nt, who had broken down too. He'd had little rest, poor chap,
through shepherding his company ... and now he had knocked under. The
company swayed and hesitated. Some of them faced round. It was touch and
go. "Steady there! Steady! Come on, men;" said Stansfield, the little
company lieutenant, as the men wavered on the grey edge of collapse.
"Steady that company; what in hell's the matter with 'em. Keep your men
up and going, Sir!" shouted a captain rushing over. But the company had
gone all to pieces. The fire of battle had departed from them, and it
flung itself on the ground. And soon the whole battalion was taking
cover in the same way. A captain called on Tim's company to advance. Two
men obeyed and one of them was Tim. But the enemy's fire redoubled and
the other man was shot, and so Tim at once took cover again. The saying
of his sergeant-instructor in England came to his mind, that a man must
lie down and hide if he wished to live, and he felt quite justified in
hugging the earth. Tim ached in every inch of his body. Surely
something was snapping in his brain, for those dusty khaki figures on
the ground, the sky, the earth all seemed to be dancing madly about him.
It was not yet light and Tim strained his eyes to pierce the darkness.
Then he made a discovery. A dark mass, like some prehistoric monster,
was gradually approaching. Tim spoke to a man next to him who was softly
swearing and bandaging a shattered hand. He peered through the light and
half-light of dawn, and then started to laugh in a nervous way. "Hell,
mate;" he said, "the whole German race are advancing against us; it's
all up with us. Look, they are coming on like a solid wall ... springing
out of the earth just solid ... no end to 'em."

It was just about that time that Tim observed a light mist rising in
front of him. It seemed to scintillate and sparkle as it rose, and
curled in a sort of pillar or spiral. "Great Heaven!" he whispered to
himself, "the thing is taking shape."

And true enough, in a very few moments he saw standing erect in front of
him a tall man--and he was dressed in shining armour; that was the
strange thing about him. A strange-looking fellow this! He was more like
a Spaniard than an Englishman, with black eyes and olive complexion. His
expression was lofty and noble, and his tall lithe figure was in strict
accordance with British traditions. So were the bold features, which
were rather marred by a white scar which stretched