We left the hill, where the town was, some four miles behind us, and when we had passed through two wrecked and silent villages and through three of those strips of park timber which Continentals call forests, we presently drew up and halted and dismounted where a thick fringe of undergrowth, following the line of an old and straggly thorn hedge, met the road at right angles on the comb of a small ridge commanding a view of the tablelands to the southward.
As we climbed up the banks we were aware of certain shelters which were like overgrown rabbit hutches cunningly contrived of wattled faggots and straw sheaves plaited together.

They had tarpaulin interlinings and dug-out earthen floors covered over thickly with straw.

These cozy small shacks hid themselves behind a screen of haws among the scattered trees which flanked an ancient fortification, abandoned many years before, I judged, by the grass-grown looks of it.

Out in front, upon the open crest of the rise, staff officers were grouped about two telescopes mounted on tripods.

An old man--you could tell by the hunch of his shoulders he was old--sat on a camp chair with his back to us and his face against the barrels of one of the telescopes.