The men will be served with hot cocoa at 8.30 p.m. Is that quite clear, gentlemen?" There was a general murmur of assent. The staff-captain requested permission to advance with the second company, the one that was attacking straight ahead. He received it. The conference was at an end. Officers went out to give final instructions to their subalterns, came in again, beating powdered snow from their huge fur coats. One and all looked like Polar explorers. Presently orderlies entered, put a steaming hot meal upon the table. Crowded closely together in the confined space, the officers ate--talking and laughing in high confidence, though in all was the tension which precedes the moment of action. Occasionally during the meal they heard the dull thud of an Austrian shell's arrival. They sat over coffee and smoked. At last the colonel looked at his watch, stood up. "It is time to go to your companies, gentlemen. I rely upon all of you as upon myself. I have promised the general that the trench shall be taken--and held. _Per la più grande Italia!_ And good luck to all of you!" Some time later the staff-captain found himself by the side of the company commander in the deep trench hewn through the snow. It was night and in the faint reflected radiance of the white walls he could just dimly discern the figures of a long line of men, all garbed in white like himself. Only when their heads moved did they detach themselves from their surroundings. Overhead, above the crisp line of the parapet, the sky was a black background for an immense multitude of strangely brilliant stars. A wind raised little whirls of powdered snow upon the lip of the parapet, blew down into the trench in chill gusts that penetrated the clothing. Not a sound broke the intense silence. It seemed almost that one could hear the crackle of the sparkling vivid stars. The artillery bombardment had long since ceased. There was nothing to suggest that a death-dealing enemy was hidden only eight hundred metres away across the glacier. No sound came from the company that had already advanced. Along the trench was a murmur of conversation, stifled laughter. The company commander stood gazing at the luminous dial of his watch. 9.15! He turned his head, gave a command in a low voice. "_Avanti!_" It was repeated in a low murmur to right and left. In an instant the company commander, the staff-captain at his side, had sprung up on to the parapet. A bitter wind smote upon them from the darkness, chilling to the bone. The commander glanced back, saw his men like a line of ghosts faint in the dim light, already over the parapet. Then the company commenced to thread its way through the openings previously cut in their own wire.