"There was a chap of the Grenadier Guards who was always mighty particular about his appearance, and persisted in wearing a tie all the time, whereas most of us reduced our needs to the simplest possible. One day, under heavy rifle fire, he was seen to be in a frightful fluster. 'Are you hit?' he was asked. 'No,' he said. 'What is it, then?' "'This ---- tie is not straight,' he replied, and proceeded to adjust it." A motor-cycle despatch-rider wrote: "I have just had a hot bath and shave, and complete change of underclothing; the shock may kill me, but it is a glorious feeling, and I am glad to say I have by the use of iodoform kept free from vermin, which so many fellows suffer from out here." "I hung my shirt out all night to dry on a tree," writes Lance-Corporal Laird, Royal Army Medical Corps. "At daylight I found that a piece of shell had taken the elbow of it. Good job I wasn't in it." Some of the shirts wanted washing badly. Seeing a man busily examining his shirt, an officer asked him had he caught many. "Yes, sir," was the reply, "I think there's a new draft come in." Fashion demanded a clean shirt when an Army Service Corps man went to a party. "We stayed at ---- four days. The inhabitants were delighted to see us as they felt much safer. Little did they dream of what was in store for them later on. A lady and a gentleman gave me and my two mates an invitation to tea. They came down the lines to fetch us. We made ourselves up as best we could under the circumstances. I put on a clean shirt, washed, shaved, and had a regular brush-up. We arrived at the house, or rather mansion, and were quite out of place, as we thought, walking on polished tiles in the passage, with our big heavy boots. It was a perfect slide. We took a seat by a big round table, had wine, cakes, tea, cigars and cigarettes. To our surprise, this lady's father was mayor of ----. The lady, whose husband was with his regiment about eleven miles away, sang us two songs in English, 'The Holy City' and 'Killarney.' It was a perfect treat to have one's legs under a table to drink from cups and saucers. Next day we thought it was a dream." CHAPTER XXIV Graphic Descriptions Many things surprised our soldiers on coming to France, and they described them with much humour. Speaking of the French soldiers a sergeant remarked: "Aren't their trousers baggy? They can march all the same, though. D'you know what they're paid? They get a halfpenny a day, and they're paid every five days in a crossed cheque. Well, they seem glad to see us, don't they, sir? As soon as ever I pull up they gather round and want to shake my hand. It's as bad as bein' a parliamentary candidate."