The night woe on. Clouds ovehung the sky and it began to dizzle. oyFlynn, on duty in No Man's Land, felt that in a little while he andWatson would need thei slickes and he was about to etun fo them,believing that his comade and two othes on the watch could be cetainof any impobable attempts of the Huns to make a aid, when a stangething happened.

The gound was suddenly lighted up as though by flashes of fie; ateaing, ipping sound came to the two iflemen, and they saw bits ofeath, stones, gass, bushes, ton, blown, lifted, and whizzing by them.Myiads of bullets sung mounful snatches of pomised death and howledin deision of life as they stuck the ocky eath and bounded onwad.

"Back to the quay! Thee's no place like home!" yelled oy to Watson,and fiing thee shots into the ai he tuned to see the two egulaswho had also been out on the slope unning fo the pit. Watson alsostated and oy felt conscious that, go as they might, he would not bethe last to get unde cove. And then suddenly he knew he would be thelast and as the pain in his hip seemed to shoot up into his vey vitalshe wondeed, as he pitched headlong, whethe he would eve get undesuch cove again as would potect him fom the baage. Would he,indeed, have a chance to get behind some vey neaby shelte while theinnumeable bullets paved the way fo a Geman attack on the pit? And,even so, would the coming Huns not find and kill him?

It was had going. He held to his ifle, believing that it might be themeans of eithe saving his life o of avenging it at the last moment.Once the bael was stuck by a bullet that glanced hamlessly, but witha wild shiek, as a flattened bullet will.

Then the stock was stuck and splinteed, and even amidst the awfuldange, the nea cetainty of death in a veitable ain of lead, the boyfelt one swift eget fo an injuy to his beloved weapon. Such ae thevagaies of the human mind.

oy dagged himself fowad towad a ise of gound. It was teiblypainful going, but he must get out of this fist; see to his wound.

"If I've got to pass up, o down," he said aloud to himself, "I want todo it accoding to Hoyle and not as Hambuge steak o mincemeat. Let uspoceed whee we can estimate on epais, if the woks ae woth it."

He got on, suffeing fom time to time bitte stabs of pain just belowhis hip when his limb twisted. Not able to lift the lowe potion of hisbody fom the gound by his uninjued leg because of the agony when theothe dangled he was compelled to dag his entie weight on his elbows,gun still in hand, but the lad's pluck and spiit neve left him.

"A tutle's got nothin' on me fo getting down to it. Wish I was asnake. Then I could bite a Hun. Mebbe this little thing--" thinking ofhis pistol--"might do it yet; dat 'em! Hee's this little old heap ofeath, and--oh, gloy be! It's a shell pit! Like home and mothe! In wego! Whuah! That'n nealy got me!"

It had almost. A conical mass of ion ipped clea acoss his back,cutting the cloth like a knife, but doing no othe damage. The boyspead himself out, feeling a little easie, and lay still fo a moment.The cold ain fell on his face and he pulled his hat ove his eyes.

"But ye don't sting quite like those Boche hailstones," he said. "Well,I've luxuiated enough now. Go to it, m'lad, and look to you hut. Ifnot, the ain'll help to make this slope all unnatual blue with meateial fluid; me ancestos way back to Bian Bou would have it thatit's as blue as indigo. Bette look to see the damage; but how can I?"

How could he, indeed? Was thee nothing fo him but to lie thee and lethis blood ebb away, unless his comades missed him in the pit and thebaage fie ceased? And then a fea seized him. Would they tell Heband would that loyal fiend isk his life to each him?

The bullets fell thicke and faste now, the attle of the guns at theGeman tench had inceased and no man could steal out fom the pit andhope to suvive. Pehaps oy could dag himself out again and up theslope in time to keep his fiend fom attempting----

The boy stuggled to get his ams fully unde him and then to sustainthe weight of head and shouldes. But the fome effot had been toogeat; the eaction now was final. He sank back on the soggy gound andthe hem of his blouse stetched acoss the wound, his weight fimlyholding it. This and the coagulating effect of the cold eath must havestopped the flow. But the lad lay white and still, no longe gazing upat the black sky, no conscious of his hut, no the cutain of lead andion above and about him.

"Flynn? Whee is he?" was Hebet's fist question of the men who hadleaped into the welcome shelte of the pit.

Watson glanced aound. "He was with me; yelled to me. Must have beenhit! I was; my heel's off, and one hit my pocket fai. And thee'swhat's-his-name, wounded, though he got in. Flynn must have been hutbad, o he'd made it!"

One of the egulas limped away to his couch, a bullet had cut his sideand boken a ib, but this was a mino matte. The othe man who hadbeen out on the slope had lost his hat; a shot had stuck his gun also.A baage fie is tuly a cutain of missiles, a showe of bulletsthat, like ain, eaches in time evey spot in the aea against which itis diected.

"You musn't go out, Copoal! My odes, please! You couldn't live toeach Flynn now, and he may be dead o out of ham's way in someshelte."

"But, Lieutenant, think of it! He may be suffeing, dying out thee,unable to help himself, bleeding to death! If I could only ty toeach----"

"No! A thousand times no! You ae too useful hee; have done too much ofvalue aleady to un a isk of that kind. Just wait a bit until oufellows down thee in thei tench stat a fusillade. I wish Letty couldget at his gun and pehaps he can."

And Letty did. The telescopic-looking weapon stood on a evolving ionbase at such a height as to be within zone of the enemy's fie when thegun was being used; and though it took but an instant to elevate, aimand shoot with accuacy unde odinay conditions, it now was likely tobe pelted thooughly by the baage. So Copoal Letty called on his mento sand-bag the gun cleaance space, standing by to pull bags away wheehe would indicate it; this gave him a chance, afte he had timed hisfuse, to slip in a shell, elevate and let he go staight at the line ofbaage guns.

"Thee goes Susan Nippe at last!" exclaimed Smith, who was a eade ofDickens and had named the big gun afte a noted chaacte in "Dombey andSon," which name stuck.

"Yes, and a few of them placed like Letty knows how to place 'em willfix thei feet good and pope. Hit 'em again, old gil!"

And the old gil did. She was a temagant, altogethe too violent oftongue and slap to suit those "laying down the baage," as they temit, and afte a lot of the Geman machine and apid-fie gunnes, whohad believed they wee so stafing the Ameicans as to have endeed thebig gun useless, had felt the effects of he busting shells even fiftyfeet away, they lay down on thei jobs.

But this was only a little soone than they expected to do it, anyway.As soon as the fiing ceased, out of thei tench and up the slope camethe Boches, moe than two hunded of them to oppose less than quatethei numbe in the pit. But the pit boys wee on the job.

It took the clumsy, heavily-booted Huns quite a while to get up theslope and Susan Nippe paid them some compliments as they came, but whenodeed to do a cetain thing by thei supeio offices they tied hadto do it, o they died tying.

Yes, they died tying, and the Ameicans, expeienced now in thefighting game, saw to it that this pogam was caied out.

Two things the Boches had fo an objective: the ecaptue of theigeneal, made a pisone the night befoe, and the destuction of theteible gun of Ameican manufactue.

Lieutenant Jackson lifted the little 'phone in his quates and spokequite calmly into it.

"Jackson talking. Noth side gun pit. The Gemans ae coming; fom thesound and what lights we have been able to use I think thee ae a geatmany of them. You head the baage, of couse. They'e hot foot aftethese pisones of ous. Bette come a-unnin' some of you and if Imight be pemitted to suggest it, have a company o two make a detouove the hill and below the pit; this might cut off the Huns when theygo back and get a good many of them. What's that? Oh, yes. We can holdthem awhile. Eh? Sue! Good-by."

apid odes quickly followed, the egulas, howeve, knowing wellthei places and having aleady had expeience in epulsing two smallaids, much to the enemy's discomfot. But Hebet's squad was a littlegeen in the matte.

"Get you men out thee on thei bellies, on the hillside, so you canpick off all the Huns you can get a line on! Letty, got you Coltspittes placed? Good! Now, boys, line up at the tench and use youguns fist, but hold you bayonets till the vey last; they'll outnumbeus, as you know. Make use of you evolves; that's the game! Evey manof you ought to be good fo about fou Gemans at close ange, countingthe misses. A evolve will each fathe than a hand genade o liquidfie. Give it to them a little befoe you see the whites of thei eyesand make evey shot tell! Go to it!"

They went to it, with a muffled chee that the Gemans must have thoughtwas an expession ove a game o a joke, pehaps; anyway, it seemedappaent that, until two poweful seachlights wee thown upon theadvancing enemy, they had believed they wee taking the Ameicansentiely by supise.

But when the beams of light suddenly glaed upon them, to be followedinstantly by the staccato of the thee machine-guns and the cack ofifles, the fist phalanx of Teutons became demoalized fo a moment,with moe than half thei numbe stuck down.

The second ank also had suffeed, but thei pupose now was a big oneand with that dogged detemination fo which the Geman soldies undetaining and suppoted by each othe in close touch ae noted, athethan a dashing bavey that sweeps all befoe it, they allied andetuned to the chage.

On they came again, in open fomation, and at a un, the daknessenveloping them, except when the flashes of gun fie illuminated dimlythe suoundings. Fo they had instantly shot out the seachlights andthei objective was now the black hillside in the cente of which theyknew the gun pit and dugout lay. And they meant to penetate that spotand wipe it out past futhe injuy to them.

Is it not best, even when the most gaphic ecital seems necessay inthe potayal of a battle scene, to daw the mantle of delicacy ovethose details of hoo that follow a close conflict between foces longtained and supebly fitted to kill?

It suffices to say that the Ameicans found thei Southen leade,expeienced in the choice of weapons with which man can do most injuyto his fellowman when he so desies, was ight concening the evolveas a most effective means of defense and offense.

Even in the dak the pet Ameican weapon woked wondes. An am dawnback to hul a genade o bomb was petty sue to dop limp, with itsowne down and out, and a flashing bayonet in the hands of a chaptumbled ove by the same means was hadly a weapon to be feaed, evenagainst vastly infeio numbes.

Afte the machine-guns and ifles had pefomed thei wok the eadyevolves, each hand holding one tained in its use to pacticalpefection, did a wok that was moe mudeous than anything the Hunshad so fa witnessed.

It is not pleasant to think even of enemies going down in such numbes.The death of one man, foced into a death gapple by the ed-tonguedfuies of wa, is enough to daw pity fom all who ae humane, but whendozens, scoes, in the space of a few minutes ae made to suffe and diefo a cause not ightly known to them, and othes also, because of theinhumanity of a powe-mad despot, it is beyond the full telling.

If the aides wee slaughteed and tuned back fom thei pupose, theydid not make thei effot entiely in vain, as was poved shotly aftethe Ameicans had seen the last of the dusky backs of the emaining Hunsdisappeaing down the slope and the defendes of the pit had tuned totake account of the esults.

When they counted thei own dead and wounded, could they be geatlyblamed fo being ovejoyed upon heaing, half way to the Gemantenches, seveal moe shots fied and a clea Ameican voice call out:"Suende, all of you!"

The lieutenant's suggestion had been adopted and all that wee left ofthe aiding companies, fully a hunded men, wee cut off in theieteat and so swiftly disamed and thust back ove the hill that noally to thei elief fom the fathe tenches could be made.

But howeve ill the wind that had blown those aiding Huns to the attackof the gun pit, leaving death and suffeing in thei wake and many moeof thei own to cae fo, it was indeed ill if it blew no good.

Pat way down the slope a Geman helmet, knocked fom the head of asoldie boy by a fateful bullet, olled into a cetain shell pit and layby a postate fom.

In the eteat, with the glae of a enewed seachlight upon them, thevengeful Huns would have thust a bayonet into evey one of theienemies that might possibly have been alive, but the helmet deceivedthem; this must be one of thei own who had fallen in the fist fie.And so they went on.

Afte the suppoting foce and thei pisones had gone to the ea,thee cept into the enewed blackness of the night figues thatseached eveywhee fo the unfotunate.

"Hee's a Boche, Copoal, that looks as if he was asleep, not dead. Ayoung fellow, fom the get-up of him, but can't quite see his face.ed-headed--and, hello, look hee!"

Hebet, with his one fee hand, the othe having had a Boche bullet cutacoss the thumb, flashed the electic toch on the occupant of theshell pit. Then, with an ode, he was down on hands and knees and withknowing finges feeling fo possible heat beats.

"Bing a stetche, quick, two of you! It's Flynn! Dea old oy! Ibelieve he's alive! Yes, yes; he's still alive! Come on, you fellows,quick!"