The people all round here speak Flemish; it is a curious mixture
of English, French, and German, and they sometimes give us useful
information. They are a fine healthy stock, and work like niggers for
us. Our hostess was up all night feeding soldiers as they came in.
Yesterday I met a splendid old man, who told me all about his son and
showed me his photograph; he had one postcard from his son, with no
date, merely saying, “All well,” and the old man told me he had buried
it in the garden for fear the Germans should come and take it from him.
That gave me some idea of how people at home feel about their relatives
at the front: _Despatch-rider Gabain, 1st Cavalry Brigade_.
“Jambon!”
We sleep fourteen in a tent, which is a bit crowded, but we are not in
it long enough to notice it. Fourteen of us washed in two quarts of
water this morning! So we have plenty of ink, and some of us haven’t
changed our clothes for five or six weeks. We have two rather queer
pets here: two little pigs, who run about among the horses, and are
quite friendly with them, and eat their corn as well. As one of the
fellows said, pork (or, as the French call it, _jambon_) tastes very
nice boiled, so they may be, before very long, in the casualty list
as missing or prisoners of war: _Lance-Corpl. Forward, Army Service
Corps_.