eir Teutonic heads off.

January passed quietly. By this time we had become so accustomed to
the mud and rain that I doubt if we would have been happy without
them. In spite of all the difficulties, we managed to get our rations
and _mail_ every day. The regular shelling had become a part of our
daily life, and the constantly growing list of killed and wounded we
accepted without comment. The Machine Gun Section was gradually losing
its original members and replacing them by drafts from the infantry
companies. It was simply a case of "Conditions continue normal in the
Ypres salient," to quote the official reports. We now maintained two
strafing guns, shifting about from one position to another whenever an
opportunity offered to harass the boche.

That winter, 1915-16, was what they call a "wet winter," that is, it
rained continually and rarely got cold enough to freeze. With the
exception of a light flurry in late November and a fairly heavy snow
about the first of March, we never saw any of the "beautiful." A few
times there was frost enough to make thin ice, but never enough to
enable us to walk on top of the mud which was from six inches deep in
the best parts of the trench to thigh deep in the worst. We had no
rubber boots at the start but got some late in the winter.

A peculiar affliction, first noticed during this war, is what is known
as "trench feet." Where men are required to remain for long periods
standing in cold water and unable to move about to any great extent,
the circulation of blood in the lower limbs becomes sluggish and,
eventually, stops. The result appears to be exactly the same as that
caused by severe frost-bite; in fact it _is_ freezing without frost,
(I don't know why not, if you can cook with a fireless cooker), and,
in severe cases, amputation is necessary.

While the Imperial troops on our flank suffered considerably from this
dreaded affliction, we had but few cases, although our position was
infinitely worse than theirs, we being in lower ground. Probably the
average Canadian is better able to stand the cold and wet than the
native-born Briton. We had but one case in the Machine Gun Section and
that was not severe.

As a preventive measure, whale oil was issued with positive orders
that every man must, at some time during each twenty-four hours,
remove his shoes and socks and rub his feet with this oil. I never did
think the oil was anything but just an excuse to make the men rub as