This gibe suddenly roused the temper of the other participant in the debate.

“I tell you,” he exclaimed, in a voice shrill with indignation, “that these ——­ helmets are some ——­ use!”

“And I tell you,” retorted James earnestly, “that these ——­ helmets are no ——­ ——­ use!”

When two reasonable persons arrive at a controversial impasse, they usually agree to differ and go their several ways.  But in “K(1)” we prefer practical solutions.  The upholder of helmets hastily thrust his upon his head.

“I’ll show you, Jimmy!” he announced, and clambered up on the firing-step.

“And I’ll ——­ well show you, Wullie!” screamed James, doing likewise.

Simultaneously the two zealots thrust their heads over the parapet, and awaited results.  These came.  The rifles of two Boche snipers rang out, and both demonstrators fell heavily backwards into the arms of their supporters.

By all rights they ought to have been killed.  But they were both very much alive.  Each turned to the other triumphantly, and exclaimed,—­

“I tellt ye so!”

There was a hole right through the helmet of Jimmy, the unbeliever.  The fact that there was not also a hole through his head was due to his forethought in having put on a tam-o’-shanter underneath.  The net result was a truncated “toorie.”  Wullie’s bullet had struck his helmet at a more obtuse angle, and had glanced off, as the designer of the smooth exterior had intended it to do.

At first glance, the contest was a draw.  But subsequent investigation elicited the fact that Jimmy in his backward fall had bitten his tongue to the effusion of blood.  The verdict was therefore awarded, on points, to Wullie, and the spectators dispersed in an orderly manner just as the platoon sergeant came round the traverse to change the sentry.

II

We have occupied our own present trenches since January.  There was a time when this sector of the line was regarded as a Vale of Rest.  Bishops were conducted round with impunity.  Members of Parliament came out for the week-end, and returned to their constituents with first-hand information about the horrors of war.  Foreign journalists, and sight-seeing parties of munition-workers, picnicked in Bunghole Wood.  In the village behind the line, if a chance shell removed tiles from the roof of a house, the owner, greatly incensed, mounted a ladder and put in some fresh ones.

But that is all over now.  “K(1)”—­hard-headed men of business, bountifully endowed with munitions—­have arrived upon the scene, and the sylvan peace of the surrounding district is gone.  Pan has dug himself in.