The sack didn’t go very far. It only took a minute or so before the lot was eaten. Then we started out, now a column about a mile long, to find Porquericourt, a tiny village some two kilometres off the main road, the gunners sleeping as they walked, the drivers rocking in the saddle, the horses stumbling along at a snail’s pace. None of us had shaved or washed since the 21st. We were a hollow-eyed, draggled mob, but we got there at last to be challenged by sentries who guarded sleeping bits of units who had dropped where they stood all over the place. While my two units fixed up a wagon line I took the Quartermaster with me and woke up every man under a wagon or near one asking him if he were Bombardier So and So,--the man with the food. How they cursed me. It took me an hour to go the rounds and there was no bombardier with food. The men received the news without comment and dropped down beside the wagons. The Babe had collected a wagon cover for us to sleep under and spread it under a tree. The four of us lay on it side by side and folded the end over ourselves. There was a heavy dew. But my job wasn’t over. There was to-morrow to be considered. I had given orders to be ready to move off at six o’clock unless the Hun arrived before that. It was then 3 a.m. The Army had told me that if our Corps was not completely wiped out, their line of retreat was Buchoire, Crissolles and so back in the direction of Lassigny. They advised me to go to Crissolles. But one look at the map convinced me that Crissolles would be German by six o’clock in the morning. So I decided on Lagny by the secondary road which went straight to it from Porquericourt. If the brigade was not there, surely there would be some fighting unit who would have heard of them, or who might at least be able to spare us rations, or tell us where we could get some. Fighting on scraps of bread was all right but could not be prolonged indefinitely. At six o’clock we set out as a squadron of cavalry with slung lances trotted like ghosts across the turf. We had only been on the march five minutes when a yell from the rear of the battery was passed quickly up to me as I walked in the lead. “Halt! Action rear!” My heart stood still. Were the Germans streaming up in the mist? Were we caught at last like rats in a trap? It _couldn’t_ be. It was some fool mistake. The Babe was riding just behind me. I called him up. “Canter back and find out who gave that order and bring him here.--You, lead driver! Keep on walking till I give you the order to do anything else.” We went on steadily. From moment to moment nothing seemed to happen, no rifle or machine-gun fire.--The Babe came back with a grin. “The order was ‘All correct in rear,’ sir.” Can you get the feeling of relief? We were not prisoners or fighting to the last man with clubbed rifles in that cold grey dawn on empty stomachs.