Norwich bulletin., 1917-08-25
Nature and the Battlefield.

There are places in the valley of
 the Anere where crops flourish, patches
 of an acre or more being covered with
 oats or barley or wheat, mixed with
 weeds certainly, but hardly less close
 and even than if they had been truly
 Sown- One patch of barley Gone almost
 inclines to call it a field) which I saw
 was especially fine: but all three are
 growing strongly between Longueval and Ginchy, where it seems impossible
 that they could have been sown last year. More likely, they survive from
 chree summers ago- and self seeded,
 they have held their own well against
 the wild things which riot around and among them. In one pla"e I found a
 solitary potato plant, going strong sprung presumably from some potato strayed from a German field kitchen
 Next to poppies. the most abundant flower is camomile, and it alone seems to have been able to spring up and grow on the roads and beaten paths by which the enemy used to travel to and from his lines: so that. looking over the country. amid the deep green and waving colors, you can often trace the course ot an old path where it runs like a pure white ribbon amid the sea of green and waving coiors.
 Tie woods remain desolate beyond ina ginstion, even though in most of them grass and flowers have sprung up to cover the ground and shoots have risen from the old roots. Above ground level hardly a tree has put out any new life. but the shattered trunks still stand bare and blackened Ma ture finds use, however, even for the shell scars on the wood, for sparrows have built their nests this year at the points where trees have splntered so that untidy wisps of straw and stuff stick out from the jagged wounds. In Leuze wood a pair of crows have nest ed. Perhaps they thought that later in the year the tree would put forth leaves as usual; but as it is the nest stands absurdly landmark for long distances round, as exposed as if it were on the top of flagstaff or bare ships mast. Near CIery. amid the waste, single post some three feet high stood up, and on the top of it I saw a mother warbler feeding a young cuckoo three times her own size
 But the strangest thing of all In natures haste to hide the raVages of war seems to me the shell holes. As one wades through the deep herbage the lesser shell holes merely make the walking very difficult and uneven for ones feet blunder among the shell holes. which are concealed by the growth, and trip over strands of barb ed wire and unexploded shells and other things which are scattered every where out of sight. Many of the larger holes, however, still remain half filled with water. Around the edges of thirsty creatures, crowd to drink, and when you disturb them they rise in clouds till the air is full of them, like ! snowstorm. In the water itself a luxuriant pond life has developed. Lit tie whirligig beetles dance may l dances on the surface, and water boat | nen swim about and water scorpions | md other things just as in A1y village | pond at home. have spoken before | of frogs in the new shell holes on the | Vimy ridge. But here. On the dry | slopes of the Albert ridge, on the high ] ground, how has all this teeming life | come into the shell Holes of last sum 'ner ?-London 'Ttmes Correspondence ]