s a spur of the Palantuken, on the far
slope of which were the Turkish trenches. The night had begun by being
pretty nearly as black as pitch; even the smoke from the shell
explosions, which is often visible in darkness, could not be seen. But
as the wind blew the snow-clouds athwart the sky patches of stars came
out. Peter had a compass, but he didn't need to use it, for he had a
kind of 'feel' for landscape, a special sense which is born in savages
and can only be acquired after long experience by the white man. I
believe he could smell where the north lay. He had settled roughly
which part of the line he would try, merely because of its nearness to
the enemy. But he might see reason to vary this, and as he moved he
began to think that the safest place was where the shelling was
hottest. He didn't like the notion, but it sounded sense.

Suddenly he began to puzzle over queer things in the ground, and, as he
had never seen big guns before, it took him a moment to fix them.
Presently one went off at his elbow with a roar like the Last Day.
These were Austrian howitzers--nothing over eight-inch, I fancy, but to
Peter they looked like leviathans. Here, too, he saw for the first
time a big and quite recent shell-hole, for the Russian guns were
searching out the position. He was so interested in it all that he
poked his nose where he shouldn't have been, and dropped plump into the
pit behind a gun-emplacement.

Gunners all the world over are the same--shy people, who hide
themselves in holes and hibernate and mortally dislike being detected.

A gruff voice cried '_Wer da_?' and a heavy hand seized his neck.

Peter was ready with his story. He belonged to Michael's wagon-team
and had been left behind. He wanted to be told the way to the sappers'
camp. He was very apologetic, not to say obsequious.

'It is one of those Prussian swine from the Marta bridge,' said a
gunner. 'Land him a kick to teach him sense. Bear to your right,
manikin, and you will find a road. And have a care when you get there,
for the Russkoes are registering on it.'

Peter thanked them and bore off to the right. After that he kept a
wary eye on the howitzers, and was thankful when he got out of their
area on to the slopes up the hill. Here was the type of country that
was familiar to him, and he defied any Turk or Boche to spot him among
the scrub and boulders. He was getting on very well, when once more,
close to his ear, came a