Anecdotes of the great war, gathered from European sources
History
Anecdotes of the great war, gathered from European sources
World War, 1914-1918 -- Humor, caricatures, etc.
I protest I never saw such a panharmonium! Foreign residents had
their windows stoned, and abstained many cuts and confusions from
the missals. The proprietor of our boarding-house was not actually
indolent, but treated me in a very caviare manner, advising me to
speak no English. Even neuters, he told me, were being distrained to
stimulate a factious enthusiasm for the Kaiser.
Next day an official arrived. He asked me if I was English. “Sir,”
I replied, “I am no camellia, changing my colors to suit my
surroundings.” I think he hardly depreciated my semaphore; he merely
told me to pack my trunks in readiness to leave Berlin at a certain
hour next day. After another sleepless night passed in anxious
participations, four of us were convoyed to the station in a closed
vehicle and left for hours on a platform crowded to supplication with
fugitives. Some of the women wept quietly, while others gave way to
historical outbursts. They gave us nothing but water, and I was induced
to eating some digestible chocolate caravans produced by my maid.
At last the aliens’ train arrived; but we were at the back of the
crowd, and you may imagine my constellation when I discovered that
every department had its full quotient of passengers. Seizing a
passing official, I exclaimed: “Thou transcendental Triton, is
it thus that the confidential visitors, whose gold gorges the
coffins of thy treasury, and who patiently suffer the ubiquitous
distortions of thy greedy countrymen, are rewarded? Fie, sir! It is
larceny—tyranny—barometry of the vilest conscription!”
He seemed puzzled, and said, roughly: “Are you Suffer-gette?”
“Sir,” I replied, “I will endure no more obliquity. I will say no more.
I refuse to omit another syllabus.”
He called another official, and after a long discursion, during which
they regarded me very strangely, frequently tapping their foreheads,
they had a horse-box corrected to the train, into which my maid and I
were inducted, attended by a German female. I passed the journey in
a sort of comma, and eventually reached England, which it is my firm
resolution never to leave again.
PERMANENTLY POSTPONED
The Irish Guards were holding a position at Ypres, and flying bullets
were the order of the day. The Germans endeavored to break through, and
after a particularly brisk volley Private Flynn was heard to shout:—
“Murder of wars, I’m done now altogether!”
“Why, have you been hit?” shouts Captain P——.
“Not entoirely hit, sir,” shouts Flynn; “but I’ve been waiting this ten
minutes for a smoke from Murtagh’s pipe, and by the powers they’ve just
shot it out iv his mouth.”
UNINTENTIONAL LIMITATION
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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