It rained all day and almost every day; tents were water-logged and one
moved about in a slough of sticky mud. We ate mud, we drank it in our tea,
we slept in it, for our wardrobes had been left behind in Cairo.
Harness-cleaning was another bugbear, but even that succumbed to the mud
after a time; and as the weeks flew by and inspections, infallible
finger-posts to a "scrap," became more frequent we knew that all was not
in vain and that very soon we should have the chance of justifying the
long, arduous days of preparation. And quite suddenly it came.

One evening in the canteen the whispered news--"straight from the horse's
mouth"--was passed round that we should be in action in two days! It was
laughed to scorn. How often had we heard that tale before! There had
certainly been an inspection of field-dressings in the morning, which
usually meant something, yet even that had been done before and nothing had
come of it. We were frankly sceptical. However, this time the doubting
Thomases were wrong, for the very next day we were roused at a depressingly
early hour by the guard, who told us in a hoarse whisper that we were "for
it."

We were sufficiently experienced in turning out to get the preliminaries
over quickly and without the amazing chaos that usually attends the efforts
of the beginner. It is indeed remarkable how soon one becomes accustomed to
working in the dark. Breast collars seem to slide into their places and
buckles and trace-hooks find their way into one's hands of their own
volition. By sun-up we were well on our way across the desolate, dreary
waste.

It was terribly heavy going, over fetlock-deep in mud, as hour after hour
we toiled along. Beyond small bodies of cavalry dotted here and there on
the desert, there did not appear to be any signs of a battle. Men were
riding at ease, smoking and talking, when, almost unnoticeably, the plain
became alive with soldiers. Infantry appeared from nowhere in particular,
the cavalry seemed suddenly to have increased considerably in numbers and
to be massing as if for a charge, and before we realised it, we were
unlimbering the guns and the horses were struggling through the mud back to
the waggon-lines. In a few seconds the roar of an explosion proclaimed that
the guns were firing their first shots against an enemy, and presently over
the waggon-lines came a persistent whining sound indicating that the enemy
had a few remarks to make on his own account.

Th