Round this drum a wire cable was coiled, and a length of the cable
stretched like a snake across the field to where it ended in a swivel,
made fast to the bottom of the riding car. It was not, strictly
speaking, a riding car. It was a straight-up-and-down basket of tough,
light wicker, no larger and very little deeper than an ordinarily fair-
sized hamper for soiled linen. Indeed, that was what it reminded one
of--a clothesbasket.

Grouped about the team and the wagon were soldiers to the number of
perhaps a third of a company. Half a dozen of them stood about the
basket holding it steady--or trying to. Heavy sandbags hung pendent-
wise about the upper rim of the basket, looking very much like so many
canvased hams; but, even with these drags on it and in spite of the
grips of the men on the guy ropes of its rigging, it bumped and bounded
uneasily to the continual rocking of the gas bag above it. Every moment
or two it would lift itself a foot or so and tilt and jerk, and then
come back again with a thump that made it shiver.

Of furnishings the interior of the car contained nothing except a
telephone, fixed against one side of it; a pair of field glasses, swung
in a sort of harness; and a strip of tough canvas, looped across halfway
down in it. The operator, when wearied by standing, might sit astride
this canvas saddle, with his legs cramped under him, while he spied out
the land with his eyes, which would then be just above the top of his
wicker nest, and while he spoke over the telephone.

The wires of the telephone escaped through a hole under his feet and ran
to a concealed station at the far side of the field which in turn
communicated with the main exchange at headquarters three miles away;
which in its turn radiated other wires to all quarters of the battle