We turned from this young American to Sapper W---- of Western Canada,
who had just been through the same battle underground, and asked him to
tell us his own story.


"Well, sir, long before the battle we were digging under Hill Number
60. A chance shell exploded on the surface above us and buried us all
underground. Three of us were killed and the other two left alive. I
had one man across my chest and another across my legs, one dead and
the other wounded. We could not move hand or foot. We were buried in
there for seven hours and they finally dug us out unconscious.

"Then we started another sap to lay a mine. My pal was listening, with
an iron rod driven in the ground and two copper wires leading from it
to a head piece, such as a wireless operator uses, so that we could
hear the approach of the enemy's sappers, who were countermining
against us. My pal asked me to come and listen. But I had hardly got
the headpiece on when I said, 'O Lord, they're on us!' and before I
could get the thing off my ears the end of our sap fell through and the
Germans were at us. There was only room to use revolvers and bayonets
in that dark hole and the Germans seemed to get nervous and could not
shoot straight in the panic. We lost only one of our men, but we
killed seven and took the rest of the twenty prisoners. Then, before
they found out what had happened, we crawled through to the German end
of the tunnel and blew up their sap.

"You say was I a Christian? Not me! I was wild and going to the
devil. But one night I was wounded and lay in a deserted shell hole,