Show HORRORS OF j. j BA TILE UNE LINE ARE RECITED British Lieutenant Gives a aPen aPen Pen Picture of Conditions on the Western Front MEN l GROWING MORBID Imagination Staggered by hy A Awful Toll of Death Taken by hy Shot and ShelL LO T ONDON ON Nov ov It-A It A new picture o ot of J 1 the batUe battleground on the tho western front which Is b somewhat hat different from frets and a a. little more 30 than some of or the earlier descriptions of ot that stricken area Doren cornea comes In a letter to a a. well kno American publisher froma from froma a lieutenant In tho the new now British armr which Is b fighting there thore Ha He writes Well o F s n my first jj modern jj batU bat bat- U of I old and am quite about the splendor of ot war The splendor pl n- n dor dOT lj is all aU In the souls of ot the bow bowed men who creep through h the squalor like vermin vermIn Its If nothing ex external ex- ex The There was a chap hero here theother tho the other day who deserved the tho V. V C. C four tour times time over for tor running back baek through the tho German shell firo to lo bring D news new thAt tha t ha In nf t 8 J more ar support i was owa ob obe observing In th the tam tor- ward station at the time And how ho managed ed to live through the ord 1 l nobody knows known But men lau laugh h w while they do tb these things its it's flue fine A modern battlefield 1 is b the nation of ot abominations Imagine a vast Tut stretch of or dead country pitted with shell hole bole as M though It had been mutIlated mutilated mu nu- hated d with srn smallpox Ox Therea Theres not a a. leaf lear or a blado blade of ot g grass s in sight Every hou house e has hns either been leveled or H is la In ruins No bird sings slugs Nothing stirs The only live liTe sound Is at Dt night tha bt tho scurry of ot rats JAle In Trenches You Yon enter a B. kind of ot deep ditch called a trench It leads on to another and another in an ul maze From Prom the tho sides te feet t stick sUck out out and anna arms a and d faces the faces tho dead of previous encounters tors Ono One of ot our chaps you ciru ally say recognizing him b by hia s hoots boota or khaki or Poor blighter a a nun Ibm Ono One can afford to forget enmity In inthe tho the presence of ot th these o d dead d. d It H Is la horribly horribly hor hor- difficult sometimes to distinguish between the tho living and tho the slaughtered they they both He lie so 50 silently In their lit littIe little lit Ut- tIe tle kennels In the tho earthen bank You push on on on especially If It you Ou are doing observation atlon work work till till you TOU are aro arop p past t your our own front line and in No NoMan's NoMans NoMans Noan's Mans Man's ans an's Land You have havo to crouch and move warily now ZIn Zing A bullet ballot from a German sniper You Yon laugh and whisper A near r shave havo that thal My first trip to the trenches was WL up Ut to No Mans Man's Land I went In the early c. dawn and came camo mo to a n. Tu show of the tho dead frozen Into immobility ity In the most extraordinary attitudes Some of ot them wore were part way out ont of at th the ground ono one hand pressed p to the tho wound the tho other pointing the head bead sunken and tho the hair plastered over oYer the to forehead hend by repeated rains I kept kepton on wondering what my ray co companions would look like had they been en weeks dead Im My Iy Imagination Uon b became e Ingeni Ingeniously Y Yand and vividly morbid When I hM to tn step over o them to pa pass It seemed as though they must clutch at my trench coat and ask mo me to help Poor lonely people pee peo pIe so 50 brave and so anonymous in their death Somewhere Some there Is a woman who had lo loved loyed ed each one of them theta and would give her life lIfo for Cor my roT opportunity to touch the poor clay that had bod been beon kind lo to her Its It's like walking through the day of ot r resurrection to visit No NoMan's NoMans NoMans NoMan's Mans Man's Land Then the Germans ae e eyou you ou and tho the shrapnel b begins to failand fall falland tAU fail and you crouch like Jlko a do doc dOf and run for itOno it IL One Ono gets used to up to a a. point but ther theres there's not a man m who d does doea s sI I not Ilot want to duck duek when he b hears one coming The worst of all alt la is tho the whiz whirs ban bang because It doesn't give Sivo you rv a chance It chance It pounces and I Is on you OU oti tb the same Bamo moment that it bangs Tho The other night I 1 had a n ncr cr very lucky escape I was In a when a shell landed killing killing kill kill- ing a 3 man only a foot toot awa away from mo me and wounding three others others and and I and the sergeant were tho the only two to get et out all nil right M Men n who have o been en out here some somo time hmo have a 0 dozen stories of or similar near squeaks And talking of ot squeaks it was a Q mouse that saved Cd one man It kept him awake to such an nn extent that ho hI determined to move to another place Just as ho he got outside the dugout a a. ashell shell tell fell on tho the roof root O I |