"
It is remarkable how these songs and witticisms steady the soldiers
under fire. In a letter in the _Evening News_ Sergeant J. Baker writes:
"Some of our men have made wonderful practise with the rifle, and they
are beginning to fancy themselves as marksmen. If they don't hit
something every time they think they ought to see a doctor about it....
Artillery fire, however, is the deadliest thing out, and it takes a lot
of nerve to stand it. The Germans keep up an infernal din from morning
till far into the night; but they don't do half as much damage as you
would think, though it is annoying to have all that row going on when
you're trying to write home or make up the regimental accounts."
Writing home is certainly done under circumstances which are apt to have
a disturbing effect upon the literary style. "Excuse this scrawl,"
writes one soldier, "the German shells have interrupted me six times
already, and I had to dash out with my bayonet before I was able to
finish it off." Another concludes: "Well, mother, I must close now. The
bullets are a bit too thick for letter-writing." To a young engineer the
experience was so strange that he describes it as "like writing in a
dream."
Some of the nick-names given by Tommy Atkins to the German shells have
already been quoted, but the most amusing is surely that in a letter
from Private Watters.
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