went up, far hills seemed to sit and brood over the valley: their
black shapes seemed to know what would happen in the mist and seemed
sworn not to say. The rocket faded, and the hills went back into
mystery again, and Dick Cheeser peered level again over the ominous
valley.

All the dangers and sinister shapes and evil destinies, lurking
between the armies in that mist, that the sentry faced that night
cannot be told until the history of the war is written by a historian
who can see the mind of the soldier. Not a shell fell all night, no
German stirred; Dick Cheeser was relieved at ``Stand to'' and his
comrades stood to beside him, and soon it was wide, golden, welcome
dawn.

And for all the threats of night the thing that happened was one that
the lonely sentry had never foreseen: in the hour of his watching Dick
Cheeser, though scarcely eighteen, became a full-grown man.

Standing To

One cannot say that one time in the trenches is any more tense than
another. One cannot take any one particular hour and call it, in
modern nonsensical talk, ``typical hour in the trenches.'' The routine
of the trenches has gone on too long for that. The tensest hour ought
to be half an hour before dawn, the hour when attacks are expected and
men stand to. It is an old convention of war that that is the
dangerous hour, the hour when defenders are weakest and attack most to
be feared. For darkness favours the attackers then as night favours
the lion, and then dawn comes and they can hold their gains in the
light. Therefore in every trench in every war the garrison is prepared