THE YPRES TIMES
46
threatened. One of our captainsa certain Honourablepresently appeared from
the seclusion of the officers' quarters, and after making some very tactless remarks
had to beat a hasty retreat as the men looked like mobbing him. I may say I have
related this event from hearsay, as it did not occur in my platoon. And I am
anxious to finish with the baseI hated it. Before leaving for the front a
sergeant-major told us we would be better off up the line, and he never said a truer
thing, despite the perils that surrounded us. If there were horrors and hardships
we felt we were taking a more serious part in the war.
Ex-service men will remember something of the system of feeding and ration
ing, although it may have varied in different units according to circumstances.
Each tent or hut or section of platoon appointed two men as orderlies for the day,
these men receiving warning of this the previous night from their corporal.
In the very early hourssay, at 3.30 a.m.the camp orderly made his round,
rousing the men, not by the blowing of the bagpipes, as at places on the home front,
but by quietly projecting his head in at the door and speaking in a loud whisper
lest his voice should penetrate to where enemy aircraft may have been
hoveringCorporal," he would say, half past threesee these men get up."
A Réveille given in this way every morning became stereotyped and mono
tonous. Only, in this instance, it wasn't without a humorous aspect, as the corporal
was usually about the last man to get to his feet, which prompted a wag one
morning to repeat the corporal's order in the reverse way. Men," he shouted,
half past threesee that corporal gets up."
Of course, the first to jump to the summons were the orderlies for the day
for time was short. We had to be on parade in half an hour. I am thinking now
of the winter of 1917-18 spent at Dickebusch; of those dark hours of the morning
groping along towards the cookhouse and stumbling back again carrying in each
hand a heavy dixie to the brim with tea. Meanwhile, the other man would be
slithering along in the mud, a platter of fried bacon grasped in his arms, the two of
us, no doubt, looking as if we were on roller skates. A slip on the part of either
would have been serious. It is the case that such a thing did occur to one man,
but, by the aid of a lighted match the pieces of bacon were rescued from the soft
Flanders soil. On returning to the hut that man's name was, in a very special
sense, Mud.
It was then the hut orderly's job to pour the tea into, the men's mess-tins
ranged ready on the floor, and each man received a piece of bacon to eat with his
ration of bread. The consumption of breakfast was often attended with diffi
culties. In the midst of it a second visit from the camp orderly was no uncommon
thing. Blow out these candles," he would say; enemy aircraft about." And
breakfast, eaten off the floor, was often finished in inky darkness. Thereafter we
moved noiselessly into the open where, to more commands eerily whispered, we
lined up and tiptoed off to duty like a platoon of ghosts.
In these days we were back again in camp by ten in the morning, and our
principal meal was usually ready some time about midday. For this meal all the
camp orderlies were paraded before the cookhouse door. 'Shun," roared the
cookhouse sergeant, Right turn," and we were marched through an atmosphere
smelling strongly of stew and out by another door lifting up as we went the appro
priate dixies and platters. Despite all this ceremony, however, dinner was always
less acceptable than tea. The big meal was invariably stewand greasy at that.
Occasionally it was followed by rice-pudding, with the sugar left out. At times
the rice was changed for what looked like or was shaped like a roly-poly. Its main
