And in that summer of 1916 there was much to be said for life in the Souchez sector. It was a 'peace-time' sector, where divisions stayed for months at a time, and one went in and out like clockwork at ritual intervals, each time into the same trenches, the same deep dug-outs, each time back to the same billets, or the same huts in the same wood. All the deserted fields about the line were a mass of poppies and cornflowers, and they hung over one in extravagant masses as one walked up the communication trench. In the thick woods round Bouvigny and Noulette there were clusters of huts where the resting time was very warm and lazy and companionable, with much white wine and singing in the evenings. Or one took a horse and rode into Coupigny or Barlin where there had not been too much war, but one could dine happily at the best estaminet, and then ride back contentedly under the stars. In the line also there was not too much war. Few of the infantry on either side ever fired their rifles; and only a few bombers with rifle grenades tried to injure the enemy. There were short sectors of the line on either side which became spasmodically dangerous because of these things, and at a fixed hour each day the Germans blew the same portions of the line to dust with minenwerfers, our men having departed elsewhere half an hour previously, according to the established routine from which neither side ever diverged. Our guns were very busy by spasms, and every day destroyed small sections of the thick red masses of the German wire, which were every night religiously repaired. The German guns were very few, for the Somme battle was raging, but at times they flung whizz-bangs vaguely about the line or dropped big shells on the great brows of the Lorette Heights behind us. From the high ground we held there was a good view, with woods and red and white villages on the far hills beyond the Germans; and away to the left one looked over the battered pit country towards Lens, with everywhere the tall pit-towers all crumpled and bent into uncouth shapes, and grey slag-heaps rising like the Pyramids out of a wilderness of broken red cottages. To the south-east began the Vimy Ridge, where the red Pimple frowned over the lines at the Lorette Heights, and all day there was the foam and blackness of bursting shells. In the night there was much patrolling and bursts of machine-gun fire, and a few snipers, and enormous labours at the 'improvement of the line,' wiring and revetting, and exquisite work with sand-bags. It was all very gentle and friendly and artificial, and we were happy together. Burnett had left us, on some detached duty or other, and in that gentler atmosphere Eustace was a good companion again.