In October the Argonne front suddenly became as calm as it had previously been active. The enemy, discouraged by their losses, in despair of reaching the Sainte-Menehould-Verdun road, and with their hands full elsewhere, remained on the defensive in the Argonne. Their efforts were now turned in other directions--towards Les Eparges, the Trench of Calonne, and Ailly Wood, from which they hoped once more to threaten Verdun. The Crown Prince had expected to cross the Argonne, but after sacrificing thousands of soldiers, he was unable to break down the French resistance. The massed attack on an extended front having only increased his losses without result, he returned to his original plan of trench raids and small local operations, the object of which was to nibble away the ground and exhaust the opposing troops as much as possible. From November, 1915, the sap and mine fighting was renewed, in which the French gained the advantage. Every month, at one place or another, or at several places at once--at Bolante, Fille-Morte, Hill 285, near the Haute-Chevauchée road, at St. Hubert, Courte-Chausse, and Marie-Thérèse, in the Vauquois sector--mines destroyed the enemy trenches, and there were fierce fights with hand-grenades for the shell-craters. The battering of the defences, the constant improvement of the equipment, and the construction of deep bomb-proof shelters, mitigated the hardships of war and effected a considerable reduction in the losses of the French. During the battle of Verdun, fighting in the Argonne was practically limited to artillery duels, the French batteries on the eastern border frequently engaging the enemy batteries in the Bois de Cheppy and Montfaucon. In 1917, the fighting consisted almost entirely of hand-to-hand struggles for outposts or trenches. The French, who excelled in this kind of warfare, constantly destroyed the enemy mines and brought back numbers of prisoners from more or less extensive raids. THE OPERATIONS OF 1918 During the first half of 1918, while grave events were taking place on other parts of the front, the Argonne remained quiet. The battle, however, spread from point to point, and the Argonne front in its turn was again set ablaze on the date fixed by Foch in his plan for the great offensive which was destined to bring the Germans to their knees. [Illustration: MARSHAL FOCH] After the Allied counter-offensive of July 18 on the Aisne front (see Volume I: “The Second Battle of the Marne”), which drove the Germans back to the Vesle, the Allies were forced to mark time on the centre of the front. The battle shifted to the wings. Offensive followed offensive with unfailing regularity, first on the left (the Franco-British offensive of August 8), then in Artois (the offensive of August 20), and lastly against the whole of the Hindenburg line, which the Allies attacked on September 1.