On the 25th, as soon as it was daylight, the bombardment began again more violently than ever. With my field-glasses, I looked at the plain. Here and there I could see enemy patrols and trenches. At the fringe of the wood, just beyond, I saw troops gliding along and I thought I could see a German on the lookout behind the chimney of a house. At a certain moment, a battery of the enemy Light Artillery took position about 1500 yards away from us. It began firing and its projectiles almost grazed us. We informed our Artillery, which answered feebly. We were furious at this, for we did not know that our gunners were short of ammunition. We had lost our Antwerp stores and the French supply was not yet organised.[9] In spite of all this, and with our poor resources, we resisted these mass attacks prepared by a diabolical Artillery. On that day, I still had courage enough to write a few words in my note book, whilst Dixmude was crumbling away under the 210 and 280 shells. Everything trembled, the heavens, the earth and--the men. The Taubes were hovering over us constantly. They were trying to discover our positions, which they indicated by dropping white fuses. A shower of shrapnels and shells informed us of the result of this information. Our soldiers presently began to complain. They had nothing to smoke, and some of them began to cut the handles of their knapsacks into shreds. Several of them were ill from this privation and among these was our Lieutenant, the only one left among us. Life now was a martyrdom. After all our overwork and fatigue, we had nothing with which to sustain ourselves, and we felt our strength giving way. We could not get any more provisions and we had no more warm food, as our kitchen had been destroyed at Dixmude by the shells.