Wood since the twentieth of
April, mid-way between the sanguinary struggles of St. Julien and Hill
60, spectators of both. Although subjected to constant alarm we had
had a comparatively quiet time of it, with casualties that had only
varied from five to fifty-odd each day.

By day and night the gun-fire of both battles had beat back upon us in
great waves of sound. There were times when we had donned our water
soaked handkerchiefs for the gas that always threatened but never
came, so that the expectation might have shaken less steady troops.
Quick on the heels of the first news of the gas the women of Britain,
their tears scalding their needles, with one accord had laboured, sans
rest, sans sleep, sans everything, so that shortly there had poured in
to us here a steady stream of gauze pads for mouth and nostril. For
the protection of our lungs against the poison of the gas they were at
least better than the filthy rags we called handkerchiefs. We wore
their gifts and in spirit bowed to the donors, as I think all still
do. We soaked them with the foul water of the near-by graves and kept
them always at our side, ready to tie on at each fresh alarm.

Once there had come word in a special army order of the day: "Our
Belgian agent reports that all enemy troops on this front have been
directed to enter their trenches to-night with fixed bayonets. All
units are enjoined to exercise the closest watch on their front; the
troops will stand to from the first appearance of darkness, with each
man at his post prepared for all eventualities. Sleep will not be
permitted under any circumstances."

The consequence had been that that night had been one of nervous
expectation of an attack which did not materialise. We always carried
fixed bayonets in the trenches but the Germans were better equipped
with loopholes, as they were with most other things, and were forced
to leave their bayonets off their rifles in order to avoid any danger
of the latter sticking in their metal shields when needed in a hurry,
to say nothing of the added attention they would draw in their exposed
and stationary position at the mouth of a loophole. The "Stand-to" had
come as a distinct relief that morning.

And always there had been the glowering fires of a score of villages.
The greater mass of burning Ypres stood up amongst them like the
warning finger of God. Occasionally the roaring burst of an ammunition
dump flared up into a volcano of fiery sound.