7.27 a.m.--The heaviness of the bombardment has slightly decreased. A large number of guns must be altering range on to the German back lines in order to allow our infantry to make their attack. The hills are gradually becoming clearer as the sun gets higher, but the haze will be far too thick for us to see them go over. 7.29 a.m.--One minute to go. I have not seen a single German shell burst yet. They may be firing on our trenches; they are not on our batteries. 7.32 a.m.--Ever so distant, but quite distinctly, under the thunder of the bombardment I can hear the sound of far-off rifle firing. So they are into it--and there are Germans still left in those trenches. 7.35 a.m.--Through the bombardment I can hear the chatter of a machine-gun. And there is a new thunder added, quite distinguishable from the previous sounds. It is only the last minute or so that one has noticed it--a low, ceaseless pulsation. It is the drumming of the German artillery upon our charging infantry. Behind that blue screen they must be in the thick of it. God be with our men! CHAPTER XII THE BRITISH--FRICOURT AND LA BOISELLE _France, July 3rd._ Yesterday three of us walked out from near the town of Albert to a hill-side within a few hundred yards of Fricourt. And there all day, lying amongst the poppies and cornflowers, we watched the fight of the hour--the struggle around Fricourt Wood and the attack on the village of La Boiselle. To call these places villages conveys the idea of recognisable streets and houses. I suppose they were villages once, as pretty as the other villages of France; each with its red roofs showing out against its dark, overshadowing woodland. They are no more villages now than a dust-heap. Each is a tumbled heap of broken bricks, like the remains of a Chinese den after it has been pulled down by order of the local council. Through this heap runs a network of German trenches, here and there breaking through some still recognisable fragment of a wall. It was by the sight of two or three English soldiers clambering up one of these jagged fragments and peering into whatever lay beyond it, that we knew, as we came in sight of Fricourt, that the village had already been taken. A string of men was winding past the end of the dust-heap into the dark wood behind it, where they became lost to view. Somewhere in the heart of the wood was the _knock-knock_ of an occasional rifle. So the fight had gone on thither. In front of us was a long gentle hill-slope, gridironed with trenches which broke out above the green grass like the wandering burrow of a mole. The last visible trench was in redder soil and ran along the crest of the hill. It passed through or near to several small woods and clumps of trees--the edges of them torn to shreds with shell-fire. They stood up against the skyline. In one of them, clearly visible, was a roadside crucifix.