ovely
that it should be chronicled in deathless verse. But we gaze at the
glassy sea and turn to the deep blue cloudless sky, victory our only
thought.

Colonel Dick, King's Messenger, has arrived bringing letters up to 3rd
instant. Or rather, he was supposed to have brought them, and it was
hoped the abundance of his intelligence would have borne some relation
to the cost of his journey,--about L80 it has been reckoned. As a matter
of fact, apart from some rubbish, he brings _one_ letter for me; none
for any of the others. Not even a file of newspapers; not even a
newspaper! In India many, many years ago, we used to call Dick _Burra
dik hai_, Hindustani for, _it is a great worry_. So he is only playing
up to his sobriquet. The little ewe lamb is an epistle from Fitz giving
me a lively sketch of the rumpus at the War Office when its pontiffs
grasped for the first time the true bearing of their own orders. There
was a rush to saddle poor us with the delay as soon as the Cabinet began
to show impatience. They seem to have expected the 29th Division to
arrive at top speed in a united squadron to rush straightway ashore.
They don't yet quite realise, I daresay, that not one of their lovely
ships has yet put in an appearance. That the men who packed the
transports and fixed their time tables should say we are too slow is
hardly playing the game.

Never lose your hair: that is a good soldier's motto. My cable of last
night, wherein I tried to calm their minds by telling them the sea was
rough and that, even if every one had been here with gaiter buttons
complete, I must have waited for a change in the weather, has answered
Fitz's letter by anticipation.

Worked all day in my office like a nigger and by mid-day had got almost
as black as my simile! We are coaling and life has grown dark and noisy.
In the middle of it, Ashmead-Bartlett came aboard to see me. He has his
quarters on the _Queen Elizabeth_ as one of the Admiralty authorised
Press Correspondents, or rather, as the only authorised correspondent.
In Manchuria he was known and his writing was well liked. When he had
gone, de Robeck and I put through a good lot of business very smoothly.
A little later on, Captain Ivanoff, commanding H.I.M.S. _Askold_, (a
Russian cruiser well-known to fame in Manchurian days), did me the
honour to call.

After lunch went ashore and saw parties of Australians at embarking and
disembarking drill. Colonel Paterson, the very man who be