ys a Boy Scout--and he made his report.

"I went back to have a look-see into the crater, sirr."

"Well?"

"It's fair blown in, sirr, and a good piece of the sap too. I tried
could I find a prisoner to bring in"--our Colonel has promised a
reward of fifty francs to the man who can round up a whole live
Bosche--"but there were nane. They had got their wounded away, I
doubt."

"Never mind," says Simson. "Sergeant, see these men get some sleep
now. Stand-to at two-thirty, as usual. I must go and pitch in a
report, and I shall say you all did splendidly. Good-night!"

This morning, the official Intelligence Summary of our
Division--published daily and known to the unregenerate as "Comic
Cuts"--announced, with solemn relish, among other items of news:--

_Last night a small party bombed a suspected saphead at_--here
followed the exact bearings of the crater on the large-scale map.
_Loud groans were heard, so it is probable that the bombs took
effect_.

For the moment, life has nothing more to offer to our seven friends.

II

As already noted, our enthusiasm for our own sphere of activity is
not always shared by our colleagues. For instance, we in the trenches
frequently find the artillery of both sides unduly obtrusive; and we
are of opinion that in trench warfare artillery practice should be
limited by mutual consent to twelve rounds per gun per day, fired by
the gunners _at_ the gunners. "Except, of course, when the Big Push
comes." The Big Push is seldom absent from our thoughts in these days.

"That," observed Captain Wagstaffe to Bobby Little, "would leave us
foot-sloggers to settle our own differences. My opinion is that we
should do so with much greater satisfaction to ourselves if we weren't
constantly interfered with by coal-boxes and Black Marias."

"Still, you can't blame them for loosing off their big guns,"
contended the fair-minded Bobby. "It must be great sport."

"They tell me it's a greatly overrated amusement," replied
Wagstaffe--"like posting an insulting letter to some one you dislike.
You see, you aren't there when he opens it at breakfast next morning!
The only man of them who gets any fun is the Forward Observing
Officer. And he," concluded Wagstaffe in an unusual vein of pessimism,
"does not live long enough to enjoy it!"

The grievances of the Infantry, however, are not limited to those
supplied by the Royal Artillery. There are the machine-guns and the
trench-mortars.

The machi