“_Saturday the 20th_ (11 P.M.).--The lake, with its dreary waters and its sombre setting, runs right up to the three ridges that shut in the horizon. The moon hangs over this distant quarter like a silver veil, dotted with darker specks along the summit of the hills. At the foot of our trenches she sheds her shimmering light over the marsh of the ravine, so that it forms a burnished island amid the ripple of the waters. “To the right, on the dyke, a procession of funereal shadows glides past in silence. “It is the relief that is going by. “At a steady pace, never stumbling, it climbs up towards the Hardaumont plateau, where our shells are crashing, and the white, red, or green cones rise unceasingly into the sky--a firework display given by men marked out for death. “_Sunday, May 21._--The fine weather continues. So does the cannonade. “Midnight. “This evening, at nightfall, the Boche sent us tear-shells. These gases are extremely unpleasant. Your eyes smart, you weep, you choke, you get a splitting headache. What a torment! “The cannonade becomes fast and furious. “The 24th will soon have to attack on the hillsides of Vaux in front of R¹. All my men are at their posts. The hill that commands Fort Vaux stretches out its dark line beneath the half-red disc of the moon. It is reflected down below, a motionless shadow, in the marsh at the foot of our trenches. “The horizon, the fort, the ravine, and the distant dip of the Woevre are wrapped in a silvery mist. “Near me, right and left, I see in the darkness, above the trench, the dim glint of the men’s helmets. I think of the terrace of Elsinore and of the sentries relieving each other there during the night. “Here the sentries get no relief. Under those helmets their eyes are watchfully sweeping the ravine, the embankment slope and the ballast of the railway. On all sides there spurts up the lurid flame of the crashing shells. The splinters fall like a heavy shower of rain into the marshes; others come humming like a top and land in the trenches. “The half-hidden, sinister struggle goes on. “At ten minutes to two the cannonade grows more intense. Rifles and machine-guns spit and crackle. The night is made hideous with a confused uproar that re-echoes in the valley. “Red rockets dart up incessantly from the German lines. On the parapet, with straining eyes, our rifles in our hands, dumb with horror, we witness a mysterious duel, in which we hear the din without seeing the actors. Green rockets flare up from our trenches. ‘Lengthen the range!’ is the cry, while a Boche machine-gun emits its crisp, abrupt note. “Another machine-gun that the artillery preparation has forgotten. “The valley is filled with a dense vapour, a blend of dust and smoke, which hides everything from view. “On the Hardaumont plateau dawn begins to appear.