burst of shrapnel overhead. It is a most amazing scrimmage altogether.
One of those members of His Majesty's Opposition who are doing so much
at present to save our country from destruction, by kindly pointing
out the mistakes of the British Government and the British Army,
would refer to the whole scene as a pandemonium of mismanagement and
ineptitude. And yet, though the scene is enacted night after night
without a break, there is hardly a case on record of the transport
being surprised upon these roads by the coming of daylight, and none
whatever of the rations and ammunition failing to get through.

It is difficult to imagine that Brother Boche, who on the other
side of that ring of star-shells is conducting a precisely similar
undertaking, is able, with all his perfect organisation and cast-iron
methods, to achieve a result in any way superior to that which Thomas
Atkins reaches by rule of thumb and sheer force of character.

* * * * *

At length the draggled Company worms its way through the press to the
fringe of the shell-area, beyond which no transport may pass. The
distance of this point from the trenches varies considerably, and
depends largely upon the caprice of the Boche. On this occasion,
however, we still have a mile or two to go--across country now, in
single file, at the heels of a guide from the battalion which we are
relieving.

Guides may be divided into two classes--

(1) Guides who do not know the way, and say so at the outset.