e tale of terrific fighting, of the
stubbornness and gallantry of the Germans, and of the heroic resistance
of that thin band of French _poilus_ who still held the main outposts
of the Verdun salient. Let us but say that they had been driven in
four miles from the northern posts they had held, and on the east had
been forced to fall back via Bezonvaux. But those positions had been
but flimsily held, but indifferently fortified, when compared with the
main defensive positions arranged by our allies. They were back upon
that main defensive line now, where it swept from Vacherauville, on the
River Meuse, opposite the Mort Homme and Hill 304, across the hill of
Talou and Pepper Hill--ominous names already to the enemy--past
Louvemont, and so to Douaumont and Damloup, where the trenches had now
descended to the plain of the Woevre, and they held to it till they
clambered once more up the slopes, and so to the other end of the base
of the salient.

Checked on their right, where the 5th Division was advancing, the
Brandenburgers were swept from the face of the earth by a tempest of
shot and shell; but their 6th Division, advancing up the ravine in
front of the shattered fortress, finally burst from cover, and,
supported by a torrent of projectiles from the German guns, hurled
itself from a close point upon the French defences, and, in spite of
the heroic resistance of these soldiers, forced them back.

It was at that particular period that Henri and Jules and a dozen or
more of their comrades found themselves in a portion of the fire-trench
cut off from their comrades, who had retreated, and already almost
surrounded by Germans.

"It's all up! We are surrounded! We are captured! Vive la France!"
shouted one of their number; while others looked about them, at first
doubtfully, and then with grim resignation.

"Yes, captured! Better lie down in the trench till we are discovered,
or else those Huns will fire into us," counselled another of the men.

"And give in like that!" shouted Jules indignantly. "Give in without
trying to crawl back to our people?"

"Crawl back!" a corporal answered him hotly. "As if we shouldn't do
that if it were possible. Look for yourself, man; you've eyes in your
head. See the lines of Brandenburgers between us and our people!"

As a matter of fact, just at the moment when he was pointing to a thick
though somewhat scattered line of grey-coated infantry which had now
swept on beyond t