The trench is a world within itself, having customs, joys and griefs peculiar to its limitations. The inmates can only claim for the most part a short existence; they have degrees of opulence and poverty, but the former is far removed from those who are legally heirs to it, and all the dwellers in the trench commune share their poverty in common. The word "ours" is on all lips; save for a few relics of outside civilisation there is nothing which a man claims as "mine." Food and drink and clothing are "ours," as also are the parcels from home, though the men to whom they are addressed have generally the privilege of opening them. Money has lost all its value: for the time being food is not sold here, and all men have to work at the same job, and they work well, for the safety of their bodies depends upon the labour of their hands. Again, in the carping times of peace a soldier may depend upon the sweat of others for his daily needs; here in the trenches he is a Socialist in the highest sense of the much-abused word. The life of the Commune is seldom monotonous, its uncertainty makes it interesting, its novelty never wanes. The trench has its history, every dug-out a legend, and the shell-riven alleys of war are steeped in tradition. The narratives of the trench are handed on from regiment to regiment, a word or two on the firestep while the battalion just going out changes places with the relieving battalion, and the legend of an adjacent dug-out is made plain. Such scraps of conversation as these may be heard. "That dug-out on the left got a 'ole in the roof the other night. A time-expired man who was going off to Blighty the next day went in there and lay down to kip. A whizz-bang 'it the roof, and the poor bloke went west." "The Germans occupied these trenches at one time; the Guards charged them, and not a man escaped. You'll see their dug-outs all along here." "A sniper used to play 'ell with this bay a month ago. 'E used to send the bullets into the trench. It took the men some time to discover 'im. Then they got 'im. 'E was up on the top of a chimney-stack in the village behind the German trench. 'E could see right down the trench. Our artillery brought the chimney down and the sniper with it." So the stories are told and retold, and passed from one set of soldiers to the next who occupy the trenches. No doubt stories become distorted and enlarged in the course of time, but always there is a grain of truth in the most exaggerated trench story; and every tale gives an added interest and a subtle touch of romance to the locality. The mean, primitive trench, the home of the Brown Brethren, is not without certain features of grandeur, and an atmosphere of mystery pervades the whole place, due, no doubt, to its close association with death.