The spectator., 1919-03-21


 makes you want to be up and at . 'em," but that miserable damp kind that eats into the marrow of your bones, attacking you from the rear and sending cold shivers up and down your spinal column. It gives you feeling of dread and loneliness.
 The three of us, Curly" Happy and myself, were standing at the cor ner of Yankee avenue" and "Yiddish street." waiting for the word Stand to-" upon which we were to mount our machine gun on the parapet and go on watch for two hours with our heads sticking over the top.
 "7ankee avenue" was the name of the fire trench, while "Yiddish street" was the communication trench leading to the rear We were occupying ~ . sector of the front line of our brigade.
 The trench was muddy, and in some places a thin crust of ice was begin ming to form around the edges of the puddles.
 We had wrapped our feet and legs with empty sand bags, and looked ike snow shoyelerS on Fifth avenue. My teeth were chattering with the cold. Happy was skipping his hands on his thighs. while Curly had unbuttoned one of the buttons on his overcoat, and with his left hand was desperately trying to reach under his right armpit no doubt a "cootie" had gone mar keting for it's Christmas dinner.
 Then came the unwelcome "Stand to-" and it was up on the firestep for Us, to get our gun mounted. This took about five minutes.
 Curly. while working away, was muttering; "Bline me, Christmas eve, and ere I am somewhere in France, 'alf starved with the cold"
 Happy was humming Keep the Home Fires Burning" Right then, to me, any kind of home fire would have been very welcome.
 It was black as pitch in No Mans land. Curly stopped muttering to him self and Happy's humm:ng ceased. There was serious work in front of us. For two hours we had to try and pene- trate that blaekness with our Straining eyes to see that Fritz did not surprise us with some Christmas stunt of his.
 Suddenly, Happy, who w2s standing on the firestep next to me, gripped my arm, and in a low, excited whisper, asked:
 Did you see that out in front, Tank, a little to the right of that black patch in the barbed wire?"
 Turning my eyes in the direction in- dicated with my heart pounding against my ribs, I waited for some thing to develop.
 Sure enough, I could make out a slight movement. Happy must have seen it at the same time, because he carefully eased his rifle over the top, ready for instant use My rifle was al ready in position. Curly was fumbling with the flare pistol. Suddenly, ''plop!" as he pulled the trigger, and a red streak shot up into the air as the star shell described an arc out in front; it hit the ground and burst, throwing out a white. ghoStly light. A fright ened ''meouw," and a cat, with speed clutch open, darted from the wire in front of us, jumped over our gun and disappeared into the blackness of the trench. Curly tucked his head and Happy let out a weak, Squeaky laugh. I was frozen stiff with fear. Pretty soon the pump action of my heart was resumed, and once more l looked out into No Mans land.
 For the remainder of our two hours on guard nothing happened. Then we turned over" to the second relief and, half frozen, wended our way through the icy mud to the entrance of our dugout.
 From the depths of the earth came the notes of a harmonica playing Pack Up Your Troubles in Your Old Kit Bag, and Smile, Smile, Smile" Stumbling down the muddy steps we entered the dugout. About eight boys of our section, sitting on their packs, had formed a circle around wooden box. In an old ammunition tin six canoes were burning. I inwardly shud- dered at this extravaganza, but sud denly remembered that it was Christ mas eve. "Sailor Bill" was making cocoa over the flames of a 'Tommy's cooker" while "Ikey" Honney was toasting bread in front of trench fire bucket, the fumes from which nearly choked us.
 As soon as we made our appearance in the dugout the circle stood up, and, as is usual with the English, made room for us to get around the fire bucket to thaw out our stiffened joints. In about twenty minutes or so the cold of the trench was forgotten and we joined in the merriment. The mu- slcian put his barmonica away, and, bursting with importance, Sailor Bill addressed us:
 "Gentlemen, 1t is now time for this