We were all dressed by this time. After a lot more waiting about
outside in a yard, a sergeant came and took about eight of us into a
room where there was a table and some papers and an officer in khaki.

I spotted a Bible on the table. We had to stand in a row while he read
a long list of regulations in which we were made to promise to obey
all orders of officers and non-commissioned officers of His Majesty's
Service. After that, he told us he would swear us in. We had to hold
up the right hand above the head, and say, all together:
"Swhelpmegod!"

I immediately realised that I had taken an oath, which was not in
accordance with my regimental religion!

No sooner were we let out than I began to feel the ever-tightening
tangle of red tape.

What the dickens had I enlisted for? I asked myself. I had lost all my
old-time freedom: I could no longer go on in my old camping and
sketching life. I was now a soldier--a "tommy"--a "private." I loathed
the army. What a fool I was!

The next day I reported at Fulham. More hours of waiting. I discovered
an old postman who had also enlisted in the R.A.M.C., and as he "knew
the ropes" I stuck to him like a leech. In the afternoon an old
recruiting sergeant with a husky voice fell us in, and we marched, a
mob of civilians, through the London streets to the railway station.
Although this was quite a short distance, the sergeant fell us out
near a public-house, and he and a lot more disappeared inside.