ve to sleep
or good temper. I vowed that I would make it pretty hot for snipers,
and agreed with myself there and then to pay a reward of fifty dollars
for every sniper captured dead or alive inside our lines.

The German sniper is really a lineal descendant of the impenitent
thief. When I say a sniper I do not mean a sharpshooter who fires into
our lines from the German lines. I mean one of those horrible
creatures that goes about clad in a stolen uniform or the clothes of a
Flemish farmer during the day, and at night takes a Leuger automatic
pistol and haunts the billets and roads in hope of killing some lone
British or Canadian soldier or sentry, whose duty calls him abroad
during the night and relieving the dead body of any money or valuables
that may be on it. Truly this war developed into a form of warfare
akin to that between the whites and the North American Indians.

We suspect a few of the habitants of being snipers and not without
some reason. Several of these farmers and small saloon keepers would
like to see the Germans win the war so that they could "cash in" on
the German requisitions they hold. It happened in this way: When the
"Boches," as they call the Germans, overran the country last August
and September, they took all the wine from the saloon keepers and
brewers, and the best horses, cattle and hogs from the farmers. They
paid for these articles with requisitions or orders on the German
Government, payable after the war if Germany won. We were constantly
coming up against these people that were devastated by the Germans,
and when we remarked that the British or French Government would pay
the "requisitions" after the war they inform us that they hold
requisitions for 5,000 or 10,000 francs given them by the Germans for
their property. At one place where I was quartered the proprietor had
lost 40,000 francs worth of stock and wine. He was rather "frosty" to
the British. That is why we suspected some of being snipers, and there
are some cases on record where they were caught red-handed in the act.
Our experience had taught us to put a dead line of sentries several
miles behind the line of trenches, and our vigilance was rewarded
because the Germans throughout were unable to locate our batteries and
were at sea as to what was taking place behind our lines. On the other
hand our scouts were so bold that they often crept forward at night in
spite of the constant firing of flare lights or rockets by the