ardly Huns had
poisoned the stream higher up, where it ran through their lines. We
warned the rest of the battalion by the field telephone wires and saved
them all from being poisoned.

An exasperating though _not_ murderous "kultur" trick was to send us
insulting messages down the stream enclosed in bottles, calling us
"dirty dogs," "English swine," etc., etc.

The final furious attempt of the Germans to dislodge us began in the
daylight. Their snipers advanced first in an open field beyond the trees
and took cover in a wagon, which we located by the ridge of flame.

At night they advanced in great masses for hand-to-hand fights, which
took place in the stream. The carnage was terrible. The poisoning
tricks had worked our fellows up to a high pitch, and they fought with
reckless bravery. We managed to explode a mine and caught their
reserves. Then their artillery opened on the stream and we rushed out to
meet them. They didn't get "Suicide Bridge" from us, but the losses were
heavy on both sides and the stream itself was red with blood.

SUICIDE SIGNAL BOX.

[Illustration: "SUICIDE SIGNAL BOX."]

The sketch of "Suicide Signal Box" takes us to a spot on the railway
line close to the scene of one of the biggest battles of the war. Its
chief feature is the dug-out actually under the line itself. Of course
the line was not being used across the top of the dug-out. As a matter
of fact, at this time a railway truck was run up to the edge nightly
propelled by forty of our men, bringing filled sandbags for making a
barricade across the line, thus affording the relieving party cover when
getting out of trench. The position was known to us as "Suicide Signal
Box," because it was so dangerous as to be almost suicidal to cross
the line, as was necessary to reach the road only five yards beyond. The
ruined building is the signal box itself, protected by the line of
sandbags in front of telegraph poles and shelled trees.

A most curious fact about this place was that, though it was being
continually shelled by the enemy and their maxim guns were trained day
and night on this very important position to catch troops coming up as
relieving parties, it was a wonderful place in which to hear the birds
sing. The larks trilled at every dawn to herald the coming day, and
never seemed in the least disturbed by the roar of artillery. In the
left-hand corner of the sketch will be noticed the firing platform, over
which is the "funk h