s' over it. Our guns--those behind
us, from which we had to dodge occasional prematures--have a peculiar
bang-sound added to the sharp crack of discharge. The French 75 has a
sharp wood-block-chop sound, and the shell goes over with a peculiar
whine--not unlike a cat, but beginning with n--thus,--n-eouw. The big
fellows, 3000 yards or more behind, sounded exactly like our own, but
the flash came three or four seconds before the sound. Of the German
shells--the field guns come with a great velocity--no warning--just
whizz-bang; white smoke, nearly always air bursts. The next size,
probably 5 inch howitzers, have a perceptible time of approach, an
increasing whine, and a great burst on the percussion--dirt in all
directions. And even if a shell hit on the front of the canal bank, and
one were on the back of the bank, five, eight, or ten seconds later
one would hear a belated WHIRR, and curved pieces of shell would
light--probably parabolic curves or boomerangs. These shells have a
great back kick; from the field gun shrapnel we got nothing BEHIND the
shell--all the pieces go forward. From the howitzers, the danger is
almost as great behind as in front if they burst on percussion. Then the
large shrapnel--air-burst--have a double explosion, as if a giant shook
a wet sail for two flaps; first a dark green burst of smoke; then
a lighter yellow burst goes out from the centre, forwards. I do not
understand the why of it.

Then the 10-inch shells: a deliberate whirring course--a deafening
explosion--black smoke, and earth 70 or 80 feet in the air. These always
burst on percussion. The constant noise of our own guns is really worse
on the nerves than the shell; there is the deafening noise, and the
constant whirr of shells going overhead. The earth shakes with every
nearby gun and every close shell. I think I may safely enclose a cross
section of our position. The left is the front: a slope down of 20 feet
in 100 yards to the canal, a high row of trees on each bank, then a
short 40 yards slope up to the summit of the trench, where the brain of
the outfit was; then a telephone wired slope, and on the sharp slope,
the dugouts, including my own. The nondescript affair on the low slope
is the gun position, behind it the men's shelter pits. Behind my dugout
was a rapid small stream, on its far bank a row of pollard willows, then
30 yards of field, then a road with two parallel rows of high trees.
Behind this again, several hundred ya