But for a general description I doubt if any of them will give us anything much better than the following account, written by a German journalist, of the wearing monotony of the life of the men at the front. I give it partly for that reason, but chiefly because I think it is useful for all of us to realize that French and English soldiers are not the only ones who, however brave and however cheerful they are, must sometimes be appalled by the unendingness of the struggle. There are two sides to the nightmare of the trenches, just as there are to the moral effect of shell-fire and the horror of the horizon. And sometimes non-combatants—I do not say the soldiers—are apt to forget the way in which it may be and must be affecting the enemy. Let them listen to this German, writing from the other side of the line:— * * * * * * “And the siege goes on. “Along the whole front, hundreds of miles long, from the North Sea to Switzerland, the faithful soldiers are posted in the trenches. “In Flanders the water reaches to their knees. The pumps are working, but without much success. In spite of cement and joists and props, the trenches fall in every day, and the sandbags have to be renewed with infinite trouble every minute. When they leave the trenches the soldiers march through water for miles. In Champagne they are white with chalk, in the Argonne and the Vosges they are coated with mud up to their forage-caps. There, too, the pumps are working to get the mastery over the water. “It pours with rain, it snows, the wind blows. When our soldiers go to their quarters to rest, many of them support themselves with sticks; for the water and the cold have stiffened their legs. No army of ancient days could have shown such energy as this. Even Napoleon would never have dared to ask of his armies, though they were used to hardship, such prodigious efforts. At the present time the willingness of the men is tenfold. The soldier marches in blood up to his ankles, the blood of the enemy, and the blood of the comrade he loved; but his brow is crowned with laurels.