A spirit of wonderful fervor filled me as I saw that our behemoth was not disturbed in the slightest by the fact that he had gone into a crater; he continued to waddle all around the huge hole, his machine guns playing on the balance of the men that were jumping this way and that, and swarming like ants up, over and on top of it, to escape and save their lives in some manner.  In sheer mad desperation they climbed over every part of the mammoth, discharging their revolvers at any seam in the metal or place where they thought it might be effective, breaking their bayonets on its iron coat—­in vain!  They could not overcome the unknown!  One man thrust a hand grenade into the muzzle of one of the guns, but was blown to bits in the try.  Still, over and over it they swarmed, like bees searching for a nook in a flower, the difference being that instead of getting honey they got hell.  Then the poor desperate devils, in the frenzy of despair, flung themselves from the top and sides of the titan down into the crater and tried to scamper up the sides to the top, only to be met with a hail of bullets when they reached the edge and fall backwards into the crater depths, upsetting in their fall their companions who were behind them, and also trying vainly to get out of that hole of hell.

Language is futile to give anything like an adequate description of the scene in the crater.  A few of the Huns, more long-headed than the rest, still clung to the tank, remaining there until it reached the top, when they held up their arms, yelling Kamerad at the top of their lungs, and these were all that were left of that 300—­just 20.

The titanic ducks were each of them doing similar work on every part of the line, but the particular one whose work I was able to follow then made a call on a whiz-bang battery, smashing one of the guns when it first stepped upon it, and mowing the gunners down, the rest fleeing as though from the wrath to come.  Many batteries and crews were similarly smashed, and then their work being done for the day, they all returned with the exception of one which lay in the German lines for about five hours, due to engine trouble.  While lying there, Fritz did his damndest to place a mine underneath the helpless hulk, but the earnestness and the energy with which our boys at the guns worked for the preservation of their beloved behemoth, prevented him carrying out his purpose; and while the concert was in full swing all around us, the preserving messages from our guns whizzing past it in one direction, and the destructive messages from the German guns coming at it from the other direction, the tank crew quietly and industriously went about their work, repaired the engine trouble, said “ta-ta” to Fritz and waddled back home.

No returning hero from the scene of his glory ever received such a greeting as did the crews of the mighty monsters when they stepped out of the sheltering internals of their huge bowels.  Clad in pants and boots, littered with grease, dirt and oil, scarred with bruises incurred as they were thrown from side to side of their armored shelter by the swaying of the thing, when they stepped from the door to the ground, the shouts and roaring cheers of ten thousand times ten thousand men thrilled them with such a thrill, that they felt fully repaid for everything that they had done that day.