still
further
aided by
the
shell-plowed
condition
of the
hillside.
Again and
again he
had to
break his
stride, to
leap some
shell-hole.
Often he
had to
encircle
such
holes.
More than
once he
bounded
headlong
down into
a gaping
crater and
scrambled
up its far
side.
These
erratic
moves, and
the
nine-hundred-yard
distance
(a
distance
that was
widening
at every
second)
made the
sharpshooters'
task
anything
but an
exact
science.
Mahan's
