They were shot next
morning.

It takes me a month to read a Sevenpenny out here.

_Sunday (Advent), November 29th._--On the way down from Chocques. We
have got Indians, British, and eight Germans this time. One big,
handsome, dignified Mussulman wouldn't eat his biscuit because he was in
the same compartment as a Hindu, and the Hindu wouldn't eat his because
the Mussulman had handed it to him. The Babu I called in to interpret
was very angry with both, and called the M. a fool-man, and explained to
us that he was telling them that in England "Don't care Mussulman, don't
care Hindu"--only in Hindustan, and that if the Captain Sahib said
"Eat," it was "Hukm," and they'd got to. My sympathies were with the
beautiful, polite, sad-looking M., who wouldn't budge an inch, and only
salaamed when the Babu went for him.

_Monday, November 30th, Boulogne._--Yesterday a wounded Tommy on the
train told me "the Jack Johnsons have all gone." To-day's French
communique says, "The enemy's heavy artillery is little in evidence."
There is a less strained feeling about everywhere--a most blessed lull.

We were late getting our load off the train last night, and some were
very bad. One of my Sikhs with pneumonia did not live to reach Boulogne.
Another pneumonia was very miserable, and kept saying, "Hindustan gurrum
England tanda." They all think they are in England. The Gurkhas are
supposed by the orderlies to be Japanese. They are exactly like Japs,
only brown instead of yellow. The orderlies make great friends with them
all. One Hindu was singing "Bonnie Dundee" to them in a little gentle
voice, very much out of tune. Their great disadvantage is that they are
alive with "Jack Johnsons" (not the guns). They take off _all_ their
underclothes and throw them out of the window, and we have to keep
supplying them with pyjamas and shirts. They sit and stand about naked,
scratching for dear life. It is fatal for the train, because all the
cushioned seats are now infected, and so are we. I love them dearly, but
it is a big price to pay.

_Tuesday, December 1st._--We are to-day in a beautiful high embankment
at Wimereux, three miles from Boulogne, right on the sea, and have been
dry-docked there till 3 P.M. (when we have just started for?), while
endless trains of men and guns have gone up past us. H.M. King George
was in the restaurant car of one of them. We have been out all the
morning, down to the grey and rolling sea, and have been