Anzac Day’s correct designation
THE Returned Soldiers insist with reason on the distinction between ‘‘holy day’’ and ‘‘holiday’’.
With some of us, alas, the distinction has been obliterated utterly. But it must be revived for Anzac Day. Anzac Day is a holy day, not a secular holiday. Anzac Day is the Day of the Dead, of the dead who can never die . . . who lie in graves inaccessible, maybe indistinguishable, on the Gallipoli Peninsula. We remember the manner of their going away — the cheering from the crowded troop ships, two or three together, as they left Wellington. But that was nothing in comparison with the cheering when they left the harbour of Lemnos for the landing beaches of Gallipoli. I quote a passage from John Masefield:
“They went like kings in a pageant to the imminent death. Their feeling that they had done with life and were going out to something new welled up in those battalions. They cheered and cheered till the harbour rang with cheering. As each ship crammed with soldiers drew near the battleships, the men swung their caps and cheered again, and the sailors answered, and the noise of cheering swelled, and the men in the ships not yet moving joined in, and the men ashore, till all the life in the harbour was giving thanks that it could go to death rejoicing. All was beautiful in that gladness of men about to die, but the most moving thing was the greatness of their generous hearts. They left the harbour very, very slowly; this tumult of cheering lasted a long time. No one who heard it will ever forget it, or think of it unshaken. It broke the hearts of all there with pity and pride. It went beyond the guard of the English heart.” — Civis