an incredibly short space of time every officer learns the (p. 006)
country off by heart, and can bring any gun to bear on a particular
target at short notice. At first Junior Officers are allowed practice
shoots on targets well behind the enemy lines, and as they gain
confidence and experience, are entrusted with "close shoots," _i.e._,
firing on hostile emplacements, etc., in the front line, a job which
requires extreme caution and accuracy, as "No Man's Land" averages not
more than 200 yards in width in most places. Batteries can always
communicate with Battalion Headquarters in the line, a wire, usually
buried, leading from there to our Brigade Headquarters, and each
Battery has its own private wire to the latter place. In the same way
one can be linked up with nearly every unit in a Division by means of
an Exchange run by the Royal Engineers.

A few days sufficed us to make ourselves quite at home, and officers
went freely about "seeking whom they might devour," visited old
established O.P.'s, and searched for new or better ones. It is a
curious fact that the average subaltern is never fully satisfied with
an O.P., and is always bent on discovering "something better,"
although in few cases is his ambition realised! One officer favours
this O.P., another that, and on this occasion the one which our worthy
Battery Commander had a preference for was a most unpleasant place,
commonly known as "The Doll's House," though why so called no one
could tell. At any rate, it was an abode to be avoided on all possible
occasions, and the subalterns were quite convinced it was the
registering place of all the hostile batteries within range and
vision. At any rate, we daily found less and less of the building,
until one day the staircase was blown away as well as the perch on top
which afforded us our view. Great was the relief when the B.C. at last
declared the O.P. "out of action" until further notice.

Nearly every O.P. has an appropriate name given to it, and so we
repaired to "Stink Farm" after abandoning our old love! We put in most
useful days of practice there, and the knowledge and experience gained
was invaluable. Our thanks were due to the enemy for his consideration
in allowing us to conduct our daily tasks almost unmolested: he showed
himself to be most lethargic and sleepy, and did not waken up unless
we were unusually energetic. Perhaps his chief reason for remaining so
inactive was the absence of any heavy g