The rain ceased, and the steady grey sky broke a little as we marched on, still in silence, and by this time thirsty and a little dazed.  A ravine opened in a bare plateau, and we saw that it held a little village.  They led us into it, down a short steep bit of road, and lined us up by a great basin of sparkling water, and every man was mad to break ranks and drink; but no one dared.  The children of the village gathered in a little group and looked at us, and we envied their freedom.  When we had stood thus for a quarter of an hour or so, an orderly came riding in all splashed, and his horse’s coat rough with the rain and steaming up into the air.  He came up to the lieutenant in command and delivered an order; then he rode away fast northward along the ravine and out of the village.  The lieutenant, when he had gone, formed us into a little column, and we, who had expected to dismiss at any moment, were full of anger, and were sullen to find that by some wretched order or other we had to take another hour of the road:  first we had to go back four miles along the road we had already come, and then to branch off perpendicular to our general line of march, and (as it seemed to us) quite out of our way.

It is a difficult thing to move a great mass of men through a desolate country by small units and leave them dependent on the country, and it is rather wonderful that they do it so neatly and effect the junctions so well; but the private soldier, who stands for those little black blocks on the military map, has a boy’s impatience in him; and a very wise man, if he wishes to keep an army in spirit, will avoid counter-marching as much as he can, for—­I cannot tell why—­nothing takes the heart out of a man like having to plod over again the very way he has just come.  So, when we had come to a very small village in the waste and halted there, finding our guns and drivers already long arrived, we made an end of a dull and meaningless day—­very difficult to tell of, because the story is merely a record of fatigue.  But in a diary of route everything must be set down faithfully; and so I have set down all this sodden and empty day.

That night I sat at a peasant’s table and heard my four stable-companions understanding everything, and evidently in their world and at home, although they were conscripts.  This turned me silent, and I sat away from the light, looking at the fire and drying myself by its logs.  As I heard their laughter I remembered Sussex and the woods above Arun, and I felt myself to be in exile.  Then we slept in beds, and the goodwife had our tunics dry by morning, for she also had a son in the service, who was a long way off at Lyons, and was not to return for two years.

* * * * *

There are days in a long march when a man is made to do too much, and others when he is made to do what seems meaningless, doubling backward on his road, as we had done; there are days when he seems to advance very little; but they are not days of repose, for they are full of halting and doubts and special bits of work.  Such a day had come to us with the next dawn.