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Updated: May 29, 2025
On one hand were the life and the world she knew; on the other, silence, mystery, possible adventure. The roadway where she stood was a crush of sundry vehicles from bicycles to dog-hauled water-carts, and on all sides men were laboring busily, the echo of hammers mingling with the cries of teamsters and the tinkle of music within the saloons.
Here all the linen of the city is washed by hosts of noisy negresses, and here also the water-carts are filled painted hogsheads on wheels, drawn by bullocks. Along these beautiful roads we found much to interest us during the first few days.
Worthington argued that the distance was such that the running water purified itself; but the men wouldn't listen to his science, vigorously enforced as it was by idiomatic expletives, and there was no safety for his water-carts till he yielded.
Dripping water-carts with as many spigots as the regiment had companies, howitzer guns guided by as many ropes as a May-pole, crowded past these to the trail, or gave way to the ambulances filled with men half dressed and bound in the zinc-blue bandages that made the color detestable forever after.
An army is ever a hungry monster, so slaughter-houses and bakeries and field-kitchens, to say nothing of incredible quantities of food-stuffs, had to be provided. Fighting being a thirsty business, it was necessary to arrange for piping up water, for great tanks to hold that water, and for water-carts, hundreds and hundreds of them, to peddle it among the panting troops.
"Well, sometimes I've known water-carts to bring water from the river, and then a few adventurous fellows will offer to throw it on to the fire. But the carts are not always to be depended upon."
Municipal authorities seem particularly stingy in the matter of brooms, brushes and water-carts. Such little disagreeables must not prevent the traveller from exploring every corner. But the real, the primary attraction of Moret lies less in its historic monuments and antiquated streets than in its chemins qui marchent, its ever reposeful water-ways.
Here were clanking water-carts, dozens of them waiting in their turn, stamping mules and snorting horses; here were motor-transport wagons with "W.D." in white on their grey sides; ambulance wagons jolting slowly back to their respective units, sometimes full of wounded, sometimes empty. Here all was bustle and noise.
The starry brightness above the blackness of the sea, the steep rising face of the hill, with the twinkling lights and flickering fires of the bivouacs, the throng of toilers among the great piles of stores, the mules and water-carts crunching along the gravel, the wounded waiting embarkation Mac saw what might be called the throbbing heart of Anzac.
With these aids the town authorities had the good sense to enforce cleanliness, and all manner of rules for making the streets fit for the lounging promenades of the well-dressed. Water-carts and brooms were kept in active employment; beggars and dust-heaps were under the eye of a vigilant police.
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