To the Fore with the Tanks!

THE jolting cattle-trucks pulled up with a disconcerting jerk at the termination of a fifty-mile railway journey, performed in the remarkably record time of fifteen hours.

From a springless truck, on which was painted the legend, "40 hommes ou 8 chevaux," descended fifty-two tired but elated Tommies, thirsty, ravenously hungry, but quite able to keep up a bantering conversation with the peasants who had gathered by the side of the temporary line.

It was a miserable night, even for the Somme district in early March. Rain was falling solidly. The ground was churned into deep mud of the consistency of treacle. The gaunt gables of a dozen roofless houses, silhouetted against the constant glare in the sky, betokened ruined homes and uncomfortable billets; while the loud rumble of distant artillery was in itself ample proof that at last the Second Wheatshires had arrived somewhere on the Western Front--the goal of six months' constant and arduous training.

Into the squelching mud the men stepped blithely. They were used to it by this time. The double line of khaki-clad figures, showing dimly through the darkness, shuffled impatiently. Here and there a man would "hike" his pack to relieve the weight of the webbing equipment over his shoulders, or sling his rifle while he lighted the almost inseparable "fag." The distant flashes of the heavy guns glinted from the wet "tin-hats" of the Tommies, as the unaccustomed head-gear wobbled with every movement of the wearer's head. The issue of steel trench helmets given before the commencement of the railway journey had confirmed the rumour of the past fortnight--that No. 3 Platoon was to be sent to join the rest of the battalion at the Front.

"Ah, well, 'tis certain he hath crossed River Somme,'" quoted Private Graham Alderhame formerly of the Shakesperian Repertoire Company and now a humble foot-slogging Tommy in a noted Line Regiment. "Well, if this is across the Somme I don't think much of it. Another ten miles by motor-bus, I suppose, and then something in the way of grub. Got a cigarette on you, dear boy?"

Private Ralph Setley, who seven months previously had been a bank-clerk in a busy provincial town, placed his rifle against a pile of equipment that was serenely resting in the mud, and fumbled for a packet of smokes. Then, having handed one of the contents to his chum, he struck a match.

The light flickered upon the honest, deeply tanned features of a typical British lad of about nineteen or twenty. In spite of a day of extreme discomfort in the over-crowded horse-box which the French Government placed at the disposal of Allied troops, his eyes twinkled with the excitement of the moment. At last he was within sound of the guns, and more, the chance of meeting a Hun was within measurable distance.

Having lighted Alderhame's cigarette and his own, Setley was about to throw the vilely sulphurous match to the ground when another voice interposed:

"Hold hard, chum. Let's have a light."

Ralph was about to comply with the request when a hand shot out and sent the still flaring match flying through the air.

"What's that for, George?" asked the disappointed applicant for a light, with mingled truculence and resentment.

"'Cause 'tain't for no good; third chap as 'as a light from the same match allus goes West--honest fact," replied Ginger Anderson, a short, wiry man, who, according to his attestation papers, used to be a gamekeeper, although others of his platoon swore that he had been convicted three times for poaching.

"Listen!" exclaimed Alderhame, placing a hand on Setley's shoulder.

A short distance along the double line of waiting Tommies a hungry Kentish man was endeavouring to persuade an ancient paysanne to sell some eggs. Judging by the man's injured tone his efforts were not meeting with success.

"Wot, no compree?" he asked. "Des woffs, des woffs. Blimey, these old Frenchies don't understand their own bloomin' language. Woffs, I said, missis--them wot we calls heggs."

A motor-car with dimmed head-lights dashed up, throwing showers of mud on either side like miniature cascades. From it descended a great-coated staff-officer. The ranks stiffened. Something was in the air. Information, perhaps, as to the place where the tired Tommies were to be billeted.

"Who's in charge of this platoon?" rasped out an authoritative voice.

"I am, sir," replied a subaltern fresh from home, a beardless youth of about nineteen, Stanley Dacres by name. "Details for the Second Wheatshires."

"Quite about time," rejoined the staff officer. "You are to take your men to the reserve trenches. Motor-buses for the first five miles. With luck you ought to be there by midnight. Arms and equipment all correct?"

"All correct, sir."

"Gas masks?"

"Two per man, sir."

"All right; see that one is returned. New pattern gas-helmets will be issued. A guide will accompany you. Good night and good luck."

The staff officer vanished in the darkness, his place being taken by a sergeant who had evidently emerged from an estaminet.

In single file the No. 3 Platoon marched off, ankle deep in liquid mud, the coldness of which penetrated the thick puttees and boots of the men as they made their way towards the supply depot.

The depot was a long, rambling stone building that originally possessed one doorway. Now there were two, a Hun shell having obligingly knocked away twenty or thirty square feet of masonry in the end wall, while of the roof only a few rafters and tiles remained. Tarpaulin sheets had been nailed to the woodwork to form a temporary shelter from the driving rain. The corners of the canvas, flapping in the wind, threatened to demolish the remaining structure, besides allowing a steady stream of water to pour upon the earth and lime-trodden floor.

As each man entered the building he threw one of the two gas-masks in a corner, and in return had a complicated anti-poison-gas device thrust unceremoniously into his hand. Three paces further on he was greeted with half of a very dry loaf and a tin of bully-beef, while as he emerged into the night another gift in the shape of one hundred and fifty rounds of ball ammunition in clips was bestowed on the already heavily weighted Tommy.

"Repairs executed while you wait!" exclaimed Ginger Anderson. "Oh, dash! There goes my bloomin' tucker."

The half-loaf had slipped from his grasp and was rolling in the mud. As he stooped to retrieve it the man next to him cannoned into his unstable form, with the result that Ginger went on all-fours, plus equipment, in the Artois mud.

"Say, sergeant," remarked the luckless private, holding up the bread. "Wot am I ter do wi' this?"

"Get outside it when you're hungry," was the N.C.O.'s unsympathetic reply. "If you've never got to eat stuff worse than that you can thank your lucky stars."

"All aboard for 'Appy 'Ampstead!" shouted a wag as a line of motor-buses, some possessing the original advertisements they had displayed in London Town, snorted up through the blinding rain.

"Silence in the ranks!" ordered the platoon commander.

Even had his order not been given absolute silence fell upon the men as a blinding flash stabbed the darkness, followed by an appalling crash like a concerted roar of a dozen thunder claps. The ground trembled. A partly demolished gable collapsed with a long drawn-out rumble.

"We're under shell fire at last, then," remarked Second-Lieutenant Dacres to the sergeant told off as guide to the platoon.

"Fritz's evening hate, sir," replied the N.C.O. imperturbably. "He drops them occasionally on the high road well behind our lines on the off chance of strafing some of our chaps. That one fell quite five hundred yards away. You'll soon get used to it, sir. There'll be two more coming, and then we can get a move on."

Private Setley could feel his heart beating against his ribs as he waited. Being under shell fire for the first time was decidedly an uncanny sensation. Dimly he wondered if he would ever get used to it.

The second and third projectiles came almost simultaneously, one bursting a quarter of a mile away on the right, the other landing in an already ruined farm building on the outskirts of the village. Beams and masses of brick-bats were tossed sky-high like straws in a gale of wind, while some of the men felt certain that they saw portions of a field gun hurled upwards in the glare of the bursting shell.

"That's the lot," declared the sergeant coolly. "'Tain't like what it used to be. Fritz thinks twice about wasting heavy gun ammunition."

Silently the Tommies boarded the waiting buses. For the time being their natural hilarity was subdued by the unwonted display of war.