10
BALLADS OF BATTLE
And when a huge "Jack Johnson" made us a sudden raid,
I was dug out from the dug-out that Macfarlane made!
I was dug out from the dug-out that Macfarlane made!
If in the unseen scheme of things, as well may be, it chance
That I bequeath my body to the soil of sunny France,
I will not cavil though they leave me sleeping where I fell,
With just a little wooden cross my lowly tale to tell:
I do not ask for sepulture beneath some cypress shade—
Just a six by two feet "dug-out" by Macfarlane made.
That I bequeath my body to the soil of sunny France,
I will not cavil though they leave me sleeping where I fell,
With just a little wooden cross my lowly tale to tell:
I do not ask for sepulture beneath some cypress shade—
Just a six by two feet "dug-out" by Macfarlane made.
Postscript.—In the trenches, as will be readily understood, one has no continual abiding place. Consequently the dug-out of the picture is not the dug-out of the poem, and when last I looked in upon Macfarlane, he was swinging contentedly in a hammock of his own construction. It unfortunately falls to me to add a postscript of sadder import. Since the Advance of 25th September, my comrade has been counted among the missing.
