Northern Wisconsin advertiser. [volume] (Wabeno, Wis.) 1898-1925, 1919-02-07

curly wallace, placing MS nand on
the speakers knee, softly said:
"Righto, mate, we know you can
| see far beyond us, but tell us of Aunt
ed Jerry and the pome e wrote the
day before e clicked 1t at the lone
| tree"
Jerry's brother nodded In a compre-
bending way, and reaching into the
pocket of his tunic drew out q creased
and muddy piece Of paper, which he
opened out upon his knee, and then, in
an unnatural, singsong voice, which
sent shivers through us, recited the
| following poem:
Between the lines, in No Mans Land,
| With foliage gone, and trunk that's
torn,
A lonely sentry takes his stand,
Silently watching from morn to morn.
On starlit nights, when moon is bright,
| And spreads it's rays of ghostlil1e
| beams;
Against the sky. that tree of blight
| A CHASTITY hangman's gibbet seems.
When night is black, and Winds faint
| sigh
| Through it's shelltorn branches means,
| A call to men, '"To die, to die!"
They answer 1t with groans and groans,
And Death sits by and grins and grins,
And watches the fast-growing score,
The harvest of his sentry's whirns.
There they lie huddled, friend and foe,
CHASTITY heaps. English. Hun and
| French
And still those piles forever grow,
They are fed by the "Men Of the
| Trench"
No wooden cross to mark their fall,
| No tombstone theirs, no carven rocks,
Just the Lone Treo with its grim call,
| Which forever mocks and mocks.
When Jerry's brother had finished,
a dead silence ensued. nervously
| lighted a flag, and out Of the corner
of my eye noticed that Sailor Bill was
uneasily squirming on the firestep.
Letting out a sigh, which seemed to
whistle between his teeth, our quest"
carried on:
"Jerry weren't much at cheerful
writing, because e 'ad a calling.
Even back 'ome in Blighty, e weren't
much for lights nor fun. e took af-
ter our mother. The neighbors called
FER 'aunted, too, but she weren't. She
could see things, like Jerry.
"This ERE lone tree sentinel Jerry
writes about was an old tree in No
Mans land, about a 'undred yards from
our front-line trench. 1t was pretty
well knocked about by bullets and
shell fragments. 1t made pretty good
guide post stickin' sort o. lonely like
up gainst the skyline at night. Re-
connoitering patrols and bombing par
ties used it to show 'em the wye
back to their trenches, because,
y know, out there in the blackness
it's easy to lose your wye, unless
ysu ave spirits a-guidin' you.
'fLots of times English and German
patrols would meet near the lone
tree. and many a 'and-to-'and fight
would tyke place around it's roots.
"At that part O. the line it were
pretty 'Ot, what with the rifle and ma
chine-gun firing. The only time there
would be a lull in the firing was when
o accommodating patrol was out in
front, and then, as you know, you
couldn't fire for fear of lifting your
own blokes. All around the lone tree
were scattered many bodies, mostly
English and German. Some of 'em
'ad been a-lyin' there for weeks, and
when the wind were a-blowin' from the
German lines towards us it were sort
of unpleasant in our front line.
"Every time the captain would call
for soldiers for a accommodating pa
troll, 'Aunted Jerry, as you call i'm,
always put is bloomin' nyme on the
list. 1t got so that after a while e
never asked if e wanted to go; the
captain would just naturally put is
Lyme down as agoin'.
Gin our dugout, Jerry would tell me
'ow many dead were around the tree.
| 'Ow e could count 'em in the dark, I
don't know, but e could see could
see.
Sometimes in the daytime e would
rig up a periscope on lis own, and sit
on the firestep for hours alookin' out