three miles back of us, for the Germans started a heavy barrage which went singing over our heads.  The shells went high, but just the same they made everyone uncomfortable for a few minutes.  Fellows that have been on the line, however, will tell you that you don’t mind the noise of shell fire—­for you figure it out that the bullet that hits you is the bullet you never hear—­and while that doesn’t seem a very comfortable thought, you soon forget to think of danger.

[Sidenote:  Shifting the gun’s position.]

Perhaps the most exciting incident, and at the same time the one that sent more terror to our hearts than any other, occurred late one afternoon.  It was foggy, though fog always hung over our battery—­in fact, the climate of the front that has been assigned to our troops is notorious for its winter fogginess.  Orders had been sent out to shift the position of our gun, and as the afternoon wore away—­and the thick smoke-like pall that hung over us made it impossible to recognize the fellow standing next to you when he was half a dozen feet away—­it was decided that there was no use to wait till night, but that we could shift the gun at once.

[Sidenote:  A German aeroplane right overhead.]

All the crowd started to work, the new gun pit was ready, and the signal station was all moved.  It was just as we got the gun into the position and were straightening it into position that a faint breeze came stealing down from the mountains.  In a minute the breeze was stronger, and we could see a hundred yards away.  In another minute we could see three times that distance, and at the end of the third minute we could see clear up into the heavens—­and there was a German plane flying straight for us.

Did you ever stand waiting for death?  I suppose not—­but that was what happened to our gun crews.  The plane swooped low and seemed to hang right over us.  We waited, hardly daring to breathe.  I saw the perspiration running from one fellow’s face, and guess it was running down mine.  I know that I had a most pressing desire to run—­anywhere, so long as I was moving.  As I was looking down I glanced at my wrist watch about every thirty seconds and lived minutes between each glance.  No one spoke—­it was as if we had suddenly been turned to wood.  Then after fifteen minutes of observation the Hun plane circled away from us—­and we had lived several lifetimes in that short time.

[Sidenote:  Army trucks take us back to the village.]

It was the fog that got me—­and sent me back to the United States.  Two years before, coming home from drill at the armory (I was then a member of the National Guard) I fell asleep on the train and contracted a severe cold.  The cold never seemed to leave me, and now, after a week of fog, after sleeping in a gun pit, I grew hoarse and developed a nasty cough.  I was not really sick when I left the firing line after my six days and returned to the billet, but I felt pretty miserable.  I can remember being glad when, after a several miles’ walk back of the lines, we found the army trucks ready to carry us to the village where we were quartered.