His flares and rockets, if he fires them, will bring him no assistance; they will be smothered by the mountainous wall of whiteness. Fear seizes him, which he can no longer master; at the same time the same fear seizes every other watcher. By telephone or runner they each one send bark tidings of their terror. But the nine-tenths of the enemy who are sleeping are annoyed at being disturbed. “It is nothing,” they declare. The news spreads slowly from battalion to brigade, brigade to division, division to corps, from corps to army. Each headquarters, peevish at being aroused and hesitant about arousing its next senior headquarters, wastes time in checking back to the watcher in the front-line for confirmation of his doubts. What is it that he fears? No attack is to be expected; the Allies’ storm-troops are up north. There is positive evidence of that fact. The worst that can be looked for is a local raiding-party. What are the reasons for his panic? The reasons for his panic! They are vague, indefinite; he has no reasons—only intuitions, doubts, conjectures. He knows that the night is black and that he is filled with a horrible foreboding. There are too many men over there across No Man’s Land. He cannot prove it, but he can feel their bated breath. Reluctantly the nine-tenths of the army who were sleeping, are awakened. They lie listening in their deep dug-outs, unwilling to believe that calamity threatens. Then suddenly, when it is too late to be prepared, the suspicion strengthens that a major offensive will open with the morning. There is only an hour till dawn—too little time to act. The infantry are ordered to stand to in the trenches and the batteries to increase their rate of fire. Messages are sent to the rear to hurry up the reserves. Brigades of artillery, which are out at rest, hook in and start forward at the gallop. Even the most autocratic old generals are convinced and, to save their reputations, forsake their beds and become officiously important. Meanwhile, the men in the Front-line shiver in the darkness. They know that they have no chance now and are merely waiting to be slaughtered.