Maple leaves in Flanders fields

MAPLE LEAVES IN FLANDERS

MAPLE LEAVES IN FLANDERS FIELDS

FLANDERS FIELDS

MAPLE LEAVES IN FLANDERS FIELDS

INTRODUCTION

It is the story of Canadians by a Canadian, and is well and graphically told. It is written in a light and humorous style. It touches briefly on the formation of the Contingent in Canada, its organization at Valcartier, its training on Salisbury Plain, until eventually it was turned out, a finished article, ready to fight on the battle-fields of France and Flanders.

OLD TIMERS AND TENDERFEET 85

held on for so many weary months in winter, we felt we were beginning to learn. In those early days there were no sandbags, the wire amounted at times to only one strand, and everygne was in the front-line trench. Cooks, parsons, batmen, and paymasters. We had read of the Battle of Ypres, and the thin screen of dismounted cavalry who held the line from Zandvoorde south to opposite Frelinghein, but now, for the first time, we under- stood what it had really meant. And here we found representatives of the famous regiments who had taken part in those glorious early days. The trenches were dry now, and, wrapped like cocoons in a mesh of wire, were comparatively safe; but we thought of the days of the single strand, of the troops standing knee-deep in water, of the trenches sliding and puddling across the map, and the endless anxiety and weary waiting. We hoped we might do as well as those who had gone before. Meantime others of our battalion had been hard at work. Working-parties had been busy wiring and sand-bagging, and when we returned to the brewery, we found the night had not forgotten to take its toll. One officer and one man killed, and two men wounded. It was Lieutenant Beaumont, one of our very best. The first on every parade and duty, and now the first to go. Ask of his fellow- officers and the men under him if you want to know. His name stands large in the little Flemish churchyard, but his epitaph is written for ever in

Battle of the Lys (1918)