He had bored holes in the bottom of the pail for air, and was
shielding the glow carefully with his overcoat.
Many people have written about the trenches--the mud, the odours, the
inhumanity of compelling men to live under such foul conditions.
Nothing that they have said can be too strong. Under the best
conditions the life is ghastly, horrible, impossible.
That night, when from a semi-shielded position I could look across to
the German line, the contrast between the condition of the men in the
trenches and the beauty of the scenery was appalling. In each
direction, as far as one could see, lay a gleaming lagoon of water.
The moon made a silver path across it, and here and there on its
borders were broken and twisted winter trees.
"It is beautiful," said Captain F----, beside me, in a low voice. "But
it is full of the dead. They are taken out whenever it is possible;
but it is not often possible."
"And when there is an attack the attacking side must go through the
water?"
"Not always, but in many places."
"What will happen if it freezes over?"
He explained that it was salt water, and would not freeze easily. And
the cold of that part of the country is not the cold of America in the
same latitude. It is not a cold of low temperature; it is a damp,
penetrating cold that goes through garments of every weight and seems
to chill the very blood in a man's body.
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