in a very
happy condition, for they had hardly any officers left and had been
extremely uncomfortable for the last week, being hauled out of their
barns on most nights and made to sleep in the wet open as supports in
case of attack.

Our orders were, together with the 15th R.F.A. Brigade, to move north
and concentrate near Strazeele and Pradelles, where we were to go into
rest for five or six days.

I knew those rests.

So after handing over to Macbean at 10.30 A.M., and talking to General
Anderson (commanding the Indian Division) and the Maharajah of
Bikanir,[15] we made devoutly thankful tracks in the direction of
Locon and Merville.

[Footnote 15: I was struck with his wonderful command of
English--not the trace of any accent.]

We were but a small part of the 15th Brigade after all who left the
environs of Festubert on that morning--only Headquarters, a very weak
battalion of Cheshires--not more than 300 all told--and two companies
of Bedfords. The remains of the Dorsets had been ordered to join us
about Strazeele, and the whole of the Norfolks and half the Bedfords
were left in the trenches to give a bit of moral and physical support
to the Indians. I did not at all like being parted from them, but
there was no help for it. The West Ridings (Duke of Wellington's) were
attached to me from the 13th Brigade, but that did not make up for the
absence of one and a half of my own beloved battalions.

Nevertheless it was with a feeling of extreme thankfulness that we
left the horrible mud-plain of Festubert and Givenchy, with its cold
wet climate and its swampy surroundings and its dismal memories, for
both Dorsets and Cheshires had suffered terribly in the fighting here.
And the pleasantest feeling was to hear the noise of the bursting
shells grow less and ever less as we worked north-westwards, and to
realise that for the present, at all events, we need not worry about
Jack Johnsons or Black Marias and all their numerous smaller brethren,
nor to keep our attention on the tense strain for bad news from the
firing trenches, but that we could, for several days to come, sleep
quietly, not fully dressed and on our beds or straw with one eye on
the wake all night, but in our blessed beds and in our still more
beloved pyjamas.

We trotted on ahead over the cold, wet, muddy, level roads of those
parts, with a welcome break for luncheon at a real live estaminet,
till we got to Merville, and then we sl