h rueful countenances. This was the
Divisional artillery. Tractors, those wonderfully ugly but efficient
engines which triumphed over most obstacles, had got the heavies into
position. The 96th Heavy Group, consisting of three 6-inch howitzer
batteries, one complete 60-pounder battery, and a section of another
60-pounder battery, and the Hong Kong and Singapore Mountain Battery,
were attached to and up with the 74th Division. The 10 and B 9
Mountain Batteries were with the 60th Division waiting to try their
luck down the hills, and the 91st Heavy Battery (60-pounders)
was being hauled forward with the 53rd. The heavies could get
in long-range fire from Kustul, but what thought the 18-pounder
batteries? With the country in such a deplorable state it looked
hopeless for them to expect to be in the show, and the prospect of
remaining out of the big thing had more effect upon the gunners than
the weather. As a matter of fact but few field batteries managed to
get into action. Those which succeeded in opening fire during the
afternoon of December 8 did most gallant work for hours, with enemy
riflemen shooting at them from close range, and their work formed a
worthy part in the victory. The other field gunners could console
themselves with the fact that the difficulties which were too great
for them--and really field-gun fire on the steep slopes could not be
very effective--prevented even the mountain batteries, which can go
almost anywhere, from fully co-operating with the infantry.

The preliminary moves for the attack were made during the night. The
179th Infantry Brigade group consisting of 2/13th London, 2/14th
London, 2/15th London, and 2/16th London with the 2/23rd London
attached, the 10th Mountain Battery and B 9 Mountain Battery, a
section of the 521st Field Coy. R.E., C company of Loyal North
Lancashire Pioneers, and the 2/4th Field Ambulance specially equipped
on an all-mule scale, moved to the wadi Surar in two columns. The
right column was preceded by an advance guard of the Kensington
battalion, the Loyal North Lancashire Pioneers, and the section of
R.E., which left the brigade bivouacs behind Soba at five o'clock
on the afternoon of the 7th to enable the pioneers and engineers to
improve a track marked on the map. For the greater part of the way the
track had evidently been unused for many years, and all traces of it
had disappeared, but in three hours' time a way had been made down the
hill to the wadi, and