A turn out, a turn in, and now we're out again, and barring three Field Service post cards, I believe all that time has gone without my writing to you. You must try to forgive me. I can assure you things have been happening. There hasn't been much idle time. When I last wrote we had only begun to talk about the new front trench, hadn't we? Things certainly have hummed since then.

The first move was a tour of inspection and survey of the proposed new line, by the O.C. of our Field Coy. of R.E., with some other officers. Somewhat to my surprise—I suppose he really ought not to expose himself to that extent—our C.O. accompanied this party. The next night, when the pegs were driven in, definitely marking the whole new line, the O.C.R.E. allowed me to go with him. The new line, as we marked it out, was 760 yards long; from down near The Gut right across to what used to be our centre, cutting off the whole big re-entrant and equalising the whole sector's distance from the Boche.

The next day our C.O. sent for O.C. Companies, and "the Peacemaker" took me along when he went, as I'd been over the ground, and he guessed the pow-wow would be about the new trench. The C.O. told us all about it, and what the ideas of the authorities were. He said it was the sort of job which might possibly prove costly in lives. But it had got to be done, and he was of opinion that if everyone concerned made up his mind never for a moment to relax the care and watchfulness he would use in the first half-hour, the job might be done with comparatively few casualties. He talked longer than he generally does, and I think he felt what he said a good deal. He said he never expected to have one moment's anxiety as to the bearing of any officer, N.C.O., or man of the Battalion in the face of danger. He knew very well we were all right on that score. But what he did want to impress upon us, as officers, was that our duty went a good deal beyond that.

"I know very well that none of you would ever show fear," he said; "and I think you are satisfied that your N.C.O.'s and men will never fail you in that respect. But, remember, your greatest asset is the confidence the men have in you. Never do anything to endanger that. If you use all the care and judgment you can, and if each one of your men understands exactly what the job before him is, and your influence is such as to prevent anyone from losing his head, no matter what happens, then the casualty list will be low. Every casualty you prevent on a job like this is as good as an enemy casualty gained. When we have to lose our men, let us lose them fighting, as they themselves would choose to go down if go down they must. But in this job of the new trench, we pit our wits and our coolness and discipline and efficiency against those of the Boche; and it's your job to see to it that the work is carried through at the minimum cost in man-power."

He said other things, of course, but that was the gist of it, and I think we were all impressed. He's a martinet all right, is our C.O.; and, as you know, his tongue is a two-edged sword. He's as stern a man as I ever knew; but, by Gad! he's just, and, above and before all else, he is so emphatically a man.

Well, the upshot of our plans was that "A" Company was to provide the covering party and be responsible for the tactical aspect of the show, and "C" Company—all miners and farm workers—with one Platoon of "D," was to do the digging, for a start, anyhow. The R.E. were to run the wire entanglement right along the front of the new line, and this was to be the first operation. It was obvious that as much as possible must be done during the first night, since, once he had seen the job, as he would directly daylight came, the Boche might be relied on to make that line tolerably uncomfortable for anyone working near it without cover.

While we were out of trenches that week our fellows were pretty busy during the first half of each night carrying material up to the front line. There was a good number of miles of barbed wire to go up, with hundreds of iron screw standards for the wire, and hundreds more of stakes; a lot of material altogether, and I am bound to say I think the R.E. arranged it very well. They had all their material so put together and stowed up at the front as to make for the maximum of convenience and the minimum of delay when they came to handle it in the open and under fire—as men always must be when doing anything in No Man's Land.

Our men were bursting with swank over the Company's being chosen to act as covering party; delighted to think that what they regarded as the combatant side of the show was theirs. Indeed, I rather think a lot of 'em made up their minds that they were going to utilise the opportunity of having a couple of hundred men out close to the Boche trenches for a real strafe of the men in those trenches. "The Peacemaker" had to get 'em together and talk very seriously and straight about what our responsibilities were in this job. This was necessary to make the beggars realise that ours was a defensive and not an offensive stunt; in which success or failure depended mainly upon our ability to be perfectly silent.

"All the scrapping will come later," said "the Peacemaker." "We mustn't invite one single bullet while we've a couple of hundred men behind us using picks and shovels, and working against time to get cover. If Boches come along our line, it will be our job to strafe 'em with our naked fingers if we possibly can. The last thing we'll do will be to fire a shot. And the one thing that must not happen, not in any case at all—no, not if the whole Prussian Guard turns out—is for a single Boche in any circumstances whatever to get through our line."

And that was the basis on which we tackled the job. Of course, the O.C. knew better than to try to handle his Company as a Company on the night. Orders could only be given in whispers, you understand. As a matter of fact, in all such work, as in night attacks, one must be able to rely, not alone on Platoon Sergeants and senior N.C.O.'s, but on Corporals and Section Commanders. And if they have not been trained so that you can rely on their carrying out instructions exactly, one's chances of success are pretty small.

It was dark soon after five, and by a quarter to six we were moving out into the open. One and two Platoons went out down Stinking Sap, myself in command, and three and four Platoons went out from just a little way above Petticoat Lane. I led my lot and "the Peacemaker" led the other half-Company, the idea being that when he and I met we should know that we were in our right position, and could stay there. We moved with about three paces' interval between men, and kept three or four connecting files out on our inside flank and a couple on the outer flank; the business of the inside men being to steer us at an average distance of forty paces to the front of the foremost line of pegs, which was the line to be followed by the barbed-wire entanglements; the line of the new trench itself being well inside that again.

This meant that one flank of our line, just above Petticoat Lane, would rest within 150 yards of the Boche front trench, and the other flank about 225 yards. We had drilled the whole business very carefully into the men themselves, as well as the Section Commanders and Sergeants. We got out on our line without a sound; and then "the Peacemaker" made his way back to Stinking Sap to report to Captain ——, of the R.E., that we had taken on the duty of protection and were all ready for his men to go ahead. He marched his carriers out then, stringing them out along the whole line, and the whole of his Company set to work putting up the screen of wire entanglements behind our line.

This whole business has given me a lot of respect for the R.E.; a respect which, I think, is pretty generally felt throughout the Service. The way they planned and carried out that wiring job was fine. No talk and no finicking once they were in the open; every last peg and length of binding wire in its right place; sand-bags at hand to fold over anything that needed hammering; every man told off in advance, not just to make himself as generally useful as he could, but quite definitely to screw in standards, or drive in stakes, or fix pegs, or carry along the rolls of wire, or strain the stays, or lace in the loose stuff, as the case might be. Every man knew precisely what his particular part was, and went straight at it without a word to or from anyone.

Meanwhile, I was working carefully along from end to end of our line, checking up the intervals, altering a man's position where necessary, and making sure that all our men were properly in touch and keeping their right line, watching out well and making no sound. Nobody in our lot moved, except the officers. All the others lay perfectly still. We kept moving up and down in front the whole time, except when flares were up or machine-gun fire swept across our way, and then, of course, we dropped as flat as we could.

But no machine-gun spoke on that sector, not once while the wire was going up. Before half-past seven "the Peacemaker" came along to me with orders to lead my men off to Stinking Sap. The wiring was finished. There had been a hundred and fifty men at it, and at that moment the last of 'em was entering Stinking Sap—casualties, nil.

"The Peacemaker" marched his half-Company round the end of the wire above Petticoat Lane, and I took mine round the end in front of Stinking Sap-head. Then we wheeled round to the rear of the new wire entanglement and marched out again, immediately in rear of it, till "the Peacemaker" and I met, as we had previously met in front. So we took up our second and final position and got down to it exactly as we had done in the first position.

When the O.C. reported that we were in position, "C" Company marched out, half from each end of the line, under their own officers, but with the O.C.R.E. in command, and his officers helping. They were at three yards' interval. There was a peg for every man, and the first operation was for each man to dig a hole in which he could take cover. It had all been thought out beforehand, and every man knew just what to do. Their instructions were to dig as hard as ever they knew how, but silently, till they got cover. All the sections were working against each other, and the O.C. Company was giving prizes for the first, second, and third sections, in order of priority, to get underground.

We couldn't see them, of course, and had all the occupation we cared for, thank you, in looking after our line. I was glad to find, too, that we could only hear them when we listened. They were wonderfully quiet. It's a wet clayey soil, and they had been carefully drilled never to let one tool touch another. I am told they went at it like tigers, and that the earth fairly flew from their shovels. In our line there wasn't a sound, and every man's eyes were glued on his front.

The evening had been amazingly quiet, nothing but desultory rifle fire, and unusually little of that. At a quarter to nine a Boche machine-gun dead opposite the centre of my half-Company began to traverse our line—his real objective, of course, being, not our line, but the line of trench, the old fire trench, in our rear. I know now that at that moment the slowest of "C's" diggers was underground. That burst of fire did not get a single man; not a scratch.

A fine rain, very chilling, began to fall, and got less fine as time went on. The wind rose a bit, too, and drove the rain in gusts in our faces. By good luck it was coming from the Boche trenches. At half-past ten they sent over ten or twelve whizz-bangs, all of which landed in rear of our old front line, except two that hit its parapet. Rifle fire was a little less desultory now, but nothing to write home about. They gave us an occasional belt or two from their machine-guns, but our men were lying flat, and the diggers were below ground, so there was nothing to worry about in that.

By half-past eleven I confess I was feeling deuced tired. One had been creeping up and down the line for over five hours, you know; but it wasn't that. One spends vitality; it somehow oozes out of you on such a job. I never wanted anything in my life so much as I wanted to get my half-Company through that job without casualties. And there was one thing I wanted even more than that—to make absolutely certain that no prowling Boche patrol got through my bit of the line.

Down on our flank at The Gut there were half a dozen little bombing shows between six and midnight, and one bigger scrap, when the Hun exploded a mine and made a good try to occupy its crater, but, as we learned next day, was hammered out of it after some pretty savage hand-to-hand work. Farther away on the other flank the Boche artillery was unusually busy, and, at intervals, sent over bursts of heavy stuff, the opening salvoes of which rather jangled one's nerves. You see, "A" Company could have been extinguished in a very few minutes had Boche known enough to go about it in the right way.

If only one enterprising Boche, working on his own—a sniper, anybody,—without getting through our line just gets near enough to make out that it is a line, and then gets back to his own trenches, our little game will be up, I thought. It wasn't restful. The men were getting pretty stiff, as you may guess, lying still in the wet hour after hour.

At half-past two "the Peacemaker" came along and whispered to me to take my men in: "Finished for to-night."

I wasn't sorry. I put my senior Sergeant on to lead, and myself brought up the rear. I was, of course, the last to get into Stinking Sap, and my Platoon Sergeant was waiting for me there to tell me that not one of our men had a scratch, nor yet a single man of "C" Company. One man of No. 3 Platoon, in "the Peacemaker's" half-Company, had a bullet through his shoulder; a Blighty, and no more. And that was our record.

But, look here, I absolutely must stop and censor some of the Platoon's letters before turning in. I'll write again as soon as ever I can and tell you the rest of it. But—a trench nearly 800 yards long, wire entanglements in front—casualties, one man wounded! Nobody felt much happier about it than your

"Temporary Gentleman."