In supposing that I should at least be thorough about my sleep, I reckoned without my old though not always welcome friend, Banner. His view is that when a crisis arrives it is up to the people involved to be at least busy, if not worse. To him commotion is essential, and he has always distrusted our adjutant because the only thing he did on receiving telegraph orders to mobilize was to send out an orderly for a hundred cigarettes and a _Daily Mirror_. When Lieutenant Banner receives orders he at once puts his cap on, pushes it to the back of his head and passes a weary hand across a worried brow. When he has confused himself to the top of his bent he searches round for other victims. On this Sunday night ill luck directed his footsteps to my billet; seeing me in bed, he became positively aghast, though I firmly believe he was inwardly delighted to discover so depressing a sight. You may imagine the colloquy that ensued; how he repeated to me, with a nice sense of climax, the news which I had already received from the corporal. "It is impossible to do it," said he. "Quite," said I, turning on my other side. "But good heavens, man, you're not going to _sleep_?" he asked. "I'm going to have a try," I told him. The result of the business was that Banner eventually did all my packing for me, feeling, no doubt, that I should be left behind if he didn't. Of course he was left behind himself. Really, I suppose, I ought to be very grateful to the dear old fellow; but I have the feeling that, if he had stayed away, I should have had my sleep and every thing would have arranged itself in the meantime, and would have arranged itself _rightly_. We marched forth at break of day from that town where we have been stationed the last three months, and it shows how unavailing are these precautions for secrecy when I tell you that the local tailor was up and about before dawn collecting his unpaid accounts notwithstanding. Since then we have slept in hay-lofts, and sometimes in eligible villas, knowing the dignity and pleasure of the white sheet again. Our willy-nilly hosts are all firmly convinced that we want conversation confined to the more gruesome experiences of their friends and relations who have got mixed up in this war, but otherwise they are kindness itself. At the house I at present inhabit it is found absolutely essential that the father and the mother, three daughters, two maidservants, the nurse, and even, I believe, the infant son, should rise from their beds at 5 o'clock when reveillé is, at the whim of the G.O.C., put at that unforgivable hour. It is only myself who may lie a-bed till six!