Chorus.

    “With our rifles,” etc.

Our colonel sang this song at a concert, thus showing the democratic nature of the New Army, where a colonel sings the songs written in the ranks of his own battalion.

At the ten minutes’ halt which succeeded the first hour’s march, my Jersey friend spoke to me again.  “Aren’t there stars!” he said, turning his face to the heavens and gripping his rifle tightly as if for support.  His wide open eyes seemed to have grown in size, and were full of an expression I had never seen in them before.  “I like the stars,” he remarked, “they’re so wonderful.  And to think that men are killing each other now, this very minute!” He clanked the butt of his gun on the ground and toyed with the handle of his sword.

Hour after hour passed by; under the light of the moon the country looked beautiful; every pond showed a brilliant face to the heavens, light mists seemed to hover over every farmhouse and cottage; light winds swept through the telegraph wires; only the woods looked dark, and there the trees seemed to be hugging the darkness around them.

On our way back a sharp shower, charged with a penetrating cold, fell.  The waterproof ground-sheets were unrolled, and we tied them over our shoulders.  When the rain passed, the water falling in drops from our equipment glittered so brightly that it put the polished swords and brilliant rifle butt-plates to shame.

We stole into the town at midnight, when nearly all the inhabitants were abed.  With arms at the trail, we marched along, throwing off company after company, at the streets where they billeted.  The battalion dwindled down slowly; my party came to a halt, and the order “Dismiss!” was given, and we went to our billets.  The Jersey youth came with me to my doorstep.

“’Twas a grand march!” he remarked.

“Fine,” I replied.

“I can’t help looking at the stars!” he said as he moved off.  “There are a lot to-night.  And to think—­” He hesitated, with the words trembling on his tongue, realising that he was going to repeat himself.  “Anyway, there’s some stars,” he said in a low voice.  “Good night!”

There is a peculiar glamour about all night work.  The importance of night manoeuvring was emphasised in the South African War, and we had ample opportunities of becoming accustomed to the darkness.  On one occasion at about nine o’clock we swung out from the town with our regimental pipe-band playing to pursue some night operations.  So far the men did not know what task had been assigned to them.

“We’ve got to do to-night’s work as quiet as a growing mushroom,” someone whispered to me, as we took our way off the road and lined up in the field that, stretching out in front and flanks, lost itself in formless mistiness under the loom of the encircling hedgerows.  Here and there in the distance trees stand up gaunt and bare, holding out their leafless branches as if in supplication to the grey sky; a slight whisper of wind moaned along the ground and died away in the darkness.