I am billeted with very decent folk, extremely devout Catholics. The old man is the secretary to the Mayor. He spends his spare time learning English, and can read an English newspaper quite well. My room is of the kind I like--plain, with two huge windows opening like folding-doors, and only a tiny carpet to attract the dust; the rest clean, bare boards. In the room are two waxen images, one of the Virgin and Child, and one of Christ carrying a child in His arms; also a waxen model in a case of glass of the Virgin and Child, besides no fewer than three crucifixes. This is only characteristic of the whole village: every room I've seen hereabouts seems crowded with images. There are lots of these images, chipped and smashed, lying about the streets of Ypres. I suppose where you are at present [Scotland] everybody is a Presbyterian and very much against all ritual. There is at least this resemblance between Scot and Flemish: they both call the church "kirk" or "kerque." It is rather amusing to think that, according to the ideas of some English Churchmen, both Scottish Presbyterian and Flemish Catholic are lost for ever; while the Baptist of Llanelly is equally convinced that all three of them are; and each imagines the other to be hopelessly wrong. The war has this advantage: that it cuts athwart of all such ridiculous distinctions--for have we not among the Allies English Churchmen and Nonconformists, Catholics, Mohammedans, Hindus and secular Frenchmen, all fighting on the one side against another side which includes Catholics, Protestants and Mohammedans? I say what matter what a man believes if he does his duty? The last two or three days I have spent in more or less local work, meaning by that districts within about ten miles of headquarters. I have been in the saddle all day, from 9 _A.M._ to 7 _P.M._, the only interval being for lunch. Riding is glorious sport. I don't think I shall ever be able to live without a horse in the future. I have been using here one of my own mares, and a fine charger belonging to a 9th Lancer employed at H.Q. (you remember it was this regiment that made the famous charge at Le Cateau back in October). It is a glorious steed this, full of "devil," and a bit bad-tempered. My own big mare is a rather quiet horse, very good at trotting long distances; my other one is smaller but more fiery. I prefer to ride whenever possible a horse that really takes some managing. _September 8th, 1915._