I stepped forward to ascertain that I was being called by two or three compatriots whom I had left behind at Sennelager, but who had afterwards been released on “pass” and re-rounded up as aliens.  I returned the greeting hilariously, upon which one of the British prisoners, who was remarkably agile, swarmed the bars, and poised thus above his comrades, was emulating the strange and amusing antics of a monkey at the Zoological Gardens, thereby conveying by his actions that he and his friends were caged after the manner of our simian prizes at home.

The cells were indeed cages, as I discovered upon closer inspection, and recalled nothing so much as parrot cages upon a large scale.  All sides were barred in the self-same manner so that from any point one could see every corner of the cell and discover what the inmate or rather inmates were doing, because each cell was really six cells in one.  The cage was rectangular in plan, each cell measuring about seven feet in length by three feet in width, and fairly high.  But it was the internal arrangement of the cell which struck me.  In plan it was set out something like the following:—­

[Illustration]

The middle gangway A not only served as the approach to the sub-divisions or cells B on either side, but also constituted the space occupied by the prisoners during the day.  Each of the sub-divisions was large enough to receive a bed and nothing else.  There was only sufficient space to stand beside the couch.  Upon retiring for the night the prisoner was compelled to disrobe in the central space or gangway A, then, picking up his clothes he had to sidle round the door and climb over his bed to get into it.  In the morning, upon rising, he either had to stand upon his bed to dress or to come out into the central gangway, the space beside his bed being scarcely sufficient to permit free movement.

Normally, I suppose, each cell or cage is designed to receive six prisoners, one to each sub-division, in which event circulation in the dividing open space would be possible.  But the facilities of Klingelputz were so taxed at the time that every morning further prisoners were brought from the masonry cells below and locked in this open space for the day.  The result was considerable overcrowding, there being no fewer than twenty-six men in one of the cages including some of our fellow-countrymen from Sennelager upon the day I entered.  But the men from the latter camp happened to be some of the most irrepressible spirits among us.  They considered it to be huge fun to swing and climb about the bars like monkeys, and their quaint antics and badinage kept their comrades buoyant.