Being stationed about two miles north of the left flank of the German attack, it was for us a much more comfortable morning than that spent by most of those south of Arras. For when the mist began to rise, it revealed no phantom figures; we did not find ourselves encircled, and outflanked, with the cheerful alternatives of a perpetual rest where we stood or of an indefinite sojourn on the wrong side of the line. Everything presented a very orderly appearance. Far away on the right was the dull noise of guns, but over the whole of the immediate front spread out the peaceful prospect of a programme of trench routine. “Seems as if Jerry weren’t coming over after all,” said the section corporal. “Looks like it,” I said. “Then I suppose as we’d better clean things up a bit, Sir.” “It would be as well.” And the half-section settled down to the usual work of cleaning themselves, their guns, and their position. The infantry on the right were even more resigned to the uneventful. “This ’ere offensive was all wind up, Sir,” said the man at the strombos form, “they thought we was gettin’ a bit slack, I suppose, so they thought this scare ’ud smarten us up a bit; but I knew it all along, Sir; I’m too old a soldier to be taken in by that.” The runner from Battalion, however, brought quite a different story. “Been an attack all along the line, Arras to St. Quentin, but it’s been broken up absolutely; never even got the front line.” The man at the strombos form shifted suspiciously. “They not bin trying to come over ’ere. I never seen no Germans,” which was not surprising considering that from where he stood he could not see the front line at all. “No,” he went on, “there’s bin no offensive, and there won’t be one neither. It’s all a wind up.” At any rate, whether there had been an attempted attack or not, it seemed quite clear that it had not got very far. With that comforting certainty, I returned to the position, and having seen that the guns were clean, descended into the dugout and went to sleep. About two hours later a perspiring runner arrived. He was quite out of breath from dodging whizzbangs, and was in consequence incapable of logical statement. He said something about “Bullecourt.” The chit he brought explained. “BULLECOURT, ECOUST, NOREIL ARE IN THE HANDS OF THE ENEMY” It took at least five minutes to realise what this meant. To think that they had got as far as that. It had seemed so delightfully safe. One had walked along the Ecoust road in daylight, and there was a canteen at Noreil. And then that glorious dugout in Railway Reserve that we had covered with green canvas and festooned with semi-nudities from the _Tatler_, to think of some lordly Prussian straddling across the table, swigging champagne. It was an unspeakable liberty....