"Gawd! I hope they don't send many packets like that."
"Spread out a little to the left," came the order from an officer. "When you hear a shell coming lie flat."
We got to our feet, all except Stoner, who was still asleep in his lair, and changed our positions, our ears alert for the arrival of the next shell. The last bee had scarcely ceased to buzz when we heard the second projectile coming.
"Another couple of steps. Hurry up. Down." Again we threw ourselves in a heap; the shell burst and again we were covered with dust and muck.
"Move on a bit. Quicker! The next will be here in a minute," was the cry and we stumbled along the narrow alley hurriedly as if our lives depended on the very quickness. When we came to a halt there was only a space of two feet between each man. The trench was just wide enough for the body of one, and all set about to sort themselves in the best possible manner. A dozen shells now came our way in rapid succession. Some of the men went down on their knees and pressed their faces close to the ground like Moslems at prayer. They looked for all the world like Moslems, as the pictures show them, prostrate in prayer. The posture reminded me of stories told of ostriches, birds I have never seen, who bury their heads in the sand and consider themselves free from danger when the world is hidden from their eyes.
Safety in that style did not appeal to me; I sat on the bottom of the trench, head erect. If a splinter struck me it would wound me in the shoulders or the arms or knees. I bent low so that I might protect my stomach; I had seen men struck in that part of the body, the wounds were ghastly and led to torturing deaths. When a shell came near, I put the balls of my hands over my eyes, spread my palms outwards and covered my ears with the fingers. This was some precaution against blindness; and deadened the sound of explosion. Bill for a moment was unmoved, he stood upright in a niche in the wall and made jokes.
"If I kick the bucket," he said, "don't put a cross with ''E died for 'is King and Country' over me. A bully beef tin at my 'ead will do, and on it scrawled in chalk, ''E died doin' fatigues on an empty stomach.'"
"A cig.," he called, "'oo as a cig., a fag, a dottle. If yer can't give me a fag, light one and let me look at it burnin.' Give Tommy a fag an' 'e doesn't care wot 'appens. That was in the papers. Blimey! it puts me in mind of a dummy teat. Give it to the pore man's pianner...."
"The what!"
"The squalling kid, and tell the brat to be quiet, just like they tell Tommy to 'old 'is tongue when they give 'im a cig. Oh, blimey!"