The difficulty of obtaining sufficient exercise was very great at times.  We only held a piece of territory under a square mile in extent, and none of it was free from shell or rifle-fire, so that our perambulations were carried on under difficulty.  Major Meikle and I had our regular walk before breakfast.  At first we went down the beach towards Gaba Tepe, and then sat for a while talking and trying to see what we could see; but a sniper apparently used to watch for us, for we were invariably saluted by the ping of a rifle in the distance and the dust of the bullet in close proximity to our feet.  We concluded that, if we continued to walk in this direction someone would be getting hurt, so our walks were altered to the road round “Pluggey’s Plateau.”  We were seated there one morning when our howitzer in the gully was fired, and we felt that the shell was not far from where we sat.  We went down to the Battery, and I interrogated some of the gunners.  “How far off the top of that hill does that shell go?” said I.  “About a yard, sir,” replied the man; “one time we hit it.”  I asked him if it would be convenient for the battery to elevate a bit if we were sitting there again.

POST OFFICE

The postal arrangements on the whole were good, considering the circumstances under which the mails were handled.  It was always a matter of interest for all of us when we saw mail-bags in the barges, whether or no we were to participate in the good luck of receiving letters.  And here I might make the suggestion to correspondents in Australia to send as many snap-shot photos. as possible.  They tell more than a letter, for one can see how the loved ones are looking.  Papers were what we needed most, and we got very few indeed of these.  I wrote home once that I was fortunate in having a paper to read that had been wrapped round greasy bacon.  This was a positive fact.  We were up the gully at the advance dressing station, and a machine gun was playing right down the position.  Four men were killed and six wounded right in front of us, so that it was not prudent to leave until night fell.  It was then that reading matter became so necessary.  The paper was the Sydney Morning Herald and contained an advertisement stating that there was a vacancy for two boarders at Katoomba; I was an applicant for the vacancy.  The Bulletin was a God-send when it arrived, as was Punch.  Norman Morris occasionally got files of the Newcastle Morning Herald, which he would hand on to us, as there were a lot of men from the Newcastle district in the Ambulance.  Later on it was possible to register a small parcel in the Field Post Office—­for home.

SANITARY ARRANGEMENTS

In order to keep the health of the troops good it was necessary to be exceedingly careful in the matter of sanitation.  Lieutenant-Colonel Millard was the Sanitary Officer for our Division, and Lieutenant-Colonel Stokes for the 1st Australian Division.