12 
LAND & WATER 
The Charge 
By Patrick MacGill 
May 1 8, 191 9 
Seven supple lads and clean 
Sat down to drink one night, 
Sat down to drink at \oiiox-les-Mincs 
Then went away to tight. 
Seven supple lads and clean 
Are finished witli the fight. 
But only tliree at Nouex-les-Mincs 
Sit down to drink to-night. 
RIFLEMAN FELAX, my mate, went up the ladder 
of the Assembly trench with a lighted cigarette 
in his mouth. Out on the open his first feeling 
was one of disappointment ; the charge was as 
dull as a church parade to start with. Felan, although 
orders were given to the contrary, e.xpccted a wild, 
whooping forward rush, hut the men stepped out soberly 
with the pious decision of ancient ladies going to church. 
In front the bilious yellow gas receded like a curtain, 
but the air stunk with it still, and many of those who 
followed pulled down their respirators over their mouths. 
A little \allcy formed by the caprice of the breeze 
opened in the gas and its far end disclosed the enemy's 
wire entanglements. Felan walked through the valley 
for a distance of twelve yards, then he glanced to his 
right and fotmd that there was nobody in sight there. 
Dudley Prior had dir.appeared in the gas. 
" Here, Bill, we've lost connection ! " he cried, turn- 
ing to his left. But his words were wasted on air ; he 
was alone in his little glen, and invisible birds flicked angry 
wings close to his ears. His first inclination was to turn 
back, not through fear, but with a desire to make en- 
quiries. 
" I can't take a trench by myself," he muttered. 
" Shall I go back ? If I do, some may call me a coward. 
Oh, damn it ! I'll go forward." 
He felt afraid now, but his fear was not that which 
makes a man run away ; he was attracted towards that 
which engendered the fear as an urchin attracted to- 
wards a wasps' nest longs to poke the hive and annoy its 
occupants. 
" Suppose I get killed now and see nothing," he said 
to himself. 
" Where are Bill and Pryor and the others ? " 
He reached the enemy's wire, tripped and fell headlong. 
He got to his feet again and took stock of the space in 
front. There was the German trench, sure enough, with 
its rows of dirty sandbags, a machine gun emplacement 
and a maxim peeping furtively through a loop hole. 
A big, bearded German was adjusting the range of the 
weapon. He looked at Felan, Felan looked at him and 
tightened his grip on his rifle. 
" You — ! " said Felan, and just made one step for- 
ward when something " hit him all over," as he said 
afterwards. He dropped out of the world of conscious 
things. 
A stretcher-bearer found Felan some twenty minutes 
later and placed him in a shell-hole, after removing his 
equipment which he placed on the rim of the crater. 
l-'elan returned to a conscious life that was tense with 
agony. Pain gripped at the innermost parts of his 
being. 
" I cannot stand this," he yeUed. " God Almighty, 
it's hell ! " He felt as if somebody was shoving a red- 
hot bar of iron through his chest. Unable to move, he 
lay still, feeUng the bar getting shoved further and further 
in. For a moment he had a glimpse of his rifle lying on 
the ground near him and he tried to reach it. But the 
unsuccessful effort cost him much and he became un- 
conscious again. 
A shell bursting near at hand shook him into reality 
and splinters whizzed by his head. He raised himself 
upwards, hoping to get killed outright. He was un- 
successful. Again his eyes rested on the rifle. 
" If God would give me the strength to get it into mv 
hand, " he muttered. " Lying here like a rat in a trap 
and I've seen nothing. Not a run for my money. . . . 
I suppose all the boys are dead. Lucky fellows if they 
die easy. . . . I've seen nothing only one German 
and he done for me. I wish the bullt't had gone through 
my head. " 
He looked at his equipment, at the bayonet scabbard 
lying limpU' under the haversack. The water bottle 
hung over the rim of the shell hole. : 
" i-'uU of rum, thtj bottle is, and I'm so dry. I wi^h I 
could get hold of it. I was a damned fool ever to join 
the Army. . . . My God ! I wish I was dead," said 
F>lan. 
The minutes passed by like long grey thread unwinding 
itself slowly from some invisible ball, and the pain bit 
deeper into the boy. Vivid remembrances of long-past 
events flashed across his mind and fled away like tele- 
graph poles seen by passengers in an express train. 
Then he lost consciousness again. 
About eleven o'clock in the morning I found a stretcher- 
bearer whose mate had been wounded and he helped 
me to carry a wounded man into an original front trench. 
On our way across I heard somebody calling, " Pat ! 
Pat ! " J looked round and saw a man crawling in on 
hands and knees, his head almost touching the ground. 
He called to me but did not look in my direction. But I 
recognised the voice ; the Corporal of my section was 
calling. I went across to him. 
" Wounded ? " I asked. 
" Yes, Pat," he answered, and turning over, sat down. 
His face was very white. 
" You should not have crawled in," I muttered. " It's 
only wearing you out, and it's not very healthy here." 
" Oh, I want to get away from this hell," he said. 
" It's very foolish," I replied. " Let me see your 
wound." I dressed the wound and gave the Corporal 
two morphia tablets and put two blue crosses on his face. 
This would tell those who might come his way later, that 
morphia had been given. 
" Lie down," I said. " When the man whom we 
are carrying is safely in we'll come back for you." 
I left him. In the trench were many wounded lying 
on the floor and on the fire steps. A soldier was lying 
face downwards groaning. A muddy ground sheet was 
placed over his shoulders. I raised the sheet and .saw 
that his wound was not dressed. 
" Painful, matey ? " I asked. 
" Oh, it's old Pat," muttered the man. 
" Who are you ? " I asked, for I did not recognise 
the voice. 
" You don't know me ? " said the man, surprise in his 
tones. He turned a queer, puckered face half round, 
but I did not recognise him even then ; pain had so 
distorted his countenance. 
" No," I replied. " Who are you ? " 
" Felan," he replied. 
".•My (iod ! " I cried, then hurriedly, " I'll dress your 
wound. You'll get carried in to the dressing station 
directly." 
" It's about time," said Felan wearily. " I have been 
out a couple of days. ... Is there no R.A.M.C. ? " 
I dressed Felan's wound, returned and looked for the 
Corporal, but I could not tind him. Someone must have 
carried him in, I thought. 
Kore had got to the German barbed wire entanglement 
when he breathed in a mouthful of gas which almost 
choked him at first and afterwards instilled him with a 
certain placid confidence in everything. He came to a 
lesiurely halt and looked around him. In front of him 
a platoon of the 2otli London Regiment, losing its objec- 
tive, crossed parallel to the enemy's trench. How funny 
that men should go astray, Kore thought. Then he 
saw a youth who was with him at school and he shouted 
to him. The youth stopped ; Kore came up and the 
boys shook hands, leant on their rifles and began to talk 
of old times while a machine gun played about their 
ears. Both got hit. 
M'Crone disappeared ; he was never seen by any of our 
regiment after the 25th. 
The four men were reported as killed in the casualty 
list. 
