Resting in the earthen side of a trench, the horrors of the battle passed out of his mind.

The white gloom was so heavy there that he could not see the other wall four feet away, and the falling flakes almost grazed his face as they passed, but he had a marvelous sense of comfort and ease, even of luxury.

The caveman had fared no better, often worse, because he had no blankets, and John drew a deep sigh of content.
A gun thundered somewhere far back in the German lines, and a gun also far back in the French lines thundered in reply.

Then came a random and scattering fire of rifles through the falling snow from both sides, but John was not disturbed in the least by these reports.

He felt as safe in his narrow trench as if he had been a hundred miles from the field of battle, and compared, with the driving storm outside, his six feet by one of an earthen bed was all he wished.