heir shrubs, our
envoys returned with armfuls of material. The outside of the train and
the surface of the table were gaily decorated, and two photographs of
her Majesty which we had cut out of magazines were framed in leaves and
flowers and bits of coloured paper, the very best we could do! We had
secured an order for some beer and a couple of bottles of whisky, and
when these adjuncts had been duly fetched from the canteen we sat down
to our Christmas dinner. Towards the end of it our kind and deservedly
popular C.O. Captain Fleming, R.A.M.C., paid us a visit, with a civilian
doctor and the two nurses. The Captain made us a little speech and
informed us that the Queen had sent her best Christmas wishes to the
troops. We then cheered her Majesty, and Captain Fleming and Dr. Waters
and the nurses, and our visitors left us to enjoy the rest of the
evening as we liked.

After various toasts--the Queen, our General, Absent Friends and so
on--several comrades from other corps dropped in and every one was
called upon for a song. It is curious to find the extraordinary
popularity amongst soldiers of lugubrious and doleful songs. The
majority of our songs at that Christmas dinner dealt with graves and the
flowers that grew upon them, on the death of soldiers and the grief of
parents. One song, I remember, was almost ludicrously sad. It told how
a young soldier on active service in the Sudan or some other distant
region hears, apparently by telepathic means, that his mother--the
conventional grey-haired mother--is in some distress. The soldier at
once, without any attempt to secure leave of absence, sets out for
"home" on foot. He is brought back, and, as the excuse about his mother
is very naturally discredited, the deserter is sentenced to be shot.
Just as his lifeless body falls back riddled with bullets the mother
arrives--how, it is not explained--so, as the refrain has it, "The
Pardon comes too late". There were also several pauses in the
conversation for "solos from the band," to wit, a flute and a fiddle.

After dismantling the marquee and dinnertable we started through the
darkness for Modder River. We had thoroughly enjoyed our Christmas fare,
and K----, a Scotchman, attempted with some success to perform a
sword-dance on two crossed sticks, and when we pulled up at some station
with a Dutch name his fervid patriotism broke loose in an attempt to
address the people on the platform, whom he apostrophised as "rebels"