soldierly" in
appearance and asked for permission to return them to the Ordnance. But
this was not allowed. The men stood the heat well, though at the
beginning, before they had got accustomed to the change of climate,
there was some dysentery. I myself, a few days after my arrival and
before I had a smasher hat, had a touch of the sun and lay about all day
cursing the flies. But next day I was all right again.

[Footnote 1: Next summer the introduction of mustard gas made it unsafe
to leave our knees uncovered.]

Our rations at this time were a special Anglo-Italian blend; less meat,
bacon, cheese and tea than in the British ration, but macaroni, rice,
coffee, wine and lemons from the Italian. It was a good ration and no
one suffered from eating a little less meat than at home. In order to
check the spread of dysentery, it was ordered by the medical authorities
that no meat was to be eaten at midday.

We were not doing a great deal of firing when I came, though we had
always to be prepared to come suddenly and quickly into action,
especially at night. Most of our prearranged daylight shoots were
observed from an O.P. in a ruined house at S. Andrea, on the plain just
outside Gorizia, where one had a fine view southwards of the Tamburo and
of the whole boundary ridge of the Carso from Dosso Faiti to the Stoll.
Observation was beautifully easy on these high hills and in this clear
air. What worlds away is this country with its wonderful cloudless
sunshine from the dismal flat lands of the Western Front! Said one
enthusiast of ours, "This is a gunner's heaven!" The Austrians fancied,
I think, that we had our O.P. in Vertoiba, which is north of S. Andrea,
for they shelled this frequently, but S. Andrea seldom. They shelled
Vertoiba heavily, I remember, all one afternoon, while I was on duty at
S. Andrea and while the Italian Staff were present in large numbers for
two hours to watch our shooting. I remember thinking what a fine bag
they would have got if they had lifted about four hundred yards! The
Italian Staff were always most complimentary and enthusiastic over the
work of our Batteries.

We had taken part in the Italian May offensive, the results of which had
been claimed by the _Daily Mail,_ with characteristic good taste and
sense of proportion, as a "great Anglo-Italian victory." Our part had
been more justly described by General Cadorna, who in a special Order of
the Day had said that "amid the roar of battle w