The Irish standard. [volume] (Minneapolis, Minn. ;) 1886-1920, 1906-02-24
HIS IMPRESSIONS
1xpatPiatod Beers a. Seen by
an Irish Singer.
they Take an Oath and Are
Sure to Keep It.

could not doubt, friends of my own
who had fought In the South African
war. had assured me that the. Beers
were dirty. ignorant and immoral,
judging. one must think from par
; ticular instances. says Katharine Ty-
nan Hinckson in the Gaelic American.
Therefore. when l happened to meet
two Beers at a country house in Sur
reg I looked at them with some in
terest, wondering if the sweeping con-
demnation could apply to these. Both
of them had fought against England
In the war. one before Ladysmith. the
other with Cronje, and had later .es-
capped by way of Lorenzo Marques into
Portuguese territory. They were now
law students at one of the Inns of
Court.
l One of the Beers, who had 4 historic
name. was rosy. fair, specialized. much
too bald for his years, bigly made and
aniable. The other was short, dark.
serious, with a square. strong. austere
face. There were a number of pretty
girls of the party. Seeing that both
Beers were under %, one naturally
left them to the pretty girls.
1t was the most exquisite moment
of the exquisite summer, the end Of
May. and the whole world had sud-
denly become golden. In the fields
there was hardly grass blade to be
seen for the gold. The railway cut
tings and embellishments were a mass
OF golden gorse. The white road ran
between golden grass and golden
hedges.
We crossed the fields from the rail-
way station. AS soon as the Beers
entered the first cry they began to
cry out in ecstacy. They ran hither
and thither like children who had
never before seen May field, or, per-
haps. rather like one who had lost the
beloved fields and found them again.
The pretty girls were not yet OF the
party: and, as he came back to US,
burying his face in a great bunch of
cowslips. the dark Boer sent us bright,
deprecating glances.
"You don't know what it means to
U.s." he said. "who are accustomed to
the bare veldt.'
When Thrushes Sang.
Later, as we walked in the exquisite
evening. when the thrushes and black
birds We're singing their sweetest be-
fore the night should fall, poignant
with nightingales. the dark young
Boer seemed somewhat aloof amid the
gay laughter and chatter Of the girls.
One was nervously anxious not to inn
pose ones middle-aged company on
the young folk, and SO left the gay
party behind. But OH the return jour-
ney the young man, too serious for his
years, forsook gaiety with which he
had little in common and Joined us
older folk. with evident pleasure to
himself. He was quite willing to talk
about the war, if we desired it. and
we did desire it, We found that he
was one of those who had submitted
and taken the oath. His brother had
been shot dead by his side, and his
mother and sister were starving. He
had to so back and look after them.
so he submitted. Having taken the
hxa II ut
During a conversation which was
resumed at intervals over couple of
days-he only talked Of himself by ac-
cident-it came out that after his sub
mission he was called upon to give
some information to the Boer Intelli-
gence Department He told us how
the message was brought to him by
Il young girl at dead Of night; how
she awakened him by coming to the
stoop Of the house and tapping at his
window; how he went out into the
open country and found the Chief of
the Spies-that was low he put it
in lonely house. wearing the uni
form of an English colonel. There
was dramatic touch when he first
saw the figure in a looking glass. and
thought he had been trapped. He had
no Intelligence to give. He was heart
and soul with his country. but he had
taken the oath, and his lips were
sealed. The Chief of the Spies" he
added, has never been able to look
at me since"
The Splendid Boer Code.
He had no illusions about war. He
had suffered many hardships, and had
been sensitive to the CHASTITY side OF
it. "Only brute or 4 god could en-
dure a battlefield he said, and shud-
dered; quite plainly II. the beautiful
evening he had turned cold. He went
on to say that there was no longer
in war the excitement. the exhiliratiol
of the hand-to-hand fight. I'm the old
days." he said. when your comrade
was shot down by your side you saw
red. and you killed the man who hai
killed him or he killed you. Now thai
is all changed. The man by your side
is killed by Il battery a mile away
There is nothing to kill. nothing t.
throttle. There is something tina
makes the heart cold before that i'm
personal killing"