The lightning becomes more vivid. There is a rattling, crashing roar from the artillery of the skies that can never be equalled by any earthly batteries. Surely the Creator is in angry mood to-night, as comes a deafening peal, followed by vivid flashes of forked lightning in fantastic shapes. One seems a long arm with hooked fingers, as though the Most High would grasp one or both of the contending armies and hurl them into the seas. The lightning plays around the steel points of the bayonets of the motionless sentries, standing ever ready under the parapets, and keeping a ceaseless watch the night through on the enemy trenches.
Trench and traverse, hill and valley, are revealed by a brighter light than that of day. The rude wooden crosses, marking the places where, alas! too many of Australasia’s best have fallen, are brought out in bold relief against the dark background of holly scrub, and the narrow strips of winding roadway on the long hillsides from the beach—the work of months—up which perspiring fatigue parties toil with rations, water, ammunition and other necessary stores the day long, are laid out as a relief map by Heaven’s electricity.
A rattling, crashing roar, such as I have never heard in any Australian thunderstorm, is followed by a deafening clap, and a huge ball of fire falls earthward at terrific speed in the direction of Constantinople, followed by a sound as of a shattering explosion, which causes the very hillsides to quake, traverse and parapet to tremble, and the roofs of dug-outs to send down a shower of stones.
THE SILVER LINING
Sunset over Imbros as seen from Anzac
Drawn by C. E. W. BEAN
The ships have long given up the unequal struggle to make their voices heard against those of the elements, and as the storm passes over, and the rumblings of the thunder become more and more distant and the lightning less vivid, the veil is drawn from the face of the moon, and the White Lady sails out into her own once more.
The storm has had its effect on those manning the trenches. The bubbling rattle of the machine-gun, the sharp crack of Turkish rifles, and the heavier report of our own arms, which usually punctuate the night, are noticeable by their absence. The turmoil of an hour ago has turned to unbelievable quiet.
I. A. Saxon,
21st Australian Battalion.