A Song Of Winter Weather

It isn't the foe that we fear;

    It isn't the bullets that whine;

It isn't the business career

    Of a shell, or the bust of a mine;

It isn't the snipers who seek

    To nip our young hopes in the bud:

No, it isn't the guns,

And it isn't the Huns —

    It's the

mud,                    mud,                              mud.

It isn't the

melee

we mind.

That often is rather good fun.

    It isn't the shrapnel we find

Obtrusive when rained by the ton;

    It isn't the bounce of the bombs

That gives us a positive pain:

    It's the strafing we get

When the weather is wet —

    It's the

rain,                      rain,                            rain.

It isn't because we lack grit

    We shrink from the horrors of war.

We don't mind the battle a bit;

    In fact that is what we are for;

It isn't the rum-jars and things

    Make us wish we were back in the fold:

It's the fingers that freeze

In the boreal breeze —

    It's the

cold,                    cold,                            cold.

Oh, the rain, the mud, and the cold,

    The cold, the mud, and the rain;

With weather at zero it's hard for a hero

    From language that's rude to refrain.

With porridgy muck to the knees,

    With sky that's a-pouring a flood,

Sure the worst of our foes

Are the pains and the woes

    Of the

rain,

                the

cold,

                        and the

mud.

From RHYMES OF A RED CROSS MAN, Robert W. Service, published by Barses & Hopkins, New York, US, © 1916, pp. 45-46.