Energy books

The chaplain of this battalion had spent all the long night behind the
lines, stoking fires and going round the cook-houses and looking at
his wrist-watch to see how the minutes were crawling past. He had tea,
rum, socks, oil, and food all ready for those who were coming back,
and the lighted braziers were glowing red.
At the appointed time the padre went out to meet his friends, pressing
forward through the snow and listening for any sound of footsteps
through the great hush.
But there was no sound except the soft flutter of snowflakes. He
strained his eyes for any moving shadows of men. But there was only
darkness and the falling snow.
Two hours passed, and they seemed endless to that young chaplain whose
brain was full of frightful apprehensions, so that they were hours of
anguish to him.
Then at last the first men appeared. "I've never seen anything so
splendid and so pitiful," said the man who had been waiting for them.
They came along at about a mile an hour, sometimes in groups,
sometimes by twos or threes, holding on to each other, often one by
one.


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