The Mena weekly star., 1918-05-30
Continued from last week }

"German snipers get paid rewards for killing the English"
 I eagerly asked, What are theyr'
 He answered.:
 .sFor killing or wounding an English nrivate, the sniper gets one mark. For tilling or wounding an English officer he gets five marks. but If he kills Red ,Oap or English general. the sniper gets twenty-one days tied to the wheel of a Timber as punishment for his careless ness"
 Then he paused. waiting for me to bite, I suppose.
 lbit all right and asked him why the .suiper was punished for killing an
 English general. With 6 smile he re-
 piled:
 well. you see. if all the English gen.
 erals were killed, there would be no
 one left to make costly mistakes"
 shut him up. he was getting too
 fresh for prisoner. After a while he
 winked at me and winked back, then
 the escort came to take the prisoners
 to the rear. shook hands and wished him "The best of luck and 6 safe jour ney to Blighty."
 liked that prisoner. he was a fine fellow, had an Iron Cross, too. ad- vised him to keep 1t out of sight, or some Tommy would be sending it home to his girl in Blighty as a souvenir.
 One dark and rainy night while on guard we were looking over the top from the fire step of our front-line trench, when we heard a noise imme- diately in front of our barbed wire. The sentry next to me challenged. "Halt, who comes thereT and brought his rife to the aim. His challenge was answered in German. A captain in the next traverse climbed upon the sand bagged parapet to investigates brave but foolhardy deed-"Crack' went bullet and he tumbled back into the trench with hole through his stomach and died few minutes later. A lance corporal in the next platoon was so en- ragged at the captains death that he chucked Mills bomb in the direction of the noise with the shouted warning to us: Duck your nappers, my lucky lads" A sharp dynamite report, flare tn front of us, and then silence.
 We immediately sent up two star shells, and in their light could see two dark forms lying on the ground close to our wire. A sergeant and four stretcher-bearers went out in front and soon returned. carrying two limp bodies. Down in the dugout in the nicker1pg light of three candles, we saw that they were two German off, cers, one captain and the other am
 unteroffizier," rank one grade higher than a sergeant general, but below the grade of lieutenant.
 The captains face had been almost completely torn away by the bombs explosion. The unterofflzier was alive. breathing with difficulty. In few min utes he opened his eyes and blinked in the glare of the candles.
 The pair had evidently been drink ing heavily, for the alcohol fumes were sickening and completely pervaded the ougout. l turned away In disgust, hatng to see a man cross the Great Di. vide full of booze.
 One of our officers could sneak Ger man and he questioned the dying man.
 in faint voice, interrupted by ire guent hiccoughs, the unteroffizler told his story.
 mere had been a drinking bout among the officers in one of the Ger man dugouts the main beverage being saainpagne. With a drunken leer he informed us that champagne was plen- uiui on their side and that 1t did not sost them anything either. About seven .nal night the conversation had turned .s the "contemptible" English. and the captain had made a wager that he would hang his cap on the English | usrDed wire to show his contempt for | tne English sentries. The wager was accepted. At eight o'clock the captain asa he had crept out into No Mans Land to carry out this wager.
 They had gotten about halfway | across when the drink took effect and .ne captain fell asleep. After about |, 'wo hours of vain attempts the unter- .''i1ief iad at fast succeeded In walk .nk the captain. reminded him of his use and warned him that ne would be | lns laughing stock of the officers mess | he did not accomplish his object, but .ne captain was trembling all over and s' shsisteo on returning to the German \ unes. In the darkness they lost their uearings and crawled toward the Eng nan trenches. They reached the barbed wlre and were suddenly challenged by II vur sentry. Being too drunk to realize lnat the challenge was In English, the .aptain refused to crawl back. Finally .ns unterofizier convinced his superior snat they were in front of the English w,re. Realizing this too late. the cap sain drew his revolver and with q nut cred curse fired blindiy toward our trench. His bullet no doubt killed our captain. Then the bomb came over and there \ ,e was. dying and good Job too, we 'hought. The captain dead7 We'll, his hen wouldn't weep at the news.
 without giving us any further infor- nauon the unterofflzier died.
 We searched the bodies for identifi- a.Non disks but they had left every y nlag behind before starting on their o9hardy errand.