The Ypres Times.
167
night was still young! A couple of fellow Tommies put in an appearance and,' charac
teristically, began to discuss everything except war. Observing that they had come from
the direction of the city, I asked if they had heard of the resignation of Lord Kitchener.
Resignation! was the appalling reply, why, he's drowned! And then it dawned
upon me that fondé (foundered) and tombé (fallen) sound remarkably alike when
uttered by an excited man. Further enquiries elicited the fact that the news was displayed
outside the offices of the Journal de Rouen.
The next toy tram took meon the driver's platformgingerly down the serpentine
declivity, safely past the dangerous catch-points, across the boulevards and, by way of
narrow, winding Cauchoise, to the Vieux Marchéwhere Jeanne d'Arc gained a martyr's
crown-to William the Conqueror Street. Dismounting, I plunged down a narrow, canvon-
like thoroughfare dedicateddespite prevalent anti-Semitismto the Jews, possibly an
ironic comment on the fact that the Law Courts front on to it! And so, at last, to the
dowdy, frowsy, dingy offices of the chief daily published in Normandy's beauteous
capital. There the usual proof-slip printed communiqué had given way to an enormous
poster with large letters hand-drawn in blue crayon. Raised far above the heads of the
multitude, so that a hundred could read at once, it narrated the bare fact that the British
warship Hampshire, whilst conveying Lord Kitchener from Scapa Flow to Murmansk, had
struck a mine and foundered with all hands. Emotionless Perhaps It was the way of
the war! Twenty-four hours after you had spent a hectic, sleepless night, you would
learnif lucky enough to secure a paper!that all had been quiet in your sector!
But the polyglot crowd which surged in that narrow alley was far from emotionless.
Khaki and horizon blue, mufti and mourning, French red and blue, and ghastly Belgian
black rubbed shoulders in an inextricable motley. Here a Chink sported the maple-
leaf, there a Maori was almost indistinguishable from a Briton, a yard away a picturesque
Algerian sergeant-major was exchanging broken French with a turbaned warrior from
the Punjab. French women wept, their husbands chattered volubly, and Britons swore
as this bulletin was translated over and over again! Fashoda was forgotten France
had lost her liberator, and Rouennais and Rouennaise were alike uneonsolable. The
British Army had lost a heroic and almost legendary figure the loss was well-nigh
irretrievable, but it was the fortune of war! Whose turn next Why not toast the
dead as well as the living? We did!
RECIPROCATION."
You stand to face
A grand and sacred trust to keep and guard
Undying Ypres!
Again your head is raised,
Night! and there sounds again
The shells' long wail
A thousand cannon seem to roar and scream
From Passchendaele.
The resting place
Of those who guarded you
The tramp of marching fills
Your cobbled squares,
Where every stone was bathed with blood,
and now
Holds some one's prayers.
Through your dark hours
Who stood, and bled, and died amongst your
poppies,
The while your towers
Were pounded unto dust
Oh Ypres! Guard them well.
Let none forget
To keep your thresholdeach one gave his
life
Without regret.
By shells that fell
Like rain upon your valiant walls, through four
Long years of Hell.
They kept their trust, those men,
And now they sleep
Amidst your new built walls and war-scarred fields
Let every cross that stands
About you be
A symbol of your love, and pride in those
Who stay with thee.
Undying Ypres!
F. W. HILL.
Whilst you faith keep.
What memories awake
Within your shade!
The grandeur of that awful sacrifice
Can never fade.
