We crossed the old No Man’s Land, passed the working-parties at their thankless tasks of road-making in the churned morass, and picked our way warily round the crater lips across the old German front line system till we struck the railway. It did not seem to be getting shelled, and would at least afford better going than if we plunged through the crater-field direct towards the front line. My intention was to nurse the railway for a mile or so, and then, leaving it, to strike across up the ridge in order to hit off “The Rectory,” where Battalion H.Q. were reported to be. I had not been forward myself since the show. It was worse even than I expected. The ground was just beginning to harden in the hot sunshine, but every hole was filled with water and one had to plan out one’s course with long detours, jumping precariously from island to island. The rusted wire, half buried in the loose earth, tore one’s puttees. The whole place stank. There were very few dead about; the Hun communiqué had probably not lied in saying that their outposts had been lightly held. But the railway embankment gave possible lodgment for the feet and we kept along it as I planned, with six paces between each man and one eye on the 4·2’s falling just to our right in the valley. The effect on that ground was only local and we had no fears of splinters. At last, panting and thirsty, we reached the crest which our infantry were holding. We could see no movement. Over the bleak expanse of shell-holes there was no human being to be seen; one had got to cast one’s eye right back to where the working-parties were. A line of ruined houses and pill-boxes ran along the ridge. One of them was “The Rectory.” I went into it; there was a concreted cellar facing Boche-wards, but nobody inside it. I hailed a Red Cross man who was wandering about forlornly. He hadn’t seen anyone, didn’t know anything. It was rather annoying. I looked up my book of the rules and tried a cast back to the original map reference for Battalion Headquarters. It must be a ruined pill-box which they were shelling. I waited till there was a pause and then looked inside. No, not a sign of anyone. Confound Brigade! That part of the programme must wait, that’s all. I had to establish connection by visual with our Brigade signallers at Hell Fire Corner and must plant my lamp. We went down into one of the pill-boxes on the ridge and deposited the gear. The dug-out was a foot or more deep in water, but must have been a comfortable, secure home. Two wounded infantrymen were lying on the bunks on one side of the dug-out. They told me they had been there since the first day, untended save by chance arrivals. I tried to cheer them up and we offered them our water-bottles.