For all this, Shakespeare had a share in the storming of Istabulat, as will be seen; as the ghost of Bishop Adhemar, who had died at Antioch, was said to have gone before Godfrey of Boulogne's scaling-ladder when the Crusaders took Jerusalem. ('Thank God!' said they. 'He was not frustrate of his vows.')
On Friday rain came, and Charles Copeman, who had, as already indicated, a passion for digging—caught, perchance, in boyhood from his father's sexton—dug a funk-hole from the enemy shell-fire. McInerney helped him. Now this was not an ordinary funk-hole. It was a very splendid and elaborate hole, and no one was allowed to come near, lest he cause its perfection to crumble away. So, to dry ourselves after the rain, we all dug, and the Desert-Gods laughed in their bitter little minds as they saw. Among the rest, Sowter and I dug a hole, dug deeply, widely, with much laughter and joyfulness. And to us, as the afternoon wore towards evening, came the C.O., and, after watching us for a few minutes, told us that we marched in an hour.
FOOTNOTES:
[5] 'Two and a Half Years in Mesopotamia,' Blackwood's Magazine March, 1916.
[6] South Mesopotamia; north is Jezireh.