Sir Sidney Lawford was to inspect our wagon lines in Italy, and we had
received notice of his coming. Consequently we had been up since about
5 a.m. making things ship-shape.
One of the fatigues had been picking up all the spare wire lying
about--wire from hay and straw bales, telephone wire, barbed wire, wire
from broken hop poles, miscellaneous wire of all sorts.
Sir Sidney Lawford arrived about 11 a.m. with a number of his staff,
dismounted ... and promptly tripped over a piece of wire. Imagine
our chagrin. However, the feeling passed away when a Cockney driver
(evidently one of the wire-collecting fatigue) said in a voice audible
to everyone as he peeped from under the horse he was supposed to be
grooming: "Blimey, if he ain't fallen over the only piece of blinking
wire in Italy!"--_F. Praid (late Lieut., R.F.A., 41st Div.), 88a High
Street, Staines._