Somebody was writing it down. In 1916, with the war half-run, John Meier published Das deutsche Soldatenlied im Felde — the German soldier's song in the field — and then enlarged it by sending questionnaires to the front. Men in trenches were posted a form asking what they sang. They filled it in and sent it back. By 1926 the Weltkriegslieder-Sammlung had appeared in Dresden with more than seven hundred texts in it. Music was the front's main entertainment on every side, something to set against the boredom and against the next bombardment. The concertina travelled well, which is why soldiers had them.

Four pieces, and the joke is in the title. One man sits on a sandbag with the concertina; the other sits on a crate with a bucket and a heap of potatoes and does the work. A dog lies between them doing neither. In a diorama it belongs beside the field kitchen those potatoes are going to, and What's on the Menu Tonight, which is the same company later on. The Bavarian Gefreiter is another German with nothing to do and no helmet on.

W. Britain model 23106. 1/30 scale (approximately 60mm), matte-painted metal. Four-piece set — two German infantrymen with a concertina, potatoes and a dog. Limited edition of 400 sets. Boxed.