"Well, out in front about forty yards," says this Sergeant, "you will find a lot of stakes and two reels of barbed wire. Now you go out and I'll send another fellow to knock in the stakes while you can twist the wire round them and make some entanglements." I can't say I liked the job, because I didn't! The enemy lay only a few hundred yards away, and I had to go out there attracting attention by knocking in stakes and twisting barbed wire around them, a thing the enemy would be sure to try their best to prevent. But it had to be done, so off we started, creeping over the top. We were looking for nearly an hour for this wire and, after twice nearly walking into the enemy's lines, we at length found it, and managed, after several volleys from the enemy, to accomplish our task, and rig up some sort of defence. Every night after that, whenever we occupied the front line, I was one of the men erecting the barbed wire entanglements, and many were the narrow squeaks I had at the hands of the Germans. At the end of the first week we were relieved by the 21st Brigade, containing the Sherwood Foresters and West Yorkshires. They were a new importation from England. My word! didn't they look smart, while we who had gone through so much looked worse than tramps, absolutely reeking of mud. We were taken back to a village about five miles in the rear, and on the way back we had again to go through the defile by which we entered. Our batteries were still there, but the stench from dead horses was awful. This village was at the back of the wooded hill aforementioned, and there were several caves there, perfectly safe from the shells of the biggest guns yet made. In these caves we were lodged, and we had a chance of a rest--the first real rest we had since commencing the Retirement. At the bottom of the hill was also a river, where every one indulged in a bathe. We were in those caves for two days; on the third day we were called out at 4 a.m., and we proceeded to a village on our right previously occupied by the French. To get there we had to cross a sky-line, fully in view of the German observers. We men knew that sky-line, for while we lay in our trenches the whole of the previous week we had watched the Germans shell it when the French troops marched over it. Unluckily for me, my Regiment was the last regiment of the Brigade to go over. The other three got through safely; but, as the road was thick with mud, we had taken to the field, and thus gave the Germans an even better view of us. Two companies were nearly over before we had it: we were the last two, when over they came in batteries, five shells at a time. We were of course forced to fall back over the crest, but not before we had had twenty-five casualties, though we eventually reached our objective without any further losses.