us, incredible thing modern war was--how it cared nothing for
frontiers, or nations, or people.

Very wearily we unloaded our motor bicycles and walked to the barracks,
where we put down our kit and literally feel asleep, to be wakened for
fatigue work.

We rose at dawn, and had some coffee at a little _estaminet_,[4] where a
middle-aged dame, horribly arch, cleaned my canteen for me, "pour
l'amour de toi." We managed an excellent breakfast of bacon and eggs
before establishing the Signal Office at the barracks. A few of us rode
off to keep touch with the various brigades that were billeted round.
The rest of us spent the morning across the road at an inn drinking much
wine-and-water and planning out the war on a forty-year-old map.

In the afternoon I went out with two others to prospect some roads, very
importantly. We were rather annoyed to lose our way out of the town, and
were very short with some inquisitive small boys who stood looking over
our shoulders as we squatted on the grass by the wayside studying our
maps.

We had some tea at a mad village called Hecq. All the inhabitants were
old, ugly, smelly, and dirty; and they crowded round us as we devoured a
magnificent omelette, endeavouring to incite us to do all sorts of
things to the German women if ever we reached Germany. We returned home
in the late afternoon to hear rumours of an advance next day.

Three of us wandered into the Square to have a drink. There I first
tried a new pipe that had been given me. The one pipe I brought with me
I had dropped out of the train between Amiens and Landrecies. It had
been quite a little tragedy, as it was a pipe for which I had a great
affection. It had been my companion in Switzerland and Paris.

Coming back from the Square I came across an excited crowd. It appears
that an inoffensive, rather buxom-looking woman had been walking round
the Square when one of her breasts cooed and flew away. We shot three
spies at Landrecies.

I hung round the Signal Office, nervous and excited, for "a run." The
night was alive with the tramp of troops and the rumble of guns. The old
108th passed by--huge good-natured guns, each drawn by eight gigantic
plough-horses. I wonder if you can understand--the thrilling excitement
of waiting and listening by night in a town full of troops.

At midnight I took my first despatch. It was a dark, starless night;
very misty on the road. From the brigade I was sent on to an
ambulance--an unp