They used cunning as well as courage, and went out on red-
Indian adventures over No Man's Land for fierce and scientific
slaughter.
I remember one of their early raids in the salient, when a big party
of them--all volunteers--went out one night with intent to get through
the barbed wire outside a strong German position, to do a lot of
killing there. They had trained for the job and thought out every
detail of this hunting expedition. They blacked their faces so that
they would not show white in the enemy's flares. They fastened flash-
lamps to their bayonets so that they might see their victims. They
wore rubber gloves to save their hands from being torn on the barbs of
the wire.
Stealthily they crawled over No Man's Land, crouching in shell-holes
every time a rocket rose and made a glimmer of light. They took their
time at the wire, muffling the snap of it by bits of cloth. Reliefs
crawled up with more gloves, and even with tins of hot cocoa. Then
through the gap into the German trenches, and there were screams of
German soldiers, terror-shaken by the flash of light in their eyes,
and black faces above them, and bayonets already red with blood.
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