Eugene daily guard., August 21, 1918, Image 6

EUGENE DAILY GUARD
MILE
AMERICAN
U- BOAT'S
ENEMY
WQR:
ST
Boys of Mosquito Fleet, Who Find
r French Ports Dreary and Full
of "Homesickness Germs," Go
Back to Their Ships Cheerful
and Ready for Anything after
Meeting the Women Workers
Who have Gone "Over There"
to Make France Look as Much
Like Home as Possible.
V REGINALD WRIOHT KAUFFMAN
'A
liTHOUGH h wat mere
lad h didn't look day
orer teventeeo be wore the
uniform of a tailor la toe
United Btatei Nit?. He bad come
Into tble little room, opening off the
''Bain etreet of the dreary French
. . port, with jutt a bit of a ewagger.
"Un oigmrtiic," a said, and nung
upon the counter a fifty-franc bill.
"What brand do you prefer?" allied
tba glri-behind-th-counter.
Instantly, that faint hint of bra
vado panted from the boyish face,
leering it clean and manly glad, too,
I ' and ret wistfuL
M.'; . "Gee!" be cried. "You're an
1 1 American,- area t your Oreat guns,
but If a good to bear American talked
In thla town.
Ha drew out, aa long aa be dared,
tba detaila of hia purcbaee. He went
away slowly, and preeentlr returned
and bought noma more cigarettes. He
hung about the room, and then
bought atUl mora. Ha oetentatloualjr
pulled out a ahlnlng dgarett caae
from a pocket, and filled it.
Tba Clerk couldn't help a amile.
"Ton muat amoke a great deal," abe
aald.
The tailor blushed. "It'a not that."
ha confessed, "but well, juat to
bear you talk la like home I" He
. . fumbled with the cigarette caae.
1V".Se that!" ha aaid. "I got it to-
j. - i. a . mi..
nmj iroin at iuim w aviwn. i u l
monogram tney re my initials, i
guessed maybe they'd aend ma ciga
rettea, but I didn't expect the caae.
, .i . .i ,,
m-M it was, uw cwav vmmm aiuuc.
"It'a very pretty," aaid tba clerk.
"It'a the first word I'm bad from
home for three months," aald tba boy.
"They don't writer"
Ha turned away. "X fuaaa tbe
mailt are all balled-np."
"Still, yon did get the east."
LETTERS, THK DEMAND
"Sura; but I'd rather had a letter
than a hundred cigarette cases. Of
course I'm glad I enlisted; but, gee,
if the people at borne knew bow bad
aa fellowi wanted letters, they'd
writ every day, area if they didn't
bar not bin' to aay except 'Yours
truly.' . If they only knew 1"
That tailor waa a fair example of
our young seamen in Franca: unfal
tering ia bia determination to do bit
' duty, but unremittingly homeaick.
. , Tba room ia which ha revealed hit
'teart Fee on of many tuck noma
-where, daily, many of our enlisted
men are moved to similar confeetlona :
their one healthy eubetltute for home,
tba T. M. C. A. headquarters at a
French port.
These boya are the keepera-np of
commerce, tha food-brlngera, the
aleepleaa guides and guardiana of our
"The work of tha Mosquito Fleet
la nothing abort of wonderful," a
French admiral recently declared.
"Ia tba last report of two hundred
and fifty ahlpa convoyed, only three
loasea were reported; ainca tha Mr
. . . M,... w . i. - a r a
nuno r leel cm aim avre, mw o. v.
callt du to mtnea ana aunmanne ar-
, t tacks have decreased fifty per cent."
I j Tbeea retulta are achieved only by
I labor that la hard, dangerous, and
' 'without recorded praise. 'There are
daya when men bare to atand on
watch for fourteen hours without re
lief ; whola Toyagea when tha gun
crewa have Barer moved mora than
fire feat from their guns, snatching
aleep on tba rain-washed decks;
;. cruises when tha men la tba fire room
and before tha engines have never
ear been abla to coma op for a
breath of fresh air.
WITHOUT A WHIMPER.
Tet all that ia borne without a
' whimper. Tha aailora read, now and
i than, a atray home paper and aea
i . .a -k -J tiM.
iaa acfxninM w ctimh - .
- dint Godspeed to thla or that depart
ing regiment; they feel that all the
' pnblic'a heart ia going out to ths
army. They don't at all realise their
. smtins anil their attitude it
" almoat that of apology for not more
spectacularly aervtng their country.
They will tall you that they are glad
they "Jumped to tha guna," but every
mall brines news of friends that
staved behind and have waa commts
atoaa at tha Reserve Officers' Train
ing Camps.
And thea tba ship cornea back to
pert, and there ara liberty parties
going ashore.
Tha British sailor la given his
drink ration ; tha British T. M. C. A.
ku ft isn't thua with
our man. At aea there obtains only
the taut rata of flat virtue, and the
asaa that fooa a snore at aia own
rw wm ka4 It as wow tha vjroh-
lexa that our T, hi. O. A. ass to face?
Aay Americaa ealler maa will get
mftm m uk km. iJ tl's
yoa homeaickaaaa that'a tha matter
with most el these uoa: u tney
can't ha cared of it, they'll DO (m
Mmm tm eMail 1 N
Te be homeaick and, if yoa re
member yauT (rat boarding school
aay, attar yoar metber'd kissed yoa
goodby and cried a little and told
you to aend borne all your socks for
mending, and your father'd ahakec
banda with you and cleared bis throat
and 'said you'd be coming back to
put bim out of business, and you'd
held your bead high and joked if
you remember that, you will agre.i
with me that to be homesick ia ti
be aa miserable aa it ia possible for
tba human being to become. But t
be homeaick and yet to giva a borne
to, the homeless ia to be something
very nearly heroic. Of that I aaw, in
tbia port, a recent instance:
I came acrosa three little children
boya standing in a doorway on a
quiet street, the eldest perhaps
twelve years old. the youngest not a
day over Bve. . They would have been
remarkable among the other children
of tbia somewbst rowdy port if only
for their cleanliness and for the
cleanliness of the elderly woman that
waa manifestly caring for them.
They were the mora remarkable be
cause each wore a sailors cap, on
the band of which waa inscribed the
name of a certain boat in the Mos
quito Fleet, and because they were
sil dressed In an infantile replica of
the uniform of abla aeamen in the
United States Navy.
They were ahy little boyt. but the
woman in charge of them explained
their habllimentai
WHY SAILORS ARE WORTHY.
"But. yes. monsieur. Thev were
all that waa left of a family. The
iainer waa Killed at Verdun, the
mother die in an accident at a fac
tory of munitions; to that good sail
ors upon ona of your country's little
ships have adopted them, and arc
ceeranr inear, ana will educate tliem.
They have rented for them rooms in
this house, and they have employed
ma to keep them, and, whenever their
ship ia In port, these tailors, they fail
not to coma here and receive word
of their wards, and ther give them
chocolates till the litlo ones are ill."
What do the chocolates matter?
There ia something worth doing for
men who will take upon themselves
turh obligations as this.
r-omething worth doing and tht
Y. M. C. A. is trying to do it. There
ara a headquarters and other build
ings In every French port that i
used by our navy fifty buildings In
all conducted by workers whose pay
doea not quite meet their expenses
and whoso tasks continue from tun
to tun.
MANY DIFFICULTIES.
At no ona place are there often
mora than three hundred men ashore
at a time, and to it it easier to
establish the personal relationship
between the aasociation worker and
the aailor than between worker and
soldier in the soldier huta at the
Americaa camp. But the porta are
cities, wnereaa the camp stretches
among mere Tillages, so that the
forces against which the naval
branch of the Y. M. C. A. hat to
contend ara tha stronger.
I went to an evening entertain
ment given by the British Y. M. C. A.
for the American Y. M. 0. A.'t
patrons in the rooms of the French
equivalent of the association. There
waa a reading room full of magasinee
and a growing library, free writing
materials, a pisno around which was
grouped a day-long choma of sailor
men, moving picture shows, a hall
for basket ball, a baseball grounds,
fifty clean beds at a frano apiece a
night and a clean bed ia a luxury
aa wall aa a moral force an apart
ment house for seventeen petty
officers permanently employed anhore.
a phonograph over which I've seen a
lonely lad sit all afternoon running
off sours reminiscent of his child
hood, a canteen that told chewing
gum, and candy. These may sound
like trifles to Americans at home, but
to tba American sailor abroad, to
whom only tha Y. M. C. A. provide
them, they become something large
and vital. They become America.
"There's good grub on our tub, but
not enough that'a aweet. Gimme
some mora or those) gum-drops.
"What's thisf Lemonade? Yes.
but what'a it mad off Citron-
syrup and teltserl And you call that
lemonadef Oh. well, give na another
glass of it: it'a as close aa a fellow
can coma to it over here. When are
you gnin' to be able to afford a
soda-fountain t"
MEETING FRENCH GIRLS,
If I heard those comments once
during an afternoon that I passed In
a naval Y. M. c. A., I heard them a
doien time. Unbelievable qnaniitles
of chocolate are sold in a form that
mar be easily heated and .drunk
during nlgbt-waiche at aea, and the
millionaire that wants to do effective
work against alcoholism could do
none more effective than to donate
soda fountains and hot chocolate ma
chine to tha aasociation In the
porta.
On rnnevatlon introduced recently
It tau far working wrllt parties of
rouac rrenen women ot us Best up
bringing are formed, under maternal
cbaperonage, to meet tailort of their
own sort that have some knowledge
of the French language. It is at
these gatherings that the sailor talks
most freely, and most lightly, of bit
work.
"Looking for subs?" I heard one
say to his newly met companion. "1
am going blind doing it I There it the
sub that makea up to look like a sail
ing vessel, and the one that hidce its
periscope behind an imitation ahark
tln, and now they've got one that
pouta water like a whale. Hie por
poises drive us crar.y: something
came dashing at our boat the other
day; itt track was exactly like a tor
pedo's. Humphrey saw it first. Ho
pointed it out to me. 'We're gone
this timel' he yelled. Then it jumped,
and w saw it waa a porpoise. We
call porpoises 'Humphrey torpedoes'
now."
The French girl wanted to know
about rescues at sea.
PICK UP SURVIVORS
"Last trip," ahe waa informed, "we
picked up three small boats with
fifty-nine men in them. About half
of those men wero from a ship that
had been torpedoed the day before.
They got away and were taken on a
passing steamer, and they hadn't
been aboard her for twelve hours be
fore she was torpedoed, too. We got
those fellows into the drum-room and
laid them over the boilers. When
ever we sijht a life boat the com
missary steward starta auppliei nf
soup and coffee, so wo had plenty of
the warm stuff ready for them, and
we lent them our clothes while their
own were drying."
His companion laughed.
"Why don't you tell the rest?" he
asked.
"Oh, what'a th use!" grumbled the
first sailor.
"Then I'll tell it," persisted the
second. "Our crew's clotliet were so
much better than the slops the
rescued men had come aboard in that
some of the rescued forgot to change
back to their own duda before thev
went ashore. If you see any stray
uniforraa walking around this town,
they're ours."
However, if good company it a
moral force not to be neglected, so
is good food, and in trat particular
the Y. M. 0. A. has thus far been
fortunate. There i a atory told in
one port, where Vincent Astor has
been staying when on shore leave, to
the effect that he was complaining of
the restaurant In his hotel.
'You can't get a really good meal
there," said Astor.
WHERE TO GET GOOD MEAL
Hit auditor happened to be tatis
factorilv fresh from another tort of
restaurant. "1 just now had a good
dinner at the Y. M. C A.," he ven
tured.
"Oh, there!" aaid Astor. "Of course
you did. The Y. M. C A.'a the best
eating place in town."
Mr. Astor ought to know, became
that eating place is of his wife's
making. She bought and turned over
to th association th on really good
restaurant that could be found, and
ah haa ever ainc been personally
aetiv in it arrangements.
"Yon get veal food there." a tailor
recently told me. "Real food. You
know what I mean ham-an'-eggs an'
steak-an'-fried-onions."
It it said that Mrs. Astor used to
help wtit on tabl when th service
waa ehorthanded, and that on of the
ft rat persons upon whom she waited
waa a newly enlisted man in the
United States Navy who. until a
month previous, htd been th dining
room steward on Mre, Astor't own
yacht.
"Gee" th tteward la reported to
hav commented, "when I used to
wait on her, I had to wjar evening
cloth."
Th sort nf men, then, with which,
at our navy's ports in France, tho
Y. M. C. A. has to deal, is all sorts,
They are of the two extremes and
every grade between, but once they
are in I'ncle Sam's navy there is no
distinction. Each man ia offering all
he baa to bis country; that makes
them kin. Let me exemplify:
I was just coming in from my first
cruise with the Mosquito Fleet. The
BY
j FINDING FRITZ OBSERVER'S J0B
Up at the front with the American army are two
Jobs so closely related they are one the artillery
man's and tbe observer's. The first delivers the
goods, tbe second tells him what doorstep to leave it
on, and corrects any misapprehensions he may have
as to where be is leaving it.
During the night there had been a tremendous bar
rage. Hundreds of guns ot all sizes and voices had
made It exceedingly uncomfortable for Frltzie, who
Is perched on a famous mountain which seems only
a stone's throw away. The guns bad fired tor two
hours and our fellows bad gone over the top and
come back with prisoners and captured machine
guns. In the morning I went back to the nearest bat
tery to ask how they went about it.
The battery consisted of French nineties and
seventy-fives. They were hidden, away In bomb
proof emplacements of Interesting construction. The
construction had to bo Interesting tecause Frits
knew the battery was there, and paid it consider
able attention. Every once In a while he would drop
a shell near by.
A general showed us his wall map ot the vicinity
on which was marked every German trench and post,
every stone and blade ot grass, it seemed, and then
explained the barrage.
PURPOSES OF BARRAGE
"The theory waa to wall In that section of
trenches," he said. "Part ot the guns enclosed the
locality In a barrage while others of ua played on
the. communicating trenches to keep reinforcements
from coming up. The Idea is to keep in the area all
the men who are there and to let nobody come In to
help them."
"But you can't see those trenches. How do you
know you are hitting them?"
"Observers," waa the curt answer. "We know the
location of the trench and then register upon It. The
observers correct our fire until we have the range
exactly, and then we wait for the time. Orders come
that there will be such and such a barrage on "J"
day and rero hour. And we are ready."
Tbe thing that tapped one on the shoulder about
these boya was their attitude toward the guns. They
seemed to feel toward them as a person might feel
trsrard a splendid fighting bull dog.
The seventy-fives called out the highest esteem.
The nineties were good: they did the business, but
the seventy-fives! Now there were guns.
"They won't let us fire but six times a minute."
a sergeant said with tbe air of a man who had been
personally offended.
TORN BY HUN SHELLS
All around the emplacement the ground waa torn
and upheaved by Hun shells which had been sent
over as a compliment to this battery. Out in the
field were two great craters sharply visible over the
rest.
"Hey," called a man from the other end of the line
of bomb proofs, "here comet a Y. M. C A. man with
eats."
Boyt oozed out of cavea and bomb proofs with their
tongues fairly hanging out. Their atation la with
their guna. and their mess Is on the spot so they
have little chance to get over to the canteen. The
"Y" man, being competent to fill his Job, knew this,
and made treauent trips aver with a pack ot his
"Gee It'a Great To Hear 'American' Talked
quartermaster
starboard rail.
leaned against the
"That boy," he said, as he nodded
to a blackened, barefoot lad emerging
from a hatchway, "got honora in
French at Harvard last spring."
"And he'a here aa a common tea
man?" I wondered.
"At a coal heaver," th quarter
master corrected me. "We've got a
CLARENCE BUDINGTON KELLAND
We arrived at
guna I saw Be
in France 1"
lot of college men aboard. They'ie
volunteers. Of course, they've all
had yachting experience, but the
bred-to-the-service fellows laughed at
them till a certain litle thing hap
pened on the voyage over.
"A fire atarted in our port coal
bunkert when we were three days
out of the port we were bound for.
A batch 'd been left open and there 'd
wares on his pack cakes, cookies, canned stuff,
cigarettes.
"Much obliged for running over," said the lieuten
ant. "We sure appreciate it."
That seems to be the attitude of the officers and
men at the front towards the Red Triangle. "Much
obliged and we appreciate It. Say, If it wasn't for
the "Y" we sure would be up against it,"
"I'm going ahead to some of tbe observation posts,"
the "Y" man told me. "Want to take a chance?"
a town and found a lieutenant sit
ting down in a trench. Before him a narrow slit
opened into a pile and into utter blackness.
HOW OBSERVER WORKS
"Observation post," said my conductor.
The lieutenant was glad to see us, especially when
I told him I was so recently from home, and took
us within. There, in a little room in which one could
barely stand upright, was the paraphernalia by which
th Hun is supervised in bis goings and comings, and
by which our artillery is Informed it it Is hitting the
mark. -
Facing the Hun waa a narrow horizontal slit across
the wall. Over thla hung a curtain, because Fritz in
his observation posts across No Man's Land might
see that slit through his glasses if light were allowed
to pass through it and then very shortly there would
be no observation post. Provided it suited Fritz's
humor to abolish it.
We looked through the glasses at the beautiful
mountain slope opposite, famous In the history of
the war. and which now Is the most formidable bar
in the way of our troops if they set out to take back
from Germany a city which France claims for her
own. With the naked eye this mountain slope seems
quiet and peaceful. There Is no sign of life, not
even of smoke from a mess fire. Through the glasses,
aa they are directed by the lieutenant, barbed wire
entanglements, lines of trenches, concrete gun em
placements and 'what not can be sharply distin
guished. WHAT FRITZ IS DOING
"Look along the top ot that ridge. What do yoa
make out?"
"Nothing."
"Right under the hair in the glasa now. Sharp.
The hair Is touching the top of it."
Still I made out nothing.
"Camouflage."
Just then a shell came over and burst on top of
a stone wall behind us. Maybe it was Intended for
us, and maybe it waa Just a warning for us to be
have ourselves. Anyhow I was impressed.
"See." said the lieutenant, "They could get us If
they wanted to. Say, Wharton," Wharton waa tbe
"Y" secretary. "Give me a can of peaches on the
strength of that."
High In the air over our heads we could hear the
planlng-mlll hum of a couple ot American aeroplanes
taking a look-eee. They were not fighting planes,
but observation planes. Their duty was to get more
direct and accurate Information than could be had
from any listening post.
"This morning the Boche got one out there." said
the lieutenant. "They were after him with machine
was in trouble and saw him coming
eown. nis niacaine was on ore ana ne jumped out
with his hands up. He hadn't a chance. And they
came our and got him."
been a shower water causes sue).
fires
i, you know and now, away a:
bottom of the pile, that coal was
. . All , .
the
white
uu. ju wb couia ao at first
to play the steam-hose on it and
waa
hold
ii iivia gaining ior twenty-four
hours.
"I was on the bridge at 2:30 next
morning had th midnight to 4
A. M. watch when ths starboard
bunker blew out. The fire had
crossed the shin 1V AiA t. .
but
before 4 o'clock thrm
i " uw uur iMsr
explo
, - - -"o , 1 1 1 re
losions on the port side, and then
knew that it was time, fo. a..
perate measures.
"Th captain called for volunteers
He aaid he wanted men that would
gO dOWn into that fnra. I...1-:
ith fatal gas fellows that would
walk
straight into those lungs of
and shovel a -, .1 - .
death
. i ne iop COS!
- - . ..w.r, Durmg corfJ
ship W" 7 Way t0 "v 019
COLLEGE BOYS FIRST.
"Well, sir, tha first to volunteer
were the college kids and Four
Stripes gave them the job.
"By squads of four, with a petty
officer to each, they jumped into that
helL Shovel? You ought to hav
seen them! Three minutes a shift
they were to work, but they were
gased so quickly that eleven kids
were carried out, one right after the
other, on the backs of their ship
mates. Sawbones stood on deck with
the ntllmofar mnA .... i . l
' -- - fuiupvu mem
through, but a lot were caught
sneakino- out nf tl;.
back and flnhf h - . -
A -o-;- - e- v was
as toug, a Job M j,vs ever wn at
oojs aid it; tney con
quered the fire and saved the ship
Since then, you don't hear much
laughing at the College Kids."
Somehow that quartermaster had
given me a hint about himself.
"What'a your college?" I asked.
"Yale, 'ninety-four." he said. "Btrl
Im an old hand. It was these kids
I waa talking about. Don't mention
my being a college man to any bod v
aboard. I don't want to seem to bi
putting on side."
That is one example. Here's an
other: To an orderly entertainment at 1
Y. M. C. A. building came one night
a brilliantly illuminated boatswain'i
mat 1J - 1 1:1 ,
- - Bpicnuiu 1 uicr
of physical manhood, six feet thre
inches. and as bard as nails. But he
uibcm on -sxaning aomethinff.
17, .,..... : .L. v 1 1 .
command, the singer on the stage.
He knocked down two of his protest,
ing friends, spilled a crowded bench
and awagsrered up to the secretary in
charge with the majesty of a breaker
sweeping toward the beach.
"I'm going to break up this show,"
he said.
It looked Terv mncb ss If he
would, too.
Now, the secretary in charge was a
quiet and unassuming man. He hid
uui -uiiiiria iu ins worn among onr
fleet in French waters, but he spok
in n e-mail voice ann moved gentlv.
"TV T , " : J .T. '
.. . ,.,, ram me bciic
tary. "I wouldn't interfere."
"The hell you wouldn't!" said the
boatswain's - mate and shook a
unguis jisfc.
A MISS AND A HIT.
"Please don't," said the secretary.
The big fist shot forward
It didn't hit anything. It wis
shunted aside as a little twist of the
slim switch shunts a train of coal
cara. It dragged the boatswain's
mate after it into vacant space and,
aa the boatsmain's mate went by,
something caught him something
uncommonly like an express engine
on the point of the jaw, and sent him
smashing to the floor.
Then tbe quiet secretary picked ths
gisnt up in his arms andcarried htm
to a back room, of which the two
were the only occupants.
"I hope I haven't hurt you." said
the secretary. "I tried not to."
The secretary was a Presbyterian
minister. He was also a Colorad
rancher. And also he had been t!r
best boxer in Princeton during l:u
day there ; his name is O. F. Gardner
He nursed that boatswain s mste
back to sobriety and got him on his
ship in time to escape reprimand.
The next night the sailor turned up
again at the Y. M. C. A. building.
"I ve com here to apologize, bo
said.
That's all right." said the sccre-
tarv.
"No, it ain't," the sailor persisted.
"I made a nuisance of myself befo,
all this crowd, snd it's' before the
whole ero,wd tbst I've got to apolo
gize. Here, you swipes!" he bel
lowed. - BOATSWAIN'S APOLOGY.
Every man in the room fell silent.
The boatswaia'a mat addressed
them:
"I want to tell you fellows," be
said, "that I was a fool last night,
and got what was comin' to me; hut
I'm not such a fool but what I can
learn a lesson. I'm cuttin' out the
booze. That man there treated ni
square, and saved me from trouble
aboard ship, and after tonight if any
slob tries to get fresh around this
place, why any aueh guy's got to
Uckle the two of us."
Some college men and tome men
that have hardly been to school at
all, a group of 'millionaires and a
scattering of roueh-neckt. but every
one sound st heart and brave in
action these make up the Mosquito
Fleet, The worst aren't btd, they are
only lonely. The best are enduring
a dangerous and. what ia more, a
hideously monotonous, life afloat anil
on beset with the temptstion of
emotional reaction ashore. For both
sort th choice lie toltly between
the sordidnest of a foreign port tni
the Y. M. C A.
Which are you for the Y. SI. C A.
or toe port ?