e hastened toward them, hoping to make them serve as cover, but
shell after shell arrived, each bursting close by. The trees were of no
use.

There was not another soul upon the road for over two miles. Each time
we heard a shell coming toward us we cowered with our arms covering neck
and face. After each shot we inquired of each other if either had been
hit. The shooting of the gunners with such a small and distant target
appeared to me superb.

At last a shell exploded overhead, smashing the branches and sending a
load of metal flying. I felt blows of flying earth and twigs on my back.
Bass asked, "Have they got you?"

"Are you all right?" I inquired.

"Think they have got me in the face," was the reply.

I had an electric pocket lamp, with which I made an examination. He was
cut across the jaw with a fragment of shell and bleeding freely. I
bandaged him with our handkerchiefs, Bass, as always, uncomplaining and
treating the wound humorously.

Several shells followed, each too near for comfort, but we were now
reaching the limit of the guns' range, and we came without further
incident clear of their fire.

Bass's Story

[Special Dispatch to THE NEW YORK TIMES.]

CHICAGO, Jan. 7.--John F. Bass, the staff correspondent of The Chicago
Daily News, who with Perceval Gibbon had a remarkable escape from being
blown to pieces by German shells while returning from a visit to a
Russian first-line trench in Poland, cables to his paper his version of
their experiences, which duplicates largely that by Perceval Gibbon
cabled to THE NEW YORK TIMES.

Recounting their arrival at the trench held by the Bielojevski Regiment,
in the centre of the battle line, he says:

"The officers, in small underground bomb-proofs, gave us a hospitable
welcome. The men had cut small recesses in the front wall of the
trench, where they were comfortably housed in straw with bagging in
front to keep out the cold. The trenches were in good condition and
clean for war time.

"In the loopholes rifles lay ready for firing. One man in every four
watched while the other three slept. As we walked through the trench we
stepped over dead bodies of men who had recently fallen. Two of the
regiment's battalions are commanded by Staff Capt. Podjio, one of the
finest specimens of a conscientious, hard-working line officer I have
met. He passed the night traveling the trenches, keeping a vigilant
watch and encouraging the men, who seemed to be i