EXPERIENCES IN SOUTH AFRICA DURING THE WAR. 257 



LECTURE ON EXPERIENCES IN SOUTH AFRICA 

 DURING THE WAR." By the Eev. W. H. 

 Frazei^, D.D., late Acting Chaplain to the Forces. 



LAST year my friend Professor Hull asked me to give an 

 account of my experiences, or some of them. We were 

 then on the very tip-toe of expectation — the war was existing, 

 and we know how our pulses throbbed day by day with regard 

 to news from the seat of war. That state of things happily 

 has discontinued. " Grim visaged war hath smoothed his 

 wrinkled front," and now we are about to reap the benefit — 

 benefit even from a terrible war ; and I feel that although the 

 subject may be somewhat tame, owing to the many books that 

 have been written upon it, still there are hearts to whom the 

 experiences that they have had in doing their little duty for 

 others' sake are very dear, and which they treasure most 

 thoroughly and will never part with while they live. 



Now, ladies and gentlemen, although I am asked to speak 

 about the war in South Africa, I claim that my experiences of 

 the front commenced at home. I was Acting Chaplain in 

 Woolwich. I had previously been at Aldershot. A quarter of 

 a century ago I commenced my work with the soldiers, and I 

 was brought face to face with the front on the occasion of a 

 first batch of 164 invalided men sent to the Herbert Hospital 

 for care and ministration. One's heart naturally throbbed with 

 sympathy on this first appearance of these gallant heroes, who 

 had fought and bled for their country, and I remember how 

 anxiously I wended my way up the hill, and thought how I 

 might speak words showing my sympathy with their sorrows, 

 their sadnesses and sufferings ; but I was astonished to find, 

 when I got into their midst, that I was about the only saddened 

 soul there. . I found they were all joyous and happy, and then, 

 after experience amongst them, visiting them and talking with 

 them, I came to the conclusion that it was a remarkable fact in 

 human history, that those lads who were brought from the 

 humble positions they had been taken from to fight, and who 

 had fallen, and were mutilated for life, were nevertheless 

 proud of their positions, and one grumbling word did I never 

 hear from the mouth of any with regard to his misfortunes. 

 [Hear ! hear !] It was a glorious fact — it was an opening up of 

 my own mind to many a revelation of the deep things hidden 

 within the hearts of men, no matter what their grade might be 

 in life. The war fever was abroad and I caught it, and said to 



