At this period, most of my pals in the regiment used to go into Armentieres or Bailleul, and get a breath of civilized life.  I often wished I felt as they did, but I had just the opposite desire.  I felt that, to adequately stick out what we were going through, it was necessary for me to keep well in the atmosphere, and not to let any exterior influence upset it.

I was annoyed at having to take up this line, but somehow or other I had a feeling that I could not run the war business with a spot of civilization in it.  Personally, I felt that, rather than leave the trenches for our periodic rests, I would sooner have stayed there all the time consecutively, until I could stick it out no longer.

During this after-Christmas rest, however, I so far relapsed from these views as to decide to go into Nieppe to get some money from the Field Cashier.  That was my first fall, but my second was even more strange.  In a truculent tone I said I would ride!

“Smith, go and tell Parker to get my horse ready!” It just shows how reckless warfare makes one.

A beautiful, fine, still afternoon.  I started off.  Enormous success.  I walked and trotted along, past all sorts of wagons, lorries, guns and despatch riders.  Nearly decided to take up hunting, when the time came for me to settle in England once more.  However, as I neared the outskirts of Nieppe, and saw the flood of interlacing traffic, I decided to leave well alone—­to tie this quadruped of mine up at some outlying hostelry and walk the short remaining distance into the town where the cashier had his office.  I found a suitable place and, letting myself down to the ground, strode off with a stiff bandy-legged action to the office.  Having got my 100 francs all right I made the best of my short time on earth by walking about and having a good look at the town.  A squalid, uninteresting place, Nieppe; a dirty red-brick town with a good sprinkling of factory chimneys and orange peel; rather the same tone as one of the Potteries towns in England.  Completing my tour I returned to the horse, and finally, stiff but happy, I glided to the ground in the yard of the Transport Farm.

Encouraged by my success I rode over to dinner one night with one of the Companies in the Battalion which was in billets about a mile and a half away.  Riding home along the flat, winding, water-logged lane by the light of the stars I nearly started off on the poetry lines again, but I got home just in time.

During these rests from the trenches I was sometimes summoned to Brigade Headquarters, where the arch machine gunner dwelt.  He was a captain of much engineering skill, who supervised the entire machine-gun outfit of the Brigade.  New men were being perpetually trained by him, and I was sent for on occasion to discuss the state and strength of my section, or any new scheme that might be on hand.

This going to Brigade Headquarters meant putting on a clean bib, as it were; for it was here that the Brigadier himself lived, and after a machine-gun seance it was generally necessary to have tea in the farm with the Brigade staff.