Saturday August 12, 1916

I had a nice little job last night widening a trench. It was that nice clean yellow sand and it shovelled beautifully. Jack White's brother has gone. Jack told me how he died. He was filling sand-bags behind a parados and was leaning on a shovel, resting. A bullet struck his shovel blade, glanced up, hit him under the chin and came out the top of his head. He lies buried in the graveyard at Ridgewood between the Brasserie and Dickebush village.

The Germans shelled Dickebush last night. The shrapnel was flying but down in our cellar we laughed at him. Nothing short of solid shot or high explosives will touch us.

The C.M.R's lost some trenches last night near St. Eloi. They get it in the neck every time they go into the trenches. That is a suicide spot anyway, and will be until we straighten out the line a little.

Pay-day today! The boys have nearly bought the Y.M.C.A. out. O the mixture! And I notice that it is nearly all fruit too. Heinz Beans had a run, heavy on the Belgian home-made bread, fancy biscuits galore, Lyle's golden syrup made a great hit. But preserved pine-apple beat the bunch. We all like it. I take a tuppence bundle of six fancy biscuits to work with me every night. I get a bit sick at the stomach on the long dark way home and this little bundle of biscuits just settles my stomach.