136
The Ypres Times.
seen standing near a low fire in front of the building in spite of the rain. Now and then
another soldier emerged, blinking, from a cavernous darkness underneath the brewery.
A single soldier sat reading, partially sheltered from the rain, in a circular hole made in
the' wall of the church by a shell. Every few minutes a shell exploded with a crash behind
the ramparts, while a louder crash betook the vigorous reply of a concealed British battery
in the vicinity. Ragtime music, varied by the tune of Drink to me only with thine eyes
proceeded from a piano somewhere in the brewery.
Who but Mephistopheles could have philosophized adequately over such a scene
The familiar outline of the Cathedral tower loomed up as a skeleton by day and a
ghost by night. Most troops paid two or three visits to Ypres during their spell of active
service and each visit seemed to render more and more evidence of destruction. Each
time they passed along the cobbled and shell-holed streets, some new gap or heap of debris
met the eye. Yet one could not help feeling that the tide of life at Ypres had passed
the lowest ebb. Heaps of rubbish were being cleared awayand it was interesting to
note that some of the R.A.M.C. sanitary squads engaged in the work were Territorials
who, in civil life, were employed by London sanitary authorities. Moreover, there was an
atmosphere of nascent order and government throughout the town, The troops felt as
they looked back to the old town from their trenches under the early morning sky, when
there was a lull between the hates," that after their own country, Ypres had some claim
upon their endurance and their fighting pride.
THE SALIENT—NOW.
Rain, rain and mist, and slow obscuring clouds
And mile on mile, and league on league of bog,
A waste where desolation outruns sight.
A shell torn trackone time the busy road
Trails straightly on where no man passes by,
Guarded on either side by poor white ghosts,
The gaunt and spectral trees which still must stand
Though dead. A highway of calamity.
Part grass-grown mounds, not graves of men, but graves
Of towns, all havoc and decay long lost.
Beneath the weeds, the oneness of the plain.
Beyond, far down the waste, as in a dream
The phantom City rises through the mist.
Some broken towers, clustered broken walls
Set in a rampart. Like a shattered crown
The ruin lies. Alone in level miles
That tragic pointing witness holds the heart
Of all the woe the brooding stillness hides.
Of all the terror, misery, disgust,
Of all the splendour, fortitude and will
That met the first great battleand endured.
Such is the Salient after four years War.
Shield of the Northland, guardian of the sea
And that which lies beyond the sea, our Land
The ruined city dominates the Way,
Her life destroyed, her soil inviolate,
Her soul an inspiration Have men died
In vain who wrought salvation in this place
BEATRIX BRICE
