An odd incident of this period occurred to a recruit who was sent out the first night to a listening post. In the listening post was a box on which the guard sat. At some time during the previous night the Germans had crept up and put a bomb under this box. After looking around a little the recruit felt tired and sat down on the box. A violent explosion followed. Right away a patrol worked out from our lines to see what had happened. When they got there they looked carefully through every ditch or clump of bushes in the vicinity, but they could not find a trace of the man. He was reported as dead, blown to bits. On the march up into Germany that missing recruit reported back to the regiment on his return from a German prison camp. Instead of being blown to pieces he had simply been blown into the German lines. When he came to, he was being carried to the rear on a stretcher, and he spent the rest of the war as a prisoner, little the worse for wear, except for a few scars. Shortly after this the St. Mihiel operation took place. The plan was to nip off the salient by a simultaneous attack on both sides. Our division was the left flank unit of the forces attacking on the right of the salient, being charged with the mission of making a juncture with the Twenty-sixth Division, which was the right unit of the forces attacking on the left of the salient. The resistance was so slight that the operation partook of the nature of a maneuver rather than a battle. Our losses were practically nil. A large number of prisoners were captured and a considerable amount of matériel. The reason for this was that the Germans had determined to abandon the position and were in full retreat when we attacked. They had been misinformed by their spies, however, and started their movement about twenty-four hours too late. The men had a fine time in this attack. While they had been in the Toul sector a high hill, called Mount Sec, behind the German lines, had given them a lot of trouble. From it the Germans had been virtually able to look into our trenches. In the attack they not only took this hill, but left it far in the rear. Our unit captured a German officers' mess, including the cook and a fine pig. They promptly made the cook kill the pig and prepare him for their dinner, which they thoroughly enjoyed. At another time a German company kitchen came up in the night to one of our outposts to ask him directions. When they found out their mistake it was too late, and they were promptly conducted to one of our very hungry companies.