ollowing cable and they want to cut us down:--

* * * * *

"It seems likely that during the first week of August we may have 80,000
rifles in the firing line striving for a decisive result, and therefore
certain that we shall then need more medical assistance. Quite
impossible to foresee casualties, but suppose, for example, we suffered
a loss of 20,000 men; though the figure seems alarming when put down in
cold blood, it is not an extravagant proportion when calculated on basis
of Dardanelles fighting up to date. If this figure is translated into
terms of requirements such a battle would involve conversion of, say, 30
transports into temporary hospital ships, and necessitate something like
200 extra medical officers, with Royal Army Medical Corps rank and file
and nurses in proportion. If my prognosis is concurred in, these should
reach Mudros on or about 1st August. Some would D.V., prove superfluous,
and could be sent back at once, and in any case they could return as
soon as possible after operations, say, 1st September. Medical and
surgical equipment, drugs, mattresses in due proportion. In a separate
message I will deal with the deficiencies in ordinary establishment, but
I think it best to keep this cable as to specified and exceptional
demands distinct."

_17th July, 1915. Imbros._ After lunch felt so sick of scribble,
scribble, scribble whilst adventure sat seductive upon my doorstep that
I fluttered forth. At 2 o'clock boarded H.M.S. _Savage_
(Lieutenant-Commander Homer) and, with Aspinall and Freddie, steered for
Gully Beach. We didn't cast anchor but got into a cockleshell of a small
dinghy and rowed ashore under the cliffs, where we were met by de Lisle.
Along the beach men were either bathing or basking mother-naked on the
hot sand--enjoying themselves thoroughly. I walked on the edge of the
sea, as far as the point which hides the gully's mouth from the Turkish
gunners, and was specially struck by the physique and class of the 6th
East Lancashires under Colonel Cole Hamilton. Then mounted and rode to
the Headquarters of General Shaw, commanding the 13th (new) Division.
Shaw was feeling his wounds; he had already been once round his lines;
so I would not let him come again. But Colonel Gillivan, G.S.O.1, Major
Hillyard, G.S.O.2, Captain Jackson, G.S.O.3, Colonel Burton, A.A. and
Q.M.G., joined us. First we went to the Headquarters of the 39th Brigade
commanded by Brigadier-