and desolation.
At length, in the distance, we saw a solitary fragment of a brick wall
standing in a wide hollow, a sign that we were nearing a habitable
region once again.

We passed by riddled German sign-boards--Vormarschstrasse,
Hohenzollernstrasse, Kaiserstrasse, Mackensenstrasse, Admiral
Scheerstrasse. We came to a litter of wreckage that had once been a
village and then we left the main road and entered a little wood, or
rather an assembly of scarred tree-trunks leaning at all angles. It was
crossed by a zig-zag trench and all the refuse of battle lay scattered
about.

An Australian soldier lay on a low mound. His head had dropped off and
rolled backwards down the slope. The lower jaw had parted from the
skull. His hands had been devoured by rats and two little heaps of clean
bones were all that remained of them. The body was fully clothed and the
legs encased in boots and puttees. One thigh-bone projected through a
rent in the trousers and the rats had gnawed white grooves along it. A
mouldy pocket-book lay by his side and several postcards and a soiled
photograph of a woman and a child.

An attempt had been made to bury some of the dead, and several lay
beneath heaps of loose earth with their boots projecting. But the rats
had reached them all, and black, circular tunnels led down into the
fetid depths of the rotting bodies. The stench that filled the air was
so intolerable that we hastened to get out of this dreadful place.

Soon we perceived a church steeple far away. It brought some relief to
the feeling of oppression and despair which had begun to burden us. We
struck the road once again.

We passed houses of which the scarred walls were still standing, but
with their bare, splintered rafters, empty windows, and riddled doors
they looked more gloomy and forlorn than complete ruins. There were more
concrete shelters and then some rusty iron cranes and the site of a
"Munitionslager" from which every shell had been removed. We approached
a small town. Many of the houses were intact except for scattered tiles
and broken windows. The stately church was full of huge holes. All the
streets were deserted.

Beyond the town, on either side of the road, was a series of dumps,
collecting stations, R.E. parks, workshops, and woodyards--Mastenlager,
Pi-Park, Gruppenwegebaustofflager, Pferdesammelstelle, and others. Then
a German military cemetery, beautifully kept and planted all over with
shrubs and flowers. We