casualties in the city
that day. We had hardly arrived when once again we heard the ripping
sound which had such a sinister meaning. Then followed a terrific
explosion. The final and dreadful bombardment of Ypres had begun. At
intervals of ten minutes the huge seventeen-inch shells fell, sounding
the death knell of the beautiful old town.

On the next morning, the brother-in-law of the officer who had been
killed called on me and asked me to go and see the Town Major and
secure a piece of ground which might be used for the Canadian Cemetery.
The Town Major gave us permission to mark off a plot in the new
British cemetery. It was in an open field near the jail, known by the
name of the Plain d'Amour, and by it was a branch canal. Our Headquarters
ordered the Engineers to mark off the place, and that night we laid the
body to rest.

The following morning was Thursday, the memorable 22nd of April. (p. 057)
The day was bright and beautiful. After burying another man in the
Canadian lot, I went off to have lunch and write some letters in my
billet. In the afternoon one of the 16th Battalion came in and asked
me to have a celebration of the Holy Communion on the following morning,
as some of the men would like to attend. I asked him to stay to tea
and amuse himself till I had finished my letters. While I was writing
I heard the ripping sound of an approaching shell, quickly followed by
a tremendous crash. Some building quite close by had evidently been
struck. I put on my cap and went out, when the landlady followed me
and said, "I hope you are not going into the town." "I am just going
to see where the shell has struck", I replied, "and will come back
immediately." I never saw her again. As I went up the street I saw the
shell had hit a large building which had been used as a hospital. The
smoke from the shell was still rolling up into the clear sky. Thinking
my services might be needed in helping to remove the patients, I started
off in the direction of the building. There I was joined by a
stretcher-bearer and we went through the gate into the large garden
where we saw the still smoking hole in the ground which the shell had
made. I remember that, as I looked into it, I had the same sort of
eerie feeling which I had experienced when looking down the crater of
Vesuvius. There was something uncanny about the arrival of shells out
of the clear sky. They seemed to be things supernatural. The holes
made by the seventeen inc