Though we have nothing quite so good to report from
the British front on the Somme, our progress has been distinctly satisfactory and we have taken something like a thousand German prisoners. All through Tuesday night and during most of Wednesday the weather was very rainy, with the result that the country in our area has become a sea of mud. Unfortunately work there has had to stop, and we have had to confine ourselves to artillery activity. Happily that is now a matter which causes us no difficulty. It must not be supposed, however, that because the weather is so unpropitious Sir Douglas Haig is doing nothing. Not only is his vigilance never relaxed, but the impulse of the push is continuous. If temporarily checked by some adverse circumstance like rain, the energy may be quite truly said only to accumulate. When the weather lifts, wo venture to say, wo shall find that progress has in reality been going on, and that, in spite of there having been no sensational success, what has been done places us in a better position for fresh advances.
