Not that conscience had “made a coward” of him, nor of any other man or boy he had ever seen, a great deal nearer to death and vital, elementary things than Shakespeare had ever been.  He felt a little foolish for it, but all the same he was thrilled by a sensation of triumphant superiority to the Bard of Avon.

All the time the rain was streaming down, and all the time their clothes grew wetter and wetter.  Just before dusk a halt was made by the roadside, and at last the booming of the guns died down to a silence that was only broken by the incessant patter of the rain upon the sodden earth.

There was not much to eat, only biscuits, whose freshness and crispness had been lost in moist pockets.  Nobody was thirsty:  there was too much water externally!

It was quite dark when they moved on.  Somehow the darkness used to come to them as a tremendous relief, as an armistice.  They felt, in a subtle way, more at home in it, for it shut out from their eyes the strange sights and horrors of a land quite foreign to them.  After the wearing day, it brought a freshness that was exhilarating, a refreshing coolness to the cheeks and hands that was gratifying and soothing.  In spite of everything their spirits rose.

As they passed over a little railway station, innocent, as usual, of any suspicion of a platform, with a box set up as waiting-room, one of the men in the section of fours behind him stumbled heavily over the single lines.

“Nah then, Bill, wotcher doing to New Street Station?” New Street Station, with its smoke, and hurrying crowds, and shrieking steam to be compared to this clean, open, deserted spot!  The daring of such a comparison was stupendous.  It appealed instantly to the men’s sense of the ridiculous.  They roared with laughter.

The rain fell with depressing regularity, the wind blew gustily, but the ice had been broken, an example had been set, and they all vied with each other in forgetting their troubles in laughter.

“Blessed if it ain’t Saturday night!” said one.  It was impossible to say offhand what day it was, but after a slight argument they arrived at the astounding discovery that it was indeed Saturday.  The discovery was astounding, because it was almost incredible to them that such misery could happen on a Saturday night—­the night of the week—­the night of marketing, of toothsome dishes, of melodrama and music halls.

“If my missus could see me now,” roared a Reservist, “wouldn’t her laff!” He was, perhaps, a great deal more amused than she would have been, poor woman.

“I ain’t agoing to Church to-morrer,” said another, with assumed languor.  “I’ll lay a’bed, an’ smoke me baccy, an’ read me Sunday papers” (derisive groans).

“Me and Sam’s goin’ on ‘Midnight Pass’ ter-night, ain’t we, Sam?” inquired a young “timeserving” fellow.  “Who’s on at the Hipper-drome?”

“Oh!  Mah-rie Lloyd.”