anything that might happen hung exclusively on his shoulders. The whole
day had seemed like a Sunday to him--the first real Sunday since ages
and ages ago he had left England, the easy land of peace.

There had been an air of quietness about that afternoon which is
peculiar to Sundays, and he congratulated himself on the hours of sleep
that he had been able to put in.

From his own point of view the whole war began to seem like an organised
campaign of things in general to hustle him about in the heat until he
died from want of sleep!




CHAPTER XV

THE LAST LAP


On every side the results of long marches were only too plain. Spirits
were damped. There were fewer songs, and no jokes. The men were not by
any means "downhearted," and would rather have died than admit that they
were depressed, but the brightness was all rubbed off, and a moroseness,
a dense, too-tired-to-worry taciturnity had set in that was almost
bullet-proof.

Although the familiar sounds of artillery boomed away quite close to
them they were not deployed, and when it was dark they bivouacked along
the side of the road.