thud on the side of the
neck, which only, as we thought, made him sleep the more soundly. He
dropped into the trench. The next moment a head bobbed up and the dose was
repeated with the result that the boche (whom we had mistaken for the
first man) slid back again. We looked over to see whether the second blow
had done its work; there were two forms instead of one. My partner took a
helmet as a souvenir. He kept it for one day and then abandoned it as
inconvenient to carry. He found that a souvenir the size of a boche's
helmet could not be put between the leaves of his St. John's Gospel.

* * * * *

Being about the only Black Watch scout left of those that had first landed
in France, I had been almost constantly on duty during the fighting at
the Aisne. You can imagine then how happy I was when we were relieved from
the trenches and billeted a short distance in the rear in hay lofts,
cottages, and stables.

On our way to billets we were looking forward to a "cushy" time, a good
rest, a decent meal, and a wash, and hoping that the next section of
trench we took over would be much quieter. It did not seem, however, as if
I had had much more than the proverbial "forty winks" when we were sent
back to support the Cameron Highlanders.

It was the Camerons who had just relieved us and their headquarters were
in a quarry where ours had been. A few "coal boxes" had landed in the
quarry, and reduced it to a mass of debris. Only one officer and bugler
had survived. It was here that Sergeant-Major Burt, of my native town, was
killed. He was reputed to have the "best word of command" in the British
army. We reached the scene in time to help the Scots Guards dig out some
of them. It was a gruesome job. Some of the men had been pinned under
heavy rocks for hours without losing consciousness.

There was, in particular, one instance of an officer [I cannot recall his
name] whose legs were crushed and pinned down. His head had been cut by a
shell splinter. When we tried to dig him out, he ordered us to attend
first to a private, a few feet away, whose ribs had been smashed in and
who was bleeding from the nose and mouth.

In all, about thirty officers and men lost their lives here.

We were called from this scene of carnage to defend a trench line against
the Prussian Guards who were threatening to break through. The machine-gun
and shrapnel fire was terrific, and for a time we were glad to squeeze