His graphic account of the shelling in Elverdinghe that morning read as follows: "A Squadron were in the next farm, and all their men sleeping peacefully in the sunshine against the wall of a barn, when, without warning, a 'coalbox' arrived and landed full on one man. They found only an arm and a leg and his head. The next arrived later and wounded two men. The inhabitants of the farm cleared at a run, and some French territorials, who had been in that farm for seven months, went like greased lightning. "The Colonel (Burnett), and Adjutant (Neame), and Captain H. (Holdsworth), walked about thirty yards up the road, when a shell arrived and wounded the Adjutant in the hand and H. in the back. It hit the Colonel on the back, fortunately on the belt, and slightly wounded him in the thigh. It bruised the Major, who was twenty yards away, on the shin. "The Germans kept on putting shells along the road, and then started on the village. They were the beastly 8·2 high explosives, and were going just over us on to the Poperinghe road. Six horses were going up this road when a shell landed about fifteen yards short of it. One of the grooms was badly wounded, one killed, being lifted into and left hanging in one of the trees by the roadside. "Then the 4th Dragoon Guards came down the road on foot and passed into the village, but came out again as a shell greeted them in the square. They came off the road, and came along a hollow near the stream toward us. The rear squadron was marching along a ditch behind a hedge-row in two-deep formation when a beastly shell landed right in the ditch and hurled four of them sixty feet into the air. Two others were killed as well. Brown, a 4th D.G. Lieutenant, was one of the four; his hand was found in the stream one hundred and fifty yards away." All things considered, I was lucky to get out of Elverdinghe unhurt that morning. I found General de Lisle as he was returning from Woesten with Captain Nicholson; I then ran to Woesten with a message for General Briggs. General de Lisle was faced with the fact that he was acting as reserve to the British left, and therefore suggested to the French commander that the French reserves should first be used, and the British cavalry only called upon to occupy the front French line when no further French reserves were available, a suggestion of which the French General at once saw the wisdom. Returning from Woesten, Nicholson and I found we must make a _détour_, as the narrow country road was completely blocked by French horse transport. Dashing into Poperinghe at high speed we were surprised to see the townsfolk running hither and thither in great fright and confusion. Six great shells had been thrown the long distance from the enemy line and landed in the town. They had come but a couple of minutes before, a scared Belgian told us.