By these delicate instruments we could locate the exact position of an unseen enemy battery. Following that location, the battery would immediately be visited with a concentrated downpour of hot steel intended to wipe it out of existence. The enemy did as much for us, so that in the artillery, when the men were not actually manning the guns in action, they were digging gun pits for reserve positions which they could occupy if the enemy happened to get the proper range of the old positions. In this casual counter battery work our artillery adopted a system by which many lives were saved. If a German battery began shelling one of our battery positions, the artillerymen in that position were not called upon to stand by their guns and return the fire. The order would be given to temporarily abandon the position and the men would be withdrawn a safe distance. The German battery that was firing would be responded to, two to one, by other American batteries located nearby and which did not happen to be under fire at the time. By this system we conserved our strength. Our infantry was strong in their praise of the artillery. I observed this particularly one day on the Toul front when General Pershing dropped in unexpectedly at the division headquarters, then located in the hillside village of Bourcq. While the commander and his party were awaiting a meal which was being prepared, four muddy figures tramped down the hallway of the Chateau. Through the doorway the general observed their entrance. The two leading figures were stolid German soldiers, prisoners of war, and behind them marched their captors, two excusably proud young Americans. One of them carried his bayoneted rifle at the ready, while the second carried the equipment which had been taken from the prisoners. The American commander ordered the group brought before him and asked one of the Americans to relate the story of the capture. "We in the infantry got 'em, sir," replied one, "but the artillery deserved most of the credit. It happened just at dawn this morning. Jim here, and myself, were holding down an advance machine gun post when the Germans laid down a flock of shells on our first line trench. We just kept at the gun ready to let them have it if they started to come over. "Pretty soon we saw them coming through the mist and we began to put it to 'em. I think we got a bunch of them but they kept on coming. "Then somebody back in our first line shot up the signal for a barrage in our sector. It couldn't have been a minute before our cannon cut loose and the shells began to drop right down in the middle of the raiding party.