for one. So we undressed on the
marshy bank and made bundles of our clothes, pinning our tunics about
everything with the safety-pins which we carried. We also used the
cord around the bundles. Ted was doubtful about swimming and carrying
his clothes, so I said I would try it first, with mine. I went down
through the coarse grass, which was harsh and prickly to my feet, and
full of nettles or something which stung me at every step, and was
glad to reach the open water. The moon was in the last quarter, and
clouded over, so the night was of the blackest. I made the shore
without much trouble, and threw my bundle on a grassy bank.

I called over to Ted that the going was fine, and that I would come
back for his clothes. At that, he started in to meet me, swimming on
his back and holding his clothes with both hands, using only his
feet, but when he got into the current, it turned him downstream. I
swam toward him as fast as I could, but by the time I reached him he
had lost the grip of his clothes, and when I got them they were wet
through. As we were nearer to the bank from which he had started, we
went back to it, for we were both pretty well blown. However, in a
few minutes we were able to strike out again, and reached the other
bank in safety. Poor Ted was very cold and miserable, but put on his
soaking garments, without a word, and our journey continued.

This was another ditch country--ditches both wide and deep, and many
of them treacherous things, for their sides were steep and hard to
climb. The darkness made it doubly hard, and sometimes we were pretty
well frightened as we let ourselves down a greasy clay bank into the
muddy water. Later on we found some corduroy bridges that the
hay-makers had put over the ditches.

All night we had not found anything to eat, and when we arrived at
a wood near morning, we decided to stay, for we could see we were
coming into a settlement, and the German farmers rise early in
harvest-time. So, hungry, muddy, wet, and tired, we lay down in the
wood, and spent a long, uncomfortable day!

My watch stopped that day, and never went again. Edwards's watch was
a better one, and although it stopped when it got wet, it went again
as soon as it had dried out.

That day we had not a mouthful of anything. But we comforted
ourselves with the thought that in this settled country there would
be cows, and unless these farmers sat up all night watching them, we
promised ourselves a treat t