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[Page 34]
Sailly
5/4/16
Heavy frost and ice at about 0630, at which time I turned out. Shifting arrangements progressed apace and at 0815 the Coy. Marched to the place appointed for the place of assemble. Billets has great advantages over camping in tents as well as possessing some disadvantages. At the house this morning there were two charming mademoiselles and there are worse occupations than rocking a cradle shaped churn and indulging with small talk and nonsense. Pretty, clean and honest some of these French women are charming indeed.
Nearer the trenches owing to the war, all decent females have left and only "witherers beldames old & drawn" remain. The lower classes who chiefly live on the sale of beer. So different to our ideas is the dungheap in the centre of the courtyard and the smells that there from arise and also the pool of farms drainage lying stagnantly near the entrance. The latrine arrangements are also very primitive and in attending to the functions of nature great commonsense is shown, nothing being thought of the presence of members of the opposite sex at the time.
The wildflowers through the green grass carpet the whole place. Some hawthorn hedges are blooming & fruit trees also. Looking into a forest, a green blush seems to have caught the "lower boughs & the brushwood skirt".
We moved of in Pde. Column of route at 0900 and each company had its cookers. "D" Co. brought theirs along and my horse took fright sliding down a bank into a ditch full of about a foot of slimy mud. The horse was covered with it and saddle as well and myself had feet and putties to say nothing of tunic smothered. Fortunate indeed not to have been rolled headfirst into it. Marched all day in 50 minute stretches with 10 minute halts. The cookers served up hot meal at noon.
Merville is a good town with first class shops and a fine church. In front of the church a fair was in progress, women had most of the booths and finery and other rubbish were on sale. Some statuary on the outskirts of the town. All along the route are shrines evidently erected in memory of some pious deceased person. Inside a small image or group and some flowers. On top an inscription such as "Notre Dame de Deliveransee priez pour nous" – or as it is frequently shortened to "p.p.n.". Stone crosses bearing a life size crucified Christ are erected alone the road.