Newspaper Page Text
Dec. 19,1917.
“The Trail Os The Painted Posts”
Bruce Barton, in Boston Transcript.
The wounded who have lost an arm,
or an eye, or part of the face, but are
still able to struggle back from the front
line trenches alone.
Go with me for a moment to France:
I want you to see what he saw. I want
you to know the truth.
It is the day before the big push. For
weeks the army has known the exact
hour and moment when the barrage
would lift and the meh leap out ‘over
the top.’
The enemy has known it, too; his prep
arations are as great and as careful as
ours.
On the day before, the engineers plant
a line of painted white posts a few yards
apart, leading from the rear straight to
the borders of No Man’s Land.
Simple painted posts —what are they
for?
They are to guide the walking wound
ed. Eyes blurred with blood and suffer
ing that might lose the road can follow
the trail of those painted posts: bodies
too weak from shell-shock or gas to stand
alone can find there a momentary sup
port.
The trail of the painted posts is the
trail of the walking wounded; the trail
of blood and misery and pain.
Just before dawn the men file into the
forward trenches. Singing? Not a bit
Talking? Hardly a word? Only the si
lent, heavy traffip of men who have writ
ten their last letters home. Men with
faces ca. ed out of stone.
They pass out of camp: tney pass th
base hospital; they pass the canteen. And
just before they reach the front trench—
at the very front, under the fire of the
big guns themselves —each man pauses
for just a second at a dugout.
It is the front trench of the Y. M. C. A
A Complete Line of Military Books at
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HEADQUARTERS for MILITARY BOOKS.
213-215 Seventh Street. (Near Broad.)
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SPACES UNDATED AND MAILORDERS
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| never can become out-of-date. Other diar- tdCQ TUF ROOK this paper on page
| ies are useless after date specified. SECURES THE BUCK
TRENCH AND CAMP
From it a hand reaches out: in the
hand a piece of chocolate for each man
to be eaten in case he falls wounded in
No Man’s Land. A ‘hearty ’Good luck and
God bless you.’ It is with this, the voice
of the Y. M. C. A. secretary, ringing in
their ears, that men go ‘over the top.’
An hour passes; two hours. And slowly,
painfully, draggingly, they come back.
Bleeding, staggering men, following th*
trail of the nainted posts.
And they stop at the Y. M. C. A. dug
out first. It lies nearest the guns. Near
er than the doctor or hospital. There
every man gets a cup of hot tea if he
wants it; there two orderlies stand with
hvpodermics in their hands.
“Do you want it?’’ they demand of each
man who passes through.
And either he thrusts out his arm to
receive the soothing potion, or he nods
his head and passes on.
On along the way of painted posts to
the hospitals and to rest.
Sometimes the dugout is shelled, and a
Y. M. C. A. secretary loses his life; two
went out together on one day recently.
It is part of the game: they ask for m
sympathy; they ask not even for pay;
many of them are working for nothing
at all.”
CAMP LEE SECRETARY HERE.
H. C. Bartholomew, general secre
tary of the Y. M. C. A. at Brookville,
Pa., was a visitor in Camp Hancack
last Wednesday. Mr. Bartholomew s
building secretary at Building No. 56
and serves the 320th Infantry. He has
many soldier friends from Brookville
in Camp Hancock and spent some time
calling on them.
BAKER DISCOURAGES
CHRISTMASJURLOUGHS
Secretary Baker denied that Christmas
furloughs had been forbidden entirely by
the war department, but said they were
discouraged on account of transportation
conditions and because training might be
seriously affected if many men were ab
sent.
“You, the people of the nation, will
bear this privation, I know,” said the sec
retary, “in the same fine spirit which
has characterized every previous re
sponse, when it is understood that the re
lieving of the railroads from this burden
will enable them by so much to concen
trate our energies and capacities for the
transportation of our resources to the
seaboard and to the battle front in
France.
The House of Dorr
is for those who wish the better grades of things to
wear.
Trench Coats, IJain Coats, Jaeger Underwear,
Sweaters, Hosiery, Etc.
Officers’ Uniforms Made in Our
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724 Broad Street
ALL THE COLONEL’S FAULT.
(Everybody's Magazine.)
The kaiser and the crown prince were
sipping a cordial.
“Father, who started the war?” quoth
the crown prince, pulling on his cigar
ette.
“Why, we’ve proved it on England.
France and Belgium, to say nothing of
Russia," sharply answered the kaiser.
“Yes, I know,” said the prince, “but
who was really responsible?”
"Well,” his father answered, “if you
must know, it was like this: You remem
ber when Roosevelt came back from Af
rica? I gave him a good time. I showed
him all around and I took him out and
together we reviewed the army. When
we got back to the palace, Teddy slapped
me on the back and said: ‘Bill, you can
lick the world!’ and, like a damned fool,
I believed him.”
Every soldier and sailor will!
feel obliged to learn French. |
Everybody connected with the |
war should record events as they |
occur. This need is best fulfilled |
by the handsome
Soldiers-Sailers Diary
and
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Newspapers of the United
States and Canada conduct
ing this distribution desire
that all shall obtain this book;
but prompt action is neces
sary because the -campaign
must end at an early date;
therefore clip coupon and get
copy promptly. .
Necessary at Home
And at the Front
Page 15
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