Visiting the place on a quiet day, in summer, with the trenches dry, we
could not of course gain a picture of what it must have been really like.
The birds were singing in the woods, and there is a poem that refers to
this occurring when the bombardment stopped for a while.
During the war however, the reality was very different. People who spoke or wrote about the war referred to the mud and the cold. When rain came the trenches were soon filled up with mud, so they needed regular maintenance. The picture on the left shows a typical scene. Some soldiers, totally exhausted, simply fell and drowned in the mud. It is said that one officer received instructions to "consolidate his position", to which he had replied "It is impossible to consolidate porridge."