ctric light, which they
all carry slung round their necks. Oh! what a noise those leaves made!
Just before I got to the wall I heard rather a commotion outside the
guardroom, and although expecting to get at least a night's start
before my absence was discovered, concluded that I had already been
missed. (Afterwards I found that this was indeed the case, as the
German flying officer on leaving had told the commandant that I was
unwell; a doctor was then sent up, but I could not be found.) Getting
up, I ran to the wall and looked over. In the dusk I faintly
distinguished some bushes below. The glance was not reassuring, but
"the die was cast," and over I went. I shall always remember that
horrible sensation of falling. It took longer than I expected to reach
the ground. Instantaneously there flashed through my brain a formula I
had learnt at school, _i.e._, that an object falling increases its
velocity thirty-two feet per second. I now realised for the first time
how true it was. The drop was somewhere between twenty and thirty
feet. Just near the ground my fall was broken by my being suspended
for the fraction of a second on some field telephone wires, which
broke and deposited me in the centre of a laurel bush, which split in
half with a crash. It is not so much the fall but the sudden stop
which does the damage. My breath being knocked out of me and seeing
several floating stars of great brilliance, I vaguely wondered if I
were dead, but I was considerably relieved to find that this was not
the case. No bones broken, only some bruises. As I was getting to my
feet I heard some one coming down a gravel path which passed beside
me. Crouching down, I saw it was a civilian, who proceeded to light a
cigar and passed on. I followed suit by lighting my one and only
cigarette, and after cutting a stick, entered a darkened street,
externally a perfectly good Hun.

But even German soldiers are subject to restrictions and I might be
asked questions. Consequently, my one idea was to get out of the town
as quickly as possible. I met two French women, to whom I explained my
position, and asked the nearest way into the country. They were
frightened and unwilling to talk at first, but when I opened my coat
and showed them the British uniform underneath, they pointed to a road
which I followed. Soon the town was left behind and I was making for
the gun-flashes and crossing a turnip field. Swinging along at a good
pace the turnip-tops