"Yes, sir," and I went quickly back toward where I knew the men were waiting, happy to think that there was work to be done at once. I gave the orders that had been handed to me, and in about twenty minutes we were turning over the earth. While we were working others were just as busy, for our battery was being placed in position, and some fifty feet behind the battery the others of the signal service detachment, of which I was a member, were setting up a receiving station. As I helped in the digging of that small trench for telephone wires my heart sang, and I lived again the months that I had served in order that I might be fit for the service I was performing that minute. It might be well, before going further into this narrative, to say that the fellows who had accompanied me were the first American troops to take charge of a sector of the French line, a sector which some day will be moved into the heart of Germany and make old friend Hun wish that there was a way for him to change his nationality and viewpoint. [Sidenote: The artillery training camp.] The training camp where we had prepared for the front after our arrival in France had been purchased by the United States from the French, and had been in use since the beginning of the war for the purpose of putting the high spots on the training of men belonging to both the heavy and light artillery. It was a spacious place; we had comfortable quarters and lots of good food. I had been on the Mexican border, so that sound of the heavy guns that were being used for training purposes did not annoy me, though to about ninety per cent. of the rest of the fellows this was a new sound, and orders were issued that cotton was to be put in the ears. [Sidenote: The French officers are fine fellows.] Except for the return fire, we might have been at the front, for the camp was an exact duplication of conditions under fire. Our equipment was largely French, and the officers who tutored us in modern warfare were all French--and as fine a bunch of fellows as ever lived. [Sidenote: Buying a village for a target.] One of the exciting incidents of the Camp was the day that news arrived that the American government had purchased a small village just beyond the Camp (France is honeycombed with small villages,--it is almost impossible to walk a mile without passing through a village) and that it was to be used as a target for the American boys. We practiced in turn, a battery going out for a few hours' work, and then returning. Both light and heavy Artillery used the village as a target, and it was not long before there was only a heap of rubbish to tell where there had once been houses. [Sidenote: The instructors praise American marksmanship.]