Tempting Grapes
In the last fight we were posted near to a wall over which hung the most tempting grapes you ever set eyes on. When you’ve lain for nearly a day in a hot sun without bite or sup, grapes seem more tempting than ever. Though the Germans seemed to concentrate their whole fire on the corner where those grapes were, most of us couldn’t resist the temptation and risk of stealing out to get them. What you had to do was to crawl along the top of the trenches like a big snail, and then, when you got there, make a big spring up and catch what you could before the German shots caught you. We weren’t always successful, and there’s many a lad of ours owes his life or his wounds to touching that forbidden fruit: An Irish Guardsman.