The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1917-07-21

chance-they were taught where to go and how to get there, and no peace-timei tripper nourished by guiqe-book ever started better equipp- ed for the hospice by Wytschaete or the Institution Royale long since laid in the red dust of a broken ridge by the weight of our bombardment.
 They Knew
 The infantry learned their lesson we'll during the long, tedious weeks and months when Messines and Plug street" and the flattened site of Ypres above it were quiet-overshadow by the Somme and Arras and forgotten by all the world.
 They learned their lesson well, as did their faithful conveys. the tanks, and they worked as did their com rades of the air and the gunners who sent theim confidently to victory in the wake of their well-aimed shells.
 The stage was set at last and all the parts well learnt. There remain ed only the dress rehearsal of the guns, the testing of that great new machine pieced together stealthily and insignificant ridges that skirt the plain Of Flanders.
 It had grown under the very eyes of the enemy without his realizing the full extent of it's power and intentions.
 I cannot. tell you how many guns fifteen inch to fifteen pounder-were in action on the Messines battle front this morning, but it amazed me that so many guns could be hidden so eff. fectively in such little space-a master magician had tucked away the grand. mothers of all gums in billets that seemed absurdly inadequate against scrutiny from the air and from the ridge that dominated us.
 That edge of Belgium and the part of France it joins simply reeked of guns. They had come from many places each to it's own place, and the hour Of ''rehearsar' found each gun ner nursing his targets and adjusted in the great scheme as carefully and deldcately as part of the mechanism of watch.
 They had their rehearsal. do not know what the Hun called it, although some of the prisoners who came through it unhurt said today that it was simply damnable."
 / You must understand that the guns were not loosed suddenly to view. The Huns had been deluged with shell day and night for more thansa week with varying degrees of intensity. At times the hurricane would ease down into a steady shower, but never during this period of preliminary castigation did it wholly cease.
 A barrage was laid, nicely across their Q frf ,Y r1, 5E xyf1 remember how the guns blockaded the German garrison before Arras un-i til some of the prisoners we took were nearly starved. The same effective preparation" was dealt out to the Prussians and Bavarians at Wytscha- etc and Messfnes.
 by high explosive, and the frayed regi- ments they superseded dreaded the journey to their rest billets even more than the ordeal in the front line
 That was the situation for at least 9 week We exhaustiveIy raided and probed the morale of the Hun. Our patrols went over in daylight, and came back with twenty, thirty, forty, on one occasion more than seventy prisoners, outrageously Kidnapped in view of their comrades.
 Our airmen added. to the agonies of the week. Flying on an average 500 hours per day, this corpsI re- fer to the front engaged today-main- tained a constant surveillance of the enemy country, watched his men and guns coming up to stiffen the garri- son round the ridge--he had more than a shrewd suspicion that we fr, south of Ypres-bombed his dumps, his aerodromes, all his various estab- lishments, fought his air scouts in their own clouds, Photographed his new and nefarious designs of earth works, and in every other conceivable way contributed by the daring self sacrifice of it's splendid pilots and ob- servers to the harassing and eventual undoing of this cocksure garrison of Messines Ridge.
 The week of preparation brought us to the eve of the battle with every detail of difficult attack perfected, and great army sitting in the sun shine of perfect summer day calm and confident of the morrow.
 met some of the troops that fought so well quietly resting in the fields, conscious that they were ready for the work: They slept in the sunshine or gathered around the piano ip the vil- lage cage to sing the popular melodies the soldier loves best, and came up- on 200 of them sitting in their shirt sleeves in the courtyard of an old re- ligious house listening to a concert by their band.
 Singing Soldiers
 They were even-tempered and in terested in the trivialities of the mo- ment as though they had no part in the great drama to be enacted a few hours later. They sang songs that were anything but sentimental, and some of them quarrelled about the name of certain Derby winner.
 Their friends the enemy were by no means as detached from affairs. Our daily bombardment was more than usually vicious and thorough Our guns still lashed them with unabated vigor when the sun dropped below the western hills. Through the night they pounded the already shapeless masses of earth and mortar along the crest of the ridge and the fragments Of the wood below 1t.
 The thunder of batteries rose and sank as the night closed in, some times falling away to a. desultory clat- ter, only to swell once more to even grQa f11a-xy