We had some crack sharpshooters or snipers in trees and also on top of ruins, but took care never to have them near our observation posts lest they should draw fire. I had one man who was a King's prize-winner, and he must have accounted for well over a hundred of the enemy, some of whom may have thought themselves quite secure when they exposed but a portion of their body eight hundred or a thousand yards from our trenches. Through the wasting of skilled men in unsuitable work which is prevalent in all our armies, this man was sent forward in a bayonet charge and killed. In his own job he was worth a battalion but in a charge of no more value than any other man. The snipers and observers make effective use of camouflage, and have uniforms and rifle-covers to blend with their background--spotted for work among trees with foliage, _a la_ Mr. Leopard--striped when in long grass or crops like Stripes of the jungle. We have suits resembling the bark of a tree, and some earth-colored for ploughed ground, also one made from sand-bags for the top of the parapet. I could fill a volume with the happenings during our many months in these trenches. We had great sport through the use of a dummy trench. This was a ditch which we dug about seventy-five yards behind our front line running parallel to it. We would light fires in this about meal-times, and now and again during the day send a file of men along it who would occasionally expose their bayonets to view above the top. This ditch would appear to the German aeroplanes exactly like a trench, and as they used their second line for a supervision and living trench they probably thought we did the same. Our boys laughed to see most of the German shells exploding on the dummy trench. There were one or two occasions in which Fritz broke the unwritten law that there should be an armistice during meal-times. We soon cured him of this, however, as we systematically for a week put out his cook's fires with rifle-grenades. Thereafter both sides were able to have their meals in peace though we took care to change our hour from one to two instead of twelve to one. Fritz's system now and again got on our nerves. It was deadly monotonous, always knowing when his severest shelling would start and I have known the boys run races with the shells, driven to take foolish risks by sheer ennui. We always expected some shells on "V. C. House" at 4 P. M., and were rarely disappointed. The men off duty would assemble in front of the old house and at the sound of the first shell race for the shelter of a dugout about a hundred yards away. Generally they would all tumble in together and in their excitement could not decide who won the race, and so would have it all over again. The officers were ordered to stop these "races with death" for there were some killed, but they would break out now and again when the last man who was killed had been forgotten.