ul to say. We managed
to get under cover before the next one came. Such is our life here,
though we are politely said to be resting! It is fairly raining
shrapnel 200 yards up the road now, but what I am on the look-out for
are high-explosives, as they are so much more dangerous to troops
amongst buildings. The other day, on November 9th, we heard a
tremendous burst of firing, and in _The Times_ of November 23rd I see
it is thought that the British guns caught the German reserves forming
up for an attack on us, and destroyed them in large numbers.
Certainly, as Colonel Napier says, it is an awful war. However, I
notice that a lot of German fuses do not explode their shells, which
makes me think they have not got quite so good a supply of stuff as
they try to make us believe! I want very much to go out, but, on the
whole, I think it is safer to stay in at present. Sir John Ross will
have his work cut out to write the history of the Coldstream Guards
for this war. My mind is so full at present that I cannot say if I
shall be able to write ours, even if I come through all right.
However, I keep an official war diary, which will always help greatly.
These brutes have now changed from shrapnel to high explosives, which
are whirling over our heads and bursting in the town about 400 yards
farther down. I hope they will not drop one short and put it in here,
which would be good-bye to all of us....

LETTERS OF DECEMBER, 1914.

IN TRENCHES.
_December 2nd, 1914._

MY DEAR F----

Am sitting in my dug-out scrawling this by the light of a signaller's
lamp. I was awake at 4.30 a.m., working hard practically ever since,
and it is now dark with a beautiful moon rising. I have been very busy
trying to get ahead of a German trench which they had sapped up to us.
We arranged to have it stormed by Capt. O'Sullivan and Mr. Graham, but
as the Royal Engineers could not let me have an officer to put a mine
in just then, it had to be postponed for one day; and that brings us
out of our trenches, as we are supposed to go into rest billets
to-morrow night. Well, I have now settled that a battery of Field
Artillery is to fire on them at fixed hours during the night, and Mr.
T---- has been sent down there with his machine gun, so it is quite on
the cards that we shall have a merry evening! I hear the guns opening
as I write, and wonder if our fr