cheerful resignation than the others. Undoubtedly it is a decided trait
of the British character never to be cast down when brought face to face
with disaster. Our boys were quite as resourceful as Major Bach,
although in the opposite direction--to keep ourselves alive. Whenever
any of us went out and came within reach of a field growing vegetable
crops we did not hesitate to raid it. Supplies of raw carrots, onions,
potatoes, turnips and any other roots in the edible line were smuggled
into the barracks. Late at night, after all lights had been extinguished
and we were supposed to be asleep, we were sitting up munching quietly
away at these spoils of war with as much gusto and enthusiasm as if
enjoying a _table d'hote_ dinner in the luxury of a crack West End
hotel.

One day one of our party came in with a cucumber. Where or how he had
got it we never knew, and what is more we did not trouble to enquire.
The fact that we had come into possession of a dainty sufficed. We fell
upon it with a relish which it is impossible to describe. It was divided
among us in accordance with our accepted communal practice, and I do not
think any article which we secured in Sennelager was ever eaten with
such wholehearted enjoyment as that cucumber. But the incident was not
free from its touch of pathos. When we sat down to the cucumber we
carefully peeled it and threw the rind away. Two days later two others
and myself set out to recover that cucumber rind which had been
discarded, the pinch about the waist-belt having become insistent. We
found it, soiled and shrivelled, but we ate it ravenously.

Major Bach may have wondered why the British civil prisoners did not
reveal signs of semi-starvation so readily as those of other
nationalities. But we had long since discovered that it was useless to
go about the camp with long faces and the bearing of the "All-is-Lost
Brigade." We were almost entirely dependent upon our own ingenuity to
keep ourselves alive, and we succeeded. The methods adopted may be
criticised, but in accordance with the inexorable first law of Nature we
concluded that the end justified any means.

CHAPTER XII

THE REIGN OF TERROR--CONTINUED

While for the most part we had been compelled to labour upon sundry
duties, we were not hard pushed, being somewhat in the position of the
workmen toiling by the hour, except that our efforts went unrewarded in
a financial sense. But this system did not coincide with