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The Training Centre of the Tank Corps had additional difficulties. There was no guidance as to training—the entire system had to be thought out from the beginning, and continually modified by the experience of the battlefield—instructors had not only to be found but trained—esprit de corps and discipline had to be built up; and all this against time.

It may perhaps be a compensation to the many officers and men who lived laborious days, and were not rewarded by seeing the results of their work in the field, to know that “France” has never been under any illusion as to the great thoroughness of their work.

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The work carried through in the munitions factories, and the ingenuity and solid labour that backed the efforts of the soldier in the field, are perhaps not yet fully appreciated by the fighting men. In France one might hear of sporadic unrest, but till one met with it, one realised nothing of the genuine faithful grind at production of objects of whose destination the worker often knew nothing, of the blind patience under duress of shortage, and of crowded accommodation; of hope deferred.