Western Mail, Thursday 23 November 1933, page 2

Musical Memories.

In '99 I was in Cape Town, when I saw four battalions of Imperial infantry marching from Greenpoint camp to the railway station. Each band was playing Kipling's "Absent Minded Beggar."

About eighteen months afterwards I was in Pretoria, and saw the Argyle and Sutherland Highlanders, march in. They had done 35 miles that day, and were pretty well done. Then the pipes struck up. They swung to it like a fresh battalion.

Towards the end of the war I was in Barberton, Eastern Transvaal. The drums and fifes of the infantry battalion stationed there used to play "Reveille" for half an hour up and down the main street. The townsfolk must have loved it.

In '14 I was in camp at Guildford. The Caledonian Society gave us a concert. One little girl sang "Who were you with last night?"

On the s.s. Mashabra Ted Arundel's band kept us in music. It was not bad, although two members of my troop who had the bad luck to get 48 hours reckoned the worst part of their punishment was having to listen to them practising outside the boob!

At Serapaeum in '16 Ted Arundel's band was in great form with a really first-class repertoire, the only item I can remember the name of was the "Destiny" waltz.

But the greatest song of all that we used to sing during the war was that good old Gippo song:–

Ya-ha Bibi, sal-u-mar,

Kar-mela kara-you.

J. Ryder, Lake Biddy.