, besides hundreds of copies of two or
three more general small-scale sheets; nevertheless, the consignment
was on its way before midnight. A day or two later G.H.Q. wired for
maps as far back as Orleans, a day or two later, again, for maps as
far as the mouth of the Loire, and yet a day or two later, for maps
down to Bordeaux--this last request representing thousands of sheets.
But on each occasion the demand was met within a few hours and without
the slightest hitch. It was a remarkable achievement--an achievement
attributable in part to military foresight dating back to the days
when Messrs. Asquith, Lloyd George, Churchill and Co., either
deliberately or else as a result of sheer ignorance and ineptitude,
were deceiving their countrymen as to the gravity of the German
menace, an achievement attributable also in part to military
administrative efficiency of a high order in a time of crisis. The
Topographical Section, it should be added, was able to afford highly
appreciated assistance to our French and Belgian allies in the matter
of supplying them with maps of their own countries.

During the first two or three weeks after fighting started, waifs and
strays who had been run over by the Boches, but who had picked
themselves up somehow and had fetched up at the coast, used to turn up
at the War Office and to find their way to my department. For some
reason or other they always presented themselves after dinner--like
the coffee. The first arrival was a young cavalry officer, knocked
off his horse in the preliminary encounters by what had evidently
been the detonation of a well-pitched-up high-explosive, and who was
still suffering from a touch of what we now know as shell-shock. He
proved to be the very embodiment of effective military training,
because, although he was to the last degree vague as to how he had got
back across the Channel and only seemed to know that he had had a bath
at the Cavalry Club, he was able to give most useful and detailed
information as to what he had noted after recovering consciousness
while making his way athwart the German trains and troops in reserve
as they poured along behind Von Kluck's troops in front line. One
observed the same thing in the case of another cavalry officer who
arrived some days later, after a prolonged succession of tramps by
night from the Sambre to Ostend. "You'll sleep well to-night," I
remarked when thanking him for the valuable information that he had
been abl