rps was posted in the
neighbourhood of St. Pol and Bailleul-les-Pernes, in readiness to
co-operate with the French Cavalry in pushing home any success which
might be attained by the combined offensive.

_September 23rd, 1915._

I am about to leave on an official mission, the nature of which I
cannot disclose to you for the time being. My kit has had to be
sent away, and I am only equipped with things I can carry about
me or in my saddle-wallets on the horses. Revolver, haversack,
official books, map-case and respirator are slung about my body.
It is fine to be independent of trunks. Last night I bivouacked
in a field, and one day I was quartered in a mining village which
before the war must have been a busy place. It reminded me very
much of the outskirts of Llanelly. I am feeling better in health
and spirits than ever before.

An article by a Liberal M.P. that appeared recently in the _Daily
Chronicle_ annoyed me very much. Previously I had imagined the
writer to be rather a sportsman and a game fighter; but his
insulting references in this article to the "good fellows" in the
trenches, who are "excellent in their time and place," etc.,
simply set my teeth on edge. I know full well that the type of
thing that he calls "a voice from the trenches" is only an
exploitation of sensational newspapers, as Tommy never by any
chance in my experience of him talks of subjects like
conscription. But the sheer cruelty of this M.P.'s patronising
talk of the men who are dying by thousands to keep him and his
kind safe at home absolutely surpasses everything. The suggestion
that the man at the Front knows less of how to run wars than
M.P.s who have, in all probability, never seen a drop of blood
shed or a gun fired in anger in their lives, is, on the face of
it, ludicrous. We have heard a lot about the Army not interfering
in politics. Well and good; but let the politicians cease to
meddle with military affairs, unless, of course, it is manifest
that the most sacred civil rights of the people are being
sacrificed to a caucus of officers, like those who tried to hold
up the Home Rule Bill.

To-day a big detachment of German prisoners was brought into the
village. They were well dressed and equipped, and in reasonably
good