The order came round that the motor-cyclists were to spend the night at the cottage—­the roads were utterly and hopelessly impassable—­while the rest of the company was to go on.  So we presented the company with a few fowls and investigated the cottage.

It was a startling place.  In one bedroom was a lunatic hag with some food by her side.  We left her severely alone.  Poor soul, we could not move her!  In the kitchen we discovered coffee, sugar, salt, and onions.  With the aid of our old Post Sergeant we plucked some of the chickens and put on a great stew.  I made a huge basin full of coffee.

The others, dead tired, went to sleep in a wee loft.  I could not sleep.  I was always seeing those wounded men passing, passing, and in my ear—­like the maddening refrain of a musical comedy ditty—­there was always murmuring—­“We shall never return.  It doesn’t matter.”  Outside was the clink and clatter of the column, the pitiful curses of tired men, the groaning roar of the motor-lorries as they toiled up the slope.

Then the Staff began to wander in one by one—­on foot, exhausted and bedraggled.  They loved the coffee, but only played with the chicken—­I admit it was tough.  They thought all was lost and the General killed.  One murmured to another:  “Magersfontein, Dour, and this—­you’ve had some successful battles.”  And one went to sleep, but kept starting up, and giving a sort of strangled shout—­“All gone!  All gone!” When each had rested awhile he would ask gently for a little more coffee, rub his eyes, and disappear into the column to tramp through the night to Saint Quentin.  It was the purest melodrama.

And I, too tired to sleep, too excited to think, sat sipping thick coffee the whole night through, while the things that were happening soaked into me like petrol into a rag.  About two hours before dawn I pulled myself together and climbed into the loft for forty minutes’ broken slumber.

An hour before dawn we wearily dressed.  The others devoured cold stew, and immediately there was the faintest glimmering of light we went outside.  The column was still passing,—­such haggard, broken men!  The others started off, but for some little time I could not get my engine to fire.  Then I got going.  Quarter of a mile back I came upon a little detachment of the Worcesters marching in perfect order, with a cheery subaltern at their head.  He shouted a greeting in passing.  It was Urwick, a friend of mine at Oxford.

I cut across country, running into some of our cavalry on the way.  It was just light enough for me to see properly when my engine jibbed.  I cleaned a choked petrol pipe, lit a briar—­never have I tasted anything so good—­and pressed on.