, after being wounded on Gallipoli and treated in Egypt,
were now returning as fit for duty. One showed a long, white scar
across his scalp, where a bullet had just missed his brain. Another,
who had still two bullets in his body, had been with our
schoolfellow Moles White in the _River Clyde_ on the great April
morning. These were people to be stared at and admired. They
occupied exactly the same position to us as the bloods did when we
were at school. They spoke with ease and grace of Mudros Harbour, of
the great April landing at Helles, of the _Eski Line_, the _River
Clyde_, the _Gully Ravine_, and _Asiatic Annie_. We felt very near
the trenches, when they thus tossed fabled names about in
commonplace conversations. They never used the name "Gallipoli," but
always "The Peninsula." We made a mental note of this.

And they affected very shrewd ideas about the surprise push that was
coming off; but since they only nodded their heads wisely and
refused to be drawn, we suspected that they knew no more about it
than we did. They would point, with the pride of previous knowledge,
to the purple-hilled islands of the AEgean that we were passing all
day: Rhodes, and Patmos, and Mitylene. They laughed with damnable
superiority at our extensive kit, declaring that for their part they
had left everything at the base, and were carrying only a few pounds
of necessaries to the Peninsula. Some of them walked the deck in
private's uniform, maintaining that it was suicide to go to the
Peninsula trenches in the distinctive dress of an officer. They were
quite modest, simple folk, no doubt, but they certainly thought they
were the only people who realised that there was a war on.

Jimmy Doon, who had heard nothing of his lost draft at Alexandria,
and was much relieved thereby, became incorrigible when he smelt the
whiff of the trenches brought by these heroes. He would invite our
subscriptions to the daily sweepstake with the words: "Come along,
fork out. Last few sweeps of your life." And he would take me aside
and say: "I suppose I shall be daisy-pushing soon. Tedious, isn't
it?"

Late one afternoon, when we were only an hour's run from Mudros,
there came by wireless the inspiring news that solved the riddle of
the chain of transports in the Mediterranean and the empty hospitals
in Alexandria. The simple typed message that was pinned on the
notice-board, and could scarcely be read for the crowds surrounding
it, ran: "_We have lande