We did not talk much about the past at dinner, except--ah me, how bitterly we regretted our 10 per cent. margin to replace casualties,--a margin allowed by regulation and afforded to the B.E.F. Just think of it. To-day each Battalion of the 29th Division would have been joined by two keen Officers and one hundred keen men--fresh--all of them fresh! The fillip given would have been far, far greater than that which the mere numbers (1,200 for the Division) would seem to imply. Hunter-Weston says that he would sooner have a pick-me-up in that form than two fresh Battalions, and I think, in saying so, he says too little. Tired or not tired, we attack again to-morrow. We must make more--much more--elbow room before the Turks get help from Asia or Constantinople. Are we to strike before or after daylight? Hunter-Weston is clear for day and we have made it so. The hour is to be 8 a.m. Showed H.W. the cable we got at tea time from K., quoting some message de Robeck has apparently sent home and saying, "Maxwell will give you any support from the garrison of Egypt you may require." I am puzzled how to act on this. Maxwell won't give me "any support" I "may require"; otherwise, naturally, I'd have had the Gurkhas with me now: he has his own show to run: I have my own show to run: it is for K. to split the differences. K. gave me fair warning before I started I must not embroil him with French, France, or British politicians by squeezing him for more troops. It was up to me to take the job on those terms or leave it--and I took it on. I did think Egypt might be held to be outside this tacit covenant, but when I asked first, directly, for the Indian Brigade; secondly, for the Brigade or even for one Gurkha Battalion, I only got that chilliest of refusals--silence. Since then, there has been some change in his attitude. I do wish K. would take me more into his confidence. Never a word to me about the Indian Brigade, yet now it is on its way! Also, here comes this offer of more troops. Hunter-Weston's reading of the riddle is that troops ear-marked for the Western front are still taboo but that K. finds himself, since our successful landing, in a more favourable political atmosphere and is willing, therefore, to let us draw on Egypt. He thinks, in a word, that as far as Egypt goes, we should try and get what we can get. Said good-night with mutual good wishes, and have worked till now (1 a.m.) answering wireless and interviewing Winter and Woodward, who had come across from the _Arcadian_ to do urgent administrative work. Each seems satisfied with the way his own branch is getting on: Winter is the quicker worker. Wrote out also a second long cable to K. (the first was operations) formally asking leave to call upon Maxwell to send me the East Lancs. Division and showing that Maxwell can have my second Mounted Division in exchange.