The unit detailed for work in the front line of a given sector was, by the irony of words, "resting," or partly resting--which means that it was quartered among ruins in cantonments partially destitute of resources, a long way from the workshops to which it had to find its way at night-fall. "Doing their bit" valiantly, sustained by a self-confidence which never deserted them, the men showed on all occasions the greatest goodwill, and--despite certain reports to the contrary--unfailing good humour. They grumbled a good deal, goodness knows; and who would not have done the same in their place? But they kept going, enduring hard labour and privation, under the stimulus of a burning desire to punish the enemy who was responsible for all the troubles that afflicted them. Clad in the most weird and often deplorable clothes, these men trudged along through the darkness of the night, over muddy tracks and sodden roads, towards the marshy belt of flooded meadows. This tramp through the night was a real penance. At every step the men stumbled in the heavy and sticky mud, over displaced cobbles or in shell-holes brimming with water. They had to struggle along in this fashion, sometimes for hours on end, to reach the "material depôts" where such sand-bags, stakes, corrugated iron sheets, barbed wire and tools as could be got together were distributed among them. To-day there is an abundance of all these things; but at the time of which we write supplies were very short, and one had to get along as best one could with anything that came to hand in a haphazard way which now seems pitiable. However, what did it matter? Carrying loads which added to the difficulties of progress, the men plodded along almost indistinguishable paths and tracks where the least slip threatened to send them headlong into deep mud. Extreme caution was needed to avoid rousing the enemy. Lights were constantly thrown up from his lines, flooding the dreary country with their pale radiance. When one rose, the men instantly threw themselves flat in the mire. Occasionally the column would be surprised before it could take cover, and be subjected to bursts of machine-gun fire. In this way many brave fellows died an obscure death while performing one of the most thankless and disagreeable tasks imaginable. On reaching the scene of action, the men set to work, forgetting their fatigue in the anxiety to add their quotum to that done on the previous night before daylight should return; raising and consolidating the frail rampart of sandbags, building fresh shelters or arranging the auxiliary defences in front of the trenches.