m., on September 17, 1914.
In that remote part of the world so removed from the benefits of
ordinary life, we were yet in receipt of our daily papers at that early
hour in the morning, and I was enjoying a twenty-four hours' history of
the world, at the moderate price of a penny, when the brief tones of the
orderly aroused me from its perusal. Its contents were startling: 'You
have been selected for immediate foreign service. Report yourself early
to-morrow morning at the War Office.' For some days past I had been
doing duty with my Territorial Battalion, the 7th Hants; but daily I had
been hoping that I might be able to throw in my lot with the great mass
of men, who had volunteered at the call of King and country.
During the month of August I had been shut up at the Riffel Alp with
some seventy other unfortunates; kicking our heels in enforced ignorance
when we would fain have been near the centre of information, if not of
service. Unable to travel owing to the railways of Switzerland and
France being required for the mobilization of troops, we could only
possess our souls in patience.
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