When the sun rose on Friday, June 2nd, the whole of this part of the Front, from the battered little hamlet of Hooge on the north to Hill 60 on the south, and passing through Sanctuary Wood, a distance, roughly, of a couple of miles, was held by 20,000 soldiers from the Overseas West. They were drawn from all classes--ranchers, farmers, miners, merchants and clerks from Winnipeg, Calgary, and Vancouver. There was a sprinkling of professional soldiers. Some hailed from Toronto, and others from as far East as Montreal. On their extreme left, where it linked up with a British Division, was a famous regiment whose deeds have already thrilled the Empire, which, repeatedly shattered, has returned again and again to take up a post of danger on the firing-line. The two divisions to which all these troops belong have been serving in the Salient for months, watching eagerly and ardently every move of the enemy’s game. What that game was every man knew well. It was to push past them and gain that tragedy-haunted grey heap of crumbling masonry whose name is already writ large on the page of Canadian history. This they were--each man of them--pledged to frustrate to the last drop of his life’s blood. Were the Germans to break through here, all the efforts of our race for nineteen months would be as naught, all the valour and sacrifice would be in vain. [Illustration: THE RUINS OF YPRES. View taken from an aeroplane. By courtesy of _Illus. Lon. News._] For weeks there had been a lull in the artillery fire, which is generally heavy in this sector. Battalions weary with work and tension came in and out, as they were relieved or went to relieve. Yet uppermost in every man’s mind was this: When will the next offensive come, and where? Twice the Germans have come on in smashing force to blot out the Ypres Salient from the war map--two deadly battles have been fought. Am I fated to take part in a third?