"Are you struck, Goliath?"
"No, I wish to heaven I was," muttered the giant, bulking up in the flare of a searchlight, blood dripping from his face showed where he had been scratched as he stumbled.
We got safely into the trench and relieved the Highland Light Infantry. The place was very quiet, they assured us, it is always the same. It has become trench etiquette to tell the relieving battalion that it is taking over a cushy position. By this trench next morning we found six newly made graves, telling how six Highlanders had met their death, killed in action.
III—"THE DEAD MAN UNDER MY FEET"
Next morning as I was looking through a periscope at the enemy's trenches, and wondering what was happening behind their sandbag line, a man from the sanitary squad came along sprinkling the trench with creosote and chloride of lime.
"Seein' anything?" he asked.
"Not much," I answered, "the grass is so high in front that I can see nothing but the tips of the enemy's parapets. There's some work for you here," I said.
"Where?"
"Under your feet," I told him. "The floor is soft as putty and smells vilely. Perhaps there is a dead man there. Last night I slept by the spot and it turned me sick."
"Have you an entrenchin' tool?"