red caps, chests of jewels, and lizards in the sun.  I wish there was another ‘Thais.’  The men here are getting a kind of newspaper sheet of literature scraps called The Times Broadsheets.  Snippets, but mostly from good stuff.  They’re small enough to stir the appetite, but not to satisfy it.  Rather an irritant—­and one wants no irritant....  I used to imagine reading was meant to be a stimulant.  Out here it has to be an anodyne....

“Have you heard of a book called ‘Tom Cringle’s Log’?

“War is an exciting game—­that I never wanted to play.  It excites once in a couple of months.  And the rest of it is dirt and muddle and boredom, and smashed houses and spoilt roads and muddy scenery and boredom, and the lumbering along of supplies and the lumbering back of the wounded and weary—­and boredom, and continual vague guessing of how it will end and boredom and boredom and boredom, and thinking of the work you were going to do and the travel you were going to have, and the waste of life and the waste of days and boredom, and splintered poplars and stink, everywhere stink and dirt and boredom....  And all because these accursed Prussians were too stupid to understand what a boredom they were getting ready when they pranced and stuck their chests out and earnt the praises of Mr. Thomas Carlyle.... Gott strafe Deutschland....  So send me some books, books of dreams, books about China and the willow-pattern plate and the golden age and fairyland.  And send them soon and address them very carefully....”

Section 12

Teddy’s misadventure happened while figs were still ripening on Mr. Britling’s big tree.  It was Cissie brought the news to Mr. Britling.  She came up to the Dower House with a white, scared face.

“I’ve come up for the letters,” she said.  “There’s bad news of Teddy, and Letty’s rather in a state.”

“He’s not—?” Mr. Britling left the word unsaid.

“He’s wounded and missing,” said Cissie.

“A prisoner!” said Mr. Britling.

“And wounded. How, we don’t know.”

She added:  “Letty has gone to telegraph.”

“Telegraph to whom?”

“To the War Office, to know what sort of wound he has.  They tell nothing.  It’s disgraceful.”

“It doesn’t say severely?”

“It says just nothing.  Wounded and missing!  Surely they ought to give us particulars.”

Mr. Britling thought.  His first thought was that now news might come at any time that Hugh was wounded and missing.  Then he set himself to persuade Cissie that the absence of “seriously” meant that Teddy was only quite bearably wounded, and that if he was also “missing” it might be difficult for the War Office to ascertain at once just exactly what she wanted to know.  But Cissie said merely that “Letty was in an awful state,” and after Mr. Britling had given her a few instructions