he fusillade died away.

To the extreme discomfort and shame of a respectable citizen of
Bannockburn, one Private Buncle, the more hairy of the two visitors,
upon recovering his feet, promptly flung his arms around his neck and
kissed him on both cheeks. The outrage was repeated, by his companion,
upon Private Nigg. At the same time both visitors broke into a joyous
chant of "Russky! Russky!" They were escaped Russian prisoners.

When taken to Headquarters they explained that they had been brought
up to perform fatigue work near the German trenches, and had seized
upon a quiet moment to slip into some convenient undergrowth. Later,
under cover of night, they had made their way in the direction of the
firing-line, arriving just in time to make a dash before daylight
discovered them. You may imagine their triumphal departure from our
trenches--loaded with cigarettes, chocolate, bully beef, and other
imperishable souvenirs.

We have had other visitors. One bright day a Boche aeroplane made
a reconnaissance of our lines. It was a beautiful thing, white and
birdlike. But as its occupants were probably taking photographs of our
most secret fastnesses, artistic appreciation was dimmed by righteous
wrath--wrath which turned to profound gratification when a philistine
British plane appeared in the blue and engaged the glittering stranger
in battle. There was some very pretty aerial manoeuvring, right over
our heads, as the combatants swooped and circled for position. We
could hear their machine-guns pattering away; and the volume of sound
was increased by the distant contributions of "Coughing Clara"--our
latest anti-aircraft gun, which appears to suffer from chronic
irritation of the mucous membrane.

Suddenly the German aeroplane gave a lurch; then righted herself; then
began to circle down, making desperate efforts to cross the neutral
line. But the British airman headed her off. Next moment she lurched
again, and then took a "nosedive" straight into the British trenches.
She fell on open ground, a few hundred yards behind our second line.
The place had been a wilderness a moment before; but the crowd which
instantaneously sprang up round the wreck could not have been less
than two hundred strong. (One observes the same uncanny phenomenon in
London, when a cab-horse falls down in a deserted street.) However,
it melted away at the rebuke of the first officer who hurried to the
spot, the process of dissolution being acceler