The enormous amount of correspondence which had to be carried on not only gave me an insight into the complications which attended this somewhat intricate command, but as I look back on it all I see more plainly than I could at the time that my work as Indian Corps Commander was doubled as compared with other Corps Generals. In this connection I remember well the remark of one of them, who was paying me a visit, and seeing the pile of letters already written and still to be answered, on my table, said, “I would not change places with you for anything; you appear to have one enemy in front and God knows how many behind you.” He was not so far from the truth. Still I would not have changed places with him, for although the writing work was onerous and generally kept me up till all hours, it was very interesting; and one felt it was all so new. Amongst the officials with whom I had to carry on a correspondence, or to whom I sent personal accounts of the Indians, were the Secretary of State for War, Secretary of State for India, the Viceroy of India, and the Military Secretary, India Office. These were high officials, but as I recall the piles of other letters I received and answered, it surprises me how many people took an interest in or wished to ascertain a hundred things concerning the Indians in France. The command was a military one, but the amount of semi-political work combined with it could seldom before have fallen to the lot of a soldier in a comparatively junior position in the field in Europe. One of the points that up to this time had most disconcerted people in India, both British and Indian, but chiefly the latter, was that they received no news of their people. High officials in India, and some of them in this country, constantly wrote urging me to let something be known of the doings of the Corps, but those were the days of secrecy, and recruiting in India was much hampered. It was not common sense to imagine that India would rush to furnish the large number of recruits necessary to maintain her contingents, unless the people were at least told whether Sikh, Dogra, Gurkha or whoever it might be was in Europe or in some other continent. You cannot describe troops from that country as “Midland” or “Highland,” and thus give a clue; for the battalions were largely composed of men of several nationalities and religions, formed in companies or double companies, and without mentioning the number of the unit no one could tell what a man belonged to. Yet it was looked on as criminal to name a corps in any of our communications; whilst the Germans knew exactly to a man what we had in France. Should Indian troops again be employed in Europe, which I hope may never be the case, the authorities concerned will have enough to go on, to avoid the blunders made during the war in the matter of reinforcements, drafts, and reserves. From the first weeks onwards these questions were a puzzle.