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The Listening Post

1 British Columbia

6th Duke of Connaughts Rifles 11th Irish Fusiliers 88th Victoria Fusiliers 01st Rocky Mountain Rangers 04th New Westminster Fus. West Kootenay Rifles Reinforcing - Battalions - - 11th . 30th . 47th

PRINTED BY KIND PERMISSION OF LT. COL. ODLUM, OFFICER COMMANDING 7TH CANADIAN INFANTRY BATTALION CENSORED BY CHIEF CENSOR. 1ST . CAN . DIV. - CAPT W.F. ORR EDITOR L/CPL. H. MAYLOR. NEWS EDITOR.

No 7 BRITISH EX. FORCE, FRANCE OCT 29. 1915. PRICE 1 d.

Why Listening Post?

Neither has it any connection with the comfortable lucrative appointment, (in better English "cushy job") you hope to enjoy when you've ceased to sweat your soul case out on the plains of Flanders.

Well what the H... is it then? What the H... Bill. What the H... I beg your pardon I was still thinking of the gluttonous British Householder with the morning paper, his asthmatic spouse and his bacon and eggs. I'm trying to put him off, until he's got his mouth empty, and can get some of his teetotal ideas off the hooks.

It is not true that we've been accused of having for one man in the firing line, ten behind. The people who are supposed to have said it are far too polite. Personally we believe that one well fed man is as good as three half starved. Also we would institute a special pluperfect particular Rum Corps, who would see we got our three ha'pennoth regularly. All the excellent blundering, misinformed, busybodies who would preach teetotalism at 4 a.m, on the parapet, have no idea what it is like to be in a British trench in the "wee sma' hoors" when the vital tide is at its lowest abb. There are no teetotalers in the trench at that hour, when the rum comes round.

We were in the trench at Fleurbaix time 4 am. We walked along slipping on the muddy boards, at times a puddle taking us well over the boot tops. The sentry gazing through a drizzle of misty rain, grunted an verbose response to our morning salutation. Everyone was depressed, and the world seemed sad slushy and sunk in a sea of mud and dispondency.

Then someone passed carrying a pannikin, he was followed by another. In the east a grey sorrowful dawn was struggling with the dismal desolate darkness. Then someone commenced to whistle, and further off a few words of a song rose in the gloom. Down the trench three figures round an object on the ground were laughing. As I approached a voice said "have some rum Old Dear?" The object on the ground was a rum bottle. We declined not because we didn't want it but because it was now required in the trench. As we left the trench the day was brightening in the east, and the whole trench was singing. And as we crawled into our dug-out we reflected that after all good wine gladeneth the heart.

All this is not explaining what a Listening Post is. A Listening Post may be described as a verbulous non-luminosity of intense optic and acoustic acuity. I don't know what this means and Archbishop W......s says it sounds like swearing.

Over in front of the parapet of our trench lies what the poetic call No Man's Land, It has been aptly described as the only neutral country in Europe.

Now although this country is neutral, we and the gentle Germans have to find out what is the state of affairs pertaining to this spot, as is the fashion with other neutral countries. Therefore we send out our listening posts. As with other ambassadors, pleinpotenticous (that takes some spelling and the editor says its rubbish. however I think it looks poetry good, and after all I m writing the "leader") and enough extraordinaries, ours has to be a diplomatist.

He wears no diplomatic service uniform, he speaks not meaning one thing with his lips another with his eyes. He talks but that in whispers and always to the point, his dress is khaki and mud and mainly the latter.

Our envoy does not spend his days in a foreign clime, hung round with dispatch boxes and foreign decoctions. His hours are those of the Tom cat from dusk to dawn, his pleasure to arrive as far towards the gentle Germans as possible and his only decoration in his rifle.

As others play with cypher and code, so he has his own private wire. Tied to his little finger or toe according to taste.

One Pull. The Boots. Two Pulls. The Chambermaid Three Pulls. The Bell Hop Four Pulls. Send up the drinks Five Pulls. And more. (To be continued)

Hotel Grandevue de la Hun Aug. 28th. DAILY BULLETIN 8 a.m.

A Daylight robbery took place sometime yesterday afternoon when a light fingered gentleman passing down. Humble Str. at a time when it was comparatively deserted stole our advertisement off the boarding. In consideration of the fact that it had no commercial value we believe this gentleman must have been paid to destroy our advertising matter by the manager of the "Hirsch Hotel". Anyway last evening when tho manager of that hotel and some of his friends had occasion to pass nur doors they were noticed to have very happy countenances. Of course such an act of spite as this evidently was, cannot possibly benefit them very much. However we have decided to employ two experts to run the perpetrators to earth. 12:30 p.m. Our two experts Messrs Davis and Ormrod, both famous for their ability in running to earth and for their connection with the Med. Profession, report that, after a minute examination of the nails, which they evidently forgot to take, they have come to the conclusion that the thief must have been under the influence of Chlorinated water. There was also a strong smell of B.S. a very powerful drug used in the manufacture of No. 9's. Evidently the plot thickens. Messrs Davis and Ormrod are working on the clue and expect to make a capture in the near future.

BC Archives, MS-0055 Box 15 File 7 / CREASE FAMILY / Miscellaneous records, Arthur Douglas Crease, 1915 - 1918.

BC Archives, MS-0055 Box 15 File 7 / CREASE FAMILY Miscellaneous records, Arthur Douglas Crease, 1915-1918

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