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While the enemy was being fought down, bombs were dropped not by pounds but by tons on villages and billets, on ammunition dumps and rail-heads, adding their destruction to that of the shells. There was more value in mastery than in destruction or in freedom of observation, for it affected the enemy's morale. A soldier likes to see his own planes in the air and the enemy's being driven away.
Their duties are to carry out the Sultan's wishes, and, receiving no pay, they look to enriching themselves at the expense of their respective billets. A body of secretaries come after the ministers, who write and dispatch the Sultan's decrees to distant cities, where their letters are read aloud in the mosques to the people by the governors.
We were now in the 2nd Corps, and, before we had time to look round our new billets, the Corps Commander, General Jacob, came and was introduced to all officers, speaking to us in the village school room. After that we looked round our new quarters and found them excellent, so settled down to have, if possible, an enjoyable rest.
But it took many shillings to obtain anything definite in the way of results, and Graeme had his own humorous suspicions as to the billets some of them found, and gently chaffed old Tom on the subject whenever they met. "You wait," said Tom, with mysterious nods.
The train journey was long, and the men experienced for the first time the inconveniences of travelling in French troop trains, being crowded fifty-six at a time into trucks labelled "Hommes 48: Chevaux en long 8." Chocques was reached on the 15th and the men marched therefrom to billets in a village close by called Oblinghem.
Thereafter I stuffed a few billets of wood into the empty casing of the harp, and when my servant returned I bade him carry forth the package, and secure it across my saddle-bow, just as I had been wont to travel heretofore. Even though it was yet dark, we rode forth on our way.
On the 10th we marched to Gorenflos, and the following day were taken by lorries to billets in Candas, where, with an East wind, we could occasionally hear the distant sounds of gunfire for the first time for two months. Our new area we found was full of preparation for something; what the exact nature of this something might be we did not know.
It would take vigor and push and enterprise to roll the heavy billets of wood over the grass-tufts to the edge of the water. And, most of all, it would take strength and nerve and determination to tear himself away from a steel trap and leave a foot behind. So it was well for the youngster that for a time he had nothing to do but grow.
The enemy tried in vain to dislodge us and exploit the success he had so dearly won." On March 4, 1916, an Order of the Day issued by the crown prince was read to the troops in rest billets in which they were urged to make a supreme effort to conquer Verdun, "the heart of France."
The Prussian troops were ruthless; the judges were paid to "punish" those whose crime was fighting for their ordinary rights; and as the judges' billets would not have been worth twenty minutes' purchase if they had not obeyed orders, they cheerfully obeyed them.
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