THE HUNS IN ARRAS

Dominion, Volume 9, Issue 2660, 4 January 1916, Page 3

THE HUNS IN ARRAS

STRANGE STREET FIGHTING THE AMAZING DEFENCES At Arras the Germans have been foi a year within about 400 yards from the main station, and very close also at other points of their line, and yet thoy have never succeeded in forcing their way into the town. On one single occasion the Germans did manage to throw a small number of men into one of the outskirts. Their retreat -was cut- off behind them by the 'rapid erection of barbed wire defences, and they were mown down where they stood by a terrific fire from machine-guns and rifles which the French poured in upon them from every story of the surrounding houses. This extraordinary defence of what was before the war an open town has been due to two main factors, the deadly French artillery and the skill of the French in organising themselves for house and . street, fighting. At some of the outlying points the French and Germans occupy buildings as close together as the houses in a London suburb, and when I had wriggled down into a certain sandbagged corner a whisper from my companion told me that I was now only four yards from the Germans, says the correspondent of a London daily. Underground : Paths. Where the intervening Space is narrowest neither side would care to risk shell fire, and the things to guard against are mines, bombs, aerial torpedoes, and grenades. Brick walls reinforced • -by sandbags form a stout protection, and there is no lack of material for building up defences. The way up to one outpost was almost entirely under cover and largely underground. The communication trenches ran now through a whole row of cottages, now through the cellars of what had once been a prosperous merchant's chateau, out \into the'open for a few yards, and then back again into tho basements of another large house. Then we scrambled over a wild jumble of bricks, boilers, fly-wheels, and shafts, scaring from amidst these relics of a big oil factory almost as largo an assortment of rats as plagued the town of Hamelin, and finally came out upon a courtyard, the walls of which had been built up to a vast thickness _ with balks of timber and huge empty oil vats. No troops could escapc utter destruction if they tried to scramble across the piles of heaped-up rubbish and ruin that lie just as they fell between the two lines. And even if they did surprise a front line picket, the enemy would, inevitably be swallowed up _ and destroyed in the unfamiliar inner lines, with their row upon row of carefully prepared posts ai'.d countless , hidden machine-gun emplacements. I Cathedral in Ruins. Behind these twofold defences the population of Arras, civil and military, await with surprising calm the frequent skellings of their enemy. The .cathedral, always the favourite target for a German gunner, has been shattered beyond repair, and such portions of tho roof as still remain hold on precariously to the split pillars of the nave. Even the famous angels, which escaped so long, liavo now been brought down, and lio amidst the piles- of white masonry on tho cracked pavement, inextricably heaped up. with boulders of cornices, vaulting, and walls. The Hotel de Ville, with its famous bolfry, is even more pitiable than the photographs have shown it to be. Tho huge now station is almost fantastio in its ruin. Amidst all this wreckage there aro still civilians living in the deep cellars with which nearly every house is provided. The doors of these cellars are kept open during the intervals of quiet, and the moment the music of the German shells is heard everybody hastens indoors to sit down till there is peace again outside. Little by littlo the old women, mothers, and children, who form tho bulk of this population, are being evacuated into places farther behind tho lines. One of the most remarkable effects in the "Mother Goose" pantomime at Mcl 1 bourne Her Majesty's is the storm and the blowing away of tho village. Not only is tho village disposed of in /a clean sweep by the force of the storm, but -whoever happens to get within the radius of the wind's furious onslaught is carried away with a rush. It would' bo "giving the show away" and robbing playgoers of a good deal of their enjoyment of this novelty _ to indicate how it is worked; but it might be mentioned that tho machinerj that plays tho principal part in it covers the Hoot of the basement beneath the stage and casts over £1000, Some humorous unrehearsed effects have been achieved since it was installed. One afternoon the electrical staff weis giving it a trial run when the producer, the director. and two or three ladies of "the company crossed the stage. They were caught in the storm that resulted and swept into a heap in a corner of the stage, wondering at the suddenness of the tornado that had struck the theatre. ' One of the most remarkable things 111 the replacing .of men's labour by women's, which is going 011 to-day, is the great popularity .which mechanical work seems to be winning for itsell among women. It seems only yesterday since practical mechanics, even of the simplest kind, were still supposed to be beyond the grasp of the female intellect, and now to-day we have the "chauffeuse" who can repair a car as well as any man, the woman driver ot heavy transport lorries, and the skilled munition maker. From Ireland conies the account of a young Irish girl only just 20 years old, who is doing the work of a skilled electrical engineer. She is Miss May Traill, the daughter of Mr. William A. Traill, C.F., a well-known engineer,, who was the constructor ot one of the first electric tramways, the Giant's Causeway and Portrust electric tramway, which was opened in 1883.