leafage, and nodded and smiled with a
quite particular cordial friendliness. "Good-afternoon, Blank," said
the General to the officer, and the warm tone of his voice said: "You
know--don't you, Blank?--how much I appreciate you." It was a
transient revelation. As, swallowed up in trenches, I trudged away
from the lonely officer, the General, resuming his ordinary worldly
tone, began to talk about London music-halls and Wish Wynne and
other artistes.

Then on another occasion I actually saw at least twenty fighting
men! They were not fighting, but they were pretending, under
dangerous conditions, to fight. They had to practise the bombing of
a German trench--with real bombs. The young officer in charge
explained to us the different kinds of bombs. "It's all quite safe," he
said casually, "until I take this pin out." And he took the pin out. We
saw the little procession of men that were to do the bombing. We
saw the trench, with its traverses, and we were shown just how it
would be bombed, traverse by traverse. We saw also a "crater"
which was to be bombed and stormed. And that was about all we
did see. The rest was chiefly hearing, because we had to take
shelter behind such slight eminences as a piece of ordinary waste
ground can offer. Common wayfarers were kept out of harm by
sentries. We were instructed to duck. We ducked. Bang! Bang!
Bang! Bang! Bang!--Bang! Then the mosquito-like whine of bits of
projectile above our heads! Then we ventured to look over, and
amid wisps of smoke the bombers were rushing a traverse. Strange
to say, none of them was killed, or even wounded.

On still another occasion I saw a whole brigade, five or six thousand
men, with their first-line transport, and two Generals with implacable
eyes watching them for faults. It was a fine, very picturesque display
of Imperial militancy, but too marvellously spick-and-span to
produce any illusion of war. So far as I was concerned, its chief use
was to furnish a real conception of numbers. I calculated that if the
whole British Army passed before my eyes at the same brisk rate as
that solitary and splendid brigade, I should have to stare at it night
and day for about three weeks, without surcease for meals. This
calculation only increased my astonishment at the obstinate in-
discoverability of the Army.

Once I did get the sensation of fighting men existing in bulk. It was
at the baths of a new division--the New Army. I will mention in
passing th