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troops up to within 20 miles of Heath Robinson, who fires off his gun
every half hour. The troops are quite happy; if anyone grumbles they
are sent up to the trenches, where George Graves and Sarah Bernhardt
let off crackers. The battalion snipers are put in the opposite trench
and told to snipe the trench opposite them. Occasionally they hit a
man, and then there is a casualty list, and some General gets sent
home in disgrace. Gallipoli is another chateau near here.

If you came out in pith helmets the corporation sand cart spreads sand
in front of you, and you are supposed to be in Egypt. To accomplish
The Great Practical Joke, Troops are trained to exercise their
imagination. They begin by being soldiers in blue, and imaginary
uniforms. Then they do arm drill and imagine they have rifles. Then
they do Brigade operations and have an imaginary enemy, get killed by
imaginary shells, shoot with imaginary rifles, fire imaginary
cartridges out of imaginary guns. In the end there is Heath Robinson
and his gun. I can't venture to read this letter over, and I am afraid
no one else will. But my imagination is now so good that I can almost
imagine my little Mother doing so, if no one else has the courage to
do so.

Well the others have returned and common sense is returning, so I must
shut up.

Good night, little Mother, and much love to all,

From your loving Son,
ALEC.

P.S.--I shall soon be home on leave as a lunatic.

11TH SUFFOLKS,
B.E.F., Wednesday, January 12th.

My darling Mother,--

I am beginning letter No. 2, so that, although you will not get it for
a few days, I may add to it occasionally and despatch it to you when
it reaches a decent length, and before it reaches the colossal and
iniquitous verbosity of my former screed--a monologue on the Great
European War.

I finished letter 35 last night. To-day we again spent in improving
our billets. The sailor is always known as the handy man, but I doubt
if he would have a look in even with amateur Tommies like ourselves.
We made scrapers for each barn door out of nothing, mats to scrape our
boots on out of straw, roadways over muddy places out of brushwood and
tins, &c., and incinerators out of mud. We could easily make bricks
without straw.

The G.O.C. inspected o