was quite impossible to obtain transport of any
kind for my stores, so I gave what remained to the R.A.M.C. for walking
wounded cases, of which I had supplied several during the day.

'Then we made a "night-flitting," the orderlies and myself, and slept a
few miles to the S.W. But with every step away from the hut I became
more and more uncomfortable. By daybreak I had decided to return and see
how things were going. The orderlies decided to accompany me.

'On the way back we had to take cover once for a while, but finally
reached the hut and carried on for the remainder of the day.

'We were called several kinds of lunatics for returning by the Medical
Staff, who were then preparing to leave, and be it confessed we felt the
truth of their remarks. It was quite out of the question to hold on any
longer without cover save a "tin-hat" a-piece, so again we evacuated,
this time finally.'

It was only when the grey-clad Germans were actually in sight that the
workers at St. Leger left their loved Y.M.C.A. I only visited St. Leger
once, but that little shanty strangely fascinated me. It was not much
to look at, just a group of ruined farm buildings, and in it 'the
swallows had found a house' and regardless of our presence, yes,
regardless of the shells, for St. Leger was bombarded every day even
then, they flew backwards and forwards, feeding their young and
twittering merrily and unconcernedly as if it had been a farm building
in one of our English counties. It must have been with a heavy heart
that those Y.M.C.A. men turned their backs on St. Leger and trudged to
Boisleaux-au-Mont, where the five splendid huts that formed our
equipment shortly afterwards shared the fate of St. Leger, and were all
destroyed before the advance of the Huns.

At Boyelles the tent was amid the ruins by the roadside, and the
enamelled Triangle sign was attached to the bottom of the trunk of a
tree that had been cut down by the enemy and was lying in the hedge
just as it fell. Achiet-le-Petit Y.M.C.A. was in an orchard, the
equipment consisting of a big marquee and several little shanties
ingeniously constructed by the workers from empty petrol cans and
biscuit boxes. High up in an elm tree was a sort of crow's nest, used by
the Germans as an observation post during the time of their occupation.
At Haplincourt the Y.M.C.A. was anything but imposing--an insignificant
house fitted up as a club room, but in the paddock behind it the
secretaries