We pushed the mess back into shape, and went inside it for a peg of something and a consultation. Next evening William called on the Heavies' commander and decoyed him up to dine. We regaled him with wassail and gramophone and explained the situation to him. The Lord of the Heavies, a charming fellow, nearly burst into tears when he heard of the ill he had unwittingly done us, and was led home by William at 1.30 a.m., swearing to withdraw his infernal machines, or beat them into ploughshares, the very next day. The very next night our mess, without any sort of preliminary warning, lost its balance, sat down with a crash, and lay littered about a quarter of an acre of ground. We all turned out and miserably surveyed the ruins. What had done it? We couldn't guess. The field guns had gone to bye-bye, the Heavies had gone elsewhere. Hans, the Hun, couldn't have made a mistake and shelled us? Never! It was a mystery; so we all lifted up our voices and wailed for William. He was Mess President; it was his fault, of course. At that moment William hove out of the night, driving his tent before him by bashing it with a mallet. According to William there was one "Sunny Jim," a morbid transport mule, inside the tent, providing the motive power. "Sunny Jim" had always been something of a somnambulist, and this time he had sleepwalked clean through our mess and on into William's tent, where the mallet woke him up. He was then making the best of his way home to lines again, expedited by William and the mallet. So now we are messless; now we crouch shivering in tents and talk lovingly of the good old times beneath our good old tin roof-tree, of the wonderful view of the mud we used to get from our window, and of the homely tune our shell boxes used to perform as they jostled together of a stormy night. And sometimes, as we crouch shivering in our tents, we hear a strange sound stealing uphill from the lines. It is the mules laughing. V CLIMATE AT THE FRONT If there is one man in France whom I do not envy it is the G.H.Q. Weather Prophet. I can picture the unfortunate wizard sitting in his bureau gazing into a crystal, _Old Moore's Almanack_ in one hand, a piece of seaweed in the other, trying to guess what tricks the weather will be up to next. For there is nothing this climate cannot do. As a quick-change artist it stands _sanspareil_ (French) and _nulli secundus_ (Latin). And now it seems to have mislaid the Spring altogether. Summer has come at one stride. Yesterday the staff-cars smothered one with mud as they whirled past; to-day they choke one with dust. Yesterday the authorities were issuing precautions against frostbite; to-day they are issuing precautions against sunstroke. Nevertheless we are not complaining. It will take a lot of sunshine to kill us; we like it, and we don't mind saying so.