After some weeks of fighting we had come to our last Sunday in Achicourt, and were gathered for the evening service. The chapel was jammed with officers and men, but not all my flock was there. There was Rifleman Gibson absent. He was carrying his beloved Lewis gun in an attack when a bullet struck him, and he died, as his comrades report, with a smile upon his face. Before going into the battle he had given me his father’s address and thanked me for the spiritual help he had received at the services. It was his farewell to me, and his father now has the penciled words. And Rifleman Stone was absent, too. He was but a boy, and beautiful with youth and goodness. His comrades loved him as David loved Jonathan, with a love passing the love of women. Every day, they told me in their grief, he knelt in the trench to say his prayers and to read his Bible. One night after praying he laid him down and slept. He had often sung the evening hymn: "Jesus protects; my fears, be gone! What can the Rock of Ages move? Safe in Thy arm I lay me down, Thy everlasting arms of love. "While Thou art intimately nigh, Who, then, shall violate my rest? Sin, earth, and hell I now defy; I lean upon my Saviour’s breast. "Me for Thine own Thou lov’st to take, In time and in eternity, Thou never, never wilt forsake A helpless soul that trusts in Thee." And as he slept, God took him from the misery of this world--took him without waking him. His broken-hearted comrades gathered together his broken body, and a friend, a Congregational preacher, who, though over military age, was serving in the ranks, read the burial service over him. Lance-corporal Gilbert James was missing, too--he whom I had known to lose his breakfast to attend a service in a cold, dirty, old barn. And many others were absent whose departure to the Land beyond our mortal reach was to us like the putting out of stars. We were leaving the Arras front and we sang a hymn for those who had taken our places: "O Lord of Hosts, Whose mighty arm In safety keeps ’mid war’s alarm, Protect our comrades at the Front Who bear of war the bitter brunt. And in the hour of danger spread Thy sheltering wings above each head, "In battle’s harsh and dreadful hour, Make bare Thine arm of sovereign power, And fight for them who fight for Thee, And give to justice, victory. O in the hour of danger spread Thy sheltering wings above each head. "If by the way they wounded lie, O listen to their plaintive cry; And rest them on Thy loving breast, O Thou on Whom the cross was pressed; And in the hour of danger shed Thy glorious radiance o’er each head.