Bullets whistle through the air, or smack into the ground, or find a 
human target. Cries. Shouts. But, always the louder, interminable 
singing. Flat on the ground, we fire into the groves. There are no 
sections, no companies even. But individuals jump ahead, and set an 
example that is readily followed — too readily, for sometimes they block 
our fire. In the thick of the battle we organise ourselves with a certain 
amount of success into sections. 
The Spanish problem is quickly solved: “Manuel! What’s the Span- 
ish for ’Forward’?’’ “Adelante!” yells Manuel, and waves the Spanish 
lads on. “Abajo!” And down they flop to give covering fire. A burly 
French Lieutenant runs over to ask me for grenades. We have none. 
Waving a ridiculously tiny automatic, he advances, shouting “En Avant!” 
Ahead of us are little cones of blue-red flame. Now we know where the 
Moorish and German machine-gunners are. Oh, for grenades! As we 
hug the earth we call to one another to direct group-fire on those cones. 
Flat on our bellies we push forward. Inch by inch. Darkness falls 
like a blanket, Still the fight goes on. Advancing! All the time ad- 
vancing. As I crawl forward, I suddenly realise, with savage joy, that 
it is we who are advancing, they who are being pushed back. And then, 
in actual disappointment: “The bastards won’t wait for our bayonets!" 
We are in the olive groves. Firing ceases. We are on our feet, 
feeling for one another, in the inky blackness. I stumble against a soft 
bundle. I bend down. His spiked bayonet scrapes my hand. He is 
one of ours. His face is cold. He has been dead for hours... So we 
are back where we were at midday. 
Manuel, André and I dig in. Our rifle-pit completed, Manuel reaches 
back for the blanket he had so carefully laid down. It is missing. Ma- 
nuel rattles his bayonet and shouts lurid threats to the “bloody bastard 
who stole my blanket!” From the trees, all around, he is answered with 
roars of laughter. 

*

And thus the men who had been broken and routed a few hours 
before settled down for the night on the ground they had reconquered. 
They had dashed Fascist hopes, smashed Fascist plans. Thencefor- 
ward, for more than four months, they were to fight, and many of them 
to die, in these olive groves. But never again were the Fascists to rout 
them. They were to hold that line, and save Madrid; fighting in the 
dauntless spirit of the great rally of that afternoon, fighting too, in the 
spirit of those reckless roars of laughter that night in the Wood of Death.

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