Vilas County news. [volume] (Eagle River, Vilas County, Wis.) 1896-1927, 1915-01-06
TAKE WAR LIGHTLY.
Hindus CheerfuIIy Patient Under
All Circumstances.
One Complains That Prussian Soldiers
Neck Is Too Fat for Strangling-
Meet Old Comrades in
Arms.


Times, who signs himself AN Anglo
Indian" contributes the following:
One would not have recognized the
tired, war-worn crew who came
in yesterday in hail of pelting sleet.
Most of them were sitting up in their
beds chatting and laughing; pears, ap-
PIES cigarettes chocolate and war pic
lures were strewn on the tables by
their sides. A hot scrub-down and the
oiling and massage of the head, which
the Indian loves, had altered the color
of life to them. A Mussulman from
the Khyber whom l had seen lifted
IN the day before on the shoulders of
two orderlies, his face pitted with the
debris thrown up by a shell, was ~
ing back peacefully smoking a Gig
arctic.
Il found the Dogras and Gurkhas
together. They had come from the
same part of the field.
How were you hit?' asked one
: "By a pataka, sahib
"a crackerP At first l did not I'M
derstand A pataka is the cracker
which is thrown about the streets
when the religious professions pass
in. the bazaar.
A bomb, he explained.
1T slowly dawned on me that the
man thus lightly dismissed a Jack
Johnson or a Black Maria The
war is not like the war in old tines
he added repratfI1IIv
Some of the wounded had not seen
the Germans. Those who had did not
speak respectfully of them. One man
who had come to grips with fat
Prussian complained that he could not
get the fingers of both hands round
his opponents throat. They are
not ,bony men, he added. But this
would mean less resistance to the
kukri While he was struggling and
rolling on the ground he was shot
point-blank through the lung and the
bullet had come out through his Shout
der.
Another man told me how his COM
pany and another were enfiIaded by
machine gun fire in the trenches and
lost all their British officers. A
havildar got the men together and led
them back in the dark to the line be-
hind. They had been badly pounded
and felt a little lost nd uncertain
where they would find themselves.
BY a piece of good fortune they hit
on the trenches of the Seaforths. The
HighIanders and Gurkhas are old COM
rades in arms.
There was a story in the ward of
wounded havildar who fell into the
hands of a Good Samaritan. The Ger
man officer Spoke to him in Hindu
gtani, asking him the number of his
regiment and where he came from.
He bound up his wounds, gave him
drink and brought him bundle of
straw to support his head.
THE Gurkha as rule is direct and
matter of fact, more interested in
physical than abstract affairs, as when
he complains of the thickness of the
Germans neck. But one meets a
more Dumasesque type sometimes
among the Sikhs and Mohammedans.
/ asked a Pathan how many of the en-
envy he had killed.
"a great many he said; one can
not count
DE Souza, a delicate, cultured
youth, who was laid up with a slight
attack of pneumonia, gave me vivid
picture of life in the trenches. The
German trenches were not two hun
dred yards from his own, and he lay
awake at night listening to their
accordions and concertinas. He seemed
rather to like the music. One morn
ing they hoisted up huge placard on
a pole with the inscription in large
letters:
Holy War.
Indians Fight On Our Side.
Woe to the British
1t at once became a target.
IF it ever entered ones head that