On September 9th, just before dawn--it was raining and very cold--I was
sent with a message to Colonel Cameron at the top of the hill, telling
him he might advance. The Germans, it appeared, had retired during the
night. Returning to the chateau at Méry, I found the company had gone
on, so I followed them along the Valley of Death to Montreuil.

It was the dismallest morning, dark as if the sun would never rise,
chequered with little bursts of heavy rain. The road was black with mud.
The hedges dripped audibly into watery ditches. There was no grass, only
a plentiful coarse vegetation. The valley itself seemed enclosed by
unpleasant hills from joy or light. Soldiers lined the road--some were
dead, contorted, or just stretched out peacefully; some were wounded,
and they moaned as I passed along. There was one officer who slowly
moved his head from side to side. That was all he could do. But I could
not stop; the ambulances were coming up. So I splashed rapidly through
the mud to the cross-roads north of Montreuil.

To the right was a barn in which the Germans had slept. It was littered
with their equipment. And in front of it was a derelict motor-car
dripping in the rain.

At Montreuil we had a scrap of bully with a bit of biscuit for
breakfast, then we ploughed slowly and dangerously alongside the column
to Dhuizy, where a house that our artillery had fired was still burning.
The chalked billeting marks of the Germans were still on the doors of
the cottages. I had a despatch to take back along the column to the
Heavies. Grease a couple of inches thick carpeted the road. We all
agreed that we should be useless in winter.