A young officer--Captain Klotz of the third battalion--of German descent and a very fine boy,--sat with me and chatted for a while as we watched the division march past. Although he was orderly officer of his battalion he had not been able to resist the temptation to slip away for the day to see a little of the march past. Poor chap! He was killed at the second battle of Ypres three months afterwards. The first Canadian division as it swung past was certainly a magnificent spectacle and I was quite willing to agree with a General who told me later in the day that though he had been at reviews for many years he had never seen such a fine body of men in the whole of his career. The King and Lord Kitchener both seemed to be greatly impressed with the division. Finally the time did arrive for the division to leave and one night it disappeared--for Southampton everybody thought--though an officer who had been left behind sick was unable to find any trace of it later on in the day when he arrived at that port. Certainly the British do not tell all they know. The impedimenta left behind in camp was something to marvel at, and included pianos, a Ford car, gramophones, bayonets, rifles and many other things. Why a man should leave behind his rifle, and how he managed to do so without getting caught, will probably always remain a mystery. The first Canadian Division had passed on to the great adventure in Flanders. CHAPTER III EARLY WAR DAYS IN LONDON. In the early part of our sojourn in England I was sent to London on duty. On the surface the city looked about as usual, except that the taxi-cabs, buildings and squares, were plastered with recruiting posters, the chief ones reading "Your King and Country need you" and "Enlist to-day." After you had read them a couple of thousand times they met your eyes with no more significance than do the bricks in a wall or the people in a crowd. London at night, however, was much different, because the city was in darkness. The system of darkening adopted was rather amusing, as all the squares and circuses, which in other times were most brilliantly illuminated, now were darker than the streets, the contrast making them, to an aviator, as distinguishable as before. Later on more judgment was used in the control of lighting, as well as many other things in England. Soldiers were plentiful on the streets and in the theatres, hotels and restaurants,--soldiers on leave from the various camps. But we were more inclined to notice the tens of thousands of physically fit men walking about in civilian clothes. Nobody seemed particularly disturbed about the war. Kitchener was raising his army, and "the Navy, thank God! was in excellent shape. Just wait till the Spring, and Emperor Bill would get his bumps. We are willing to go if they need us but not till they do. Why worry?"