.

'But to get on wi' the drill--the row in the trenches got hotter an'
hotter, an' our house might 'ave been a high-power magnet for bullets,
the way they was comin' in, through that open window special. The old
lady lost another eye an' half an' ear, an' 'er Sunday gown an' a big
gold brooch was shot to ribbons. A bullet cut the cord at last, an'
the old girl came down bump. But I'd been watchin' 'er so long I felt
she oughtn't to be disgraced lyin' there on 'er face before the German
fire. So I crawled out an' propped 'er up against the wall with 'er
face to the window. I 'ope she'd be glad to know 'er photo went down
with flyin' poke-bonnet.'

'It was shortly after this our wire was first cut--about ten ac emma
[A.M.] that would be. I sings out to the F.O. that I was disc[1], but
what wi' the bullets smackin' into the walls, the shells passin' over
us, the Coal-Boxes bursting around, an' the trenches belting off at
their hardest, the F.O. didn't 'ear me an' I 'ad to crawl up the stairs
to 'im. Just as I got to the top a shrap burst, an' the bullets came
smashin' an' tearin' down thro' the tiles an' rafters. The bullets up
there was whistlin' an' whinin' past an' over like the wind in a ship's
riggin', an' every now an' then _whack!_ one would hit a tile, sending
the dust an' splinters jumpin'. The F.O. was crouched up in one corner
where a handful o' tiles was still clingin', an' he was peepin' out
through these with 'is field glasses. "Keep down," 'e sez when 'e saw
me. "There's a brace o' blanky snipers been tryin' for a cold
'alf-hour to bull's-eye on to me. There they go again----," an' _crack
. . . smack_ two bullets comes, one knockin' another loose tile off, a
foot over 'is 'ead, an' t'other puttin' a china ornament on the
mantel-piece on the casualty list.

'I reported the wire cut an' the F.O. sez he'd come along wi' me an'
locate the break. "We'll have to hurry," he says, "cos it looks to me
as if a real fight was breezin' up." So we crawled out along the ditch
an' down the trench, followin' the wire. We found the break--there was
three cuts--along that bit o' road that runs from the Rollin' River
Trench down past the Bomb Store, an' I don't ever want a more highly
excitin' job than we had mendin' it. The shells was fair rainin' down
that road, an' the air was just hummin' like a harpstring wi' bullets
an' rickos.[2] We joined up an' tapped in an' found we was through all
right, so we h