The Mena weekly star., 1918-02-28

At night about half an hour before "hghts out" you can see the Tommies grouped around candle, trying, in It's dim light, to rid their underwear of the vermin. A popular and very quick method Is to take your shirt and draw CTS, and run the seams back and for ward In the flame from a candle and burn them out. This practice Is dan gerous. because you are liable to burn holes in the garments if you are not careful.
 Recruits generally sent to Blighty for q brand of insect powder adver- used as Good for body lice" The ad- vertisement is quite right; the powder Is good for "cooties;" they simply thrive on 1t.
 The older men of our battalion were wiser and made scratchers out of wood. These were rubbed smooth with bit of stone or sand to prevent splin- ters. They were about eighteen inches long, and Tommy guarantees that a scratcher of this length will reach any part of the body which may be at tackled. Some of the fellows were lazy and only made their scratchers twelve inches, but many a night when on guard, looking over the top from the fire step of the front-line trench, they would have given thousand "quid" for the other six inches.
 Once while we were in rest blllets an Irish Hussar regiment camped in an open field opposite our billet. After they had picketed and fed their horses, q general shirt hunt took place. The troopers ignored the call Dinner up," and kept on with their search for big game. They had curious method of procedure. They hung their shirts over a hedge and beat them with their en- trenching tool handles.
 I asked one of them why they didn't pick them off by hand, and he an- swered, "We haven't had bath for nine weeks or change of clabber. If I tried to pick the 'cootles' off my shirt. I would be here for duration of war" After taking a close look at his shirt, I agreed with him: 1t was alive.
 The greatest shock recruit gets when he arrives at his battalion in France is to see the men engaging in q ''cootie" hunt. With an air of con tempt and disgust he avoids the com pany of the older men, until a couple of days later, in a torment of itching, he also has to resort to shirt hunt. or spend many a sIeepless night of misery. During these hunts there are lots of pertinent remarks banded back and forth among the explorers. such as, "gay, Bill. I'll swap you two little ones for big one" or, i've got a black one here that looks like Kaiser Bill"
 One sunny day in the front-line trench, saw three officers sitting out side of their dugout ("cooties" are no respecters of rank have even noticed suspicious uneaslness about certain well-known generaD, one of them was major, two of them were explorin, their shirts, paying no attention to thu occasional shells which passed over head. The major was writing letter every now and then he would lay aside his writing-pad, search his shirt for { few minutes, get m inspiration, ant then resume writing. At last he fin ished his letter and gave it to his run ner." was curious to see whether hs was writing to an insect firm, so wher the runner passed me I engaged hin in conversation and got a glimpse al the address on the envelope. It was addressed to Miss Alice Somebody, ir London. The runner" informed me that Miss Somebody was the majors sweetheart and that he wrote to her every day. Just imagine 1t. writing a love letter during a "cootie" hunt; but such is the creed of the trenches.
 fTo ha continued naxt waalx