ad got to the stores there was nothing left, and we had to go
hungry.

Somewhere about 4 A.M. I came on Sir C. F. standing at the
cross-roads near Nauroy. I naturally asked him where we were to retire
on; but he had not recently received any definite orders himself; so
after talking it over we came to the conclusion that our best line
would be on St Quentin, and we directed the men, as they came up--5th
Division straight on, 4th Division to the right to Bellicourt, and 3rd
to the left to Lehaucourt, for thus we should get the Divisions more
or less in their right positions. Of course a vast quantity of troops
had already preceded us, probably towards St Quentin, but that could
not be helped.

It was a long way yet to St Quentin, about eight miles, and on the
road and off it were men, waggons, and stragglers in every direction.
The jumble of the night had disintegrated most of the formed bodies,
and the whole thing had the appearance of a vast _debacle_. Men moving
on singly but slowly, little bunches of three and four men together,
sometimes of the same regiment, but oftener of odd ones; men lying
exhausted or asleep by the roadside, or with their packs off and
sitting on the grass, nibbling at a biscuit or looking hopelessly
before them. It was a depressing sight, and I wondered how on earth
the formations would ever come together again. Officers of course were
doing their best to get their own men together, but the results were
small. Whenever we passed men of the 15th Brigade we collected them as
far as possible into bodies; but it was very difficult to know what
units men belonged to without asking them, for very many of them had
long ago, on arrival at Havre and elsewhere, given their cap-badges
and shoulder-names as souvenirs to women and children, and they were
most difficult to identify.

A mile or two before getting into St Quentin I passed Laurence
Drummond, commanding the 19th Brigade, hobbling along on foot, and
offered him of course my second horse. He had got damaged somehow--by
a fall, I think--and said he had his horse all right, but it hurt him
less to walk than to ride.

As we approached the town the entrance had got rather blocked with
troops. This was rather a good thing, as it enabled the stragglers
behind to close up and find other portions of their own regiments;
and, extraordinary as it seemed, whole companies had now got together
and in some cases had even coagulated into battalions. I foun