Item 01: G. O. Hawkins articles and notes ca. 1916-1919 - Page 102
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[Page 102]
6.
from slumber or had fallen to sleep through the slowness of their task.
The soldier who is here for a rest enjoys the vast tranquillity of the place and regains his interest in the amenities of civil life. In the village he finds that humanity, in the process of enduring existence, is much the same as elsewhere in the world. The urchin sends forth his little paper ship in the gutter, the schoolboy idles his time shreading the head of a bulrush to fluff, the old man works at his basket-making until it is too dark to see, the poor man, laboring at the building of a brick wall, smiles while earning a niggard wage, the man of wealth and property is worried throughout the day because a drunken soldier has broken a pane of glass in the window of one of his numerous tenements, the housewife toils incessantly, the newspaper arrives, it is eagerly read, the latest phases of the war are discussed, and peace, up in the trenches, where the resting soldier has so recently been, is longed for by all.