That was a memorable day when, with a noise like an asthmatic steam-roller, it came ambling out of the hospital yard, peered around the corner of the fence, and struck off down the road at a clip of three good English miles an hour. We rushed to the door to see it, and when the smoke of the exhaust cleared a little, there sat the major ensconced in the front seat. There was a beatific smile about his mouth and a gleam of pride in his eye—the pride of possession. He wasn’t quite sure what it was he possessed, but it was something which moved, something instinct with life. "Sounds a bit noisy yet," he murmured confidentially to himself, "but it will loosen up when it gets running a while." What prophetic sagacity there was in this remark! It _did_ loosen up, and to such good purpose that several parts fell off upon the road. Little by little it got going, and in less than a month you might have heard it almost any bright afternoon, groaning in the garage preparatory to sallying forth upon its quest. But about this time another event of such importance occurred that the major’s car was thrust into the background. We had in our hospital a venerable old sergeant of peripatetic propensities, who had two claims to recognition: first, that he was, and is, the oldest soldier in the Canadian force in France; and secondly—but this was never proved—that he could "lick," according to his own testimony, any man within fifteen years of his age in that part of the world. Sergeant Plantsfield, our postman and general messenger, travelled into Boulogne and back from once to thrice daily—in other words, inside the year he accomplished a motor trip of sufficient length to encompass the earth. His stock of rumours was inexhaustible, for he developed and launched upon an unappreciative world at least one new tale daily. Now if there is one thing a soldier loves more than another it’s a "rumour"; and the more glaringly absurd, the more readily he will listen to it. So when the worthy old sergeant burst into the hospital with excited eyes, flushed cheeks and cap all awry after his latest trip from Boulogne, the boys crowded round to hear the news. "They’re here! By gosh! They’re here at last!" he shouted, as he deposited his overflowing mail bag in the hall and looked triumphantly from one to another of his listeners. "Who’s here," demanded Barker, "the Germans?" "Germans be blowed!" declared the sergeant with scornful emphasis. "They won’t never be here!" "Put a little pep in it, dad!" said Huxford. "Wot is it?" The sergeant waited a full minute to give impress to his announcement, and then in a tense whisper ejaculated: "The rest of the Canadians are in France—the whole division’s at the front!" There was a dead silence for a moment, and then a wild cheer went up that shook the hall until the windows rattled. "Ye ain’t stuffin’ us again?" Wilson queried anxiously, when the noise had died away. "Ye done it so often afore."