"We have roses picked every day for the Mess-room; it does improve it. The other evening we had a specially nice meal. We sat round the polished table with candles in the centre and bowls of roses round them (as a matter of fact the bowls were old tinned-fruit tins, but what of that). The food was very special, though I can't remember what it was, but to crown all there was in the room just across the passage ... a real fiddler with a real fiddle. I really don't know how he managed to bring a fiddle out here; he is a private in the Royal Garrison Artillery, and plays simply beautifully. He has long hair and just a suggestion of side whiskers, and large boots, and, but that he would not be complimented, looks like a Viennese. "He started off by playing Grand Opera--I believe--and he gave us the Intermezzo from 'Cavalleria Rusticana.' Then he gave us 'Gipsy Love' and the 'Merry Widow,' and so on. He finished up with American ragtime. We sent him in a bottle of whisky half-way through the performance, and the music got lighter thenceforward. It was most amusing to notice the effect. When we looked in later the whisky was standing on the table, and he was walking round it with his fiddle, playing hard and apparently serenading it! "I was inoculated again on Friday evening because it is only _really_ effective for about six months, and there is going to be a lot of enteric about, I expect. This apparently is just the very place for it--flat low-lying country, poor water supply, and the soil heavily manured. So I have been feeling rather weak and feverish after it, but I am better again now. I have to have it done again ten days later--but the second time is not so bad. "Talking about roses, Thomas picked a beauty this morning (before I got up) and brought it to me in bed. It is in front of me now, and is 5 inches across, and has a very fine smell." "_Wednesday, 16 June 1915, 1.30 p.m._ "We made an attack early this morning, and our Company waited here to receive the prisoners. Poor devils, I do feel so sorry for them. One officer of sixteen with six weeks' service. Old men with grey beards too, and many of the student type with spectacles--not fit to have to fight. "You remember 'Very Pressing are the Germans'; well, that's where I am, right inside the walls. Quite shell-proof, but very dank. "I have got the machine-gun job, and am going for a fortnight's course, starting on the 26th of June." "_Monday, 21 June 1915, 4.30 p.m._ "We have had an extremely trying time lately, and I am very sorry to say we have lost Thomas. "He was hit on the head by shrapnel on the night after the attack--I expect you saw the account in the papers--and died about an hour later, having never recovered consciousness.