It was recorded on April 9 that French aviators had discovered the location of the new guns at Crepy-en-Laonnais, near the road from La Fère to Laon, and that continual bombardment of the spot was causing the increasingly intermittent nature of the German long-range fire. The French had learned the location to a yard, and from a powerful battery ten miles away they were dropping enormous shells weighing half a ton each into the low hills where the German monsters were hidden. There were three of the supercannon, and a few days later an air photograph showed that two French shells had fallen on the barrel of one of them, putting it out of commission. Tremendous craters had been made around the others, and one French shell had fallen on a main railway line, blocking it a whole day. A correspondent who visited the French battery engaged in this work wrote on April 13: "It is stated that these German guns are ninety-six feet long. At the moment of firing, other big guns let fly simultaneously, to confuse the French, and a smoke screen is emitted in the vicinity to hide the pieces from aircraft. Up to yesterday there had been no firing at night, lest the flashes show the position of the cannon. How necessary this precaution is may be illustrated by my experience last night, when I saw the whole northern sky constantly lit up by the guns on the eighty-mile front of the German offensive." After April 13, when the Germans knew that their secret was fully known, they began bombarding Paris by night, though without any increase in effectiveness. Up to the middle of April a total of 150 long-distance shells had fallen in Paris, and the only ones that had caused any notable casualties were those which struck the Church of St. Gervais, an infant asylum, and an old man's bowling green. The Irish Guards By RUDYARD KIPLING [Read at a matinée in London in aid of the Irish Guards' War Fund, for which it was written by Mr. Kipling.] We're not so old in the Army List, But we're not so young at our trade, For we had the honor at Fontenoy Of meeting the Guards Brigade. 'Twas Lally, Dillon, Bulkeley, Clare, And Lee that led us then, And after a hundred and seventy years We're fighting for France again! _Old Days! The wild geese are flighting, Head to the storm as they faced it before! For where there are Irish there's bound to be fighting, And when there's no fighting, it's Ireland no more! Ireland no more!_