to their original units as
substantive lieutenants.

And now all are gone, some home to England to write for _The Times_
(Appointments Required column) and some to watch the Rhine and see that
it gets up to no irregularities, such as running the wrong way or dry.
Here, on the fringe of the old battle-grounds, only the merest handful
of us remain, deserted by the field armies, apparently forgotten by the
management.

It has happened before. Bob, our Camp Commandant, swears that a
battalion of his regiment, while garrisoning some ocean isle, got
mislaid for years and years, and they would have been there to this day,
chatting to the crabs and watering the palm-trees with their tears, if
some junior subaltern had not sent his birthday-book to KITCHENER with
the request that the Field-Marshal would inscribe some verses therein.

Occasionally the boom of explosions coming from the devastated areas
tells us that our brave allies the Chinese are still on deck, salvaging
ammunition after their own unique fashion of rapping shells smartly over
the nose-caps with sledge-hammers to test whether they be really duds or
no.

Although a very courageous man, I do not linger in their whereabouts
unless I have to. I don't follow their line of thought. One of them
unearthed a MILLS bomb the other day. It gave off blue smoke and fizzed
prettily. When last seen he was holding it to the ear of a chum, who was
smiling entrancedly, as a child smiles at the croon of a conch-shell.

By the way, whilst we are on the subject, who is this MILLS? The
illustrated papers have shown us THE MAN WHO WON THE WAR, the
thousand-and-one sole and only inventors of Tinribs the Tank; their
prattle-pages are crammed daily with portraits of war-worn flag-sellers,
heroic O.B.E.'s, and so on; but what of our other benefactors, the names
of whom are far more familiar to the average Atkins than are those of
the Twelve Apostles or his own Generals? I confess, to a great desire
to behold the features of Mr. MILLS, the bombster (I picture him a
benevolent-looking old gentleman with a flowing white beard), Mr. STOKES
of the gun, Mrs. AYRTON of the gas-fan, and Messrs. ARMSTRONG and
NISSEN, the hutters. Can no enterprising picture-paper supply the want?

But to return to ourselves. With the exception of the faithful
Celestial, the land is empty of human interest. The roads that once
rumbled unceasingly with wheels and swarmed with merry men now run bare
under a sad