adjutant came around, he gave me a look as much as to say: "That kid
certainly has got a lot of nerve." He offered to make Bill a corporal, but
as that would have transferred him from D Company to F Company he declined
rather than leave me.

This will give you some idea of the kind of organization or
non-organization when the First Contingent Canadians was formed. Not only
in our own battalion but nearly anywhere in the regiment almost anybody
could have been a non-commissioned officer--certainly anybody that had
looks and the nerve to tell the adjutant that he had had former military
experience.

It was not very long before we began to realize that soldiering, after all,
was no snap. There was the deuce of a lot to learn, and the deuce of a lot
to do.

To the rookie one of the most interesting things are the bugle calls. The
first call, naturally, that the new soldier learns is "the cook-house," and
possibly the second is the mail-call. The call that annoyed me most at
first was "reveille." I had been used to getting up at nine o'clock in the
morning; rising now at five-thirty wasn't any picnic. This, especially when
it took a fellow half the night to get warm, because all we had under us
was Mother Earth, one blanket and a waterproof.

It was the second day at camp that we started in to work good and hard.
Reveille at five-thirty A.M.; from six to seven Swedish exercise,
then one hour for breakfast when we got tea, pork and beans, and a slice of
bread. From eight to twelve saw us forming fours and on the right form
companies. From twelve to half past one more pork and beans, bread and tea.
Rifle practise, at the butts, followed until five-thirty, and ... yes, it