On the nature of the individual Americans depended what happened. Sometimes the Germans were released from their chains and sent to the rear as prisoners. Sometimes the bayonet was used as the only answer to such tactics. And who shall blame either action? When, as frequently happened, it was a case of man to man, the Pennsylvanians found that it was a rare German who would stand up and fight. Long afterward they told gleefully of finding, here and there, a Hun who bravely gave battle, for our men frankly preferred to kill their men fighting rather than to slaughter them or take them prisoner. Some of the Americans were so eager to keep close on the heels of the retreating Huns that they did not stop long enough thoroughly to clean up machine gun nests and other strong points. Groups of the Boche hid until the main body of the Americans had passed on, then raked them from the rear with machine gun and rifle fire, snipers concealed in trees being particularly annoying in this way. In scores of instances our men found machine guns and their gunners both tied fast in trees, so that neither could fall, even when the operator was shot. It was reported reliably but unofficially that machine gun nests had been found where the Germans, in the short time they had been on the ground, had arranged aerial tramways of rope from tree to tree, so that if a machine gun nest were discovered in one tree and the gunners shot, the guns could be slid over to another tree on the ropes and another group of men could set them going again. Many of the Huns "played dead" until the American rush was past, then opened fire on the rear. This is an old trick, but Allied soldiers who tried it early in the war discovered that the Germans countered it by having men come along after a charging body of troops, bayoneting everybody on the field to make sure all were dead. The Germans, however, knew they were safe in trying it with our men, for they were well aware Americans did not bayonet wounded men or dead bodies. Sergeant McFadden, who has been mentioned before, was making his way through the woods with a single companion when he noticed an apparently dead Boche in a rifle pit. He got a glimpse of the face, however, and noticed the eyes were closed so tightly the man was "squinting" from the effort. McFadden jabbed his bayonet in the German's leg, whereupon he leaped to his feet and seized the rifle from the astonished American's hand. He threw it up to fire, but before he could pull the trigger, McFadden's companion shot him.