The officers danced reels in stocking feet with challenging cries, Gaelic exhortations, with fine grace and passion, though they were tangled sometimes in the maze⁠ ⁠… many of them fell in the fields outside or in the bogs of Flanders.

On the western side of Arras there were field sports by London men, and Surreys, Buffs, Sussex, Norfolks, Suffolks, and Devons. They played cricket between their turns in the line, lived in the sunshine of the day, and did not look forward to the morrow. At such times one found no trace of war’s agony in their faces or their eyes nor in the quality of their laughter.