Dinner over, Uncle Podger took charge or the five subalterns, and piloted them into the crowded ward-room, where a "sing-song" had already been started. The Sub, the Pink Rat, Bubbles, the Lamp-post, the Orphan, and the Hun changed quietly into their war gear. The Sub, the Orphan, and the Hun climbed down into the two steamboats, went across and made fast to the trawler which was to tow them and their eight transport boats (empty) across to the Peninsula during the night. The other three snotties, laden with leather gear, water-bottles, field-glasses, revolvers, ammunition-pouches, haversacks with food for twenty-four hours, and blankets rolled up in their straps, were taken across to the Newmarket—fleet sweeper—along with all the men of the beach parties.
The sing-song in the ward-room was in full swing as the last crowded boat pushed off, and up through the open ward-room skylights came the rousing, roaring chorus of "John Peel", following them in the darkness until they were almost alongside the Newmarket. Many of those who sang it were singing it for the last time.
At ten o'clock the Achates weighed anchor.
The sing-song went on until nearly eleven, but breakfast had been ordered at a quarter to four, so older heads suggested sleep. The "Lancashire" officers were stowed away in cabins, beds were made up for them on the deck; the ward-room cushions and arm-chairs all helped, and the men of the battalion lay down on the upper deck, with their heads on their packs.
At 3.15 everyone turned out, and half an hour later breakfast was ready for the soldiers—eggs and a good helping of bacon, bread and jam and butter to fill up corners, and as much coffee, tea, or cocoa as they wanted to wash it down.
This was all the Achates could do for them, and, little though it was, everyone felt happy that each officer and man of that grand battalion started on The Great Adventure with a good breakfast under his belt.
The little Padre, whose gentle soul had been in anguish all that night, was not the only one who wished that their mothers and wives could know this.
At half-past four the Achates stopped engines; the Lancashire Fusiliers "fell in", and out of the darkness covering an absolute calm, almost unruffled sea, came the six steamboats and the twenty-four transports' boats, each with its crew of five bluejackets.
Into these the soldiers filed, down the long ladders, and in twenty minutes the last boats had been filled and towed away.
There are no words which will properly and soberly describe the admiration felt by the officers and men of the Achates for that battalion. When the last boat had shoved off, and the transports' boats and their six steamboats had taken up their stations in line abreast and began to move slowly away, Captain Macfarlane turned to the Commander and said gravely: "I've seen, Commander, a good deal of war on shore, but I have never seen anything which has stirred me so greatly as the quietness and discipline of those fellows—as the majesty of their bearing."