If I ever thought of myself as a man of thirty-five it was a visualization of dreary decrepitude. - Siegfried Sassoon

Rambling among woods and meadows, I could ‘take sweet counsel’ with the country-side; sitting on a grassy bank and lifting my face to the sun, I could feel an intensity of thankfulness such as I’d never known before the War; listening to the little brook that bubbled out of a copse and across a rushy field, I could discard my personal relationship with the military machine and its ant-like armies.

An innocent youth wrote recently that he is convinced I am the greatest writer in the world (from New Zealand). A touching letter – so simple & unaffected. Another young man wrote, only yesterday, that I am to him what Hardy must have been to me. Such tributes are worth having, aren't they, even if I don't deserve them.

You smug-faced crowds with kindling eye Who cheer when soldier lads march by, Sneak home and pray you’ll never know The hell where youth and laughter go.