double design of screening themselves and of attacking their enemy. As the German pressure became less, and as more regiments of the Territorials began to arrive, taking some of the work from their comrades of the Regulars, it was possible to mitigate something of the discomforts of warfare, to ensure that no regiments should be left for too long a period in the trenches, and even to arrange for week-end visits to England for a certain number of officers and men. The streets of London got a glimpse of rugged, war-hardened faces, and of uniforms caked with the brown mud of Flanders, or supplemented by strange Robinson Crusoe goatskins from the trenches, which brought home to the least imaginative the nature and the nearness of the struggle. [Sidenote: Increase of the Army.] Before noting those occasional spasms of activity--epileptic, sometimes, in their sudden intensity--which broke out from the German trenches, it may be well to take some note of the general development of those preparations which meant so much for the {320} future. The Army was growing steadily in strength. Not only were the old regiments reinforced by fresh drafts, but two new divisions of Regulars were brought over before the end of January. These formed the Twenty-seventh and Twenty-eighth Divisions under Generals Snow and Bulfin, two officers who had won a name in the first phase of the war. [Sidenote: Formation of the Fifth Corps.] The two Divisions together formed the Fifth Army Corps under General Plumer, the officer who had worked so hard for the relief of Mafeking in 1900. The Divisions, composed of splendid troops who needed some hardening after tropical service, were constituted as follows, the list including territorial battalions attached, but excluding the artillery as well as the four original regular units in each brigade: FIFTH ARMY CORPS GENERAL PLUMER. TWENTY-SEVENTH DIVISION.--General SNOW. 80_th Brigade--General Fortescue._ Princess Pat. Canadians. 4th Rifle Brigade. 3rd King's Royal Rifles. 4th King's Royal Rifles. 2nd Shrop. Light Infantry. 81_st Brigade--General MacFarlane._ 9th Royal Scots (T.F.). 2nd Cameron Highlanders. 1st Argyll and Sutherlands. 1st Royal Scots. 2nd Gloucesters. 9th Argyll and Sutherlands (T.F.). 82_nd Brigade--General Longley._ 1st Leinsters. 2nd Royal Irish Fusiliers. 2nd Duke of Cornwall's Light Infantry. 1st Royal Irish. 1st Cambridge (T.F.). Army Troops, 6th Cheshires. {321} TWENTY-EIGHTH DIVISION.--General BULFIN. 83_rd Brigade--General Boyle._ 2nd E. Yorkshire. 1st King's Own York. Light Infantry. 1st Yorks. and Lancasters. 2nd Royal Lancasters. 3rd Monmouths (T.F.). 5th Royal Lancasters (T.F.).