"OVER THE TOP"

TO

MY MOTHER AND MYSISTER

I have had many good comrades as Ihave journeyed around the world, before the mast and in thetrenches, but loyal and true as they were, none have ever done,or could ever do, as much as you have done for me. So as a littletoken of my gratitude for your love and sacrifice I dedicate thisbook to you.

FOREWORD

During sixteen years of "roughingit," knocking around the world, I have nibbed against the highand low and have had ample opportunity of studying, at closerange, many different peoples, their ideals, political andotherwise, their hopes and principles. Through this elbowrubbing, and not from reading, I have become convinced of thenobility, truth, and justice of the Allies' cause, and know theirfight to be our fight, because it espouses the principles of theUnited States of America, democracy, justice, and liberty.

To the average American who has notlived and fought with him, the Englishman appears to be distant,reserved, a slow thinker, and lacking in humor, but from myassociation with the man who inhabits the British Isles. I findthat this opinion is unjust. To me, Tommy Atkins has provedhimself to be the best of mates, a pal, and bubbling over with afine sense of humor, a man with a just cause who is willing tosacrifice everything but honor in the advancement of thesame.

It is my fondest hope that UncleSam and John Bull, arms locked, as mates, good and true, eachknowing and appreciating the worth of the other, will wend theirway through the years to come, happy and contented in eachother's company. So if this poor attempt of mine will, in anyway, help to bring Tommy Atkins closer to the doorstep of UncleSam, my ambition will have been realized.

Perhaps to some of my readers itwill appear that I have written of a great and just cause in asomewhat flippant manner, but I assure them such was not myintention. I have tried to tell my experiences in the language ofTommy sitting on the fire step of a front-line trench on theWestern Front -- just as he would tell his mate next him what washappening at a different part of the line.

A. G. E.

NEW YORK City,

May, 1917.

CHAPTER I
FROM MUFTI TO KHAKI

It was in an office in Jersey City.I was sitting at my desk talking to a Lieutenant of the JerseyNational Guard. On the wall was a big war map decorated withvariously colored little flags showing the position of theopposing armies on the Western Front in France. In front of me onthe desk lay a New York paper with big flaring headlines:

LUSITANIA SUNK! AMERICAN LIVESLOST!

The windows were open and a feelingof spring pervaded the air. Through the open windows came thestrains of a hurdy-gurdy playing in the street -- I DIDN'T RAISEMY BOY TO

BU KİTABI OKUMAK İÇİN ÜYE OLUN VEYA GİRİŞ YAPIN!

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