"Keep your eyes open, the attack will certainly recommence."
Has there really been an attack?
"They do that sort of thing to prevent our falling asleep," growls one man.
The rain has stopped. Each man leans against the trench wall and groups form. We converse in low tones, hiding the light of the pipes in the hollow of the hand, and await events.
At midnight a fresh alarm. The fusillade upon Crouy begins again, and in a few seconds is raging along the entire line. The cannon also are firing. The field of beetroots is lit up by fuses. We maintain an uninterrupted fire under the quiet command of Sergeant Chaboy. A few balls ricochet into the trenches and eight men are wounded.
After forty-five minutes of furious firing everything again becomes calm. A few more salvos and a final crackling of the mitrailleuses, and it is over. Profound silence throughout the rest of the night. We cannot understand it.
The company has spent thirty thousand cartridges, perhaps without killing a single German.
Tuesday, 22nd December.
Still in the first line, though in a sector farther away from the enemy.
Reymond invites a few friends to inaugurate an exhibition of drawings he has just finished. Into the recesses of the trench walls enormous beetroots are fitted. On the slices of these hard white roots (they resemble in no way the beetroot of the salad-bowl), cut clean through with a chop from a spade, Reymond has sketched, with a violet crayon, some of the heads of the section.