FOOTNOTES:
[52] These men were evidently advancing from Saulchoy-sur-Davenescourt, into which a number of the enemy had filtered in the darkness.
[53] Returned prisoners of war informed Captain Miller, whose diary has been drawn upon in this chapter, that the streets of Erches, through which they were marched, were littered with German dead. So, as he remarks in a letter to the writer, the affair "was not so one-sided as it looked."
[CHAPTER XII]
Flanders: The 108th Brigade in the Messines-Kemmel Battle:[54] April to June 1918
The 36th Division had a glance only, infinitely tantalizing, at the beautiful valley of the Bresle, with its pastures and woodlands, and snug villages in which the troops were billeted, from Gamaches, several miles inland, to the little pleasure-resort of Ault on the coast. A short rest in these surroundings would have been delightful. But there was no rest for anyone for a long time to come, nor could be. The last trains did not arrive in the area till the morning of April the 1st; the last trains left it, bearing the remnants of the Division towards Ypres, on the 4th. For the old battlefield, still known as the Salient, was its new destination.
The interval had been spent in reorganization and the absorption of the Entrenching Battalions, originally formed in February from the surplus personnel of the infantry, which had accompanied the Division north. They did not go very far to fill the gaps caused by the prodigious casualties. The word gaps, in fact, is inapplicable. The infantry of the Division had disappeared. The 108th Brigade had been reduced to a little over three hundred, mostly transport and employed men. The total casualties in the Division in the ten days from March 21st were 7,252. Of these, 185 officers and 5,659 other ranks were reported missing. Perhaps four-fifths of these were prisoners of war, wounded or unwounded. It was a very weak Division which detrained at Proven and other stations further west.
From the day of its arrival, however, it began to receive very large drafts from the flood of recruits that now poured across the Channel. Bitter criticisms have been heard of the policy which had kept so many troops in England till then. Whatever their justice in some cases, they have none where the drafts now received by the 36th Division are concerned; for of these eighty or ninety per cent. consisted of boys of nineteen, with far from adequate training. In some cases these youths, almost before they knew their officers by sight, were to be put to the severest test, and were to emerge from it with quite astonishing credit.
Divisional Headquarters, in which Lieutenant-Colonel A. G. Thompson, D.S.O., Indian Army, had succeeded Colonel Place as G.S.O.1, were established at Ten Elms Camp, near Poperinghe, on April the 3rd. On the night of the 6th the Division began relieving the southern part of the front held by the 1st Division. By the morning of the 8th the relief was complete, the 107th Brigade being in front line, the 109th in support, and Divisional Headquarters on the Canal Bank a mile north of Ypres.[55]
The new front line included the village of Poelcappelle, which consisted now of a few "pill-boxes" and naught besides. The area behind it had been the scene of the most savage fighting on the British front, and was simply a waste of shell-holes, traversed by "duck-board" tracks. In rear, however, camps had sprung up amidst the desolation. Ypres, of all places under the sky, boasted an officers' club. There was a railway station at St. Jean, which those who had seen the campaign of 1917 remembered as one of the most unpleasant spots upon the front, and a mass of sidings at Wieltje, which had been infinitely worse. Not for long was the area to enjoy these amenities, nor Ypres its unwonted isolation from the enemy. On the 9th the troops heard a tremendous bombardment to the south. The enemy's offensive on the Lys had opened.
From Givenchy, where they were magnificently held, to the neighbourhood of Gapaard, on a front of some twenty miles, the Germans had broken through. On the front of the Portuguese Corps the line was shattered, and the German wave flowed up the low valley of the Lys. The battered city of Armentières fell. For two or three days no real resistance could be organized across the gap, and the Germans pushed west upon Hazebrouck, a most important railway junction. Estaires, ten miles west of Armentières, was occupied by the evening of the 10th. By that time troops of the 36th Division were upon the scene of action.
The 108th Brigade was in II. Corps reserve. At noon on the 10th it received orders to move at once to Kemmel, with "C" Company of the Machine-Gun Battalion. 'Buses were provided for dismounted personnel. The 'bus column, moving via La Clytte, reached Kemmel village at 4-15 p.m., the Brigade coming under the orders of the G.O.C. 19th Division. That Division, with the 9th, had been fighting hotly for the defence of the Messines Ridge. The admirable steadiness of their young recruits and the gallant fashion in which their counter-attacks had been launched form a brilliant page in the history of the war, and helped to turn the Lys offensive, huge as were its gains, into one of the most expensive and fruitless of the great series of German assaults. General Griffith was ordered to put his Brigade into the Kemmel defences. His headquarters were established in Kemmel Château.
Shortly after midnight General Griffith received orders to move up to the Messines Ridge, in support of the weak South African Brigade of the 9th Division, which had been thrown into the battle under the orders of the 19th. The 1st Irish Fusiliers took up a line on the Messines-Wytschaete Road, from five hundred yards north of the former village to the neighbourhood of the 36th Division's old acquaintance, Pick House. The 12th Rifles was on the Spanbroek Ridge in support; the 9th Fusiliers about the old British front line on the Wulverghem-Messines Road. The morning passed fairly quietly, but there was ominous news as to the German advance north of Ploegsteert. General Griffith received a secret warning order that, in the event of the enemy capturing Hill 63, the whole line would have to pivot back across the Spanbroek Ridge and its prolongation east of Wulverghem, south of which village touch would be obtained with the 25th Division.
At half-past three, after heavy bombardment, the enemy launched an attack upon the crest-road. The South Africans on the left were pushed off it, and the line of the 1st Irish Fusiliers broken. A very gallant counter-attack by Fusiliers and South Africans, side by side, restored the position, though subsequent pressure on the left of the latter forced them to bend back somewhat from the road toward Hell Farm. At 7 p.m. came another assault, in face of which the Fusiliers lost not a yard of ground. None of the officers who took those raw boys into action can have dared to expect of them such steadiness and resolution as they now displayed.
At night, however, came orders to carry into effect the movement anticipated in the warning order. The advance of the enemy to the south had made it only too necessary. The ridge must go, though the 9th Division was still to cling to its northern crown, the village of Wytschaete. The retirement was carried out before dawn, but it was discovered on its completion that there was no touch with the left flank of the 25th Division. After a great deal of trouble, this was attained by withdrawing the right of the 108th Brigade some hundred yards.
All day was heavy shelling, but no infantry attack developed till after six o'clock. On this occasion, as always, the Germans placed great reliance upon a local assault delivered as dusk was falling, which just permitted attackers to consolidate a position won, and gave no time for a counter-attack before the pall of darkness descended. Such a night as this, which would be lit scarce at all by the thin sickle of a new moon, was peculiarly favourable to these tactics.
They were, however, unsuccessful. Once again the defence of the 108th Brigade prevailed. The left of the 9th Fusiliers was driven back. Quickly a counter-attack was launched. The reserve company of the 9th, led by the commanding officer of the battalion, Lieut.-Colonel P. E. Kelly, and a company of the 12th Rifles, led by Major Holt Waring, most gallantly restored the position. By eight o'clock all was quiet. But casualties had been heavy. The 1st Fusiliers in particular had had very serious losses the previous day on the Messines Ridge. This battalion was reorganized as a company, and attached to the 9th. During the night there was no touch with troops of the 25th Division, the gap having formed owing to the advance of the enemy on Neuve Eglise and the consequent lengthening of the line. In the early hours of April the 13th a battalion of the 178th Brigade, now attached to the 19th Division, was moved up to fill it.
The 13th was a day of continuous alarms. Parties of the enemy made attempts at dawn to advance by short rushes on the front of the 12th Rifles, east of Wulverghem, but were beaten off with loss by Lewis-gun and rifle fire. A couple of hours later fresh attacks appeared to be brewing. Parties of Germans were dispersed by the fire of machine and Lewis guns. The former were excellently placed by an officer who knew every foot of the ground, Captain Walker, in old positions which he had often held before the Battle of Messines in 1917. Then, all through the afternoon, small parties of the enemy strove to make ground under cover of the old camouflage screens upon the Messines-Wulverghem Road. They were counter-attacked and driven off, suffering considerable casualties from the fire of Lewis guns. The position on the right flank was, however, more desperate than ever. At nine o'clock had come from the 25th Division the evil news that the Germans were in Neuve Eglise.
During the night the 9th Fusiliers was relieved by troops of the 178th Brigade, and withdrawn to the dug-outs on Kemmel Hill. The 12th Rifles remained in line. The relieved battalion was not given long to rest. Before noon it was ordered to man the Kemmel defences, and to send up its company of the 1st Fusiliers to dug-outs behind the old British front line opposite Kruisstraat Cabaret. The 14th may be accounted a quiet day, since it passed without infantry attack. But the volume of artillery fire was immense, and distributed to a great depth in rear of the positions held. "Green Kemmel Hill," as one officer wrote, "was turning brown before our eyes." And the enemy was definitely in possession of Neuve Eglise.
At 10-30 p.m. orders were received from the 19th Division for an immediate withdrawal west of Wulverghem. This was carried out before dawn, the line pivoting back on the left of the 12th Rifles, which joined up with the 178th Brigade west of the village. It was completed only just in time. With morning light the Germans opened an intense bombardment on the new position, which, for the greater part of its length, followed no old British trench. An infantry attack followed, and bodies of Germans broke through at the junction of the 12th Rifles and 178th Brigade. A counter-attack by the 1st Irish Fusiliers and the scanty reserves of the 12th Rifles, led by Major Holt Waring, failed to restore the position, but prevented the enemy gaining further ground on the left. Major Waring, a most gallant officer and a born leader of men, was killed. The left and centre of the 12th Rifles were very wisely withdrawn a few hundred yards to a famous communication trench of old days, known as "Kingsway." From this there was a fairly good field of fire. The 9th Irish Fusiliers had now been moved up from the Kemmel defences, and was ordered to send up two platoons to connect the right flank in "Kingsway" with the original line west of Wulverghem. These two platoons had an unfortunate fate. At dusk they were almost surrounded by groups of the enemy pressing forward, and were forced to fall back some hundred yards with heavy casualties.
At 2-15 a.m. on the 16th the little remnant of the Brigade began to withdraw on relief, covered by small outposts. It then marched back to a camp near La Clytte, suffering numerous casualties on its route from shell-fire. Four machine-guns remained near Kemmel village. The enemy was now indulging in what were known to artillerymen as area bombardments, concentrating upon half a square mile of country for half an hour, then switching his batteries to another. Such methods are ineffective unless based upon an enormous mass of heavy artillery. With this available, as it was on this occasion, they are extraordinarily noxious and demoralizing. Reserves, tired units withdrawn for a short rest, are kept constantly on the strain, ever wondering when their turn is coming, compelled hurriedly to shift position when it does. Severe loss and disorganization are caused to transport piqueted in the open or bringing up rations and munitions. A spot undisturbed at one minute becomes the centre-point of a hellish tornado at the next.
April the 16th, while the men of the 108th Brigade, wearied out and dazed by shell-fire, snatched what rest they could, was the occasion of furious fighting at Wytschaete. The village was lost in the morning, and retaken by a magnificent counter-attack of those veritable paladins of modern war, the Highland Brigade of the 9th Division. It could not be held on the morrow owing to its isolation, and the line had to be withdrawn to the neighbourhood of the old British trenches of 1917. The 17th, to many observers, appeared the blackest day they had seen. Almost everywhere the gains of years of desperate fighting had been lost. Passchendaele and Poelcappelle—to which there will be further reference when we return to the fortunes of the 36th Division—were gone. Huge slices of territory on which the Germans had never stood, or over which they had been hustled in retreat, were now in their possession. Bailleul, which had been at many periods a Corps Headquarters, had fallen. From villages such as Westoutre, where they had lived in comparative peace since 1914, the villagers were rushing out under shell-fire, pushing barrows, staggering under the burden of huge bundles, across the fields. Men asked whether we had any reserves remaining, whether the young American formations would ever be ready, whether the Channel ports could be saved.
And yet, though none who watched can have guessed it, hardly even the great soldier now in supreme command of the Allied Armies, or his British colleague, the day may have marked a turning-point. The French were hurrying north. Their troops were already in line on the right of the 9th Division; their field artillery, the "seventy-fives," rushed up, each at the tail of a lorry which carried the detachment, were lining the hills, the Scherpenberg, Mont Rouge, and Mont Vidaigne. The German infantry was suffering heavy loss. Black as was the night, there was, if as yet no faintest light of dawn, the paler gray on the horizon which is its herald.
On the evening of that day orders were received for the formation of the Brigade, which could now muster about four hundred rifles, into a composite battalion. This battalion, under the command of Colonel Kelly, was ordered to move down behind Kemmel Hill, in reserve, to be in position by 4 a.m. next morning. It encountered a storm of shelling on its way, having seventy casualties. Among the killed here was Captain Despard, 9th Irish Fusiliers, who had shown great tenacity and fine leadership during the retreat of the previous month. All day the battalion remained here, under very heavy fire, from which Kemmel now afforded but slight protection. At evening it was withdrawn, French troops having taken over the defence of this part of the line. The remnants of the Brigade marched all night, to Siege Camp and Hospital Farm, between Poperinghe and Elverdinghe, rejoining the 36th Division at 5-30 a.m. on the 19th of April.
The Brigade had, for the second time in a month, been cut to pieces. The 12th Rifles alone had had upwards of fifteen hundred casualties in that period. One often saw in our summaries of intelligence reference to reports that such and such a German formation had had particularly heavy losses, followed by a statement that it might be considered negligible for some time to come. Few can have had losses higher than those of the 108th Brigade, which had, as has been recorded, practically disappeared by the end of March. Yet in ten days' time this Brigade had entered another great battle, to prove itself very far from negligible. The admiration one feels for its achievements is mingled with surprise when one thinks of the youth and lack of experience in its ranks. Well did it merit its share of the commendation expressed in a telegram received from the G.O.C. IX. Corps the day before it was finally relieved. The message ran as follows:
"The C. in C. has just been at Corps H.Q. He would have liked to see all ranks now fighting on the 9th Corps front, and to tell each one of them of his personal appreciation of the magnificent fight they have made and are making. He would like to shake hands with each individual and thank him for what he has done. He has not time for this, but has asked me to give everybody this message."
The 36th Division, when the 108th Brigade departed on its desperate lone venture, was left with its front line east of Poelcappelle, and its headquarters on the Canal Bank. On that very day, March the 10th, the Army Commander decided to withdraw the II. Corps to its Battle Zone, here practically the British front line of 1917. The right of the 36th Division would now be just in front of Wieltje, so well known of old. An outpost line was, however, to be maintained upon the Steenebeek.
The retirement was absolutely essential, nor could it be delayed. By April the 11th the Germans were approaching the Forest of Nieppe. Passchendaele and Poelcappelle now protruded, an incredible salient, that made the old Ypres Salient unremarkable by comparison. Nevertheless, a few nights' respite was allowed, in order that the enemy might be deprived of the booty, and of the shelter for future operations, that had otherwise fallen to him. The heavy artillery was to move back first, bringing back all the ammunition that could possibly be carried, and tipping that which could not into shell-holes. An extensive programme of demolitions was planned by the C.R.E. Every dug-out or "pill-box" of importance was to be destroyed by explosives at the last possible moment. Craters were to be blown at important road-junctions. Light railways were to be, as far as possible, torn up or otherwise demolished.
There was a feverish rush by the Engineers, assisted by Infantry working-parties, to do the work in the scanty time available. Most of the forward demolitions were carried out by the 122nd Field Company, now commanded by Major W. Smyth, who had greatly distinguished himself during the March retreat as an attaché to the Divisional Staff. They were very effective. The 121st Field Company dammed the Steenebeek in an attempt to make it a more formidable obstacle, and began the construction of a new line behind it. The 150th Field Company prepared ten bridges over the Ypres Canal for demolition. The world knows that none of these bridges was ever "sent up," but may not know by how little their destruction was averted.
On the night of the 11th of April the withdrawal of the heavy artillery to cover the Battle Zone began, being completed three days later. The field artillery also moved back, leaving, however, forward guns in action by night, to deceive the enemy as to the British intentions. All was now prepared in rear. It remained only to withdraw the two battalions manning the outpost positions, firing the charges for the demolitions as they retired. This was carried out on the night of the 15th. Necessary as was the task, it was one which could not but inspire disappointment and regret. In a night the British Army was abandoning ground which had been profusely watered with its blood, and had taken long months in winning. The enemy advanced very slowly and cautiously on the morrow, heavily shelling Poelcappelle, now a mile and a half from the outposts, before he ventured to occupy it.
The Belgian Army was extending its front, as a helping hand in time of adversity. On the night of April the 18th the 4th Belgian Division relieved the 30th Division, on the left of the 36th, taking over the front of one battalion of the 107th Brigade. The next week passed quietly, the infantry showing aggression against the enemy outposts, capturing six prisoners in patrol affairs on successive nights. Divisional Headquarters were withdrawn from the Canal Bank to Border Camp, in the woodlands north of the Vlamertinghe-Poperinghe Road. For a couple of days the Steenebeek became the line of resistance, with outposts on the east bank. But Kemmel, so many miles in rear, had fallen, and the Germans were attacking north of it. General Plumer felt himself compelled to order a further withdrawal. The Ypres Canal was now to be the line of resistance. That decision, it is believed, has never been realized by people in England. Battered Ypres, small as was its actual importance of late, had been all through the war a sort of lodestar to the Germans. The best blood of England had been spilt in its defence. And now, theoretically, it was in the front line. Theoretically only, however, it may happily be recorded. An outpost line over two thousand yards east of it was maintained, and, as the German troops on the immediate front remained unaggressive—they had had a heavy defeat from the Belgians further north a few days previously—and the Lys Battle died down, lines in rear were gradually improved and dispositions altered, so that they might be held in greater strength in the event of an attack.
The second withdrawal of the 36th Division was evidently anticipated by the Germans, who followed it closely. An officer and two men of the 31st Landwehr Division, over impetuous, were captured. One party of the enemy, pressing swiftly on, entered Juliet Farm, a point which the 107th Brigade had been ordered to retain. Both the "pill-box" and Canopus Trench, in its neighbourhood, were retaken next night, together with an enemy machine-gun. The 109th Brigade on the right took five prisoners.
On the following day a great attack was launched by the Germans from south of Meteren to Voormezeele, upon the French D.A.N.[56] and the Second British Army. Everywhere it was completely and bloodily repulsed. To the enemy it was a terrible check. April the 29th, 1918, deserves to rank as high as the following 8th of August[57] in the history of the war. It marked the failure of the German northward offensive. For failure that offensive was, as the Somme offensive was not. The tenacity of troops on the flanks, such as the 55th Division on the right and the 9th on the left, had confined and narrowed the thrust. The curious formation of great hills, in almost straight line across the Flanders plain; Kemmel, the Scherpenberg, Mont Rouge, Mont Vidaigne, Mont Noir, Mont Kokereele, Mont des Cats, then, after a gap, Cassel, proved an impassable barrier in later stages of the battle. The first of the series alone fell. Upon the rest French artillery was now massed, pouring death into the Germans below. A few days earlier Ludendorff had, at a critical moment, struck again at Amiens. That offensive, which might have changed the whole position, had been pushed back before counter-attacks, and nipped in bud by the brilliant recapture of Villers-Bretonneux by the Australian Corps. The Germans were to make new offensives and gain much ground, notably near Rheims, where they cut the main Eastern Railway, and came all too close to Paris at Château-Thierry. But they were the blows of desperation. Week by week drew nearer the great retribution.
The next six weeks passed quietly for the 36th Division. The chief diversion was about a little dug-out near Juliet Farm, in the front line, formerly a Signals testing-point for overhead wires. Here there was constant bombing and raiding, largely to the disadvantage of the German troops, who were not of first quality and were unable to withstand our men in close fighting. During the month of May fourteen prisoners were taken by the Division on seven separate occasions. One night a German wagon with rations drove into our outpost position in error and was captured, so indeterminate were the opposing front lines. The 36th Divisional Artillery had returned and taken over the defence of the front before the end of April. Early in May it received, with all other British divisional artilleries in France, a proportion of Indian personnel for its D.A.C., to replace English drivers. These were thereupon sent back for training as gunners.
During this period there occurred a great change in the command of the Division. Within three weeks three general officers long associated with it returned to England. On May the 6th Major-General O. S. Nugent, C.B., D.S.O., was succeeded by Major-General Clifford Coffin, V.C., D.S.O., in the command of the Division, General Nugent proceeding next day to England, preparatory to taking up a command in India. As long as the 36th Division is remembered, General Nugent's name will be associated with it. His whole existence was centred upon it; he was intensely proud of its achievements and jealous for its good name. It owed much to him, particularly to his training in the early days after its arrival in France. His successor, General Coffin, was an officer of the Royal Engineers, with a reputation for vigour, and a Victoria Cross gained for great bravery at Ypres. Just before General Nugent, General Withycombe and, just after him, General Griffith gave up command of the 107th and 108th Brigades respectively. General Withycombe had commanded his Brigade from within a few days of its arrival in France, except for a short period in 1917 when he had commanded a Brigade in England, and had inspired affection and trust in all its ranks. His headquarters was always a happy family, and a hospitable one, as the present writer would be ingrate were he to refrain from recording. The war leaves few pleasanter memories than those of meals at friendly boards after much perambulating of trenches. General Griffith had arrived a little later, and his service with the Division was actually longer. His imperturbability and resource in moments of emergency had often served it and his own Brigade well. Their successors were Brigadier-General E. J. de S. Thorpe, D.S.O., in the 107th Brigade, and Brigadier-General E. Vaughan, D.S.O., in the 108th.
Major-General C. C. Coffin, V.C., C.B., D.S.O.
The 36th Division had indeed enjoyed the continuity of tradition and purpose which comes from a long tenour of command by senior officers. General Nugent, General Withycombe, General Griffith, General Brock, in the Divisional Artillery, had now commanded for two and a half years. In the 109th Brigade had been more frequent changes, but two of its Brigadiers, Generals Ricardo and Hessey, who between them commanded it for two years, had previously commanded two of its battalions.
In the early days of June came a most welcome relief, just when the country was at its best. Handing over the defence of the line to the 12th Belgian Division, the 36th moved back to the agreeable wooded area between Poperinghe and Proven. It was now in II. Corps reserve, ready if necessary to support the right flank of the Belgian Army. One Brigade, two Field Companies, and two companies of the Pioneer battalion, were at the disposal of the II. Corps for work on rear defences. There was now, men said, "wire from Ypres to Calais." Between Ypres and Poperinghe, six miles apart, were no less than four well-defended lines: the Brielen defences, and the Green, Yellow, and Blue Lines. In rear of Poperinghe were plenty more. The troops working upon these defences were relieved periodically, the other formations and units carrying out training. The Artillery put one section per battery into positions prepared for the defence of the Blue Line, in the event of another great attack, which still appeared not improbable.
The troops benefited very greatly from this welcome respite, the first the Division had had for a year, if the few days in the snow at Christmas be excepted. The young soldiers who now for the most part filled the ranks grew strong under the influence of good food, exercise, and life in the open under pleasant conditions. Their fitness for battle increased swiftly under that of steady training. There was plenty of sport, football, cricket, running, and boxing, in all of which their neighbours, the Belgians, took a hand. The only trouble was the extraordinary epidemic of influenza which swept over the world that summer, and visited all the armies in the field. Some German divisions, it was reported, were for a time not in a fit state to move or fight owing to its ravages. In the prevalent fine weather, fortunately, men recovered quickly from its effects.
The 36th Division had great tasks yet before it. It had to swing its hammer in the mighty line of destroyers that was to crush in the German defences and open the road to final victory. For those tasks that sunny month of June out of line was, as a prelude, of inestimable worth. After the dazing and deadening effect, the abrutissement of a battle, nothing told so much on the dash and energy of troops as long, dreary months of trench warfare, even in a line relatively quiet. They lost not only their physical agility, their power to march and run, but their mental power as well. A spell such as this gave them not only new strength, but new heart, new spirit, new hope. Affairs might be gloomy, but gloom was dispersed by the sun, like the Flanders mists. When the Division next entered the line, it was once again a fine fighting force.
That event came in the first week of July. The French, who, after losing Kemmel, had made a very fine stand at Locre, the vital gateway to the valley between the Scherpenberg and Mont Rouge, were now being relieved by the British along the line of the hills. After three days about Cassel, in reserve to the French XVI. Corps, the 36th Division relieved the 41st French Division on the northern skirts of Bailleul. Divisional Headquarters were established at Terdeghem, with a command post on the Mont des Cats prepared for emergencies. The sudden move had almost, but not quite, succeeded in spoiling a very fine Divisional Horse Show, held at Proven, in beautiful weather and surroundings, on July the 3rd. Upon this the officers of the neighbouring Belgian Cavalry Division, including an Olympic competitor, descended like wolves on the fold, giving a remarkable display of skill and horsemanship, and taking practically all the prizes for jumping events.
The Division was to hold this line for upwards of two months, then to go forward upon the enemy's heels. Nor was it ever again to be forced to give ground. The gray blur on the horizon was brighter now; the light was not far off.