"They're the long 120's. They're on the edge of the wood half a mile away. Fine guns, old man, like gray-hounds. They're slender and fine-nosed, those guns--you want to call them 'Madame.' They're not like the 220's--they're all snout, like coal-scuttles, and spit their shells out from the bottom upwards. The 120's get there just the same, but among the teams of artillery they look like kids in bassinettes." Conversation languishes; here and there are yawns. The dimensions and weight of this outbreak of the guns fatigue the mind. Our voices flounder in it and are drowned. "I've never seen anything like this for a bombardment," shouts Barque. "We always say that," replies Paradis. "Just so," bawls Volpatte. "There's been talk of an attack lately; I should say this is the beginning of something." The others say simply, "Ah!" Volpatte displays an intention of snatching a wink of sleep. He settles himself on the ground with his back against one wall of the trench and his feet buttressed against the other wall. We converse together on divers subjects. Biquet tells the story of a rat he has seen: "He was cheeky and comical, you know. I'd taken off my trotter-cases, and that rat, he chewed all the edge of the uppers into embroidery. Of course, I'd greased 'em." Volpatte, who is now definitely out of action, moves and says, "I can't get to sleep for your gabbling." "You can't make me believe, old fraud," says Marthereau, "that you can raise a single snore with a shindy like this all round you." Volpatte replies with one. * * * * * Fall in! March! We are changing our spot. Where are they taking us to? We have no idea. The most we know is that we are in reserve, and that they may take us round to strengthen certain points in succession, or to clear the communication trenches, in which the regulation of passing troops is as complicated a job, if blocks and collisions are to be avoided, as it is of the trains in a busy station. It is impossible to make out the meaning of the immense maneuver in which the rolling of our regiment is only that of a little wheel, nor what is going on in all the huge area of the sector. But, lost in the network of deeps where we go and come without end, weary, harassed and stiff-jointed by prolonged halts, stupefied by noise and delay, poisoned by smoke, we make out that our artillery is becoming more and more active; the offensive seems to have changed places. * * * * * Halt! A fire of intense and incredible fury was threshing the parapets of the trench where we were halted at the moment: "Fritz is going it strong; he's afraid of an attack, he's going dotty. Ah, isn't he letting fly!" A heavy hail was pouring over us, hacking terribly at atmosphere and sky, scraping and skimming all the plain.