their lines. This was to be attended to as soon as the work on
the forward trenches was completed. This Ypres salient had only one
thing of military value to commend it. It afforded a position in which
troops could be massed to break through and advance on Ghent and
Antwerp. I suspected that when the proper time came that was what
would happen here. "Sentiment should have no place in business" is a
hackneyed expression. War is a business, therefore sentiment should
have no place in war. In war there is usually too much sentiment. We
cling to impossible positions because we have won them and held them.
We attack villages and redoubts that we should go around, and out of
which the enemy would run the minute they found us on their line of
retreat. We fail to support because we think it is a corps duty to
hold their own line, which they may be able to do, but out of which if
they had been supported they might launch a counter attack at the worn
and shaken enemy which might bring us a notable victory. The
principles of war which guided Wellington and his staff apply to this
war. I often wished I had brought my "Napier's History" of
Wellington's campaigns with me.

When we got back to St. Julien the staff told me that the Germans had
registered pretty nearly all over the place during the evening, and
that it was a case of shells from north, south, east and west. During
the night I called up the various sections of our line and they all
reported that the Germans were very quiet.

While I was doing the rounds of the forward trenches I could not help
noting the roar of waggons and limbers along the whole German line in
front of us. The night was very calm, and whilst it was quite usual to
hear a lot of waggons about rationing time, still on this occasion the
whole German line seemed to be in motion. I had never heard anything
like it before. Something extraordinary was certainly happening.
Either the Germans were changing the army in front of us, or else I
thought they had got tired of holding the line in our immediate front,
and anticipating a strong offensive of which rumors were abroad, they
were preparing to retreat to the Rhine. I reported the occurrence to
headquarters that night.

In the morning of the 22nd of April Lieutenant Drummond of the Royal
Highlanders came to see me and told me he had attended the funeral of
Captain Warren.

The Germans were shelling our billets and dugouts in St. Julien pretty
heavily, and