On the 27th, General de Lisle sent me to the headquarters of Major Pilkington, of the 15th Hussars, on an errand. The reserve Belgian line was hard by. In backing my car, to turn it in the narrow lane, a bank of a reserve trench or ditch caved, and the poor car stood on its tail, at an uncomfortable and astonishing angle. Colonel Burnett and one of his 18th Hussar officers passed, and with their help and that of a dozen obliging 15th Hussar troopers, we attempted to move the brute. It resisted our combined efforts. Then the Belgians near by saw what had transpired and came at a run. In a jiffy the car was out, but having been lifted with more zeal than discretion was strained in so many places that it ran more like a crawfish than a car, until a week later, when time and opportunity allowed me to substitute an ample and expensive list of new parts. Plodding through Poperinghe late that afternoon, the first of seven or eight 17-inch Boche "big 'uns" fell close behind me. I felt, rather than heard, a crash, the wave of sound deafening me. Missiles rained down sharply on roofs, walls and paved roadway. Lame duck though it was, the car lifted itself and sped at a touch of the accelerator pedal. I heard some of the other shells explode, but was well out of harm's way by the time they arrived. On the 28th of April the Division was moved back to a bivouac in the woods that lined the Poperinghe--Proven road, the main highway to Dunkirk. Late in the afternoon, after a splendid day of lying in the sun, which was greatly appreciated by the whole Division, billets to the westward were assigned to us, and we trekked off without delay. [Illustration: Staff officers at lunch] [Illustration: Looking east over the Menin Bridge at the edge of Ypres] Wormhoudt, a French-Flemish town on the main road from Dunkirk to Cassel, was selected for headquarters, and there we rested for four days before returning to our old home, the La Nieppe château, on the road from Cassel to St. Omer. _En route_ to Wormhoudt we passed the Indian Cavalry, coming up to relieve us as reserve. The Poona Horse, Sind Lancers, and Inniskilling Dragoons presented a fine appearance as they rode by. Rest was welcome to the Division. The troops had not been in the actual firing-line, but had been in continual occupation of reserve trenches for days, frequently under heavy shell-fire, and rarely with an opportunity for taking off their boots or sleeping elsewhere than in the open. The villages and farms around Wormhoudt provided excellent billets for the troopers. Barns filled with straw and flax were warm and comfortable resting-places after the days and nights in cold, damp trenches.