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Bellboys, clerks, and waiters pelted with hand grenades its smoldering remains and squirted chemical fire-extinguishers upon it; but the Gasowashine's day was done. Its turbulent spirit had passed to another sphere.
"That was all; and it was quite enough in the way of compulsion for a good many like myself who didn't hanker to stick bayonets through men we'd never seen, nor shoot them, nor blow them up with hand grenades, nor kill them ten thousand feet in the air and watch them fall, turning over and over like a winged duck. But these things seemed necessary.
There was very little cover from enemy snipers, who were pretty active, and there were several casualties from fishtail trench mortars. One night was marked by a very intense "strafe" for a short time with rifle grenades and trench mortars.
It was protected by a deep ditch, twelve feet wide, with an abattis of pine limbs outside, with a draw bridge, which, when raised, formed a door to the entrance. It mounted four or five guns and was well supplied with hand grenades from one-half to two pounds.
All my spare time was spent in going over and testing the grenades to be fired next day, or in baling out the bombing trench, which filled very rapidly in wet weather. And so it went on day after day. Thirteen officers and 671 men who had never previously thrown a live grenade went through the course at Hénencourt; and about 1400 live grenades were fired.
The officer commanded the rest of the party to be ready to support them, and only saying to us, "Look to your safety, gentlemen," gave, in rapid succession, the word to the grenadiers "Open your pouches handle your grenades blow your matches fall on."
Some of the Leicesters made a dash three hundred yards up the trench, but were beaten back by overpowering numbers of German bombers and bayonet-men, and again and again other Midland lads went up that alleyway of death, flinging their grenades until they fell or until few comrades were left to support them as they stood among their dead and dying.
Many of the loop-holes are labelled with men's names, written in a good engrossing hand; and between the loop-holes, and level with them, are pinned coloured postcards and photographs of women, girls, and children. Tucked conveniently away in zinc cases underground are found zinc receptacles for stores of cartridges, powders to be used against gas, grenades, and matches.
I did not believe that any one could cross that fire-swept area alive, but before many moments we heard the staccato of bursting bombs and hand grenades which meant that some of the enemy, at least, were within striking distance.
Frank, a little in the van, reached out a warning hand and they slowed up. "We'll make faster time if we give ourselves a minute's rest," he panted. "When we start in again we'll have our second wind. They haven't got out of that mix-up yet. Besides, they'll come on more cautiously now. They won't know how many grenades we have left." "I haven't any," gasped Tom.
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