Although we soldiers of the Second Contingent experienced fighting on a smaller scale than our comrades of the First, we had quite enough to enable us to realize, as one who has not been there never can, a great deal of what the first lot went through. I think it is no exaggeration to say that no soldiers of the Second or succeeding contingents think it necessary to look anywhere but to the First Canadians for their highest example of self-sacrifice and devotion to duty. I have heard people at home complain that they find it hard to get any information from returned soldiers as to their experience, or to get any real idea of what the fighting is like. I think the reason is that we are afraid of giving people a false impression, and that it is impossible to make people grasp the reality of conditions of warfare which have no parallel in history. Everybody at home expects a tale of glory and heroism, but the days of pomp and circumstance of battle are over, and it is only the ideals for which we are fighting that can dignify the mean and ugly reality of present-day war. Besides, when I look back upon the one or two little affairs out of the common in which I have taken part, my impressions are a curious mixture of distinctness and vagueness, as of a dream or nightmare rather than of a real experience, and such impressions are difficult to put into words. I was in and out of the trenches for six months as an N.C.O., and was in the front line every time but one, so that as far as the ordinary routine of trench life goes, I am qualified to speak. The shortest phrase I know of which attempts to sum up life in the trenches is "Days of unendurable monotony and moments of indescribable fear." That phrase, as far as it goes, is a good description, but it leaves out two important aspects of trench life, the humorous and the picturesque. It is only a sense of humour that can make the monotony of trench life endurable. Any man who went up to the front line expecting to find the heroic defenders grimly defiant and serious over their task would probably be more shocked than amused to find men busy arguing over the division of a pot of jam while Fritz was generously spraying our line with shrapnel; or to discover that some fellow was more elated over having swiped someone else's brazier than if he had bayonetted a dozen Fritzes; or to discover that the breaking of a rum jar was considered a greater calamity by the whole company than if our trench had been blown to pieces. I have often sat in my dug-out, just a little way down the communication trench, and listened to a ration party going up to the front line in the dark with their heavy loads, wading through mud, plunging into holes, falling over broken trench mats, and I have heard with great pleasure the flow of language; it was immense, nothing like it is to be heard from any other troops in the world's history.