I say, I came back
to the gun position to learn that I was to have one day off at the back
of the lines. You can't imagine what that meant to me--one day in a
country that is green, one day where there is no shell-fire, one day
where you don't turn up corpses with your tread! For two months I have
never left the guns except to go forward and I have never been from
under shell-fire. All night long as I have slept the ground had been
shaken by the stamping of the guns--and now after two months, to come
back to comparative normality! The reason for this privilege being
granted was that the powers that he had come to the conclusion that it
was time I had a bath. Since I sleep in my clothes and water is too
valuable for washing anything but the face and hands, they were probably
right in their guess at my condition.

So with the greatest holiday of my life in prospect I went to the empty
gunpit in which I sleep, and turned in. This morning I set out early
with my servant, tramping back across the long, long battlefields which
our boys have won. The mud was knee-deep in places, but we floundered on
till we came to our old and deserted gun-position where my horses waited
for me. From there I rode to the wagon-lines--the first time I've sat a
horse since I came into action. Far behind me the thunder of winged
murder grew more faint. The country became greener; trees even had
leaves upon them which fluttered against the grey-blue sky. It was
wonderful--like awaking from an appalling nightmare. My little beast was
fresh and seemed to share my joy, for she stepped out bravely.

When I arrived at the wagon-lines I would not wait--I longed to see
something even greener and quieter. My groom packed up some oats and
away we went again. My first objective was the military baths; I lay in
hot water for half-an-hour and read the advertisements of my book. As I
lay there, for the first time since I've been out, I began to get a
half-way true perspective of myself. What's left of the egotism of the
author came to life, and--now laugh--I planned my next novel--planned it
to the sound of men singing, because they were clean for the first time
in months. I left my towels and soap with a military policeman, by the
roadside, and went prancing off along country roads in search of the
almost forgotten places where people don't kill one another. Was it
imagination? There seemed to me to be a different look in the faces of
the men I met--for the t