Volume 153 — The Rest-Rumour.

I know not in what rodent-haunted caverns By what rough tongues the tale was first expressed, By choking fires or in the whispering taverns With wine and omelette lovingly caressed, Or what tired soul, o'erladen with a lump Of bombs and bags which someone had to hump, Flung down his load indignant at the Dump And, cursing, cried, "It's time we had a rest!" And so, maybe, began it. Some sly runner, Half-hearing, half-imagining, no doubt, Caught up the word and gave it to a gunner, And he, embroidering, 'twas noised about From lip to lip in many a trench's press Where working parties struggled to progress Or else go back, but both without success, "Officer says Division's going out." It found the Front. It came up with the rations; The Corporals carried it from hole to hole; And scouts behaved in strange polemic fashions On what they thought would be their last patrol; While Fritz, of course, from whom few things are hid, Had the romance as soon as any did, And said, thank William, he would soon be rid Of yon condemned disturbers of his soul. Nor were there few confirming little trifles, For James, rejoining from the Base, had scann'd Strange waiting infantry with brand-new rifles, In backward areas, but close at hand; And some had marked the D.A.Q.M.G. Approaching Railhead in the dusk, and he (Who, as a fact, was simply on the spree) Had gone, of course, to view the Promised Land. And what a land! Who had not heard its promise? A land of quietude and no grenades, Soft beds for officers, fair barns for Tommies, And rich estaminets and gracious maids, And half-an-hour from Abbeville by the train A land of rivulets and golden grain (Where it would be impossible to train And even difficult to have parades)! Then it appeared the groom of General Harrison Had news denied to ordinary men, How the Brigade was going home to garrison A restful corner of the Lincoln fen; But weeks have passed and we are as we were; And possibly, when Peace is in the air And these dear myths have died of sheer despair, They may come true—but not, I think, till then.