As the Dudshires were preparing
For a winter in the trenches,
Just as they were getting settled
In their sector of the trenches,
Came an order for their moving
To an unknown destination—
Sudden as a German flare-light
To a midnight working party,
Unexpected as a kidney
To a quartermaster-sergeant.
There were many speculations
As to what was going to happen,
Many arguments about it,
Many wagers laid about it,
Many strange unholy rumours.
In the mighty British Army
Rumour is the only issue
That arrives at units larger
Than it leaves the Base Supply Park.
Up it comes without an indent
(Possibly in lieu of lime-juice),
Heaven only knows its maker;
Like a toy balloon it swells up,
Gently growing big and bigger;
At the Dump the Mr. Knowalls
Have a blow to make it fatter,
Pass it on to Transport drivers,
Who in their turn puff their hardest,
Make it change its shape a little,
Hand it over with the rations.
Then the minions of the Q.M.
Do their little bit to help it,
After which the Sergeant-Major
Takes a lusty breath to fix it,
Sends it up into the trenches
As a full-blown Army rumour.
Fast and thick as flying fishes
Rise and dive in the Pacific,
Rumours came and went in those days.
Sending off the whole battalion
On a mission to the Aztecs,
As town guard of Buenos Ayres,
Or to fight beside the Russians,
Or to sail for Salonica.
And the last seemed most fantastic,
Tiadatha laughed the loudest,
Laying 9 to 2 against it.
After several days of waiting,
Being issued out with goatskins,
Issued out with leather jerkins
(Fuel to the rumour-mongers),
Came a very trying night march
To a dreary railway station.
As they neared the railway station
Rose before my Tiadatha
Visions of a Pullman carriage,
Or at least a third-class smoker,
And he called to mind the adage,
“Third-class riding’s always better,
Better far than first-class walking.”
Bitterly the Dudshires grumbled,
When they found their third-class riding
Was to be in old horse-boxes,
Squashed like figs and not so comfy:
Thirty-nine at first were crammed in,
Then another and another,
Then a pile of army blankets,
Then their overcoats in bundles.
Tiadatha and his brothers
Found themselves another horse-box,
Got a little straw and spread it,
Wrapped themselves up in their great-coats,
Fell asleep with straw for mattress,
Someone else’s boots for pillow.
Tiadatha often shuddered
Thinking of the days that followed,
Of the days and nights that followed,
As that God-forsaken troop train
Rocked upon its journey southward.
All his life will he remember
Turning out for tea at midnight
In some dimly-lighted station,
Shaving in acute discomfort,
Washing when he got a chance to,
Hotting up his ration bacon
On a wobbly Tommy’s cooker,
Passing by the weary hours
Playing little games of vingty,
Losing one by one his chattels
In the straw about the horse-box,
In the straw that buried all things,
In the straw that clung to all things.
At Marseilles at last they halted,
And straightway my Tiadatha,
Having stretched his legs a little,
Found himself and all the Dudshires
Packed aboard a British cruiser;
Not a chance to see the beauties
Of that very ancient seaport,
Not a chance to stop to dinner,
Not a chance to try his hand at
Crime-committing after dinner.
Soon, however, Tiadatha
Loathed the very thought of dinner
At Marseilles or in the Ward Room,
As that cruiser started rolling
Through the heaving Gulf of Lyons.
But there followed days of sunshine,
Sea and sky as blue as Reckitt’s,
When he wished he’d joined the Navy,
Wished he’d gone and been a sailor,
When his only care was wondering
If he’d have another sherry.
What a periscope would look like,
Where on earth he’d left his life-belt,
Wondering still where they were bound for,
Egypt, Serbia, or Mespot:
Till at last all bets were settled,
All the speculations answered,
As one day my Tiadatha
Came on deck and saw before him
Salonica, white and lovely,
Gleaming in the morning sunlight.