On the last day in June Lieutenant Butler, one of the leading spirits in the concern, went up to the face on the important duty of breaking the surface and pinpointing the position. The tunnel had at length been pushed through the clogging stratum, a total ascent of nine feet had been made from the lowest point, and it was judged that the end of it must now be very near the surface. To confirm this, a narrow hole was bored straight upwards from the face. It was found that there were still six feet of clay and soil to be negotiated. This was disappointing, but it was not so disappointing as was the result of verifying the actual position. Butler very gingery pushed a stick with a piece of white paper attached to it up through the hole. The watchers from one of the upper end-corridor windows groaned as they discerned the damning piece of paper moving slowly to and fro, _still eight or nine yards short of the rye_. The interest and general tension had now become so great that, although nothing was said, half the camp knew the same evening that something was wrong and guessed fairly shrewdly what the something was. To carry on into the rye would take at least three weeks’ hard work, by which time the rye would probably have been cut and the only cover afforded would be the darkness of the night. But about three or four yards nearer than the rye was a row of beans, and it was decided to make a last effort to reach these and to trust to luck and the darkness to carry the party across the bare space between the beans and rye. The beans in themselves would afford no mean screen.