Painfully I got up and staggered toward the struggling men, but I was too late to be of any use. After a particularly frantic struggle Troolan managed to get on top of his adversary, with his right arm free. His mighty fist came smashing down full in the other’s face. The German staggered to his feet, but Troolan leaped clear of him, seized his rifle, and, this time, brought the butt down with a thud on the other’s skull. Then Troolan burst into some of the most profane Scotch it has been my doubtful privilege to hear.
“What are you cursing about?” I asked him.
“I want to mak shair that Deevil’s deed!” he said.
Later that day we were relieved by other scouts.
Toward nightfall troops began to arrive on either side of us in great numbers, and dispatch riders with various insignia continually dashed up on their speedy motorcycles to our brigade headquarters. Everyone realized that we must be approaching something big, for previous to this we had been fighting, for the most part, isolated engagements. As a matter of fact, it developed that we were preparing for the Battle of the Marne.
We remained at this spot all night. At dawn, orders were given that we were to take the high ground the Germans were occupying a few miles ahead of us. Our brigade marched in skirmishing order, followed by the cavalry and artillery. We passed scores of dead—some French but the majority German. Dead horses were intermingled with the bodies of men.
We were under heavy shell fire until we descended into the shelter of a gully. Here we met a few of the French Chasseurs. Four or five farms were clustered together, and the sights we encountered in the yards and on the roads were the worst we had yet seen. Pools of congealed blood; bodies of dead soldiers partly covered with sacks and straw; the barns so filled that the feet of dead men were protruding. The Chasseurs appeared very pale and silent.
The ridge was densely covered with hazel-wood. We got the command to fix bayonets and extend into skirmishing formation. The Black Watch with the Camerons were to take the ridge, while the Coldstreams and Scots Guards were to be in reserve.
An incident occurred during the ascent of the ridge which illustrated the reckless, devil-may-care spirit of the men in our battalion in a way which impressed even me. The front-line men came upon a lot of blackberry bushes. They began plucking and eating the berries, shouting gleefully to one another to signal the discovery of an especially well-laden bush. Until the officers sternly warned them of the peril they invited by such noise and incaution, you would have thought they were schoolboys on a lark.