The girl gave the sheet another tug. She did not want to take it off, but Bubb's terror amused her. The boy could stand it no longer. He got to his feet, wrapped the sheet round his waist and fled up the street. The village came out to see him careering along; all laughed at the escapade but few were surprised at the spectacle. "It's only the mad English," the old women said. "They are always up to mischief." That night the London Irish set out on their trek to the Somme. CHAPTER XIX THE SOMME There's a shell as 'as fell in the mud, A bloomin' big shell in the mud, A bloomin' big shell, An' it might give us 'ell. As it would if it wasn't a dud. I was watching and saw where it goed, Exactly the spot where it goed, In a sweat o' a funk, I watched where it sunk, And I'm thankful it didn't explode. (_From "The Dud."_) The trench was quite a good one for the Somme, about six foot deep with here and there a few dug-outs where men could sleep and eat. There, on a certain autumn morning, we find the men of the London Irish again, waiting to cross No Man's Land and attack the Germans. A month has passed since they left Gorre and during that time they have seen much fighting in which they have earned great renown. "We're too well known," Bubb often remarked bitterly, but beneath all his grumbling it could be seen that he was more than a little proud of his regiment. "We're too well known that's wot it is," he would continue. "If there's anything to be done oo's to do it? Us. We're always in the thick o' it. If the 'eads 'ear that there's a stiff job to be done and it wants an army corps to do it, wot do the 'eads say. They say: 'Put the London Irish, the footballers of Loos on the job. They'll soon do it.'" On this morning Bubb was preparing breakfast in a dug-out while Bowdy Benners was sleeping in a corner and Flanagan was out on the parapet watching for Tanks. These monsters were going to cross presently, but as yet they were not to be seen. In front, the self-sown crops were waving in the breeze, and the barbed wire entanglements showed red and rusty over the meadows. Nothing of the German wires remained; they had been blown to bits. The German trenches could be seen in front, dipping out of sight into a natural valley on the left and losing all outline amongst the tree stumps on the right. The stumps were all that remained of the well-known High Wood; the locality was pitted with shell-holes and littered with dead, friend and foe, who lay together in silent communion. The Germans still held the wood. Bubb, having prepared breakfast, went to the door and called Flanagan in, then he turned round and kicked Bowdy on the shins. "Git out 't," he said. "Ye're not going to fight on an empty tummy, are yer?"