Now another song with verses more expressive of their sentiments has taken its place. The chorus runs:
"There’s a long, long trail a-winding Into the land of my dreams, Where the nightingales are singing And a white moon beams; There’s a long, long night of waiting Until my dreams all come true; Till the day when I’ll be going down That long, long trail with you."
Then the mood changes, and we hear the lads piping out,
"Taffy’s got his Jennie in Glamorgan, Sandy’s got his Maggie in Dundee, While Michael O’Leary thinks of his dearie Far across the Irish Sea. Billy’s got his Lily up in London, So the boys march on with smiles; For every Tommy’s got a girl somewhere In the dear old British Isles."
"Every little while I feel so lonely, Every little while I feel so blue, I’m always dreaming, I’m always scheming, Because I want you, and only you. Every little while my heart is aching, Every little while I miss your smile, And all the time I seem to miss you; I want to, want to kiss you, Every, every, every little while."
Here is part of a song I have heard sung, many and many a time, by young officers and men whose voices are now silent in death:
"If you were the only girl in the world, And I were the only boy, Nothing else would matter in the world to-day, We could go on loving in the same old way; A Garden of Eden just made for two, With nothing to mar our joy; I would say such wonderful things to you, There would be such wonderful things to do, If you were the only girl in the world, And I were the only boy."
Sometimes the imagination will wander into the days that are to be--for some--and they sing,
"We don’t want a lot of flags flying, We don’t want your big brass bands; We don’t want a lot of speechifying, And we don’t want a lot of waving hands; We don’t want a lot of interfering, When we’ve safely crossed the foam; But we _do_ want to find the girls we left behind, When we all come marching home."
Will the girls remember! The words are not without tragedy. How deeply some of the men love may perhaps never be realized by those at home. The longing of their hearts is, at times, almost unbearable. A captain, past middle life, took my arm one day and led me aside. He was, he said, a little anxious about himself, for he was getting into the habit of taking more drink than he was wont to take. He had been taking it when he felt lonely and depressed to ease the longing of his heart.