ABSTRACT
A C A PTA IN in the Army travelling in war-time cannot be allowed much kit. There are too many of him, and means of transport are restricted. Also he is not usually expected to be an archaeo logist as well, with archaeological as well as military truck to carry. In fact, he is not supposed to take with him much more than he can personally ‘hike’ on his back and with his own hands. So that my personal belongings had to be cut down to a minimum, at any rate until I was at sea or had reached Egypt or India, where my necessaries could be discreetly increased. Still, even so, rather more than the kit of a captain going back to France had to be taken from England, including, naturally, certain necessary and heavy books. Accordingly I joined my troop-train at Waterloo (after a hectic last-minute search on a bicycle for a promised but nearly-defaulting taxi) at 8.30 a.m. on 6 November, 1918, with a cabin-trunk, my regulation military kit-bag and a civilian handled kit-bag on which was painted my name and ‘unit’ as ‘Captain H. R. Hall, British Museum’ (a ‘unit’ destined to puzzle R .T .O .’s and camp-officers all the way from London to Baghdad); two hand-cameras and a very German-looking rucksack, regarded with great suspicion in France, and probably considered by fellow-soldiers to be spoil of the enemy, whereas it was in reality but a trophy of many happy days tramping in the Vosges or the Bohmerwald with German friends before the War. On arrival at Cherbourg, and when paraded before the British military officials for assignment to camp,
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it appeared that nobody under the rank of a field-officer was allowed to stay in the town, and that mere captains must tramp regimentally in a body, carrying their own baggage, three miles out to a rest-camp. But, though my heavier things went on independently, it was impossible for me to carry my smaller kit (exiguous though it was for my purpose) three miles, keeping step with boys of twenty with nothing on their backs but a valise, so I remained plante-la until the authorities, after some puzzled discussion, had to allow me to join the field-officers at an hotel, whither I drove off in a fiacre with a couple of colonels amid the stares of my hierarchical equals who had obediently formed up for their footslogging
tramp. Another fiacre took me next morning, in company with a major, to the gare, where I found my place in the troop-train, in company with two subalterns-helpful boys both, with no desire to play cards. I am always grateful to those who will kindly per mit me to be unable to play cards. Boswell reports Dr. Johnson as saying: ‘ I am sorry I have not learnt to play at cards: it is very useful in life,
it generates kindness, and consolidates society.’ I am afraid that my play never generated kindness: certainly not in the heart of my partner!
