III

Oh, mothers, write to your sons at sea;
Write to them, I implore,
A letter as earnest as it can be,
Containing a delicate, motherly plea,
A plea for them not to snore.

Oh, I take much pride in my trousers wide,
The ladies all think them sweet,
And I must admit that I love to sit
In a chair and relieve my feet.
Avast! Belay! and we're bound away
With our hearts lashed fast to the fore,
But when mermaids sleep
In their bowers deep,
Do you think that the sweet things snore?

Our company commander spoke to us this morning in no uncertain terms.
He seems to be such a serious man. There is a peculiar quality in his
voice, not unlike the tone of a French 75 mm. gun. You can easily hear
everything he says--miles away. We rested this afternoon.

_March 3d._ Sunday--a day of rest, for which I gave, in the words of
our indefatigable Chaplain, "three good, rollicking cheers." Some
folks are coming up to see me this afternoon. I hear I must moo
through the fence at them like a cow. (Later.) The folks have just
left. Mother kept screaming through the wire about my underwear. She
seemed to have it on her brain. There were several young girls
standing right next to her. I really felt I was no longer a bachelor.
Why do mothers lay such tremendous stress on underwear? They seem to
believe that a son's sole duty to his parents consists in publicly
announcing that he is clad in winter flannels.

[Illustration: "MOTHER KEPT SCREAMING THROUGH THE WIRE ABOUT MY
UNDERWEAR"]

Polly drove up for a moment with Joe Henderson. I hope the draft
gets hold of that bird. They were going to have tea at the Biltmore
when they got back to the city. I almost bit the end off of a sentry's
bayonet when I heard this woeful piece of news. Liberty looks a long
way off.

I made an attempt to write some letters in the Y.M.C.A. this evening
but gave up before the combined assault of a phonograph, a piano, and
a flanking detachment of checker players. Several benches fell on me
and I went to the mat feeling very sorry for myself.

_March 4th._ The morning broke badly. I lashed my hand to my hammock
and was forced to call on the P.O. to extricate me. He remarked, with
ill-disguised bitterness, that I could think of more ineffectual
things to do than any rookie it had been his misfortune to meet. I
told him that I didn't have to think of them, they just came
naturally.

Last night I w