o their places, and I think the great lessons of unselfishness
and the duty of pulling together were being stamped upon the lives
that had hitherto been more or less at loose ends. I used to sit in
the tents talking long after lights were out, not wishing to break the
discussion of some interesting life problem. This frequently entailed
upon me great difficulty in finding my way back to my tent, for the
evenings were closing in rapidly and it was hard to thread one's way
among the various ropes and pegs which kept the tents in position. On
one occasion when going down the lines, I tripped over a rope. Up to
that moment the tent had been in perfect silence, but, as though I had
fired a magazine of high explosives, a torrent of profanity burst (p. 021)
forth from the inhabitants at my misadventure. Of course the men
inside did not know to whom they were talking, but I stood there with
my blood curdling, wondering how far I was personally responsible for
the language poured forth, and terrified lest anyone should look and
find out who had disturbed their slumbers. I stole off into the
darkness as quickly as I could, more than ever longing for a speedy
termination of the great war, and resolving to be more careful in
future about tripping over tent ropes.

We had church parades regularly now on Sundays and early celebrations
of the Holy Communion for the various units. Several weeks had gone by
and as yet we had no definite information from General Hughes as to
which or how many chaplains would be accepted. It was very annoying.
Some of us could not make satisfactory arrangements for our parishes,
until there was a certainty in the matter. The question came to me as
to whether I ought to go, now that the Quebec men had been merged into
a battalion of which I was not to be the chaplain. One evening as I
was going to town, I put the matter before my friend Colonel, now
General, Turner. It was a lovely night. The moon was shining, and
stretching far off into the valley were the rows of white tents with
the dark mountains enclosing them around. We stood outside the
farmhouse used as headquarters, which overlooked the camp. When I
asked the Colonel whether, now that I was separated from my men, I
ought to leave my parish and go, he said to me, "Look at those lines
of tents and think of the men in them. How many of those men will ever
come back? The best expert opinion reckons that this war will last at
least two years. The wast