Page:Punch Vol 148.djvu/469

Fond Mother. "I'm afraid it's no use; he's set his mind on having one with 'Jellicoe' on it."

There is a delusion current that this war out here is stationary when it does not move. It is true that there was once a rumour that certain lines of trenches came to understandings with certain other lines, by which blue and red flags were waved before the occupants on either side fired off rifles, or committed similar dangerous acts which might otherwise have been interpreted as unfriendly. In the meantime they completed the tessellation of their pavements and installed geysers and electric light. Everyone has heard the rumour, but no one you meet was actually there; so the only conclusion we can come to is that both sides dug and dug until they got completely lost underground, and were either incapable of return, or so happy, comfortable and well found that they stayed there, thus ingeniously leaving the war without leaving their posts, which is, after all, the ultimate ideal of troglodytic patriotism.

However that may have been, the war elsewhere is in a state of steady evolution. You can never count on it. You get into a beautiful quiet trench, the sun shines and the birds sing, and you plant primroses on the parapet, and arrange garden parties, and write home and ask the sister of your friend to come out and have tea in the trench on Friday. And then on Friday, just as you're getting the tea-things out, and sorting the tinned cucumber sandwiches, and shifting the truffles out of the pâté, the wind blows from the north, and the rain rains, and the birds shut up, and an 8-inch shell comes crump on the primrose bed, and stray splinters carry away the teapot and the provision box and the cook; and on the whole you're not sorry Leonore couldn't come after all.

Not long ago it seemed good to the état majeur that no officer should be in possession of the means of supplying the pictorial daily with pictorial war. Every company in every regiment duly rendered a certificate that it was without cameras. Now there was a certain regiment much given to photographic studies. And when the day came that the certificate should be signed and rendered, the commander of A company bethought him of his old-time friendship with the commander of B company; and in token of his sincere esteem sent to him as a gift the three cameras which his officers had no further use for. This done, he forwarded his certificate. B company, though delighted at the gift and the spirit in which it was offered, had already four cameras in possession of its officers. Moreover, the time for B company to render its certificate was at hand. And seeing that there was much friendship subsisting between B and C companies the O.C. B company remembered that the O.C. C company was a keen photographer, and one likely to welcome a gift of seven cameras. Having despatched them, he signed and certified for B company. C company, whose gratitude cannot easily be described, was nevertheless in an obvious predicament. So, when C company certified, D company was in possession of thirteen cameras; and finding that A company had now no cameras at all rendered unto it the very large stock with which it was reluctantly obliged to part, and unto the C.O. a certificate that D company was cameraless; and the C.O. certified in accordance with company notifications.

That evening company commanders dined together, and latest advices advise that the wicked regiment still spends its spare time in photographing approaching shells, devastated churches and Tommy at his ablutions.