While we were out of trenches that week our fellows were pretty busy during the first half of each night carrying material up to the front line. There was a good number of miles of barbed wire to go up, with hundreds of iron screw standards for the wire, and hundreds more of stakes; a lot of material altogether, and I am bound to say I think the R.E. arranged it very well. They had all their material so put together and stowed up at the front as to make for the maximum of convenience and the minimum of delay when they came to handle it in the open and under fire--as men always must be when doing anything in No Man's Land. Our men were bursting with swank over the Company's being chosen to act as covering party; delighted to think that what they regarded as the combatant side of the show was theirs. Indeed, I rather think a lot of 'em made up their minds that they were going to utilise the opportunity of having a couple of hundred men out close to the Boche trenches for a real strafe of the men in those trenches. "The Peacemaker" had to get 'em together and talk very seriously and straight about what our responsibilities were in this job. This was necessary to make the beggars realise that ours was a defensive and not an offensive stunt; in which success or failure depended mainly upon our ability to be perfectly silent. "All the scrapping will come later," said "the Peacemaker." "We mustn't invite one single bullet while we've a couple of hundred men behind us using picks and shovels, and working against time to get cover. If Boches come along our line, it will be our job to strafe 'em with our naked fingers if we possibly can. The last thing we'll do will be to fire a shot. And the one thing that must not happen, not in any case at all--no, not if the whole Prussian Guard turns out--is for a single Boche in any circumstances whatever to get through our line." And that was the basis on which we tackled the job. Of course, the O.C. knew better than to try to handle his Company as a Company on the night. Orders could only be given in whispers, you understand. As a matter of fact, in all such work, as in night attacks, one must be able to rely, not alone on Platoon Sergeants and senior N.C.O.'s, but on Corporals and Section Commanders. And if they have not been trained so that you can rely on their carrying out instructions exactly, one's chances of success are pretty small.