The Bemidji daily pioneer. [volume] (Bemidji, Minn.) 1904-1971, 1915-03-20
By PHIL RAIDER.


Copyright, 1915, by United Press.
London, March 1.-How does it
feel to live in the trenches? Here's
little recipe by which you may find
out. Take cold damp cellar, food
it with some three to six inches If
almost ice cold mud At a height OF
five feet from the floor, stretch tan
gle of wires, turn an electric cur
rent into the wires, and let the volt
age be so heavy that every wire will
be so deadly as a third rail. Now
blow out the light, crawl to the mid
die of the floor and in the darkness
stand erect, trusting to blind luck
that your head won't touch the
wires.
Neglecting Duty.
These charged wires in the dark
ness reveal the invisably, deadly
traits of the bullets that fly over
your head in the darkness. Of
course, if you want to be safe in the
cellar, you can keep your head down,
but if you did that in the trenches,
you would be neglecting your duty,
1t is your duty, for instance, to fire
eight bullets an hour, while on
guard. Watchful eyes of officers
will tell whether you are shooting
into the air or whether you are firing
with your eyes fixed on the enemy's
trenches and a good sentinel is sup
posed to raise his head above the
trenches every ten minutes to see
what is going on.
Victor Chapman, Hardware grad
uate, who was with me in the tren=
ches, was somewhat Of a philosopher
and he used to say: 1.-THE danger
of being shot is very small The trail
of a bullet is very small, the space
around you, as compared with the
trail of bullet is 100000 to one,
so the chances of being hit are in
the same proportion"
Was Hit First Day.
But it did not work with Chapman
at all. He was hit the very first day
in the arm.
The trenches are underground city
filled with unspeakably dirty citizens.
They are in a tangle of sunken
streets, the houses are holes in the
earth and the streets of my district
converged in one place where the
Americans called Long Acre
Square," a very exclusive triangle
where all officers lived
There are street signs, too, telling
how to reach this or that officer
hole in the ground and now and then
there are danger signs warning the
passersby to keep his head low. 1t
was two-mile journey through the
trenches from our front to the rear
trench and on this journey one would
meet and pass many men. The SOL
diers always speak to each other at
these meetings, just the same as two
men pass the time of day on coun-
try road The lieutenant is prac-
tically the mayor of this under
ground city, the sergeants might be
likened to policemen
Also a Music Hall.
There is trading underway, too
Tobacco is the medium and the store
keeper is a chap who at certain
time may have more of something
he does not want and less of some
thing he does.
Do you want to go to music hall ?
There's to be certain dugout in the
trenches where the musical men
gather. There was in the trenches
George Ullard, a negro from Calves
ton, Texas, who played wonderfully
on a banjo with one string and in
our mud hut there was the music OF
mouth organs, an accordion and VI
lard's banjo every night. The Ger
man trench was only As feet away
from us at this point and they used
to listen to us every evening and
cheer us.
Tombstone to Prepare.
There are many little tasks with
which the citizens of trench towr
busy themselves. You'll see a MAJ
fixing his rifle, another will be re-
flooring his hut with straw, another
will be rigging bottle on a sticl
for the Germans to shoot at, two OF
three may be preparing lay figure
for German target. Another may
be marking his initials in the side!
of the trenches by sticking his empt!
cartridge shells into the earth. Their,
are artists, too, in this strange colony
Almost daily there was woodel
tombstone or two to prepare. It wa!
Continued on last paEs).