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The Germans, exhausted by the long strain of constant counter-attacks, found the Canadians in their midst with little warning. But the defenders did not give up without a struggle, and there was fierce bayonet fighting.
But their advance was then halted by the French in a series of the most brilliant counter-attacks, and the German offensive appeared to die down by March 1, when their losses in the ten days' battle were estimated at 175,000, including between 40,000 and 50,000 killed.
All the rest speaks of war, of war that comes to gardens, without banners or trumpets or splendour, and roots up everything, and turns round and smashes the house, and leaves it all desolate, and forgets and goes away. And when the histories of the war are written, attacks and counter-attacks and the doom of Emperors, who will remember that garden?
But science had been at work here, as at Panama, and wire gauze and the kerosene spray had captured the first trenches of yellow fever and malaria, and against these weapons of the medico all counter-attacks have been unavailing. Some strong hand was ruling in this town, for the streets were spotless and the dogs lean. And, oh, how the nigger does hate cleanliness!
It was stormed by the battalion which had been waiting outside it since the previous morning. German counter-attacks on the 15th were repulsed, and on the 17th a further advance was made to the Bois d'Hollande north of Grandcourt, while Canadians from the Regina trench established themselves near its western outskirts.
The convoy had come in from the direction of the Summer Palace, and was accompanied by such a small escort of infantrymen that I should not have cared to insure them against counter-attacks on the road from any marauders who might have seen them in a quiet spot. A dozen mounted men of resolution could have cut them up.
Generally it was understood that we had penetrated successfully into the hills until we were brought to a halt by the difficulties of supply, and that now the Turk was beginning to recover from the effects of his long retreat and was launching counter-attacks, which had in some cases been fairly successful, and that he had given the XXI. Corps a couple of heavy knocks to the north-west of Jerusalem.
Probably the Germans imagined that this extension had weakened our lines at Ypres; and on 8 February they began a bombardment which developed into a fierce struggle for Hooge and The Bluff on the Ypres-Commines Canal. The ground lost was mostly recovered by counter-attacks on 2 and 27 March and 3 April, but it could not all be held against further German attacks later in the month.
Many an anxious mother in England was seeking news of a son whose body had become a part of that Flemish landscape. During the week following the commencement of the offensive, the wounded were brought back in twos and threes from the contested area over which attacks and counter-attacks were taking place. One plucky Englishman was discovered about fifty yards in front of our trenches.
Our Sixth and Fifth Brigades had been in during the time we were out and both had suffered severely in the many counter-attacks, but held on, like true British bull-dogs, to what had been our original front line. The craters were lost as it was impossible for any troops to hold them under the devastating fire of the German guns.
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