CHAPTER XX


"JHILL-O! JOHNNIE!"


"A" BEACH

SUVLA BAY

There's a lot of senseless "doing"
And a fearful lot of work;
There are gangs of men with "gangers,"
To see they do not shirk.
There's the usual waste of power
In the usual Western way,
There's a tangle in the transport,
And a blockage every day.
The sergeants do the swearing,
The corporals "carry on";
The private cusses openly,
And hopes he'll soon be gone.


One evening the colonel sent me from our dug-out near the Salt Lake to
"A" Beach to make a report on the water supply which was pumped ashore
from the tank-boats. I trudged along the sandy shore. At one spot I
remember the carcase of a mule washed up by the tide, the flesh rotted
and sodden, and here and there a yellow rib burstiing through the