ork here
and there suggested that once upon a time, say 100 B.C., it might have
been. In due time I reached the place. A machine-gun company were in
possession, and I found an officer, who offered to show me over the
Bosche's underground fortress. I entered a dug-out entrance, the usual
type, and switching on my electric torch, proceeded with uncertain steps
down into the bowels of the earth. The steps were thick with mud and
water; water also was dripping through all the crevices in the roof, and
the offensive smell of dead bodies reached me.

"Have you cleaned this place out?" I called to my friend in front.

"Yes," he said. His voice sounded very hollow in this noisome, cavernous
shaft. And it was cold--heavens how cold! Ugh!

"There was one gallery section; where it leads to we cannot find out,
but it was blown in by us and evidently quite a few Bosches with it;
anyway, we are not going to disturb it. There is a possibility of the
whole gallery collapsing about our ears."

"We are at the bottom now; be careful, turn sharp to the left."

"Why this place must be at least forty feet deep."

"Yes, about that. This gallery runs along to more exits and a veritable
rabbit warren of living compartments. See these bullet-holes in the side
here," pointing to the wooden planks lining the gallery. "When our men
entered the other end the Bosche here had a machine-gun fixed up and so
they played it upon anybody who came near; lit up only by the gun
flashes it must have been a ghastly sight. It must have been the scene
of devilish fighting judging by the number of bullet-holes all over the
place. There are plenty of bloodstains about, somebody caught it pretty
badly."

I followed my guide until eventually we came to a recessed compartment;
it was illuminated by two German candles stuck in bottles, and a rough
wooden table with two chairs, evidently looted from the farm when the
Bosche arrived.

We made our exit from another shaft and came out at a spot about one
hundred yards from the place we had entered.

This will give you some idea of the way the ground was interlaced with
subterranean passages, and this, mind you, was only one tunnel of many.

It was quite pleasant to breathe comparatively fresh air again after the
foul atmosphere down below.

Bosche was more lively with his shell-fire and they were coming much too
near to be pleasant. I fixed up my machine and filmed several very good
bursts near some guns. He w