were billeted for the night, the Subaltern threw off his equipment, and
having bought as much chocolate as he and a friend could lay their hands
on, retired to his room and lay down.

At about seven o'clock in the evening the three Subalterns made their
way to the largest hotel in the town, where they found the rest of the
Mess already assembled at dinner. He often remembered this meal
afterwards, for it was the last that he had properly served for some
time. In the middle of it the Colonel was summoned hastily away by an
urgent message, and before they dispersed to their billets, the
unwelcome news was received that Battalion parade was to be at three
o'clock next morning.

"This," said he, "is the real beginning of the show. Henceforth,
horribleness."

A hunk of bread eaten during the first stage of the march was all the
breakfast he could find. Maroilles, a suburb of Landrécies, was passed,
and an hour later a big railway junction. The march seemed to be
directed on Mauberge, but a digression was made to the north-west, and
finally a halt was called at a tiny village called Harignes. The
Subaltern's men were billeted in a large barn opening on to an orchard.

After a scrap meal, he pulled out some maps to study the country which
lay before them, and what should meet his eye but the field of Waterloo,
with all its familiar names: Charleroi, Ligny, Quatrebras, Genappes, the
names which he had studied a year ago at Sandhurst. Surely these names
of the victory of ninety-nine years ago were a good omen!

"You've only left Sandhurst a year, you ought to know all about this