on the balance of the men that were jumping this way and
that, and swarming like ants up, over and on top of it, to escape and
save their lives in some manner. In sheer mad desperation they climbed
over every part of the mammoth, discharging their revolvers at any seam
in the metal or place where they thought it might be effective, breaking
their bayonets on its iron coat--in vain! They could not overcome the
unknown! One man thrust a hand grenade into the muzzle of one of the
guns, but was blown to bits in the try. Still, over and over it they
swarmed, like bees searching for a nook in a flower, the difference
being that instead of getting honey they got hell. Then the poor
desperate devils, in the frenzy of despair, flung themselves from the
top and sides of the titan down into the crater and tried to scamper up
the sides to the top, only to be met with a hail of bullets when they
reached the edge and fall backwards into the crater depths, upsetting in
their fall their companions who were behind them, and also trying vainly
to get out of that hole of hell.

Language is futile to give anything like an adequate description of the
scene in the crater. A few of the Huns, more long-headed than the rest,
still clung to the tank, remaining there until it reached the top, when
they held up their arms, yelling Kamerad at the top of their lungs, and
these were all that were left of that 300--just 20.

The titanic ducks were each of them doing similar work on every part of
the line, but the particular one whose work I was able to follow then
made a call on a whiz-bang battery, smashing one of the guns when it
first stepped upon it, and mowing the gunners down, the rest fleeing as
though from the wrath to come. Many batteries and crews were similarly
smashed, and then their work being done for the day, they all returned
with the exception of one which lay in the German lines for about five
hours, due to engine trouble. While lying there, Fritz did his damndest
to place a mine underneath the helpless hulk, but the earnestness and
the energy with which our boys at the guns worked for the preservation
of their beloved behemoth, prevented him carrying out his purpose; and
while the concert was in full swing all around us, the preserving
messages from our guns whizzing past it in one direction, and the
destructive messages from the German guns coming at it from the other
direction, the tank crew quietly and industriously went about t