erman shells still flung at them,
waited as the 25th February grew gradually older, and the light grew
stronger. Something in the air seemed to tell them that this was to be
a sterner day than any that had preceded it, and yet there was that
about the artillery-fire of the enemy which rather contradicted that
feeling. For while everything up to the 24th of the month had gone in
the favour of Germany, and while she had gained enormous
successes--thanks to her long-continued and secretly-made
preparations--yet now the elements themselves turned against her--and
in all conscience she had had difficulties enough before, considering
the terrific resistance shown by those French heroes. It was snowing,
banks of snow-clouds filled the heavens, while whirling flakes made
artillery-fire a matter of extreme difficulty. True, big guns, long
since established on concrete foundations and quite immobile, could
still register by the map as accurately as ever, and still poured
shells of large dimensions on Fort Douaumont and on other sectors; but
the smaller guns, mere babes compared with those 17-inch howitzers, yet
guns flinging missiles which pounded the French trenches, could now
only fire aimlessly, so that the torrent of shells was reduced and
became a mere nothing to that formerly experienced.

"They will not attack," a _poilu_ gave it as his decision, and very
decidedly. "These Boches never attack unless they have first cut up
the ground and smashed our trenches; therefore I vote for a brazier
here, something to cook, and a pipe of good tobacco."

"And perhaps a game of manne, too," laughed another. "Well, a little
rest, after what we have gone through, will do us no harm, and will fit
us all the more for what is to follow. Who cares! To-day, to-morrow,
or even later, we shall fight. If not to-day, well, let us make the
most of it."

Cheery groups collected in the trenches all along the line, men who
hardly took the trouble to peer out over the parapets and watch for the
coming of the enemy. It looked, indeed, as if this 25th February was
to be a day of rest--one sorely needed by our allies. And then, of a
sudden, an alarm spread along the trenches; men sprang to their arms
and gripped their rifles, while machine-gunners dived into cunning
approaches to hidden pieces out in the open, and, scuttling along,
manned those instruments which were to send death into the ranks of the
Kaiser.

For the enemy were not to b