dropped into the trench by the side of the Australians. Their bombers
went to the left to relieve the men who had been holding the open flank.
They brought in with them keen, fresh faces and bodies, and an
all-important supply of bombs. It was better than a draught of good
wine.

So it was that the first of the Canadians arrived.

Long before the last Australian platoon left that battered line, these
first Canadians were almost as tired as they. For thirty-six hours they
had piled up the same barricades, garrisoned the same shell-holes, were
shattered by the same shells. Twenty-four hours after the Canadians
came, the vicious bombardment described in the last letter descended on
the flank they both were holding. They were buried together by the heavy
shell-bursts. They dug each other out. When the garrison became so thin
that whole lengths of trench were without a single unwounded occupant,
they helped each others' wounded down to the next length, and built
another barricade, and held that.

Finally, when hour after hour passed and the incessant shelling never
ceased, the garrison was withdrawn a little farther; and then five of
them went back to the barricade which the enemy's artillery had
discovered. They sat down in the trench behind it. A German battery was
trying for it--putting its four big high-explosive shells regularly
round it--salvo after salvo as punctual as clockwork. It was only a
matter of time before the thing must go.

So the five sat there--Tasmanians and Canadians--and discussed the rival
methods of wheat growing in their respective dominions in order to keep
their thoughts away from that inevitable shell.