“The German who had surrendered stood with his hands held high above his head, waiting for us to tell him what to do. He never took his eyes off us, even to look at his officer, lying at his feet. As we moved down the trench he followed us, still holding his hands up and repeating, ‘Mercy, _Kamerad_!’ At the next trench angle we took five more prisoners, and as Godsall had been slightly wounded in the arm, I turned the captives over to him and ordered him to take them to the rear. Just then the men of our second wave came over the parapet like a lot of hurdlers. In five minutes we had taken the rest of the Germans in the trench section prisoners, had reversed the fire steps, and had turned their own machine guns against those of their retreating companies that we could catch sight of.” * * * * * Badly wounded in the knee a little later, the sergeant took refuge in a shell-hole. Four German prisoners on their way to the rear were requisitioned as stretcher-bearers and carried him in on an improvised litter. KNICKERBOCKER WAITER “It was a trip which was not without incident. Every now and then we would hear the shriek of an approaching ‘coal-box,’ and then my prisoner stretcher-bearers and I would tumble in one indiscriminate heap into the nearest shell-hole. If we did that once, we did it a half-dozen times. After each dive, the four would patiently reorganize and arrange the improvised stretcher again, and we would proceed. Following every tumble, however, I would have to tighten my tourniquets, and despite all I could do the hemorrhage from my wound continued so profuse that I was beginning to feel very dizzy and weak. On the way in I sighted our regimental dressing station and signed to my four bearers to carry me toward it. The station was in an old German dugout. Major Gilday was at the door. He laughed when he saw me with my own special ambulance detail. “‘Well, what do you want?’ he asked. “‘Most of all,’ I said, ‘I think I want a drink of rum.’ “He produced it for me instantly. “‘Now,’ said he, ‘my advice to you is to keep on traveling. You’ve got a fine special detail there to look after you. Make ’em carry you to Poizers. It’s only five miles, and you’ll make it all right. I’ve got this place loaded up full, no stretcher-bearers, no assistants, no adequate supply of bandages and medicines, and a lot of very bad cases. If you want to get out of here in a week, just keep right on going now.’ “As we continued toward the rear we were the targets for a number of humorous remarks from men coming up to go into the fight. “‘Give my regards to Blighty, you lucky beggar,’ was the most frequent saying. “‘Bli’ me,’ said one cockney Tommy, ‘there goes one o’ th’ Canadians with an escort from the Kaiser.’ “Another man stopped and asked about my wound. “‘Good work,’ he said. ‘I’d like to have a nice clean one like that myself.’