There is one man of the second battalion who, wounded and sent home from the battle in the north-west of France, speaks of the fighting there as "past description." He had seen hard fighting in India, but reckoned the work against the Germans as beyond words to express it. "Germans came on in solid masses, urged on by the officers with the points of their swords, and on over the bodies of their dead comrades. This," producing a German forage cap, "belonged to one poor devil I sent to his long home; and this," producing a rosary, "was given to me by a Frenchwoman in return for helping her to get her daughter away to a place of safety, out of the way of the Germans." Little things, these, but the contrast afforded by the two trophies goes to prove that the men of the Fusiliers are fighting in the right way and with the right spirit. There is little doubt, however, that the second battalion of the regiment has lost very heavily in the Flanders fighting. One report--an unofficial one, it is true--speaks of the battalion as being reduced to less than 150 officers and men. This may mean anything, for companies are sent away on detached duties, bodies of men get cut off from their battalions and join up with others--all sorts of things may happen in addition to real casualties to reduce the strength of a battalion in such a series of actions as has been fought between Lille and the coasts of France and Belgium. But, whatever may have happened in this way, there can be no doubt that the Royal Scots Fusiliers, of which the second battalion certainly took part in these battles, has maintained the honour of the regiment to the full, and such of its officers and men as have fallen have rendered good account of themselves. CHAPTER IV THE KING'S OWN SCOTTISH BORDERERS If legend may be believed, the Scottish Borderers came into existence with a strength of a thousand men in four hours of the 19th of March, 1689, a recruiting record which stands unbeaten in subsequent history. The regiment was raised by the followers of King William III, and within four months of the time of its formation was facing "Bonnie Dundee" at the pass of Killiecrankie. General Mackay, the officer commanding the King's troops, testified that only two regiments of his force bore themselves as they ought, and of these two one was the King's Own Scottish Borderers. When it is remembered that the regiment had only been formed four months, this fact will be seen in its true light; and for over two centuries the Borderers have maintained the reputation given them by Mackay.