k and sending a spray of sand around.

We ran on perhaps a quarter of a mile, when from the rear came
the sharp command, "Down," and the next second we lay on the
ground, panting and exhausted, my heart almost bursting with the
exertion. Simultaneously the whizzing of a motor above our heads
could be heard and we knew why the enemy's shrapnel had so
suddenly found us. It was a Russian aeroplane which presumably
had signaled our approach, together with the range, to the Russian
gunners, and now was probably directing their fire and closely
watching its effect, for a chain of hills was hiding us from the view of
the enemy, who consequently had to fire indirectly. The air craft
hovered above our heads, but we were forbidden to fire at it, the
extremely difficult, almost vertical aim promising little success, aside
from the danger of our bullets falling back among us. Our reserves
in the rear had apparently sighted the air craft too, for soon we
heard a volley of rifle fire from that direction and simultaneously the
aeroplane arose and disappeared in the clouds.

Just then our own artillery came thundering up, occupied a little hill
in the rear and opened fire on the enemy. The moral effect of the
thundering of one's own artillery is most extraordinary, and many of
us thought that we had never heard any more welcome sound than
the deep roaring and crashing that started in at our rear. It quickly
helped to disperse the nervousness caused by the first entering into
battle and to restore self control and confidence. Besides, by
getting into action, our artillery was now focusing the attention and
drawing the fire of the Russian guns, for most of the latter's shells
whined harmlessly above us, being aimed at the batteries in our
rear. Considerably relieved by this diversion, we resumed our
forward movement after about fifteen minutes of further rest, our
goal being the little chain of hills which our advance guard had
previously occupied pending our arrival. Here we were ordered to
take up positions and dig trenches, any further advance being out of
the question, as the Russian artillery overlooked and commanded
the entire plain stretching in front of us.

We started at once to dig our trenches, half of my platoon stepping
forward abreast, the men being placed an arm's length apart. After
laying their rifles down, barrels pointing to the enemy, a line was
drawn behind the row of rifles and parallel to it. Then eac