Before reaching the chasseurs I overtake four Boches, in each of whom, either in the back or in the head, I put a revolver bullet. Each one drops in his tracks with a long, strangled cry. (Censored.) * * * * * Skirting the base of a steep slope, I pass through a fire zone where the bullets in hundreds, whining and shrilling, tear up the soil all about me. Then I encounter a group of men, standing at the foot of a tree. There is a dying officer in the center, supported against the tree-hole. A glimpse I have of a dark blue tunic wide opened, of a shirt stained with bright blood. The wounded man's head sags heavily down to his shoulder, and in the whitened, tortured face, moist from fearful agony, I recognize my own major. But I must not stay! * * * * * I question a lieutenant who is marking the fall of the shells through his glasses, shaking from head to foot the while from excitement. "Things going well? Eh?" He turns towards me. The joy which fills him is plainly legible in his face. He laughs exuberantly: "I should say they are going well. The Germans are giving way--deserting their positions like rats a sinking ship." He laughs once more. "Listen to our 75's! They are making them dance like madmen! That is the way to carry on, what? They are being kicked in the sterns now, the swine!" A staff captain on foot is watching the delighted gunnners. He laughs also and repeats several times in a loud voice: "Good! Very good!" III--STORIES TOLD AFTER THE BATTLE Heavily and dreamlessly I sleep, and awake to find myself in precisely the same attitude as that in which I flung myself down the preceding night. The straw wraps me in grateful warmth, rather moist, perhaps, because the water in my saturated clothes has evaporated during the night.... We find that in the night the torrent has well-nigh filled the trenches with liquid mud. Some sappers, however, come to our assistance, and, thanks to them, we are able to shelter ourselves from the worst of the downpour. The men work easily, flinging jests one to the other. The incidents of the night attack are revived and acquire a totally new force by reason of the simple words in which they are related. "I was all right at the beginning," says Martigny, one of my men. "But all at once, while I was still firing, down toppled a Boche right on top of me, without so much as a "by your leave!" I was on my knees and he lay across my calves. It's not easy to fire in such a position as that! Little by little the weight forced my knees down into the mud; the water rose almost up to my hands: how was I to refill my magazine? I could not see the animal, but you can take my word for it, he was heavy." And a second: