ced during that journey.

I had only just reached King Street, when it started on that section.
Bosche was fairly plastering the whole trench, and smashing down our
parapets in the most methodical manner. Four men passed me, with
horrible wounds; another was being carried on the shoulders of his
comrades, one arm being blown clean off, leaving flesh and remnants of
cloth hanging down in a horrible manner. The shells fell in front,
overhead and behind us.

I bent low and rushed through traverse after traverse, halting when a
shell burst in the trench itself round the next bend, sending a ghastly
blast of flame and choking fumes full in my face. At one point I halted,
hardly knowing which way to go; my guide was crouching as low as
possible on the ground. The further I went, the worse it got; shrieking,
splitting shells seemed to envelop us. I looked back. The same. In
front, another burst; the flames swept right into my face. If I had been
standing up it would have killed me without a doubt. To go back was as
dangerous as to advance, and to stay where I was--well, it was worse, if
anything. Truth to tell, I had gone so far now that I did not like
turning back; the picture of our men in Sunken Road attracted me like a
magnet.

"Go on," I shouted to the guide. "We'll get through somehow. Are you
game?"

"Yes, sir," said he.

We ran round the next traverse, and had to scramble over a heap of
debris caused by a shell a few moments before.

"Look out, sir! There are some dead men here, and the parapet has
practically disappeared. Get down on your stomach and crawl along."

Phut-bang! The shells crashed on the parapet with the rapidity of
machine-gun fire.

I went down, and crawled along over the dead bodies of some of our lads
killed only a few minutes before. It couldn't be helped. Purgatory, in
all its hideous shapes and forms, could not possibly be worse than this
journey. It seemed years getting through that hellish fire.

"How much more?" I yelled out.

"We are quite near now, sir; about twenty yards."

"Rush for it, then--rush."

I did, and my guide pulled up quickly at the entrance of what seemed
like a mine.

"Incline in here, sir," he said, and disappeared. I followed. Never in
all my experience had I welcomed cover as I did at that moment.

"Hold on a bit," I said, "for five minutes' breathing space."

The tunnel was no more than two feet six inches wide and five feet high.
Men inside were passin