At second speed we toiled along again behind the lorries who were making as bad weather of it as ever, when all at once I caught my breath, hearkening to the far, faint skirling of Highland bagpipes, and, leaning from the car, saw before us a company of Highlanders, their mud-splashed knees a-swing together, their khaki kilts swaying in rhythm, their long bayonets a-twinkle, while down the wind came the regular tramp of their feet and the wild, frenzied wailing of their pipes. Soon we were up with them, bronzed, stalwart figures, grim fighters from muddy spatter-dashes to steel helmets, beneath which eyes turned to stare at us--eyes blue and merry, eyes dark and sombre--as they swung along to the lilting music of the pipes. At the rear the stretcher-bearers marched, the rolled-up stretchers upon their shoulders; but even so, by various dark stains and marks upon that dingy canvas, I knew that here was a company that had done and endured much. Close by me was a man whose hairy knee was black with dried blood--to him I tentatively proffered my cigarette case. "Wull ye hae one the noo?" I questioned. For a moment he eyed me a trifle dour and askance, then he smiled (a grave Scots smile). "Thank ye, I wull that!" said he, and extracted the cigarette with muddy fingers. "Ye'll hae a sore leg, I'm thinking!" said I. "Ou aye," he admitted with the same grave smile, "but it's no sae muckle as a' that--juist a wee bit skelpit I--" Our car moved forward, gathered speed, and we bumped and swayed on our way; the bagpipes shrieked and wailed, grew plaintively soft, and were drowned and lost in that other sound which was a murmur no longer, but a rolling, distant thunder, with occasional moments of silence. "Ah, the guns at last!" said I. "Yes," nodded K., lighting another cigarette, "I've been listening to them for the last hour." Here my friend F., who happened to be the Intelligence Officer in charge, leaned forward to say: "I'm afraid we can't get into Beaumont Hamel, the Boches are strafing it rather, this morning, but we'll go as near as we can get, and then on to what was La Boiselle. We shall leave the car soon, so better get into your tin hats." Forthwith I buckled on one of the morions we had brought for the purpose and very uncomfortable I found it. Having made it fairly secure, I turned, grinning furtively, to behold K.'s classic features crowned with his outlandish-seeming headgear, and presently caught him grinning furtively at mine. "They're not so heavy as I expected," said I. "About half a pound," he suggested.