TCD MS 10821 folio 39 recto
[July 29th 1916] was the River Authie, deep & cold, where we all of us spent the afternoon bathing & lying under the trees on the bank. From here we can just hear the distant murmur of the guns, but it is all so peaceful that war might be very far away.
July 30th. Another glorious summer’s day. To our great joy we are to be allowed a day’s rest here. It being Sunday, a church service was held in a natural church formed by the tall poplars on the river’s bank – one of the prettiest that I have seen. In the afternoon I wandered along the shady banks of the river & read & bathed. A very pleasant way of passing the time. In the evening there was a concert. There are delightful flowers in all the cottage gardens, begonias & phloxes seem to be favourites; everywhere are rose bushes & a bright red handsome flower whose English name I do not know, but the French call Croix de Jerusalem. Late at night orders arrived that we were to move on tomorrow. I wish we could have stopped longer in this pleasant valley.
July 31st. The staff have at last awoken to the fact that the middle of the day is the hottest for marching & as some of the battalions in this Brigade have had over 300 fall out & several deaths from heat stroke, we are to