ncern in the German trenches just over the
way with regard to what was taking place in our lines. Relief periods
are ticklish intervals for the side making them. It is quite possible
that some intimation of our presence may have been given.

There was considerable conversation and movement among our men that
night. Jimmy found it frequently necessary to call the attention of
Johnny to some new thing he had discovered. And of a consequence, much
natural, but needless, chattering resulted.

I believe the Germans did become nervous because they made repeated
attacks on the enveloping darkness with numbers of star shells. These
aerial beauties of night warfare released from their exploding
encasements high in the air, hung from white silk parachutes above the
American amateurs.

The numerous company and battery jesters did not refrain from imitative
expressions of "Ahs" and "Ohs" and "Ain't it bootiful?" as their
laughing upturned faces were illuminated in the white light.

That night one rocket went up shortly before morning. It had a different
effect from its predecessors. It reared itself from the darkness
somewhere on the left. Its flight was noiseless as it mounted higher and
higher on its fiery staff. Then it burst in a shower of green balls of
fire.

That meant business. One green rocket was the signal that the Germans
were sending over gas shells. It was an alarm that meant the donning of
gas masks. On they went quickly. It was the first time this equipment
had been adjusted under emergency conditions, yet the men appeared to
have mastered the contrivances.

Then the word was passed along the trenches and through the dugouts for
the removal of the masks. It had not been a French signal. The green
rocket had been sent up by the Germans. The enemy was using green
rockets that night as a signal of their own. There had been no gas
shells. It was a false alarm.

"The best kind of practice in the world," said one of our battalion
commanders; "it's just the stuff we're here for. I hope the Germans
happen to do that every night a new bunch of our men get in these
trenches."

While the infantry were experiencing these initial thrills in the front
line, our gunners were struggling in the mud of the black gun pits to
get their pieces into position in the quickest possible time, and
achieve the honour of firing that first American shot in the war.

Each battery worked feverishly in intense competition with every othe