Clinch Valley news. [volume] (Jeffersonville, Va.) 18??-2019, 1917-12-07
THE WHITE POST.

No matter how busy you are, please
take time to read the following, a new
note from the great filed of war pass
cd on by Bruce Barton:
1t is the day before the big push.
For weeks the army has known the
exact hour and moment when the bar
rage would lift andt he men lean out
"over the top"
The enemy has known it, too; his
preparations are as great and as
careful as ours.
On the day before the engineers
plant line of painted white posts a
few yards apart, leading from the
rear straight to the borders of No
Mans Land.
Simple painted posts; what are thew
for?
They are TO guide the walking
wounded. Eyes blurred with blood
and suffering. that might lose the
road can follow the trail of those
painted posts; bodies too weak from
smell shock OF gas to stand alone
can lind there momentary support.
The trail of the painted posts is the
trail OF the walking wounded; the
trail OF blood and misery and pain.
Just before dawn the men file into
the forward trenches. Singin? Not
a bit. Talking? Hardly word. Only
the silent, heavy tramp of men who
have written their last letters home.
They pass out of camp; they pass
the base hospitals, they pass the can
teen, and just before they reach the
front trench-at the very front, I'M
der the fire of the big guns themselves
each man pauses for just second
ut dugout
1t. is the front line trench of the
Y. NJ. C. A.
From it hand reaches out: in the
hand piece of chocolate for each
man, to be eaten in case he falls
wounded in No Mans Land A hearty
good luck and God Bless You. 1t is
with this, the voice of the Y. NJ. CA.
secretary ringing in their ears, that
! men go cover the top"
An hour passes; two hours. And
slowly, painfully, draggingly, they
come back The men who have lost
an arm, and the men who have lost
an eye, and the men who carry in
their shoulders or their abdomens or
their legs the enemy's bullets and
shells.
Bleeding, staggering men, following
the trail of the painted posts.
And they stop at the Y. NJ. C. A.
dugout first. 1t lies nearest the guns.
Nearer than the doctor or hospital.
There every man gets cup of hot
tea if he wants it; there two orderlies
stand with hypodermics in their
hands.
"Do you want it?" they demand of
each man who passes thru.
And either he thrusts out his arm
to receive the soothing potion, or he
mods his head and passes on.
On along the way of painted posts
to the hospitals and to rest.
You will never forget this picture
the line of white posts that lead
from hell back to life! If not life, at
least to few hours of comfort be-
fore death!
| It may be we'll to remember, also,
that in the everyday battle of life
which has its stress and strain for
each of us. and wherein often we are
called to face grave experiences and
trying situations, it is well for us in
hours Of ease to plant white posts
which will serve as guides for those
wounded in the struggle.
White posts of honesty and just
dealing and pure thoughts which base
! fine character; white posts of unset
ishness and kind words and CHEEKY
CONFERENCE.-The the broken in
spirit and the discouraged and the
ll-but-defeated still may see thru
their tears and follow to a place
where courage can be removed and
strength given back.
To be planters of such white posts
to be builders of such strange high
ways back to hope, this is an inspira-
ton worthy of the best that is in us;
war lesson which should produce a
great harvest of help and happiness
when peace once again folds tired
and torn world in her comfortable
wings.-Leigh Mitchell Hodges.