I saw of this little affair was
a vision of one of my machine gunners, who was a bit of an amateur
hairdresser in civil life, cutting the unnaturally long hair of a docile
Boche, who was patiently kneeling on the ground whilst the automatic
clippers crept up the back of his neck.

CHAPTER IX

SOUVENIRS--A RIDE TO NIEPPE--TEA AT
H.Q.--TRENCHES ONCE MORE

A couple of days after Christmas we left for billets. These two days
were of a very peaceful nature, but not quite so enthusiastically
friendly as the day itself. The Germans could be seen moving about in
their trenches, and one felt quite at ease sitting on the top of our
parapet or strolling about the fields behind our lines.

It was during these two days that I managed to get a German rifle that I
had had my eye on for a month. It lay out in the open, near one or two
corpses between our trenches and theirs, and until this Christmas truce
arrived, the locality was not a particularly attractive one to visit.
Had I fixed an earlier date for my exploit the end of it would most
probably have been--a battered second-lieutenant's cap and a rusty
revolver hanging up in the ingle-nook at Herr Someone-or-other's
country home in East Prussia. As it was, I was able to walk out and
return with the rifle unmolested.

When we left the trenches to "go out" this time I took the rifle along
with me. After my usual perilous equestrian act I got back to the
Transport Farm, and having performed the usual routine of washing,
shaving, eating and drinking, blossomed forth into our four days' rest
again.

The weather was splendid. I went out for walks in the fields, rehearsed
the machine-gun section in their drill, and conducted cheery sort of
"Squire-of-the-village" conversations with the farmer who owned our
farm.

At this period, most of my pals in the regiment used to go into
Armentieres or Bailleul, and get a breath of civilized life. I often
wished I felt as they did, but I had just the opposite desire. I felt
that, to adequately stick out what we were going through, it was
necessary for me to keep well in the atmosphere, and not to let any
exterior influence upset it.

I was annoyed at having to take up this line, but somehow or other I had
a feeling that I could not run the war business with a spot of
civilization in it. Personally, I felt that, rather than leave the
trenches for our periodic rests, I would sooner have stayed there all
the time consecutively, until