31 OCTOBER 1914, Page 3

An officer's letter, published in the Daily Mail, gives an

amusing account of how he obtained volunteers for a special and very dangerous service :—

" When I asked my section, which consists of sixty, for volun- teers, I left them for half-an-hour. At the end of that time the necessary number reported, one with an awful eye, and the rest looking as though they had been playing footer.' I asked no questions, but gathered that it was a case of survival of the fittest.' They are wonderful ; scarcely a day but some one has a close call or two."