A mess fashioned
out of stone-blocks hewn from the quarry, perfectly cut and perfectly
laid. Six-inch girders to support the concrete roof, and an underground
passage as a funk-hole from bombs, shells, and gas. Separate
strong-room bedrooms for the officers; and some one had had time to
paint on the doors, "O.C., R.F.A. Brigade," "Adjutant," "Intelligence
Officer, R.F.A.," and "Signal Officer, R.F.A.," with proper
professional skill. Electric light laid on to all these quarters, and
to the Brigade office and the signallers' underground chamber. Aladdin
didn't enjoy a more gorgeous eye-opener on his first tour of his
palace.

"Never seen such headquarters," grinned the adjutant. "Wonder why
there's no place for the Divisional Band."

I shall never forget the content of the next week. The way from Brigade
H.Q., past the batteries and up to the front line, was over a wide
rolling country of ploughed and fallow lands, of the first wild
flowers, of budding hedgerows, of woods in which birds lilted their
spring songs. The atmosphere was fresh and redolent of clean earth; odd
shell-holes you came across were, miracle of miracles, grass-grown--a
sight for eyes tired with the drab stinking desolation of Flanders. A
more than spring warmth quickened growing things. White tendrils of
fluff floated strangely in the air, and spread thousands of soft
clinging threads over telephone-wires, tree-tops, and across miles of
growing fields--the curious output of myriads of spinning-spiders.
There were quaintly restful visits to the front line. The Boche was a
mile away at least; and when you were weary of staring through
binoculars, trying to spot enemy movement, you could sit and lounge,
and hum the rag-time "Wait and See the Ducks go by," with a new and
very thorough meaning. The signal officer was away doing a course, and
I took on his duties: plenty of long walks and a good deal of labelling
to do, but the task was not onerous. "We've only had one wire down
through shell-fire since we've been here," the signalling officer of
the outgoing brigade had told me: and indeed, until March 21, the
telephone-wires to batteries and "O.P.'s" remained as undisturbed as if
they had skirted Devonshire fields and lanes. The colonel was quite
happy, spending two or three hours a day at O.P.'s, watching our guns
register, or do a bit of sniping on the very very rare occasions when a
Hun was spotted.

"I can see how the subalterns shoot on a big ope