.

As fast as I could, I made my way to the Company commander and reported
what I had seen. Almost at the same moment we were fired upon. The rifle
fire was immediately followed by artillery shelling. Patrols on the other
flank had made sketches of the country and orders were issued for the
regiment to take cover in a gully which was across some fields and the
other side of a small woods. The men ducked through a wire fence which was
at the side of the road and sections of it were torn to let the combat
wagons through.

As we retreated we kept up a steady fire, forcing the Uhlans close to
their cover, but the artillery continually sprayed over the field.

Thus began for us the Battle of the Oise.

We had little hope of any support. We knew we had to fight it out alone,
and there was little enough ammunition. I was running and ducking for the
next bit of cover from behind which I could use my rifle, when a shell
exploded behind me. It threw me from my feet but I was unhurt and as I
jumped up I heard a crashing and splintering a few feet away. One of the
horses on an ammunition wagon had been struck. He was plunging on the
ground, terrifying his team mate and kicking the wagon to pieces. The
transport officer, C. R. B. Henderson, drew his revolver and shot the
animal.

The Uhlans must have had reinforcements for they were getting bolder. The
bullets were cutting up little spurts of dust and turf all about us. They
were singing overhead like a gale in the ropes and spars of a transport at
sea. The Germans were firing at the ammunition wagon in the hope of
blowing it up.

I was just about to run for cover again when I saw Lieut. Henderson--he
who had shot the transport horse--walk calmly up (leading his own animal)
and cut the dead one from the traces. I didn't care about being killed,
but I couldn't leave this officer, who was standing there as though he
were on parade, except that his hands were working ten times as fast as
they ever did at drill. Together we got the dead animal free and harnessed
the lieutenant's horse to the wagon. We used one of the lieutenant's
spiral puttees to mend the cut and broken harness. The driver of the
ammunition wagon was holding the head of the other horse, shaking his fist
at the Germans, and swearing at them with a heavy Scotch burr.

Men were running past us like rabbits. Some of them were tumbling like
rabbits, too, when a steel-nosed bullet found its mark. I saw others
stoop,