ial fact in the form of a
box-body, and in about an hour he was speeding toward Headquarters. It
was dark when they reached the village, and as they entered, he
experienced that curious feeling of apprehensive expectancy with which
one approaches the spot where one is to live and work for some time to
come. The car slowed up to pass some carts on the road, and started
forward with such a jerk that Talbot was precipitated from the back of
the machine into the road. He picked himself up, covered with mud. The
solemn face of the driver did not lessen his discomfiture. Here was a
strange village, strange men, and he was covered with mud!

[Illustration: _Copyright by Underwood & Underwood, N.Y._
A BRITISH TANK AND ITS CREW IN NEW YORK]

Making himself as presentable as possible, Talbot reported to
Headquarters, and was posted to "J" Company, 4th Battalion. That night
he had dinner with them. New men were arriving every few minutes, and
the next day, after he had been transferred to "K" Company, they
continued to arrive. The nucleus of this company were officers of the
original tanks, three or four of them perhaps, and the rest was made
up with the newcomers.

Men continued to arrive in driblets, from the beginning of December to
the first of January. When a new man joins an old regiment there is a
reserve about the others which is rather chilling. They wait to see
whether he is going to fit in, before they make any attempts to fit
him in. In a way, this very aloofness makes for comfort on the part of
the newcomer. At mess, he is left alone until he is absorbed
naturally. It gives him a chance to find his level.

All this was different with the Tank Corps. With the exception of the
very few officers who were "old men," we were all painfully new, so
that we regarded one another without criticism and came to know each
other without having to break through the wall of reserve and
instinctive mistrust which is characteristically British. A happy bond
of good-fellowship was formed immediately.

The first few days were spent in finding billets for the men. They
were finally quartered at a hospice in the village. This was a private
almshouse, in charge of a group of French nuns, where lived a number
of old men and women, most of them in the last stages of consumption.
The Hospice consisted of the old Abbey of Ste. Berthe, built in the
twelfth century, and several outbuildings around a courtyard. In these
barns lived t