It is curious what a man thinks about when he is in trouble. Into my mind shot memories of feats of strength performed. Why, I was the strongest man in the section. Surely I could lift myself out, I thought to myself, and my confidence began to return. I worked the dirt out of my mouth with the tip of my tongue and prepared myself mentally for the sudden heave that would free me. A quick inhalation, and my mouth filled again with dirt. I could not move a muscle under my skin. And then I seemed to be two people. The "I" who was thinking seemed to be at a distance from the body lying there. My God! Am I going to die stretched out in a hole like this? I thought. Through my mind flashed a picture of the way I had always hoped to die--the way I had a right to die: face to the enemy and running toward him. Why, that was part of a soldier's wages. I tried to shout for help, and more dirt entered my mouth! I could feel it gritting way down in my throat. My tongue was locked so I could not move it. I watched the whole picture. I was standing a little way off and could hear myself gurgle. My throat was rattling, and I said to myself, "That's the finish!" Then I grew calm. It wasn't hurting so much, and somehow or other I seemed to realize that a soldier had taken a soldier's chance and lost. It wasn't his fault. He had done the best he could. Then the pain all left me and the world went black. It was death. Then somebody yelled, "Hell! He bit my finger." I could hear him. "That's nothing," said a voice I knew as Collette's. "Get the dirt out of his mouth." Again a finger entered my throat, and I coughed spasmodically. Some one was working my arms backward, and my right shoulder hurt me. I struggled up, but sank to my knees and began coughing up dirt. "Here," says Soubiron, "turn round and spit that dirt on your parapet. It all helps." The remark made me smile. I was quite all right now, and Soubiron, Collette, Joe, and Marcel returned to their holes. The Red Cross men were picking something out of the hole made by a 250-millimetre, they told me. It was the remnant of Corporal and Sergeant Fourrier, who had their trench to my left. It seems that a ten-inch shell had entered the ground at the edge of my hole, exploded a depth of two metres, tearing the corporal and the sergeant to pieces, and kicking several cubic metres of dirt into and on top of me. Soubiron and the Collettes saw what had happened, and immediately started digging me out. They had been just in time. It wasn't long before my strength began to come back. Two stretcher-bearers came up to carry me to the rear, but I declined their services. There was too much going on. I dug out the German overcoats, recovered some grass, and, bedding myself down in the crater made by the shell, began to feel quite safe again. Lightning never strikes twice in the same spot.