There was no malice in that soldier. He was puzzled, as puzzled as he would have been if his brother had suddenly seized a rifle and lain in wait for him. He looked upon the Irish as his comrades, not his enemies. "I mean to say, we're all the same, I mean to say!..." He had been in camp at Watford. "We was in a picture-palace, me an' my pal ... a whole lot of us was there ... and then a message was put on the screen: 'All the Dashes report at once!' I never thought nothink of it you know. Of course, I went all right. But I thought it was just one of these bloomin' spoof entrainments. They done that to us before ... two or three times ... just to see 'ow quick they could do it ... an' I was gettin' 'a bit fed-up with it. I'd said 'Good-bye' to a girl three times ... an' it was gettin' a bit monotonous. 'At it again,' I says to my pal, as we hooked back to the camp, but when we was in the train, an' it didn't stop an' go back again, I says to 'im, ''Illoa,' I says, 'we're off!' An' I 'adn't said 'Good-bye' to 'er this time. I thought to myself, 'I won't make a bloomin' ass of myself this time!' An' there we was ... off at last! 'This is a nice-old-'ow-d'ye-do!' I says. I didn't want the girl to think I was 'oppin' it like that ... sayin' nothink or anythink.... When we got to Kingstown an' 'eard we was in Ireland ... well, I mean to say, it surprised me, I tell you.... Wot I can't make out is, wot's it all about? I mean to say, wot do these chaps want?"

"They want to be free!..."

"But ain't they free? I mean to say, ain't they as free as me?"

"They don't think so."

"Well, wot can I do that they can't do?"

Henry did not know. "You ast me anythink," the soldier went on, "they're a lot freer'n wot we are. I mean to say, we got conscription in our country, but they ain't got it 'ere...."

There was another interruption, to enable a motor-cyclist to pass along. When he returned to Henry, he said, "You know, when we got 'ere, an' all the people come out their 'ouses an' treated us like their long-lost brother, we couldn't make it out at all, an' when we 'eard about the Sinn Feiners, we didn't know wot to think. I mean to say, we didn't know 'oo they was. One of our chaps thought they was black ... you know ... niggers ... but I told 'im not to be a bloody fool. 'They don't 'ave niggers in Ireland,' I says, 'They're the same as us,' I says. 'I mean to say ... they're white!...'"