les and picturesque villages which
looked so peaceful that it was hard to realise that there was a war
on. The second day saw us skirting Paris by Juvisy, and gave us a good
view of Versailles and the numerous airships at St Cyr. The last day
our route lay chiefly through water meadows, and by 9.30 we had
reached our detraining station--Noyelles--whence after a hot breakfast
we marched ten miles to our destination--St Firmin near the mouth of
the Somme. Our transport had already been here about a week, and we
found excellent quarters in the long straggling village.

Here we spent ten days, being fitted out with gas helmets, and passed
through gas, a form of warfare of which we had had no practical
experience out East, and in bayonet fighting also, under experts who
found we had not very much to learn in that line. Our number of Lewis
guns were doubled, and we started lots of classes of new Lewis gunners
to form the new gun crews and provide a large nucleus of trained men
as reinforcements. Our transport establishment was also completed
here. We entrained at Rue early on the morning of the 21st, and made
our way via Etaples and St Pol to Ligny St Flochel, whence we had a
long fifteen miles march to Humbercourt. That night we had our first
experience of night bombing. From here several senior officers went
for a day or two's experience of trench life to a New Zealand Division
in the Hebuterne sector north of Albert.

On the 25th May we moved to a very much better area at Grand
Rullecourt where we stayed for just a month. Here there were much
better facilities for training, and we worked away steadily at wood
fighting, fighting through crops, co-operation with tanks, and all the
while paying special attention to the Lewis-gun personnel. We also
gave an exhibition of the attack in open warfare, for the edification
of the Canadians who were in the neighbourhood, and put in a good
deal of musketry at the rifle ranges, and throwing and firing
grenades. We had quite a good field for football, and had an
inter-platoon competition, won by No. 6 platoon, but the great event
was the defeat of the Scots Guards by the Battalion team. The Scots
Guards were the winners of the Bull Dog Cup at the Crystal Palace, and
had only once been beaten, and to defeat them 2-0 was a great
achievement.

The Ayr and Lanark Battalion of the R.S.F. left us here to form a new
brigade along with the 12th (Norfolk Yeomanry) Battalion; the Norfolk
Regi