Page:The Irish guards in the great war (Volume 1).djvu/123

 *mans and shelled both en route and as they were billeting, but, as chance chose, without accident. The billets were good, though, like most in the early days, they needed cleansing, and a rumour went about that the trenches to which the Battalion was assigned were peculiarly foul, in very bad shape and would probably need re-making throughout.

Bombing classes with a new and an "absolutely safe" bomb (Mills), the routine of company drills and exercise, sports and an Eton dinner on the 4th June, filled the warm, peaceful days till it left Nœux-les-Mines for Sailly-Labourse. This was not the sector they had expected, but one farther to the north and nearer Cuinchy. Their trenches were an unsatisfactory line with insufficient traverses, not too many dug-outs, and inadequate parapets facing fields of fast-growing corn, which marked the German front two hundred yards away. They were reached from Cambrin through a mile and a half of communication-trenches, up which every drop of water had to be carried in tins. A recent draft of fifty had increased the Battalion to over a thousand men, and, apparently by way of breaking in the new hands, it was suggested that the Battalion should dig a complete new line of trenches. They compromised, however, by improving the existing one, which they shared with the 2nd Grenadiers, changing over on the 12th June to a stretch of fifteen hundred yards, held by the 2nd Coldstream. This necessitated three companies instead of two in the front line and the fourth in support.

The enemy here confined themselves to shelling timed to catch reliefs, hut rarely heavy enough to interfere with working parties digging or wiring in the tough chalk. On one occasion a selection of coloured lights, red, green, and white, had been sent up for the battalions to test. They chose a night when the enemy was experimenting on a collection of lights of his own, but soon discovered that rocket-lights were inadvisable, as their fiery tails gave away positions and drew fire. This disadvantage might have been found out in England by