It was the first time I had been under fire, and for the first ten minutes I felt a bit nervous, and so, I think, all of us did; but it soon wore off, and seeing our comrades hit by shell seemed to stiffen us. We could see the Germans lying in their trenches more than 1000 yards away: we could see their helmets, which showed up like a lot of mushrooms. While we were still digging our trenches the enemy began to advance; and some of our cavalry to our rear came through us to attack the enemy. The Lancers, however, were met by a tremendous rifle and machine-gun fire, and mown down; and they retired through us, followed by the Germans, who came on yelling with fixed bayonets. The regiment who were next us on our right digging themselves in, got caught, I fancy, for I saw some of their men tumbling out of their half-finished trenches in their shirt-sleeves without their rifles. We were ordered out of our trenches to meet the advancing Germans, who, firing from the hip, and with fiendish yells, were evidently intending to rush us. They were coming on in dense blocks--blocks which were probably companies--in _échelon_, but when they saw us come out of our trenches with our bayonets fixed they didn’t like it, and most of them turned and ran. Some of them, however, came on, and I saw one man single me out and come for me with his bayonet. He made a lunge at my chest, and, as I guarded, his bayonet glanced aside and wounded me in the hip; but I managed to jab him in the left arm and get him on the ground, and when he was there I hammered him on the head with the butt-end of my rifle. I think I had become a bit dazed, for I did not see my battalion, only a few dead and wounded lying on the ground: _A Private of the Yorks Light Infantry_. Smoke--and Fire!