ex-cabmen
are accomplishing what most military authorities asserted was
impossible: they are driving German veterans out of trenches amply
supported by artillery--and they are doing the job cheerfully and
extremely well.

I believe that one of the reasons why the morale of the British is so
high is because, instead of adopting the dugout life of the Germans,
they have in the main kept to the open. Trench life is anything but
pleasant, yet it is infinitely more conducive to confidence, courage,
and enthusiasm than the rat-like existence of the Germans in
foul-smelling, ill-lighted, unsanitary burrows far beneath the surface
of the ground. Few men can remain for month after month in such a
place and retain their optimism and their self-respect. One of the
German dugouts which I saw on the Somme was so deep in the earth that
it had two hundred steps. The Germans who were found in it admitted
quite frankly that after enjoying for several weeks or months the
safety which it afforded, they had no stomach for going back to the
trenches. They were only too glad to crawl into their hole when the
British barrage began and there they were trapped and surrendered.

[Illustration: A British "Heavy" Mounted on a Railway-Truck
Shelling the German Lines.
During a big offensive the guns frequently fire a round a minute
for days on end, the gunners working in shifts, two hours on and
two hours off.]

[Illustration: Buried on the Field of Honor.
"Dust thou art and unto dust thou shalt return."]

Germany largely based her confidence of victory on the belief that,
under the strain of war, the far-flung British Empire, with its
heterogeneous elements and racial jealousies, would promptly crumble.
It was a vital error. Instead of crumbling it hardened into a unity
which is adamantine. Canada has already contributed half a million men
to the British armies, Australia three hundred thousand. South Africa,
by undertaking her own defense, released the imperial regiments
stationed there. She not only suppressed the German-fomented
rebellion, but she conquered German Southwest Africa and German East
Africa, thus adding nearly a sixth of the Dark Continent to the
Empire, and has sent ten thousand men to the battle-fields of Europe.
Indian troops are fighting in France, in Macedonia, in Mesopotamia, in
Palestine, and in Egypt. From the West Indies have come twelve
thousand men. The Malay States gave to the Empire a battle