New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1915-07-05
TONNES MAKE SYLVAN
PARADISE OF TRENCHES
Take Summer Holiday from Shipping in Flanders and Turn
to Gardening Swimming Playing Cricket and
Making Siege Warfare Comfortable.

pumping and bailing kept them from
complete immersion and walls contln-
ually falling in, now the only com
plant of the trench housekeepers is
the want of water for washing for the
spongy subsoil is as dry as bone and
as hard as cement
The toll of casualties where there
are only snipinR and infrequent shell
ing has been much reduced, owing not
only TO the increased adaptability OF
the men in self-protection-t result
Of experience in trench warfare-but
TO an immense improvement in the
protective character Of the work.
Though a trench may be on exactly
the same line as il was in December,
spade work in the spring and summer
has completely transformed 1t, afford
ing small chance for either shrapnel
she'll bullets or bullets fired by snipers
from trees or buildings to hit the de-
tenders.
You can move only few feet in
straight line in this maze of human
warrens. The zigzag traverses local
ize damage. On dull days in the stale
mate part Of the line there have been
instances of not a single casualty for
a distance of q mile in twenty-four
hours It IL when the artillery fire
is concentrated and an effort is made
to get through the barbed wire and
take trench by either side that the
casualty list leaps like a thermometer
thrust from an icebox into an oven.
Soldiers Consider Shipping Sport.
So used have they become to trench
life that some soldiers prefer life IN an
average trench on an average day to
that in billets, because sniping has
the elements of sport and excitement
The confidence and patriotism Of the
fighting men at the front are shown IN
both officers and soldiers, even il they
have only a few shillings put by, IN
subscribing TO the war loan.
The professional opinion Of officers
at the front is that they are not dis
couraged by the German offensive in
the east. They say the war must be
won by the killing Of German and
that the further the Germans are avn
into the Russian quicksand the more
wastage for. them. This period Of the
war for the Entente Allies is compared
to that for the North in 1883, at the
time of Lees and Jackson's success IN
Virginia and the Confederate advance
In PENNSYLVANIA before Gettysburg was
won.
Riding about the British front, even
an expert observer is unable to guess
how many troops the British have in
France, so easy Of concealment is the
thicklv settled country. He passes
bodies of infantry changing station or
moving TO the front, without being any
the wiser. Only Sir John French, COM
mander in chief Of the British expedi-
tionary force, and few staff officers
really know. The average officer never
asks, but attends strictly to his bust
ness.
Allied Gains Have Future Value.
In the hard fighting in the Festubert
and La Bass6e region and the French
offensive in the Arras region, though
the changes show so little on the map,
gains OF a very positive tactical value
for the future were made. If the opln-
ion of a lay observer counts for any
thing, the British army is far from
making anything like maximum et-
fort yet.
The anger Of officers and men at the
gas attacks of the Germans has not
yet passed. Tommy Atkins always is
seen in new trenches with a resplrator
in bag slung at his side.
In the trenches these days at least
one hears no talk of any peace which
is not gained by forcing Germany to
her knees.