After retreat the long grey road would become alive with the continuous movement of soldiers going and coming. The officers did not care to walk along this road, as it meant for them one continual return of salutes. Sometimes an open-air moving-picture show would be in progress. There were also two halls where moving pictures were shown on rainy nights. In the early days it was a treat to the lads to visit these places. As there were never any ladies present, smoking was permitted. Sometimes the smoke rose in such density that it obscured the pictures on the screen. At ten o’clock last post would sound and weary men would roll themselves in their blankets on the hard ground and dispose themselves to sleep. Chapter VI MASS OUT OF DOORS On Sundays I would set up the portable altar on two rifle boxes placed one above the other, on a great green plain near the end of the camp. Nearly always an awning would be erected above the altar, and whenever the wind blew canvas was draped about posts as a windshield, so that the candles might not be extinguished. It was a wonderful sight to see the men draw up on the grass, every one of them reverent and quiet before the little altar as I vested for Mass. Often three thousand were drawn up on the green plain as level as a floor. Sometimes a number would wait till this late Mass--which was always said at ten o’clock--to go to Holy Communion, though I always said an early Mass for those who wished to receive. Since the war, different men who were present at those open-air Masses have told me that never before had they assisted at the Holy Sacrifice with such devotion. All things seemed to praise God; the great solemn mountains stood silent, the clouds moved soundlessly across the blue of the sky. Not a sound could be heard, save when a man coughed softly, or when the little bell tinkled. On account of what happened, I recall one of those Sunday mornings in particular. I had noticed, standing among the officers of one of the battalions drawn up in the church parade, an elderly man wearing ordinary blue civilian trousers and a military khaki shirt and helmet. He wore a leather belt but no coat. I no sooner saw him than I said to myself: “An old soldier!” And as I vested for the Holy Sacrifice the question came flashing across my mind again and again: Who can he be? What war was he in? When I turned after the Communion to address the men, there he was standing, well in front with the officers. He listened very attentively to my sermon, which was on the text, “Son, give me thy heart.” Towards the end I said a few words about Our Lady, because it was the Sunday within the octave of the Assumption. I told the lads to run to their Mother in all their trials; to be Knights of Our Lady, to think of her especially during their long hours of sentry duty at night, and never to let a day go by without saying her beads.