XV

THE RUM JAR

AND OTHER SOLDIER SUPERSTITIONS

The most notable feature in the famous history of the "Angels of Mons" was the fact that hundreds of practical, unpoetical, and stolid English soldiers came forward and testified to having seen the vision. Whether the story were fact or fancy, it is an excellent example of a change in our national character.

Before the war, the unromantic Englishman who thought he saw a vision would have blamed in turn his eyesight, his digestion, his sobriety, and his sanity before he allowed that he had anything to do with the supernatural. He now tells, without the least semblance of a blush, that he puts his faith in superstitions, and charms, and mascots, and that his lucky sign has saved his life on half a dozen occasions.

Of all the many and weird superstitions that exist in the British Army of to-day, the most popular has to do with the jar that contains the ration of rum. Rumour has it that once, long ago, a party that was bringing up rations for a company in the trenches was tempted by the thought of a good drink, and fell. When all the rum had been consumed the question arose as to how to explain matters, and the genius of the party suggested breaking the jar and pretending that it had been hit by a bullet. When the party filed into the trench, the waiting company was shown the handle of the jar, and had to listen to a vivid tale of how a German bullet that had just missed Private Hawkes had wasted all the company's rum. Rumour also has it that the unsteady gait of one member of the party gave the lie to the story—but this is beside the point.

From this little incident there has sprung up a far-reaching superstition—German bullets, the men have it, swerve instinctively towards the nearest rum jar. A few stray shots have helped to strengthen the belief, and the conviction holds firm down nearly the whole length of the British line that the man who carries the rum jar runs a double risk of being hit.

Mascots and talismans hold an important place in the soldier's life. I know of one man who used to carry in his pack a rosary that he had picked up in one of the streets of Ypres. One day his leg was fractured in two places by a large piece of a trench-mortar bomb, but, in spite of his pain, he refused to be taken down to the dressing station until we had hunted through his pack and found him his rosary. "If I don't take it with me," he said, "I'll get 'it again on the way down."

And this is by no means an isolated example. Nearly every man at the front has a mascot of some sort—a rosary, a black cat, a German button, or a weird sign—which is supposed to keep him safe.

Their superstitions, too, are many in number. One man is convinced that he will be killed on a Friday; another man would rather waste a dry—and therefore valuable—match than light three cigarettes with it; another will think himself lucky if he can see a cow on his way up to the trenches; a fourth will face any danger, volunteer for any patrol, go through the worst attack without a qualm, simply because he "has got a feeling he will come through unhurt." And he generally does, too.

I once had a servant who used to wear a shoe button on a piece of string round his neck. At some village billet in France a tiny girl had given it him as a present, and he treasured it as carefully as a diamond merchant would treasure the great Koh-i-noor stone—in fact, I am convinced that he often went without washing just to avoid the risk of loss in taking it off and putting it on again. To you in England it seems ridiculous that a man should hope to preserve his life by wearing a shoe button on a piece of string. But then, you have not seen the strange tricks that Fate will play with lives. You have not watched how often a shell will burst in a group of men, kill one outright, and leave the others untouched; you have not joked with a friend one moment and knelt by him to catch his dying words the next; you have not stood at night by a hastily dug grave and wondered, as you mumbled a few half-remembered prayers, why the comrade who is lying there on a waterproof sheet should have been killed while you are left unhurt.

Besides, there are so many things which tend to make a man superstitious and to confirm him in his trust in mascots and charms. Many a man has had a premonition of his death, many a man has come through long months of war, and then has been killed on the day on which he lost his mascot.

The thought of superstition recalls to me Joe Williams, the ex-policeman. Joe Williams was a fatalist, and believed every word he read in his little book of prophecies, so that the dawn of September 4th found him glum and depressed.

"It ain't no bloomin' good," he grumbled. "It says in my book as 'ow September 4th is a disastrous day for England, so it will be. There ain't no way of stopping Fate." And when his section laughed at him for his fears he merely shrugged his shoulders, and sat gazing into the brazier's glow.

The day wore quietly on, and I had forgotten all about Williams and his gloomy prophecies when a corporal came along to my dug-out. "Williams has been hit by a bomb, sir," he said, "and is nearly done for."

At the other end of the trench lay Joe Williams, near to death, while his comrades tied up his wounds. The glumness had gone from his face, and when he saw me he signed for me to stoop down. "What did I tell you, sir, about the disaster for England?" he whispered. "Ain't this a bloomin' disaster?" and he tried to laugh at his little joke, but the flow of blood choked him, and he died.

Perhaps, though, he was nearer the mark than he imagined, for it is a rash thing to say that the death of a man who can joke with his dying breath is not a disaster to England.

It may all seem intensely foolish to you, and childish; it may strike you that our men at the front are attempting to bribe Fate, or that we are returning to the days of witches and sorcerers. But it is not without its good points, this growth of superstition. Man is such a little, helpless pawn in the ruthless game of war, and death is so sudden and so strange, that the soul gropes instinctively in search of some sign of a shielding arm and a watchful power. The Bible, the Crucifix, a cheap little charm—any of these may bring comfort to the man in the trench, and give him the illusion that he is not one of those marked for the sickle of Death.

A man who is confident that he will come through a battle unhurt generally does so, or, if Death comes, he meets it with a smile on his lips. The man who expects to be killed, who has no belief in some shielding power—though it be but symbolised by a common shoe button—is taken by Death very soon, but, even then, not before he has gone through those long, morbid hours of waiting that breed the germs of fear.

The penny lucky charm that can bring comfort to a man in danger is not a thing to be ridiculed. It may be a proof of ignorance, but to the man it is symbolical of his God, and is therefore worthy of all respect and reverence from others.