“March easy” was blown, and caused at once a pulling out of pipes and cigarettes, and a quickening in the eye of cadgers as they singled out new victims. Hawkins rode beside me. Back down the lines trotted the trumpeter in time for a cigarette. He stuck it in the corner of his mouth, and winked at me. “Hail, most noble one, thou erstwhile bum Piccadilly-promenader! Sallyest thou forth to the field of battle?” He broke off to snatch the match from Hawkins’s hands and light his cigarette. Drawing a deep glow, he threw his chest out and struck himself with a noble gesture. “I shall away to mine post in the van. Farewell, most valiant sirs!”
Peasants were at their work on both sides. They stayed their reaping and their watering to watch our passage; they fell to chattering among themselves, and to laughing. They were as light-hearted as we. The column continued at a walk, so that men would shoot a glance towards the officers, and all being clear, would break rank and trot up or drop back to some particular friend. All over the place one heard the same appeals. “Give us a cigarette, old man. Not ’ad a smoke all day.” “I say, old chap, have you a match?” Or, “Where the ’ell do yer think you’re going with that ’orse? Let ’is mouth go! Of course, ’e won’t stand with you jerking ’is teeth out!”
The clatter of thousands of hoofs and the murmur of many hundred tongues set me pondering how soon this imposing train would be mouldering in the earth. A month hence, how many empty saddles would there be? How many riders mourning their steeds?
“Gunner Lake, Gunner Lake, peace to your unquiet thoughts. Verily you are no soldier. The good soldier performs what lies ahead: the good soldier does not think.”
Shadows deepened; evening drew in; the sun set; the miles were eaten up. We had not halted. Of a sudden the country ended, and we were clattering through the suburbs.
The clamour of our going sounded bravely along the harder roads, and echoed into the gardens of private houses and into the upper apartments. Pale faces, olive faces, brown faces peered from windows, and over balcony rails: heads with hair piled high in French fashion, heads supporting pigtails bound with broad bows; heads crowned with red fezes. Heads of raven hair I saw, heads of brown hair, heads of silver. Many a smile the girls sent us; but the old men looked on without giving sign. Thus forward we went, and the traffic in our path had to bunch itself on the side of the way. The road ran on between the rows of houses: the houses seemed to have no end; and it grew darker and darker, until there were only seen dim forms on either hand and lights through countless windows.
An order came down from the head of the column. “Halt!” At once there was tightening of reins, and the drivers lifted their short whips in the air. You could see the signal passing down the line. “Prepare to dismount!” “Dismount!” “Look round your horses!” I pushed my fingers under “The Director’s” belly. He was hot and steamy, but quite well. I gave him a smack and left him.
Those who could, found seats on the curbstones, and started to munch chocolate or biscuits or whatever they had. But the rest was not for long. “Prepare to mount!” “Mount!” and in five minutes we were off again.
We came to a noble bridge bearing great lamps overhead. Beneath us flowed the ancient Nile. Countless native boats lay along the shores, and the lights from the city followed the moving waters as far as the eye could go. This was the river which had rocked Moses; the barge of Cleopatra had floated here; and now across it streamed a swollen foolish company, big with relief it was to write a word in the book of history. Which first shall be forgotten—Anzac, or the ancient, ageless Nile?