“At this moment the guide stops us: ‘Here on the right is the communication trench leading to the Colonel’s place.’ I still insist, ‘But I have to go to the first line.’ ‘I don’t know the way: I am going to the Colonel’s quarters,’ and in less time than it takes to tell he hurries away in that direction. What can we do? The men are restless, and won’t march without a guide.... We all rush in the direction of the Colonel’s quarters. In places, the communication trench cannot be traced, for it is chock-full of corpses. All classes of troops are there: engineers, foot-sloggers, colonials.... In this blend of mud and dead bodies we mark time, and all that amid an acrid smell of blood and putrefying flesh.... Our nerves are on edge; we begin to become the supermen that we shall be when the gunpowder has scorched us.... “We come to a relief post for scouts. Our guide is here. I am on the point of scolding him severely and asking for an explanation, when a substitute comes to lead us, this time to the first line. This fellow actually does know the way. We about turn to go back again upon the road towards Fort Vaux. The men are tired out. We break off for a rest. “Urged by the guide, who maintains that the faster we go the better it will be for us, we resume our march. Once again we are on a good road. The first fatigue party, led on the direct route by its guide, is far on ahead. It has passed the plateau and is now descending the slope of the Ravine of Death. At this moment the Boches begin to aim at them and start curtain fires; a rain of steel, projectiles of all calibres, proceeds to fall ... everywhere one sees things flying in the air.... “Forward! It is a terrible dance of death. The men begin to spread out; if I stop, they will not start off again.... “The whole countryside is ablaze with sunlight.... An unrivalled opportunity for taking a splendid photograph: in the background, on the left, Fort Vaux; on the right, the Woevre plains; on the left, the few tree-stumps that mark what was once La Caillette Wood, blackened with 210 rounds of gunfire. In the foreground, the stricken field where the shell-holes adjoin each other, full to the brim with dead. And everywhere great geysers, as it were, of earth and war-material leap into the air under the impact of the shells.... It was a unique scene, and so easy to photograph, since it was a part of my duties to do so.... But my camera was at Fort Tavannes....”