Captain Lumsden and I went off to search for an estaminet to try to get something to eat, and we had not far to go. But the new-found estaminet did not lay itself out to supply anything but thin beer and short drinks. However, we got two pork cutlets and some eggs, and were sitting half-way through this welcome meal when A—— M——, with some other officers, having discovered our retreat, entered and ordered lunch, but with little success. The two pork cutlets and six fried eggs had apparently exhausted the resources of the establishment, and the new-comers had to content themselves with bread and butter, Dutch cheese, and the thin mixture, yellow in colour, slightly bitter to taste, which in this misguided locality is called beer.
On getting back to the road we found that most of the officers had settled down to sleep in the ditch on one side of the road, and most of the men followed their example on the other.
Train-loads of refugees, mostly women and children, were continually passing through the station.
It was nearly four o'clock when at last the order came to fall in. We marched back past the level-crossing and followed the railway line for a short way along a narrow paved road leading to the little village of Hyon, situated on a hill immediately to the right of Mons, where the Chateau de Hyon overlooks the plains and stands out distinctly in the picturesque landscape.
The sun had not long set when the men were settled down in billets, and cooking-pots stood smoking in the village street, where the afterglow of sunset still held off the twilight.
Through the still air came the hum of an aeroplane, which soon was floating over the village, about 2000 feet above our heads, spying out our position—unmolested and unafraid, the first German Taube!
II.
"From the Camp before Mons,
September 26.
Comrade,
I received yours and am glad yourself and your wife are in good health.... Our battalion suffered more than I could wish in the action.... I have received a very bad shot in the head myself, but am in hopes, and please God, I shall recover. I will not pretend to give you an account of the battle, knowing you have better in the prints....