ed from a hill whose contours on the map were a very fair imitation
of a dumb-bell. Here we were still facing to a flank, but our left
came up to the corner where the proper front began, which meant that
we lay enfiladed from the main front, and they used to throw over a
good deal of stuff if ever they spotted any movement.

At the beginning of May we did another move, this time on to the real
front in the Sheikh Abbas Sector. This was quite a pleasant place, as
we lived on the reverse slope of a fairly steep bank, pretty well
defiladed from all the Turk guns, and the trenches, though only in
most places a single line with quite insufficient communication
trenches, had a long view and a good field of fire. The wire was
continuous though not very thick, and it was quite safe to leave the
trenches during the day in charge of a few observation posts. Add to
this the fact that all, except the posts, could walk about during the
day in the open quite covered from view by the steep slope mentioned
above, consequently it was trench warfare under the most pleasant
possible conditions. All the same it was a trying life owing to the
difficulty of getting a normal amount of sleep. We had to "stand to"
from about 3 A.M. till dawn, and then work till breakfast, and on
to about 9.30 A.M. By that time it was too hot to do any more, and the
rest of the day had to be spent in idleness. Few of us could sleep
during the day because of the heat, and the temperature seldom began
to get much cooler before 8.30 P.M., and sometimes later. There was
nothing doing in the way of warfare beyond continuous patrols at
night, sometimes small, sometimes up to twenty or more. The only
occasion during our first stay did anything in the nature of a
skirmish take place, and that was brought on by one of our patrols
having a narrow escape of being cut off at dawn near a place called
Two Tree Farm. One of the platoons in the line saw what was happening
and went out to support them, and managed to get them in all right. A
very small affair, but quite exciting for the onlookers, when there is
nothing more important doing. In this part there was about a mile of
No-Man's-Land, and the Turk was very completely wired in and was
seldom to be found outside his wire. Most of our patrols in
consequence came in without having seen a Turk at all, but it was not
a comfortable job, as machine guns were firing bursts all night.

[Illustration: DUG-OUTS IN THE FRONT LINE.