On the 20th November, a misty day when things were quiet, the C.O.’s of the two front-line Battalions (3rd Grenadiers and 2nd Irish Guards) together with the commandants of artillery brigades and batteries in the vicinity were assembled “to select passages to be cut by artillery fire at certain places, and for these to be kept constantly open, while raids one or two companies strong paid surprise visits to the German lines, killing or capturing and returning.” Three such places were thus chosen on the brigade front, one of which was in the line of the centre company of the 2nd Irish Guards. Having neatly laid out that much trouble for their successors, they were relieved by the 3rd Coldstream, marched to billets at La Gorgue and came into Divisional Reserve at 10.30 P. M. They expected, as they were entitled to, a long night in the Girls’ School which they occupied. But, for reasons which have long since passed with dead policies, it was important that the late Mr. John Redmond, M.P., should inspect them next morning. So their sleep was cut and they and their 1st Battalion marched a mile out of La Gorgue, and hung about for an hour on a muddy road in morning chill, till Mr. Redmond, blandly ignorant of his deep unpopularity at the moment, walked down the lines and shook hands after the manner of royalty with each officer. One of these chanced to be an ex-R.I.C. who, on the last occasion they had met, was engaged in protecting Mr. Redmond from the attentions of Mr. O’Brien’s followers in a faction-fight at Mallow. Mr. Redmond did not remember this, but the tale unholily delighted the Battalion, on their way to Divine Service afterwards. Lieutenant T. Nugent left them on the 21st November to join the 1st Battalion with a view to appointment as Adjutant. This was a season, too, when a little leave might be counted on as within the possibilities. Nothing was breathed about it officially, but hopeful rumours arose that they were likely to be in billets well back of the firing-line for the next few weeks. The mere chance of five or six days’ return to real life acts as unexpectedly as drink or drugs on different temperaments. Some men it fills with strenuous zeal. Others it placates so that the hardiest “bad character” can take advantage of them; and there are yet those who, fretting and yearning beneath the mask of discipline, are hardly fit to approach on light matters till their date for home has been settled. Moreover, one’s first service-leave is of a quality by itself, and in those days was specially precious to parents and relatives, who made themselves cling to the piteous belief that the War might, somehow, end at any moment, even while their beloved was safe with them.