she sleeps. She typifies Paris to me. Hides her poverty behind a smile.
Sir Philip Sassoon, who is the confidential secretary to Lloyd George, calls the next day with Georges Carpentier, the pugilistic idol of France, and we are photographed many times, the three of us together, and separately. ”