rocket will be fired." Of the whole complex system of lines, that between headquarters (which in our case is the group commander, batteries being usually organized in groups under a senior officer) and the battery commander is by far the most fertile in trouble. It is not so much the line itself that is to blame, as a sort of nervous feeling that it connects one with one's superior officer, a feeling that in a wholly indefinable way pervades everybody who comes in contact with it. If, as frequently occurs, wire is saved by leading the various battery lines to an exchange, whence a single line runs back to headquarters, the possibility of complication is enormously increased. The process of getting a message through is then a nerve-racking one. I was once assisting the battery commander in the observation post, observing a series that was of some considerable importance--it was during the fighting round Hill 70. In the middle of the transmission of orders to the battery, an interruption comes through from them. "Headquarters want to speak to the major, sir!" "Never mind headquarters, you take my message." Three minutes elapse, during which we get off a few more rounds. Then the battery calls through again, "Headquarters say it's urgent, sir!" "All right, stop firing, switch them through." A long pause, during which the receiver echoes, "Hullo, hullo, exchange! Hullo, can you hear me? I want headquarters. Hullo! Speaking to another battery are they? Hullo, is that headquarters? I'm 320th Siege--here you are, sir." Then a still small voice, "Am I speaking to the major?" "I'm taking the message for him; go on." "Message from G.O.C. Corps Artillery, begins. Please report by noon on 30th instant number of Army Forms XY 9999 in your possession, ends. For your information and compliance please." Fortunately Job was a hasty and impetuous individual compared with the major, or his remarks on having wasted a quarter of an hour of rapidly failing light to receive such a message might have been unthinkable.