On 4 August war was declared between England and Germany. The early morning post [5 August] brought my mobilization order to rejoin at Preston at once, so I will have to take the earliest train to Dublin...The country people’s conceptions of the German soldier are based on the German bands that used to travel around Ireland up to 1913. The musicians were square-headed, pot-bellied men without either shape or make, and therefore all Germans must be alike. The German Bands were not popular, as they played music, which the country people did not understand. Did any farmer, shopkeeper or labourer know anything, or in fact ever hear of Schubert, Mozart, Beethoven, Wagner, Offenbach or Verdi? No! - certainly not. The Germans could not play the ‘Wearin’ of the Green’, ‘The Rocky Road to Dublin’, ‘The Wind that shed the Barley’ or ‘Brian Boru’s March’; therefore the half-pence they picked up were few, as no one understood classical music or opera. Major Dease, the Earl of Longford, Colonel Pollard-Urquart and Major Boyd-Rochford did, and used to keep the Germans playing for hours outside the hall doors of their country mansions. I am told that if I let such apologies for men beat me then I need never show my face in the Parish again. << less