New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1919-01-05
Easy with the big
through ankle

them to regain their strength. Some of
them are never able to return to the very
strenuous life of the army; these sold
to French farmers for the lighter work on
the farm. Others which, though free Of all
disease are untitled for work Of any kind,
are sent to French abattoirs, there to be
humaney killed for human food. Perhaps
it is necessary to do this, but it seems a
pity that these fine old fellows, who fought
not their fight, but ours who gave us all
they had of strength and courage, could not
be pensioned and spend their last days in
peace and plenty some quiet farm some
four-footed soldiers home.
While the horses and mules played
part vital to the success of the Allies, there
were other animals which played lesser
parts, some Of them of great Importance.
Undoubtedly the most picturesque of the
animals used in the war were the camcls
Wherever there is camel there is pct-
ure. Whether they were seen marching in
long trains, silhouetted against the evening
sky in Palestine, or bearing fierce looking
Bedouin tribesmen on their way to join the
Arab armies against the Turks, or lying at
dusk in the desert, feeding from the cloths
ldlu on tnc SallU IN front or tnem, they
were always interesting and usually beau
tiful. They served the great cause in a
hundred ways. In Abyssina they carried
on their backs great loads of wheat to be
shipped to the Allied armies in France; in
Mesopotamia driven four in hand, they
hauled wagonloads Of provisions to the
"Tommies" in the fighting lines; in Pales-
tine they conveyed the wounded two at
time, stretched out in long boxes fastened
atop of their humps. Wherever there was
work to be done in hot countries, on little
food and less water, there the camels were
to be seen doing that work. "The airy
scary cont" may be what Rudyard Kiplng
assures US that he is
"a devil and an ostrich and an orphan
child in one
but he played his part in the Great War
and he played it we'll.
And so did the little donkey bless his
hairy face. Slow and plodding but patient
and faithful and sure-footed as a goat, he
worked many front. In Palestine he
often seen leading camel train, for
"Neddy" is a wise little beast, for all the
jokes that cracked at his expense. In
Morocco he carried staggering loads Of
lumber dashed to his sidess and in France
he simply made himself generally useful. AT
one time he might be found picking his
way through a desolate region of mud and
shel-blasted trees, where horse would
break his legs; at another he would be ses IN
trotting along a narrow gauge railroad
track drawing a Titles fatcar loaded with
soldier workmen and their picks and shov-
els, on their way to make trenches and
dugouts. And again, he and hundred com
panions would come tripping briskiy
through a picturesque French village, each
donkey with paniers on his back, laden with
food for the men in the trenches And into
the trenches they would go, their drivers
distributing the food as they passed along
This work often done under fire, and
hundreds of little donkeys were killed out
right wounded and sent back in ambu-
lances to the veterinary hospitals know
of donkey-his name is Constantine
who has lost one eye and both his ears;
and when donkey loses his ears there isn't
20 very much left of him.
And oxen did fair share of the work
on some of the fronts In Serbia they drew.
in old fashioned lumber carts, almost unbe-