n the water. Just a sufficient
amount of drill and work was put in to make the rest enjoyable, and even
a long and tiring "Brigade Exercise" was able to be faced when we knew
that a bathe awaited us at the end.

During this period the Battalion exchanged their Mark VI. rifles for
those of Mark VII. and had a few days' practice at a range close by.

[Illustration: INSIDE YAPTON POST.]

Captain F.W. Brown, R.A.M.C., was with us for a short period, taking the
place of Captain MacArdle who departed on home leave.

No reserve area could compare with Regent's Park. It was situated among
the sandhills, on the very edge of the Mediterranean, and when the sun
made the atmosphere too hot a medium for comfortable living, the sea was
always there. Our bivouac area lay within a mile to the east of the
mouth of the great Wadi Ghuzzeh, down which flowed for the last mile or
so of its course clear fresh water. This attracted a great variety of
birds, including flamingoes and storks, and on the bushes near the wadi
were found these wonderfully nimble little green tree frogs. Small fish
abounded in the pools; but pools were not popular with the malaria
experts and attempts were being made to drain all casual water into one
channel, put a little paraffin in the pools that could not be emptied by
draining, and so either remove or render ineffective the breeding places
of the anophylis mosquito. The day's work lay on the rifle range or in
practising trench-to-trench attacks. There was no enemy artillery-fire
to disturb the calmness, and each day gave the same opalescent eastern
sky at dawn and the same fast-dropping sun falling below the sea at
night. A battalion could really rest at Regent's Park, and we were
somewhat unwilling to move when orders came on the 9th July to take over
the front line at Dumb-bell Hill.

A night-march across the rear of our own lines on compass bearings, a
rest at dawn, and we took over the line from Bury Hill to Yapton
Redoubt. In this part of the line the trench system, which was opposite
and to the left of Gaza, gave place to mutually supporting redoubts and
defended localities. The Battalion was disposed with three companies in
the line and "C" Company in reserve. There was nothing to do in this
sector beyond the ordinary routine of trench garrison. The distance
between the enemy line and our own was so great that there was no
chance of the painful intimacy of other sectors. But the country in
front was