minutes before 5:30 the guns almost ceased fire, so that there was a strange, solemn hush. We waited and our pulses beat faster than the second hands. They're away!" said a voice by my side. The bombardment broke out again with new and enormous effects of fire and sound. The enemy was shelling Arras heavily, and black shrapnel and high explosives came over from his lines, but the British gunfire was twenty times as great. Around the whole sweep of his lines green lights rose. They were signals of distress and his men were calling for help. It was dawn now, but clouded and stormswept. A few airmen came out with the wind tearing at their wings, but they could see nothing in the mist and driven rain. I went down to the outer ramparts of Arras. The eastern suburb of Blangy seemed already in British hands. On the higher ground beyond the British were fighting forward. I saw two waves of infantry advancing against the enemy's trenches. Protected by the barrage of field guns, they went in a slow, leisurely way, not hurried, although the enemy's shrapnel was searching for them. "Grand fellows," said an officer lying next to me on the wet slope. Oh, topping!" Fifteen minutes afterward some men came back. They were British wounded and German prisoners. I met the first of these walking wounded. Afterward they were met on the roadside by medical officers who patched them up there and then before they were taken to the field hospitals in the ambulances. From these men wounded by shrapnel and machine gun bullets I heard the first news of the progress. They were bloody and exhausted, but they claimed miles east of Arras. The enemy was afraid of an attack, and in the night had withdrawn all but rearguard posts to trenches further back, where he resisted fiercely. The enemy's trench system south of Arras was enormously strong, but the British bombardment had pounded it, and the infantry went through without much loss to the reserve support trench, and then on to a chain of posts in front of Harvest trench, which was strongly held, and, after heavy fighting with bombs and bayonets, to Observatory Ridge, from which for two years and a half the enemy looked down, directing the fire of his batteries against the French and British positions. South of Tilloy there were two formidable positions, called the Harp and Telegraph Hill, the former being a fortress of trenches shaped like an Irish harp, the latter rising to a high mound. These were taken with the help of tanks, which advanced upon them in their leisurely way, climbed up the banks and over the parapets, sitting for a while to rest, and then waddling forward again, shaking machine gun bullets from their steel flanks and pouring a deadly fire into the enemy's position, and so mastering the ground. North of the Scarpe-that is, northeast of Arras-the whole system of trenches was taken as far as the Maison Blanche Wood, and north again along Vimy Ridge the Canadians achieved a heroic success by gaining this high, dominating ground, which was the scene of some of the fiercest French battles in the first part of the war and which is a great wall defending Douai. It was reckoned up to noon today that over 3,000 prisoners had been taken. They were streaming down to the prisoners' camps and to the British who pass them on the roads they are the best proof of a victorious day. After the retreat from Bapaume and Péronne, this news should be a thunderbolt in Germany, tearing the scales from the blind and raising anew a cry for peace. THE HE well-kept secret of where the British proposed to make a new thrust in the Spring was suddenly disclosed on the morning of Easter Monday, April 9. It was an offensive along a front of forty-five miles, having for its immediate objective Lens at one end and St. Quentin at the other. This is the struggle which has become known as the battle of Arras, although at the end of seven days' fighting the scene has shifted considerably to the east of the city which has given its name to the battle. The Hindenburg line, on which the Germans were relying when they fell back from the Somme, was pierced within a week, leaving them in the awkward position of having to form a new defensive line without adequate preparation. The bombardment of the German positions during the four days preceding the opening of the offensive on April 9 was as intense and as sustained as the artillery fire before and during the other great battles on the western front. Eyewitnesses even declare that it has been more concentrated and destructive than at the Somme and Verdun. The British guns were very numerous, of great calibre, and supplied with such vast quantities of ammunition that their "curtains of fire" were terrible realties. Fierce Aerial Fighting The battle of Arras has eclipsed all previous battles in aerial operations. During the four days before the battle began British airplanes literally swarmed in the sky, and the fighting in the air was on far the largest scale up to date. The German aviators were outnumbered many times over. Throughout the battle the British airplanes were constantly active despite the most unfavorable weather conditions, with snow, sleet, bitterly cold wind, and rain. The whole week's fighting was carried out, not in pleasant April sunshine, but in wintry weather which added its own gloom to the horrors of war. The principal object of the aviators was to photograph the enemy's new positions, and, incidentally, to bombard strategic points behind the German front. Other squadrons, protecting those whose business was reconnoitring and observation, also went up for fighting purposes only. Duels, skirmishes, and engagements of all kinds took place between the British and German airplanes for the mastery of the air. In the numerous fights that ensued, the British, according to their own reports, had twenty-eight machines missing, most of them shot down behind the enemy's lines. According to the German reports, the number of British airplanes destroyed was fortyfour. On the other hand, the Germans lost fifteen airplanes and ten balloons, while the British drove to the ground thirty-one additional machines, which, according to Sir Douglas Haig's report on April 7, "must have been totally destroyed." That the British Flying Corps achieved its purpose was indicated by the statement that large tracts of the enemy's country for many miles in the rear had been photographed, over 1,700 photographs having been taken behind the lines. The bombarding squadrons also were successful. Seventeen raids were carried out, and over eight tons of bombs were dropped on enemy aerodromes, ammunition depots, and railroads. The air fighting was wholly over enemy territory, and in one instance the British airmen penetrated fifty miles behind the German lines. The British established beyond question their supremacy in the air by reason of the much larger number of machines at their disposal and the greater dash and resourcefulness of their aviators. Beginning of British Offensive The British opened the battle on April 9 with a terrific offensive on a twelvemile front north and south of Arras, penetrating the German positions to a depth of from two to three miles and capturing many important fortified points, including the famous Vimy Ridge, where the Canadians led the attack. In this first onset nearly 6,000 prisoners, mostly Bavarians, Württembergers, and Hamburgers, were taken, as well as large quantities of artillery and war material. The line of advance extended from Givenchy-en-Gohelle, southwest of Lens, to Henin-sur-Cojeul, (the village of Henin on the Cojeul River,) southeast of Arras. All the fighting was against dominating positions on high ground, some of which had been held by the Germans for two years and were protected by wide belts of barbed wire. The capture of Vimy Ridge was particularly important, because it protects the French coal fields lying to the eastward. Along the greater part of the front the advance of the British infantry was strenuously opposed. Near Arras the Germans made a determined stand. The famous redoubt known as the Harp was captured with virtually the whole German battalion defending it. Several "tanks" figured in this operation. Along the railroad running through the valley of the Scarpe the British made good progress, while on the Lens branch of the line they captured Maison Blanche Wood. The first day of the battle ended with the British having accomplished their most successful day's work on the western front since the beginning of the war. The attack had hit the hinge of the recent German retreat from Arras to the Aisne and upset the plans of the German General Staff, who had expected the offensive to be renewed in the valley of the Somme. The capture of Vimy shifted the pivot of the whole German retreat and placed the enemy in a position of danger. The second day of the battle, April 10, saw the British, despite heavy snowstorms and bitterly cold weather, continuing their advance along the greater part of the twelve-mile front from Givenchy to Henin, capturing many more prisoners and guns, with quantities of all kinds of war material. The infantry pushed forward as far as the outskirts of Monchy-le-Preux, five miles east of Arras, capturing a height protecting Monchy and threatening the entire German line south of the Arras-Cambrai road. Monchy was for a while the central point of interest in the whole world war. Further north the British captured defenses on both sides of the Scarpe River. They also took the remaining positions on the northern end of Vimy Ridge, thus clearing it entirely of the enemy, and progressed in the direction of Cambrai and St. Quentin. The northern pivot of the Hindenburg line was now turned. The artillery support for the British infantry attacks was so thorough that casualties were proportionately light. The British artillery also made a record for long-range firing. Aided by information from the aviators, the gunners were able to concentrate their fire on German reinforcements ten miles away and so prevent them from helping to counterattack. The prisoners, who numbered 11,000 at the end of the second day, were penned up behind barbed wire fences till they could be sent rearward. British troops waiting their turn to go up to the front congregated outside the fences and chatted amicably with those Germans who could speak English, and gave them chocolate and cigarettes. One observer says that all animosity between the soldiers disappeared the moment they were no longer trying to kill one another. Unusually cold weather for the time of year, with a heavy fall of snow, greatly impeded operations on the third day, April 11. Nevertheless, the British kept on pushing forward and captured the village and heights of Monchy-le-Preux and the neighboring hamlet of La Bergère. Cavalry and a “tank" contributed to the capture of Monchy, one of the key positions between the Scarpe and Sensée Rivers, which the Germans had strongly organized. Fierce fighting took place in the village streets. The Germans fired from the windows and rooftops of houses, and made every effort to hold this vital position. The British made satisfactory progress at other points. They repelled two vigorous counterattacks and pressed forward down the eastern slopes of Vimy Ridge. The chief result at the end of the third day was that the British had been able to consolidate their gains and move forward their artillery. Germans Beaten Off On the fourth day of the battle, April 12, the British made substantial progress east of Arras, capturing the villages of |