he German trenches and our own. The view, in short,
was this: One saw the backs of our own trenches, then the "No man's
land" space of ground, and beyond that again the front of the German
trenches. This is best explained by the sketch map which I give on the
opposite page. I saw exactly how the house stood with regard to the
position, and also noticed that it had two dangerous sides, _i.e._, two
sides which faced the Germans, as our position formed two sides of a
triangle.

[Illustration: clogs and bucket]

I then proceeded to explore the house. In the walls I found a great many
bullets which had stuck in between the bricks of the solitary chimney or
imbedded themselves in the woodwork of the door or supporting posts at
the corners. Amongst the straw in the attic I found a typical selection
of pathetic little trifles: two pairs of very tiny clogs, evidently
belonging to some child about four or five years old, one or two old and
battered hats, and a quantity of spinning material and instruments. I
have the small clogs at my home now, the only souvenir I have of that
house at St. Yvon, which I have since learnt is no more, the Germans
having reduced it to a powdered up mound of brick-dust and charred
straw. Outside, and lying all around, were a miscellaneous collection of
goods. Half a sewing machine, a gaudy cheap metal clock, a sort of
mangle with strange wooden blades (which I subsequently cut off to make
shelves with), and a host of other dirty, rain-soaked odds and ends.

[Illustration: map of village]

Having concluded my examination I crept out back to the wood and took a
look at it all from there. "Yes," I thought to myself, "it's all very
nice, but, by Gad, we'll have to look out that they don't see us, and
get to think we're in this village, or they'll give us a warm time." It
had gone very much against my thought-out views on trench warfare,
coming to this house at all, for I had learnt by the experiences of
others that the best maxim to remember was "Don't live in a house."

The reason is not far to seek. There is something very attractive to
artillery about houses. They can range on them well, and they afford a
more definite target than an open trench. Besides, if you can spot a
house that contains, say, half a dozen to a dozen people, and just plop
a "Johnson" right amidships, it generally means "exit house and people,"
which, I suppose, is a desirable object to be attained, according to
twentieth cen