Tally Ho. S.C.M.

The three days of being under canvas in Linton Camp were three days of sheer chaos. We did not know what to wear at what time or how to wear it, neither did we know what to do or how to do it. While we were at Linton we went through the formalities of swearing allegiance, and one of the questions involved was what each man's religion was. Men both in front and behind me in the queue and the Waac clerk worried when they told her they could not tell what religion they belonged to as they were certain that they had never been to any church (tally-ho SCM ! !). Also we spent an afternoon on personal aptitude tests, and it was during a break from one of these tests that one of our fellow Victorians made himself a noted personality. He strolled out of one of the classrooms with both hands thrust casually in his trouser pockets only to be met with a bellow from the small statured but powerfully voiced sergeant.

"Hey, son! Did you walk about like that at college?"

"Yes, sergeant."—The sergeant looked slightly ruffled.

"What's yer name, son?"

"Beaglehole T., sergeant"

"Good, I'll remember that."—But after all the whole family is noted anyway.

On Monday. January 1. reveille for our section of the camp was at 4.30 a.m. As members of either the Artillery or the Royal N.Z. Armoured Corps we were on the move, and the destination was Waiouru for the remainder of the period in camp. Getting up, at that hour was quite an effort. The "wordly" types in, our tent roiled over and moaned that they should perhaps be going to bed at that hour but oertainly not getting up. The train from Palmerston was a slow, alow train with carriages so antiquated they could have been the originals from the Atcheson Topeica and the Santa Fe. We stopped at every little tin shed along the line as long as it was painted in the faded regimental colours of the SJZ. Govt. Railways. It took us six and a half hours to travel the 70 miles.