in whose command we were. I bunked down in the trench on the top
of the ridge: the sky was red with the glare of the city still burning,
and we could hear the almost constant procession of large shells sailing over
from our left front into the city: the crashes of their explosion
shook the ground where we were. After a terribly hard day,
professionally and otherwise, I slept well, but it rained
and the trench was awfully muddy and wet.


Sunday, April 25th, 1915.

The weather brightened up, and we got at it again. This day we had
several heavy attacks, prefaced by heavy artillery fire; these bursts of fire
would result in our getting 100 to 150 rounds right on us or nearby:
the heavier our fire (which was on the trenches entirely) the heavier theirs.

Our food supply came up at dusk in wagons, and the water was any we could get,
but of course treated with chloride of lime. The ammunition had to be
brought down the roads at the gallop, and the more firing the more wagons.
The men would quickly carry the rounds to the guns, as the wagons had to halt
behind our hill. The good old horses would swing around at the gallop,
pull up in an instant, and stand puffing and blowing, but with their heads up,
as if to say, "Wasn't that well done?" It makes you want to kiss
their dear old noses, and assure them of a peaceful pasture once more.
To-day we got our dressing station dugout complete, and slept there at night.

Three farms in succession burned on our front -- colour in the otherwise dark.
The flashes of shells over the front and rear in all directions.
The city still burning and the procession still going on.
I dressed a number of French wounded; one Turco prayed to Allah and Mohammed