he trench
and let the brigade pass over him. He was mud and sand from head to
foot.

CHAPTER XXI

THE RED COCK CROWS

On the afternoon of the 19th I was very busy closing out my
correspondence. I always made it a point while I was out of the
trenches to answer all the letters I had received, and that usually
occupied three or four hours every day while we were out of the trench
line.

Previous to this our battalion has alternated with the Royal Montreal
Regiment in our tour of trench duty. The rule used to be for each
battalion to be three days in the trenches, and then three days out.
In these trenches we were changed around. The 16th Canadian Scottish
were to alternate with the 48th Highlanders. The 16th reported to us
that the trenches were very bad, and we were to go into them the next
night. This evening Majors Marshall and MacKenzie were out visiting
company billets, and my Adjutant, Capt. Dansereau and I went into a
small Flemish restaurant to have our dinner. While we were seated at
the table an officer of the French Flying Corps and several of his men
came in for something to eat, and we engaged in conversation. The
French Officer, whose name is well known, and who was afterwards
killed, was a small perky chap with black hair and eyes. His cheeks
were hollow, as like most of the top-notch aviators he had had his
teeth pulled out.

Many of the aviators have all their teeth drawn because when at very
high altitudes it is very cold, and the nerves of the teeth become
affected and give them most intense pain.

These officers told us that the French Flying Corps was going to leave
that night for a district further south where there was going to be
some "nibbling" at the German front. He told us further that the
Germans were moving a great number of guns into the Ypres section, and
that he had an idea that as soon as the Canadians and British took
over the salient we would be "jolly well shelled," if not attacked in
force. This was very cheerful news, and sure enough the next day they
began shelling the city with big Austrian siege mortars, a shell from
one of which killed Captain Warren.

In the evening of the 20th I rode out to the company billets to see
that everything was in readiness for the battalion to take over the
right section of our line from the 16th. The companies were to march
into three sections independently, shortly after dark, and the idea
was to have the relief over as quickly as