So we spent the next days making our Christmas preparations, determined to keep the feast.  We decorated the sand-bag cabin—­oh, yes!  Over the pictures of our people, pinned to the sand-bag walls, we placed sprigs of a small-leaf holly that grew on the Peninsula.  We planted the little fir in a disused petrol-tin, and, after a visit to the canteen, decorated it with boxes of Turkish delight, sticks of chocolate, packets of chewing-gum, oranges, lemons, soap, and bits of Government candles.  It was a Christmas tree of some distinction.  And mistletoe?  No, we couldn’t find any mistletoe, but then, as Monty said, it would have no point on Gallipoli, there being no—­just so; when we should be home again for Christmas of next year, we would claim an extra kiss for 1915.

“Pest!  Rupert,” exclaimed Monty, “we’ve forgotten to send any Christmas cards.  To work at once!”

We sat down at the tiny table and cut notepaper into elegant shapes, sticking on it little bits of Turkish heather, and printing beneath:  “A Slice of Turkey” (which we thought a very happy jest); “Heather from Invaded Enemy Territory.  Are we downhearted?  NO!  Are we going to win?  YES!”

And by luck there arrived a parcel from Mother with a cake.  Of plum pudding we despaired, till one fine morning there came a present (half a pound per man) of that excellent comestible from the Daily News (whom the gods preserve and prosper).

“All is now ready,” proclaimed Monty.

Christmas Day dawned beautiful in sky and atmosphere.  It would have been as mild and gracious as a windless June day had not the Turk, nervous lest these dogs of Christians should celebrate their festival with any untoward activity, opened at daylight a prophylactic bombardment.

We stood in the dug-out door and watched the shells dropping.

“Does it strike you, Rupert,” asked Monty, making a grimace, “that Old-Man-Turk has more guns firing than ever before?”

“Yes,” I answered.  “The guns from Suvla have come.”

The words were no sooner out of my mouth than a shell shrieking into our own cookhouse, drove us like rabbits into the dug-out.

“Does it strike you, Rupert,” said Monty, “that Turk Pasha has some pals with him who are firing heavier shells than ever before?”

“Yes,” said I.  “The Germans have come.”

Sec.3

The afternoon we devoted to preparations for the feast of the evening.  We laid the table.  There was a water-proof ground-sheet for the cloth.  There were little holly branches stuck in tobacco tins.  And there were candles in plenty (for they were a Government issue, and we could be free with them).  At Monty’s suggestion, who maintained that the family must be gathered at the Christmas board, we placed photographs of our people on the table.  There was a picture of Monty’s sister and (for shame, Monty! fie upon you for keeping it dark so long) the picture of somebody else’s sister.  There was the portrait of my mother, and oh! in a silent moment, I had nearly placed on the table the dear face of Edgar Doe, but, instead, I put it back in my pocket, saying nothing to Monty, and feeling guilty of a lapse.