Momentous news. We of the headquarters company, or rather eighty-seven of us, start Monday on the first leg of that longed-for journey to France. We go to a Southern training camp where new units are being formed into which each of us will fit. And along with this news came the announcement that none of us will be given a pass to go home for a last good-bye. This has stirred the men more than the news of the transfer South. Several impromptu indignation meetings were held this morning and this afternoon, just after mess, a real demonstration took place in the mess hall and most of the eighty-seven of us were loud in our assertions that we would go home anyway, even though we were arrested for desertion afterward.

This little incident served to impress upon me more than anything else the freedom that is accorded the men of this new American Army, for behold, before the meeting broke up a Lieutenant came in and addressed us on the penalties for desertion, the difficulty of dealing with headstrong soldiers and similar subjects, and then when we all felt and looked like slackers he announced that although orders had gone forth that no passes were to be granted, our commanding officer, knowing our feeling in the matter, was at that time trying very hard to arrange to secure permission for the men to go home over Saturday night and Sunday. As I left the mess hall I wondered vaguely how such a mass meeting would have been treated in the German Army, for instance, and I thanked my lucky stars that I was an American.

But there are a thousand and one things remaining to be accomplished to-day. I have been hurrying from one place to another since reveille and now at taps all that I should do is not done yet. But to-morrow is another day.

First of all we were rushed off to receive our third and fourth inoculations together. Then came the announcement that we would be relieved of all our winter clothing and given a complete summer outfit instead, for it appears there is no need for woollens in this Southland camp to which we are going.

And between times, there were a score of personal things I wanted to do, not the least of which was to join the line of waiting men before the telephone booths in the Y. M. C. A. shacks to tell them at home the news of our going. In all this, poor Fat seems to be sadly left out, for he is not among the fellows who are to leave. He stands helplessly by and watches the hurry and bustle going on about him, and sometimes I think there is a sad, wistful sort of a look in his big, good-natured face, for I know he doesn’t like the idea of staying here when the snow begins to fall and winds whistle disconsolately around the corners of the barracks building. I am glad that I will not have to spend the winter here and I’m sorry, too, that Fat is not to be with me.