The calm that prevailed Thursday and Friday proved to be only the lull before the storm. Early Saturday morning it became apparent that the Germans were preparing an attack in strength against our line running east and northeast from Ypres, for they were concentrating under cover of a violent artillery fire, and at about 10 o'clock the battle began in earnest. At that hour the Germans attacked our line from the Ypres-Poelcappelle road to within a short distance of the Menin highroad, it being evidently their intention while engaging us closely on the whole of this sector to break our front in the vicinity of the Ypres-Roulers Railway, to the north and to the south of which their strongest and most determined assaults were delivered. Under this pressure our front was penetrated at some points around Frezenberg, and at 4:30 o'clock in the afternoon we made a counter-attack between the Zonnebeke road and the railway in order to recover the lost ground. Our offensive was conducted most gallantly, but was checked before long by the fire of machine guns. Meanwhile, the enemy launched another attack through the woods south of the Menin road, and at the same time threatened our left to the north of Ypres with fresh masses. Most desperate fighting ensued, the German infantry coming on again and again and gradually forcing our troops back, though only for a short distance, in spite of repeated counter-attacks. During the night the fighting continued to rage with ever-increasing fury. It is impossible to say at exactly what hour our line was broken at different points, but it is certain that at one time the enemy's infantry poured through along the Poelcappelle road, and even got as far as Wieltje at 9 P.M. There was also a considerable gap in our front about Frezenberg, where hostile detachments had penetrated. At both points counter-attacks were organized without delay. To the east of the salient the Germans first were driven back to Frezenberg, but there they made a firm stand, and under pressure of fresh reinforcements we fell back again toward Verlorenhoek. Northeast of the salient a counter-attack carried out by us about 1 A.M. was more successful. Our troops swept the enemy out of Wieltje at the bayonet's point, leaving the village strewn with German dead and, pushing on, regained most of the ground to the north of that point. And so the fight surged to and fro throughout the night. All around the scene of the conflict the sky was lit up by the flashes of the guns and the light of blazing villages and farms, while against this background of smoke and flame, looking out in the murky light over the crumbling ruins of the old town, rose the battered wreck of the cathedral town and the spires of Cloth Hall.