Then followed other regiments of infantry, squadrons of horses, Indian
troops with strangely-laden mules, guns; then, more cavalry. The
horses sent out great spurts of steam from their nostrils into the
cold raw air.
Then a space, and the funeral car drawn by six horses with riders
approached. The coffin, covered with a Union Jack, looked very small,
and a big lump came into my throat as I realized that this was all
that remained of the great little soldier, whose motor car not three
weeks before at Salisbury Plain had stopped beside mine, and whose
deeply seamed and furrowed face I had studied with the greatest
interest, remarking then that he looked very, very old.
After the car, the General's horse, with boots reversed in the
stirrups, was led,--riderless.
Next came a dozen or more coaches bearing the mourners, including the
King, and the pall-bearers, one of whom was Lord Kitchener. Squadron
after squadron of cavalry filed past two and two, until one felt the
procession was never going to end. The fog thinned somewhat, and a tug
and scow whirled past down the river on the rapidly flowing tide,
disappearing again into the mist.
As the last horses disappeared, the crowd began to move; motor cars
appeared; and the cortege of one of the greatest British generals
passed on to St. Paul's, the last resting place of the great soldiers
and sailors of the Empire.
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