se ourselves with; half the battery is in with my
second in command. We have only had three killed in the battalion so
far, two men and one officer, and about half a dozen slightly wounded,
almost all on working parties, on which trench mortar batteries do not
go. If you are with the battalions you come out for four days rest,
but it is a very deceptive rest; you usually have to send large
working parties up at night-time to work on the trenches. Our rest,
fortunately, is really rest. The only things we have to do is to take
rations up to the dump for the rest of the battery, draw our own
rations, and get our mails from the Field Post Office. I have a fair
amount to do. There is a sort of Will o' the Wisp person called the
field cashier, from him a whole army corps draws the pay for its men,
and he goes to various places. His best game is to hide himself in a
wood miles away from anyone, and, then just before you succeed in
reaching him, he flits away to the other end of France; it takes about
a week to catch him, if you are lucky--I have been trying for six days
now. Another way I manage to fill up my time: Suppose I want some
rifle oil I send an indent in marked urgent. Then the indent goes to
the Practical Joke Department of the Division, and the indent is
returned to you, telling you to apply elsewhere. You apply elsewhere,
and are told to apply to the cheese department. If you are persevering
you get the right department at last, and your indent is returned to
you again with either a demand for the authority for the issue of what
you require--and by then you have forgotten what you wanted, and have
"borrowed" someone else's--or telling you that what you want is not
one trouser button, but button, trouser, one, and you let it go at
that. So the rest of my time is spent indenting and receiving indents,
and finally bearding some divisional authority in his den, and discern
him trying to find some way out of supplying you with the article. I
then smile in my most charming manner, and treat the matter firmly.
It's like answering Margaret's questions, or getting her to go to
sleep. The last "Tatler" you sent me has a large picture that will
cover a lot of boards in my dug-out. I am becoming very careful now.
When I first got in the trenches I used to get bored with a periscope,
and put my head and shoulders up and have a good look round. The
Bosches opposite us are rather sleepy. But now I am becoming quite
careful; No Ma