And so, having seen at last a practical demonstration of what I had long considered a fact--that the Gunners’ Bible F.A.T. (the handbook of Field Artillery Training) was a complete waste of time, we all went back to Deepcut even more than ever convinced that we were the finest brigade in England. And all on the strength of sixteen rounds apiece! Almost at once I was removed from the scientific activities necessitated by being a battery subaltern. An apparently new establishment was made, a being called an Orderly Officer, whose job was to keep the Colonel in order and remind the Adjutant of all the things he forgot. In addition to those two matters of supreme moment there were one or two minor duties like training the brigade signallers to lay out cables and buzz messages, listen to the domestic troubles of the regimental sergeant-major, whose importance is second only to that of the Colonel, look after some thirty men and horses and a cable wagon and endeavour to keep in the good books of the Battery Commanders. I got the job--and kept it for over a year. Colonel, didn’t I keep you in order? Adj, did I _ever_ do any work for you? Battery Commanders, didn’t I come and cadge drinks daily--and incidentally wasn’t that cable which I laid from Valandovo to Kajali the last in use before the Bulgar pushed us off the earth? 3 So I forgot the little I ever knew about gunnery and laid spiders’ webs from my cable wagon all over Deepcut, and galloped for the Colonel on Divisional training stunts with a bottle of beer and sandwiches in each wallet against the hour when the General, feeling hungry, should declare an armistice with the opposing force and Colonels and their Orderly Officers might replenish their inner men. Brave days of great lightheartedness, untouched by the shadow of what was to come after. May had put leaves on all the trees and called forth flowers in every garden. Then came June to perfect her handiwork and with it the call to lay aside our golf clubs and motor-cycles, to say good-bye to England in all her beauty and go out once more to do our bit. There was much bustle and packing of kits and writing of letters and heartburnings over last week-end leaves refused and through it all a thirst for knowledge of where we were going. Everything was secret, letters severely censored. Rumour and counter-rumour chased each other through the camp until, an hour before starting, the Captain in whose battery I had begun appeared with a motor car full of topees. Then all faces like true believers were turned towards the East and on every tongue was the word Gallipoli. Avonmouth was the port of embarkation and there we filled a mass of waiting boats, big and little.