We dug and they dug, each side laboring everlastingly to find the
other's listening places and to blow them up by means of mining, so
that the earth became a very rat-run. Above-ground, where were only
ruin and barbed wire, there was no sign of activity, but only a
great stench that came from bodies none dared bury. We were thankful
that the wind blew oftenest from us to them; but whichever way the
wind blew Ranjoor Singh knew no rest. He was ever to be found where
the lines lay closest at the moment, either listening or talking. We
understood very well that he was carrying out orders given him at
the rear, but that did not make the squadron or the regiment like
him any better, and as far as that went I was one with them; I hated
to see a squadron leader stoop to such intrigues.

It was plain enough that some sort of intrigue was making headway,
for the Germans soon began to toss over into our trench bundles of
printed pamphlets, explaining in our tongue why they were our best
friends and why therefore we should refuse to wage war on them. They
threw printed bulletins that said, in good Punjabi, there was
revolution from end to end of India, rioting in England, utter
disaster to the British fleet, and that our way home again to India
had been cut by the German war-ships. They must have been ignorant
of the fact that we received our mail from India regularly. I have
noticed this about the Germans: they are unable to convince
themselves that any other people can appreciate the same things they
appreciate, think as swiftly as they, or despise the terrors they
despise. That is one reason why they must lose this war. But there
are others also.

One afternoon, when I was pretending to doze in a niche near the