gulations at home. All along the line there was a continuous stream of
refugees of all nations and races--poor, hunted creatures who had
horrible stories to tell of the ravages of the Bulgar and the atrocities
of the Bolsheviki. At one place the Serbian women and children got the
breakfast of my men, the Tommies refusing to eat until the kiddies had
been satisfied. And the pathetic homage they paid to our flag when they
discovered it was the flag of England! I shall never forget some of the
scenes which showed us also the wonderful trust the struggling
nationalities of the world have in the power, humanity and honour of our
country. It is a priceless possession for the world which Englishmen
must for ever jealously guard.

Through apparently never-ending uplands we entered the great range which
forms the natural boundary between China and Siberia. On and on, through
mountain gorge and fertile valley, we broke at length out on to the wide
open plains of Manchuria. Perhaps it could be best described as a
combination of all the most wonderful scenery in the world. It is
somewhat difficult to keep three huge trains of over forty trucks each
together on a single line. This, however, had to be done, first for
purposes of safety, and secondly for defence in the then lawless state
of the country. The next difficulty was transport. Horses had to be
watered, and if they were to be ready for use the train must stop and
the animals be exercised every fourth day. Hence much scheming and
management had to be exercised for the journey to be successfully
carried through.

I saw much about the "hidden hand" in the newspapers we received from
home, but our experiences of the same character were sometimes amusing
and sometimes serious. The railway was under a sort of joint control,
Russian, American and Japanese, and it soon became clear that one or the
other of these groups was unfriendly to our western advance. It may have
been all, but of that I have no proof. The first incident was a stop of
four hours. After the first two hours a train passed us that had been
following behind; after another two hours, when slightly more vigorous
inquiries were being made as to the cause of delay, we were quite
naively informed that the station-master did not think we ought to risk
going farther. We soon informed him to the contrary, and again started
forward. The next stop of this character was at a fairly big station
about twenty hours from Harbin.