TO UNDERGROUND.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LIII, Issue 16213, 26 April 1916, Page 8

TO UNDERGROUND.

WORK OF THE SAPPERS.

STRUGGLES IN THE DARK.

TERRIFIC EXPLOSIONS.

"After a new series of mine explosions, accompanied by a very violent bombardment, the Germans delivered an attack on a front of about' 1500 yds. . . At two points where our firing trench had been broken down by explosions they , were able to occupy the craters, of which most were soon retaken." | These words aro from a French communique relating to the front about Neuvillo St. Vaast. Nothing better, says the London Daily Chronicle, marks' the crystallisation of the western front than these desperate efforts in which the sappers and miners plough a short way for the infantry, to seize and hold a yawning hole 56ft or 100 ft in diameter. If it is seized thousands of telegraph clerks are engaged in sending the news to the ends of the earth; and when it is recaptured there is another paragraph for the famous "communique." Preparations for such an event entail hard and dangerous labour underground , for many days. The. sapper, furnished with curious tools, stands day and night at the face of his gallery, which is just deep enough to stand up in, pushing it forward inch by inch towards the enemy trench. Encounter with the Enemy, Sometimes in a momentary silence, while his own machine has stopped, the ' sapper catches the faint sound of an I enemy miner tunnelling a way towards ' him and tho lines behind. It is an agonising moment. Will it be best to drive straight ahead, in the hope of being able to reach the opposed trench before • the j enemy can reach his own, or to direct ' i a branch, sap under the other, and blow him into eternity ? Sometimes- a French sapper has sud- , denly found.his pick go, through a thin layer of earth, and lay open the end |of a German gallery. If men aro busy i there, ho is detected, and a primitive hand--1 to-hand struggle takes place in the dark, , narrow cavern, followed quickly by a terrific explosion, and a more considerable and bloody encounter out in the onen overhead. From the trenches whence the attack has been planned, the men leap over their parapets, race down into the crater and up the other side, and there attempt to ,! hold tho edge against counter-attack uii' ! til it can be provided with a parapet '• and made an integral part of the first line 1 trench. It will then becomo a slight salient, dangerous in itself, but constantly threatening to tho enemy. • All Kinds of Weapons. ,1 If both antagonists—at first only 50 , ! from each side, perhaps, but vory quickly ' ; reinforced—get into the crate together, '' a frightful struggle will ensue; and it • may continue for hours, or give rise to , repeated counter attacks. Bombs, Maxims, [ rifles, tho bayonot, and even spades and extemporised clubs, are all brought into play in this meleo,- and it is. perhaps, the smallest weapon—the hand grenade, 1 which bursts into a hundred ragged- , edged fragments of cast iron— is the most deadly. The traditional hell of the theologians

is a holiday resort compared with the places of such encounters. I have seen them with a shudder, days afterwards, when the tide of battle has gone farther forward—giant pock-marks in the faco of the earth, and stained a yellow-green with the fumes of high explosives.

PLUNDERING ARABS.

ISHMAI-LS OF THE PLAIN.

METHODS OF WARFARE.

WILY AND ELUSIVE FOES.

Tho representative of the British press with tho Expeditionary Force in Mesopotamia, Mr. Edmund Candler, sends the following estimate of the character and ' powers of tho irregular Arab cavalry fighting against us :— " The mobility of tho Arab cavalry, who ride light and are unsparing of their horses, is something beyond experience. On approaching a Turkish position to reconnoitre, our scouta will often see a hordo of Arabs emergo from tho dark masses and spread in a fanliko movement over ! tho whole horizon. These irregulars are ' eternally swooping about for no apparent i reason, unless it bo bravado or the instinct of tho kite, in complicated movements and figures of eight. Drop a shell in front of them and they will swerve like a flight of teal, make a wide detour at full gallop, and appear on tho other fla::k. " Tho atmosphere is most deceptive, and 1 in the haze or mirage it iB difficult to tell if the enemy aro horses or foot, or to make any estiinato of their numbers. Everything is magnified. A low-tying mud village becomes a fort with walls 20ft high, a group of donkeys a palm grove. Camels appear on a near horizon like huge dissipated compasses. There is 1 not a cavalry regiment with the force which has not at somo time or other mistaken sheep for infantry. All that is gained in scouting by the flatness of the country is discounted by the eccentricities 1 of tho mirage. Often in a reconnaissance 1 the enemy aro within 600 yds before the i squadron commander can distinguish , whether they l are mounted or on foot.. ' "Like Jackals In Our Rear." " Apart from the mirage, the country I affords little or no cover, save the mud banks of an occasional dry irrigation ' I channel. These are high, and in tho dis--1 tanco might be taken for tho walls of ' a city. The disused water channels look as if" the channel had been carried above , tho level of the surrounding country. The low, isolated sandhill is a snare which draws artillery fire and leaves an exposed 1 flank on either side. i "In no theatre of the war is our t cavalry so essential, for the Arabs make up a kind of irregular arm for the Turk. They are always hovering on our flanks ready to take advantage of any accident 3 or confusion by the way. And theV fols i low like jackals in our rear- Two jibbing i. ponies in a Jaipur transport can have to 31 be unyoked and the cart, abandoned. The 4 Arabs are down on it before the rearguard has passed on 800 yds. After this 3 the nondescript herd closes in, emboldened 1 by the loot. " They are frankly plunderers, and murder is merely tho preliminary to pillage. They kill their prey before they strip it. A battlefield is haunted by them for days. They leave tho dead stark, and have been known to dig up graves. Yet, to see their prisoners clamouring for food and water and attention to the wounded, you would think they had been trained in the comity of nations. _ It is on record that they have sometime.-, spared the wounded, but only on occasion when somo responsible - person has been bv—an influential Sheikh, i or a regular Turkish officer. Fear of Cavalry Charges. 3 " The Arabs, of course, melt away whenever our cavalry charge. We can never get in among them. They are light • and carry little kit, and seem to bo in- > dependent of supplies. Their horses look ) thin and poor, but are hard and well fed, i and they do not mind using them up. Our chargers are handicapped with their •ix 6tone of accoutrement, rifle and sword and ammunition, water-bottle, cloak, two blankets, emergency rations, a day's grain for tho horse, and generally a heavier man to carry. The Arab horseman has his bag of dates, a small ration of grain for '' his horse, and nothing else save his arms •' and ammunition. Theso aro of no regular [ pattern—a riflo always, Martini-Henry or i Mauser, a dagger, or sword, or both, waist 'belt, and bandolier of ammunition, and ' occasionally, especially among the Munta- ' fiks, a lance, a broad-headed, formidable spear like an assegai."