2          “THE O-PIP”
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Here’s hoping all our kind readers A Very Merry Christmas, with lots of the good things and the best of luck in the New Year. Don’t let the enjoyment of the festive season be curtailed by the thought that your sons, brothers, or husbands are having a hard time of it in France and missing all the good things. We are planning on the biggest time of our lives. They talk about roast pork for Christmas dinner, but there are too many stray chickens floating around our billets, and more than likely a lot of them will be taken prisoners before that time. Any way when you are sawing the white meat oft the breast of the turkey, and you say “I’d like dear Jim to have this piece,” just have a good laugh all round and imagine Jim having a most uproarious time himself.
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We hope to have another issue soon.
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TO THOSE IN ENGLAND.

We nose around in towns and cellars,
     We cut our pants off at the knees,
We never have a kit inspection-
     Say, bo, it’s a life of ease!

Although one seems to live by inches,
     The life in France is jake-a-lou:
There’s no parades or hut inspections
     Like those in England we went through.

We don’t get bread that’s full of sawdust,
     We don’t get fish from Zanzibar;
Were you to ask us on the level,
     France has England skun by far.

We don’t grind dinners for our horses,
     Just throw the damn stuff to ’em raw;
The G.S. wagons takes our luggage,
     Like they did in Blighty—Oh, Yes! Ha, Ha!

We never see those spray-you taps:
     At the guns we don’t get up till nine,
 Our bandoliers and boots and buttons
     Don’t know what it is to shine.

We don’t use whitewash by the gallon,
     Or scrub our huts with creolin—
Come on over and join the gang,
     Provided you havn’t already been.

[In the poem above, lines 19, 20 & 21 were marked, and a handwritten note added to the margin: “This is not so in our Battery. But the rest of it is absolutely correct.”]