“Look out!” Something is laid out on the ground on our right—­a row of dead.  As we go by, our feet instinctively avoid them and our eyes search them.  We see upright boot-soles, outstretched necks, the hollows of uncertain faces, hands half clenched in the air over the dark medley.

We march and march, over fields still ghostly and foot-worn, under a sky where ragged clouds unfurl themselves upon the blackening expanse—­which seems to have befouled itself by prolonged contact with so many multitudes of sorry humanity.

Then we go down again into the communication trenches.  To reach them we make a wide circuit, so that the rearguard can see the whole company, a hundred yards away, deployed in the gloom, little obscure figures sticking to the slopes and following each other in loose order, with their tools amid their rifles pricking up on each side of their heads, a slender trivial line that plunges in and raises its arms as if in entreaty.

These trenches—­still of the second lines—­are populous.  On the thresholds of the dug-outs, where cart-cloths and skins of animals hang and flap, squatting and bearded men watch our passing with expressionless eyes, as if they were looking at nothing.  From beneath other cloths, drawn down to the ground, feet are projected, and snores.

“Nom de Dieu!  It’s a long way!” the trampers begin to grumble.  There is an eddy and recoil in the flow.

“Halt!” The stop is to let others go by.  We pile ourselves up, cursing, on the walls of the trench.  It is a company of machine-gunners with their curious burdens.

There seems to be no end to it, and the long halts are wearying.  Muscles are beginning to stretch.  The everlasting march is overwhelming us.  We have hardly got going again when we have to recoil once more into a traverse to let the relief of the telephonists go by.  We back like awkward cattle, and restart more heavily.

“Look out for the wire!” The telephone wire undulates above the trench, and crosses it in places between two posts.  When it is too slack, its curve sags into the trench and catches the rifles of passing men, and the ensnared ones struggle, and abuse the engineers who don’t know how to fix up their threads.

Then, as the drooping entanglement of precious wires increases, we shoulder our rifles with the butt in the air, carry the shovels under our arms, and go forward with lowered heads.

* * * * * *

Our progress now is suddenly checked, and we only advance step by step, locked in each other.  The head of the column must be in difficult case.  We reach a spot where failing ground leads to a yawning hole—­the Covered Trench.  The others have disappeared through the low doorway.  “We’ve got to go into this blackpudding. then?”

Every man hesitates before ingulfing himself in the narrow underground darkness, and it is the total of these hesitations and lingerings that is reflected in the rear sections of the column in the form of wavering, obstruction, and sometimes abrupt shocks.