Stacked next to them were a corresponding number of hollow copper cylinders containing stiff little cream-colored children's belts, with eyelet-holes down the middle, coiled neatly inside them. Some of them had one coil; others two coils, one on top of the other; others three coils superimposed. These were the propelling charges for the shells, and were of three strengths according as one, two or three of the coils of cream-colored explosive were put in the copper shells. They were topped off with a heavy felt pad which fitted neatly into the cylinder.
Meantime the rain came down in torrents and began to leak through the thin plank roofing in little streams which were very hard to dodge.
The Lieutenant showed us a bomb-proof which he had just begun to build into the earth wall of the cellar, behind the stack of shells. He was going to cover it with a concrete roof, pile a few feet of earth on top of that, then some sand-bags, and top the whole off with boulders, so as to make any shell hitting it explode at once on the surface, instead of boring half-way down before exploding. He was doing all this work with his eight men at night when they were not handling the gun. During the day they slept except when, as now, they wanted to disturb the sleep of the enemy. This bomb-proof was only meant for refuge when the Germans began bombarding him. The men's regular sleeping-quarters were a little to the rear.
And still the rain came down, the air became raw and cold, and the little waterfalls became harder and harder to dodge. But the man at the telephone squatted patiently by the wall, and his seven mates chatted placidly together in incomprehensible Flemish, switching instantly to French when answering any question the Lieutenant put to them.
The Lieutenant explained how the gun was aimed, the sighting device showing a stake in line with a church steeple; only as there was nothing to be seen in front of Julia except an earth bank and ten feet of false hedge, it stands to reason that stake and steeple were behind her and appeared, not through a telescope as I had just stupidly thought, but as a reflection in a mirror—which is the way all well-conducted howitzers are aimed.
Finally, after an hour's wait the Lieutenant rang up his Major on the telephone and asked whether anything was amiss with the Captain. No; the Captain was only linking up a new telephone connection nearly four kilometres in front of us.
The Lieutenant pointed out a false hedge some hundred yards behind us.
"That is exceedingly dangerous for us here," he explained. "It is much too close to us. It should be at least 150 yards further removed. If it draws the German fire, as it is intended to do, that fire is just as apt to hit us as the false hedge. It was put up as a protection to another gun which was off there to the right, but it's a very uncomfortable thing to have near us, especially before we have a bomb-proof to crawl into."
"Ting—aling—aling!" went the telephone bell. The soldier listened. "The Captain says, 'Are you all ready?'"
"Tell him 'yes'," replied the Lieutenant.