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lasted only a minute. Towards dawn we turned into a farm, and for about two hours I slept in a pigsty. I noticed the same thing about that farm that I’d noticed about most French farms. That was, although they seemed more intensively cultivated than English, farms, the farm implements were very old-fashioned.
    September 5th
– Early on this morning reinforcements from England joined us, and the difference in their appearance and ours was amazing. They looked plump, clean, tidy, and very wide-awake. Whereas we were filthy, thin, and haggard. Most of us had beards; what equipment was left was torn; instead of boots we had puttees, rags, old shoes, field boots – anything and everything wrapped round our feet. Our hats were the same, women’s hats, peasants’ hats, caps, any old covering, while our trousers were mostly in ribbons. The officers were in a similar condition.
    After the reserves joined we marched about twenty miles to a place called Chaumes, It was crowded with staff officers. We bivouacked in a park, and then had an order read to us that the men who had kept their overcoats were to dump them, as we were to advance at any moment. Strangely, a considerable amount of cheering took place then.
    I discovered that the company I was in covered 251 miles in the Retreat from Mons, which finished on September 5th, 1914.
    Corporal Bernard John Denore, 1st Royal Berks Regt., 6th Brigade, 2nd Division, 1 Army Corps. In Action at Battle of and Retreat from Mons; Battle of the Marne; the Aisne (about two months); First Battle of Ypres; in the Salient four weeks. Wounded at Zonnebeke (in seven places); in hospital at Boulogne, London and Reading
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AN OLD CONTEMPTIBLE AT LE CATEAU
R. G. Hill
    On August 5th, 1914, I reported to my regimental depot, being an Army Reservist. What a meeting of old friends! All were eager to take part in the great scrap which every pre-war soldier had expected. At the depot all was bustle, but no confusion. In the mobilization stores, every reservist’s arms and clothing were ticketed, and these were soon issued, with webbing equipment. About 300 men were then selected and warned to hold themselves in readiness to proceed to the South Coast to make up the war strength of the battalion stationed there. There was great competition to go with this draft, the writer being one of the lucky ones to be selected.
    We entrained next morning. Then another meeting with old chums. That night, bully, biscuits, emergency rations, and ammunition, were issued. Surplus kit was handed in and next night the battalion entrained for an unknown destination. We eventually arrived in Yorkshire, and, after a fortnight’s strenuous training, left for the South of England again, to join our division. By this time we had welded together, and were a really fine body of men, hard as nails, average age about twenty-five, and every man with the idea that he was equal to three Germans! Splendid men, enthusiastic, and brave, going to fight, they thought, for a righteous cause.
    We embarked for France and landed at Boulogne on the morning of August 23rd. What a contrast between us and the slip-shod undersized French territorials who were guarding the docks. In their baggy red trousers and long blue coats, they looked like comic-opera soldiers. We looked smart in our new khaki, and training had made us broad-chested and clean-looking. We disembarked and marched through the narrow streets of Boulogne singing popular songs. The enthusiasm of the French people was unbounded. They broke our ranks to shower gifts upon us, and many a blushing Tommy was kissed by men and women. A few hours in camp, where we had to be guarded by gendarmes to save us from excited female admirers, and we entrained, leaving buttons and badges behind as souvenirs. A tedious journey in horse trucks followed. The line was littered with empty bully tins and Woodbine packets, showing that British troops had passed that way before.
    We detrained just outside Le