Bit by bit we were provided with our uniforms, and we began to fancy ourselves as the real thing. We began to make new friends, and we were drawn closer to those we knew. We came from all over the world. At the call men had come home from the Far East and the Far West. A man who had gone up the Yukon with Frank Slavin, the boxer; another who had been sealing round Alaska; trappers from the Canadians woods; railway engineers from the Argentine; planters from Ceylon; big-game hunters from Central Africa; others from China, Japan, the Malay States, India, Egypt--these were just a few of the Battalion who were ready and eager to shoulder a rifle, and do their bit as just common or garden Tommies. The thought of taking a commission did not enter our minds at the start. Every man was eager to get on with the work, with but a dim thought of what it was going to be like, but worrying not a bit about the future. In a few weeks the Battalion had learnt how to form fours, to wheel, and to maintain a uniformity of step. Every man was desperately keen; to be late for parade was a great big sin. And this despite the fact that every man had to come into London from all parts of the suburbs, and farther out than that in many instances, by train (paying his own fare) every morning. So the time went on. Then came the news that we were to go into camp at the Grey Towers, Hornchurch, Essex, and next came the formation of a fatigue party to go on ahead and get things ready for the reception of the Battalion. There was a rush to get into this party as soon as the news went round. Everyone was eager to do something fresh, and, after all, we didn't know what fatigues were in those days. So the party went on ahead. We who were left kept on with our drills; we even did physical jerks on the slopes of Savoy Street, Strand. Then came the news that we were to march away. That bucked everybody up tremendously, for, to tell the truth, we were really beginning to get tired of the London life. Some of us, who had seen life in various parts of the world previously, were sighing again for the open air. All of us were thinking it was really time we did something to justify our existence. We did not claim to be show soldiers; we wanted to get at it. [Illustration: MARCHING AWAY FROM HYDE PARK TO ENTRAIN FOR HORNCHURCH. To face p. 28] All things come to those who wait, however. We were to move to Hornchurch--the first step to active service. We had our uniforms, we even had white gloves, and at last we fell in, by the Hotel Cecil, with a band at our head, and off we went. Funnily enough, some of us felt this break with London more than we felt anything afterwards. It was really our first introduction to "the Great Unknown."