A title such as "A Soldier's Sketches Under Fire" indicates at once the nature, scope and limitations of this unpretentious volume of annotated drawings to which it has been given. Faked pictures of the war are plentiful. Sketches taken on the spot they depict, sometimes by a hand that had momentarily laid down a rifle to take them, and always by a draughtsman who drew in overt or covert peril of his life, gain in verisimilitude what they must lose in elaboration or embellishment; are the richer

Private Harold Harvey Frontispiece Aboard the Transport Bivouac at Malta Casement Gardens, Malta Sergeants' Mess Ordnance Department, Malta On the Quayhead at Marseilles Quayside, Marseilles Forty Passengers in each Cattle Truck A Wash and a Wait "Doomsday Book": a French Lesson in a Cattle Truck Lady Angela Forbes's Soldiers' Home at Etaples Road to the Trenches My Sketch-Book Map: La Bassée-St. Julien Outskirts of a Village My First Sniping-Place Captured German Trench The Woodcutter's Hut Typ

Illustration. On the outbreak of the war I joined the Royal Fusiliers, uninfluenced by the appeal of wall-posters or the blandishments of a recruiting sergeant. My former experience as a trooper in the Hertfordshire Yeomanry being accounted unto me for military righteousness, I sailed with my regiment from Southampton on September 3rd, 1914. We thought we were bound for France direct, and only discovered on the passage that we were to be landed, first, at Malta. I think I know the reason why the

From the bows of our boat as she lay in harbour at Marseilles, I "spotted" three typical figures. The one holding the rope is a French sailor, the one at the bottom of the picture is a French gendarme, and the third is a Ghurka, one of our fine sturdy hillmen from India, who had come out to France to stand by the Empire. Marseilles was a most wonderful sight at the time I was there, and although I had made many previous visits in normal times, when I had greatly admired its grand proportions, no

The incidents of the railway journey from Marseilles to Etaples, en route to Armentières, told in detail, would fill a book. It was made in ordinary cattle trucks, in which, packed forty to a truck, we spent four days and a half at one stretch. Yet was it a bright and merry trip, for our spirits were raised to the highest by the thought that we were going into action, and we were at all sorts of expedients to make ourselves comfortable. For instance, before we started the Stationmaster's Office

My Sketch Book. My Sketch Book. I don't think I'm a bit sentimental in the matter of souvenirs, and anyway I can't need anything to remind me of the unforgettable, but all the same there's one souvenir of my experiences in the trenches and the firing line that I shall never part with—and that's the little notebook (measuring 5-1/2 ins. by 3-1/2 ins., bought in Armentières) which I carried with me through everything, and in which are the originals of the sketches here collected, taken "under fire

That there was (and is) a lighter side, a social side, of trench life, as of the life generally of a soldier on active service, even in this war, merely incidental remarks of mine such as could not be omitted from any true and fair description of that life must furnish abundant evidence; but this lighter side was, in my experience, so very real and so pronounced that to illustrate a few set observations thereon I take a few sketches from my notebook out of the order in which I find them in it. O

The four following sketches will, I hope, give a fairly clear and accurate idea of the construction of a British trench. The first depicts one of my comrades (who was also a brother-artist by profession, and a brother-sniper) sitting reading, during a surcease of the firing, on the firing platform in a trench corner. It will be noticed that he wears his sleeping cap. Very close and handy are his tall jack-boots—so serviceable in wet weather and heavy mud. My artist-friend, I should like to remar

Snipers on both sides exhibited the most extraordinary artfulness, cunning and ingenuity in the discovery, adaptation and invention of "cover." The great desideratum, of course, was to hide where we could see without being seen, to shoot from where there was least danger of being shot. I helped to track and put an end at Houplines to one German sniper who had resorted to a ruse that I really think deserves the dignity of a short chapter all to itself. The story is tellable in a few words, and ma

I suppose it may be said, without exaggeration, that we were in a death trap all the time, but I have sketches to show of three particular and "extra special" sort of death traps. The first is of:— "Suicide Bridge." "Suicide Bridge." This bridge, made by the British, was called "Suicide Bridge," because it was, and was at, such a specially dangerous spot. The British trenches were in the foreground and beyond the bridge. We held these trenches for fourteen days against the enemy's attacks. The g

It is fitting that my sketch of a French Convent, as the abode of holy women whose innocent lives were dedicated and devoted to the service of the Prince of Peace, should stand by itself, apart from any drawings suggesting less faintly the devilry of war. The nunnery had been in the possession of the Germans for some short time before we arrived on the scene, and bore traces of their customary depredations and violations. The stories related by the nuns themselves were not of a description to be

The accompanying sketch is of the Market Square of Armentières, the building shown in the centre being the Town Hall. The cobble stones of the roadway and the lattice-shuttered windows are of the style which has lasted for generations. This quaint and picturesque town was devastated and almost totally destroyed; in fact, the bit of it I show was the only portion the enemy left uninjured. We captured the place, taking four machine guns, several horses, a quantity of equipment and ammunition. Two

"The Black Hole." "The Black Hole." Returning to the "group system," the three following sketches in juxtaposition relate to one and the same happening—our taking of a distillery (on the outskirts of Armentières) of which the Germans had been in possession for about three weeks, and within the boundaries of which they set a big trap that didn't catch us. The air was poisoned with the stench of dead animals as we arrived within smell of the block of buildings I show first—and, with thoughts in th

Almost on the last page of my Sketch Book I come on the last sketch I took "under fire." It shows the most advanced positions taken by the British in the course of one of the biggest battles of the war—at St. Julien. The trench, which was a very rough one, was originally dug by the Germans and captured by our forces in our advance. The fighting was so intense at this spot that the casualties went far into five figures on both sides, the losses of the enemy being admittedly much higher than our o

By FREDERIC COLEMAN. Author of "From Mons to Ypres with French," of which it is a continuation. Crown 8vo. Fully Illustrated. 6/- net. Pike's Fine Art Press, Limited , Printers , 47 & 48, Gloster Road, Brighton ....