told it in snatches, night by night, after the
manner of Scheherazade in the _Arabian Nights Entertainments_, and as
a rule to an auditory of two. Here is a full list of:

PERSONS OF THE DIALOGUE

NARRATOR.

Major Sir Roderick Otway, Bart., M.C., R.F.A.

AUDIENCE AND INTERLOCUTORS.

Lieut. John Polkinghorne. R.F.A., of the Battery.
Sec. Lieut. Samuel Barham, M.C. R.F.A., of the Battery.
Sec. Lieut. Percy Yarrell-Smith. R.F.A., of the Battery
Sec Lieut. Noel Williams, R.F.A., attached for instruction.

But military duties usually restricted the audience to two at a time,
though there were three on the night when Barham (Sammy) set his C.O.
going with a paragraph from an old newspaper. The captain--one
McInnes, promoted from the ranks--attended one stance only. He dwelt
down at the wagon-lines along with the Veterinary Officer, and
brought up the ammunition most nights, vanishing back in the small
hours like a ghost before cock-crow.

The battery lay somewhat wide to the right of its fellows in the
brigade; in a saucer-shaped hollow on the hill-side, well screened
with scrub. Roughly it curved back from the straight lip overlooking
the slope, in a three-fifths segment of a circle; and the officers'
mess made a short arc in it, some way in rear of the guns.
You descended, by steps, cut in the soil and well pounded, into a
dwelling rather commodious than large: for Otway--who knew about
yachts--had taken a fancy to construct it nautical-wise, with lockers
that served for seats at a narrow saloon table, sleeping bunks
excavated along the sides, and air-holes like cabin top-lights,
cunningly curtained by night, under the shell-proof cover.

"It cost us a week," he wrote home to his sister, "to get the place
to my mind. Since then we have been adding fancy touches almost
daily, and now the other batteries froth with envy. You see, it had
to be contrived, like the poet's chest of drawers."

A double debt to pay:
Doss-house by night and bag-of-tricks by day.

And here we have lived now, shooting and sleeping (very little
sleeping) for five solid weeks. All leave being off, I have fallen
into this way of life, almost without a thought that there ever had
been, or could be, another, and feel as if my destiny were to go on
at it for ever and ever. And this at thirty-five, Sally!

"It must be ever so much worse for the youngsters, one would say.
Anyway I