Evening star., 1918-05-27
SHRAPNEL
Sidelights on the War
OLIVER OWEN KUHN,

sammy-Over in America we have
lilac bush nifty feet high.
TOMMY wish could lilac that.
Dwindls. dwindle. little car.
How I wonder where you are:
Down beneath your throne - ls~.
Seems to me life must be slow.
A group OF soldiers at the front
were talking about narrow escapes.
battle and wars devastation.
T know something worse than
that" said one soldier after having
listened to a particularly stirring
story dealing with torture. rs there
anything worse than sitting in a bar
ber's chair with your mouth full of
another customer your panama hat!
This soldier won tho prize for lurid
tales.
Describing the wide radius OF the
wireless outfits carried on tho larger
ber of a German crew writes:
Tho wireless apparatus upon C-2o0
was far more efficient and had a far
greater range than that in use upon
an ordinary cruiser of the same ca
pacity. Height is. of course. the
dio work. and U-200 got her height
by sending the wireless antennae aloft
suspended between two small captive
balloons. We had no difficulty what
ever in sending and receiving mes
sages through to Sofia and even Con-
stantinople. a distance of more than
thousand miles over land and sea. and
never needed to fly the balloons at
anything like their extreme height of
900 feet"
In describing the attractiveness of
a fr tAr ~ - q l.
lied corps declared the airplane lifts
one out of the sordid CRIME of every
day war into a land of dreams and
seeming unreality.
The typical fashioned English
in the world. has undergone great
changes since the war started. In
telling of the situation one writer
says:
Time was when in our village
and in nearly all other villages. too.
was an object of interest and curl
osity. The sight of one walking up
or down the street was enough to
bring dozen heads to the windows,
and as many housewives to their cot
iage doois or garden gates on some
ostensibly domestic errand which
might serve as an excuse for a good
start. Not that the attitude of the
village was in any way like the, ira
dftional 'Ere's stranger-eave art
brick at inn; 1t was simply that
the arrival of a stranger was SO un-
usual that It could not be passed
over unnoticed. Even summer visitors
were few and far between. for the
village, although 1t lies amid scenery
as fair as any in all sweet England.
has no attractions Of the guide book
variety. Only two or three houses,
moreover. had suitable accommoda-
tions, and they generally got the
same families year after year.
That is one of the things which
the war has changed. We see plenty
of strangers nowadays. We see SOL
dieys-dusty and hot. or wet and
colo soldiers-marching through the
village on the long. long road OF war.
We see labor corps, forestry corps.
all kinds of corps. some OF them
speaking in the manner OF strange
lands which were formerly to most
Of US mere names on the map. IL SO
much, and which we had never seri-
ously thought Of as being peopled by
men and women not unlike ourselves.
Some strangers even descend-under
stress Of engine trouble or some such
reason-from the skies themselves
into our ancient, unchanging fields.
What would such q visitation have
meant a hundred and hfty years ago?
Sometimes they come ana build
bridges over our winding river
reaches, causing a mighty fiutter and
uuackfng among the feathered viii
laees of the reedy eyots."