LITTLE PICTURES.

Lyttelton Times, Volume CXVI, Issue 16805, 15 March 1915, Page 4

LITTLE PICTURES.

VIVID FLASHES OF VAR.

THE BATTLE AT LA BASSEE. The battle fought in a sea of mud on Monday, between La Bassee and Givenchy, was the biggest affair in which our troops have been engaged this year. The Germans liad set- themselves a particularly difficult task. Anything like a rapid advance in force over the Slough of Despond into which two months' incessant rains have turned the plain of La Bassee being practically impossible, they decided to make a dash along the La Bassee-Bethune Road, which at lease afforded foothold.

When tho attack did begin, with surprising force and rapidity against the British trenches, our men wore unsupported and had to fall bark before the enemy’s rush. flic Germans had entrusted the post of honour in the forefront of the attack to the 56tli Prussian Infantry, a regiment composed of good-humoured Rhinelanders, which is quartered in time of peace at the fortress of Wesel. The o6th. judging from the prisoners who fell into our hands, seemed to have borue the brunt of the fighting on the German side.

Detachments of the 7th Pioneers accompanied them into action. Men on the left saw their neighbours falling back, and reported to their own colonel that “ something was doing” in the neighbouring lines. They bad to fall back Tn turn, as the Germans in possession of the adjacent trenches would have enfiladed, theirs. For the same reason the trenches further to the right seem to have been evacuated, and for a moment the Gormans appeared to be having it all their own way. Their olan carried them clean along the road up to the outskirts of Givenchy. There thqy occupied a trench, capturing half a dozen British soldiers, and T hen pushed into tho town, a company (of the -50th) strong, with twenty men of the 7th Pioneers, under the command of .three officers.

They left to their supports hurrying after them, and their reserves—stated to have been about 6000 strong—the task of securing the ground so hastily traversed. Here they had reckoned without their enemy’s host. At about one o’clock a certain regiment, with part of another, were ordered to retake the lost trenches.

Other regiments supported them. They had to cross a sodden morass to a trench 300yds away. They floundered forward almost knee-deep in mud and water, under a heavy fire. It must have been one of the queerest charges ever witnessed. The going waa so bad that it was impossible to keep any kind of line, and at one point part of the attackers simply lay down to dodge the bullets while they waited for their comrades to detach themselves sufficiently from, the bog to come on. The men declare that the Germans were unable to make hqad or tail of this method of attack. They climbed OOt of their trenches to meet their assailants with the cold steel, and then, seeing them coolly lying down in the mud, leaped back into trie trench, fearing that some new kind of British perfidy was to be practised on them. The end was that the British got to .the trench and hold it, although not until very many of them had fallen. The German advance along ' the Bethune road was an utter and expensive failure.

The 66th Prussian Regiment was driven back, after leaving.4oo of its men on the road. The German reserves were unable to come to the rescue; our infantry, with effective aid from the French, attended' to that of the company that got into Givenchy. The survivors. mostly wounded, are prisoners of the British. Advancing into the town, they found themselves met by a heavy British lire from in front. Alter an ineffectual attempt to stand, they decided to fall back to the trench they had occupied outside the town. . But now they found that the British had got into the houses and were firing on them from the first floor windows, so that many .fell by the wayside and 'the proportion of wounds in the head and the upper part of the Ixidv among those who survived is unusually high. In the trench they tried ‘to hold out. hoping that help would come, but as they point cut. in extenuation of their surrender, The British were firing at us from the houses from above, " and the trench was untenable. , , „ ’ Two of the officers had fallen. The third gave himself up with the remnants of liis. men. In. a small -ward in one of the hospitals three men. wounded in this fight lay side by side. The central bed is occupied by a corporal of the sGth Prussians. On each side of him lies an Irish soldier. One of these Irishmen was the cause of the German’s undoing. On the day of the fight ho marked the corporal, with a few other men, sniping at the British from a clump of trees on the La Basses Hoad. He warned some of our people, with the result that the corporal and his .men were captured after the former lmd been wounded. ■When he arrived in hospital he could speak quite good English* but in the course of his first night there he forgot this language entirely, so that now lie cannot understand even the Simplest questions. The reason is that he and the Irishman on his left hand have recognised each other. The Irishman knows, and the German knows that ho knows, that this German “ unter-offizier is a clover sniper. The Irishman saw him well enough to recognise him some days before the battle close to the regiment’s lines—so the 'lrishman now tells the story of his exploit to the doctors and visitors, and the German pretends to he asleep, listens with both oars, and replies, Neiii. v when asked in English how he feels. Ho is not quite certain what we do with snipers, poor fellow.— Reuter's Special Service.

:r ii. OUT OK BOUNDS. Out of Bounds/’ in large black letters. meets the eye of the Australian "tourist” (we tire not soldiers yet) on his arrival at the Second Pyramid, the Chivbren. This huge pile, though not so high by fifty feet as the Cheops, is much more difficult to ascend owing to its greater degree of steepness. ( nlike the Cheops, also, the Ohrebreu has a huge cap of limestone-—-solid blocks, roughly hewn, and cemented together. At one time this outer shell or limestone extended to the apex, but, with the exception of what remains on top and extending about 100 ft down the sides, all the mighty blocks were removed for the purpose of building the. Sultan 11n.ssan’s mosque and tomb, a> vast building in Cairo. Built about 3(506 years 8.C., it is little wonder that in some places the stonework has commenced to crumble, though, on the whole, the masonry is in a wonderful state of preservation. Owing to the number of fatal accidents which liave occurred to wouldbe scalers of the dizzy heights, this Pyramid was immediately placed out of bounds for Australian troops, which in itself was sufficient incentive for some of our boys to essay the task and risk_ life and limb to be, able to say Wo got to the top.” T will try to describe the ascent as it appealed to me, when, early on New Year’s I>ay, three of us succeeded in reaching the twelve-foot platform on the summit. We started on the eastern corner. Our difficulties soon commenced. The blocks of masonry are about tour feet high, and are piled one on the other in such a manner as to form stops, varying in. width from about six. inches to twelve inches. ’Each successive row’

has ta be climbed, a ad oa account of the narrow toe-holds the ascent is very dangerous. Of course, by the time SOfllft has been climbed one needs a rest. Sa we sat down on one of the ledges and gazed down on the great desert below. Five minutes’ rest and then the party faced the sky again. From this pointwe had to branch off diagonally towards the southern corner, so as to take advantage of a particularly wide ledge. However, this teas not making much headway, and the limestone cap had still to be sealed: this is, alas, too smooth and unbroken for rapid progress. Here the toe-holds were few—mere cracks between the stones, and 4ft apart. Progress was slow and extremely dangerous. _ Pains in the chest, tltrough the necessity of keeping close to the masonry and continually throwing the body forward, were slowly suffocating us. Wo could not- descend, so had t-o stick to it and advance. The last 50ft were worse than pack-drill-—the private’s hell—but wero at last- accomplished. Lying on the table on top, almost exhausted, with sore feert, and throats full of mummy dust, we looked in vain for Pyramid coffee; which is dispensed by Egyptians on the Cheops. Nothing was on tap, however, so we had to remain thirsty. We gazed around at our leisure. 'Hie view obtained from this Pyramid is. T consider, superior to that obtained from the Cheops, which in all trdth is magnificent enough. Due east the old Sphinx sits facing bia master, the sun. Further east, and hovering like a dream city over the foliage of the. date palm plantations, with only an occasional smoking chimney to prove its reality, lies Cairo. Beyond again, the great- quarries from which this very stone was taken thousands of years ago. All round are excavations marking tile resting places of dead -generations—now ruthlessly despoiled by the scientist. North lies our camp and the long stretch of Canberra Bead. The main, attraction, however, is the Niie Valley, a continuous stretch of green, with the old Nile, verily the Egyptians’ god, crawling like a-huge silver snake through the centre. Th<s fertile valley is well watered by the

most wonderful irrigation scheme in the world—deep channels, cut on a system calculated to ensure the floodlug of the pastures at the periodical rising of the river. Alter fan hour or so wo commenced the descent, even more nerve-racking than the upward journey. We know a slip would just give us time to say, “God help mo!’’ and then oblivion. Continually extending the feet downwards and - feeling for toe-holds while hanging on to the ledge above with, the fingers, wo at last got off that awful limestone on to the broader ledges. Here wo had a rest and unanimously voted the game “ up to putty.” We tore what remained of socks off our sore and tired feet, put on our boots, and finished the descent. We were glad to hang on to the same old noticeboard, gaze at the 400 ft height we had scaled and once more admit we,were foola, when “Halt!’' Alas, the picket had us. We were too tired to run. so gavo ourselves up. They marched us back and put us in the guard-tent, where we lingered till evening. Then we were tried for disobedience to orders. Our hearts were heavy when the 0.0. said, “Seven days pack-drill.” i f don't want to climb that master-! piece of masonry again I— A. Hine in Sydney “Sun.”

ht. . THE SEA FREE. “ ior the first time in history England can say ‘ the sea is free,' ” declared the First Lord of the Admiralty, in an interview with M. Hugues Letoux, editor of the “ Matin.” '/In the days when you and wa fought each other,” he continued, “ our most important victories never brought us security comparable with that which we enjoy to-day. Even after Trafalgar we knew nothing like it. “ Supposing Germany has friendships and relationships in South America, how can help reach her from them now?

“There remains the United States. Public opinion there hesitates, perhaps, in bestowing its sympathies, but at the present moment it is fully unified. We shall arrange to take precautions fully compatible with the rights of belligerents and the respect due to neutrals. I' Onr adversary, perhaps, can obtain a few supplies from Turkey and Asia Minor. I cherish no illusions,, for as long as there are neutrals, a complete blockade must be a chimera. Germany will continue to receive a small quantity of that whereof she has considerable. but meanwhile you 1 and wo breathe freely, thanks to the sea we have kept and can keep open. “ Germany is like a roan throttled with a heavy gag. You know the effect of such a gag when action is necessary. The effort wears out the heart, and Germany knows it. This pressure shall not bo relaxed until she gives in unconditionally, -for evert if you of France, and if our ally Russia, should decide to withdraw from the struggle, which is inconceivable, we English would carry on the war to the bitter end.

“ Hie action of a navy necessarily is slow, but the pressure it exercises on an adversary is unrelenting. Compare it to the forces of Nature, to the inexorable grip of winter, and remember tha.t it is a stress nothing can resist-.”

-yia-ter FY . ' ' ' •' GOOD-BYE, DADS !” A seaman of the light cruiser Tbpaze sends it, vivid description of the last moments of the battleship Formidable, which was torpedoed in the Channel. The Topare was the last of a line or ships, and at ten minutes' past two in the morning the bugle sounded “ Action.” Tumbling on deck, the writer saw that the Formidable hpd dropped out of tlie lino and had. a heavy list to starboard. At half-past two her boilers exploded and all her lights wont but. Continuing, the writer says: “ All the remainder of the fleet scattered, but we stood by her till she went. We kept sweeping round in circles so as to make ourselves an awkward target to the submarine. The first time round we managed to got a line to a cutter, • and got thirty-five hands out of her. The coxswain of the boat was a real good Britisher, He

remained in the boat, calling to hi*' crew to stand by him. He wanted to* go back again for another boatload. He refused to come out until an offri cer went down and literally hauled hirnj out, ami he nearly cried because theyj wouldn’t let lum go back. “ What struck me meet was the cool-, neas of the captain of the Formidable He stood there among the men, cheer-* ing them up and giving orders quite* «*>“£• He waa a T white man? The* men had fallen in on the smoking and quite orderly. j “ The third and last time wo steaoH ed round wo went right close to the* Foimidable, and endeavoured to gw alongside her, but were unable to d.ii so on account of the state of the seed We laid off helpless to aid them, anefi at two minutes past six the poor old? Formidable went down to Davy. ) “ The voice of the skipper could stiiS be heard cheering up the men on. tb<3 deck. Then we saw her settle down by* the bows, heard the skipper yell, out* ‘ Good-bye, lads. Every man fo£ «im-} self, and may God. help you all? His cool and calm voice seemed to reach! miles. He was answered with a oheerj from the men, and then—l sup nob ashamed to say that tears were in myf eyes 'and in many others, too—the shin took the final plunge. The lads on he* deck went down singing ‘ Should Aulq Acquaintance be Forgot.’ It wnj grand, yet oh, so pitiful.’*