During all these four months I was fortunate in having as a commanding officer a really great soldier. The C.O. had inaugurated his arrival by a vigorous emphasis of the following principle: “No Man’s Land belongs to _US_; if the Boche dare show his face in it, he’s going to be d--d sorry for it. We are top-dogs, and if there is any strafing, the last word must always be ours.” Such was the policy of the man behind me during those four months. Meanwhile, from eight to midnight every night, trenches were being deepened, the parapet thickened, and fire-steps and traverses being put in the front line, which had hitherto been a maze of hasty improvisations; barbed wire was put out at an unprecedented pace, and patrols were going out every night. If things went wrong, there was the devil to pay; but if things went well, one was left entirely unmolested; and if there was a bombardment on, the orders came quick and clear. And any company commander will know that those three qualities in a commanding officer are worth almost anything.
The snow was coming down in big white flakes, whirling and dancing against a grey sky. I shivered as I looked out from the top of the dug-out steps in Maple Redoubt. It was half-past seven, a good hour since the snipers had reported to me before going to their posts. It was quite dark then, for a sniper must always be up on his post a good hour before dawn to catch the enemy working a few minutes too late. It is so easy to miss those first faint glimmerings of twilight when you are just finishing off an interesting piece of wiring in “No Man’s Land.” I speak from experience. For so a sniper got me.
“U--u--u--gh,” I shuddered, “it’s no good keeping the men on in this”; so, putting my whiskey-bottle full of rum in my haversack, I set off up Old Kent Road to visit my posts and withdraw the men _pro tem_. I expected to find the fellows unutterably cold, shrivelled up, and bored. To my surprise, at No. 1 post Thomas and Everton were in a state of huge excitement, eyes glowing, and faces full of life. There seemed to be a great rivalry, too, for the possession of the rifle. For the snipers always worked in pairs: a man cannot gaze out at the opposing lines with acute interest for more than about half an hour on end; so I used to work them by pairs, and give them shifts according to the weather. In summer you could put a pair on for four hours, and they would work well, taking half-hour shifts; but in cold weather two hours was quite enough.