" In a moment the Towers had in
full swing their medley caricature of the French march singing, under
which "God Save the King" was very completely drowned.
"What the devil d'you mean? Are you all mad?" demanded a wrathful
subaltern, plunging round the traverse to where Snapper mouth-organed
the "Marseillaise," 'Enery Irving lustily intoned his anthem of the
Blind Mice, and Corporal Flannigan passed from the deep lowing of a cow
to the clarion calls of the farmyard rooster.
"Beg pardon, sir," said 'Enery Irving with lofty dignity, "but if I
'adn't started this row the 'ole trenchful o' Frenchies would 'ave been
'owling our 'Gawd Save.' I saw that 'ud be a clean give-away, an' the
order bein' to act so as to deceive----"
"Quite right," said the officer, "and a smart idea of yours to block
it. But who was the crazy ass who started it by singing the
'Marseillaise'?" On this point, however, 'Enery was discreetly silent.
Before the French had cleared the trench the Germans opened a leisurely
bombardment with a trench mortar. This delayed the proceeding somewhat,
because it was reckoned wiser to halt the men and clear them from the
crowded trench into the dug-outs. "With the double company of French
and British, there was rather a tight squeeze in the shelters,
wonderfully commodious as they were.
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