S.O.S. Stand to!

een 4000. Is that you, Burt

g paper that enlistments for Canada's first overseas contingent were

ing. Where wil

French leave of the office, I hastened to the camp wher

as each man struggled to get to the door and signed up before the quota was full. With only th

nd, and although I believe none of us on that day dreamed of what we were getting into, yet, looking back over

was standing on the station platform waiting for the train that would take us to

girls was my sister. I immediately scented trouble. I skipped across to the other side of the depot, intending to board the train from the other side when it came in; I was not going to have my soldiering interfered with if I cou

d energetically to the Colonel and I could plainly

y says you are not of age. Is

of age

lonel. I straightened up and folded

to stand to attention?" I shifted my feet a litt

s folded. Almost purple in the face with his violence, he roared, "Put those damned hands of yours down!" and he grabbed my wrists and flopped them d

gingerly raised my hand to my forehead and held it there, much after the fashion, I th

nd he saluted. I followed as well as I was able, but the utter disgust that was plastered all over his visage as he turned

s, could not keep back the smil

the like of which I had never before experienced, I was as hard as a nail, and as to

service to which I was assigned. Starting about 4:30 in the afternoon, in torrents of rain, we headed for the city of Quebec. Along the way the people had thoughtfully built large

was lurching from side to side, like a ship staggering in a storm, it was the better part of wisdom

ok a rubber sheet, used to cover the horses, tied the two corner

tesimal part. I was sitting on the right hand side of the limber close to the wheel and, before long, the effort to think and ho

e. Numb with cold, absolutely helpless, my head almost down to the wheel, I gave one more yell for dear life. The Sergeant suddenly and providentially woke up; he thought he had a nightmare. I was almost choked and could hardly breathe, but managed to make him understand, and he whipped out his knife, cut the string and released me from what in a couple of seconds more would have b

he rope, two or three at a time, with about ten to twenty feet of space between them. In making a downward trip I was second; the man ahead of me going down was over twenty feet from me; and the rope suddenly slipping off the pulley and out of the hands of the men running it, I dropped fifty feet. The man below on the rope broke his leg and on top of him I fell. Although my drop

uns and wagons as they were swung out and over by the derrick, and pulling them across on to the dock. While pulling over a gun, the cable skidded and the gun, coming on top of me, caught me partly under it, knocking me unconscious. Luckily the weight of the gun did not fall on me in its entirety; if it had, I would not be telling this story; it ca

fulness by a scream. A man, who turned out to be an escaped epileptic, was standing in the doorway screaming, his eyes bulging out of his head. He had escaped by striking the sentry over the head with the fire brazier, used to keep the sentry warm. Staring wildly about the room for a couple of seconds, he made a leap for the nearest man and bit him in the arm;

us amount of excitement, as well as pain and suffering to the men upset who, some of them, like myself, had casts on their limbs. In the m

he doctors took no chances; every man who was bitten had the w

ueen of England, who were on a visit of inspection to the camp. The visit of their Majesties was concluded

ses and performing general battery work. After my narrow escape from the gun wheel, the fall into the hold of the vess

rew me off his back. I fell backwards and on the left side, and as I fell the long rein wound itself round my right arm, keeping me tied as it were to the horse; and my head came dangerously close to the animal's front hoofs which he was kicking up every other second; with

n a few minutes I was able to navigate without assistance. I then and there decided that I surely was pres

pany, and for two or three hours we lay behind a wee bank, no higher'n your knee, fighting them off. Lord how we plugged them! They died like flies! And then puir Sandy got his, an' there was naething left for me tae do but tae beat an honorable retreat, an' I grabb

ing his experiences during the world memorable retreat at Mons, when Britain's little regular army, den

Were you wounded?" asked Lawrence. "Aye, laddie, you're damned right I was," and he rolled up his tr

ng wound,-looks like

said Scotty, "it was the shell th

ition to this decided detraction from his manly beauty, he was short, squatty, thick-necked, a nose of the variety commonly known as a stub, and a couple of little eyes that had a constant twinkle, half-shrewd and half-humorous, the whole surmounted wit

to get into a Canadian

l two birds wi' the one stone,-get more money and get into the game again. So I ups and goes to the Colonel and says I, 'Colonel, I'd like to get into the game again.' 'Well,' says he, 'I hae na room for any more men in my

t many a fellow grumbled about not getting enough to eat and, in many cases, that they did not get what was coming to them. But Scotty would shut them with the authority of an old soldier and, besides, in his cookhouse he was monarch of all he surveyed. In a half-humorous, half-scold

ly served us all the grub given him by the quartermaster's department, and someone was so unjust, I thought, as to venture the suggestion that he believed "the damned Scotch r

't do such a thing, and we all know he is a go