July 2nd.
I go up to Brigade H.Q. before breakfast, leaving my mare in the nullah in front of Pink Farm, where the Brigade Staff’s horses are stabled. The General’s groom, now knowing my mare well, gives her breakfast, good cool water from a well which has just been found there, oats from the Argentine, and hay from Ireland. As I walk up the trench I feel very limp and weak. Something is wrong with me. Half-way up the trench, I see part of the parapet which has been knocked down by a shell recently, and from there obtain a good view of our trenches and Sphinx-like Achi Baba. She is almost human, and in my imagination appears to be smiling at the vain efforts of our little, though never contemptible, Army to conquer and subdue her. I shake such thoughts off. I am run down, and in consequence imagine things worse than they are. Arriving at Brigade H.Q., I find the General and Staff up in the trenches, and talk to Brock, of the Gypy Army, the Staff Captain. He tells me all about the Sudan—how he has two months’ leave and is spending it on Gallipoli. What a place to spend a holiday! He reads my thoughts, and says, “People in Egypt do not realize what things are really like out here.” He then tells me that lately orderlies and others have been disappearing in a curious way. A driver last night was sent up the gully with two mules to fetch a watercart. Neither driver nor mules returned.
On the way back from Pink Farm I call on the R.N.D. armoured cars and see a friend. Then to the beach. While issuing, shells burst on the top of the high ground and back of the beach. Feel rotten, and so turn in for a rest. Sea very rough, and we are unable to land stores, etc. Rather cloudy day, cold and windy.
7 p.m.
Sixty-pounders on our right start firing again on to the hill, and Asia answers back with that 7·5-inch. Shells come screaming over to our cliff, and we have to take cover again.
Doctor has given me medicine, and I feel a bit better, but horribly nervy and jumpy.
Brigade coming back to-morrow.
My complaint is only bilious attack, and when one is like that, shells make one jump. Nearly everybody is getting jumpy, however, as we are so exposed and get no peace day or night. Several men and officers are being sent away for a rest. There is rumour that when the hill is taken the 29th Division is going to be withdrawn for a complete rest. Things will be much easier here when the hill is taken. At present it is awful. Oh! for tons and tons of ammunition. Buck up! you workmen at home. The army with the most guns and unlimited shells wins in modern war. You should see the damage the dear little French “75’s” make, and they pop off day and night. God knows what we should have done without them.
July 3rd.
Turks shell transport this morning, but no damage done. Feeling very run down and seedy, and doctor orders me away to Alexandria for a rest, but I do not think I shall go, as I should be fit in a day or so, if only they would stop shelling on the beach; we could then get exercise. Men fall ill day by day through having to continually lie in their dugouts and then go out in hourly fear of “Asiatic Annie’s” shells. It is much worse over in the French camp by Morto Bay.