nch and took it, found themselves
looking out over a wide expanse of country. Miles in front of them, and
far away to their flank, there stretched a virgin land. They were upon
the crest of the ridge, and the landscape before them was the country
behind the German lines. Except for a gentle rise, somewhat farther
northward behind Thiepval, they had reached about the highest point upon
the northern end of the ridge.

The connecting trenches, between Mouquet Farm and the ridge above and
behind it, were attacked by the Tasmanians. The fire was very heavy, and
for a moment it looked as if this part of the line, and the
Queenslanders immediately next to it, would not be able to get in.
Officer after officer was hit. Leading amongst these was a senior
captain, an officer old for his rank, but one who was known to almost
every man in the force as one of the most striking personalities in
Gallipoli. He had two sons in the Australian force, officers practically
of his own rank. He was one of the first men on to Anzac Beach; and was
the last Australian who left it: Captain Littler.

I had seen him just as he was leaving for the fight, some hours before.
He carried no weapon but a walking-stick. "I have never carried anything
else into action," he said, "and I am not going to begin now." He was
ill with rheumatism and looked it, and the doctor had advised that he
ought not to be with his company. But he came back to them that evening
for the fight; and one could see that it made a world of difference to
them. He was a man whom his own men swore by. Personally, one breathed
more easily knowing that he was with them. It would be his last big
fight, he told me.

Half-way through that charge, in the thick of the whirl of it, he was
seen standing, leaning heavily upon his stick. It was touch and go at
the moment whether the trench was won or lost. "Are you hit, sir?"
asked several around him. Then they noticed a gash in his leg and the
blood running from it--and he seemed to be hit through the chest as
well.

"I will reach that trench if the boys do," he said.

"Have no fear of that, sir," was the answer. A sergeant asked him for
his stick. Then--with the voice of a big man, like his officer, the
sergeant shouted, and waved his stick, and took the men on. In the
half-dark his figure was not unlike that of his commander. They made one
further rush and were in the trench.

They were utterly isolated in the trench when they reached