, so would have had to take
my chances on a hen coop or a hatch if anything had gone wrong.

The men were in great good humor. They were singing like larks. Some
of them had left newly married wives at home in England. One at least,
one of my best men, was too much married as he had left two wives
behind. He had joined the regiment in Toronto and had given his
separation allowance to a wife in Paisley. When we got to Salisbury
another woman wrote from Glasgow saying she was his wife and claiming
the allowance. In an unfortunate moment he had taken a trip to Paisley
and wife No. 1 had pounced on him while he was visiting wife No. 2 and
there was a scene. She wrote to me threatening to have him arrested
for bigamy. I saw this would not do as there were three interests
demanding satisfaction. First, there was his duty to the King. It had
cost a lot of money to train him and bring him so far. He would be no
use to the King in gaol for bigamy and would be only a further expense
to the country and a good soldier would be lost to the service. So I
suggested to Wife No. 1 that she leave him alone till after the war if
he gave her an assignment of his pay of twenty dollars a month. Like a
sensible Scotch woman she saw the wisdom of Solomon in my suggestion
and accepted it. Wife No. 2 received the separation allowance and the
King got the services of a first class soldier and all three interests
were satisfied.

We embarked for France with not a dozen men in the regiment with
entries on their conduct sheets. A better behaved lot of men it would
be hard to find. We had succeeded in instilling in them the iron
discipline of duty which was to prove better than the discipline of
fear. It was Napoleon who said, "Show me the regiment that has the
most punishments and I will show you the regiment that has the worst
discipline." He was right.

We sailed during the early hours of the morning. I got up early and
after some breakfast went on deck. Colonel Burchall Wood of the
Divisional Staff had joined us on the previous afternoon, and as he
was my senior officer I reported to him, but he said he preferred to
be my guest and for me to take command. The Captain who was a Welshman
named Griffith told me he wanted a guard of fifty men fore and aft
with loaded rifles to look out for submarines. We also mounted two
machine guns on the bridge so we pitied the submarine that would come
along. The _Mount Temple_ could make ten knots in calm wea