are that," went on the grammarian with the elbow sling, "but there's no
such thing as an Anzac--the Anzacs--it's nonsense."

I remember that day well. It was the day before their first entry on the
Somme. The man with the elbow sling had stopped a shrapnel pellet one
frosty morning eight months before at Anzac; the man who sat next to him
had a Turkish shrapnel shell burst between his shins at Hell Spit. They
were some of the oldest hands, back again, and about to plunge with the
oldest division into the heaviest battle the division had yet faced.

It was more than a grammatical objection. You know the way in which it
makes you wince, if ever you have lived in Australia or New Zealand or
Canada, to hear people talk of "the colonies" or "the colonials." The
people who use the words do not realise that there is anything unpopular
in their use, although the objection is really quite universal in the
self-governing States, and represents a revolt against an out-of-date
point of view which still lingers in some quarters.

In the same way anyone who _is_ in touch with them knows that to speak
of the feats of "an Anzac" or of "the Anzacs" is unpopular with the men
to whom it is applied. You will never hear the men refer to themselves
as Anzacs. They call themselves simply Australians or New Zealanders.

It is an interesting mental phase. The reason of it is not that
Australians and New Zealanders dislike being clubbed together. Quite the
reverse--the Australians are never more satisfied than when they are
next to the New Zealanders. The two certainly feel themselves in some
respects one and inseparable to a greater extent than any other troops
here. They are proud of Anzac as the name of their corps, and as the
name of that hill-side in Gallipoli where their graves lie side by side.