That night the 3rd Battalion Scots Guards, just out from England, came into the wood also, and a fresh Regiment of Zouaves joined us. We were all very pleased to think that we were about to be relieved, and I remember well taking a dozen field post-cards from different men of the Scots Guards to post as we went down the line. We marched out at eight o'clock, every one convinced that we were going to have our rest, when, on reaching the road, instead of marching towards Ypres, they took us towards the trenches. Even then we thought we were going for our rest, some suggesting that we were on our way to a meeting-place for the Brigade; others took it to be another way round--"Yes, _viâ_ Germany," remarked some one. Well, we did _not_ get our rest: we went into the trenches again on _two_ occasions after that, and for forty-eight-hour stretches. At length we were relieved by the Guards Brigade, and went back to Hazebruck by easy stages.
I should like to say a few words about Ypres before I close the account of my experiences there. We were during the whole of the first Battle, from October the twenty-third to the seventeenth of November, 1914, fighting in the trenches all the time, with the exception of the first three days. I was in the Bipschoote-Langemarck-road engagement, in what is now better known as "the Ypres salient." From the time when I first went there until October the thirty-first our front line was fully six kilometres from Ypres town, but between the twenty-third and the thirty-first of October the Germans gained from us quite three to four kilometres. We did not regard this as a defeat to the British arms, as at that time the enemy were, without exaggeration, six to one against us, and they were also much better equipped with artillery. On the contrary, I wish to pay my humble tribute to all ranks who served during that time, short as they were of men, sometimes even putting the military police into the trenches, to say nothing of the cavalry and cyclist corps. It was there that we finished off the remainder of what was the original Prussian Guards, as well as the Bavarian Guards; and to-day the British nation has to thank those troops who fought so well during that time, and put a finish to the chance of the Germans ever reaching Calais, and thence England.