It just sort of fell down, as if it was tired out, and what had been our billet was a gaping ruin. That was the kind of damage which was being done in all directions, and it told with sorry effect on those who were not so lucky as we had been, and were buried in the smash. All the cellars were crowded with people who had taken refuge in them, and they lived in a state of terror and misery during these continuous bombardments by German guns. After that lively bit of billeting we returned to the trenches, and on Sunday, the 20th, with the West Yorkshires on our right, we were in the very thick of heavy fighting. The artillery on both sides was firing furiously, and the rifles were constantly going. Our own fire from the trenches was doing very heavy mischief amongst the Germans, and they were losing men at such a rate that it was clear to them that they would have to take some means of stopping it, or get so badly mauled that they could not keep the fight going. Suddenly there was a curious lull in the fighting and we saw that a perfect horde of the Germans were marching up to the West Yorkshires, carrying a huge flag of truce. It was a welcome sight, and we thought, “Here’s a bit of pie for the Tykes--they must have been doing good.” They had lost heavily, but it seemed from this signal of surrender that they were to be rewarded for their losses. A large party of the West Yorkshires went out to meet the Germans with the flag, and I watched them go up until they were within fifty yards of the enemy. I never suspected that anything wrong would happen, nor did the West Yorkshires, for the surrender appeared to be a fair and aboveboard business. When only that short distance separated the Germans and the West Yorkshires, the leading files of the surrender party fell apart like clockwork and there were revealed to us, behind the flag of truce, stretchers with machine-guns on them, and these guns were set to work at point-blank range on the West Yorkshires, who, utterly surprised and unprepared, were simply mown down, and suffered fearfully before they could pull themselves together. Now, this dastardly thing was done in full view of us; we could see it all, and our blood just boiled. What we would have liked best of all was a bayonet charge; but the Germans were too far off for the steel, and it seemed as if they were going to have it all their own way. They had given us a surprise, and a bad one; but we had a worse in store for them--we also had machine-guns, and they were handy, and we got them to work on the dirty tricksters and fairly cut them up. The whole lot seemed to stagger as our bullets showered into them. That was one of the cowardly games the Germans often played at the beginning of the war; but it did not take the British long to get used to them, and very soon the time came when no risks were taken, and the stretcher dodge was played out.