"Notice the ticklin' feelin'?" enquired our sub., as he took our helmets and put them carefully by. "Bit tryin' at first, but you soon get used to it--yes, rather. Some of the men funk tryin' at first--and some hold their breath until they fairly well burst, an' some won't go in at all, so we carry 'em in. That gas you've tried is about twenty times stronger than we get it in the open, but these helmets are a rippin' dodge till the chemical evaporates, then, of course, they're no earthly. This is the latest device--quite a tophole scheme!" And he showed us a box-like contrivance which, when in use, is slung round the neck. "Are you often in the gas?" I enquired. "Every day--yes, rather!" "For how long?" "Well, I stayed in once for five hours on end--" "Five hours!" I exclaimed, aghast. "Y'see, I was experimentin'!" "And didn't you feel any bad effects?" "Yes, rather! I was simply dyin' for a smoke. Like to try a lachrymatory?" he enquired, reaching up to a certain dingy box. "Yes," said I, glancing at K. "Oh, yes, if--" "Only smart for the time bein'," our sub. assured me. "Make you weep a bit!" Here from the dingy box he fished a particularly vicious-looking bomb and fell to poking at it with a screwdriver. I immediately stepped back. So did K. The Major pulled his moustache and flicked a chunk of mud from his boot with his whip. "Er--I suppose that thing's all right?" he enquired. "Oh, yes, quite all right, sir, quite all right," nodded the sub., using the screwdriver as a hammer. "Only wants a little fixin'." As I watched that deadly thing, for the second time I felt distinctly unhappy; however, the refractory pin, or whatever it was, being fixed to his satisfaction, our sub. led the way out of the dingy hut and going some few paces ahead, paused. "I'm goin' to give you a liquid-fire bomb first!" said he. "Watch!" He drew back his hand and hurled the bomb. Almost immediately there was a shattering report and the air was full of thick, grey smoke and yellow flame, smoke that rolled heavily along the ground towards us, flame that burned ever fiercer, fiery yellow tongues that leapt from the sand here and there, that writhed in the wind-gusts, but never diminished. "Stoop down!" cried the sub., suiting the action to word, "stoop down and get a mouthful of that smoke--makes you jolly sick and unconscious in no time if you get enough of it. Tophole bomb, that--what!" Then he brought us where those yellow flames leapt and hissed; some of these he covered with wet sand, and lo! they had ceased to be; but the moment the sand was kicked away up they leapt again fiercer than ever. "We use 'em for bombing Boche dugouts now!" said he; and remembering the dugouts I had seen, I could picture the awful fate of those within, the choking fumes, the fire-scorched bodies! Truly the exponents of Frightfulness have felt the recoil of their own vile methods.