he gas and had taken possession
of the hill. Notwithstanding the machine-gun fire which the Germans
poured upon them, many of the trenches were retaken by the Surrey
soldiers in their first frenzied rush to regain what they had lost
because of the gas. The battle ended when there was no hill left. The
bombardment and the mines had leveled the mound by distributing it
over the surrounding territory. The British, however, were accorded
the victory, as they had trenches near where the hill was and made
them a part of the base of the salient about Ypres.

That town has been likened to the hub of a wheel whose spokes are the
roads which lead eastward. It is true that one important road went
over the canal at Steenstraate, but practically all of the highways of
consequence went through Ypres. Thus the spokes of the wheel, whose
rim was the outline of the salient, were the roads to Menin,
Gheluvelt, Zonnebeke, Poelcapelle, Langemarck, and Pilkem. And the
railroad to Roulers was also a spoke. Hence all of the supplies for
the troops on the salient must pass through Ypres, which made it most
desirable for the Germans to take the town. It will be remembered that
they had won a place for their artillery early in November, 1914,
which gave them an opportunity to bombard Ypres through the winter. On
February 1, 1915, a portion of the French troops which had held the
salient were withdrawn and their places taken by General Bulfin's
Twenty-eighth Division. Thus, by April 20, 1915, that part of the
Allies' front was held as follows: From the canal to east of
Langemarck was the Forty-fifth Division of the French army, consisting
of colonial infantry. On the French right, to the northeast of
Zonnebeke, was the Canadian division, under the command of General
Alderson, consisting of the Third Brigade, under General Turner, on
the left, and the Second Brigade, under General Currie, on the right.
The Twenty-eighth Division extended from the Canadian right to the
southeast corner of the Polygon Wood. This division comprised the
Eighty-third, Eighty-fourth, and Eighty-fifth Brigades in order from
right to left. The next section of the salient was held by Princess
Patricia's Regiment of the Twenty-seventh Division, which division,
under the command of General Snow, guarded the front to the east of
Veldhoek along the ridge to within a short distance of Hill 60, where
the Fifth Division, under the command of General Morland, held the
line. The g