The achievement of the troops of the 36th Division, a mere handful at this time, almost broken by fatigue, in many cases without food, must take a high place, not alone in the annals of the March retreat, but in that of the war. That men here and there, bowed beneath the weight of a burden almost unbearable, showed weakness, is not controverted. The account of Captain Walker has been purposely inserted--as an instance, to which many might be added--to show in what fashion weakness was overcome by leadership and example. It is the finest type of courage that, in the slang phrase, "comes up to scratch" again and again, beating down in the breast the inevitable weakness as it arises. The individual Briton is at least as brave as the individual of any other race; but men in the mass are not naturally heroic. It is discipline, training, pride in a unit or a formation, and, above all, in such crises as these, leadership alone which can instil into men who have undergone the strain these men had undergone, the courage to stand firm in the plight wherein they found themselves. These men had stood. Not only to the officers and picked men among them, who made the stand possible, but to the whole group spirit which they created for their weaker brethren in adversity, the adjective "heroic" may fairly be applied. Best of all, their object had been achieved. There can be no suggestion of hyperbole if that object be described in a phrase from Lord Haig's Despatch. The resistance, he said, of the 36th Division near Andechy played "no small part in preventing the enemy from breaking through between the Allied Armies." If we ponder that phrase and its inferences we shall have small need of further testimony.