fire, for the stoves were going, and we
made our mulligan and boiled water for tea on them.

Our guards were ordinary soldiers--sometimes those who had been
wounded or were sick and were now convalescent--and we had all sorts.
Usually the N.C.O.'s were the more severe. The privates did not
bother much about us: they had troubles enough of their own.

At the school garden, where the Commandant lived, I went to work one
day, and made the acquaintance of his little son, a blue-eyed cherub
of four or five years, who addressed me as "Englisches Schwein,"
which was, I suppose, the way he had heard his father speak of us. He
did it quite without malice, though, and no doubt thought that was
our proper name. He must have thought the "Schwein" family rather a
large one!

* * *

It was about May, I think, that a letter came from my brother Flint,
telling me he was sending me some of the "cream cheese I was so fond
of"--and I knew my compass was on the way.

In about three weeks the parcel came, and I was careful to open the
cheese when alone. The lead foil had every appearance of being
undisturbed, but in the middle of it I found the compass!

After that we talked over our plans for escape. Edwards and I were
the only Canadians in the camp, and we were determined to make a
break as soon as the nights got longer. In the early summer, when the
daylight lasts so long, we knew we should have no chance, for there
were only four or five hours of darkness, but in August we hoped to
"start for home."

CHAPTER XIX

THE BLACKEST CHAPTER OF ALL

When the days were at their longest, some of the Russians who had
been working for the farmers came into camp, refusing to go back
because the farmers made them work such long hours. There is
daylight-saving in Germany, which made the rising one hour earlier,
and the other end of the day was always the "dark." This made about a
seventeen-hour day, and the Russians rebelled against it. The farmers
paid so much a day (about twenty-five cents) and then got all the
work out of the prisoners they could; and some of them were worked
unmercifully hard, and badly treated.

Each night, a few Russians, footsore, weary, and heavy-eyed from lack
of sleep, trailed into camp with sullen faces, and we were afraid
there was going to be trouble.

On the night of July 3d, three tired Russians came into camp from
the farms they had been working on after we had had our supper.