He, taking the nearest two men with him, went out in search of them, and a flare falling near the little party showed them up to the enemy snipers. He alone was hit.
We buried him in the battalion cemetery the next day, the colonel reading the service over his body, and we thought as we lowered him into his grave what a very good friend he had been.
It was not very many days later that we changed from this brigade area to another, leaving Ploegsteert with its memories, sad and otherwise, behind us.
CHAPTER XIX
IN FRONT OF MESSINES
The Second Canadian Division arrived in France during our stay in Ploegsteert, and after a short rest took over a sector on the right of St. Eloi and in front of Messines.
Here it was that we relieved them about a fortnight later—our third move while in front of this grim hill, the scene of such hard fighting in October of the year before.
The line at this point swung forward in a small salient to within fifty yards of the enemy—the only footing we now held on this famous ridge—and to the Toronto and Eastern Ontario Battalions fell the honour of guarding this point all winter.
Here, too, we were to learn something of grenade and mine warfare such as the other two battalions of our brigade had been waging all summer near Ploegsteert.